People who believe in god are broken

[MonDie]

Response to Immortal's Last Post

 

I currently cannot view youtube videos. If you could show me something else with similar content, I might understand your post.

Anyway, my guess is that they set aside the problem of consciousness because they didn't know how to solve it yet.

 

I edited something into my previous post after you posted, so I'm moving it here.

 

---

 

Your views on religious faith are probably what led you to think Mother Teresa was a hero.

Although MT probably had good intentions, she was not a hero. With the people in her care, she was primarily concerned with ensuring their entrance into heaven. She had little concern for their longevity, health, or well-being. She just wanted them to go to heaven.

Mother Teresa actively discouraged the nuns from seeking medical training. Her justification was that God empowers the weak and ignorant. I actually have a book written by a former nun named Colette Livermore. She writes about how she planned to be a doctor, but she joined Mother Teresa's order instead. Because of this organization headed by MT, Colette delayed medical training for over a decade, until she was 30.

If Mother Teresa weren't so fanatical, her organization could have done a lot for those poverty stricken people in India. Thus it puzzles me that people of India revere Mother Teresa.

 

Based on your recent posts, I'm assuming you are not a Catholic. So why were you talking about Mother Teresa like she was a hero? Catholics think suffering is beneficial in some way, which explains Mother Teresa's behavior. Does your religion also view suffering as a good thing?

Edited December 16, 2012 by Mondays Assignment: Die

[immortal]

Response to Immortal's Last Post

 

I currently cannot view youtube videos. If you could show me something else with similar content, I might understand your post.

Anyway, my guess is that they set aside the problem of consciousness because they didn't know how to solve it yet.

 

I think you should watch them because not only you will understand my point as to why the conclusion should have been more open but also recognize the point which I said that its not my belief in gods which led me to this conclusion, its this conclusion which led me to believe in gods.

 

 

 

 

I edited something into my previous post after you posted, so I'm moving it here.

 

 

Your views on religious faith are probably what led you to think Mother Teresa was a hero.

Although MT probably had good intentions, she was not a hero. With the people in her care, she was primarily concerned with ensuring their entrance into heaven. She had little concern for their longevity, health, or well-being. She just wanted them to go to heaven.

Mother Teresa actively discouraged the nuns from seeking medical training. Her justification was that God empowers the weak and ignorant. I actually have a book written by a former nun named Colette Livermore. She writes about how she planned to be a doctor, but she joined Mother Teresa's order instead. Because of this organization headed by MT, Colette delayed medical training for over a decade, until she was 30.

If Mother Teresa weren't so fanatical, her organization could have done a lot for those poverty stricken people in India. Thus it puzzles me that people of India revere Mother Teresa.

 

Based on your recent posts, I'm assuming you are not a Catholic. So why were you talking about Mother Teresa like she was a hero? Catholics think suffering is beneficial in some way, which explains Mother Teresa's behavior. Does your religion also view suffering as a good thing?

 

I think you have misunderstood me, I have never talked about Mother Teresa on sfn. I was actually talking about St. Teresa of Avila(1515-1582) and not Mother Teresa(1910-1997).

 

The one whom I am talking of is she, my real hero -

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teresa_of_Ãvila

 

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://www.mountainrunnerdoc.com/stteresaofavila.html

 

So your questions are based on a complete misunderstanding.

 

Even if you say St. Teresa of Avila is a catholic why shouldn't I not revere her? Sorry I don't hold any fundamental beliefs. Actually the religions I am interested in which are basically esoteric religions, they are all dead, I guess, perhaps only followed here and there.

 

Perhaps this quote might show you how esoteric and liberalistic the Vedic Aryan religion actually is.

 

"Aum Bhur Bhuvah Svah" the Viyahritis shall have to be concerted. The three planes of Bhur Bhuvah Svah that constitute the whole universe shall have to be brought into focus. In other words, it must be established in mind that I belong to no particular country but am a dweller of the whole universe. In this way those who are Aryans, find themselves established in the Sun, Moon, the Planets, and the stars at least once a day, and thus renew their unbreakable ties with manifest universe"

 

- Rabindranath Tagore, on the meaning of Gayatri Mantra.

 

My interests of study are completely different and to answer this question Does this religion also view suffering as a good thing? even though it was irrelevant is, yes, much of views are based on stoic philosophy so they see goodness in all works of nature whether there is a bloodshed or a great harvest.

[Ringer]

When I was 16 I was told that the biggest mystery facing biology today is this: What is consciousness?

I'll tell you what it is. It's a poorly defined state of awareness that, while many use it to make humans seem important, a wide variety of animals have.

Rather than putting forward such crazy ideas if scientists study religion then they will find the answer.

So why don't theistic scientists have the answer?

So the questions which atheistic scientists sidelined and the double standards that people who think that Schroedinger is there hero showed led me to conclude if Schroedinger needs to be right then it is inevitable that these gods need to exist.

I didn't watch the videos yet because I don't want to wake my wife, but I have a feeling they are going to bring next to nothing in quality information. Not to mention there are quite a few theistic scientists working in well established positions, are they sidelining these questions as well?

[John Cuthber]

 

When I was 16 I was told that the biggest mystery facing biology today is this: What is consciousness?

 

Questions which atheistic scientists sidelined and ignored.

 

 

 

Rather than putting forward such crazy ideas if scientists study religion then they will find the answer.

 

 

“The multiplicity is only apparent. This is the doctrine of the Upanishads. And not of the Upanishads only. The mystical experience of the union with God regularly leads to this view, unless strong prejudices stand in the West.”

(Source: WHAT IS LIFE? By Erwin Schrödinger Pg. Cambridge University Press)

 

“There is no kind of framework within which we can find consciousness in the plural; this is simply something we construct because of the temporal plurality of individuals, but it is a false construction… The only solution to this conflict insofar as any is available to us at all lies in the ancient wisdom of the Upanishad.”

(Source: Mein Leben, Meine Weltansicht [My Life, World View] (1961) Chapter 4)

 

What did the people of Upanishads believed in?

 

 

 

 

So the questions which atheistic scientists sidelined and the double standards that people who think that Schroedinger is there hero showed led me to conclude if Schroedinger needs to be right then it is inevitable that these gods need to exist.

At about six and a half minutes into the video he says something that's plainly wrong.

He says that "we" scientists" assume that matter is not capable of consciousness That's plainly wrong. I assume it is capable - as long as it's arranged correctly. That's why my brain - which is made of matter is aware that it is my brain and made of matter.

 

It's not the first thing he gets wrong and I don't know if it's the last because I stopped watching.

What would be the point? he s basing his argument on a false premise so it van't be a valid argument.

The idea that he is trying to put forward is that we can't explain consciousness within science because we are making the wrong assumption.

In fact we don't make that assumption so his point is invalid.

He is trying to make the analogy with old astronomy where, because they thought the Earth was the centre of the universe, we couldn't explain the movements of the planets.

Once you ditch that assumption, the planets behave just as you would expect.

That's true enough- but in order to ditch that belief, we also had to ditch the reason for that belief: it had been told to us by an old book.

 

If you say that consciousness is not a function of the matter and arrangement of the brain, then you have to accept that being shot in the head won't affect consciousness. It's funny that they don't seem willing to do that experiment.

 

Finally there's one obvious comment to make about the idea that

"What is consciousness?"

is one of the

"Questions which atheistic scientists sidelined and ignored.".

 

It's a flat out falsehood.

It's just not true.

Science is working on it. OK , we have yet to get there but that's just a comment on the current state of knowledge.

 

Two hundred years ago we hadn't eliminated smallpox and we had, at best, a shady idea of how we might.

Now we can say that that problem is solved.

It may be two hundred more years before we sort out the nature of the mind, but that doesn't mean we need to resort to magic explanations of it- it just means we have to say that it's a work in progress (at the minute).

 

But let's be absolutely clear on this.

It simply is not true to say that science has ignored the question.

 

Saying otherwise is either remarkable foolishness (in not having checked) or a lie.

[immortal]

I'll tell you what it is. It's a poorly defined state of awareness that, while many use it to make humans seem important, a wide variety of animals have.

If nature has made us special then we have to simply accept it and not discard it. Mathematics has shown that human beings can answer questions for which no algorithm exists showing that human thinking is non-algorithmic and Green, E.E., Biofeedback for mind/body self-regulation, healing and creativity, in Academy of parapsychology and medicine (1972) show that human beings are indeed special.

So why don't theistic scientists have the answer?

They have it.

 

Roger Penrose contends that the foundations of mathematics can't be understood absent the Platonic view that "mathematical truth is absolute, external and eternal, and not based on man-made criteria ... mathematical objects have a timeless existence of their own..."

Anyone who has studied molecular neurobiology knows that there is no place for such a model in the physiology of the human brain but such a model is easily feasible if we consider eastern philosophical models of the mind where they have continuously asserted that intellect exists in a platonic realm and that we intuitively access already existing truths and Neoplatonism is a religion and one cannot take away the religious element from such an idea.

 

 

It has been argued that "[consciousness causes collapse] does not allow sensible discussion of Big Bang cosmology or biological evolution, at least on the assumption of an atheistic universe.[16] For example, as Roger Penrose put it, "[T]he evolution of conscious life on this planet is due to appropriate mutations having taken place at various times. These, presumably, are quantum events, so they would exist only in linearly superposed form until they finally led to the evolution of a conscious being—whose very existence depends on all the right mutations having 'actually' taken place!"[36]

 

16. http://arxiv.org/pdf/quant-ph/9501014v5.pdf, p.46

36. R. Penrose, The Emporer's New Mind, Penguin Books, 1989, p. 295.

 

 

Again the eastern philosophical systems know there is a non-physical mind but no scientists are interested in it.

 

 

I didn't watch the videos yet because I don't want to wake my wife, but I have a feeling they are going to bring next to nothing in quality information.

It might wake you up if you are aware of the recent developments in these fields.

Not to mention there are quite a few theistic scientists working in well established positions, are they sidelining these questions as well?

Actually its their very investigation which have made them to believe in a theistic universe.

 

 

 

Edited December 16, 2012 by immortal

[John Cuthber]

If the theist scientist have the answer why don't they publish it?

 

"Anyone who has studied molecular neurobiology knows that there is no place for such a model in the physiology of the human brain"

Clearly nonsense.

Since nobody (yet) has a valid claim to understand the brain, they can't say what it doesn't do.

 

And I'm still wondering if you would take the shotgun test?

 

"Academy of parapsychology and medicine"

I think there's a thread here somewhere debating whether psychology is a science, yet you think it's legitimate to cite parapsychology as evidence.

Do you expect to be taken seriously?

[immortal]

At about six and a half minutes into the video he says something that's plainly wrong.

He says that "we" scientists" assume that matter is not capable of consciousness That's plainly wrong. I assume it is capable - as long as it's arranged correctly. That's why my brain - which is made of matter is aware that it is my brain and made of matter.

 

It's not the first thing he gets wrong and I don't know if it's the last because I stopped watching.

What would be the point? he s basing his argument on a false premise so it van't be a valid argument.

The idea that he is trying to put forward is that we can't explain consciousness within science because we are making the wrong assumption.

In fact we don't make that assumption so his point is invalid.

He is trying to make the analogy with old astronomy where, because they thought the Earth was the centre of the universe, we couldn't explain the movements of the planets.

Once you ditch that assumption, the planets behave just as you would expect.

That's true enough- but in order to ditch that belief, we also had to ditch the reason for that belief: it had been told to us by an old book.

 

If you say that consciousness is not a function of the matter and arrangement of the brain, then you have to accept that being shot in the head won't affect consciousness. It's funny that they don't seem willing to do that experiment.

 

Finally there's one obvious comment to make about the idea that

"What is consciousness?"

is one of the

"Questions which atheistic scientists sidelined and ignored.".

 

It's a flat out falsehood.

It's just not true.

Science is working on it. OK , we have yet to get there but that's just a comment on the current state of knowledge.

 

Two hundred years ago we hadn't eliminated smallpox and we had, at best, a shady idea of how we might.

Now we can say that that problem is solved.

It may be two hundred more years before we sort out the nature of the mind, but that doesn't mean we need to resort to magic explanations of it- it just means we have to say that it's a work in progress (at the minute).

 

But let's be absolutely clear on this.

It simply is not true to say that science has ignored the question.

 

Saying otherwise is either remarkable foolishness (in not having checked) or a lie.

 

You guys aren't anything different from Bishops who did not wanted to look through the telescopes and let go their beliefs, right? Its atheists who are showing double standards.

 

http://henry.pha.jhu.edu/aspect.html

 

Alain Aspect is the physicist who performed the key experiment that established that if you want a real universe, it must be non-local (Einstein’s “spooky action at a distance”). Aspect comments on new work by his successor in conducting such experiments, Anton Zeilinger and his colleagues, who have now performed an experiment that suggests that “giving up the concept of locality is not sufficient to be consistent with quantum experiments, unless certain intuitive features of realism are abandoned.”

 

Be clear what is going on here. Quantum mechanics itself is not crying out for such experiments! Quantum mechanics is doing just fine, thank you, having performed flawlessly since inception. No, it is people whose cherished philosophical beliefs are being threatened that cry out for such experiments, exactly as Einstein used to do, and with exactly the same hope (we think in vain): that quantum mechanics can be refined to the point where it requires (or at least allows) belief in the independent reality of the natural world it describes.

 

Quantum mechanics makes no mention of reality (Figure 1). Indeed, quantum mechanics proclaims, “We have no need of that hypothesis.” Now we are beginning to see that quantum mechanics might actually exclude any possibility of mind-independent reality⎯and already does exclude any reality that resembles our usual concept of such (Aspect: “it implies renouncing the kind of realism I would have liked”). Non-local causality is a concept that had never played any role in physics, other than in rejection (“action-at-a-distance”), until Aspect showed in 1981 that the alternative would be the abandonment of the cherished belief in mind-independent reality; suddenly, spooky-action-at-a-distance became the lesser of two evils, in the minds of the materialists.

 

Why do people cling with such ferocity to belief in a mind-independent reality? It is surely because if there is no such reality, then ultimately (as far as we can know) mind alone exists. And if mind is not a product of real matter, but rather is the creator of the illusion of material reality (which has, in fact, despite the materialists, been known to be the case, since the discovery of quantum mechanics in 1925), then a theistic view of our existence becomes the only rational alternative to solipsism.

 

[MonDie]

Even if you say St. Teresa of Avila is a catholic why shouldn't I not revere her? Sorry I don't hold any fundamental beliefs. Actually the religions I am interested in which are basically esoteric religions, they are all dead, I guess, perhaps only followed here and there.

Not all Catholics are bad. I don't know anything about St. Teresa of Avila.

However, I'm starkly opposed to many views linked with modern Catholicism. Even Catholics who don't embracing suffering often condemn homosexuals homosexuality (teen suicide) or demand rights for tiny embryos (poverty).

 

 

My interests of study are completely different and to answer this question Does this religion also view suffering as a good thing? even though it was irrelevant is, yes, much of views are based on stoic philosophy so they see goodness in all works of nature whether there is a bloodshed or a great harvest.

That might not be the same as Mother Teresa's view.

Mother Teresa thought the people in her care were brought closer to God when they suffered, thus she took few measures to relieve their suffering.

 

I haven't finished the book by Colette, but the summary says she was exposed to diseases while she was in the order. This correpsonds with Sanal Edamaruku's claim that MT's homes for the dying were very unclean, exposing the inhabitants to infectious diseases. You can read Sanal Edamaruku's take on Mother T for more criticism.

 

 

 

Regarding the youtube videos. When I said "I cannot," I did not mean "I do not," I meant "I cannot."

Edited December 16, 2012 by Mondays Assignment: Die

[John Cuthber]

"You guys aren't anything different from Bishops who did not wanted to look through the telescopes and let go their beliefs, right? Its atheists who are showing double standards."

Not only is this demonstrably wrong, but it has nothing to do with the points I raised.
Asking for information is the exact opposite of refusing to look through the telescope.
Saying that science is not looking into consciousness is simply not true.

 

(Edited to sort out the formatting which had gone haywire.)

Edited December 16, 2012 by John Cuthber

[tar]

Immortal,

 

I was rather disappointed when you started to actually name the 33 gods or the 1 and a half, or whatever the numbers and different categories. Sky, heaven, air and such. These are just the things we all know. If this is what the Buddah "believed in", then there is no argument. We all believe in these things, and no "brokeness" or unbrokeness can be determined regarding our agreement that these things exist.

 

Throws a whole different light on the subject, and puts it in the realm of a "misunderstanding".

 

Also answers in my mind why so many sayings of the teachers and mystics are so circular and childish, and pretend to hold some deep underlying truth, that only the practiced can understand.

 

When in actuality, all the words are just describing common things. Things that we hold in common. No surprise then that the sky is the sky, and when we look up we see the sky, and the clouds are in the sky, and produce rain which waters the earth from which springs the seeds that were sown, and this is life, which is the energy of the sun and the form of the earth and the movement of the waters and the air, which is the Magilicutti, that we are.

 

So, on further inspection, with the added knowledge, that the Gods you are referring to, are the items that science believes in, as well, the arugment is, or the question is, why consider your own awareness of these things, special?

 

Regards, TAR2

 

And more specifically, why bother going through all the contortions, to come up with the truths that were evident to begin with? Just to call them "your" idea? Or the Buddah's idea?

 

And all the other made up stuff about levels and hidden (unevident) realities, are either imaginary crap, or real, evident stuff, cased in the same figurative language that mystifies the obvious, like the 1.5 god.

Edited December 16, 2012 by tar

[immortal]

Immortal,

 

I was rather disappointed when you started to actually name the 33 gods or the 1 and a half, or whatever the numbers and different categories. Sky, heaven, air and such. These are just the things we all know. If this is what the Buddah "believed in", then there is no argument. We all believe in these things, and no "brokeness" or unbrokeness can be determined regarding our agreement that these things exist.

 

Throws a whole different light on the subject, and puts it in the realm of a "misunderstanding".

 

Also answers in my mind why so many sayings of the teachers and mystics are so circular and childish, and pretend to hold some deep underlying truth, that only the practiced can understand.

 

When in actuality, all the words are just describing common things. Things that we hold in common. No surprise then that the sky is the sky, and when we look up we see the sky, and the clouds are in the sky, and produce rain which waters the earth from which springs the seeds that were sown, and this is life, which is the energy of the sun and the form of the earth and the movement of the waters and the air, which is the Magilicutti, that we are.

 

So, on further inspection, with the added knowledge, that the Gods you are referring to, are the items that science believes in, as well, the arugment is, or the question is, why consider your own awareness of these things, special?

 

Regards, TAR2

 

And more specifically, why bother going through all the contortions, to come up with the truths that were evident to begin with? Just to call them "your" idea? Or the Buddah's idea?

 

And all the other made up stuff about levels and hidden (unevident) realities, are either imaginary crap, or real, evident stuff, cased in the same figurative language that mystifies the obvious, like the 1.5 god.

 

Nope, they are anthropomorphic gods with which you can have a dialogue with and they exist in the Pleroma(western neo-platonic Christianity) or the Agnisoma Mandala(eastern religions). The Vajrayana Tradition of the Tibetan Buddhists which is the culmination of all Buddhist teachings and the Smarta tradition which is the culmination of all Vedic teachings takes the existence of gods very seriously and the non-dual truth is based on the existence of these gods.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=kY-STjNnHRQ

 

If you take this line of reasoning -

 

http://www.holosforum.org/v4n1/rosenblum.html

 

and if you dig deeper

 

http://www.centerforsacredsciences.org/publications/the-mystical-core-of-the-great-traditions.htm

 

if you go more deeper then this line of reasoning will inevitably lead to the conclusion that "gods are real and these gods are everywhere in all aspect of human existence and all aspect of human life." - James Hillman

[iNow]

Can someone clarify... Are these recent posts supposed to serve as evidence of the position that people who believe in god(s) are broken, or are they supposed to support the counter that they are not? It's kinda hard to tell...

[Moontanman]

Can someone clarify... Are these recent posts supposed to serve as evidence of the position that people who believe in god(s) are broken, or are they supposed to support the counter that they are not? It's kinda hard to tell...

 

 

I think some of the posts have become a pulpit for proselytizing...

[tar]

Immortal,

 

Gods you can have a dialogue with?

 

Do you mean "think you can have a dialogue with", or that you could have a dialogue with, that could be recorded in some fashion for the benefit of others, and for the inspection purposes that others might have?

 

My guess is that you mean they "really" exist, in some objectively testable fashion, exactly adorned with jewels, mined from the minerals of the earth, and the jewels would be measurable as to their luminousity and size and wheight and shape, color and hardness.

 

In this case, I think you are expecting reality to hold an entity which it does not hold. Your mind might hold the image, but its analog does not exist in reality, where I can behold it.

 

Inow,

 

I was not able to view the recent videos, so I can't comment on what points Immortal was making, or attempting to make, but in general, recently on this thread, I would say that Immortal has retreated into an indefensible area, and being that he believes the area he has retreated into IS defensible, I would say he is broken, as in the way an ostrich is broken when it hides its head in a hole to escape danger.

 

So although I was attempting to give Immortal an out or two, I do believe he is defending a rather broken position, and if his beliefs are of the same type, as others who believe in gods, and these beliefs are of the type where the expectation is that these entities are "actual" and measurable, and exist in reality, then I will have to once again give up, giving such individuals the benefit of the doubt, and fall back into the "people that believe in God are broken" camp, since the fortifications surrounding that camp will hold, and the fortifications surrounding the opposing camp are somewhat thinner than air.

 

Regards, TAR2

Edited December 16, 2012 by tar

[John Cuthber]

I was looking for an image of a T shirt with "the voices made me do it" as a response to the idea of a "dialoge" with God, but I found this which makes the point even better

http://raichious-muffin.deviantart.com/art/The-voices-made-me-do-it-340469585

 

Seriously, talking to God is bad enough, but if you think he's talking back that's clearly defined as "broken"

Here

 

"F06.0 Organic hallucinosis

A disorder of persistent or recurrent hallucinations, usually visual or auditory, that occur in clear consciousness and may or may not be recognized by the subject as such. Delusional elaboration of the hallucinations may occur, but insight is not infrequently preserved."

from here

http://www.who.int/classifications/icd/en/bluebook.pdf

[Ringer]

If nature has made us special then we have to simply accept it and not discard it. Mathematics has shown that human beings can answer questions for which no algorithm exists showing that human thinking is non-algorithmic and Green, E.E., Biofeedback for mind/body self-regulation, healing and creativity, in Academy of parapsychology and medicine (1972) show that human beings are indeed special.

*sigh* Have you really already started ignoring what I said and answering the point you tried to make? I was saying humans are not special, because other animals have the very similar abilities to those we have. Consciousness studies from 1972 don't hold a lot of weight, let alone those of parapsychology, since much of consciousness research has changed.

They have it.

 

 

Where is it?

 

[MonDie]

Or the Buddah's idea?

 

The Ds come before the Hs. Buddh-a, Buddh-ist, Bodh-i, etc.

 

 

Can someone clarify... Are these recent posts supposed to serve as evidence of the position that people who believe in god(s) are broken, or are they supposed to support the counter that they are not? It's kinda hard to tell...

Maybe this was aimed at my post.

 

Believing in god isn't as broken as beliving in god and embryo souls and divine penis proscriptions. That's all I was implying.

 

 

Seriously, talking to God is bad enough, but if you think he's talking back that's clearly defined as "broken"

 

Ahh, this topic again.

http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/65651-people-who-believe-in-god-are-broken/page-53

Edited December 17, 2012 by Mondays Assignment: Die

[tar]

Monday's Assignment Die,

 

Thank you for the correction. I stuck an h in weight where it never existed, as well.

 

I often error. Perhaps I should be more careful. Had an argument with my 5th grade teacher that if she marked the word I used wrong, she must have known what word I meant, and that should have been good enough. I also complained that it was difficult to look a word up in the dictionary, if you did not know how to spell it. I lost that argument.

 

Inow,

 

Ignoring your request...I just watched the comments that our president made to a gathering in Newtown. He waxed rather philosophical, and a bit religious, speaking of God and Jesus, and the importance...no the critical role that love played in the event and its aftermath. It surprised me, that my pragmatic, secular president would open himself up to being deemed broken by those who would call believers such.

 

Regards, TAR2

[immortal]

If the theist scientist have the answer why don't they publish it?

 

"Anyone who has studied molecular neurobiology knows that there is no place for such a model in the physiology of the human brain"

Clearly nonsense.

Since nobody (yet) has a valid claim to understand the brain, they can't say what it doesn't do.

 

And I'm still wondering if you would take the shotgun test?

 

"Academy of parapsychology and medicine"

I think there's a thread here somewhere debating whether psychology is a science, yet you think it's legitimate to cite parapsychology as evidence.

Do you expect to be taken seriously?

 

Immortal,

 

Gods you can have a dialogue with?

 

Do you mean "think you can have a dialogue with", or that you could have a dialogue with, that could be recorded in some fashion for the benefit of others, and for the inspection purposes that others might have?

 

My guess is that you mean they "really" exist, in some objectively testable fashion, exactly adorned with jewels, mined from the minerals of the earth, and the jewels would be measurable as to their luminousity and size and wheight and shape, color and hardness.

 

In this case, I think you are expecting reality to hold an entity which it does not hold. Your mind might hold the image, but its analog does not exist in reality, where I can behold it.

 

Inow,

 

I was not able to view the recent videos, so I can't comment on what points Immortal was making, or attempting to make, but in general, recently on this thread, I would say that Immortal has retreated into an indefensible area, and being that he believes the area he has retreated into IS defensible, I would say he is broken, as in the way an ostrich is broken when it hides its head in a hole to escape danger.

 

So although I was attempting to give Immortal an out or two, I do believe he is defending a rather broken position, and if his beliefs are of the same type, as others who believe in gods, and these beliefs are of the type where the expectation is that these entities are "actual" and measurable, and exist in reality, then I will have to once again give up, giving such individuals the benefit of the doubt, and fall back into the "people that believe in God are broken" camp, since the fortifications surrounding that camp will hold, and the fortifications surrounding the opposing camp are somewhat thinner than air.

 

Regards, TAR2

 

 

There must be an objective justifiable reason before concluding anyone as broken and that criteria should be empirical evidence and actually my position is very much defensible, develop a machine capable of strong AI and that's a challenge to the atheistic scientific community and unless and until, allow practitioners to worship gods. Honestly speaking scientists should have abandoned physicalism or even scientific realism by now and theistic scientists will do realize it and abandon it and shift their line of research into investigating the gods.

 

 

 

Question: You talked about the peaceful and wrathful deities. Most Westerners don’t know they exist. Is it possible to recognize fear, anger and wrathful things in bardo?

 

Rinpoche: This is the reason Trungpa Rinpoche had the Tibetan Book of the Dead translated, printed, and distributed everywhere. It is very beneficial in introducing people to the bardo.

 

I don't believe in gods just because that belief easily gets a pass, its because we have genuine, reasonable scientific reasons for that belief, just because you don't understand a concept it doesn't mean such a concept is childish or wrong, that's quite a common accusation when the claim is counter-intuitive to normal experiences but many of the well accepted scientific theories are also counter-intuitive.

 

Its double standards and foolish to say we are working on consciousness and we will understand it say by another 200 years and ignore all evidences with in the exact sciences as well as from psychological studies in bio-feedback research which forces one to question such a line of research and at the same time insult practitioners world wide as broken who at least know that science and the scientific method is not all there is and who are honestly working to demonstrate that a non-physical mind exists questioning the basic assumption that the empirical universe exists independent of the human mind.

 

There aren't a lot of places over the internet where I can honestly discuss this because no one seems to care for scholarly evidences in religion as well as evidences from the exact sciences and everyone are so hooked up with their false beliefs they just doesn't want to let that go.

[iNow]

There must be an objective justifiable reason before concluding anyone as broken and that criteria should be empirical evidence and actually my position is very much defensible, develop a machine capable of strong AI and that's a challenge to the atheistic scientific community and unless and until, allow practitioners to worship gods.

Nobody here has suggested that theists not be allowed to worship. Please try to avoid arguing against strawmen, and please try to avoid moving the goal posts.

Honestly speaking scientists should have abandoned physicalism or even scientific realism by now and theistic scientists will do realize it and abandon it and shift their line of research into investigating the gods.

I presume you mean outside of psychology or anthropology, correct? If so, then kindly please define god in a way that can be measured without the use of neuroimaging equipment. Until then, your assertion that science "will abandon physicalism and shift thei r line of research into investigation of the gods" is quite an unrealistic assertion to make.

everyone are so hooked up with their false beliefs they just doesn't want to let that go.

Indeed, sir. Very much agreed. Unfortunately, you ought to look in the mirror when casting such aspersions instead of at the people who ask for a reason to accept your ideas as anything more than wish thinking and delusion.

[Moontanman]

 

I don't believe in gods just because that belief easily gets a pass, its because we have genuine, reasonable scientific reasons for that belief,

 

 

Immortal, please show us that evidence you keep talking about, so far all you do is make claims and appeals to authority...

[tar]

Immortal,

 

If I did come up with a way to develop a machine with strong AI, or a machine that was conscious of its own existence, wouldn't you quickly find a rational to explain it as a cheat in some way, where I had actually taken some of your gods, put them into the machine, and erroneously claimed it was "my" idea?

 

Regards, TAR2

 

Or perhaps you would suggest that I had found a way to grab disembodied souls, on their transit from a former life to the next, and coax them into residing in my machine.

 

In any case I think you might not release your belief in gods, just because scientists developed strong AI machines.

 

Immortal,

 

By the way, since I mentioned it, how many souls do you figure there are, in total?

 

This reincarnation thing, does not seem to work out right, as the population of humans grows. Are there human souls of a certain number? Or can any mammal soul become a human soul? Or can the soul of any life form, become a human soul? Is it just the count of souls on Earth that we care about, or if we should birth more beings than the souls available, do we import souls from other planets?

 

If you have answers to these questions, can you give us the empirical evidence that was used to arrive at the number?

 

Regards, TAR2

 

(don't forget to subtract the souls that have reached nirvana, as it would not be cricket to put THEM though the whole eternal process again)

 

By the by the way, this reaching nirvana thing has another related glitch, as that you would still be inhabiting a mortal body after you reached nirvana. Either that, or you would immediately expire.

Seems a logical problem, to me.

Edited December 17, 2012 by tar

[PeterJ]

People who believe that they can understand God through logic and reason are broken, religion is not irrational, its non-rational,

 

God doesn't contradict logic, he harmonizes logic, he is beyond reason and if someone doesn't want to believe in that I have no problem with that and its quite normal that those who do not understand religion to say that all religious people are broken.

 

Yes, but logic (and science) allows us to place limits on what we mean by God, and this is useful. It seem to me that logic more or less settles the God issue if we bother to do the calculations, but I agree that logic alone can bring no understanding.

[tar]

PeterJ,

 

I up arrowed your post, but would say that the reason that logic alone is not enough for understanding, is that an awareness of something to be logical about is also required.

 

Regards, TAR2

[PeterJ]

Not sure I see quite you mean, Tar, but I probably agree.

 

One thing though. it will never be possible to show that consciousness can be 'put' into a machine, This is a point that AI fans often fail to grasp, even though there can be no doubt about it. But I see what you're saying.