Man vs. God

[JerryLove]

You don't seem to have followed the linked article earlier that showed time-marker problems in a faking of this show.

But I'm really not going to engage in a debate on the merits of a for-entertainment show on the SciFi channel. It's fictional entertainment.

I love watching Top Gear. They often race things "who can cross the city faster, this car or a pair of BMX bikers". There are lovely get aheads and setbacks and people despeate to win.

Yet time and again they are in so precisely the same place that the bikers jump over the cars. There are miraculaly located ramps thoughout the city that the bikers already know and are right along the car route, and the ability of the cameramen to race ahead of everyone and get the perfect shot is... well.. there isn't a real race going on. It's just made to look that way.

But, and I cannot state this strongly enough: if you think a SciFi show proves ghosts, I don't think you and I have enough in common to have a meaningful conversation.

 

[mtrycrafts]

Yes I have, but the skeptics are only voicing their own views, not offering any proof.

Are you saying then that the show offers and has proof? Just because of it being presented as it is on TV?

I saw one such attempt to “debunk” an image that was captured. The person tried to claim it was the reflection of a soundman. He drew in (via computer) what he alleged was the boom mic & headphones. It was very poorly done by someone who refuses to believe thqat such a thing could be reqal. There are lots of clips around that show many odd things like chairs and other objects moving on their own & full body apparitions both on video & thermal imaging cameras. But if you go into it with the mindset that “such things can’t be real” will never be convinced, even if they experience these occurrences first hand.

It is kind of hard to debunk the show if they don't let you, a qualified investigator, follow them around and check everything they do, right? to check that in fact that light or whatever was not a reflection of the crew? Is that not possible that it could have been a reflection? Are the master tapes available for investigation? All of it, including the ones on the cutting room floor? Who checked it? Who certified it? Oh, the show did?

But that seems to be the case all around. Through the posts I have read here, no one is “on the fence” on the topic at hand – there are those who believe, and those who don’t, and I don’t see anyone saying their mind has been changed by anything.

But that would put you in one of those categories, right? Certainly not a fence sitter. Let me ask you sincerely, how did you verify that what they present is proof? Was there a peer review of their work? Duplicated by credible others? What are the qualifications of those Ghost Hunters?

It does occur to me however that a good number of people are completely put out by the idea that there exists other people whose views are out of line with their own, and want very much for that to change. That’s cool I didn’t expect to change anyone’s mind, just trying to give some different ways of thinking about things, so C'est la vie.

Well, this area you brought up, the Ghost Hunters show, is not even close to what we have discussed up until then. It can be tested properly and those hunters taken to task. So far, there is no credible evidence that they have discovered ghosts, only their claim.
Why would this crew be the real deal when so many others who claimed to have captured evidence of ghosts have failed the real testing?
Brings me back to my sister and the real psychics.

By the way, I think I read something about first hand experience. Is that really necessary? And, even if one had one and could not explain it on the spot, doesn't mean the even was a ghost. Maybe someone else does have the answer. That always gets me when one states that if You cannot explain it it must be so.

 

[mtrycrafts]

...The point I am trying to make is, there is some evidence out there that has been captured by conventional means which supports the idea that after the mortal body dies, something is released. But even with this evidence, doubters will deny it because to accept it would mean they have to admit something they vehemently deny can be possible.

Please, show us that evidence. Where is it? Which Journal? How was it gathered, etc. While that is not my career, to follow that research, I could have missed the real evidence. But, I have seen other so called evidence debunked, as it were.

You are mistaken about acceptance. Doubters cannot deny real, solid, credible evidence that is reproducible, impossible. Such evidence would lead to research, funding $$$ and the expansion of science knowledge.

One more suggestion, if I may, if you have not read Carl Sagan's "The Demon-Haunted World" consider reading it. Not sure now if his interesting passage from his 1987 Pasadena lecture, "The Burden of Skepticism" is mentioned but it deals with skepticism and open mindedness.

 

[CraigV]

So JL, you seem to be hung up on the name of the channel that carries the show. Would it have more credibility if it was The Science channel or Discovery channel?

Anyway, you and mtrycrafts have helped prove one of my beliefs (highlighted below). I was simply trying to say live & let live, but for some people, that’s just not good enough.

But that seems to be the case all around. Through the posts I have read here, no one is “on the fence” on the topic at hand – there are those who believe, and those who don’t, and I don’t see anyone saying their mind has been changed by anything. It does occur to me however that a good number of people are completely put out by the idea that there exists other people whose views are out of line with their own, and want very much for that to change. That’s cool I didn’t expect to change anyone’s mind, just trying to give some different ways of thinking about things, so C'est la vie.

 

[zhimbo]

there are those who believe, and those who don’t, and I don’t see anyone saying their mind has been changed by anything.

Not on this thread, perhaps, but I've certainly changed my mind on this topic. I don't think I ever firmly believed in the reality of ghosts, but I used to think there were compelling cases. Now I don't find any of them particularly compelling, given what I now know about 1) human perception and memory 2) the abilities of magicians to out-perform pretty much any "haunting" 3) the lack of repeatable objective observations by knowledgeable skeptics and 4) my own experiences with hypnagogic states .

It's not that I don't believe in Ghosts and therefore I dismiss anything that contradicts my view. It's that I've actually spent time thinking about these issues and come to a conclusion that supernatural explanations for "hauntings" are unwarranted.

 

[JerryLove]

Same here, quite a few. I can even think of a few that changed as the result of an online discussion.

 

[Davemcc]

I can honestly say that I have changed my mind on certain topics from philosophical discussions in which my counterpart had more rational arguments than I.

 

[CraigV]

AARRGH! Has anyone changed from being a believer to a non believer in the existence of God by reading this thread? Has anyone changed from being a non believer to a believer in God by reading this thread?

I don’t think so. That’s the point I’m trying to make!

I for one am finished…

 

[JerryLove]

AARRGH! Has anyone changed from being a believer to a non believer in the existence of God by reading this thread? Has anyone changed from being a non believer to a believer in God by reading this thread?

Your point is that, in an argument over some rationals that, as far as I know, only one person accepts, no one else has changed their position?

I think you were the only person who believed Ghost Hunters in the first place, and your arguments in favor of them were poor; so I'm not surprised this thread did not change anyone's ideas.

I can think of other threads that have.

 

[highfigh]

AARRGH! Has anyone changed from being a believer to a non believer in the existence of God by reading this thread? Has anyone changed from being a non believer to a believer in God by reading this thread?

I don’t think so. That’s the point I’m trying to make!

I for one am finished…

Here's another way to show this:

 

[zhimbo]

Here's another way to show this:

Here's my way, which is the right way. Your way is mistaken.

 

[CraigV]

Here's my way, which is the right way. Your way is mistaken.

Well, if that’s your belief…

 

[highfigh]

Here's my way, which is the right way. Your way is mistaken.

My shoulders would never stand for that movement. I think you'd also wear a hole in the horse's shoulder, too. That poor horsie!

 

[adwilk]

 

[Davemcc]

Has anyone changed from being a non believer to a believer in God by reading this thread?

Certainly not from the arguments presented herein.

 

[basspig]

Dawkins is incompetent. He is unsure of his own epistomology. As such, he does more harm to the atheist side of the argument than good.
He fails to recognize that an attack on Reason attacks the Mind, which attacks the Self.

One idea that I found interesting, however, is the theory that children are naturally "dualist": they see the mind as a little person sitting inside your head, which could exist on its own independent of the body. This idea, if it persists in adulthood, can lead to belief in life after death, and belief in a non-physical creator of the physical world. Through this example and many others, Dawkins shows that the more we know, through the study of all the sciences, the less plausible the idea of God becomes.

 

[Davemcc]

Science might one day describe this but not in a profound way. This is properly the playground of philosophy...

I fixed that for you.

 

[JerryLove]

My thoughts on your view

-Science neither proves nor disproves the existence of God. Science describes reality. It will never get to the ultimate beginning or ultimate end of the "universe", i.e. all it's descriptions will be incomplete.

Science fails to address God because no God is part of observable reality. I agree there.

-God, if something along these lines exists, is far removed from the angry fairy godmother represented by most tv preachers.

That's just an arbitrary position.

-The last place I ever get a religious feeling is in the presence of a priest or preacher "running" his mouth.

There's actually a "religious experience helmet" that can induce religious experiences at the press of a button.

The Old Testament and New Testament are poetic accounts not to be taken literally. Honestly it does not matter who "begat" whom.

I suspect that the authors of many of them intended for them to be taken literally.

To the beliefs of Judaism, blood-linage is indeed important.

The more science I do know, the larger my wonder and amazement at the world. This is my religious experience.

Now *that* would be simile, as amazement isn't religion.

Where does the "I" that is I reside? Where was it before "I" was? How does this "I" come into being and where does it go when the"I" that is I dies? (liberally taken from "the Wings of Desire") Science might one day describe this but not in a profound way.

Consciousness is this kind of circuit of various portions of the brain all adding weights to a neural network. What's most interesting to me is that this self-perspective of person as singular is so wrong. Our mind is not a soloist, but a chorus; we just can't hear the individual singers.

As a good example... there is one portion of the brain that responds to the people closest to your. Your family or closest friends. When this part is damaged, you recognize your drinking buddies or co-workers or politicians; but you don't recognize your mom. You may think she looks a lot like your mom (or, commonly, start thinking it's a mom-impersonator), but you are convinced she's not.

The problem is that the weight of the image in your brain is not right because it normally includes the now broken part.

 

[Davemcc]

Where does the "I" that is I reside? Where was it before "I" was? How does this "I" come into being and where does it go when the"I" that is I dies? (liberally taken from "the Wings of Desire") Science might one day describe this but not in a profound way. This is properly the playground of religion...

No thanks. ( from wikipedia) A religion is a system of human thought which usually includes a set of narratives, symbols, beliefs and practices that give meaning to the practitioner's experiences of life through reference to a higher power...

I see no reference to a higher power in your original quote. I do see questions regarding man's self-examination of his place in the world, if you will, a search for the truth behind man's place in the universe. Without the invention of such a higher power, it is philosophy not religion.

 

[JerryLove]

That is a very good example of the limits of science... Although interesting it would mean nothig to me if "I" were faced with imminent death...

Science never attempt to create meaning, that's the preview of philosophy.

It's also terribly subjective/relative.