Metacrock

Meta: You are just throwing out a bunch of big words you've heard people use without any concern for what they mean or how they apply here. You can't do data of course, and you've given no thought to what the word placebo means or who uses it.

1) Religious experience cannot be reduced to mere placebo:


http://pub18.ezboard.com/fhavetheolo...opicID=9.topic


2) Wouldn't make any difference if it could be, the affects are real and that's the point.

3) I've already linked to several studies empirical studies (ooooooo the magic word) which prove what I'm talking about and you have none!

I have 300 studies alluded to in the previous post, and more in the one that Toto read.






Great.



BTW, neither of your links work. At least not on my browser (IE 5). Perhaps there is a god .


Hmmm I'll check it o


Meta: what kind of written permission do people need now days? That's so free thoughtie of you. I always knew "free thinkers" were fascists.

They send me emails I take as all the permission I need.

Metacrock

The city on a hill links don't work but the source is documented. The previous link, the first one, where it says "this transformative power," does work. Did you read it? Here it is:





B. Long-Term Positive Effects.


1) Psychological and life Tranformational.

Noble:

* Experience more productive of psychological health than illness
* Less authoritarian and dogmatic.
More assertive, imaginative, self-sufficient, intelligent, relaxed
* High ego strength, relationships, symbolization, values, integration, allocentrism, psychological maturity, self-acceptance, self-worth, autonomy, authenticity, need for solitude, increased love and compassion.[Noble, Kathleen D. (1987). ``Psychological Health and the Experience of Transcendence.'' The Counseling Psychologist, 15 (4), 601-614.]


Transpersonal Childhood Experiences of Higher States of Consciousness: Literature Review and Theoretical Integration. (Unpublished paper 1992 by Jayne Gackenback.
http://www.sawka.com/spiritwatch/cehsc/ipure.htm

"In terms of psychological correlates, well-being and happiness has been associated with mystical experiences,(Mathes, Zevon, Roter, Joerger, 1982; Hay & Morisy, 1978; Greeley, 1975; Alexander, Boyer, & Alexander, 1987) as well as self-actualization (Hood, 1977; Alexander, 1992). Regarding the latter, the developer of self-actualization believed that even one spontaneous peak or transcendental experience could promote self-actualization. Correlational research has supported this relationship. In a recent statistical meta-analysis of causal designs with Transcendental Meditation (TM) controlling for length of treatment and strength of study design, it was found that:

TM enhances self-actualization on standard inventories significantly more than recent clinically devised relaxation/meditation procedures not explicitly directed toward transcendence [mystical experience"] (p. 1; Alexander, 1992)


Wuthnow's study: * Say their lives are more meaningful, think about meaning and purpose.
* Know what purpose of life is * Meditate more.
* Score higher on self-rated personal talents and capabilities.
* Less likely to value material possessions, high pay, job security, fame, and having lots of friends.
* Greater value on work for social change, solving social problems, helping needy.
* Reflective, inner-directed, self-aware, self-confident life style.

[Wuthnow, Robert (1978). Peak Experiences: Some Empirical Tests. Journal of Humanistic Psychology, 18 (3), 59-75




2) Physical Affects.

Transpersonal Childhood Experiences of Higher States of Consciousness: Literature Review and Theoretical Integration. Unpublished paper by Jayne Gackenback, (1992)
http://www.sawka.com/spiritwatch/cehsc/ipure.htm


"These states of being also result in behavioral and health changes. Ludwig (1985) found that 14% of people claiming spontaneous remission from alcoholism was due to mystical experiences while Richards (1978) found with cancer patients treated in a hallucinogenic drug-assisted therapy who reported mystical experiences improved significantly more on a measure of self-actualization than those who also had the drug but did not have a mystical experience. In terms of the Vedic Psychology group they report a wide range of positive behavioral results from the practice of meditation and as outlined above go to great pains to show that it is the transcendence aspect of that practice that is primarily responsible for the changes. Thus improved performance in many areas of society have been reported including education and business as well as personal health states (reviewed and summarized in Alexander et al., 1990). Specifically, the Vedic Psychology group have found that mystical experiences were associated with "refined sensory threshold and enhanced mind-body coordination (p. 115; Alexander et al., 1987)."

Metacrock

Metacrock, please respect the copyright practices on this forum.

Joel
BC&H Moderator

Toto

Are you saying that an atheist cannot evaluate the historicity of Jesus? Why is that?

Well, Mao and Stalin must not have been True Atheists, to have missed out on the transformative experience that True Atheists claim for conversion to True Atheism.

But seriously, it's not a red herring. You are claiming some sort of transformation happens due to X. If people who have X do not show evidence of this transformation, and people who do not have X show an equal amount of transformation, the only conclusion is that X is irrelevant.

I'm not ignoring the Christians who did good things, but I don't see any evidence that their good deeds were connected to their theology.

Your links don't work, but from your description, it appears that getting kids involved in a serious organized activity can keep them out of trouble, whatever its theological content. This does not show that belief in a HJ is necessary or sufficient for a transformative experience that creates productive citizens out of little thugs.

Toto

Meta - this is getting way off topic.

You have cited a study of TM (transcendental meditation) as proof of what? TM is not based on a belief in a HJ.

Metacrock

Meta: Toto I sited a plethora of studies: Hood, Alexander, Lu, Lucaough, Maslow, Worthnow, and others. Gackenbacks shows that these studies include all kinds of people They include Bron again Christians. TM is just one of the traditions studied. The point is that if Jesus were to be proven to not have existed, Christianity would not be destroyed. It would still have transformative power, and Jesus as savior would still have power as a symbol of the divine, more importantly, i]as speicifically reconciliation, rebirth, and solidarity with the divine.[/i]

It doesn't matter to me that other traditions are also good. In my book God is God. God is not just the God of the Hebrews or the Christians but of all humanity; and God is working in all cultures.

Metacrock

Meta: some day you really must infrom me of your thought processes. you can really come to some odd conclusions. I said nothing to imply that atheists can't evalutate HJ or anything. I was speaking of the belief in HJ as a doctrine of theology!





Meta: ahahah, very drole. Most amusing. You have quite a wit there.


Meta: The link to transformation is clear. I produced 300 studies (or a reference to them) which shows transformative power. All the mystical experience studies include christians. The incidents of transformation in Christianity are abundant. Are you not at all familiar with the tradition of Christian mysticism? Or the charismatic movment? Don't you remember the days of the great born again experience story: "I was a drug adict, that that's just what i did when I was bored form the witchcraft I praciticed, and that was just a side line to supplament my job as a hit man. God came down and I saw birght light I was filled with joy, bot born again and called Pat Roberston." Remember?


Well it worked for me. It worked for tons people I know, and it worked for the people in the studies. I have yet to see one shred of evidence of an atheist getting mystical experience, peak experience, or whatever you care to call it, from becoming an atheist. Maslow alludes to the possiblity, but he has no data that this is anything like a common experience for atheists.

Now dont' go telling me how much better you felt when you shucked religion, cause we aren't talking about just a nice a littel feeling of being freed from mommy and Daddy. We are talking about big life chainging long term stuff.


Meta: WEll then you haven't studied their lives have you? Schwetizer went to Africa speicifically becasue he felt that God had blessed him with success in academia and he wanted to spread the love around. Dorothy Day was an atheist, communist, libratine reporter and got religion in one day and was transformed into a saint. She specifically gave all that up and ran a religious commune that served inner city poor in New york because she was a Christian. The underground railroad and the abolitionists and civil rights people all over the place speicifically say it was their faith.







Meta: There was a lot more there than just dealing with kids. The health stuff, the marrage stuff, lots of adutls in there too. But the studies compare to other activities, there are none that compare. Religious participation has the highest effect on health, psychology and social adujustment, much more so than secular organizations and activities. I am assuming that religious experience is acompanied in participation,why else would they partcipate.

But even if you want to exlude those 300 studies, you still have to deal with the dozen or more in Gackenback and Maslow. Those include Christians having mystical experience.

I don't have to show that it's connected to belief in HJ. that was not my argument. My argument was the transformative effects would be there anyway, so Doherty is irrevlivant


HJ is better for doctrine. But either way, the uniqnueness of the symbol of atonement and resurrection offers something no other religoius tradition can, that of Grace. That works with or without HJ.

RED DAVE

From Metacrock:

I think you're being a little ingenuous here, given that this thread started with Paul and the Historic Jesus, not the transformative power of faith.

Anyone reading James' "The Variety of Religious Experience" understands something about the objective nature of religion. That is, spiritual experiences, whatever the fuck they are, happen all the time. That isn't the point. The point is filling these experiences with a specific historical concept, one, moreover, that's linked to some of the most unsavory actions in history.

If you empty your spiritual life of historic an mythic content and become a Zen master, great! But, until you examine the arbitrary nature of the symbols you're attached to, you're engaged in self-delusion and propaganda.

RED DAVE

Toto

I'm sorry I ever got involved in this thread. It seems to be impossible to pin Meta down on whether a HJ is important or not.

If the HJ can only be evaluated theologically, it implies that there was no HJ as far as secular history is concerned. Is that your position?

And this is not the place to debate whether religion in general or Christianity in particular can have some effect, or what that effect is. I just know that there is nothing unique about the effect of Christianity, and nothing consistant.

Given all that, would it not be better for Christianity to dump the Nicene Creed and its requirement of believing in impossible things? Think of all the people who have been driven away from the church because of Biblical errancy and supernaturalism.

If the message of Jesus is valid, does it matter if he actually existed?

Vorkosigan

You know, Meta, this is now the third time you have posted that list of biased and bogus studies. You win. I haven't the energy to shoot it down yet again.

I don't have to show that it's connected to belief in HJ. that was not my argument. My argument was the transformative effects would be there anyway, so Doherty is irrevlivant

Thanks for arguing that the existence of the HJ is irrelevant.

BTW, it's Gackenbach, and the fact that you cite her shows what an completely uncritical thinker you are. She is a complete nut who believes dreams are links to a higher state of consciousness. So is Skip Alexander, another you cite, who works on wild theories of higher consciousness based on the ideas of the Maharishi Yogi. There's really nothing funnier than someone panting over these fruitcake ideas pooh-poohing Earl Doherty. The "300 studies" you have, Meta, are so many piles of dog shit.
Mysticism is purely an internal brain state, and for every Dorothy Day overcoming the evils of her belief system there are a hundred Fred Phelps.

Vorkosigan