Hi! thanks for the reply. I responded to Tom directly above in ways that address your comment, but let me reply here too.

You write, "About transfiguration: people in all religions and most spiritualities express a desire, and sometimes a definite sensation, of becoming one with the unity of the cosmos, the world, the spiritual life."

As I wrote Tom, I don't know what the word "spiritual" means. It has so many mutually contradictory definitions that I can't even approach understanding what you mean when you use the word.

But I already wrote that to Tom, so let me add something I did not write to him but that I think is important. Desire about what reality and/or the universe "should be" does not (empirically speaking) have any relationship to what reality and/or the universe is, in fact.

And? "Becoming one with the unity of the cosmos?"

What? I mean, you can desire that, but I would submit that just because you desire such a fantastical (almost silly) thing, that doesn't mean it can actually happen or is in any sense a valid, true concept.

Of course, in one sense we are ALL part of the universe, in that we are all made of the stardust formed after the initial expansion of the singularity we all came from.

That's cool!

But it only says so much. It's interesting as a metaphor, and it's clearly objectively true, but it's not all that important, I don't suppose. What I mean by that is that it can't tell us much about our lives, it can't demonstrate communication with spirits, demonstrate the validity of faith statements, etc.

So, I'm pretty much stuck at that point of your comment.

But I would like to address your point about love, which I reject. People of faith often make that argument, and I (no offense) find it silly and pointless.

Of course I know if I feel love, a human emotion with clear evolutionary/biological explanations. One need not be "spiritual" to both value love and understand how that brain-based emotion provided a survival advantage and so was reinforced in our species. (This is particularly obvious with parental and other sorts of familial love, but it applies well to romantic love too.)

I can revel in the power and beauty of love without needing a supernatural explanation for it.

So, your argument, as sincere as I'm sure it is, isn't something I'm able to wrap my head around. Sorry!