Materialism (championed by Darwinists) makes reason Impossible.

The neuroimaging studies of cardiac arrest survivors show a high incidence of temporal lobe lesions that would have gone unnoticed without specifically looking for them.

Now, if somebody suffers a cardiac arrest and after regaining consciousness tells abou having met God and that his life has completely changed, would you assign it to really having met God or to the hypoxic brain damage?
I would go for the latter.

I have had my share of hallucinations so I know how real they can be.
Also I've had a lot of incidences of synchronism that 'science cannot explain'.

Science cannot and it should not be used to explain 'data' from random observations.

And yes, even Dutchmen lie.
 
Last edited:
Sideroxylon said:
What is emotional telepathy? It sounds like a supernatural explanation.

Anyway, poor word choice by me. "Supernatural" is a term with fundamental problems of definition.
Click to expand...

I see no supernatural process at work here, only a physical process, which is as yet unknown to science.

Can you provided an explanation that makes use of phenomena that can be reliably verified by scientific methods? Let's apply Occam's Razor here.
Click to expand...

I can think of no scientific explanation, can you?
 
punshhh said:
I see no supernatural process at work here, only a physical process, which is as yet unknown to science.
Click to expand...
punshhh:

We know there are physical processes unknown to science. There are big questions left to be answered; this is why we built the LHC for example.

However, even given this, how do you know that your incident is due to processes unknown to science?
I can think of no scientific explanation, can you?
Click to expand...
Yes, plenty. I lack the information to know if they are correct, or if any of them are correct; but even if they're all wrong, I don't know this is a physical process we don't know about. It's entirely possible, but I don't see it as necessary at all to reach that conclusion.

You, however, have concluded that there is, and I'm not sure how you could do that.
 
punshhh said:
I see no supernatural process at work here, only a physical process, which is as yet unknown to science.



I can think of no scientific explanation, can you?
Click to expand...

Doesn't mean there isn't one though, does it. Should that be a blank check for any explanation based on unverified phenomena?

Observational selection has already been offered up as a problem. I like the way Francis Bacon illustrated it:

The human understanding when it has once adopted an opinion (either as being the received opinion or as being agreeable to itself) draws all things else to support and agree with it. And though there be a greater number and weight of instances to be found on the other side, yet these it either neglects and despises, or else by some distinction sets aside and rejects; in order that by this great and pernicious predetermination the authority of its former conclusions may remain inviolate. And therefore it was a good answer that was made by one who when they showed him hanging in a temple a picture of those who had paid their vows as having escaped shipwreck, and would have him say whether he did not now acknowledge the power of the gods,-"Aye," asked he again, "but where are they painted that were drowned, after their vows?" And such is the way of all superstition, whether in astrology, dreams, omens, divine judgments, or the like; wherein men, having a delight in such vanities, mark the events where they are fulfilled, but where they fail, though this happen much oftener, neglect and pass them by. But with far more subtlety does this mischief insinuate itself into philosophy and the sciences; in which the first conclusion colours and brings into conformity with itself all that come after, though far sounder and better. Besides, independently of that delight and vanity which I have described, it is the peculiar and perpetual error of human intellect to be more moved and excited by affirmatives than by negatives; whereas it ought properly to hold itself indifferently disposed towards both alike. Indeed in the establishment of any true axiom, the negative instance is the more forcible of the two.
Click to expand...


This is why the scientific method is based on disciplined observation. To rule out observational selection you would have to carefully record when you had some kind of feeling of dread and whether it preceded anything significant. Then you would need to ask about those cases where a hit was recorded if the odds were significantly beyond chance.

But that's a lot of hard work and perhaps magical thinking is too comforting anyway.
 
yy2bggggs said:
punshhh:

We know there are physical processes unknown to science. There are big questions left to be answered; this is why we built the LHC for example.

However, even given this, how do you know that your incident is due to processes unknown to science?

Yes, plenty. I lack the information to know if they are correct, or if any of them are correct; but even if they're all wrong, I don't know this is a physical process we don't know about. It's entirely possible, but I don't see it as necessary at all to reach that conclusion.

You, however, have concluded that there is, and I'm not sure how you could do that.
Click to expand...

This not a conclusion I have made, it is a speculative explanation.

I can think of no other way in which I was experiencing the same emotional shock as the other members of my family.

Can you?
 
punshhh said:
Yes indeed, the owl and the pussycat.

Which side of the debate is the owl and which the pussycat, I wonder.

This is why as far as I am concerned the mind is not the means by which to know reality. Only the interpretive tool with which to contemplate it.
Click to expand...
More word games.
 
punshhh said:
Ah! hide it in the statistics.
Click to expand...

Off you go and find it then, mate. You'll need to collect your data first, though. It's a sad fact of life that we have to resort to rigorous investigation to find meaning* in this world.

ETA: * Meaning through narratives that allow us to make reliable predictions about the world.
 
Last edited:
Sideroxylon said:
Doesn't mean there isn't one though, does it. Should that be a blank check for any explanation based on unverified phenomena?

Observational selection has already been offered up as a problem. I like the way Francis Bacon illustrated it:




This is why the scientific method is based on disciplined observation. To rule out observational selection you would have to carefully record when you had some kind of feeling of dread and whether it preceded anything significant. Then you would need to ask about those cases where a hit was recorded if the odds were significantly beyond chance.

But that's a lot of hard work and perhaps magical thinking is too comforting anyway.
Click to expand...

Recording your hunches and following them up i one way to kill fun.
I like the feeling of being connected to the spirit of the Universe when somebody who I just thought about calls me.

Only that there are hundreds of threads going on in an average head every minute and the one that coincides with an unusual event instantly gathers Meaning.

Some people keep doing that even as grownups.
Which is a bit boring at times.
 
what does that proofs?

Malerin said:
It can mean that they may be detecting a supernatural being but differing on their interpretation of the experience. Different people will interpret the same thing differently. For example, if SETI received the message "We will visit your planet soon", many people will interpret that many ways. Some will see it as a threat, others as a boon. But the underlying fact, that alien life exists, would not be disputed. Theists may differ about what god is, but they all agree that god(s) exists.

ETA: also eyewitnesses can have vastly different recollections of the details of the same event (what the suspects looked like, what they said, the timeline of what they did), but still agree on the basic event itself (a bank robbery).
Click to expand...

Malerin, since you didn't answer, here I go again:

Ignosticist said:
Theists may differ about what god are, and they also differ about which god(s) exists... many of them believe only their particular interpretation of god(s) is "real", and the others do not.

On the other hand... what does that proofs? Many people once believed that diseases were caused by "evil spirits", we now know the real causes of diseases are not "evil spirits". Does the fact that all the ancient cultures were unable to discover microbiology by intuition or "divine revelation" says nothing to you? Or you believe they were actually "detecting a supernatural evil spirits but differing on their interpretation of the experience"?
Click to expand...

Lots of people wrong about something (like evil spirits doing what microorganisms do) do not make it any less wrong.
 
Last edited:
Sideroxylon said:
Doesn't mean there isn't one though, does it. Should that be a blank check for any explanation based on unverified phenomena?

Observational selection has already been offered up as a problem. I like the way Francis Bacon illustrated it:




This is why the scientific method is based on disciplined observation. To rule out observational selection you would have to carefully record when you had some kind of feeling of dread and whether it preceded anything significant. Then you would need to ask about those cases where a hit was recorded if the odds were significantly beyond chance.

But that's a lot of hard work and perhaps magical thinking is too comforting anyway.
Click to expand...

So I am indulging in magical thinking am I. This sounds like a claim that phenomena not yet known to science is magic.

I have only experienced this kind of emotional phenomena twice. Both times it was strikingly different to how I normally experience feelings.
It did not originate through an activity or phenomena I was experiencing myself, but rather was somehow delivered to me from elsewhere. As such I did not forget the experience and am sure it has not happened at any other time.
 
Marlerin,
you never quite explained your position on the hypothetical you gave me.
What effect do YOU believe that if replaced my cells with perfect mechanical replicas Would have?

Would I be conscious still and appear to function and interact normally?
If the answer is no, why? What is different that prevents the replacement? Afterall, all other organ transplants seem to work with the person remaining. Why is the brain different?
If the answer is yes, then how is your position different from mine?
 
punshhh said:
So I am indulging in magical thinking am I. This sounds like a claim that phenomena not yet known to science is magic.

I have only experienced this kind of emotional phenomena twice. Both times it was strikingly different to how I normally experience feelings.
It did not originate through an activity or phenomena I was experiencing myself, but rather was somehow delivered to me from elsewhere. As such I did not forget the experience and am sure it has not happened at any other time.
Click to expand...

"Magical thinking" is a pejorative term but I think it is appropriate here as you are inserting a fanciful explanation into a situation where it would be more honest to say "I don't know".

Could you have forgotten other times that you had this feeling? What would have counted as a hit if the cat hadn't died? A news report of a disaster some place in the world? Perhaps, death of a celebrity? Someone in your family very ill?

You did mention noticing that the occupants of the home were not following usual habits. Could it be that unconsciously you noticed it, triggering the feeling of dread, before a concious realisation occurred?
 
punshhh said:
This not a conclusion I have made, it is a speculative explanation.
Click to expand...
That it is something current science cannot explain is not an explanation. Are you referring to your emotional telepathy here?
I can think of no other way in which I was experiencing the same emotional shock as the other members of my family.

Can you?
Click to expand...
It's not fair to ask me to explain something I was not present for. All I could possibly do is develop impressions of the account you have given; I cannot, for example, notice a thing you may have missed.

But this is the account you are giving:
1. Your family went into the house
2. They stayed in the house for a few minutes
3. You got out of the car alone
4. You experienced an extreme emotion
5. On entering the house, the atmosphere was quiet
6. It is unusual for the atmosphere to be that quiet
7. You felt very disturbed
8. You did not consciously perceive that everyone else was as disturbed as you.

What troubles me is just how easy it is to explain this. It would appear by this account that you were all but being explicitly told that something was off (2, 3 explain 4; 5, 6 explain 7). The apparent explanation of this account is that you were processing these clues unconsciously; what is really odd is that your account contains the explanation including the clues, but you're saying the explanation is something unknown.

So what am I missing?
 
Last edited:
punshhh said:
I see no supernatural process at work here, only a physical process, which is as yet unknown to science.



I can think of no scientific explanation, can you?
Click to expand...

Two have already provided you a scientific explanation : remembering bias, and feeling unrelated to the situation. Whether youa ccept it or not, or whether are appliable to the situation is up to you. The challenge was only to provide a potential explanation. It was done.
 
punshhh said:
Ah! hide it in the statistics.
Click to expand...

It is not hiding int he statistic. It is simply that we human have a lot of BIAS into what we remember and when. A classic example of that is the premonitory dream, which are not remembered when nothing happens, but clearly and vividely remembered for a long time when a correlation happens. The things is , it is a bias and statistic effect, not a true premonition !
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom