dlorde
Philosopher
- Joined
- Apr 20, 2007
- Messages
- 6,864
It is my experience that someone can be sawn in half then restored, that a man can make live doves appear out of nowhere, and that a man can read minds at a distance. Fortunately, I've been told that these experiences were the result of deliberate deception for entertainment, so I know they were not what they appeared to be, although I still don't know what actually happened.It is my experience that the spirit world exists, therefore there must be undetectable, higher particles.
Your experience must also be mistaken, since we know for certain there are no undetectable, higher particles that could influence your life - if they could influence your life, they would be detectable; we know this as surely as we know that electricity will not run out of the socket and pool on the floor when we unplug a device, even if the socket is still switched on. The spirit world exists only in your imagination, and in the imagination of others who believe in it. Empirical evidence shows how easily we construct misleading models of the world unless we base them on solid foundations.
The late Richard Feynman, a great scientist, said "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool". Since he said that, we've discovered that it is easier to fool yourself than we ever suspected. We unknowingly twist and distort our perceptions, experiences, memories, and thought processes to fit our preconceptions and expectations. An awareness of these fallibilities, coupled with skepticism and vigilant critical thinking, can help mitigate the number of errors we make, and when personal experience and reliable empirical data conflict, personal experience should yield.