Traditions, Superstitions, Omen, and the like

Mechazawa said:

Yes, if billions upon billions of people report a specific experience then it can be considered true.

So, what is this specific experience that all disparate religious/spiritual persons have endured and all agree upon?

Mechazawa said:

Regardless, it is majority who have positive proof of something, yet you deny.

Uh, I deny that because it's not true. Those people believe in something, that doesn't mean they have proof of it. The idea that lots of people would believe in something that isn't true isn't surprising - history is littered with examples: here's a big ol' long list of them for your entertainment. Reality isn't determined by a democratic election and it's kind of sad that this is the best you can come up with.

Mechazawa said:

Yes, if billions upon billions of people report a specific experience then it can be considered true.

Billions of people report a belief, not an experience, and those beliefs are not even consistent with each other. You are being intellectually dishonest when you use this argument.

Mechazawa said:

It isn't possible they could all have come together to orchestrate a lie.

You don't need to tell a lie to believe something that's wrong, you only need to be told it and believe it. But if we're being honest, isn't this literally a description of most religious institutions? They're organized groups, usually hierarchically organized, dedicated to promoting a particular belief (which for obvious reasons I'd characterize as an untruth). Why is the idea of an "orchestrated lie" so unreasonable?

Mechazawa said:

You believe Cameroon exists don't you? Have you ever been there? No (I' assuming not). You only believe it exists because a bunch of people said it exists. Or because some book (maps/geography) say it exists. Despite never having been there or experienced it, you have faith Cameroon exists.

You know that this nonsense makes you look really, really dumb, right? I think if you have some respect for yourself you should hold yourself to a higher standard of thought and debate.

fraggle said:

Uh, I deny that because it's not true. Those people believe in something, that doesn't mean they have proof of it. The idea that lots of people would believe in something that isn't true isn't surprising - history is littered with examples: here's a big ol' long list of them for your entertainment. Reality isn't determined by a democratic election and it's kind of sad that this is the best you can come up with.

I kinda feel like I should make some corrections to this, so here we go:

fraggle said:

I deny that, because those people believe in something, which I don't believe in. The idea that lots of people would believe in something that isn't true isn't surprising - Atheists are also quite a lot of people, though. Reality is determined by everybody's personal perception, and it's kind of sad that I can't even allow you to live your life the way you want to, without talking down on you.

Any more questions? Feel free to ask...

Sure Bowb said:

I kinda feel like I should make some corrections to this

When you're done maybe you'd like to actually contribute to the discussion rather than "correcting" other people's posts to say something they didn't actually say. There are things in your "correction" that I would have happily responded to if you'd gone to the effort of expressing them like a grown-up.

fraggle said:

When you're done maybe you'd like to actually contribute to the discussion rather than "correcting" other people's posts to say something they didn't actually say.

Not only did I contribute more to this "discussion" than you have, I have also been able to do so without dismissing others' points of views as sad, or looney, or hollow for the longest time. That being said, you have barely any reason, at all, to be demanding anything from me.

If you want to talk with me about how I approach this subject, feel free to refer to my earlier, and significantly longer posts. There should be enough for you to "work" with.

Sure Bowb said:

Not only did I contribute more to this "discussion" than you have, I have also been able to do so without dismissing others' points of views as sad, or looney, or hollow for the longest time. That being said, you have barely any reason, at all, to be demanding anything from me.

I didn't demand anything from you; I simply suggested that maybe you'd like to have a grown-up discussion - rather than wasting all our time with a passive-aggressive rhetorical device. That invitation is still open if you're interested.

Sure Bowb said:

Not only did I contribute more to this "discussion" than you have, I have also been able to do so without dismissing others' points of views as sad, or looney, or hollow for the longest time. That being said, you have barely any reason, at all, to be demanding anything from me.

If you want to talk with me about how I approach this subject, feel free to refer to my earlier, and significantly longer posts. There should be enough for you to "work" with.

I hope you don't wrongly feel a better debater here though, what with your dismissal of pritch's post with a really lame edit of his post that puts nonsense into his mouth.

dew said:

pritch

Interesting :)

fraggle said:

I didn't demand anything from you; I simply suggested that maybe you'd like to have a grown-up discussion - rather than wasting all our time with a passive-aggressive rhetorical device.

I'm actually a lot less passive agressive than you tink I am. The mere fact that eventhough I went through quite some effort to share my point of view, the discussion has been constantly devolving into picking apart arguments by way of method, rather than content.

The example of 50.000.000 Elvis fans comes to mind, which does not look very grown-up to me either.

fraggle said:

That invitation is still open if you're interested.

If I wasn't interested, I wouldn't even react at all. So by all means, consider me interested.

dew said:

This summer, in the holy places near you... Revenge of the Checkmate, Atheists: The Postening.

Also TIL if a majority is wrong, they're actually right by the power of majority. It's magic! The proofs are invisible, so stop asking to see them!

I hope you don't wrongly feel a better debater here though, what with your dismissal of pritch's post with a really lame edit of his post that puts nonsense into his mouth.

Look who's talking...

Sure Bowb said:

The example of 50.000.000 Elvis fans comes to mind, which does not look very grown-up to me either.

I could have said "argumentum ad populum" but I suspect there are a lot of people out there who roll their eyes when people start using latin phrases and talking about "logical fallacies". It's nice to keep the discussion fresh.

If I wasn't interested, I wouldn't even react at all. So by all means, consider me interested.

Why do you think it is the case that everyone in the world cannot be convinced of the existence of ghosts? Advance warning: if your answer is "because they're stupid/brainwashed/closed-minded/etc." I probably won't take your answer seriously.

Mechazawa said:

What you will also notice, as a tactic used by atheists, is that they will ask for proof only within the confines of their specific system (science). The problem is you are trying to prove something that cannot be observed with the 5 sense by normal means, so using a system that only accepts what can be observed with the 5 senses will not get you anywhere, hence this minority still refuses to accept. It is like trying to prove a program written in language A will work when your opponent only accepts you to use a compiler from language B. Of course it won't work, he will call you an idiot and deem you to be a loon.

What reason have I got to believe in 'language B' other than "a lot of other people do so I should too"? The majority of people also thought the world was flat once, that didn't just magically make it true.

Religion generally requires you to have faith that something is true and to follow rigid teachings without much room for change. I don't need faith to look under a microscope and watch cells divide. I don't need faith to look into a telescope and observe hundreds of thousands of distant planetary bodies. Science is ever changing, nothing is rigid, always open to new discoveries - That's the whole point. There's always room to grow and learn.

Since you hate 'scientism' as you incorrectly call it, maybe you should toss your computer in the bin. You wouldn't have that if not for scientists. In fact, get rid of all your electronics and never take medication again, because all that stuff was developed/designed/invented by scientists. Hell, some of them were even religious and still didn't have the ignorance to dismiss scientific discovery.

You don't need faith to take a keen interest in science. You don't need faith to test and verify hypothesis. All you need are tools, knowledge and an open mind, but as Fraggle once eloquently put it, "not so open your brain falls out". If you can give me a good reason to believe in 'language B', not just some hokum, but something I can observe or that at least has some shred of evidence, I'll believe it, but not until then.

All that said, I accept your right to believe in what you want, but once again, that aforementioned oppressive theological legislation is pretty fucking frustrating, but that's neither here nor there.

fraggle said:

I could have said "argumentum ad populum" but I suspect there are a lot of people out there who roll their eyes when people start using latin phrases and talking about "logical fallacies". It's nice to keep the discussion fresh.

It would have been fun, however, albeit a bit "exclusive".

fraggle said:

Why do you think it is the case that everyone in the world cannot be convinced of the existence of ghosts? Advance warning: if your answer is "because they're stupid/brainwashed/closed-minded/etc." I probably won't take your answer seriously.

I am somewhat certain that this will go sort of like the same way it did when I responded to "Yello" earlier.

For the record, I do not tend to dismiss people as small-minded or anything along those lines, just because they not believe in anything other than "solid-proof". If anything I'd consider people as small minded if they proclaim to be willing to partake, but do nothing to actually validate their "willingness". If that makes any sense.

I was a non-religious person for 19 years of my life, however I did not rule out that there may be something that I just did not know about. This has nothing to do with being open-minded, as far as I am concerned. I did not decide, up to this point, if I would be "OK" with having a spiritual aspect in my life. I had no "hands on experience", so to speak, and my modus operandi always has been that I would believe only things that I have experienced for myself in some way shape or form.

So, basically my background was -I did not experience the presence of something "paranormal", but neither did I try to experience it for myself. So how could I know?

I ended up digging through books, as much as the next person would have in my situation, I suppose. I was looking for someone, or something to show me, and convince me. I was seeking out churches, mosques and so forth, asking for how it could be possible to believe in something that is seemingly impossible to grasp. You've no idea the hollowness of what some priests tried to convince me with. WEll, perhaps you do, if I come across just as hollow to you, but I can't say for sure.

To wrap it up, I spent years looking for the "one thing" that would allow me make my decision, regardless of what it would be, regardless of what my decision would be. At the age of 24 it happened, and I experienced something that I considered as proof. So I made my choice, never looked back, and never had regrets at all.

I guess that's what it's all about. It's always up to you, no matter what, but you're not getting anywhere by way of "book-smarts" alone. You need to get your feet wet.

The whole idea of convincing others is a flawed approach, to begin with. To convince someone, a prior decision of some sort is required. So, if you are convinced, that spirits don't exist, and then ask someone to convince you otherwise is about the same as asking someone to tell you, that your concept of life is wrong. That's why convincing is as much of a problem as proof is.

As a more blunt example take newpapers. Eventhough they want to regarded as neutral, they have their own stances, and at times even agendas. But why is it, that people prefer one newspaper over the other? Because they chose to do so, regardless of how arbitrary their reason was, it was their own choice, as in: They convinced themselves.

Doomkid said:

What reason have I got to believe in 'language B' other than "a lot of other people do so I should too"? The majority of people also thought the world was flat once, that didn't just magically make it true.

Physical reality, and perceived reality or two vastly different things. The issue is that some things can be proven by way of science, or logic, but it does not mean that this applies to everything.

Doomkid said:

Religion generally requires you to have faith that something is true and to follow rigid teachings without much room for change. I don't need faith to look under a microscope and watch cells divide. I don't need faith to look into a telescope and observe hundreds of thousands of distant planetary bodies. Science is ever changing, nothing is rigid, always open to new discoveries - That's the whole point. There's always room to grow and learn.

Living life generally requires you to have faith that what you perceive is true.

Also, religion is not some stiff corset that you lace around your brain. You have a negative perception of religion, I'd say.

Science is ever changing as much as (some) religions are, however science has limits. At some point in time, science will have measured all that it is able to measure, it will have proven all it is capeable of proving, but then what? There will be no more room for it to grow at some point. Science functions only in the physical "realm", so to speak.

Science can explain how chemical substances in our brains create "emotions", for example, but can it explain how it feels like to have emotions? I think not, at least not thouroughly.

Doomkid said:

Since you hate 'scientism' as you incorrectly call it, maybe you should toss your computer in the bin. You wouldn't have that if not for scientists. In fact, get rid of all your electronics and never take medication again, because all that stuff was developed/designed/invented by scientists. Hell, some of them were even religious and still didn't have the ignorance to dismiss scientific discovery.

*ahem* a lot of these "medications" have been developed over thousands of years, and are considered ancestral knowledge. That does not apply to all medicine there is, however. Your idea of religion being dismissive towards science in general is not the way I'd go about it.

Doomkid said:

You don't need faith to take a keen interest in science. You don't need faith to test and verify hypothesis. All you need are tools, knowledge and an open mind, but as Fraggle once eloquently put it, "not so open your brain falls out". If you can give me a good reason to believe in 'language B', not just some hokum, but something I can observe or that at least has some shred of evidence, I'll believe it, but not until then.

-No, you don't need faith to experience science. You see things, thus you have faith that they're real.
-I did not need faith to experience the presence of spirits. I have seen them and felt them, and thus have faith that they're real.

Why do you imply that those who believe are in charge of "giving" you something you can "observe"?

Doomkid said:

All that said, I accept your right to believe in what you want, but once again, that aforementioned oppressive theological legislation is pretty fucking frustrating, but that's neither here nor there.

Not all religions are equal in that regard.

Sure Bowb said:

Look who's talking...

I wasn't suggesting you need to apply the same level of respectful debate towards me, heh. By all means, keep it street with me. Or playground, I guess. What I said still applies though.

fraggle said:

Interesting :)

Uhm. A malicious spirit altered what I could see? You can't deny that!

dew said:

I wasn't suggesting you need to apply the same level of respectful debate towards me, heh. By all means, keep it street with me. Or playground, I guess. What I said still applies though.
Uhm. A malicious spirit altered what I could see? You can't deny that!

Well, if anything I would like you to actually say something that goes beyond dropping a few lines here and there. It's easy to misunderstand you, if you don't give others more than that, you know?

Why don't we keep it "Café" for the time being?

Your idea of religion being dismissive towards science in general is not the way I'd go about it.

I think Mechazawa needs to read that more than anyone else in this thread, since he has clearly demonstrated himself to be religious and dismissive of science in general. He makes a mockery of a thing he relies on to live his everyday life. To equate science to a religion is absurdity, that's my point.

I would fight for a person's right to believe whatever they wish, so I don't exactly think of myself as in need of a lecture about acceptance, I just personally haven't ever once seen or felt a reason to believe in the supernatural. That's my personal choice based on my own experiences, no more, no less, but his dismissal of science is frankly disturbing and the fact that so many people would nod their heads reading his puerile post is a scary thought considering the implications it has for overall human progress. Dismissing science is to dismiss new inventions, new discoveries and new knowledge, there's really no two ways about it.

^you have just become one of my favourite human beings here on doomworld.

It's something that I find problematic too. The idea of religions being generally dismissve towards science, for instance, was a breeding ground for people deeming religion, and religious people, as "oddities", for lack of more polite term.

This is why I'm happy to be a Secular Jew. You get all the fun of the culture and the holidays with basically none of the commitment and horrible regressive carry over from the good old days. God doesn't exist for 90% of the day but when you make that light you really shouldn't have made you can still look at the sky and say, "thanks". And to top it all of you got the whole secret cabal running the world bit.

Tarnsman said:

This is why I'm happy to be a Secular Jew. You get all the fun of the culture and the holidays with basically none of the commitment and horrible regressive carry over from the good old days. God doesn't exist for 90% of the day but when you make that light you really shouldn't have made you can still look at the sky and say, "thanks". And to top it all of you got the whole secret cabal running the world bit.

Now I am curious...

How did you become a secular jew? How do you perceive your own religion, in terms of influence on you and those around you?

Sure Bowb said:

Thank you for your long reply.

Sure Bowb said:

The whole idea of convincing others is a flawed approach, to begin with. To convince someone, a prior decision of some sort is required. So, if you are convinced, that spirits don't exist, and then ask someone to convince you otherwise is about the same as asking someone to tell you, that your concept of life is wrong. That's why convincing is as much of a problem as proof is.

I'd certainly agree that trying to convince people to change their opinions on things like religion or politics is usually very difficult because these tend to be deep-rooted beliefs held over a long period of time, sometimes stretching back as far as childhood; often they're absorbed as part of a personal identity ("I'm a Christian", "I'm a conservative", etc.). So I can understand where you're coming from.

For most other things though it's usually not the case that things are so difficult. For example suppose I come to you saying "you know that we only use 10% of our brains ..." - it's easy for you to just reply "oh that's not true, check out this Wikipedia page about it". If I'm a reasonable person, read the page and don't have any strong objections to it, then I've learned something and changed my mind. For the most part there aren't any "brainists" out there who cling to a debunked idea like this and refuse to accept that it isn't true.

With certain things like this we inevitably come to a point where either something is true or it isn't. Either ghosts exist or they do not exist; one of us is wrong here. In a previous comment you mentioned that "reality is determined by everybody's personal perception", but we exist together in a shared universe for which we don't set the rules; as Douglas Adams put it, "reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away". If there's a brick wall in front of you then it won't disappear even if you have a deeply held belief that brick walls don't exist.

My point is that when we have a dispute about things like this it's usually possible to put things to the test and find out which of us is correct. If we're not sure about the 10% thing we can put someone in a brain scanner and find out; if we really doubt whether Cameroon exists we can book a plane flight and go there. While we're never going to convince ourselves on religious matters we can at least agree that the sky is blue and that gravity works in a particular way, since we can put these things to the test.

This is kind of why I asked about ghosts rather than religious beliefs. For the most part, the existence or nonexistence of ghosts is something that we ought to be able to test, at least in the sense that they're claimed to be something that really exists in a form we can potentially observe and interact with. That's why I asked my question the way I did - why doesn't everyone believe in them? This ought to be a question we can answer definitively just like any of the other things I mentioned above that really exist. Even when it comes to things which are invisible to the human eye (gases, microscopic life forms, subatomic particles, etc.) we can usually construct some kind of experiment to figure it out.

I expect Mechazawa is reading this now and crying "scientism! scientism!" but really I'm just talking about the shared reality we inhabit - putting things to the test and settling disputes. For the reasons I already explained above, reality is a neutral testing grounds - it doesn't matter what your religious beliefs are. When the results are in, if you're honest then you have to accept if you're wrong.

So it's frustrating when a seemingly-testable claim is answered with an array of what frankly seem like excuses. In a previous comment you mentioned that spirits "choose to not interact with you, or your surroundings". Maybe you're right, but all I'd say is that it's frustrating that your definition of "spirits" seems carefully constructed such that you can never be proved wrong. That whole neutral ground thing, where we can put things to the test and find out which of us is really right, has been torn up in a way that seems a bit like stacking the decks.

That's why in these discussions I tend to bring up the importance of things like falsifiability; making unfalsifiable claims is one of several techniques that's often used to trick people. But so that I'm not misunderstood; I don't say that to infer or ascribe any malice; as much as it's used to trick others, it's just as often a way of tricking oneself too.

Sure Bowb said:

Now I am curious...

How did you become a secular jew? How do you perceive your own religion, in terms of influence on you and those around you?

It's a cultural thing (a lot of religion is culture). You grow up Jewish because your parents are Jewish, and they're Jewish because their parents are Jewish and with each generation the faith aspect has become less and less important but you keep doing the other crap because it's fun and it's tradition.

Tarnsman said:

It's a cultural thing (a lot of religion is culture). You grow up Jewish because your parents are Jewish, and they're Jewish because their parents are Jewish and with each generation the faith aspect has become less and less important but you keep doing the other crap because it's fun and it's tradition.

I agree that religion has a big impact on the culture of people, even if they don't adhere to the faith. For example, I'm agnostic but I can see how the Catholicism has shaped me culturally. The same goes for protestants, and the concept of the "protestant work ethic".

fraggle said:

Uh, I deny that because it's not true. Those people believe in something, that doesn't mean they have proof of it. The idea that lots of people would believe in something that isn't true isn't surprising - history is littered with examples: here's a big ol' long list of them for your entertainment. Reality isn't determined by a democratic election and it's kind of sad that this is the best you can come up with.

Billions of people report a belief, not an experience, and those beliefs are not even consistent with each other. You are being intellectually dishonest when you use this argument.

You don't need to tell a lie to believe something that's wrong, you only need to be told it and believe it. But if we're being honest, isn't this literally a description of most religious institutions? They're organized groups, usually hierarchically organized, dedicated to promoting a particular belief (which for obvious reasons I'd characterize as an untruth). Why is the idea of an "orchestrated lie" so unreasonable?

You know that this nonsense makes you look really, really dumb, right? I think if you have some respect for yourself you should hold yourself to a higher standard of thought and debate.

1. I didn't say people "believe in it" per se I said people interact, ie. they put in input and they get a separate output, with spirit like entities. It is an interaction, an experience. That is *why* they believe it. You push the button you get the reward.

2. No, they report experiences. Consistent experiences between unrelated groups. They may call these things different things, angels, demons, jinn, "gods" and so on. But people do interact with things and they get results, that is why they do it. Just because *you* can't see it or *you* don't get results, is not their problem. It is your problem.

3. Except we are not talking about something that comes from one source, there is no "hierarchy" in control of the information, no authority to manipulate it. We are talking about completely unconnected separate groups, separated by time and space, reporting extremely consistent things. It is impossible that all of them came together one day to get their stories straight and then agree to lie about what they experienced as if it is some great conspiracy.

4. No, my Cameroon comment was the final nail in the coffin to the argument. You believe Cameroon exists only because people say it does and because a book told you. Unless you have been there this is 100% truth. If you believe whole religious communities can come together to lie about what they experience, why cant people come together to lie about the existence of a country? Have you been there? Did you experience this place? No? According to what is implied here, you cannot be sure Cameroon exists. Where is the proof it exists? I would like it. Can you prove to me Antarctica exists without appealing to a book, group of people, or an "authority" (which is less reliable than a group of people anyways)? I am dead serious.

@fraggle, I say scientism because science is through and through just *another* system we have to understand the world, it is not more valid than any other. It is not "more right" or anything of that nature. Not only that, science is a tool to measure probability, not actuality. Science can't tell you what actually is or is not, only what is likely based on a limited number of tests and assumptions. It doesn't matter if something does or does not conform with scientific assumptions. Nor does its non/conformity with science have any affect on whether something is true or not.

fraggle said:

Thank you for your long reply.

You're most welcome.

fraggle said:

For most other things though it's usually not the case that things are so difficult. For example suppose I come to you saying "you know that we only use 10% of our brains ..." - it's easy for you to just reply "oh that's not true, check out this Wikipedia page about it". If I'm a reasonable person, read the page and don't have any strong objections to it, then I've learned something and changed my mind. For the most part there aren't any "brainists" out there who cling to a debunked idea like this and refuse to accept that it isn't true.

This however is a case in which something can be measured and visualized by way of pictures or numbers, for example.

Granted, if I was "arty" I could draw you pictures as well, and say "This is what I have seen", but it still remains a picture as much this remains text.

Religion, spirits, demons and the likes are difficult topics to explain and agree on, doubly so when "being posessed by a demon", for instance, has been a way for people to come up with something that they otherwise could not explain themselves.

Throughout history, there are many cases in which people have been considered as posessed, eventhough they "simply" had epillepsy or other disorders, as you may know. This is playing a somehwat important role when it comes to proving things, since people eventually started to "condition" themselves and others into explaining things by way of science alone, because if science can explain it to the satisfaction of the audience, it is "good enough". And frankly, science is "good enough" for more things than we can possibly imagine even at this point in time, but that does make it the be all end all.

Again, I do not dismiss science. The point is, that science is very straight forward on a principle level, making it easy to get in to, and providing examples and proofs in a logical way for those who are interested in seeing them. This is something that religion can not do for you, or anyone else, for that matter. Science can measure, calculate, evaluate and much more, which is good, because it makes it applicable, but science can not "feel". Religion remains nothing but a fable for many people, because it is not straight forward at all times, at times contradicts itself, and the thought of following something (or someone) that you never see or feel in your life seems odd.

fraggle said:

With certain things like this we inevitably come to a point where either something is true or it isn't. Either ghosts exist or they do not exist; one of us is wrong here. In a previous comment you mentioned that "reality is determined by everybody's personal perception", but we exist together in a shared universe for which we don't set the rules; as Douglas Adams put it, "reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away". If there's a brick wall in front of you then it won't disappear even if you have a deeply held belief that brick walls don't exist.

I would actually like to take a step away from the idea of right or wrong here, because I think it is not the best of ideas to eventually fall into the trap of creating a "winner" and a "loser", for that matter.

When you never have "made contact", for lack of a better term, you are right in assuming that ghosts do not exist. For me it obviously is the other way around.

Yes, we do exist in the same shared universe, and the fact that we are discussing topics like this one makes "ghosts" a part of your reality as well, eventhough it may be in a somewhat limited fashion.

The issue with Douglas Adams' approach is that it only works on paper. If you stood in front of a brickwall, you could not make it disappear by thinking it did not exist, because of your inability to "convince" yourself that it is not real. You know there is a brickwall, and even if you close your eyes it is still there, furthermore closing your eyes does not make it any easier for you to convince yourself that the brickwall does not exist... It is there, and it is a part of your reality. For me, the brickwall you stood in front of does not exist, if you get where I come from.

On behalf of spirits and the likes, I can not think of them as being unreal for the same reason you can not think of the brickwall as unreal, this is the "dilemma", so to speak. No matter how hard I would try, I could not stop believing in them, because I "feel" them, for lack of a better expression. What you feel is real, to put it short.

fraggle said:

My point is that when we have a dispute about things like this it's usually possible to put things to the test and find out which of us is correct. If we're not sure about the 10% thing we can put someone in a brain scanner and find out; if we really doubt whether Cameroon exists we can book a plane flight and go there. While we're never going to convince ourselves on religious matters we can at least agree that the sky is blue and that gravity works in a particular way, since we can put these things to the test.

Like I said already, I really kept looking for the sake of being able to make up my mind. I have seen others being "in touch" with spirits long before it happened to me. To them it was real, and to me as well. Just watching it made it part of my own reality as well.

What is keeping you from putting spirits to the test, I wonder? This is where it becomes difficult for me to explain things, because I expect people to employ science alone to put things to the test. For me, using "lifeless, emotionless devices" in search for spirits is an exercise in futility.

If you ever got so angry that you felt like loosing control over yourself you can approach it by means of science, like measuring brain activity. Then you can compare it to a picture of your brain in state of "relief" and see a difference, but you can not reproduce the sensation of pure rage by looking at these pictures.

fraggle said:

This is kind of why I asked about ghosts rather than religious beliefs. For the most part, the existence or nonexistence of ghosts is something that we ought to be able to test, at least in the sense that they're claimed to be something that really exists in a form we can potentially observe and interact with. That's why I asked my question the way I did - why doesn't everyone believe in them? This ought to be a question we can answer definitively just like any of the other things I mentioned above that really exist. Even when it comes to things which are invisible to the human eye (gases, microscopic life forms, subatomic particles, etc.) we can usually construct some kind of experiment to figure it out.

If by testing you mean employing the aforementioned devices: No, I don't think you can do that.
If by testing you mean using your senses: Yes, you can do that, but I can not do it for you, neither can anyone else, for that matter.

You can interact with spirits, it is not even a necessarily complicated thing to learn and do, at least from my experience, eventough it took me some time. But before the "doing" there is always the "learning". In order to receive, one must give.

This is why science is "the one and only approach" for so many: Science can do what it does instead of you, to some degree at least. For instance science can explain momentum, and how directional thrust creates a sensation of "shifting gravity", however shifting gravity did not become a sensation you had, just because it has been explained to you.

fraggle said:

I expect Mechazawa is reading this now and crying "scientism! scientism!" but really I'm just talking about the shared reality we inhabit - putting things to the test and settling disputes. For the reasons I already explained above, reality is a neutral testing grounds - it doesn't matter what your religious beliefs are. When the results are in, if you're honest then you have to accept if you're wrong.

What manner of "dispute" is it that we have in the first place? I will stand by what I said already: I can't do it for you, as much as I'd like to, really. For me there is no actual dispute going on here. I mean, sure some disagree with either one of us, some just watch us writing stuff they will giggle about at times, but for me there still is no dispute of some sort, because I have no doubts, if that makes any sense.

Actually my reality, as much as my belief, is not only something others get involved in "passively", quite a few people, family, friends, even strangers at times, partake in my belief simply as benefitors, because of my training, and my knowledge about the healing properties of herbs, and the rituals I perform to make my "stuff" work properly. I became a Mambo for a reason, and as such I have certain responsibilities.

fraggle said:

So it's frustrating when a seemingly-testable claim is answered with an array of what frankly seem like excuses. In a previous comment you mentioned that spirits "choose to not interact with you, or your surroundings". Maybe you're right, but all I'd say is that it's frustrating that your definition of "spirits" seems carefully constructed such that you can never be proved wrong. That whole neutral ground thing, where we can put things to the test and find out which of us is really right, has been torn up in a way that seems a bit like stacking the decks.

"Seemingly" being key here...

By the same token it could be frustrating for me that you do not try to figure things out for yourself, and instead cling to your devices. It is not, but I hope you get the idea. ;-)

Some things you need to find out for yourself, and that is a good thing. That aside, own experience > booksmarts.

It is not "my definition" alone, I'd like to make that perfectly clear. Also, in what regard would this definition differentiate my belief from others, if I may ask? In every religion there is what many would call "higher being(s)", a "higher state of mind" (I don't quite like this expression, though), a different "plane of existance". Now you'll tell me that, if that was true, it would have been tested and proven ages ago, thus presenting an unfalsifiable statement. To me, the fact that it has not been proven by means of "measuring" is proof that measuring is the wrong approach, again another unfalsifiable claim. "Back to square one v2.0" ;-)

What is this neutral ground you speak of? Which one of us neutral? Which one of us has the "neutral stance"? Are you being neutral, because you want to employ science to have something proven? Or am I neutral, because I think you should take it into your own hands, if you want results?

As for my previous statement, I'd like to remind you that it was specific to an experience "Jello" had. He explained that his parents were certain about those ghosts, but he did not see them even once. Sure, he also mentioned that his parents may have had some schizophrenia-esque issues, which is why I'd say it is fair to have doubts about it. However I am not keen on dismissing "paranormal experiences" as a mere result of mental illness just because it's a possibility.

fraggle said:

That's why in these discussions I tend to bring up the importance of things like falsifiability; making unfalsifiable claims is one of several techniques that's often used to trick people. But so that I'm not misunderstood; I don't say that to infer or ascribe any malice; as much as it's used to trick others, it's just as often a way of tricking oneself too.

If by unfalsifiable you mean deeming something to be non-existant, because it has not been proven to you, I'd also consider this a bit of a problem ;-)

I get what you say, though. And most certainly people have built themselves a world of their own quite a few times. I wonder why that would be such a bad thing, after all, though. Why would there be a reason to prove them wrong, as long as they mean no harm to anybody?

Speaking of unfalsifiable, some priest wanted to prove the existance of god to me somewhat like this: "If you put 2 ants in a card-board-box without them noticing, and one of them said they have been put there, while the other one disagrees, which ant would be right?" And I was like, "Well I have not been put here. I was born here as a natural result of my parents' spare-time activities, but thanks anyways." So, I've had my share of "bold claims" as well.

Mechazawa said:

No, my Cameroon comment was the final nail in the coffin to the argument. You believe Cameroon exists only because people say it does and because a book told you. Unless you have been there this is 100% truth. If you believe whole religious communities can come together to lie about what they experience, why cant people come together to lie about the existence of a country? Have you been there? Did you experience this place? No? According to what is implied here, you cannot be sure Cameroon exists. Where is the proof it exists? I would like it. Can you prove to me Antarctica exists without appealing to a book, group of people, or an "authority" (which is less reliable than a group of people anyways)? I am dead serious.

I can go book a flight to Cameroon literally right this instant. When you can book a flight to heaven we'll talk. That's the difference. With one you can test what the authority says yourself. With the other you can't. Sorry they will never ever be the same thing.

*Just mentally insert like 50 laughing anime girl gifs here, fedora guy, checkmate atheists guy, that gif of rap battle people freaking out, michael jackson eating popcorn, and pretty much any other obnoxious shit post material you can think of here*

Tarnsman said:

I can go book a flight to Cameroon literally right this instant. When you can book a flight to heaven we'll talk.

I love practical approaches like this one. Seriously.

Tarnsman said:

With one you can test what the authority says yourself. With the other you can't. Sorry they will never ever be the same thing.

I will have to disagree here, unfortunately, because this example is not applicable to all religions.

Furthermore, the fact that "one does not simply lay down money" in exchange for proof does not rule out the fact that you can still experience things for yourself, if you so chose. That's what makes them different from one another.

Sure Bowb said:

On behalf of spirits and the likes, I can not think of them as being unreal for the same reason you can not think of the brickwall as unreal, this is the "dilemma", so to speak. No matter how hard I would try, I could not stop believing in them, because I "feel" them, for lack of a better expression. What you feel is real, to put it short.

Like I said already, I really kept looking for the sake of being able to make up my mind. I have seen others being "in touch" with spirits long before it happened to me. To them it was real, and to me as well. Just watching it made it part of my own reality as well.

If you ever got so angry that you felt like loosing control over yourself you can approach it by means of science, like measuring brain activity. Then you can compare it to a picture of your brain in state of "relief" and see a difference, but you can not reproduce the sensation of pure rage by looking at these pictures.

If by testing you mean employing the aforementioned devices: No, I don't think you can do that.
If by testing you mean using your senses: Yes, you can do that, but I can not do it for you, neither can anyone else, for that matter.

You can interact with spirits, it is not even a necessarily complicated thing to learn and do, at least from my experience, eventough it took me some time. But before the "doing" there is always the "learning". In order to receive, one must give.

Do you realize that your perception of an experience may not be accurate of the experience itself? You "feel" spirits or whatever. You've experienced them, so you believe they exist. Unless you take the bias out of the equation(yourself and others) and factor out all possibilities, you really have no idea at all what the actual nature of your experiences were. You just assume its spirits because other people told you that and it makes sense to you. You do no further investigation. The modern world will pass you closed-minded people up, rightfully, as it progresses. You close your mind because you cannot accept that all personal experience is always marred by bias. Rational inquiry takes away bias to find the true nature of experience because it builds civilization and betters humanity as a whole. The less close-minded people we have to deal with, the better off we all will be.

Mechazawa said:

1. I didn't say people "believe in it" per se I said people interact, ie. they put in input and they get a separate output, with spirit like entities. It is an interaction, an experience. That is *why* they believe it. You push the button you get the reward.

2. No, they report experiences. Consistent experiences between unrelated groups. They may call these things different things, angels, demons, jinn, "gods" and so on. But people do interact with things and they get results, that is why they do it. Just because *you* can't see it or *you* don't get results, is not their problem. It is your problem.

I don't deny that people have religious experiences. Those people might reasonably claim those experiences as a basis for their beliefs (I don't believe those experiences are really evidence that supports those beliefs, but I at least understand why they would find them personally compelling).

But what percentage of people holding religious faiths have religious experiences? The majority of people hold religious faiths because they were raised with religious upbringings (the geographical distribution of religions is evidence enough for this). You conflate religious believers with people who have religious experiences, and claim that "billions of people" have such experiences. I don't think that's true and I think it's dishonest of you to claim so.

Mechazawa said:

3. Except we are not talking about something that comes from one source, there is no "hierarchy" in control of the information, no authority to manipulate it. We are talking about completely unconnected separate groups, separated by time and space, reporting extremely consistent things. It is impossible that all of them came together one day to get their stories straight and then agree to lie about what they experienced as if it is some great conspiracy.

• You assume that "extremely consistent things [experiences]" necessarily implies a higher source that is responsible for those experiences, when this is not the only explanation for such consistency, nor is it even the simplest explanation. An alternative explanation is that such experiences are a result of human biology.
  
  As an analogy, many people who take psychedelic drugs report having consistent experiences (brightly enhanced colors, seeing fractal patterns, etc.). We shouldn't be surprised by this considering we all have broadly the same biology. Plenty of writers have documented similarities between religious experiences and drug experiences (Huxley's Doors of Perception, etc. etc.); the human body is a complex chemical system and it's really not so unreasonable to believe that religious rituals can trigger chemical changes that we should expect to be similar regardless of belief system or culture.
  
  
• You appear to assume that I think people are lying about the religious experiences they have. I don't; I just don't agree that such experiences are evidence of anything in particular, any more than I think someone taking DMT and hallucinating alien creatures can reasonably be considered evidence of such creatures existing.
  

Mechazawa said:

If you believe whole religious communities can come together to lie about what they experience

I don't. I'm not going to dignify any of the rest of this "Cameroon" argument with a response, because it's so silly it honestly doesn't deserve one.

insanoflex312 said:

Do you realize that your perception of an experience may not be accurate of the experience itself? You "feel" spirits or whatever. You've experienced them, so you believe they exist.

So far, so good...

insanoflex312 said:

Unless you take the bias out of the equation(yourself and others) and factor out all possibilities, you really have no idea at all what the actual nature of your experiences were.

It's not like something happened and I was dead set on it without any further consideration.

insanoflex312 said:

You just assume its spirits because other people told you that and it makes sense to you. You do no further investigation

See above... Furthermore, unless you know what I have been doing, you'd best not be so quick to judge.

insanoflex312 said:

The modern world will pass you closed-minded people up, rightfully, as it progresses.

Let's see about that. Oh, and you're talking about bias? Most interesting...

insanoflex312 said:

You close your mind because you cannot accept that all personal experience is always marred by bias.

As do you, so what was it that you had in mind when you came up with this?

insanoflex312 said:

Rational inquiry takes away bias to find the true nature of experience because it builds civilization and betters humanity as a whole. The less close-minded people we have to deal with, the better off we all will be.

Right... So I am close minded... You, for that matter, are right about me without even knowing me personally, also you are not biased in any way, shape or form. I love me a good laugh...

So mankind will be better off the less close minded people "we" have to deal with? Funny how the most ignorant of people tend think they can lecture anyone they want to, just because they're different.

Consider yourself a part of the problem.

fraggle said:

I don't deny that people have religious experiences. Those people might reasonably claim those experiences as a basis for their beliefs (I don't believe those experiences are really evidence that supports those beliefs, but I at least understand why they would find them personally compelling).

That, right there, is what I call being open-minded.

fraggle said:

But what percentage of people holding religious faiths have religious experiences? The majority of people hold religious faiths because they were raised with religious upbringings (the geographical distribution of religions is evidence enough for this). You conflate religious believers with people who have religious experiences, and claim that "billions of people" have such experiences. I don't think that's true and I think it's dishonest of you to claim so.

Religious experiences are not considered to be "common" anymore. It is worth noting however, that what a religious experience is, varies from one religion to another.

I will have to agree in reference to what tarnsman said earlier. Religion can just as well be part of a culture, and thus be part of "daily routine" that you just grow up with.

fraggle said:

• You assume that "extremely consistent things [experiences]" necessarily implies a higher source that is responsible for those experiences, when this is not the only explanation for such consistency, nor is it even the simplest explanation. An alternative explanation is that such experiences are a result of human biology

Which is especially true when certain religious practices involve "certain substances", or "cleansing the body" by not eating for days and the likes.

fraggle said:

As an analogy, many people who take psychedelic drugs report having consistent experiences (brightly enhanced colors, seeing fractal patterns, etc.). We shouldn't be surprised by this considering we all have broadly the same biology. Plenty of writers have documented similarities between religious experiences and drug experiences (Huxley's Doors of Perception, etc. etc.); the human body is a complex chemical system and it's really not so unreasonable to believe that religious rituals can trigger chemical changes that we should expect to be similar regardless of belief system or culture.

Also agree here. Which is part of why skepticism is important. However I think that "chemical changes" are rather a matter of what sort of chemicals are being consumed prior to, or during rituals.

fraggle said:

You appear to assume that I think people are lying about the religious experiences they have. I don't; I just don't agree that such experiences are evidence of anything in particular, any more than I think someone taking DMT and hallucinating alien creatures can reasonably be considered evidence of such creatures existing.

See above... As far as DMT goes, I'd very much like to employ science here. It is known what DMT does, it has been experimented with in controlled environments, and I will strongly agree that, whatever people have seen during said "trips", it is nothing I'd consider as a proof without a shadow of a doubt.

Sure Bowb said:

The issue with Douglas Adams' approach is that it only works on paper. If you stood in front of a brickwall, you could not make it disappear by thinking it did not exist, because of your inability to "convince" yourself that it is not real. You know there is a brickwall, and even if you close your eyes it is still there, furthermore closing your eyes does not make it any easier for you to convince yourself that the brickwall does not exist... It is there, and it is a part of your reality. For me, the brickwall you stood in front of does not exist, if you get where I come from.

I'm afraid I don't.

Sure Bowb said:

When you never have "made contact", for lack of a better term, you are right in assuming that ghosts do not exist. For me it obviously is the other way around.
....
If by testing you mean using your senses: Yes, you can do that, but I can not do it for you, neither can anyone else, for that matter.
....
You can interact with spirits, it is not even a necessarily complicated thing to learn and do, at least from my experience, eventough it took me some time. But before the "doing" there is always the "learning". In order to receive, one must give.

Suppose that I did everything you said, and after much effort I fail to have any interaction with the spirits you mention. I have to assume that you believe such a result is possible.

What would be your response to this result? Because I'm guessing the response would be something like: you haven't made contact yet; you have to give more before you receive; you aren't doing it right; you're being too skeptical; you're the one holding yourself back, etc. Is that right?

This for me is the problem, because it sets up a double standard - if you follow the ritual and get the intended result, it's evidence it's true, but if you don't get the result it's because you were doing it wrong. And not wanting to turn the discussion uncivil or insulting here, but this is the kind of mental trick that's commonly used by cults and con-artists. Go and read about Scientology's practices for example.

I don't think for a second that what you believe is anything like Scientology or any of those cults by any means. But my point is that those groups use tricks to mislead people and lie to them. I don't want to be lied to in this way; sticking to what's objectively observable and repeatable is a way to avoid this.

Sure Bowb said:

If by unfalsifiable you mean deeming something to be non-existant, because it has not been proven to you, I'd also consider this a bit of a problem ;-)

No - by falsifiable I mean that it can be disproved. It doesn't sound like your beliefs can ever be disproved and you seem to admit this ("You're free to [...] try to convince me that I'm wrong, but you won't succeed"). Anybody can be wrong and deluding themselves about the things they believe, but in your case it seems like there's no way you can ever know this - apart from falsifiability what criteria would you use to distinguish your beliefs from delusions?

What ever happened to,

"I can't explain this, and I'm not going to try to explain it, because my perspective is imperfect and the experience can not be recreated within my limited means."

There does not have to be a ghost. There does not have to be a hoax. There is no alien visitation. You're just ignorant by the dictionary definition. That's not a value judgment. If you want to believe in the supernatural, that's fine. They used to say the gods caused the sun and rain. No one can disprove the hurricane is not the wrath of gods. It's impossible to prove a negative in most situations.

It would be absolutely incredible if you have absolutely no idea why something happened, then you explain, A-ha!. "It was caused by the supernatural, and I figured it out!" If you want to believe in that, it's fine and it's harmless. But if someone doesn't believe you, chances are good that outside of yourself, you are so, so, so wrong. That's not a value judgment. It just means that someone out there could probably explain wtf happened to you, but you cannot.

Belief in the supernatural and religion can probably be explained by: "humans want to be able to explain why something happened because it allows us to adapt to our environment".