Cont: Scorpion's Spiritualism, Part Deux

[Darat]

...snip....

In the end, "karma things happen because karma angels" means the same as "karma things happen because they happen." As far as I can tell, Scorpion doesn't have any more reason to care about those angels' exact nature, or the origin of the concept, than we have to care about whether that bridge we'll cross when we come to it is cantilevered or suspension.

But we have not asked him about how they do things, what forces they use, or as you put it their exact nature. We have queried only what he says they do, not the how (as far as I can recall but who knows with the length of these threads someone may have queried something more along your point). We've not even asked him the "why do they do x" questions, because he has told us the why, we have only challenged him on his own claims and the knowledge he has imparted to us over the long years.

That's why I tried a slightly different approach and said "..... We only know about karma angels from what you have said you know about them. If you don't know about them do you accept that they may not exist?"

But he's been asked that by others and he responds with cast iron certainty that they do exist, and they do what he says they do.

The issue is always that the conclusions drawn from what he says he knows are not pleasant ones, and as he has said he simply doesn't want to think about the unpleasant consequences of his as he claims knowledge or as many of us would refer to it - his beliefs.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

You might want to inquire further about what the speaker thinks actually happened. Where do guardian angels come from? How are they organized? Do they work round the clock, or in shifts, or are they sometimes absent? By what instrumentality do they influence events? Do they protect everyone, and if not, what specific things do you have to do to gain their protection? When your sister-in-law died in that car crash, had she done something to anger her guardian angel, or had she failed to earn a guardian angel's protection in the first place, or was hers off-duty at the time, or was it just not powerful enough over earthly affairs to protect her from the crash?

"Dude, isn't that your guy over there under a bus?"

"What can I say, I was on my coffee break"

 

[Mojo]

I cannot read other peoples minds, but that office worker could read mine.

Please say you didn't terrify that poor woman by accusing her of reading your mind.

As a matter of fact, in the 18 months I worked there I never spoke to her.

You wouldn't need to if she could read your mind. Are you saying she couldn't?

 

[Scorpion]

It's not a belief, it's scientific fact combined with logic. The mind is an emergent property of the brain. When the brain dies the mind is destroyed, so there is nowhere for emotions like misery or happiness to reside. There is no need to 'believe' that, simple observation tells you it's true.

Of course if you choose to believe a fantasy instead then anything goes. But an infinity of happiness is a silly fantasy. As Captain Kirk said in Star Trek V: The Final Frontier:-

“You know that pain and guilt can’t be taken away with the wave of a magic wand! They’re the things we carry with us, the things that make us who we are. If we lose them, we lose ourselves. I don’t want my pain taken away, I need my pain!”​

Its not a scientific fact. Why can't you just admit you do not know?

If you spent the amount of time I have in a spiritualist church you might know better.

 

[JayUtah]

Its not a scientific fact. Why can't you just admit you do not know?

Because noting an ongoing lack of scientific evidence—despite considerable effort—for the mind being anything other than an emergent property of a functioning brain is not an admission of ignorance of where the mind lies. Those who claim the mind exists otherwise have the burden to prove it. Those who wish their claims to rise to scientific validity must satisfy that burden of proof in the manner acceptable to science.

If you spent the amount of time I have in a spiritualist church you might know better.

That is completely the wrong setting for determining scientific fact or engaging in scientific proof. As we've noted in your other thread, spiritualist churches intent to reinforce belief, not to test the believed tenets.

 

[Pixel42]

If you spent the amount of time I have in a spiritualist church you might know better.

If you'd spent less time in a spiritualist church and more time educating yourself you might know better.

 

[Scorpion]

If you'd spent less time in a spiritualist church and more time educating yourself you might know better.

I have collected books all my life. My front room has bookcases all around the walls. I have a very good personal library. It includes a bookcase of books on philosophy and psychology. I recently read, 'The Tao of physics' by Fritjof Capra
: I recommend it.

 

[Pixel42]

I have collected books all my life. My front room has bookcases all around the walls. I have a very good personal library. It includes a bookcase of books on philosophy and psychology.

So? It's not the number of books that matters.

I recently read, 'The Tao of physics' by Fritjof Capra
: I recommend it.

I read it years ago, it's rubbish. If that's where you're getting your understanding of science from, that explains a lot.

 

[JayUtah]

I have collected books all my life.

As have many of us. I can take you to several very nice bookstores in my city. They smell nice and have excellent tea and aromatherapy collections, but the books they sell are just the sort of rubbish you have cited to. That people fill pages with speculative or declarative nonsense, and that others create a market for them by buying them and reading them uncritically, do not constitute the education we mean.

Yes, in the sense of acquiring the thoughts dreamed up by others, you can say you are "educating" yourself in what the occultists, spiritualists, and practitioners of various religious beliefs are claiming. But what skeptics mean by education—the 'E' in JREF—is the establishment of a critical framework that can synthesize useful and correct knowledge from information. You "know" what those claimants have said. But by steeping yourself in it and categorically rejecting any criticism of it, you do not "know" that those claims are true.

As you spell out in your other other thread—where I assume these posts will eventually migrate—you have a rich belief in the afterlife fed in part by your credulity in what are rather obvious parlour tricks. But you want to believe them, and you buy lots of books that tell you stories you want to believe. That isn't even remotely comparable to a scientific examination of the truthfulness of those stories. So when someone correctly asserts that there is no scientific basis to believe in your theory of mind, saying that they need to pursue a protocol where these stories are told and accepted on faith is simply wrong. You can't cure atheism by telling people to go to church.

 

[Scorpion]

So? It's not the number of books that matters.


I read it years ago, it's rubbish. If that's where you're getting your understanding of science from, that explains a lot.

Oh yea! well I have a bookcase in my bedroom where I keep my compute,r and in a glance at the shelves I can see.

A brief history of time, by Steven Hawking.
Memories, dreams, reflections By C.G.Jung
Straight and crooked thinking, by Robert H. Thouless
Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance, by Robert M. Pirsig
The God delusion, by Richard Dawkins
Miracle mongers and their methods, by Houdini
A magician among the spirits, by Houdini
A modern introduction to logic, by L.S. Stebbing

That small sample should tell you I have read books of both sides of the issue. I told you I have a good library

 

[Scorpion]

That people fill pages with speculative or declarative nonsense, and that others create a market for them by buying them and reading them uncritically, do not constitute the education we mean.

See my list of some of my many books in my last post.

 

[Pixel42]

Oh yea! well I have a bookcase in my bedroom where I keep my compute,r and in a glance at the shelves I can see.

A brief history of time, by Steven Hawking.
Memories, dreams, reflections By C.G.Jung
Straight and crooked thinking, by Robert H. Thouless
Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance, by Robert M. Pirsig
The God delusion, by Richard Dawkins
Miracle mongers and their methods, by Houdini
A magician among the spirits, by Houdini
A modern introduction to logic, by L.S. Stebbing

That small sample should tell you I have read books of both sides of the issue. I told you I have a good library

OK, there are actually a few worth reading in that list. But you also need to understand them, and be willing to learn from them. There's an old saying: "You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink".

I've personally explained to you why your anecdotes are an inadequate basis for the conclusions you have drawn from them many times, but I might as well be talking to a brick wall. Your mind is closed on this issue, therefore knowledge cannot enter it.

 

[JayUtah]

See my list of some of my many books in my last post.

Good choices. Now show us that you learned something from them. The way you approach topics of spiritualism and religion, those works you cited might just as well be paperweights to you. As I said, education as we use the term here means more than just inserting a proposition into your memory. It means being able to address subjects critically. The fact that you own a copy of Stebbing, for example, hasn't prevented you from employing blatantly circular reasoning. Did you learn from that book?

 

[Roger Ramjets]

Its not a scientific fact. Why can't you just admit you do not know?

Another Solipsist?

If you spent the amount of time I have in a spiritualist church you might know better.

I doubt it. How much did you learn about neuroscience in your spiritualist church?

 

[Mojo]

That small sample should tell you I have read books of both sides of the issue.

In this very thread you have stated that you will not read books on one side of the issue.

 

[arthwollipot]

Why can't you just admit you do not know?

Why can't you?

 

[Scorpion]

Another Solipsist?

I doubt it. How much did you learn about neuroscience in your spiritualist church?

So what do you think consciousness is cause by? Because my whole life of fighting schizophrenia tells me it is not caused by chemicals. Because I can survive with or without chemical additives in the form of medication. I became an electronics engineer and worked under mental pressure for 20 years without medication. I can also tell you that memory is not stored by electrical means, because I had a course of ECT in 1969 and although I forgot everything for 2 weeks, after they stopped electrocuting my brain my memories returned.

I have said the following before and got a laugh. " I am the thinker not my brain"

It is my hard won experience that mind can control matter. The brain is matter, and I am not it.

 

[Scorpion]

Good choices. Now show us that you learned something from them. The way you approach topics of spiritualism and religion, those works you cited might just as well be paperweights to you. As I said, education as we use the term here means more than just inserting a proposition into your memory. It means being able to address subjects critically. The fact that you own a copy of Stebbing, for example, hasn't prevented you from employing blatantly circular reasoning. Did you learn from that book?

I will tell you the absolute truth, even if it makes me look a fool. I stopped reading the book on logic at the end of chapter two. I put it back on the shelf for later consideration. I realize that I am not literate enough to fully understand pure logic. So I have embarked on a study of a book I have on English language before going back to Stebbings. Fortunately as I have said I have an extensive library, and it contains books that give a more basic approach to logic.

I have a very good book called. 'Clear thinking', by R.W. Jepson
I am currently reading and re- reading it until I fully understand it all.

When I first started on about spiritualism on this forum I thought I could win my arguments for it because I am basically sure I am right. But you soon taught me I am not as intellectual and educated as you and other members of this forum. So I gave up on the thread and went back to reading books I have collected over my lifetime without necessarily understanding them. Now in my old age I am finding my library invaluable, and am working my way through them.

 

[Mojo]

So what do you think consciousness is cause by? Because my whole life of fighting schizophrenia tells me it is not caused by chemicals. Because I can survive with or without chemical additives in the form of medication. I became an electronics engineer and worked under mental pressure for 20 years without medication.

That's a non sequitur. Whether or not you're not taking medication your brain is formed of "chemicals".

Did the medication affect your consciousness?

 

[Scorpion]

That's a non sequitur. Whether or not you're not taking medication your brain is formed of "chemicals".

Did the medication affect your consciousness?

With or without the drugs, my mind is my own. I can still think for myself freely. The brain is a physical organ, but the mind is free to rise above physical limitations of chemical activity.