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Iflyfish
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| Quote: | Originally posted by mcfez
Can we get back onto the subject of weird snake experiments?
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Whoa! there fez, I thought we were discussing weird snake/apple experiments?
Iflyfish
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DavidT
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I've always liked this idea.
You don't have a soul.
You are a soul.
You have a body.
David
Not one shred of evidence supports the notion that life is serious.
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SFandH
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| Quote: | Originally posted by Skipjack Joe
If the theists can be criticized for claiming to know the absolute truth through a book then it seems to me that scientists can be criticized for
claiming truth based upon temporal data.
[Edited on 6-13-2012 by Skipjack Joe] |
I'd replace the word "scientists" in you statement with "atheists". I think true scientists don't claim to know the "truth".
Theism and atheism are both beliefs in the unknowable.
[Edited on 6-13-2012 by SFandH]
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paranewbi
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| Quote: | Originally posted by vgabndo
Sam Harris is one of my favorites, and listening to this talk I found that if he is correct, then I really have less reason to be cross with newbi and
777 for their inflexible stance than to feel compassion that they have no free will in the matter.
For myself, I don't believe I have portrayed any sense of being ‘cross’ with the inflexible stance of those who do not share my faith. Sorry if you
experience that type of emotion for my postings vgabndo.
I have tried in a unemotional manner to correct what I felt was a mis-quoted recollection of Biblical Scripture, and rejected a paraphrasing of that
Scripture as any form of accuracy, which I further cited an academic reasoning for that rejection. Whether you wish to disagree with that is not of
interest to me, I accept there will be disagreement even that which is inflexible...I would respect an(academic/scholarly) reason to accept
paraphrasing as an accurate replication of a quote and why it maintains the context of the far and near reach of the author. I did not find that
offered and I pursued that no further as this is not the forum for such a lengthy endeavour.
I also, if I recall correctly, that I did challenge the implication of generalizing where no authority was cited for that conclusion other than
personal opinion. This on the basis that there can be no critical analytical discussion of such matters when predicated by that basis, hence "personal
opinions are just that" which negates an impersonal response, i.e. civil debate (in an academic sense).
My statements of desire to not be included in and perhaps for the lack of a better way to put it, the togetherness that some state binds us because we
occupy the same space, is not one of intolerance, it is simply because I find no commonality in our decided foundations for a basis of inclusion. I do
not desire harm on others but I do find that others have ways I would find harmful to myself and others as well. Certainly, as some have stated they
find religion to be harmful, would there not be a possible counter that some find the thought processes that draw that conclusion harmful? Or is there
intolerance on the other side?
I do find that for my own personal health, the engagement in certain activities and thought processes are draining of the joy I receive from my own
personal choice. I do find that to present another view for the passive reader, who may not have been provided a counter to the overwhelming orgy of
other views outside of those within the pages of the Bible (or only those of which the prevalent view on this thread wishes to reveal in short bites)
enhances the ability of choice.
I did not jump into this discussion until some 10 pages had gone by and the higher percentage of the prior postings had turned this thread another
direction towards my interests. I did not know Skeet and have no intellectual response to his decision and thus left those to others who might know
him. Then others took this and ran with it on their own. Since my relatively few postings have appeared, it seems others have chosen to maintain their
repetitive dialogue of which I quickly became bored with because of the simple repetition. I have not read anything proffered that was not stated in
my memory since having encountered them in the 1980's. They can be presented as new and enlightening, but that is just something that I find not
interesting.
I do find interesting the correction of quoting material I am well versed in and the accuracy in contextual extrapolation. That is pretty much when I
jump in and become interested. I have read the material of most of the cited references including Dr. Harrison and as shocking as some others might
find this, it has not swayed my viewpoints, yet I do find it engaging to understand their offerings...even if I have to read or listen several times
while trying to learn terminology that often demands my discipline to follow through in order to obtain that understanding. (I think a period
somewhere in that sentence would be appropriate).
I also understand that the abundance of material written in proximity to my view would probably not change the viewpoint of the greater number of
those who have posted on this thread, so be it.
As such, carry on Gentlemen |
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Ken Bondy
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| Quote: | Originally posted by Skipjack Joe
| Quote: | Originally posted by Ken Bondy
Barry
When you die you enter the same nothingness you were in before you were born. That state didn't inconvenience me in the slightest before I was born
and it won't after I am gone. The mental "energy" is organic activity in your brain and it dies when the brain dies. |
How can you make these statements with any certainty?
Your entire view on these matters is based on scientific evidence. Yet science never claims to know the truth. We label things as true because their
tests give consistent results. But the brain is poorly understood. We have no explanation for consciousness or the presence of a soul or even the
spiritual feeling you feel about evolution. Like the old mariner's maps during the time of Columnbus, this is terra icognito. Or like central africa
until Livingston.
Moreoever, truth can change with time. As time moves forward our understanding can change. It's my understanding that Newtonian physics was found to
not be the complete truth about matter by the 20th century.
So how can you say with any certainty that consciousness comes from nothing and goes back to nothing. You can say that because with the present
knowledge we have no explanation.
If the best that science can do to explain BajaGringo's near death experiences is that neurotransmission occured in certain parts of the brain in a
certain order then we really have a long way to go. Don't you think?
If the theists can be criticized for claiming to know the absolute truth through a book then it seems to me that scientists can be criticized for
claiming truth based upon temporal data.
[Edited on 6-13-2012 by Skipjack Joe] |
Igor I make those statements not as certainties, but as the most likely conclusion based upon our accumulated knowledge of the neurophysiology of the
brain and what I know about biology. Of all of the wishful-thinking afterlife theories I have heard in my lifetime, my arguments for souls and
afterlives make the most sense to me. It all happens in the brain. I have no fear of normal biological processes, and I am completely comfortable,
when my time comes, in entering into the same nothingness I was in before I was born.
carpe diem!
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Osprey
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If you don't mind; a perfect place to rerun this.
Life After Life
Gerald Francis was killed instantly. He had lived a full forty one years. His life ended suddenly, tragically when his small private plane hit the
ground at almost 300 MPH. Before you mourn for this stranger I will inform you that he had been a good Christian, a practicing Catholic and his soul
went right to heaven, as promised, the very instant his heart stopped pumping.
His mother, Bernice Francis, had died four months before Gerald’s sudden departure. She had been in poor health for a very long time and finally
succumbed to the cancer that had invaded her intestinal organs. Gerald was by her side when she passed away. It saddened him to see her wasting away
and he was somehow relieved to know she was on her way to the Great Reward Beyond.
When Gerald popped into heaven there were no pearly gates, just tree lined paths and a few pedestrians. He singled out a man near the side of the
path.
“Hi, I’m Gerald Francis. I just got here. I need to find my Mom. Do you know who might know, where I can ask?”
The tall, thin man said “Maybe I can help. What’s her full name? I need her age, her date of birth and when and where she died.”
After Gerald did the math on her birth date he gave the man the information he requested.
“She’s down that way. Just keep walking down this pathway in that direction. You’ll see lots of big buildings. Look for the hospital. She’s in
the hospital.”
“Hospital? There are hospitals here? Here in heaven? Why would there be hospitals?”
The thin one spoke “She was sick. She died of her sickness, she needs care.”
“When she died, when she got here, didn’t God make her whole again, make her young and healthy, like she was when she was just a girl?”
“God promised Everlasting Life. He didn’t promise that one could relive the life they had. What kind of menu would you supply for Eternity? Would
you like God to reform your mother to suit your picture of her as young, healthy and happy? How about her picture of that? Perhaps you would like
God to make her prettier, smarter than she was. Would you like her taller, straighter teeth perhaps? If a newborn baby dies, how would you like the
child to spend Eternity? As a teen, an old man or as a babe? Your mother will live forever. Is that not enough?”
An old man using a walker passed close to the two men and addressed himself to Gerald.
“You didn’t think it through did you? The heaven thing, the Everlasting Life thing, you didn’t give it a lot of thought did you? Well, neither did
I. Practically wore out my old knees trying to make sure I got here. Don’t know if I thought I’d be playing basketball or running or what but I
didn’t expect this. I just didn’t think it through.”
Gerald addressed the tall one “What about my soul, my Mom’s soul?”
“You are your soul. It’s your essence, your body is a home for, a storage place, a transport vehicle for your spiritual essence. Would you rather
not have a body? Would you rather spend eternity as an amorphous vapor of spiritual energy, drifting among the heavenly clouds, unseen and unseeing?
I think not. Life after death should mimic corporeal life.”
“Who are you? How do you know all this? What’s your name?”
The tall man speaks “I’m what you call an angel. My name is Gabe.”
“Were you ever alive?”
“I was, I am, in the hearts and minds of every believer.”
Gerald grows bolder “Well, this was not what I expected. A feel cheated, I....”
“Measure your words Gerald. I know you. I know your history, the depth and breadth of your religiosity, your spiritual successes and failures, your
immorality, your occasional inhumanity. Gerald, you are very lucky to be here. You are here because of your mother. Her love for you is complete,
almost Devine. Her reward is not complete without you by her side. The mechanic for your airplane, Bob Stoltz, Jr. was having a bad day and replaced
your gas lines with those having a larger diameter. Nothing remains of the lines to bring the FAA investigators back to him for questioning.
Think of it like this: it could have gone the other way.
Chalk it up to, your mother needs you.”
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Skipjack Joe
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| Quote: | Originally posted by Osprey
“God promised Everlasting Life. He didn’t promise that one could relive the life they had. .....
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Excellent Jorge. It's just amazing how fiction can often reveal the truth better than stating it outright.
Anway... The above quote reminded me of my experience with dad when his time came. We were in church at the time, waiting for the service to start. In
attempt to console me the parish priest walks up and says.
"Don't worry. You know that everyone in heaven is 31 years old. That was the age at which Christ died and we all become that age. That is your
father's age now".
Well, my mouth just dropped. I was stupified. Suddenly it all came back to me. The reasons I had turned my back to the church as a late teen. How
could I do otherwise.
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Iflyfish
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Great story birdman! Much to be said about parables and short stories when pondering these matters eh?! (I gratuitously threw in the eh?! for our
Canadian cousins). Is this one of the missing chapters of the bible? It seems to explain a lot.
Does the author require strict obedience and worship of Gerald?
If I am going in my current state of decrepitude I hope it is at least warm there.
Iflyfish
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Osprey
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Thanks Flyguy, I could have been a great parable writer but the Vanna White thing kicked in every time I got the urge to research >> could not
even remember enough to google up good stuff from AAEsops or EASSops or Esasops (the guy with the crows and the grapes) or was that the termites and
the aaaaardvarks?.
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Ken Bondy
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Nice story Jorge. I like those type of sweet "Pearly Gate" stories as well as the next person. I even wrote one once after the loss of a dear
friend:
To Jim Bailey...
Where are you old friend?
Now that you know the answer to the unanswerable question, where are you?
Are you out at the edge of the universe, having a close look at the stars we used to see... Lying on our backs in the sand, late at night...
On a Baja beach?
Or are you on short final to one six right at Van Nuys?
Or on top, southwest bound at nine point five?
Or feeling the smooth surface of the throttles in three zero sierra delta, that old plane we loved? Are you tipping one with old Mike at that little
corner bar at 94th?
(Isn’t that where we met?)
Is there a white light?
Are you looking over Shawna’s shoulder?
Jeez you were proud of her...
For good reason.
Are you in Diamond City, with Patty and all your friends in Lee’s living room, watching the river... And listening to their mellow sounds?
Or are you here with me...
I think so; I feel your presence...
I always will.
Or are you everywhere?
Where are you old friend?
carpe diem!
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Osprey
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Ken, I don't feel your friend around here. He could be here. I can only hope, since he was so deserving, that he's here in spirit and is with me now
on the patio, under the mister, laughing while holding his hand over his Bloody Mary to keep out most of the spray -- no way to know if The Eagles
oldies put his new-old entity in the same place I'm at (wet hair and all).
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Ken Bondy
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| Quote: | Originally posted by Osprey
Ken, I don't feel your friend around here. He could be here. I can only hope, since he was so deserving, that he's here in spirit and is with me now
on the patio, under the mister, laughing while holding his hand over his Bloody Mary to keep out most of the spray -- no way to know if The Eagles
oldies put his new-old entity in the same place I'm at (wet hair and all). |
You are a true gem Jorge. Glad you are a friend!
carpe diem!
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vgabndo
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From paranewbi:
"For myself, I don't believe I have portrayed any sense of being ‘cross’ with the inflexible stance of those who do not share my faith."
To describe the scientific side of the myth/science question to be inflexible is perhaps more intellectually insulting than to be thought of as
"cross". That's OK, your demographic holds rapists and child molesters in higher regard than atheists!
Your circular argument is inflexible. Your nit-picking over the context of a horrid quote from a collection of Bronze Age myths with extremely poor
attribution is almost amusing considering that your most important evidence for the supernatural creation of everything got heliocentricity wrong.
The likelihood that you have no present choice over your path at this point, and that your compass will continue to point in a direction different
from science seems pretty well explained in the Sam Harris link I shared. It would have been very bad luck had all of your genetics, and up-bringing
led you to become a terrible sociopath. If your Dad was in prison and your Mom a junkie, you might not have had the will to resist a life of crime. I
am free of the mind-restricting elements of a belief in the supernatural; I think it was bad luck that you likely didn't really get a choice to know
what I know, and to be able to accept and use any and all new data that comes my way. At our house, there was no school on Sunday for 5 year olds that
explained everything once and for all. Still isn't!
I realize I'm projecting some stuff on you here, and you can tell me if in fact your belief in the supernatural came to you before or after your age
of reason, say, mid 20's.
Undoubtedly, there are people who cannot afford to give the anchor of sanity even the slightest tug. Sam Harris
"The situation is far too dire for pessimism."
Bill Kauth
Carl Sagan said, "We are a way for the cosmos to know itself."
PEACE, LOVE AND FISH TACOS
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Barry A.
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Wow, you athiests are a fiesty, judgemental bunch----------I bet that if you all got together you might embark on an actual war against all those
crazy "faith-based" fools-------like maybe a crusade? 
This whole thread is scary------------to me at least--------since I am caught in the middle. 
Barry
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paranewbi
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vgabndo;
The inflexibility is not in the content of “the scientific side of the myth/science question", it is in the ascription of describing a point of view
contrary to yours as such, when some would read into the declaring side to appear just as much so.
I do not see the Biblical decision as inflexible where to ME it describes choice as freely given and as all choices have consequences, those
consequences are just part of the choice, even in the choice to choose as you have. Unless the proposition is that there is NOT such a thing as free
will to choose. That is another subject.
In that I do not see the Biblical decision to be without choice I did not correlate the inflexibility application to such and took it as a commentary
on my own personal attitude. I do not expect that you have no choice in what you choose but I do have a notion that you would not allow the choice of
the Biblical content which takes my free will away...that is the inflexibility I have perceived in the postings and protestations.
I have not protested your or any others individual point of view and in fact just stated prior to this that I find them interesting. It was you who
said I and another were inflexible when neither of us have described your and others views as 'harmful', 'most dangerous', 'brainwashed', 'horrid
quote' associated with human destruction, child abuse or other descriptions that degenerate a debate to a level I wish not to engage in.
If I was as intolerable and inflexible as you say I am, I would probably have used such low attacks as those used as above to reflect that. Of course
this is what turns me off to New Atheist mindset as I find this common in the dialect of Dr. Harrison and others (as here in this thread).
And for the record, I really don't desire to follow any scientific path because I do see a growing body of secular scientists who recognize a
conclusion of a creator or at least intelligent design(er).
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Ken Bondy
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| Quote: | Originally posted by paranewbi
And for the record, I really don't desire to follow any scientific path because I do see a growing body of secular scientists who recognize a
conclusion of a creator or at least intelligent design(er). |
paranewbi
If you can, please cite some specific examples to support this statement.
carpe diem!
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paranewbi
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“I realize I'm projecting some stuff on you here, and you can tell me if in fact your belief in the supernatural came to you before or after your age
of reason, say, mid 20's”
This is humorous in that it is another example of how some would frame a seemingly intelligent premise when it is a poor construct of enquiry. A
reasonable person can observe that to answer the end question I would have to acquiesce to the declaration that I believe in ‘the supernatural’. This
is how a New Atheist approaches a debate when wishing to engage someone on their grounds and then gets aggressive when the person refuses to be drawn
in.
This is why I get bored.
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Ken Bondy
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| Quote: | Originally posted by Barry A.
Wow, you athiests are a fiesty, judgemental bunch----------I bet that if you all got together you might embark on an actual war against all those
crazy "faith-based" fools-------like maybe a crusade?
This whole thread is scary------------to me at least--------since I am caught in the middle.
Barry |
We are Barry!! How outrageous! Actually wanting evidence for stuff. Where will it all lead?? 
carpe diem!
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Ken Bondy
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| Quote: | Originally posted by paranewbi
This is humorous in that it is another example of how some would frame a seemingly intelligent premise when it is a poor construct of enquiry.
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WTF??? Forgive me paranewbi, and I know you will because you are so loving and forgiving, but you are speaking in tongues.
carpe diem!
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Skipjack Joe
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Barry,
Those atheists must be right about that absence of free will. I can't seem to stop coming back to this thread.
By the way, paranewbi, your writing style is very difficult to follow. Just say things more plainly.
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