dualism

This is kind of abstract. Maybe it will get firmed up. I raise it now because of a long, relatively coherent dream I had where all kinds of imagery came up. Great dryness of mouth but ice cubes turned to dusty pebbles in my mouth and full water bottles went empty as I picked them up. Masses of...

I wonder if anyone here has researched how man developed into a creature that believes in an afterlife, that feels it has a "soul" apart from its body. I suggest dualism came about because of a need to believe in an afterlife, which reveals a fear of the end of one's own existence. Animals have...

As a skeptic, I am open to all ideas and will accept them if they are supported with strong evidence, if not, I will continue to remain skeptical until evidence is provided. I understand the objections to both property dualism and substance dualism very well, but I recently came across...

My book review for the book by Pim van Lommel on Near Death Experiences.

I've been increasingly ill for the past year and a half and I've travelled to a major medical center hoping to finally get a diagnosis. A neurologist has just diagnosed me with psychogenic seizures. "Psychogenic" means that there is no organic or physical cause for my symptoms, that instead my...

The laws of thermodynamics contradict themselves unless dualism is true, some kind of dualism in physics. When calculated on mass and energy alone, the laws of thermodynamics (which most scientists accept as facts) are accurate, but when calculated on everything we have observed, they...

One of my favorite science bloggers, Dr. Steven Novella, is going toe-to-toe with one of the Disco Institute's Fellows, Dr. Michael Egnor, concerning neuroscience. In this latest blog entry, Egnor puts on display one of the new rhetorical tactics being used by creationists - calling evolution...

http://un.org/News/briefings/docs/2008/080911_NGOSymposium.doc.htm http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20026793.000-creationists-declare-war-over-the-brain.html The resurrection of Cartesian Dualism is gaining more traction. The idea that the brain and the soul are two separate objects. :hb:

Is it shelved right alongside creationism, etc.

It seems to me that dualism and theism are subsets of materialism (and in general, physicalism). Consider: Materialism -- the only thing we can know exists is matter, of one form or another. Regarding things we cannot know about, there is nothing we can say at this time. Theism -- the only...

Thank God for Evil. Consider what and where we would be without evil. Many think that God was punishing man when He evicted us from the garden of Eden. They would be wrong. Imagine us back in the garden without knowledge of good and evil. There would be little that we could talk about because...

In his latest "Skeptic" column in Scientific American, Shermer says: An interesting insight. Sounds like what you'd expect from evolution. ~~ Paul

Thanks for all those who responded to my posts in the logic of the dharma thread. I am slow and very concrete: I just don't see the inherent dualistic nature of reality. You draw a circle and say this inside the circle, that outside the circle ergo dualism? I draw a square on the beach, a...