Eschewing social conventions is a hallmark of woo beliefs.
In the world of Internet forums, this is usually demonstrated via non-standard formatting. He can't bring himself to conform; he is too special.
[Merged] Immortality & Bayesian Statistics
- Thread starter Jabba
- Start date
- Status
Eschewing social conventions is a hallmark of woo beliefs.
In the world of Internet forums, this is usually demonstrated via non-standard formatting. He can't bring himself to conform; he is too special.
tsig
a carbon based life-form
- Joined
- Nov 25, 2005
- Messages
- 39,049
You're saying time is long my life is short therefore I'm immortal.
Jabba
Philosopher
- Joined
- Feb 23, 2012
- Messages
- 5,613
Anyone,
- It appears that Loss Leader is away from his computer. Can anyone else answer my question?
Akhenaten
Heretic Pharaoh
Srsly?
Why are you here, Jabba?
Why are you here, Jabba?
Slowvehicle
Membership Drive , Co-Ordinator,, Russell's Antin
Good afternoon, Mr. Savage!
I realize that I am not the person you are hoping to hear form, nor is what I am going to say what you are hoping to hear. However, in response to this:
I have to say that the thing you continue to miss is that if your p invokes a "deterministic" universe, your ~p will encompass everything else--including the iterations where the universe would not be deterministic; if your p does not invoke a "deterministic" universe, your ~p will encompass everything else--including the iterations where the universe would be deterministic. As long as you keep trying to define ~p as anything other than "everything that is not p", you keep on making the same mistake. Once you define p, ~p is everything else.
Loss Leader
I would save the receptionist., Moderator
Because I understand logic and reasoning?
This has all been explained to you many, many times over. If you choose not to understand it, for whatever reason, I cannot force it upon you.
John Jones
Penultimate Amazing
Why? Perhaps she took umbrage with your attitude that scientists are dishonest and incompetent.
Jabba
Philosopher
- Joined
- Feb 23, 2012
- Messages
- 5,613
LL,
- I still disagree with you re the deterministic universe issue, but I think I've given it my best shot and will move on.
Jabba
Philosopher
- Joined
- Feb 23, 2012
- Messages
- 5,613
- I might finally have an effective way to express my dichotomy.
- The SM holds that any self that comes to exist will have only one, finite existence. The NSM (the complement) holds that any self that comes to exist will either exist continuously, or will exist more than once.
- Many of you will believe that it's the same thing I've been saying -- and I agree that it is what I've been trying to say -- hopefully, I'll be satisfied with this rendition.
- The SM holds that any self that comes to exist will have only one, finite existence. The NSM (the complement) holds that any self that comes to exist will either exist continuously, or will exist more than once.
- Many of you will believe that it's the same thing I've been saying -- and I agree that it is what I've been trying to say -- hopefully, I'll be satisfied with this rendition.
jsfisher
ETcorngods survivor
- Joined
- Dec 23, 2005
- Messages
- 24,532
No good.
Without being exactly precise in my use of language, your proposition is that "all living things are mortal". The complement is not "all living things are not mortal", which is what you seem to be saying. You flipped from one extreme to the other, living the middle out completely.
The complement of "all living things are mortal" is "some living thing is not mortal". It only takes one.
Last edited:
tsig
a carbon based life-form
- Joined
- Nov 25, 2005
- Messages
- 39,049
Maybe this is worth a shot?
Well, Jabba, let’s try something different.
Consider what it would be like to survive bodily death, consciousness intact (that’s what immortality means, right?), and know that you would never die, not ever, not even when the universe had expanded until every subatomic particle was octillions of kilometers from the next one. Why, the first instant of eternity would not have elapsed even then! Do you really think your human mind could take that?
What would not taking it mean anyway? Would you beg your deterministic/nondeterministic God to let you cease to exist, to fall mercifully asleep and not awaken? He’d just reply, “Nuh-uh, buddy. Nobody told you to be born, you started existing on your own. In my eternity, you take what you get. If you’re bored, try doing crosswords or sumpin’.” Because if you could die in that bodiless state, then it wouldn't be immortality at all, now would it? God would never let you get away with a cheap trick like that, country boy!
This matter of immortality comes up on JREF from time to time. I can recall a thread of some years back in which we – brace yourself for the sheer improbability of it – actually reached a consensus! Yes, we JREFers, atheists, agnostics (whatever those are), and religious believers, all agreed: In order to endure immortal existence, we’d have to become something other than human.
Maybe you’re a closet Mormon and think you’ll grow up to be a god, but in my estimation, we’d have to become something considerably less than human – that means, in your case, something considerably less than Jabba. Creepy thought, innit?
A poster here observed, in that thread or some other, that “the most exquisite paradise would become an unendurable hell in no more than an aeon or two.”
So I hope you’ll put aside that bowl of salad you’re been mixing for two years and think about what you say you desire, that is, immortality. Don’t try to think rationally; that’s not your game. Instead, try to feel your human limitations in the immensity of the universe, and be glad that, in cosmic terms, you exist only for a fragment of a second.
Well, Jabba, let’s try something different.
Consider what it would be like to survive bodily death, consciousness intact (that’s what immortality means, right?), and know that you would never die, not ever, not even when the universe had expanded until every subatomic particle was octillions of kilometers from the next one. Why, the first instant of eternity would not have elapsed even then! Do you really think your human mind could take that?
What would not taking it mean anyway? Would you beg your deterministic/nondeterministic God to let you cease to exist, to fall mercifully asleep and not awaken? He’d just reply, “Nuh-uh, buddy. Nobody told you to be born, you started existing on your own. In my eternity, you take what you get. If you’re bored, try doing crosswords or sumpin’.” Because if you could die in that bodiless state, then it wouldn't be immortality at all, now would it? God would never let you get away with a cheap trick like that, country boy!
This matter of immortality comes up on JREF from time to time. I can recall a thread of some years back in which we – brace yourself for the sheer improbability of it – actually reached a consensus! Yes, we JREFers, atheists, agnostics (whatever those are), and religious believers, all agreed: In order to endure immortal existence, we’d have to become something other than human.
Maybe you’re a closet Mormon and think you’ll grow up to be a god, but in my estimation, we’d have to become something considerably less than human – that means, in your case, something considerably less than Jabba. Creepy thought, innit?
A poster here observed, in that thread or some other, that “the most exquisite paradise would become an unendurable hell in no more than an aeon or two.”
So I hope you’ll put aside that bowl of salad you’re been mixing for two years and think about what you say you desire, that is, immortality. Don’t try to think rationally; that’s not your game. Instead, try to feel your human limitations in the immensity of the universe, and be glad that, in cosmic terms, you exist only for a fragment of a second.
Last edited:
Squeegee Beckenheim
Penultimate Amazing
- Joined
- Dec 29, 2010
- Messages
- 32,124
It's exactly the same thing that you've already been saying. Nobody has a problem with your phrasing, it's your logic which is lacking. Rephrasing illogic doesn't make it more logical.
Slowvehicle
Membership Drive , Co-Ordinator,, Russell's Antin
Good evening, Mr. Savage.
I am sorry, but I agree with neither of your formulations above; further, they represent the same mistake you have been making all along with regards to p and ~p.
1. Unless and until you can demonstrate that any scientist makes the claim that "any self that comes to exist will have only one, finite existence", I refuse to agree that that represents the "scientific model" (your SM). The "scientific model" is that consciousness (what you are celling the "self", but by which you mean the "soul") is an emergent property of the neurosystem, that is, consciousness if a by-product of the structure of the brain. (p)
2. The complement of that statement (~p) is that consciousness is not an emergent property of the brain. Full stop. Any description of consciousness that does not involve consciousness being a by-product of the structure of the brain will be included in that ~p. Do notice, please, that a description such as "the "soul exists independently of the body, and is immortal" is only a part of ~p; ~p includes anything and everything that is not p.
3. The complement of your "SM" is not, as you have it, that "any self that comes to exist will either exist continuously, or will exist more than once". Instead, if your "SM" is p, ~p can only be stated as , "any 'self' that comes into existence will not have only one, finite existence". Anything that fits that description (two finite existences; three; the illusion of existence at all; a non-infinite existence at the will of the Hairy Thunderer; an unspecified number of non-infinite existences based on random chance; etc.) is part of ~p; is subsumed in ~p. It is, as you have been told, the fallacy of false dichotomy to pick only your desired case, that the "soul" is immortal, and call that inevitable. Instead, any condition where the self does not have only one finite existence is a small part of ~p.
As long as you continue to mis-state ~p, there is no ground for agreement. You are correct in that you are still saying what you have been saying all along; it is, however, still wrong.
pakeha
Penultimate Amazing
- Joined
- Jul 11, 2009
- Messages
- 12,331
What does Jesus have to do with immortality?
Humots
Critical Thinker
- Joined
- May 29, 2012
- Messages
- 425
Jabba: I think that this sums up your problem with p nicely.
The bolded above is a scientific model. I would add the statement "Consciousness does not exist independently of the brain, and will cease to exist when the brain no longer functions". This is what p should be.
You are stating that p is "any self that comes to exist will have only one, finite existence." This is a conclusion based on the above scientific model, not a scientific model in itself.
By stating p as "any self that comes to exist will have only one, finite existence.", you are focusing on the number one, so that in ~p the number of lives must be different, hence greater.
This is not logic. This is playing word games.
Frozenwolf150
Formerly SilentKnight
- Joined
- Dec 10, 2007
- Messages
- 4,134
You don't have to address me by username, just quoting me is fine. I'll know if I see my username in the quote box.
Your source appears to be relegating all explanations and evidence to an antecedent labeled "magical reality" and is basing this reasoning on the assumption that one's existence is next to impossible. It makes this assumption in much the same way you have. In both cases, it's an unsupported assertion. Your source makes several arguments from incredulity, and seems to be saying that if we don't know the answer or lack the capacity to seek the answers, we must assume reality is "magical." Also, this still doesn't provide a mechanism or explanation for how consciousness could survive physical death.
Here's the thing. This falls into the category of a personal belief. If you want to believe it, that's fine. If you want to present it as evidence however, you're going to have to do a lot better than merely claiming that reality is "magical."
kid meatball
Critical Thinker
- Joined
- May 6, 2013
- Messages
- 303
Your NSM might also include instances where a self might only have a single, finite existence. You are implying that in the current scientific model, there is no room for immortality. While it is not proven that immortality is impossible, no scientist would say flat out that it is impossible. You can't lean on current knowledge as truth. Our understanding of the physical universe is ever changing, therefore, your SM might, in the future, also include the possibility that at least one self may exist as an immortal self.
I'm quite sure this point has been brought up at least once in this thread. Is it possible it is an immortal point?
Squeegee Beckenheim
Penultimate Amazing
- Joined
- Dec 29, 2010
- Messages
- 32,124
Ladewig
I lost an avatar bet.
- Joined
- Dec 4, 2001
- Messages
- 28,828
- Status