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The Happiness Box

I still don't have an answer to the question that is a rather important point in Jeff's argument:

Does simply having a soul guarentee justice in the afterlife? If yes, please explain how you arrived at that conclusion.
 
delphi_ote said:
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that dragons DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that hobbits DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that the Greek Gods DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that the X-Men DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that psychic powers DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that perpetual motion machines DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that zombies DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that angels DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that your imaginary friends DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that miracles DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that djinn DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that vampires DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that wizards DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that Jedi DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that philosophers' stones DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that unicorns DON'T exist?
What LABORATORY EVIDENCE do you personally know of that magic wardrobes DON'T exist?

As you can see, this is not a very good way of thinking.
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Not to mention--before you can ask if laboratory tests show whether souls exist, one has to define a soul in a way that can be tested in a laboratory.
 
Jeff Corkern said:
This is not a proof. This is just a statement.

Suppose you were drugged while you were asleep and placed into a Happiness Box without your knowledge.

How would you know you were in the Happiness Box? What physical experiment could you perform that would tell you? All connections to your physical body have been cut. The only input to your brain is coming from the computer.
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That's not a proof nor a thought-experiment. We know that the human senses can be fooled all the time. In fact, it's the difference between what the senses tell us and what is that defines "reality."

I don't need anything as complicated as a Happiness Box to demonstrate that, either. Just a quick lunch with a good and cooperative magician, who can easily show me that I have coins in my ears, that there are three salt shakers and no pepper shakers on the table, and that my fork is as flexible as open-cell foam.

But the "reality" is that I have no coins, and the magician knows it, even if he declines to permit me a video camera to disprove it.
 
Jeff Corkern said:
So what's the laboratory evidence? I want name and papers published in refereed journals, just like with evolution, relativity, and so forth.
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The point you seem to be missing is that there are no papers proving that relativity and evolution AREN'T real.

There are an infinite number of non-existant things. Therefore, scientists do not determine what IS by process of elimination. Therefore, they do not generally go about proving things aren't real, but rather that they are real.

If your argument for souls rests on lack of research proving they don't exist, then you will also have to argue for alien empathic ventriloquism, and every other idea you can think of which is incompatible with souls.

So that avenue of thought leads to infinite contradictions, with souls existing along with other things that are not souls and make souls impossible.

We can therefore dispense with it.

Now, have you had a chance to think about post 71?

Piggy said:
You say "Grant that people have eternal existence", then ask how it would affect their lives and our world.

But before we go to that next step, we have to distinguish exactly what we're plugging into the hypothetical scenario.

Important question: If people have souls (or eternal existence), do they then automatically know they have souls (or eternal existence)?

This is important b/c if not, then it won't change a thing. Our scenario will look just like before.

It seems that the effect of this thought-experiment would actually be to ask what it would be like if people believed they had souls.

And that's a very different question.

So let's back up one more time.

If we propose that soul-bearers are automatically aware of their souls, then we're in trouble b/c that means all the folks who believe they don't have a soul must actually not have a soul! So we can't go in that direction.

That means we must assume that soul-bearers aren't necessarily aware of their souls. So examining the difference between "having a soul" and "believing one has a soul" is kinda tricky if we take this route of plugging a soul into a hypothetical model of behavior.

I recommend this step first: What is it in the soul (not in mere belief in a soul) that affects our behavior?
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I thought we were starting to get a dialog going.

What is it in the soul (not in mere belief in a soul) that affects our behavior?

Thanks.
 
Jeff Corkern said:
Sensory impulses stream into your living brain and are processed in various ways.

Your brain dies----and all your perception of reality blinks out and you zero out and disappear, gone, like a light bulb going out.

Ergo, reality is a stream of sensory impulses into your brain being processed in various ways.
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Sentence 1 is a statement about processing of "sensory impulses" (it's not correct to say they "stream into" the brain, but let's let that go for now).

Sentence 2 is a satement about death, and the end of perception of reality.

Sentence 3 concludes that reality = the processing of sensory impulses.

The conclusion does not follow the premises.

To illustrate that, let's make it a syllogism about a puppy cam instead:

Light rays stream into the puppy cam and are processed in various ways.

The camera fails----and all the recording of the puppies blinks out and the data stream zeroes out and disappears, gone, like a light bulb going out.

Ergo, puppies are a stream of light rays into a camera being processed in various ways.​

Doesn't add up.
 
Anticipating an objection to my post above, let me say now that the point is not to equate our minds with cameras. It is only to point out that the 3 statements in the original aren't logically coherent.

To illustrate this, I substituted:

Light rays for sensory impulses (the medium, the carrier of data)
Camera for brain (the machinery, what processes the data)
Recording for perception (the activity, what's happening to the data)
puppies for reality (the object, the thing being perceived/recorded)
data stream for you (the subject, the thing that stops)

Once we do that, it's easier to see that when we get to the 3rd sentence, something's gone wrong. Suddenly, puppies are being equated with what's happening to the light rays, and that doesn't make sense in terms of what's been said in the previous 2 statements.

Similarly, in the original, when we get to the end, suddenly reality is being equated with what's happening to the sensory impulses, and that doesn't make sense in terms of what's been said in the previous 2 statements either.
 
A question for you, Jeff:

Suppose you and I and Dr. Adequate (with or without the bacon rind) were involved in a biological experiment, in which our brains were removed from our bodies, split into right and left hemispheres, and then all the neurons and blood vessels reattached so that:

Your body had my left brain hemisphere and Dr A's right hemisphere.
My body had your right brain and Dr A's left brain.
Dr A's body had my right brain and your left brain.

All this done with full life support during the operation, everyone is revived, we all sit up and look at each other.

Where would the souls be?
 
Dr Adequate said:
Some more questions for JC.

(1) Would you please define what you mean by "rational"? This question has been raised several times, and the concept seems crucial to your argument.

(2) Specifically, I should like to know if it is rational for me to like flowers.

(3) If it is not rational for me to like flowers, then, given the datum that I do like flowers, do you conclude that I behave as though my immortal soul will be punished in the afterlife if I don't like flowers, or can you think of an alternative hypothesis which doesn't involve intangible metaphysical entities?
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To judge whether it is not rational for you to like flowers requires information I don't have. Like whether or not you're allergic to flowers, for example.


Okay, guys, I'm calling a halt to all this and going away for a few days to let things cool down. I'm letting you all know so nobody will get mad when I don't reply to your posts.

I've had ten people jumping my case for the last few days and I'm tired. I have got other things to do that I let slide to deal with this. Now I've got to attend to those other things.

One final comment, and I'm done:

If you guys want to prove me wrong, it's s-o-o-o incredibly easy. My entire thesis revolves around the existence of the soul.

Cite detailed scientific experiments conducted by reputable scientists published in refereed journals that fail repeatedly to detect souls, and the odds are y'all are right. Of course, you can't prove the existence of a negative to 100%, but you can build up an awful lot of nines.

You can't do it 100%, but you can do it 99.999%.

I once asked somebody to do that, cite scientific experiments.

It NEVER happened.

Somebody said if I wanted to prove souls existed, the onus was on me to prove it in the lab. Perfectly correct, and I admitted I had no hard data.

However, the lack of data does NOT prove the opposite, that souls do NOT exist. It means simply NOBODY KNOWS. If you want to prove something doesn't exist, you MUST make an effort to prove that also, at least get as many nines as you can.

The scientific method, THE most effective tool ever invented by humanity for determining what is and is not true, is this:

If you state something is true, or NOT true, you MUST make an attempt to prove it, either way.

And if you don't believe the above statement is correct, then show it to a scientist and ask him/her if it is correct. Shouldn't there be a practicing scientist somewhere in a skeptics forum? Drag him/her over here and ask.

Y'all have a good one.
 
Jeff Corkern said:
If you guys want to prove me wrong, it's s-o-o-o incredibly easy. My entire thesis revolves around the existence of the soul.

Cite detailed scientific experiments conducted by reputable scientists published in refereed journals that fail repeatedly to detect souls, and the odds are y'all are right. Of course, you can't prove the existence of a negative to 100%, but you can build up an awful lot of nines.
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Oh dear. You still don't see.

It's not up to us to prove that you are wrong.
It's up to you to prove that you are right.
That's what "burden of proof" means.


Jeff, my grandfathers are dead. I believe that you murdered both of them.
Unless you can prove that you did not, you are morally and ethically bound to report to the nearest police station and turn yourself in. Make a full confession. Plead guilty, and spend the rest of your life in jail.

The flaw in my reasoning is the same as the flaw in yours.
 
These threads are like stock car races. You tell youself you're not there just for the crash -- and maybe you're not, when it comes down to it -- maybe you're there to see how long the crash can be postponed.

But still, in a way, it's sad when it comes.
 
Since you're fond of strawmen:

1. If I had a soul, then God would prevent me from claiming I do not.
2. I do not have a soul.
3. Since I can claim I do not have a soul, I therefore do not have a soul.

1. Souls weigh 1,000 lbs.
2. I weigh less than 1,000 lbs.
3. Therefore, I do not have a soul.

1. Possessing a soul makes a person commit murder in the name of god.
2. I have not killed anybody in the name of god.
3. Therefore, I do not have a soul.

There, I even gave you THREE solid proofs.

Hey, you had your chance to define what a soul is, you declined. Perhaps you'd like to choose to define it now?

Now, if your definition of a soul is something that cannot be detected by any known means (or worse yet, your definition of a soul is simply the cause of something that exists, but is entirely possible without the existance of souls) then reqesting others to prove its non-existance is just plain silly. So think hard, we'll see you later.
 
(emphasis mine)

Jeff Corkern said:
Okay, guys, I'm calling a halt to all this and going away for a few days to let things cool down.

[...]

One final comment, and I'm done:

[...]

Y'all have a good one.
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Good thing you "called a halt" before dropping yet another egg. (Maybe it was intended as a bombshell, but it's a lot more fragile than that.) Next time I get stuck in an inescapable web of my own making, I'm going on vacation too. After heating things up so they can cool down.
 
That story was hilarious, He was comparing the police officers to Satan or a judging god! Either he really hates police officers or really loves them!

Perhaps he was just trying to show some kind of authority figure and that would be better but what I don't understand is who exactly convinced the police officers of letting them do whatever in the box? Was this convincer better than the police officer or just their friend? So someone or something can convince a judger, does that mean the rules can be bent if convinced properly?

This whole story I think was to make a fantasy seem more realistic to make it become more believable, the problem in that is it makes the fantasy even more unbelievable. For example, If I am in this happiness box and can do whatever I want in it and pay for it later as agreed upon by the officers I can rape children, smoke crack, masterbate to the mother mary and defficate upon the officers legal book that he had some other people right. But when I walk out of the circle I get my just deserts.....UNLESS I believe one or all of the officers has had sons then all is good regardless of what I have done within the box. Sounds realistic to me........

The problem with this also is that you can actually prove big ugly police officers exist and there is evidence of them everywhere that EVERYONE can agree upon.

If these officers represent god and big and ugly are you calling god ugly? If they are satan are you calling authority satanic? If god is authority is he thus far satan? Or does your story have nothing to do with anything other than a pathetic attempt to ejaculate an idiotic fantasy into our eyes?
 
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If you guys want to prove me wrong, it's s-o-o-o incredibly easy. My entire thesis revolves around the existence of the soul.
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One doesn't even need to disprove the existence of the soul to prove you wrong. For the sake of argument, one could concede that souls exist (I can't be sure they don't...) - still, even if souls existed this would not mean that knowing I have a soul would motivate me to act ethically, any more than thinking I probably don't have a soul motivates me to act unethically. For your argument to work *you* need to prove not only the existence of a soul but also of something like a benevolent, omniscient God that will punish/reward us after death.
A question for you, Jeff:

Suppose you and I and Dr. Adequate (with or without the bacon rind) were involved in a biological experiment, in which our brains were removed from our bodies, split into right and left hemispheres, and then all the neurons and blood vessels reattached so that:

Your body had my left brain hemisphere and Dr A's right hemisphere.
My body had your right brain and Dr A's left brain.
Dr A's body had my right brain and your left brain.

All this done with full life support during the operation, everyone is revived, we all sit up and look at each other.

Where would the souls be?
Click to expand...

Have you read Dennet's short story/essay Where am I? A similar theme, and that is a good philosophical story :)
 
Scott Haley said:
Here's a flaw in your logic. You start with the assumption that the only reason to have any regard for other people is to avoid negative consequences. From reading your posts, your reasoning seems to start with the idea that that's the one and only possible reason not to abandon your kids or shoot everyone you meet.

Another reason to do so is the love of others. The man in your story refused to abandon his children because he loves them. If someone wants to be good to others out of love for them, souls or lack of souls are irrelevant to that.

--Scott
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I agree. Jeff seems to have a sort of straw-man belief system slanted towards behaviorism, that all behaviors can be explained by reward-seeking and punishment-avoidance. In the real world, though, there are all sorts of complex behaviors that can't really be explained by this simplistic model.

I think that Jeff believes if there is no afterlife, then everything we do and everything we are can be distilled down to stimulus-response. Perhaps this is true at a very low level, but life has certain emergent properties that are greater than the sum of their parts. I think that this imbues life with a richness that goes way beyond a textbook model of behavior, soul or no soul.
 
Just looking around me, watching the evening news, studying history--I don't see people behaving as if they had souls or as if they didn't. I just see human behavior; selfish, greedy, altruistic, noble, heinous, generous, self-sacrificing, human-sacrificing and so on. And I see that the rationale for such behaviors varies from era to era, nation to nation, and from one belief system to another. There is too much variety in human thought and belief to make assumptions about how people behave if they think they have souls. Or not.
 
I once asked somebody to do that, cite scientific experiments.

It NEVER happened.
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*sigh*

It never happened because you can't scientifically test something that by definition does not physically exist and has no contact with the physical world. How about your propose how we would scientifically test for a soul before demanding negative experimental proof.

On the bright side, at least you didn't start a fourth thread on the topic.
 
Jeff Corkern said:
If you guys want to prove me wrong, it's s-o-o-o incredibly easy. My entire thesis revolves around the existence of the soul.

Cite detailed scientific experiments conducted by reputable scientists published in refereed journals that fail repeatedly to detect souls, and the odds are y'all are right. Of course, you can't prove the existence of a negative to 100%, but you can build up an awful lot of nines.
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Jeff, this is what I'm talking about. This point has already been addressed. If you want to repeat it, please at least show how you deal with the rebuttal. Otherwise it just shows that you aren't listening to anything that's being said.

I won't try to make up my own explanation for the errors in this post. Instead, I'll give you an option. Go back and look at one of the following posts and respond to it. If you can't, then stop making this same assertion. Otherwise, you're not really talking to us anymore, you're just talking to yourself.

Anyway, here are the posts, one of which you should try to respond to:

Beleth: #110: http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1602145&postcount=110
Piggy, #105: http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1601831&postcount=105
delphi_ote, #87: http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1600411&postcount=87

There were others, but I feel these made the most pertinent points. I'd be particularly interested in a response to Beleth's post, but take your pick. You don't have to respond to every post made, but you do have to address this issue before you make the same assertion again, otherwise we'll just keep repeating this argument in novel ways and this discussion will get nowhere.

Thanks.
 
Time to pull out the Logic Lens (tm) and see what we get!

In an act of great daring, I shall attempt to analyze Jeff's statements, and see what can be derived. I am not interested in the provability of his axioms, merely in figuring out what they tell us and where they lead.


Terms:

RATIONAL: as indicated by the capital letters, being RATIONAL is a specific state of mind and means of reaching conclusions.


The following statements are currently set down as given by Jeff, and, while the proofs are found somewhat lacking, are taken as axioms for the current logic.

Axiom 1: Jeff is RATIONAL in matters of the soul.

Axiom 2: Jeff has created a RATIONAL proof that souls exist

Axiom 3: Jeff believes that souls exist

Axiom 4: Jeff is not a sociopath

Axiom 5: In Jeff's stories, RATIONAL beings, and other entities, behave the way Jeff expects them to.

Axiom 6: Jeff prefers the medium of his stories to communicate his ideas

Axiom 7: A person, who seeks to maximise his personal pleasure and satisfaction at the expense of others, is a sociopath.


Arguments in favor of axioms 1-3 holding (not proof):

a) Jeff's conclusions about the soul are, by his own statements, obvious to anyone who is RATIONAL. He accepts his own conclusions.

However, we are not certain that Jeff's conclusions being obvious implies RATIONALITY. It is theoretically possible for non-RATIONAL people to accept his conclusions.

b) In his communications, Jeff indicates that he considers himself RATIONAL.

It is theoretically possible for a non-RATIONAL person to consider themselves RATIONAL.


Conclusion: barring a better definitional of RATIONALITY, we cannot be certain that Jeff is RATIONAL in matters of the soul. However, his language and premises indicate that it is likely.

Alternatives:

Jeff is not RATIONAL in matters of the soul

Jeff is sometimes RATIONAL in matters of the soul (got to remember that too often excluded middle)

Axioms 4-6 have been proven, by Jeff stating them as correct at some point in the threads.

Axiom 7 has been implied by Jeff and other posters, and is therefore accepted as relatively common ground.



The following theorems are parts of Jeff's RATIONAL proof referred to in axiom 1.

Theorem 1: A RATIONAL person, believing souls do not exist, will behave like a sociopath.

Proof: this was given in Jeff's first story.

Lemma 1: A RATIONAL person, believing souls do not exist, will opt for the "Happiness Box" if given a chance.

Proof: this is the essence of the "Happiness Box" part of the second story.

Theorem 2: A RATIONAL person, believing souls do not exist, will seek to maximise his personal pleasure and satisfaction at the expense of others.

Proof: this follows from Lemma 1 using RATIONAL reasoning.


Time for the logic exercise.

Within the forums, Jeff has encountered people who disagreed with him (proof: check the threads)

By axiom 6, Jeff prefers his stories as a means of arguing his case

By axiom 5, the events in Jeff's stories follow his desires


Theorem 3: Jeff will opt for the "Happiness Box" if given a chance.

Proof: In a "Happiness Box", things happen as the user of the box desires. In Jeff's stories, thigs happen as Jeff desires. Jeff prefers his stories to other means of discussion.


By axiom 1, Jeff is RATIONAL in matters of the soul

By Lemma 1, a RATIONAL being who does not belive in souls will prefer an environment where events match their desires (Happiness Box)

By axiom 3, Jeff believes in souls

Theorem 4: a RATIONAL being will opt for the "Happiness Box"

Proof: RATIONAL beings believing in souls (Theorem 3) and not believing in souls (Lemma 1) opt for the Happiness box. I am unaware of any other shades of belief possible, so we have the full set.

Theorem 5: a RATIONAL being will seek to maximise his personal pleasure and satisfaction, at the expense of others.

Proof: This follows from Theorem 2 and Theorem 4, since Theorem 2 follows RATIONAL reasoning, and a RATIONAL being is willing to act according to Lemma 1 independently of his belief in souls.

Theorem 6: a RATIONAL being is a sociopath

Proof: this follows from Theorem 5 and Axiom 7.

Corrolary 2: Jeff is a sociopath

Proof: this follows from Theorem 6 and Axiom 1


Therefore we have a contradiction, and at least one of the axioms must be false.

I leave it up to the reader to decide which one.
 
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