DBT

I'd have to assume that an experience with God would produce something, anything...information that is out of the ordinary, something beyond the knowledge of the times...and that information should be verifiable in some way, a prediction, an insight...something to show that one has indeed had contact with the Ultimate Being....a God.

RAFH

I challenge that assertion. If a researcher were to studiously document every aspect, provide controls, etc., etc., such research would be accepted and published, again, if its well documented. If its not, it won't.

But your presuming such research would be automatically rejected is exactly that, presumptuous.

The reason such research hasn't been published is the lack of data. Its all anecdotal. This is why you hear the call, evidence. Bring us verifiable evidence. Until you do, your accounts are no more credible than any fairy tale or myth.

RAFH

Again, you presume facts not in evidence. You presume behavior of people whom have never even met, and you do so primarily on the basis they doubt your word. Not even denying your word, simply doubting it. Of course, there are some, like myself, who do deny your assertions, but that does give you the right to assume I have no integrity, that I would lie, most of all, to myself. That I would deny the basic tenet of science, to seek the truth, whatever it is.

RAFH

One would also tend to think a supreme being, creator of the universe and all, would be able to work out some way to provide convincing evidence. This is the greatest fault of all, that somehow this being either can't or won't reveal himself except to a select few.

Yeah, peek-a-boo, I don't see you.

David B

I looked at some minutes of the testimony on faithhealing video, posted on Wommack's web site.

The cases where shamanistic healing can work are cases where symptoms are psychosomatic rather than organic.

The case on the video refers to the subject going to umpteen doctors, none of whom could find anything wrong with her body.

The very sort of case where suggestion can actually make a difference.

Sorry Nuwanda, there are so many people making the sort of claim that you are making, from a wide number of backgrounds, that have been demonstrated to be false. Some resulting from fraud - like the Popoff's - some from genuine error.

It would take very strong evidence to persuade me that anything miraculous happens - and time and time again there is no such evidence.

Please note that I'm not attacking your veracity.

Just noting that many people have believed the same sort of thing as you who have been demonstrated to be mistaken, as opposed to the manmy people who have believed the same thing as you, NONE of whom have been demonstrated to be right.

David B

Nuwanda

I just wanted to post a final reply to all who have entered the thread and first off thank most of you for keeping it civil, and second for participating and not demanding that the thread by pulled because it smacks of evangelism.

Final thought/question: is there anything you (whoever) believe that is not validated through scientific inquiry? Do you believe in the existance of good, evil, or ultimate principles of love, hate, etc.? Through the information provided by science are you closer or further away from understanding how chemicals interacting produce life, consciousness, or how the chemicals came to being in the first place? Whether the universe is eternal or if it had a beginning - neither of which are logical according to science: all we know always existed, or all we know came from nothing (0+0=1). Which of you operating from a classical understanding of physics has come one step closer to understanding the non-locality of all of existance revealed through quantum physics?

And after all those considerations, if you're still utterly convinced that God is a myth due soley to a lack of understanding from science, more power to you.

Cheers.

ecco

All Quotes from Nuwanda

Could you be more specific? How long was the man blind? From birth? Did the blindness occur during his childhood or adult life? How do you know these things? Was his blindness documented? Was his recovery documented?

Tumors. Multiple. What kind of tumors? Were they medically diagnosed as malignant cancer or benign cancer? Were they diagnosed at all? What did they look like? Under what circumstances did the healing take place? Did you know the people?

A hernia? Do you know what a hernia is? Have you ever had one (medically diagnosed)? Big deal. You were lifting weights and got some pain, possibly from a nerve getting pushed the wrong way…the nerve realigned itself and the pain was gone. Hardly evidence of anything other than the body correcting an ooops.



Every month many of our soldiers return from Iraq with their legs missing. Why don’t you lead a mission? Pick one soldier whose legs have been amputated. Start a nationwide campaign – on Christmas day have people all across the country, in churches and at home, pray for the regrowth of the soldiers legs. Wouldn’t that be more meaningful than you curing yourself of a “hernia”?

David B

No problem

Well AFAIK the ultimate origin of the universe, and the ultimate origin of life, among other things, remain mysteries, and have not yet been understood by science, and may never be. However, there seems to me to be no need to invoke an even more mysterious god to explain them, particularly as we can note that many things previously attributed to a god have proved naturalistic - earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanoes and lots of stuff like that. Induction (except mathematical induction) is less than proof, but often turns out to be a pretty good guide.

Not in any sort of platonic sense. Before there was life, there was no good, evil...in my view.

That's not to say that the terms are meaningless though. I view them, tentatively, as part of the extended human phenotype, and as such, as emergent phenomena.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extended_phenotype

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergent_phenomena

Certainly closer. Regarding the understanding of how the light chemicals, hydrogen and helium, came into being as the original very hot universe cooled down, and then combined within stars to form heavier elements, then that is well understood. Once we have elements chemistry can start, and that is pretty well understood. The others are closer - finding out the structure of DNA was really a big breakthrough.

The big bang theory is now pretty much established, though some details remain to be discovered. Physics and then chemistry pretty much work back to a very short time after the big bang. Before that - people are working on it.

I haven't quite got my head round QM. It's so bloody hard to visualise, and what maths I had has atrophied. I still keep reading layman's guides to qm and cosmology, though.

Well, wouldn't we both agree that most human conceptions of god(s)ess(es) haven't been grounded in reality? Zeus, Thor, Kali, John Frum etc etc.

It's not solely as a result of science that have led me to abandon one more god than you.

There remains the problem of explaining the origin (or having no origin) of a putative god, for a start.

The problem of how a purely spiritual putative god could act in the world.

Lots of stuff like that.

And, in my case, we also get back to the origin of this thread. Experiences I had that seemed to me at the time sufficient to devote some years of my life to a search for enlightenment in an Eastern tradition.

Experiences which I now understand to be natural rather than supernatural, and also profoundly misleading.

And, you having come up with no evidence that satisfies sceptical analysis that your experiences are not equally mistaken, I remain of the opinion that your experiences have been as misleading to you as mine were to me.

David B

RAFH

You are welcome and it goes both ways.

Well, first of all, I don't believe, not in the theistic sense. So I guess my answer would be "No".

Not in the sense you are probably using them. I find some actions, some people as evidenced by their actions, to be good or evil, on a continuous scale and often both good and evil in different categories. Hey, Hitler, for all his evilness, did get the Autobahns built, which was good. Mao, for all the misery and unhappiness he caused, did finally break the Chinese of their Imperial past. Were both men horribly evil, yep, but they also did some good, very little good, but some.

Ultimate principles of love and hate? What are those? I haven't a clue what you are talking about. Love and hate I understand, principles thereof? ultimate principles thereof???!!!

Closer. Much closer. Though that's sort of a silly question. Closer than what? I had no idea of any of this at birth, so I guess I would have to say I am closer now, but its a silly concept. Science is almost always getting closer to a clear, accurate and reliable description of reality. Sometimes it takes a flyer, a wrong turn, sometimes it backs up, sometimes it goes in circles for a bit, but all in all, it steadily improves our understanding of reality. In any case, it appears there are chemical forces which lead to the formation of molecules. Some of these molecules are able to replicate themselves. A very crude analogy would be crystals which grow by the collection and organisation of various chemicals. Like I said, a very crude analogy but it does illustrate chemicals can attract and organize themselves. For some reason, certain groups of these molecules eventually developed an ecology that was self-sustaining as long as resources were available. Resources such as energy and raw materials. Because of natural events such as modifications of the replication codes by cosmic energy or simply replication errors, there developed variations in these ecologies. Some of these ecologies were more efficacious than others and eventually dominated. Some were able to migrate to areas where the competition was less. A lot of 'one-thing-led-to-another' and at some point we have something we can recognize as life. Keep that up for a long, long time and eventually one ends up with us communicating over the Internet discussing this very process.

Ditto. That appears to be an emergent property of sufficient quantities of sensory input and processing, neural complexity and persistent memory.

Ditto. That's easy, Hydrogen and Helium were natural results of the condensate products of the initial energy of the Big Bang. They are very simple structures that occurred because of the basic nuclear forces. The other elements were then systhesized out of Hydrogen and Helium by stellar processes.

Huh? Uh, do you have a clue what you are talking about? I don't understand your question. Perhaps you can rephrase it in more comprehensible terms.

It is not a lack of understanding. It is understanding reality and that it is all there is. If there was something else that had effects within reality, those effects would be observed and, eventually, could be explained. Your entire paradigm of some other reality has no basis in fact. There is no evidence.

The lack of understanding is where your god concept hides. Every time such claims are investigated, they come up empty. How many gaps have to be explored and found empty before you start to suspect they are all empty? No, its not a lack of understanding that convinces me your and ever other god is a myth, it is understanding that reveals that. It is the lack of understanding that leads to belief and faith.

RAFH

Yah, if you could demonstrate one regrowth, you will not only help that poor victim but gain countless adherents. But, it never happens. There's always some excuse. Kind of funny for a being that could create and manage the universe being unable to regrow one pair of legs.

Peek-a-boo, I don't see you.