Exceptional evidence
Posted by kamarling at 08:32, 22 Feb 2010Another current thread here is asking (and answering) questions about the relationship between science and philosophy. This post was prompted by that discussion but as the latter has over 40 entries and still growing, I thought I'd ask this question separately.
What I really want is an insight into the thinking of the sceptic. I want to know whether scepticism is driven by philosophical bias or by the belief that no evidence exists for the things about which they are sceptical. I know there are sceptics, philosophical materialists and debunkers who read the stories and comments on this web site. I hope that some of you might respond in an open and informative manner.
Here's my problem in a nutshell: there is evidence out there in support of phenomena such as Out of Body Experiences, NDE's, telepathy, reincarnation ... the list goes on and on. Some of the evidence is admittedly weak. Some is not. Some evidence comes from studies by well qualified researchers. Sometimes this evidence is attacked using not-so-fair tactics by the debunkers while, on the other hand, there are bogus psychics and bandwagon gurus. Why is it then that all - rather than just some - of this evidence is ignored? What makes you so sure that people who take such evidence seriously are either deluded or liars and cheats? Honestly, I do want to understand.
Let's take NDE's, for example. People all over the world, from different cultures and with different religious and secular beliefs, have reported such experiences. If taken individually, probably not one of these reported cases represents the silver bullet: the paradigm breaker. But surely the sheer volume of anectdotal evidence must count for something? Can you just dismiss it all with an imperious wave of the hand?
Add in the other supporting evidence from telepathy studies and other anomalies and can you not admit that there is a rather compelling case that something is going on that just doesn't fit with the current orthodox materialist view?
I know why my philosophy - at least in part - is what it is. As a teenager I had, like all teenagers, a crisis of belief. I was brought up to go to Sunday school every week, I studied scriptures and I sat with the local vicar and talked about parables and miracles. At some point the vicar was unable or unwilling to answer my doubts. I questioned the orthodox views of the church and found them wanting. For a while, I switched sides completely and became an atheist (at the same time my politics lurched leftwards and I started calling myself a communist). It didn't take long for my mind to start asking questions of the scientific, materialist orthodoxy and I found that wanting too. My parents died within two years of each other during my mid-to-late teens. Where had they gone? I was convinced that I could still feel them around. My step mother came to me in dreams and showed me her new surroundings.
Now I was confused. I had developed a keen appreciation of some of the things going on at the boundaries of science. I was excited by relativity and quantum mechanics and cosmology. On the other hand, I was driven to find out whether there were such things as ghosts or a spirit world. Whether life ended in oblivion or transition.
Forty years on and I'm still trying to reconcile those two sides of my psyche. I have friends who are hard line materialists and others who are New Age adherents and I feel comfortable in the company of either. I respect both but I can't seem to grasp why their views are so irreconcilable.
Dave.
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Comments
3 June 2008
8 weeks 5 days
I have also found it difficult to reconcile science with anecdotal emotional evidence.
I have had many experiences of one kind or another which convince me there is something else to life that science can't answer. Yet, science has managed to answer a lot of things so I can't discount that either.
One thing I have learned is that scientists are not taught HOW to deduce a conclusion from data, only how to collect data. Some people are excellent at drawing conclusions whilst others find it impossible to understand.
I don't like the way there is an "official view" whether it be historic, scientifice, psychological, or any other concept you wish to consider. One thing that I know is true, is there will always be exceptions, a flaw, which the majority, often official, view cannot incorporate. That is why any theory must have an ambiguous element to it, to allow the exceptions to be incorporated.
Science by its very nature cannot allow that. It has to be precise and definite. Nothing wishy washy is allowed.
It doesn't help when scientists refuse to follow an experiment precisely, thinking that if the premise is right it can be adapted to any situation. First a person who is a scientist and interested in another scientist's conclusions from an experiment, must follow the original experiment precisely to ensure that they understand fully whay such a conclusion was considered viable. Instead, many devise experiments in a different context, and if they can't replicate it in their way they say the original experiment was flawed. Sorry, but that is bad science, and many respected scientists do exactly this.
For me, the reason so many unnatural things happen, such as NDEs, OBE, telepathy, precognition, is down to the amount of emotion we emit at the time, how close we are to the subject, and how focused we are at the time.
For me, often the most successful unusual incidents happen when we are not too emotionally focused on the subject, but are often distracted by something else, so allowing thoughts and energies to bypass the usual route and come up unexpectedly into the conscious.
This has happened to me so often. We often hear we are supposed to concentrate on a picture to send telepathically to another person, but this rarely works, because we have so much emotional energy being expended that it jams the signal we wish to send. Any telepathic message that arrives or is sent in my experiences is under low emotional content. But if you try to have NO emotional feeling at all, the signal will fail too, for it requires some energy signal to be generated. The key is how much is required.
We also have to look at the stress levels a person has been under, and the amount of food and drink they have been having, as well as the level of health and fitness. There are so many variables that it becomes difficult to replicate a telepathic experiment under controlled conditions. The very point of "controlling" the experiment puts stress and emotional pressure on the subjects involved.
Does this help at all?
For something to survive and thrive something else must die.
Carol A Noble
26 June 2005
2 days 22 hours
Thank you Carol and yes, I can identify with much of what you have written.
May I ask from what perspective you speak? Scientist or researcher or, like myself, interested layperson?
These anomalies - exceptions as you call them - have the potential to be the paradigm breakers. What I find difficult to accept, much as I respect the achievements of scientists, is the refusal to consider anything that doesn't fit. Only today a group of British MP's produced a report recommending the withdrawal of public funding for Homeopathic treatment centres becuase scientists say it doesn't work. Well, many who have been treated might argue with that but what annoyed me was the statement from the scientists who helped compile the report to the effect that "it can't work because we would have to turn our understanding of chemistry on its head if it did".
I don't know enough about homeopathy to become an advocate for its effectiveness, but I have heard this kind of argument before, as in: "Paranormal phenomena can't exist because we would have to abandon hundreds of years of progress in physics just to accommodate them."
It seems to me that the history of science is littered with discoveries that "didn't fit". Michaelson and Morley were supposed to prove the existence of the aether but their experiment failed to do so and showed just the opposite, which overturned all confident expectations at the time. Similarly, Einstein objected to quantum entanglement - he mockingly called it "spooky action at a distance". John Bell produced a theorem and Alain Aspect set up an experiment which proved Einstein and his supporters wrong and the spooky stuff was indeed happening. I'm sure there are so many such examples.
Nevertheless, my bias may be showing again and the purpose of this thread is to try to understand why sceptics are so quick to dismiss all evidence suggestive of these troublesome anomalies.
Dave.
Wanted: More White Crows ... http://whitecrows.davidsmuse.co.uk
21 February 2009
1 day 3 hours
Hi Dave,
Great topic! No doubt there will be lots of thoughts.
In one respect I don’t think it is too hard to understand skepticism, we need look no further than ourselves. Without meaning to sound personal your own skepticism of ‘orthodox’ materialism is no more or less ‘skeptical’ than any other, given the lack of evidence that all of the things you describe will not one day fit into a new material system, just like the bending of time, or quantum entanglement have done.
I suppose that to adjust my own skepticism so that it’s parallels with your own can be seen we must use similar language to show the similarities. Your concern about ‘orthodox materialism’ is probably similar to my own problems with ‘orthodox magic’.
What is described here as materialist science may well already be on the verge of descriptions of how many paranormal phenomena occur. I know it is strange to think that the 95% of paranormal phenomena that become ‘explained by natural means’ still have something to say about the paranormal and about materialism. We can either look at this as science excluding the paranormal, or coming to include it. Each discovery that has implications for paranormal belief does not either exclude or include it, understanding what has previously been defined as paranormal just moves the definitions, in affect moving us. Everything can be seen as paranormal, and we just have explanations of it. We play with terms and definitions and our meaning of them, more than play with the universe, dividing it in ways that affect meaning.
The result of this is that we need not disembowel the philosophy of knowledge, or that we are capable of understanding things. We need not decide for philosophical reasons that we cannot know things, simply because what we know appears to conflict with what we hope may be true.
So what is skepticism and how do we tell who the skeptics are? Looking to my own science; am I the skeptic for understanding and believing in the evidence that the Earth is 4.65 billion years old and that the young earth creationists are wrong? Or are the young earth creationists the skeptics for dismissing all the geological and radiometric physics and evidence? Or are we both just skeptical of each other and is one in a position to be skeptical of the other, while the other is not?
The hardest thing here is the role of education. The only way to make a judgment about geologists vs. young earth creationists is to become educated in the arguments of both. A philosophical discussion may well feel like it has reached a conclusion on the matter, which most likely will include the fact that certainty is impossible and even given the weight of geological evidence there is still the chance that the young earthers are right.
To me as a scientist though this is missing the point; we do not just have two positions here. Not just geology vs. biblical creation. In a wider context we need to judge the evidence of each suggestion not just side by side, but against a theoretical infinity of suggestions. The infinity does no serve to reduce all possibilities as if we had divided by infinity, but to remind us to judge each based on its merits.
So for NDE’s and OBE’s we are not just dealing with spirituality and the soul vs. meaningless materialism. There are all sorts of possibilities. OBE, NDE, telepathy, clairvoyance; these things have become the symbols of paranormal possibility, but this is entangled with spirituality, religion, and peoples politics of meaning and hope. There is also a strong undercurrent of thought that these things must not be compatible with materialism. Not simply that the modern knowledge structure does not currently incorporate it, but that it can never ever ever do so. Philosophically that it must never do so, hence terms such as materialism existing in the first place, when you will note that this term does not exist in any sense other than to philosophically attack the modern knowledge construct from a spiritual perspective.
For these reasons the paranormal has become entangled with spirituality in a way that I think people can find disconcerting when science suggests reasons that step on peoples hope. Clairvoyance and telepathy may well be down to quantum entanglement, there is certainly no reason not to suspect this, but if they are then many people will not find this answer comforting, it will not be the ‘magic’ people hope for. If it is not down to quantum entanglement and it down to a new energy field then its easy inclusion into materialism may also cause unhappiness in many people.
I think the greater issue here is the afterlife. I don’t think people really care about whether materialism really is the prejudiced philosophical enterprise some define it as (it isn’t), but whether it impacts, redefines, or affects people’s hopes of living after death. Passions of the paranormal center around this.
NDE’s and OBE’s exist. This is not unknown to science. There is plenty of research occurring from both directions. There are plenty of ideas about what could be going on. So long as ideas are being generated and tested then I don’t see a problem. Perhaps we live after death, perhaps only fractured memories in a pool of universal consciousness do. Maybe the amazing abilities of the mind construct them all on their own, maybe this is mixed with a little quantum fuzziness, entanglement and universe splitting to create situations that are so far beyond our normal everyday life we have no language other than paranormal and spiritual to phrase them in.
I do not know if you can be skeptical if there is no answer. Is it even the right word? What would I be if I disagreed with the idea that the heart pumps blood around the body; a skeptic or stupid?
I am no longer skeptical of igneous petrology or mountain building. I am skeptical about the number of dimensions in the universe. I am no longer skeptical about evolution, but I am about the precise pathway to the human brain. I am not skeptical about vertebrate evolution, but I am open minded to panspermia. I am not skeptical about OBE and NDE experiences, but I am about the different explanations for them, at least until we amass the evidence needed to elucidate them. Knowledge and skepticism do not occur in isolation though. You will be skeptical of things I understand and vice-versa. We need to be open to the fact that skepticism can occur simply because of a lack of education. Do mountains grow because of NDE’s, the earths crust pushed up a little by energy released each time a person has an NDE? Your skepticism of this idea will differ to mine because our relative understanding of mountain building differs.
All of this role’s into what skepticism is- at least for me; right now. Really the only way to understand why scientists (though we could use the word people too) take issue with anything is to learn the science, but I can almost guarantee that doing so will not make things easier.
26 June 2005
2 days 22 hours
Thanks again for your comments. Once again I need to get ready for work but can't resist tapping out a few lines in response.
You put the case for the open minded sceptic very well but do you really think that your colleagues and peers have your self-restraint? I don't like ther terms "super"natural or "para"normal either but it is difficult to avoid them when writing about such subject matter. Likewise "materialism". My worldview encompasses the material but the materialist stops right there at the material, i.e. that which can be explained in terms of physics as we presently understand it. I think that all explanations are, by definition, natural but it is the materialist who takes issue with this and wishes to exclude those things presently labelled "para" or "super". You claim that I and others use the term "materialist" as a pejorative and maybe there is some truth in that but please take note of your own use of the term "magic" to describe those things not accommodated in the so-called natural world.
Now, on the face of it, it might seem that we are saying the same thing but I don't think so. Yes, science may well find ways to explain these phenomena but I don't think it will be able to do so without radically expanding its horizons. Exactly what kind of explanation would be acceptable to present-day scientists? Again your reply suggests that there is a lot of research going into providing such explanations but nothing could be further from the truth. There are any number of accounts, by scientists, of attempts to get funding for such research being consistently refused. Anyone who does choose this kind of research puts his or her career at risk just by association with the subject. Is this not the case? Unless, of course you include the kind of grants allowed for Richard Wiseman to rig up one of his debunking exercises. That's not what I would call serious research.
I'd love to carry on but I will be late if I linger longer. I'll check in with anticipation later in the day.
Dave.
Wanted: More White Crows ... http://whitecrows.davidsmuse.co.uk
21 February 2009
1 day 3 hours
You claim that I and others use the term "materialist" as a pejorative and maybe there is some truth in that but please take note of your own use of the term "magic" to describe those things not accommodated in the so-called natural world.
Your right here. There is a high degree of symmetry in the way we might use these words (which again serves to show how alike we all are even through our differences). I haven't really defined what i mean by 'magic' in the pejorative sense, even to myself. I haven't thought about it as much as i like. I guess i would define it as a philosophical preference towards the desire for science to be incapable of adjusting to favoured explanations of unexplaned phenomena.
So far the scientific approach is one of holistics. I know that might seem an abuse of new age language, but lets consider. So far the thrust of the attempt has been to unify everything into one whole. So we can, roughly, go from quantum principles and up through atoms to stars and galaxies, planets, planetary dynamics and geology, through organic chemistry and evolution to life as we know it. Very small to very big, very simple to very complex. All in an holistic structure. Granted that there are still unknowns, but what is now is known is working very well as a rough description, precise in many parts.
Magic, as i used it before, describes the philosophical position that unexplained phenomena will not fit into this holistic approach, something i disagree with.
Perhaps a better word is needed. Magic in my childhood meant clicking your fingers and things happening without causal reasoning; without underpinning mechanics. If something has underpinning mechanics then it is material, if it does not and just manages to work without any reason why then it is magic.
I also think that the difference between plain philosophical issues and personal idea preference shows in how all this is being expressed. If it was a problem with science per-se or scientific philosophy then people would be up in arms about every claim, through quantum physics, x-ray crystallography, igneous chemical weathering or phase change disgrams, etc etc etc. They are not. They care about the hypothesis they most favour and interact through either evidence or philosophy in defense of them. How this works in the scientific community and the general public depends on what is cared about and why. Anything related to life after death is a particular hotbed for all the special cultural and personal reasons. It is here, so to speak, that the battle is occuring (not in xray crystallography).
I don't know. To me it is fairly plain and simple - the usual criticism of materialism is incorrect. That does not mean that i don't see your point though. There are positions where i think you are right, just not about materialism per-se - more about individuals particular tastes for ideas. Materialism is quite capable of absorbing universal consciousness or even God with the proviso that there is some type of description possible, else we defer to NOMA. Bare in mind that theologian’s usual attempts to describe God as an infinitely simple, single, undivided, uniform being, of no internal complexity, but of amazing sophistication, power, knowledge and ability is probably not compatible with modern mechanical materialism. If God was made of something though and its abilities were understandable, even if the context of that understanding is something far outside of what we have today, then I see no reason why it could not fall under the materialism of causal reasoning and mechanics. So long as something has an explanation to be discovered then it should fall under this.
The problem i think more lies with individual’s opinions on the subject (and yes, even the majority opinion). It is not materialism that is in philosophical contest with an afterlife in science, but trying to place the idea of a soul in the context of biological evolution. Or at least this is where I stumble.
We must remember that the notion of a soul comes from a very poor intellectual heritage. Resistance to scholarly input over the past lets say 1500 years and in particular the last 200 has left the soul largely un-updated in light of various discoveries. There has been a movement to protect the soul, not by updating its possibilities, but by protecting it using every philosophical trick in the book. I think it is from this heritage that our conflict arises.
Updated versions may well have fewer problems to those educated in the natural sciences, but the ancient version is too full of holes. There are so many questions to ask of it in light of modern discoveries, so many that have not only not been answered, but have been shrouded in protective philosophy, that the whole subject is mired in this bog. Of course there are people who have risen above this, but quite often, even at the grail, it is difficult when reading articles by researchers in the field to pick the science from the theology and philosophy.
So why do many individuals rule out the idea of a soul? I’m not sure. I could write a post longer than this on the various reasons. I think quite a bit of it comes down to the formulation of the question though.
We either accept evidence or we do not. I don’t mean philosophically here (though at first root this would be a good place to start). I mean we either accept a baseline standard for evidence of different types and then we either include this in our deliberations, or we do not. So we can either go with medieval Christian notions of the soul, or we can try and adopt the idea in light of evidence. We know a great deal about the brain. We are still free to say that consciousness is something else, but we know a little about that too. Hypothesis of the soul in the general public operate under different conditions (comfort/happiness/religious compatibility) than in science, and it should be no surprise when these hypothesis enter the scientific arena and are refuted. That is obvious, of more interest though is how both science and those presenting better ideas of the soul relate and interact. In a world of genetics, biological and neurological evolution, as well as neurological anatomy plus inputs now from computer science and biological computing, information theory, etc hypothesis of the soul have to update to remain competitive descriptions. Over the past couple of hundred years geology has trounced biblical literalism, alongside astronomy relegating genesis to metaphor and fairytale. Biological evolution and the fossil record have done the same to the idea of special creation [and us in the image of God]. I think that it is the use of obsolete models of the soul that renders much of this type of research outside of the mainstream, this and the limited scientific input mixed with stronger overtones of theology and philosophy.
To get back on topic
[1] Yes, science may well find ways to explain these phenomena but I don't think it will be able to do so without radically expanding its horizons. [2]Exactly what kind of explanation would be acceptable to present-day scientists?
1) Perhaps. If you are right then I don’t think it matters. Science is absolutely bound to radically expand its ideas and horizons. The debate rests on what we can claim rightly or wrongly about the unknown right now based on what we think we do understand.
2) That’s a funny question as I would need to poll every one of them. The consensus is a funny thing as it can change overnight, but at the same time it does apply its own pressure. I guess there is a pressure on me to conform to say the normal interpretation of radiometric data etc, but at the same time I am entirely free to discuss a scientific paper that draws attention to uncertainty in say crystal selection in zircon ring dating. As has often been said, get a paper published and peer reviewed and we shall discuss it. No easy thing of course, but nor should it be. Bias against types of research? I don’t have an answer to that, only to say that I really wish I could see the research proposals being turned down – to make my own decision as to why.
Bias is a very annoying thing. If you or I make an application for something that seems impossible then it goes without saying that our application must be very good indeed to beat someone else to the money. This is where more updated models of the soul may help. Having said that sometimes accusations of lack of funding or available research are deceptive. Homeopaths are quite good at claiming that more research needs to be done, when plenty has, as are creationists. Afterlife research is a pain – no doubt about that. Large amounts are not being spent on it and in normal academic institutions there is little doubt that you will not find much/anything being spent. There are respected paranormal research institutions though and I see these as part of the academic environment, not as something outside of it (because they are staffed by people with PHd’s and professors – even if not publicly funded). There is no lack of intellectual capital and they certainly have more money than I could ever dream of, which should be plenty, not to win the world over maybe, but to make a case. You do not need vast amounts of money to win out if you are right (Einstein for example managed it with far less). This is not a court case where we need to employ expensive lawyers. We just need to devise a single repeatable experiment that has an undeniable positive outcome. This may be impossible though (given rarity of events and complications in assessing evidence). In which case standard practice of acceptance and incorporation alongside things like biological evolution is not going to occur (remember that the soul hypothesis is competing with others, even if you do not think they are right). You have to ask yourself whether you would want the soul hypothesis including based on those standards. There are a million things that would enter the scientific cannon if we accepted those standards, and most of them would be a waste of money, time, and given the importance of most scientific applications, lives. We shouldn’t make an exception for an idea just because it is popular. I can think of no answer to the accusations of bias and funding problems though. Maybe we would be just around the corner if more was given. Things have swung the way of the mechanical clockwork quantum universe, and of biological evolution generating the brain and mind. I have no answer to that, other than people supporting the soul hypothesis will have to update and up their game irrespective of situations of fairness.
26 June 2005
2 days 22 hours
Such a long post is almost impossible to answer point by point, especially as I don't have your scientific training so I can't comment on many of the things you mention. So I'll have to summarize my impressions - which may well be entirely wrong so I'll say so up front.
The whole thing, Daydreamer, does nothing to shift my view that you are mired in in the propaganda of the academic orthodoxy. You speak in triumphant terms about how your field of science has "trounced" biblical stories and genesis fairy-tales. I thought I was reading a Dawkins quote for a moment or two. You also speak of medieval notions of the soul which are perhaps in need of being exposed to the "light of evidence". Look at your terminology: "fairytales" and "medieval" against the "light of evidence". Perhaps the biblical stories were never intended to be taken literally? Perhaps they hinted at a deeper truth, for "those that have eyes to see and ears to hear". Agreed, religious fundamentalists are generally literalists but they are easy targets. There is a core of wisdom in all religions that transcends the superficial. When you look deep enough, there are some concepts remarkably similar to comparatively recent scientific theories.
... I see no reason why it could not fall under the materialism of causal reasoning and mechanics.
Therein lies the rub. Causal reasoning and mechanics. I think you are saying that every effect must have some kind of mechanical cause, i.e. some kind of physical force acting upon it. Therefore somthing could not be created out of nothing, God could not have dreamed up a universe, thoughts have no kinetic power, a particle on one side of the universe could not be affected by its partner particle on the other side of the universe. This has absolutely nothing to do with x-ray crystallography or how clever we have become at defining physical processes. This is simple theology: it is "I believe in ...".
I'll repeat what I said earlier ... you have put boundaries on your horizons.
Dave.
Wanted: More White Crows ... http://whitecrows.davidsmuse.co.uk
21 February 2009
1 day 3 hours
This reminds me of my Hypothesis Landscape conjecture. Ultimately we are all only dealing with hypothesis. It just depends on what you want out of them. Truth? Beauty? Comfort? Explanatory power? Nice fit to pre-conceptions?
I'll repeat what I said earlier ... you have put boundaries on your horizons.
Agreed, but this is what things do. We can start with infinite horizons, for example, but the action of any course of thought is to reduce them. Any label we place on anything does this. Only if we re-expand our minds to the infinite do we get around this. These are two states though, one philosophically powerful, but with no power to explain, and one limited philosophically, but with explanatory power.
Before jumping on the idea that the infinite has explanatory ability, any label placed on it reduces it from infinite to finite and without words/labels/meaning it can have no explanatory power, just perhaps the feeling of explanatory power. Perhaps due to our emotions running when we are not conversing with ourselves.
Perhaps the biblical stories were never intended to be taken literally?
Perhaps, though we would undergo historical recession trying to find the point where culture separated from that possibility. I meant 'trounced' within the scientific community. Biblical literalism and genesis were the predominant geological explanations at the time and the change serves as a good example of a major change within the scientific community as well as an example of the cultural conflicts possible as evidence's conflict. It is also the one i understand best.
We seem to be playing with words here, rather than dealing with things. Medieval as in the time period, though pre-medieval as well. Fairytales as in stories, fiction vs. non-fiction, especially if you are right and those stories were intentionally written as fiction, but with underlying morals - like Lord of the Rings etc. Trounced as in overwritten, newly accepted, overthrown, gained the upper hand, beaten. I would say Einstein trounced Newton, except he didn’t. Newton’s mathematics still works and is still taught in schools and colleges over the world. The scientific consensus on biblical literalism no longer exists in any shape or form.
I think you are saying that every effect must have some kind of mechanical cause, i.e. some kind of physical force acting upon it
I am saying that if something has some type of definable relationship to its inner workings then it would fall under material, though obviously it may also change 'material'. Mechanical can be taken as an extremely loose metaphor. Internal and external relationships is probably a better way of putting it.
If something has no internal relationships and no relationship to external relationships then I do not think it would be material under the above definition (though I haven’t thought too much about it). It is hard since robust definitions of materialism, non-materialism, or even magic and non-magic have not been established. Even the material universe is hard here as though there was probably something before it we end up asking what was before that. If there is no such thing as time then the question melts away, well sort of, but that still does not feel entirely fulfilling.
This is simple theology: it is "I believe in ..."
Hmmmm, to be theology it needs to be God-Speak, it is the philosophical equivalent though. OK, everything is ‘I believe in…’ no matter what we think. This is the same for you, me, and everyone else. Of course this is the same as me saying ‘this is what I believe’, its hard to avoid that. Our minds are not infinite, they do not have infinite capacity and beliefs happen without effort. Yes, trying to set some rules up is hard, trying to use them fairly at the edges is even harder.
You also speak of medieval notions of the soul which are perhaps in need of being exposed to the "light of evidence". Look at your terminology: "fairytales" and "medieval" against the "light of evidence".
I’m obviously enthusiastic about evidence. ‘Light of Evidence’ goes both ways though. Paranormal evidence can shed ‘light’ on scientific orthodoxy. The language of shedding light on subjects is not my own. I did not create it. Granted though that you accurately point out that it is used in an egocentric fashion, but again this is not my own doing. I cannot be blamed for the structure of the English language, though I will be more cautious with it in the future. I am used to the idea of new evidence shedding light on old problems. To suggest otherwise is a philosophical problem in its own right.
I thought I was reading a Dawkins quote for a moment or two
OK, well that’s quite rude in these parts. Sometimes I get a little scared round here to say that turning on a kettle boils water (with certain assumptions allowed for). It is as if I cannot say what I know. Confined within a conversation of what knowledge is in the first place I do not mind, but this is sort of what I was getting at in the first place. This sort of argument, that nothing can be presented as evidence, only undermines itself. The only way this is not hypocritical is if concrete evidence for NDE’s and OBE’s emerged and you were still to point out that it cannot be used because your being like Richard Dawkins.
I asked that perhaps the ideas for the soul that have been around for a long time, that it is us, stores our memories and emotions, that we effectively remain the same when we die and leave our bodies perhaps need updating to take our understanding of the brain into account and I point out that there is huge resistance to any change to the soul hypothesis from certain quarters and I get back a defense of the soul hypothesis that is unaccepting of the idea that anything known today might have something to say about what we should be looking for.
I know that better ideas have been put forward, but I still think many could go further.
I am absolutely sure there are things you understand better than I. Your arguments seem to centre around a principle of disrespecting evidence, even though you admit to not understanding it. I find this very difficult to understand. Clearly it is contradictory to science, but you would also have heated debates with philosophers as well as theologians. It seems designed to allow personal freedom above accuracy. Consider your phrase that you are mired in the propaganda of the academic orthodoxy. You are talking here about education itself. Send a million people off to measure the boiling point of water at sea level. They all return and say that it is 100 degrees C. Address your one neighbour who is saying that it boils at 200 degrees C at sea level and suddenly you are Richard Dawkins expressing the the propaganda of the academic orthodoxy. I know that a subject like geology is less easy to grasp intuitively than the boiling point of water. The difficulty is only down to exposure though, to me it is no more difficult. Explaining to people how evidence affects their ideas is a difficult thing at the best of times, it is made impossible if the eyes and ears are closed even to the concept of evidence. Philosophy offers some hope to those desiring complete intellectual freedom from evidence, but they will always just be choosing the philosophers they prefer. Meanwhile the world moves on, more becomes predictable, more becomes usable, and the finite ideas, with their fixed horizons become more detailed, capable, expansive and beautiful. Who knows, one day they may include what you want them to, and then we will see who was swung by the evidence, and who was simply waiting for the evidence to swing to them.
What role to you think any evidence plays, and what role do people with educational experience other than your own play? Sheldrake challenges me to try and combine his ideas with my own science, as any scientist should, but what would i do to him and myself if i denied the concept of evidence in the first place?
26 June 2005
2 days 22 hours
To debate with a scientist who is also a materialist and an atheist is very hard for a non-scientist. I don't have the education that Daydreamer so values so I can't argue point for point. I can't dispute his evidence at a professional level. So all I can do is to try to look behind the technical language and get to the underlying belief system. I wasn't trying to say that my worldview is based upon good evidence and his is not and I'm sorry if it came across that way. I was trying to say that there is a certain bias in the way scientific evidence is presented which favours the materialist view. There is also a disdain for and intolerance of other traditions of knowledge which reduces them to primitive fairy-tales. In that way, our education is being restrained.
I'm also sorry that the comparison with Dawkins struck a nerve but I am encouraged that he should find the comaprison offensive. I am certainly not happy to be compared with that man (as I was later in Daydreamer's post), so it seems we share a dislike of the comparison for similar reasons.
So back to my original question: why is it that evidence that doesn't quite fit with the current paradigm is dismissed and replaced by anything that might - at a considerable stretch - sit better with the materialist view? I'm thinking of examples such as Susan Blackmore's attempts to explain away NDE's or Richard Wiseman's attempts to debunk anything to do with the paranormal. A simple question and I'm yet to be convinced that it has nothing to do with a philosophical bias.
Wanted: More White Crows ... http://whitecrows.davidsmuse.co.uk
1 May 2004
2 days 4 hours
you guys are great deep thinkers. As much as I dislike loooooonnnngggggggggg comments, I have actually been reading them. But you both run the risk of EGO, lesser in kamarling's, starting to be the power behind your intentions. I will, in the next couple of days add a comment that you both may relate to and maybe thin down the viscosity of this threads main point.
In the mean time, I would like to say that if science could allow a bit more imagination it could dicover a bit more.
Once science becomes dogmastic and driven by EGO, it will start to stagnate. We are in a time now where this unfortunatly is happening. Humans are very imaginative creatures and we need to explore the unknown with open minds and hearts. To be anchored down to dogmastic science that stiffles our hopes and dreams would be a yoke to humanity.
Let science explain the machanism of what we observe but not tell us what we observe.
"Life can be whatever you want it to be, as long as you do what your told."
LRF.
26 June 2005
2 days 22 hours
My ego thanks you for the compliment ;)
Dave.
Wanted: More White Crows ... http://whitecrows.davidsmuse.co.uk
1 May 2004
2 days 4 hours
....not taking the piss out of me....?
I get very skeptical when a pommy gives me a compliment.
;-O
"Life can be whatever you want it to be, as long as you do what your told."
LRF.
1 May 2004
16 hours 21 min
One must not discount motivation when considering a philosophy or movement. Certain individuals support and have supported materialism because they find it appealing to their own psyche(s).
Let's examine. Ultimately, a materialist universe suggests that everything is quantifiable, certain in some context, and controllable. It also entertains no higher power and no involuntary morality.
Not every materialist, of course, possesses some ulterior motive. Some simply accept what they are taught in school and society in general. What of those who do not fall into this category?
Comfort - The materialist universe operates by a set of rules that can be ascertained. Spiritual or religious approaches seem incomprehensible or have uncomfortable consequences. Ironically, once you reach the limits of personal control, people of this stripe can fall victim to despair and even suicide.
Sheer Arrogance - "I'm smarter than you, I'm better than you, and I can prove it!" It also suggests that those who choose atheism or science can tell the rest of us what to do. In their eyes, we most certainly are NOT equal. Talk of other possibilities threatens their personal image. They don't want to hear it.
Moral relativism - "God is dead and I'm happy about it!" In this case, anything goes as long as you can get away with it. This sort is particularly touchy and, I believe, responsible for the anti-spiritual stance. Admitting the existence of any spirit edges dangerously close to acknowledging God for them. It is easy to be without sin, they think, if they define what is moral.
As we have seen with global warming, once the truth becomes the precinct of the few, the elite feel that disinformation that suits their needs is entirely justified. This kind of thing happened to the Catholic Church long ago. A Scientific Reformation is truly needed to institute the separation of science from the provincialism of today's orthodox academic culture. Ask the questions because the answers count.
21 February 2009
1 day 3 hours
I think your right on a lot of points here. Some are uncomfortable truths, even to myself, while others are a little stereotyped.
Ultimately, a materialist universe suggests that everything is quantifiable, certain in some context, and controllable. It also entertains no higher power and no involuntary morality.
Control may have quite a bit to do with it, though i think this is as much the human condition as the materialist one. I have more control living in my nice centrally heated house and shopping at the supermarket than I would living in a cave, though this is part of my pro-science position than my material one. Control exclusively through materialism is a trickier one. If perhaps you mean that I do not think that ghosts are going to get me in the dark then on an intellectual level I do not believe this, but it does not stop me being afraid of them in the dark. I am also under no false illusions of what nature can do in a matter of seconds, there is also additional pressures from recession, loss of job etc that would not be there if I was a hunter gatherer, though then I would have other things to worry about. I sometimes wonder whether belief in God allows a greater sense of control. I have no prayer or thought that the universe is in any way looking after me, though I am successful, happy, healthy, lucky, and have a good life so do not feel like I am being punished either. A higher power is tricky. It is quite possible to have the material universe and also get your cake. Deism is entirely compatible and not all religion’s feature higher powers either. An afterlife born through entirely ‘natural’ means is also possible. Involuntary morality is a trickier one. Evidence from nature is tricky, as is evidence from comparative scripture. I cannot do anything though, even within myself or within law. I believe the only people who have voluntary morality are psychopaths. The rest of us feel when we do something immoral. I can no more choose how I feel if I inadvertently hurt someone than you can and I cannot choose right and wrong.
The materialist universe operates by a set of rules that can be ascertained
This is true, but aside from their flawless application in nature they are harsh, cruel and uncompromising. It would be beautiful and amazing if a child dropped in water bounced out, or cars bounced over pedestrians instead of running them over. The rules, though discoverable, are not human-centric. Though we can be happy they allow us to exist.
Spiritual or religious approaches seem incomprehensible or have uncomfortable consequences
Actually they are entirely comprehensible within their own rational constructs, they are just not next to others.
Sheer Arrogance
I have had problems trying to place this alongside education. I read a friend’s mind once, or seemingly did. Someone is not ‘smarter’ than me for not believing that is what happened and I doubt that I am not smarter than myself for not entirely trusting it. I also seemingly made a clock bounce on the wall at will, but am not sure if i imagined it. I definitely am sure that I’ve had deja-vu, but am not sure if one memory of it as a dream a day before it happened was seeing the future, or a short circuit in my memory. I have met people who were much better at maths or could learn faster than me. I would go as far as to say they were smarter. There have been concepts in physics, chemistry, biology that I just did not get, still to this day, but some people did. Were they smarter? I don’t know. They were certainly better at that subject or concept than me. It is different to say you know more though. A Buddhist monk knows more about meditation than me, a sailor more about sailing, a doctor more about medicine and anatomy. I can admit that. Sometimes they are smarter than me, sometimes I think I could hold my own, but to think people cannot know more would be ego to the extreme.
Moral relativism - "God is dead and I'm happy about it!" In this case, anything goes as long as you can get away with it.
This denies that we have any internal compass telling us right from wrong. Again only a psychopath might truly be like that. Nobody is perfect and we all do things we regret, but we have guilt and suffering to both show us and remind us when we do something wrong. Though obviously we all also know before we do it.
26 June 2005
2 days 22 hours
A little peace offering, Daydreamer. Have some fun wading though this discussion, especially the topic of free will.
http://www.physicsforums.com/showthread....
Here's a quick sample:
"At this point I do not want to delve to deeply into free will as it touches on the very meaning of our existence and I don't want to go there. I think it would be depressing to find out that there is a proof that there is no free will as it makes life seem pointless. I do not claim to have presented a proof or refutation of free will. I merely suggested that there are implications for free will if superluminal signalling is allowed by the laws of physics."
Dave.
Wanted: More White Crows ... http://whitecrows.davidsmuse.co.uk
21 February 2009
1 day 3 hours
Even if pacifism is impossible, we can still be pacifistic.
Actually i like a little debate now and then, and some heat isn't necessarily bad, just so long as it isn't personal.
Accusations of ego are fun. I’m currently mulling it over as I think it goes to the heart of the matter. Egotistical, strident, arrogant; I am struggling to merge these into the role of education and educators.
Roman aqueduct builders would not be arrogant in claiming they could teach me a thing or two about building aqueducts. Time is not so important to understanding, just that it is right. A strong case for humility in understanding can be made, but the case for declaring something you don’t understand to be wrong surely cannot be strong, and shouldn’t be part of wisdom. So often philosophy trumps understanding, but science and philosophy are two different subjects. Philosophy is speculative and personal, you can choose whichever philosopher you want and you can never be wrong, just liked or disliked. Trying to see how a person claiming their car keys are on the bedside cabinet is arrogant is not easy. If we cannot apply these rules to all of evidence, even the bits we personally don’t understand, the how do we apply them at all? If a person comes up to me and says ‘Hi, my name is Jim’ do I declare him arrogant because he believes he is right? If his birth certificate shows it and his parents claim it then what power is left to me to disagree? If his birth certificate says it is really Bill then would he not possibly be crazy?
Individual facts and who is wrong or right does not concern me too much in this, but the overall philosophy does. Philosophically there is always uncertainty and it seems that it might be about correctly estimating it. 99.99% uncertainty, or 1% uncertainty, or perhaps less? This is a very hard thing to correctly do without learning something, and without this should it really be considered wisdom to do it?
Thanks for the link, it was interesting and gave me a few thoughts. Anyway, talk soon, I’m still enjoying the conversation even if I have to have a re-think.
Take it easy.
1 May 2004
2 days 4 hours
I do hope you guys don't mind me jumping in accassionally.
I don't believe there was any "accusation" of ego but more a warning as debates, and often discusions can be "hijacked" by EGO.
Just a comment on the aquaduct builders as I liked your metaphor, they were very good engineers and as each centor was taken out after the stones had been laid, they had to stand under while the proccess was done. So I would say that a certain death awaited any who faulted in their design.
You can be certain and correct but still be arrogant. It's more a personality trait in people but not in the true meaning of the word.
The person who is percieved to be arrogant may not know they are in others eyes.
Wisdom is very interesting. A wise person would say, they understand some things but still have much to learn and know very little.
The levels of progress in wisdom would be, information, knowledge, understanding. You could have a photographic mind and recall all you have read but not understand any of it. To others you would be "intelligent" because you could recall all this information. But without true understanding it means little. Wisdom comes from understanding.
Philosophers may speak on a subject they have little understanding of, but their speach is more a question then a resolve. Scientists, on the other hand, may say "this is so because the numbers add up", but still have little understanding why. Which is a very good thing as this is science and how they need then to understand why.
Philosophers do not create formulea, scientists do.
because there are so many aspects of the human mind that is not understood, we will have and need philosophers.
After all, it is our free will to be.........
"Life can be whatever you want it to be, as long as you do what your told."
LRF.
26 June 2005
2 days 22 hours
I'm not sure that we understand each other's position entirely. For my part, I am not saying that science is all wrong or that our education system is useless. The point I was trying to make is that those who practice and teach science seem to stop at a point where they could go further, and they seem to do so for dogmatic philosophical reasons. I am very grateful for what science has done for me personally. I would not be alive to discuss this if it were not for advances in science. I also respect the scientists who brought us these benefits, even if a lot of them do seem to be arrogant sh*ts ;)
Greg has some good points to make in his latest article on "Changing Aliens" and many of those points (unfettered speculation and the McKenna quote) are relevant to this discussion.
Dave.
Wanted: More White Crows ... http://whitecrows.davidsmuse.co.uk
21 February 2009
1 day 3 hours
Hi Dave,
I have been thinking quite hard about this. Scepticism is basically the attempt to take an idea and pick holes in it. The stronger the idea is the less holes it should have. This should be done to all ideas. I have tried to be sceptical of your own idea in relation to science, but find few holes in it. This is why there has been a delay in writing this reply. This is the third reply I have written, each quite large and in each I have made several points, to myself since I have been the only one to read them. I was unhappy with each one though as I generally find it hard to be sceptical of your point.
I think this is one thing that can be missed when we lock horns and become all assertive of our own ideas. That I am still being sceptical of all things. It is sometimes implied that scientists have reached their decisions by being uncritical of science, but critical of everything else. I would imagine this is generally wrong. When you undertake scientific education, especially as you get deeper into it, you learn a lot of interlocking evidences in great depth – much more than is available in general public knowledge or even accessible on the internet (unless someone has scanned in the textbooks). Not just the headlines of the evidences, but how they work in depth, how they were arrived at and how the equipment works. You learn their strengths and weaknesses and their error margins. Most importantly you learn the previous failed ideas, why they failed and how. The greater context of all this is scepticism itself. The solidity of the ideas you learn is down to extreme scepticism forcing people to justify their ideas to extremes that do not exist in other modes of thought. You will not be expected to amass evidences of similar standards to justify other types of beliefs.
The grail has been a fair place to air views and listen to other peoples, but there is a fair degree of scepticism of others exact ideas even here, so imagine entering with a degree in a natural science. We don’t tend to get technical and posts have to be kept quite short. Dissemination of information and explanation is actually quite difficult.
We need to be exposed to others views to become less sceptical of them, but I think there is a lot of emphasis on scientists learning other peoples and not the reverse. People with scientific training and minds are a growing percentage of the population and people will need to talk to them in ways they can understand too.
This means not exaggerating belief in ideas such that the entire world is overthrown. Not everything is wrong just because a person has a gut instinct or a memory that competes with it, and approaching people educated in a subject and saying your wrong because I think you are never goes down well no matter what. To overturn ideas you need evidence, never more so than for scientists (or natural philosophers if you want to think of us like that).
This is primarily why I am at the Grail. I love your idea about universal consciousness, not just because of its coolness, but because it doesn’t conflict with any of the strong evidences that I have learn’t – or at least the lack of evidence for the idea gives great freedom from conflict with them. Meanwhile other ideas conflict strongly. These conflicts cannot just be swept under the table as in a very real sense these evidences are all that we have, whether they are material or immaterial.
So with scepticism we start by being sceptical of everything. This gives us a filter through which some ideas pass and some fail. Understanding these requires education and any attempt to underplay the value of education in understanding is misguided. Competing educational forces, such as physics vs meditation vs Koranic revelation can be dealt with elsewhere, though evidence and philosophy can be aligned, there are probably more philosophies than religions.
So I am still sceptical of plate tectonics, as I should be; but I understand to quite a high level all the evidences for it. Bare in mind that I might have had 200 to 1000+ hours of plate tectonic university education alone depending on what you include precisely as relating to that subject. Whereas for something like NDE the research still seems to be close to its infancy, being still at the stage of correlating witness statements. If it was a police investigation this would only be step one, before evidence was actually gathered.
I guess the real question is whether there is still room to be at all sceptical of things like NDE. Are scientists really stopping at a philosophical barrier and nothing else? Is the evidence so strong that the barrier is definitely philosophical and not evidential? If there are still questions to be asked about the evidence and it’s interpretation then surely the answer is that it is not just philosophical. If there are evidential problems to be overcome then need there be any surprise that science as a whole has not moved that way, for it didn’t with all the other ideas that had not produced the required evidence either. Perhaps it is due to the wider issue of scientific philosophy and evidential standards rather than personal bias. I remain open-minded to NDE and universal consciousness, though this is not the same as not being sceptical of them. And I guess my own personal journey as a natural scientist and the inner conflicts as evidence battles with desire as well as the weighing of everything I understand vs whether I actually do and the evidential and philosophical reasons for self doubt, plus the presentation when we quiz each other and present reasons why we see things the way we do, all lead to varying types and presentation of scepticism.
26 June 2005
2 days 22 hours
Hi Daydreamer,
First let me apologise to any others at the Daily Grail who might get the impression that this is a closed debate between the two of us ... it was not meant to be and I hope others will continue to contribute. However, as you have been so open in describing your own motivations, I feel I should reciprocate and again I apologise if this is too personal. After all, this isn't group therapy (is it?).
I understand scepticism. I am only sharing my views here becuase I am sceptical of my own ideas and want to expose them to scrutiny. There's nothing worse, in my opinion, than to discover that I've been utterly gullible and have overlooked something simple that shatters my worldview. That's why I welcome your comments even if I might not agree. I have tried to discuss these things on scientific forums and have been subject to some very hurtful and spiteful abuse for daring to step into their territory with my heresies. While I might have some well honed sarcasm in my armoury, I don't have the stomach for that kind of abuse nor do I see the point in it. That's why I've apologised to you if I have overstepped the mark.
To put it in simple terms, my approach is gut driven. I feel a certainty inside that there must be a point to life, the universe and everything. I am aware that most scientists would dismiss my gut feeling with disdain but I feel that is becuase they have developed a scientific method that is essentially reductionist. You can dissect a rat and lay out its entrails on a lab table and say "all I see is an organic machine". You can then slice off bits of tissue and inspect it under the most powerful microscopes and figure out how the cells work and you can catalogue the DNA but it still doesn't tell you anything about what it is like to be a rat. All it tells you - perhaps - is that there are wonderous mechanisms developed by nature to produce such incredibly complex organic machines.
So to me, scientists are - with notable exceptions - fantastic technicians. But a brilliant technical draughtsman is not an artist. You could analyse a Monet down to the last molecule of vermillion red but you would be no closer to appreciating the art work. On the other hand, you could have an army of well trained draughtsmen and ask them to produce a drawing of a circuit diagram for an Intel CPU and they would all produce exactly that.
So to get back to my point: knowing how something is put together and the rules by which it operates does not tell you the whole story. For a start, it does not tell you why. I think that many scientists have cut themselves off from such questions. To them, there is no point in asking why because there is no evidence that there is a why to be answered. The why is something they are happy to leave to philosophers and the religious (neither of whom they have a great deal of respect for). Unfortunately, philosphers have also cut themselves off from the thinking general public due to excessive indulgence in jargon and itellectual snobbery. And the religious have abused their influence and have developed closed-minded dogma which has aslo alienated the educated public.
So I found myself without a home. I rejected religion becuase I refused to accept or worship an anthropomorphic God or believe in the literal word of the bible. I might fancy studying philosophy but I can't stay awake for more than a page of Kant. And while I am fascinated by some aspects of theoretical science, I can't live with the bleak philosophy of materialist science that says "your life is pointless and all that you have learned and experienced will be obliterated in a moment when your body stops working". Is there any wonder that we want to have some meaning? But just because I want it doesn't mean that it is so. So I look for it. I look for evidence that there might be something beyond that depressingly bleak pointlessness.
I am encouraged to believe that I have found some evidence but I need to be sure that it isn't wishful thinking. Firstly I have found that I am part of a growing minority who think along the same lines. Secondly, I have found that there is a respctable history of such a philosophy dating back to Plato and beyond. Thirdly, there are unexplained anomalies, any one of which might crack open the current paradigm if it could be shown to be true. There is evidence in support of a metaphysical reality as yet unverified by formal scientific method but with a growing database of experimental evidence. And, most satisfyingly, there are dissenters in the scientific ranks and that encourages me to know that, despite all the materialist bias in their scientific training, they still dare to wonder.
Lastly, I would like to add a disclaimer. I have already mentioned my fear of being found to be gullible. Thus, although I might be naturally sympathetic to many so-called New Age ideas, I can't say that I feel at home at the local Psychic Fayre. Indeed, I usually want to scream when confronted by all the crap on display - most of it commercial chaff. At the risk of being accused of comparing myself with the messiah, I feel I know how Jesus must have felt when he entered the temple and saw the traders.
Daydreamer, I have some thoughts on geology that may well horrify you. I'll post them when my Trekkie shields are at least 90%.
Dave.
Wanted: More White Crows ... http://whitecrows.davidsmuse.co.uk
21 February 2009
1 day 3 hours
Hi Dave,
Firstly I will repeat your apology, I did not mean to hog this subject so much. I don’t want to put off others by being sceptical of things.
Group therapy! maybe not… philosophical therapy… quite possible. For me at least.
I wouldn’t personally think of these sort of things in terms of gullibility. It is possible to be tricked by false science of course and one should be very very suspicious of scientific language being used to sell products or raise funds if the experts of those fields disagree in meaningful and evidential ways. I would hate to see ‘Earthquake Predictors TM’ being sold to poor people in Haiti for example, just as much as when silicon oxygen compounds mixed with magnesium or types of aluminium silicates are mingled with physics language to sell ‘Energy Vibration Mode Harmonizing Happyness Wellbeing Harmonizers TM’.
I would ask yourself what you can be realistically expected to know. You cannot be held responsible for not understanding something you have not been taught. I can’t remember who said it but a quote I like goes along the lines of ‘To know only the name of a thing is to know nothing about it at all’. Basically I would interpret that along the lines of the first stage of factual understanding. If you have heard that the Earth is 4.65billion years old then you still know nothing really about it and you will still have immense freedom in what you do with that factoid. In this way much can be dismissed because it is never really understood. This is the only sense in which reductionism is important. We all need to try and make sure we know more than just the name, or the title, of some item of knowledge. Else we don’t really understand it.
Perhaps it is a psychological thing, this need we have to understand why we are here. The universe is colossal and though you can see in the religions as well as in spirituality in general a philosophical attempt to boil down meaning into a single factoid, a single reason why we are here, I suspect the opposite is probably true. Meaning must be given to oneself in spite of our situation.
Perhaps you can explain to me a little as I am a bit stumped by it at the moment. If we die, progress to an afterlife and then find we die there instead then what meaning has been granted by this? Even if there is a life after this one infinite life still seems an assumption. Can life only have meaning with infinity? Or with pleasure? If we arrive in the next life and God says ‘this is it boys and girls, you have one billion years, live it up, but after that you must surrender your energy back to me.’ – then one day before a billion years are up are we not all going to still be asking the question ‘what is the meaning in that?’. Coming from a background of not expecting meaning to be absolute and fundamental to the universe and not expecting meaning from immortality this is a part of spiritual philosophy that I can’t quite get my head around. It seems to just be deferring the meaning question until later.
Perhaps that is the true context of the question. That this question must always be asked, and only without an end to time (to our time) can the question be avoided.
I find myself wondering if meaning is achieved, or whether it is avoided by infinity, and whether that would be meaning if it were.
We also face the problem that a soul on the other side surely has the freedom to be unhappy or depressed – the only get out being that we lack the capacity to be it. In fact with an infinite amount of time you will surely spend an infinite amount of time unhappy and depressed, but ignoring that. If you have that freedom then you will have the freedom to fail to find meaning in the afterlife, so you will have souls in there who find meaning in it, and those who don’t. This is entirely similar to life on this side though, with many people having little or no problem with meaning even if death is death and the universe is material. So what changes?
I don’t know, I can find meaning in materialism and reductionism as well as an afterlife. I think meaning is something that occurs inside you. You carry it as a feeling, but it might not be best to link it to apparent facts, as these can come crashing down. You learn this if you spend enough time in the natural sciences. Though I don’t know that it is too obvious looking in from the other side as it is often claimed that scientists are trying to protect their paradigm, which is funny as in a very real sense we just don’t care about it in the same way. Certainly not by hinging meaning on it, usually the opposite is true and people will say they get meaning entirely from other places having accepted that it is not present in science - even if other things like beauty, excitement or exhilaration are.
My last question is kind of interesting to me at the moment. I have spent a year here now and have managed to crack my material heart a little. In these moments I find my belief flitting from side to side. I don’t know how many of you are ‘set in your ways’ so to speak and by this I mean that the beliefs that you hold are firm enough that you havn’t sensed them flicking recently. I do not find it surprising that mine are doing this at the moment as I have been thinking about these subjects an awful lot this last year and that has got to create quite a bit of neural plasticity (so to speak). With them being so different to my natural ones. It does allow me to raise the question about what belief even means though, a subject that I feel is woefully poorly explored. Especially since I have not unlearned anything I knew before, I still understand the position’s of philosophical and material conflict, very little inside my ‘knowledge core’ has changed. Yet belief flicks depending on where my concentration lies. Its fun being human hay.
If you have any geological thoughts then fire away, though i would recommend in another post :) What about if i just set phasers to stun instead, then shields at about 10% should be fine...
16 August 2006
2 days 12 hours
Extreme skepticism can sometimes be successfully treated by the practice of certain methods, techniques, or exercises.
There must be thousands of these, and some are known to have exceptionally mind blowing effects.
The condition is associated with a kind of narrowmindedness, an egoic constriction of consciousness actually considered "normal" in a number of contemporary belief environments.
I myself sometimes suffer from the malady, after spending too much time focused on business activities and attempting to absorb the flood of information associated with that sphere -- it's definitely true that consciousness fluctuates from day-to-day and year-to-year and anyone can slip into a narrowed egoic condition, above and beyond the schizoid separation between the waking and dreaming selves so pronounced in contemporary society.
Skepticism can become quite extreme while the condition includes mentally "walling off" or suppressing memories of expansive experience, something that serves to strengthen a skeptical stance even more.
The techniques, methods, and exercises can be shared but as no two people are exactly alike what might work for one person may have no effect whatsoever upon another, while there is a tendency to develop personalized techniques not particularly suited for general purpose use.
One technique that works for me is to list my most unusual experiences. At first only a very few come to mind, but as I focus on these I begin to remember other experiences, such that I must keep reordering the list. Apparently the focusing on experiences of expansive consciousness creates exactly such an experience.
Of course anyone who is deeply egobound may not remember a single such experience.
They may also have no interest in engaging in any of these techniques or methods and may insist there is no evidence that practicing them accomplishes anything, or that expansive consciousness doesn't exist beyond anyone's imagination.
Everyone is welcome to believe what they wish to believe, even if they believe that nothing is real unless it's been reported in a peer-reviewed journal.
For a truly mind blowing exercise, I recommend Exercise 2. (Preliminary Probable Self Exercise) found at http://www.realitytest.com/doors.htm .
Bill I.
26 June 2005
2 days 22 hours
Perhaps you can explain to me a little as I am a bit stumped by it at the moment. If we die, progress to an afterlife and then find we die there instead then what meaning has been granted by this? Even if there is a life after this one infinite life still seems an assumption. Can life only have meaning with infinity?
Ah ... there you have identified the other face of my twin nightmare: eternity. When. as a child, I would lay in bed and curl-up in fear of dying, I would also consider what happens if we never die. If we just go on for eternity. I would end up hoping that death was really the end because eternity is a scary thought indeed. But, in a way, the problem contains its own solution: it tells us how conceptually limited we are. As Bill suggests in his post, we are sometimes ego-bound and I suspect that it is the ego that fears death. The essential personality (for want of a better term) knows at a deep level that the ego is a temporary device for this world and that the essence is eternal. Eternity and infinity are concepts that we can't handle - we don't have the sophistication or whatever it takes to grasp it so it presents as being something fearful. Awesome, in the true sense of the word.
This is really difficult. Half a century of pondering this stuff and it is not easy to condense all that into a single hypothesis. I have had many influences along the way - starting with Sunday School scriptures and including diverse works from channelled books to David Bohm. I think that I have taken something of value from each of them. But this would be a very long and boring post indeed if I were to describe them all. So I am left with the option of making statements which might seem trite and New Agey but these are things I have thought long and hard about.
Firstly, nothing makes sense to me without reincarnation. This is essential to my understanding of how and why we are here. Secondly, we usually do not understand our relationship with the undivided whole. We are fooled into thinking that we are separate and this belief has been reinforced, first by our western religious traditions (we are taught that God is separate and sits in judgement over his creation) and secondly by our science - back to reductionism again.
To put is simply, there is only One. This One is the creative force, the universal consciousness. This One is timeless and does not dwell in space - time and space are necessary illusions. We are both created and co-creators. We have individual validity but we are not separate (sounds like a contradiction but I don't believe it is). We are artificially limited in order to discover and create and explore things that would not be possible otherwise. This is the nature and importance of free will. Whatever we create, experience and feel is also experienced by the whole. While we are artificially limited - as we are in this life - we are at the mercy of rampant ego with its hands on the reins of human destiny. In the big picture, this doesn't really matter because every experience adds to the whole.
Depression, doubt and fears are human traits and part of the baggage of ego. With progression, through reincarnation, we eventually become free of these negatives. We become enlightened beings and move on to other "projects". The whole thing is about learning. Learning, in its purest sense is love. In earthly relationship terms, we can only truly love someone if we are prepared to walk in their shoes: to feel what they feel and to understand them completely. To do this we must let go of any desire to control them and just let them be. When they hurt, we hurt and when they find love, we rejoice. Speaking as someone who has had to deal with rejection and feelings of jealousy, I find these lessons especially hard but I am just beginning to understand why they are needed.
I also understand that it is not possible to truly know any of this by intellectual reasoning alone. I envy the people who have experienced even momentary elightenment and I believe them when they say it has changed them for life. I have my doubts about the ability of many to interpret those experiences adequately but nevertheless, if only for a moment, they understood more than I ever will by reading and reasoning.
I really hope I have done some justice, even to my own thoughts and ideas, in this short answer (relatively speaking). Daydreamer, I would not be so arrogant as to expect you to accept any of it as some profound truth but maybe a little might resonate and send you looking in an unexpected direction?
As for a new geology thread, I have a bit of a challenge for you. There is a Saturday morning radio program called "Fighting Talk". One spot they have is called "defending the indefensible" where the contestants have to defend something they would normally find repugnant. You will have heard of the anthropic principle with regard to the fine tuning of the universe. My challenge to you (bit of fun) is to explain geology in the same terms, i.e. that the earth appears designed to support life even down to how the tectonic plates, volcanic activity and the "right" amount of water on the planet seem to conspire together to create favourable conditions for life. You might like to consider the existence, position and size of the moon too, while you are about it.
:)
Dave.
Wanted: More White Crows ... http://whitecrows.davidsmuse.co.uk
21 February 2009
1 day 3 hours
Hay Dave,
I don't have much time at the moment so sorry for the lack of a reply.
I've been thinking about the idea of a fine-tuned geological explanation, but ive hit a few snags. Depending on the version you'd choose it is far more complex an idea that fine tuning the universes starting conditions (bare in mind that geology sort of goes back to the start anyway).
I'll have a crack at it, but i need an angle. Are you talking about just plain old life. I mean would you be happy with a fine tuned Earth that had just produced single celled life, or something far far simpler, like a single molecular replicator. Or do you fancy a fine tuned earth designed to produce multi-cellular life, or multi-organ life, non vertebrates, or vertebrates. Is the fine tuning free to evolve whatever it wants? Or is there a specific outcome? Like Humans? Or primates, or just sophisticated nervous systems?
26 June 2005
2 days 22 hours
Hey Daydreamer, nice to see you back online. Don't take this too seriously, it was just a whacky idea. If you are busy, don't give it a thought.
I'd like to have a crack at it myself but don't have the in-depth knowledge that you do. I watched some programs on Daytime TV some time ago - I think it was Aubrey Manning's "Earth Story". I remember thinking how amazing were the coincidences that all the systems he described seemed to conspire together to make the conditions for life on this planet possible. We seem to have the right amount of water to create the weather cycles that keep the rain falling on the land. Plate tectonics, volcanic activity and the moon are also essential to keep the climate (and, therefore, the incredible diversity of life as we know it) going.
I tried to find an example on the web ... perhaps these links give a clue:
http://serc.carleton.edu/resources/23432...
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/life-01x1...
http://www.astronomytoday.com/astronomy/...
Anyhow, I just thought it might be an interesting subject to explore from the anthropic point of view.
Go well,
Dave.
Wanted: More White Crows ... http://whitecrows.davidsmuse.co.uk
21 February 2009
1 day 3 hours
Hay Dave,
It is fun to appreciate just how complex the history of the Earth is, but it is a big subject.
I think the reason that the fine tuning argument for the universe holds is that if there is only 1 universe then the odds of it creating the conditions for life like us (or stars and planets) are very very low. If there are trillions upon trillions of slightly different universes then it doesn't work very well.
There are trillions and trillions of star systems. Each differing slightly. It is mandatory that we exist in the one with the correct history to arrive at us. Therefore the fine tuning argument is not required. All that is is an understanding of the complexity of getting from point A, the start of the solar system, to point B, us now. Its a fascinating story, but i guess one that requires alot of knowledge.
If we place a requirement on the argument that you and me are required. That there must be a Dave and a Daydreamer. That England is a requirement of the current state of the planet. (for this type of argument consider peoples thoughts on God's plan for Israel if the country of Israel was not a precondition of the planet - and hence God's plan, in the first place). This type of argument is actually written into some religions, even if the predestination of geological activity seems silly when you think about it. For this sort of thing to be true billions of years of tectonic activity must be very finely controlled. For you and me to be here all prior biological activity must be controlled - including the complete activity of your parents and grandparents up till reproduction. The repercussions for fate and the idea of free will are great - as are those from uncertainty in quantum mechanics. Even still, most people seem oblivious to the repercussions of this sort of idea.
How willing are you so surrender free will to gain geological fine tuning?
I can write an account of geological history in terms of fine tuning, but free will, chaos, and quantum processes will be absent.
18 September 2007
3 hours 14 min
These "discussions" need to go beyond the armchair. I wish there could be a sort of summer camp for diehard rational materialists where they could actually experience in the physical various impingements upon their mortal envelopes which "don't make sense." They would be greeted at the camp entrance by beautiful women in bikinis who would drape moldavite necklaces around their necks and give them a kiss. The ensuing weeks would be spent in meditation, hooked up to biofeedback machines, imbibing "ormus," having their minds read, floating in isolation tanks, playing with sigils, getting laid, going on long, lovely hikes and just generally loosening them up and messing with their minds. the closing week would be an ayahuasca retreat presided over by people who really knew how to handle these things properly. End result would be a smearing of the artificial boundary between themselves and "out there," and a more visceral appreciation of the world as vibration.
21 February 2009
1 day 3 hours
Whats really needed is teleportation. These conversations would work much better down the pub.
Some of the things you suggest sound very much like my early 20's. In fact some of it sounds very much like doing a degree in geology.
Obviously i haven't tried the specific drugs listed above, but the argument about drug imbibed revelation, unless specific drugs are required, falls a little at the idea that atheists are not doing as much drugs as everyone else.
I really am not sure that experience is what is required. A UFO abduction would certainly help quell any uncertainty i may have about that subject, but i have already read peoples minds, moved things with my mind, seen the future, been attacked by invisible forces. It is not experience that makes atheists believe different things. Nor really is the lack of belief anything to do with whether any of these things are real. It is to do with how information about possibilities is gained, gathered and accepted, and about playing devils advocate with your own imagination and the temptations of salesmen of the immortal.
For those atheists educated in various sciences it is also about relating various claims and ways of seeing the world to their own understanding and just finding a way to live peacefully in a world so diverse that at least 90% of us are either wrong, bonkers or both, and in which we have the power to destroy ourselves a million times over in ways that inevitably most of us will never fully understand, and yet must vote on.
22 November 2004
2 weeks 12 hours
Teleportation is a good start, but then the solution is relatively simple.
Free beer.
----
We are the cat.
18 September 2007
3 hours 14 min
It's amazing what a weekend floating on a fine river like our local Buffalo River here in Arkansas will do to one's philosophy and more importantly the fervor to which one clings to that philosophy. It is not so much that it changes the philosophy so much as it loosens the grip on certainty - a good thing usually - especially for people who have "worked something out in their heads" but don't get enough head if you know what I mean.
21 February 2009
1 day 3 hours
True, but perhaps a little different if you are a geologist. Perhaps thats the point though.
To many floating down a river will reveal how little they know, to a geologist it will reveal how much you have forgotten.
But thats on the physical side, rather than the metaphysical. ;)