mererdog

Yet, wouldn't that make it arrogance to set yourself up as the arbiter of what is and is not "True spirituality"? To presume that people who don't act as you would have them do are somehow less than you because of that? You know, accusing them of lacking humility, or having some other personality flaw? To approach a subject like this with true humility requires accepting that you may be wrong without realizing it. When beliefs become ingrained into your personality, that becomes all but impossible. We believe certain things too strongly to ever seriously consider the possibility they are not true. We did not choose to believe them, nor can we choose to stop, or even choose to believe them less. We are stuck with them until circumstances are such that we change our minds, whether we like it or not. That isn't arrogance. It is one of the central tragedies of human existence. All of us are destined to strongly believe things that are not true, inevitably leading to us doing things that we probably shouldn't, and there is nothing we can do to prevent it...

In other words, since you don't see a tiger, you will simply act as if there isn't one, until such time as you do see one. Hopefully that won't get you eaten. Another way to do it is to remain cognizant of the possibility that there is a tiger, and hedge your bets accordingly. It is more likely to produce wasted effort, but also less likely to get you eaten.

Rejecting popular cultural norms is not a good way to become popular within our culture. Water is wet.

Of course.

When I say "I don't believe in God," it says nothing about I believe, only what I don't. In the same way that if someone tells you what they don't like, they have not told you what they do like. Now, if I tell you what I believe, we can have a conversation comparing and contrasting our beliefs. If I only tell you what I don't believe, it can't work that way. This is the main problem with using self-descriptors that are really just rejections of the self-descriptors of others. They don't tell others who we are, just who we aren't. And it is very hard to have a conversation revolving around the fact that someone is not a cow. You know?

Sure. Humans are very good at spotting patterns. Its a survival trait that allows us to do important things like spot predators and prey despite camouflage. The problem is that since it is better to see a tiger that isn't there than it is to fail to see a hungry tiger, we see patterns in what is just random noise. So, how do you tell the difference between patterns and noise? How do you tell the difference between the fair die and the rigged die, when all you can observe are the outcomes of the rolls? When you don't know all the natural laws, how can you know there isn't one that makes knowing some of the others impossible? And, you know, I don't want you getting eaten by a tiger. That goes without saying, I would hope? And, yes, you can be wrong, and we all know we can be wrong, so that ain't a good surprise party. So my goal is not to prove you wrong or even make you doubt yourself. But here's the rub. Reason is useless on its own. Inferring from observation won't give you a reason to get up in the morning or give you any clue what to do with your life. For that, you need emotions. Passion. Likes and dislikes. Attraction and revulsion. Hormones and pheremones. All the other messy bits of the human condition, you know? So when you spot the tiger, it is your emotions that insist there is no reason to double-check. It is your emotions that decide when you are certain, you see? Not your reason. The more sure you are, the more irrational you are being, regardless of the subject (He said very irrationally). Make sense?

There is an important difference between telling people what you believe to be true and telling people what you believe to be false. When being evangelical, atheists tend to do the latter rather than the former. That approach gets a positive response when preaching to the choir, and that's about it.

Ok. I don't.

So, the dice experiment..... A few years back, I was proofreading a set of proposals for classroom activities teaching critical thinking and basic scientific theory. One was for a way to teach odds to kids. Part of it read- "If the first few flips are all heads or all tails, have the children keep flipping until the expected result is reached." That is a copy and paste of a copy and paste of the original. When I read that bit I was momentarily delighted by a vision of a classroom full of elderly kindergartners who just want to see tails so they can go home and go to sleep. I know that's a lot of words for just one sentence, but that is a very strong period at the end of it, and I believe it will hold.

I once saw a cat walking on the ceiling. It was not real, but I thought it was. Knowing that humans are capable of seeing things that are not there, and of remembering things that never actually happened, I find it more than a little difficult to believe your story. Even if I agreed with your theology, your testimony would be suspect, at best.

And in the interest of full disclosure, Cuchulain, epistemology is a hobby of mine, and I tend to lean towards the nihilistic, so I find this stuff fascinating...

That is true, assuming that the physical is all there is to you. What reason do you have to assume that?

Accidental double post

"Nature is rational. That is, nature can be rattionally understood and operates on laws of , not all of which are known, but all of which can be known given time. 2. Law of reason. The universe is governed by the law of reason. Man can't actually escape its inexorable force, but he can, uniquely, follow the law . " Italics and underlining added to highlight important points. Since you brought up observation, here is a simple thought experiment you can try. Imagine a standard six sided die. Now, how many times in a row can it roll six before you are completely convinced it is not a fair die? And, based on laws of probability, what is the maximum number of times in a row a fair six-sided die can roll six?

Its more a challenge than a belief. If you can come to the conclusion using reason alone, pretend I'm your math teacher and show your work.

But that's just ad hominem. It says nothing about the qualities of the experiment.

You seem to have misunderstood me. I was using the call-back to the title of the thread to suggest the act of accepting claims without examination, which I juxtaposed with the act of rejection without examination. I'm curious. What is the difference between a "gotcha" experiment and an honest test of someone's claims? If someone claims to be able to sense auras, how can I fairly test that claim, if not through a double-blind protocol like the one she employed?

Aren't those irrational beliefs? By that I mean isn't it impossible to come to those conclusions without a leap of faith, fallacy, or other form of nonreason?

She didn't fall for it. At the same time, she didn't simply dismiss it. She tested it. I think that is admirable. Don't you?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emily_Rosa

I don't know. But I would point out that the phrase "religious bias" seems to indicate a religious bias. If a fundamentalist says that a same sex couple will burn in Hell, that is an opinion offered on a matter of fact. Why would their opinion that it does cause harm be less valuable than your opinion that it doesn't? Beyond that, is your position that unless you can prove conclusively that it causes harm you must assume it doesn't? And what if I murder a murderer? You know, the type of scenario where you harm some and help others?

How do you objectively measure hurt? Meaning that if one guy says an action hurts and another says it does not, how do you tell who is right?

Not really backward. Age is just a number, after all. We just fall on opposite ends of the spectrum of age-related prejudice advertisers routinely mine to get us to act against our own best interests... Hey, its still better than being one of those people that falls for bandwagon sales pitches. Those guys are just sad....

I've always been more likely to fall for the "new and improved" claims, personally....

That is an interesting belief.