Proof of Immortality II

[John Jones]

- Sorry about that. I was just arguing that there is more than enough reason to support a 1% prior probability of ~A.

What reason is that again?

 

[Akhenaten]

- Sorry about that. I was just arguing that there is more than enough reason to support a 1% prior probability of ~A.

You're not arguing it at all, anymore than you're arguing in support of the silly 10⁸⁰! value. They're just arbitrary numbers, one of which you didn't even bother to make up yourself.

 

[godless dave]

- Sorry about that. I was just arguing that there is more than enough reason to support a 1% prior probability of ~A.

If that was what you were arguing, then you failed.

 

[Jabba]

Also, if you had done any kind of online research at all, you would know that the idea that the human brain has one holistic and one analytical hemisphere was discredited a long time ago.

- Sources?

 

[carlitos]

- Sources?

Here you go.

 

[Akhenaten]

- Sources?

To get you started, you might look at this one that was given to you when you last brought this nonsense up in February:

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

Broad generalizations are often made in popular psychology about one side or the other having characteristic labels, such as "logical" for the left side or "creative" for the right. These labels are not supported by studies on lateralization, as lateralization does not add specialized usage from either hemisphere.[2] Both hemispheres contribute to both kinds of processes,[3] and experimental evidence provides little support for correlating the structural differences between the sides with such broadly-defined functional differences.[4]

 

[Agatha]

Why? Belief is not a measure of reality. When people believed that bumblebees should not be able to fly, reality didn't ground all the bees. People were wrong, and bees continue to fly.

Belief in God or gods is not equivalent to a belief in the afterlife or some kind of immortality, even if belief did drive reality (which it doesn't).

It does not matter what anyone believes, evidence is what matters.

 

[Mojo]

Why? Belief is not a measure of reality. When people believed that bumblebees should not be able to fly, reality didn't ground all the bees. People were wrong, and bees continue to fly.

Well, people never really believed that. From what I've read, an aerodynamics expert had a conversation with a biologist at a dinner party, and demonstrated that the model for fixed-wing aircraft didn't allow bumblebees to fly, and it sort of went viral.

 

[jsfisher]

- Sorry about that. I was just arguing that there is more than enough reason to support a 1% prior probability of ~A.

How can you possibly support such a contention when you do not even understand what ~A must entail?

Moreover, since you do not properly understand ~A, you cannot possibly put a reasonable number on P(me|~A), even though you so very desperately want it to be considerably greater than P(me|A).

And that's really the goal, whether you admit that to yourself or not. You need P(me|A) << P(me|~A), and all this multi-year rhetorical Colossal Cave has been deception to cover your insertion of arbitrary numbers that work your way.

Still, even if you achieve all that, you are nowhere closer to establishing your immortality. ~A includes immortality as a possibility, not a requirement.

 

[Giordano]

- Sorry about that. I was just arguing that there is more than enough reason to support a 1% prior probability of ~A.

And those reasons (evidence) would be?

Perhaps you should review Bayesian statistics as you just recently promised.

And your fatal flaw in your view of consciousness, the one you just admitted shock your world? How are you doing on that?

 

[Akhenaten]

<snip>

- In addition, from my online search, it appears that either our analytic hemisphere is “transcendence blind,” or our holistic hemisphere hallucinates. It appears that what we call religious experience and transcendence are “appreciated” only by the holistic hemisphere. And surely, you guys -- and, scientists in general -- tend to be highly analytic.

For those who came in late, let's just expand a little on the Jabbanetic™ approach to this issue:

Moving right along -- it turns out that the two hemispheres of the human brain process information differently.

6. One hemisphere processes "holistically," whereas the other processes "analytically."

7. In other words, one hemisphere sees the ‘forest’, while the other sees the ‘trees.’

8. Typically, it is the right hemisphere that sees the forest, whereas it is the left hemisphere that sees the trees – but not always.

9. Whatever, we humans have two qualitatively different ways of looking at, or thinking about, the world…

10. And then, it turns out that our "sense" of magic originates in the holistic hemisphere . The holistic hemisphere is responsible for what we call "religious experience" and our sense of transcendence (the very germ of God).

11. The analytic hemisphere has little or no “truck” with such things. Unfortunately, the analytic hemisphere is also the one that decides whether or not something "makes sense."

12. In other words, our “magical” beliefs are sensed -- or imagined -- by one hemisphere, but they are judged by the other hemisphere. They are judged by the hemisphere that cannot sense -- or imagine -- them... What sense does that make?​

Pharaoh's highlighting


Source: http://messiahornot.com/Magic.php​

"Magic???" I hear you ask. Hell yeah:

Reality is probably not the impersonal, deterministic machine that mainstream science would have us believe. In that sense, reality is probably “magical.” Many of the “things” that we think we know, or that we otherwise “believe in,” do not really “make sense,” do not readily fit into our “naturalistic” (physical/analytic) worldview – and are, in that sense, magical...

So what we've really been dealing with here for the last two years is Jabba's attempt to use mathematics to prove the existence of magic.

I'm glad that we (for the most part) are able to laugh at our own foibles, because that really is kind of embarrassing.

 

[Giordano]

I wish to point out that I made an error in interpreting Jabba's numbers as a survey of scientists who believe in an afterlife, any kind of afterlife. Obviously these numbers would be irrelevant no matter what, but I noticed that the survey really asked if scientists believe in a god, not an afterlife. Jabba conflated one with the other, and I was lead astray. So the number of scientist who believe in any afterlife is smaller than Jabba cites from the survey, and the number of scientists who believe in reincarnation is likely even much, much lower still. Not that anyone certified in statistics would make the error of assuming that an opinion survey could be converted into a truth, and then used to generate numbers for Jabba's equation. Yes, one could statistically calculate from these numbers how many scientists believe in a god (although that depends on how well the survey was done); but clearly one cannot calculate from these numbers in any way the likelihood of a god, let alone the likelihood of reincarnation.

 

[Giordano]

For those who came in late, let's just expand a little on the Jabbanetic™ approach to this issue:

Pharaoh's highlighting


Source: http://messiahornot.com/Magic.php​

"Magic???" I hear you ask. Hell yeah:

​

So what we've really been dealing with here for the last two years is Jabba's attempt to use mathematics to prove the existence of magic.

I'm glad that we (for the most part) are able to laugh at our own foibles, because that really is kind of embarrassing.

The interesting part to me is that I have repeatedly requested that Jabba just state that it is his belief that reincarnation occurs. He is welcome to believe that, just as people believe in a heaven or god, for that matter. What upsets me is his repeated misuse of patently incorrect mathematics and a wild misunderstanding of the scientific model to "prove" his belief. For some reason, that really bothers me and keeps me coming back.

However, I do feel that people here have very clearly posted why Jabba is wrong in his math and science, in many different ways. He can simply read these posts if he cared and if he hasn't already. They remain visible for anyone else who wishes this information, and the inability of Jabba to respond to them is very clear for all to see. So even though the urge is still there, I will try to not duplicate what Jabba or anyone else can already read here (often in a better written form than I could do myself).

 

[Giordano]

I would also emphasize that the fatal criticisms to which Jabba has failed to reply are very telling, since he does appear to read these before he choices to not respond to them (look at his recent posting history). So I gather that he simply has no response. This appears to represent an ability to recognize these fatal errors are fatal errors, yet to propagate his faulty theorem anyway. I cannot speculate why, not knowing him as a person.

 

[Akhenaten]

<snip>

- In addition, from my online search, it appears that either our analytic hemisphere is “transcendence blind,” or our holistic hemisphere hallucinates. It appears that what we call religious experience and transcendence are “appreciated” only by the holistic hemisphere. And surely, you guys -- and, scientists in general -- tend to be highly analytic.

<snip>

Also, if you had done any kind of online research at all, you would know that the idea that the human brain has one holistic and one analytical hemisphere was discredited a long time ago.

- Sources?

Are you trying to tell us that your online search missed these?

1. Richard A Griggs - "Psychology: A Concise Introduction"
   
   
2. Jared A Nielsen, A Brandon, Michael A Zielinski, Janet Ferguson, and Jeffrey S. Anderson - "An Evaluation of the Left-Brain vs. Right-Brain Hypothesis with Resting State Functional Connectivity Magnetic Resonance Imaging." (PLOS ONE, 14 August 2013)
   
   
3. Westen et al. - "2006 Psychology: Australian and New Zealand edition"
   
   
4. AW Toga and PM Thompson - "Mapping brain asymmetry" (Nature Reviews Neuroscience 4) (2003) PMID 12511860
   
   
5. MB Pulsifer, J Brandt, CF Salorio, EP Vining, BS Carson, J Freeman - "The cognitive outcome of hemispherectomy in 71 children" (2004) PMID 15009226
   
   
6. S Knecht, B Dräger, M Deppe, L Bobe, H Lohmann, A Flöel A, EB Ringelstein, H Henningsen - "Handedness and hemispheric language dominance in healthy humans (Brain: a journal of neurology) (2000) PMID 11099452
   
   
7. M Schönwiesner, R Rübsamen, DY von Cramon - "Hemispheric asymmetry for spectral and temporal processing in the human antero-lateral auditory belt cortex" (European Journal of Neuroscience 22) (2005) PMID 16190905
   
   
8. I Taylor and M Taylor - "Psycholinguistics: Learning and using Language" (1990)
   
   
9. Regarding different languages: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-11181457
   
   
10. U Goswami - "Neuroscience and Education: from research to practice" (National Review of Neuroscience - 2006) PMID 16607400
    
    
11. E Kandel, J Schwartz, T Jessel "Principles of Neural Science. 4th edition" (2000) ISBN 0-8385-7701-6
    
    
12. Elaeanor Maccoby - "The Psychology of Sex Differences" (1974) ISBN 0804709742
    
    
13. D Tomasi, ND Volkow - "Laterality Patterns of Brain Functional Connectivity: Gender Effects" (2012) PMID 21878483
    
    
14. CG Boeree - "Speech and the Brain" (2004)
    
    
15. I Taylor and MM Taylor - "Psycholinguistics: Learning and using Language" (1990) ISBN 978-0-13-733817-7
    
    
16. J G Beaumont - "Introduction to Neuropsychology, Second Edition" (2008) ISBN 978-1-59385-068-5
    
    
17. ED Ross, M Monnot - "Neurology of affective prosody and its functional-anatomic organization in right hemisphere" (2008) PMID 17537499
    
    
18. MS George, PI Parekh, N Rosinsky, TA Ketter, TA Kimbrell, KM Heilman, P Herscovitch, RM Post - "Understanding Emotional Prosody Activates Right Hemisphere Regions" (1996) PMID 8929174
    
    
19. S Dehaene, E Spelke, P Pinel, R Stanescu, S Tsivkin - "Sources of mathematical thinking: behavioral and brain-imaging evidence" (1999) PMID 10320379
    
    
20. S Dehaene, M Piazza, P Pinel, L Cohen (2003). "Three parietal circuits for number processing" (2003) PMID 20957581
    
    
21. LM Levy, IL Reis, J Grafman - "Metabolic abnormalities detected by 1H-MRS in dyscalculia and dysgraphia". 1999) PMID 10449137
    
    
22. D Hecht - "Depression and the hyperactive right-hemisphere" (2010) PMID 20603163
    
    
23. CM Braun, J Delisle, A Guimond, R Daigneault - "Post unilateral lesion response biases modulate memory: crossed double dissociation of hemispheric specialisations" (2009) PMID 18991140
    
    
24. O Devinsky09). "Delusional misidentifications and duplications: right brain lesions, left brain delusions" (2009) PMID 19122035
    
    
25. A Madoz-Gúrpide A, R Hillers-Rodríguez R - "Capgras delusion: a review of aetiological theories". (2010) PMID 20387212
    
    
26. E Goldberg - "The New Executive Brain: Frontal Lobes in a Complex World" (2009) ISBN 978-0-19-532940-7
    
    
27. S Knecht, B Dräger, M Deppe, L Bobe, H Lohmann, A Flöel, EB Ringelstein, H Henningsen - "Handedness and hemispheric language dominance in healthy humans" (2000) PMID 11099452
    
    
28. Terence Hines - "Left Brain/Right Brain Mythology and Implications for Management and Training" (1987) JSTOR 258066
    
    
29. JG Drenth - "Growing anti-intellectualism in Europe; a menace to science". (2003) Studia Psychologica 45 (ALLEA Annual Report 2003, pp. 61–72)
    
    
30. Sergio Della Sala - "Mind Myths: Exploring Popular Assumptions about the Mind and Brain" (1999) ISBN 0-471-98303-9
    
    
31. G Vallortigara, LJ Rogers LJ - "Survival with an asymmetrical brain: Advantages and disadvantages of cerebral lateralization" (2005) PMID 16209828
    
    
32. ME Halpern, O Güntürkün, WD Hopkin, LJ Rogers (2005). "Lateralization of the Vertebrate Brain: Taking the Side of Model Systems". (2005) PMID 16280571
    
    
33. LJ Rogers - "Light Input and the Reversal of Functional Lateralization in the Chicken Brain" (1990) PMID 2363841
    
    
34. C Deng, LJ Rogers(1997). "Differential Contributions of the Two Visual Pathways to Functional Lateralization in Chicks". (1997) PMID 9331485
    
    
35. LJ Rogers - "Evolution of Hemispheric Specialization: Advantages and Disadvantages" ( 2000) PMID 10856176

You might also want to read up on the work of Nobel Prize winner Roger Wolcott Sperry. Oddly enough, he completely disagrees with you.


I'll be back.

 

[George]

I would also emphasize that the fatal criticisms to which Jabba has failed to reply are very telling, since he does appear to read these before he choices to not respond to them (look at his recent posting history). So I gather that he simply has no response. This appears to represent an ability to recognize these fatal errors are fatal errors, yet to propagate his faulty theorem anyway. I cannot speculate why, not knowing him as a person.

1. In addition, we need to hear each side from the side itself – not both sides as represented by just one of the sides…
2. But then, once we humans lean towards a particular side, listening to the other side becomes rather painful -- so mostly, we avoid doing it…

http://messiahornot.com/challenge99.php

 

[Giordano]

1. But then, once we humans lean towards a particular side, listening to the other side becomes rather painful -- so mostly, we avoid doing it…

1. 
   
   Mostly true, but then why are so many of us here? I would submit that listening to the other side can painful if they present good arguments and truly challenge one's assumptions, but that it is entertaining and enjoyable, perhaps even reinforcing, if the other side repeatedly falls extremely short of a real argument.

 

[George]

I once spent an indeterminate length of time browsing that aforelinked website.
Some years ago in the middle east a radiator found itself in the unenviable position of being chained to the preacher Terry Waite. Apparently the radiator is still undergoing therapy. I feel its pain.

 

[Humots]

Well, people never really believed that. From what I've read, an aerodynamics expert had a conversation with a biologist at a dinner party, and demonstrated that the model for fixed-wing aircraft didn't allow bumblebees to fly, and it sort of went viral.

IIRC, the correct model was more like a helicopter.

 

[Jabba]

If that was what you were arguing, then you failed.

dave,
- Just to make sure, and to nail down the wording, you believe that I have failed to show any reasonable doubt that "A" is correct?