Mageth

Originally posted by Volker:

Thats an political opinion, but not a scientific disproof as it is need to be serious.

Huh? It was neither a political opinion nor a scientific disproof.

You must demonstrate, that paranormal phenomena are impossible.

You've got it backwards. The ones who claim paranormal phenomena are possible and happen must demonstrate that they are indeed possible and happen. The burden of proof is on the claimant.

All other is quack, quack.

Now now, I didn't go so far as to call Utts and Josephson quacks.

Mageth

But information is information and can exist in many different forms. It is possible that the frontal lobe is a physical processor of spiritual *information*.

Demonstrate the existence of spiritual information, tell us how it is "carried" (in waves? how?), and inform us on how the frontal lobe acts as a receiver/transmitter/processor for these waves.

Until you or someone else can do that, you're talking pseudoscientific babble.

Oh, I'd say the difference is about a couple billion people with about a couple billion eyewitness testimonies regarding spiritual encounters/sightings......Eyewitness testimonies that span all of human history and exist in every human culture that has ever existed since the dawn of civilization.

A bit of an Argumentum ad Numerum there. The number of adherents to a particular belief has little or no bearing on the truth or falsehood of that belief. I could just as well argue that "there are billions of people who have never had a spiritual encounter or sighting. If spirits were really among us, why have so many people not seen them?"

Further, your "billions" argument is at least equally as valid as evidence for the "imaginary" side; that many if not all humans may share a particular mental facility for imagining "spiritual" experiences.

Obviously, we are dancing on the periphery of a very large subject, which is the existence of God. If a God exists and created the universe, (which all inductive reasoning supports) then it would be quite logical to assume that God may have created humans with a unique capacity for spiritual relationship. Indeed, the existence of God is the real issue here - not musings about the frontal lobe.

That's quite a leap of logic you're taking. Even if what you claim is true, and the frontal lobe does communicate with some sort of spiritual realm, that is not proof that god(s), and even more so not proof that your particular concept of God exists.

Further, it is not true that "all inductive reasoning" supports that God exists and that he created the universe.

No duh. I asked you to imagine, hypothetically, that it were real. If it were real, what kind of evidence do you predict there would be? Any thinker worth his salt can make a prediction of evidence. If you have no idea what the evidence for the supernatural would be, how in the blue blazes can you say you haven't already seen it?

Since you seem to be better at imagining it's real than Fiach, me, or other "skeptics" on this thread, why don't you tell us what the evidence should be? If you've already seen it, you should know. I've already asked you several times for such evidence and descriptions of mechanisms (e.g. what the spiritual signal is like, how the brain would interface with a spiritual signal) to support the "spiritual antenna" idea, which so far you have failed to provide. If you can't do so, should I assume you're not "worth your salt?"

Mageth

Metacrock:

I disagree. Scientists have a proceedure, or a habit really, of being skeptical of certain kinds of results.

As well they should. "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." But I would extend this beyond scientists. No doubt you are at least a bit skeptical about certain kinds of "results" (at least I hope you are). Do you believe every fad diet claim, every new exercise craze, or every new astounding claim about some new "miracle" dietary product you hear on TV?

Atheists like to pretend that being sketpical of religion makes them scientiifc.

What? My scientific knowledge, along with a healthy application of skepticism, in part led to my "abandoning" Theism as a valid worldview. But that's just me; others have different stories to tell, I assume.

Further, I apply skepticism to science, as well as to other areas. You can use skepticism in science, and science in skepticism, but the two are not analogous.

They like to pretend that science is somehow anti-religious.

They do? Well, I guess I see how you can get that idea, and no doubt some atheists hold that opinion. Many don't, including me. Many scientists are religious, and many non-scientists are not religious, after all.

Now, science can and is used against certain religious claims, the current thread and creationism being two obvious examples. But many religious scientists use science to argue against particular religous claims as well. Perhaps that's where your generalization comes from.

On this thread, science has been use to refute the claim that a particular part of the brain is some kind of interface to a spiritual realm. But as for the "supernatural" in general, science doesn't claim to be able to prove its non-existence. It does, however, ask for substantial evidence before accepting it "scientifically", if you will. That's the way science should, and does, work.

But being religious sketpical is not the same thing as being scientifically skeptical. Not necessarily. When it comes to religious skepticism there is just as much ideology and bias working for the skeptic as for the believer.

If we're talking about skepticism here, I think it's the same, or at least should be used the same, for the "religious" as well as the "scientific". Remember, it's a tool, a method, not an ideology.

And no doubt ideology and bias comes into play at least sometimes even when skepticism is applied to science. Utts and Josephson may actually be examples of that. Scientists are humans too.

Metacrock

No I agree that we should be skeptical of extraordinary claims. The problem is, why assume that belief in God, or some religious attitude toward being, or some idea of something beyond the material realm is an extraordinary claim? In some sesne perhaps, but what do you use as a base line to say "this kind of cliam is extraordinary and this kind isn't?" Well you can't use belief or thereof as the benchmark, that's not only circular reasoning, but also flys in the face of human experience. Most people who have ever lived have been religious. To then try to make out that religion is somehow anti-scientific and strange is absurd.

Meta said: "Atheists like to pretend that being sketpical of religion makes them scientiifc."

What? My scientific knowledge, along with a healthy application of skepticism, in part led to my "abandoning" Theism as a valid worldview. But that's just me; others have different stories to tell, I assume.


That doen't make skepticism scientific. My religious belief led to interest in science. Tons of scientific people are religious.

Further, I apply skepticism to science, as well as to other areas. You can use skepticism in science, and science in skepticism, but the two are not analogous.


Yes, skepticism is generally a good thing. That doesn't make skepticism of religious belief necessarily scientific.

Meta said:"They like to pretend that science is somehow anti-religious."

They do?


Many do, not all.


Well, I guess I see how you can get that idea, and no doubt some atheists hold that opinion. Many don't, including me. Many scientists are religious, and many non-scientists are not religious, after all.

Now, science can and is used against certain religious claims, the current thread and creationism being two obvious examples. But many religious scientists use science to argue against particular religous claims as well. Perhaps that's where your generalization comes from.


Sure, there are points where there is overlapp. When religious claims fly in the face of what we think of as established scientific fact, then scientific skepticism is in order,and in those cases science does deflate at least those rleigious claims. But [u]it works the other way around too, such as the claim that this "God pod" disproves the validity of religious experience.

On this thread, science has been use to refute the claim that a particular part of the brain is some kind of interface to a spiritual realm. But as for the "supernatural" in general, science doesn't claim to be able to prove its non-existence. It does, however, ask for substantial evidence before accepting it "scientifically", if you will. That's the way science should, and does, work.



ahhhh! I've seen that argument used so many times to argue against religious experience I didn't realize it was being used to argue for it here! Sorry, I see where you are coming form now. Well the discussions in this latter part of the thread were so dense (in a good sense, detailed, deeply into the thread) that I couldn't easily pick out what the positions were.

But being religious sketpical is not the same thing as being scientifically skeptical. Not necessarily. When it comes to religious skepticism there is just as much ideology and bias working for the skeptic as for the believer.

If we're talking about skepticism here, I think it's the same, or at least should be used the same, for the "religious" as well as the "scientific". Remember, it's a tool, a method, not an ideology.

And no doubt ideology and bias comes into play at least sometimes even when skepticism is applied to science. Utts and Josephson may actually be examples of that. Scientists are humans too. [/QUOTE]


I think we are basically in agreement!:notworthy

http://pub18.ezboard.com/bhavetheologywillargue

sandlewood

We can define “extraordinary” as something that is contrary to what we have always seen and experienced and for which have lots proof. I’d consider an extraordinary event to be a man parting a sea by raising his hands. There is tons of evidence why this cannot be done. All the evidence and experience is consistent. So if there is a claim that someone parted a sea, then that claim would be inconsistent and is immediately up against a huge amount of evidence that would contradict it. Therefore you need a huge amount of evidence to support it.

Fiach

I suppose. But I am not sure that I do not have much of an ideology, at least not in any serious way. I have may research and practice that occupy my life. My ideology is my family. I suppose Scottish National Liberation is my most fervent ideology but that does't affect metaphysical ideas. I oppose our entry into the European Union, and don't like France. Religion is just something that I DON'T believe in.


I think we are basically in agreement!:notworthy

Probably not "us."

http://pub18.ezboard.com/bhavetheologywillargue [/QUOTE]

Fiach

Volker.Doormann

I think not. To analyze paranormal phenomena (as natural phenomena not understood yet) doesn’t mean, to accept contradictions in science. As in classic physics one can include natural phenomena to the knowledge of science.
Bullshit is part of nature.
It is not the job of science to define the magical. The job of science is to recognize the phenomena in nature and to separate the real phenomena of nature from the unreal phenomena of the nature.
You have mentioned some phenomena, and have disqualified them from the natural phenomena by belief, not by proof. You have called this method Skepticism, and the work of research on it ‘pseudoscience’.

Nothing in that is of any scientific argumentation, but it is full of personal belief in the religion of Skepticism as shield to the personal comfort from the uncomfortable unknown.

I have presented here a case of future telling (Penny Thornton’ view of the car accident of Lady Diana Spencer), which is as a part of nature of the same reality as p.e the phenomena’s of superconductivity or super fluidity in materials or the phenomena of alocality as an existing phenomena in physics.

AFAIK there is no reason from the sight of quantum physics, that all phenomena must be of the nature of time (and energy) and its causality of cause and effect, but I’m not an expert in Quantum Mechanics. Clearly one must check scientifically elementary possible errors in that plot, but to reject the unknown only because it is the unknown is a position taken by religions and church and is well known through history from Galileo Galilei or Giordano Bruno, and is not of a belief independent scientific position.

However, the here presented case of future telling is of provable facts of reality in this one nature. Each arguing against that only from the dogmas of the religion of Skepticism using unscientific terms proves only that science is taken as abuse for personal social comfort.

The problem, which is coupled with skepticism, is the isolation from the unknown, which can be part of nature as a recognizable truth without contradictions. Behind all this are waiting other parts of nature to be acknowledged as part of nature regarding the order of spiritual nature with its spectrum of ethic. If ethic would not be a real part of nature, then each believer in skepticism could be taken as food for dogs, as well as any Crime to child’s and woman’s would only pseudoscientific bullshit of no scientific proof.
This does not mean, that religions have any rights to define ethics, but it means, that if one is arguing on the level of ethics, he agrees with the laws of ethic as part of nature or he is following a belief system of pseudoscience.

However, my experience with believers in the dogmas of religions is comparable to my experience with skeptics; on very basic questions, there are no answers, but a lot of silence or irrelevant assertions of no coherence.

Volker

Theli

Make that - "part of human nature". For your claim to even make sense.
What is nature?
I mean, science pretty much covers everything, from the birth of the universe to shopping habits.
To say that science covers that wich can be explain naturally seems abit presumptious as we don't know if there is a natural explaination before trying to find one.
It would seem that religious experiences does have a natural explaination wich can be tested, so would it still fall outside of "nature"?

Darkblade

Unfortunately, this is not testable or repeatable. Because extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence (please, someone tell me who said this, as I have heard it here but forgotten), I withhold any scientific opinion on this, and default to the logical conclusion that, assuming it happened exactly as you said, and there was no doubt of this, it was a random event. Dreams can be both focused on concerns of the dreamer and very random, so it makes more sense that Penny, knowing Diana, would dream this than others. Also, as it has not been disproven that this was a random dream, and with billions of people over many, many years dreaming, it seems likely that someone would have a dream that reflected the future. But Penny didn’t have lots of dreams that perfectly predicted the future, did she? Therefore, having a non-belief in the supernatural (as extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence), and due to the fact that this event could happen naturally, I have concluded inductively (not deductively) that this was a natural event.

If by phenomena you mean such things as the senses, I agree that traditional science has not (yet) determined things like why receiving the frequency of the color green into your eye produces the color green in your brain. This is not testable by traditional science. However, it is testable by observation, which is still a form of science. Because people all agree that they see green when a green light wave enters their eye, it is determined that it is so (Although, admittedly, there is no way to “prove” it is the same or a similar color in others’ eyes, but, then, how would science function if people had to prove deductively things that are reasonably assumed inductively? (If science really has this burden of proof, then we can not really believe it is any more likely that we are in the world of our minds than a matrix type world.)). Therefore your whole argument falls apart as opinion, not fact.

Volker.Doormann

AFAIK nature doesn’t need our explanations to be nature.
What? I agree in total with the understanding, that the brain is a machine, and that religious experiences are self-created phantoms of the brain as provable physical processes of nature. But that is not the point. As permeability is a property of the free space in the whole universe, and each mass in the universe is connected to each other mass in the whole universe, this shows, that nature is not limited or isolated by the physics internal of a human brain. There is no contest to name phenomena's outside of nature. There is a nature to understand, as it is.

I think there is a great misunderstanding of the origin sense of religion. Exact, that, what is true and without contradiction or in harmony, which is of no material or physical dimension, that is that, what is called god in origin. To find an order without contradiction in nature is equal to the origin meaning of the search of god. Starting social claims besides from skeptics or besides from religions are of the same contradictions to the truth of nature. Neither an agnostic nor a Christ is of any reality in nature; both are (brain) phantoms only. Neither a rejection of ‘paranormal’ phenomena’s in nature as of pseudoscience is of any value, nor a supernatural claim of phenomena’s besides religions. Nature is, as we are, to understand, and there is no need to bias nature in any way.

Volker