Afterlife and Pre-life

[Arioch]

@LG --

Go back up and read my response to Wynn in which I stated that the fMRI could help because it can tell us in no uncertain terms what does and doesn't cause suffering, and this data can in turn be used to construct an objective basis for morality that has literally nothing to do with spiritual/religious claims.

Come on now, I'm not moving too fast here, you should be able to keep up with me.

 

[wynn]

@LG --

Go back up and read my response to Wynn in which I stated that the fMRI could help because it can tell us in no uncertain terms what does and doesn't cause suffering, and this data can in turn be used to construct an objective basis for morality that has literally nothing to do with spiritual/religious claims.

Come on now, I'm not moving too fast here, you should be able to keep up with me.

You know, people's lives don't stop and wait for science to find the answers for pressing issues.

 

[Arioch]

@wynn --

You're right, they don't, which is why we have to make do as best we can until science catches up. However to extrapolate from that that science can't catch up is pure foolishness, especially since the track record for claims that science can't do something is abysmal.

 

[lightgigantic]

@LG --

Go back up and read my response to Wynn in which I stated that the fMRI could help because it can tell us in no uncertain terms what does and doesn't cause suffering, and this data can in turn be used to construct an objective basis for morality that has literally nothing to do with spiritual/religious claims.

Come on now, I'm not moving too fast here, you should be able to keep up with me.

Now go back and read what I said about fMRI's affecting the perception, language and treatment of the problem/success of morality in a totally non-existent manner.

:shrug:

 

[wynn]

You're right, they don't, which is why we have to make do as best we can until science catches up.

Yes, like following traditional wisdom - sometimes, religious traditional wisdom.

However to extrapolate from that that science can't catch up is pure foolishness, especially since the track record for claims that science can't do something is abysmal.

Science is free to prove to be the dark horse anytime.

 

[aaqucnaona]

Yes, like following traditional wisdom - sometimes, religious traditional wisdom.

Sure, if that is the best and most advantageous method currently possible.

Science is free to prove to be the dark horse anytime.

And it has been using that freedom very well indeed.

 

[Arioch]

@wynn --

We're working on it.

 

[Cris]

lg,

IOW they cannot actually even begin to discuss what the essential components of perception are much less how it works ... yet there is some expectation that a discussion on why they think it is true be taken seriously or at least on the same level as their more credible claims : eg metal fabrication and gps satellite navigation )

So they don't know how consciousness works.

That doesn't provide any credibility to suggesting that magic must happen, e.g. a supernatural concept that has no supporting precedent. We have no basis on which to take those suggestions seriously either.

The absence of knowledge does not provide any credibility to fantasy supernatural assertions as a default cause.

So where does that leave the idea that souls or spirits exist and there is an afterlife or pre-life? Nowhere - the concepts remains pure unsupported fantasies.

 

[Arioch]

@Cris --

You really shouldn't take most of what LG says, especially on scientific topics where he's demonstrated a lack of knowledge and understanding, seriously. He quite clearly doesn't know what he's talking about here because while we do lack a full understanding of consciousness, that's a far cry from not knowing anything and we have several theories, all of which are falsifiable, about how it works.

 

[Cris]

wynn,

Science seems to be so good and so fancy when it comes to some fancy abstractions, but it is largely useless when it comes to helping people with things as they really matter in their daily lives.

You mean like antibiotics, ibuprofen, appendectomies, CPR, psychotherapy, polio vaccinations, hygiene standards, sewerage systems, agriculture irrigation systems, and the list is endless.

Without science you'd still be living in a cave trying to avoid the next animal that wants to eat you. And with no smartphone - now that is frightening.

So beliefs in spirits, souls, and gods, brings us what benefits? A warm fuzzy feeling that when we die, if we have been good, that we will enter a Utopian paradise and live forever. Yeah right! Religions simply exploit the basic human desire of not wanting to die with false and baseless promises. Totally irresponsible and inexcusable.

 

[Cris]

Arioch,

You really shouldn't take most of what LG says, especially on scientific topics where he's demonstrated a lack of knowledge and understanding, seriously. He quite clearly doesn't know what he's talking about here because while we do lack a full understanding of consciousness, that's a far cry from not knowing anything and we have several theories, all of which are falsifiable, about how it works.

Hehe, oh I know only too well. We have some history here. I know I will never receive meaningful answers.

However, he does often pose useful perspectives that force me to think about why I accept certain science findings and methodologies. The value for me is being forced to think through an argument even though I know any debate with lg will never reach a conclusion or agreement. In this sense it is the journey that has value and the destination will remain likely unreachable and unimportant.

The effort here is not that science needs to be defended but that supernatural concepts need to be ruthlessly examined and questioned. The skilled religionists like lg will always attempt to turn the questions away from the real issues of religious fantasy, that have no support, and attack science instead and hope to put the questioners on the defensive. And in that he is succeeding nicely as most of you are going down dead ends trying to defend science rather than question the claimed supernatural alternatives.

 

[wynn]

You mean like antibiotics, ibuprofen, appendectomies, CPR, psychotherapy, polio vaccinations, hygiene standards, sewerage systems, agriculture irrigation systems, and the list is endless.

And yet when people have all that, they are still deeply unhappy, have a sense that something is lacking.

Without science you'd still be living in a cave trying to avoid the next animal that wants to eat you. And with no smartphone - now that is frightening.

So beliefs in spirits, souls, and gods, brings us what benefits? A warm fuzzy feeling that when we die, if we have been good, that we will enter a Utopian paradise and live forever. Yeah right! Religions simply exploit the basic human desire of not wanting to die with false and baseless promises. Totally irresponsible and inexcusable.

Which religions? The mainstream versions of Abrahamic religions? Even they are not utopian, given that they contain notions of eternal damnation.

 

[Cris]

wynn,

And yet when people have all that, they are still deeply unhappy, have a sense that something is lacking.

There is no rule that says that life must be just, will provide happiness, will be safe, will be painless, satisfying, etc.

Such is life.

Creating fantasies about gods etc to make people think that there is something looking out for them and when they die all will be revealed, is simply a crutch to help people ignore and/or deal with the harsh realities that life throws at us. It might make some people feel better to believe that fantasies are real, but it doesn't change the end game that death is ugly and final and life sometimes is just hard.

Many of us learn to deal with it and overcome the harshness as best we can without leaning on fantasies and similar delusions.

Which religions? The mainstream versions of Abrahamic religions? Even they are not utopian, given that they contain notions of eternal damnation.

Doesn't matter. All religions make promises based on fantasies to make their adherents feel better about themselves. Most religious fantasies include some form of reward and punishment mechanism. And they either stress the reward part or the punishment part, e.g. the fire and brimstone versions of Christianity stressed the power of fear, and this perspective dominated Christianity for most of the past 2000 years. It has only been this recent century that the love and peace angle has been exploited more.

The choices tend to be a utopian paradise, e.g. a heaven, or a hellish domain. Or perhaps a return to life after death in an animal or lesser form, or perhaps a higher or more godlike form. Take your pick, there are countless thousands of various religious fantasies and interpretations.

The only real evidence we have about death is that there is no credible evidence that death is anything other than total and final. And how you behave in life is not going to change any aspect of that final non-existence. Be as altruistic as you like or be a raging serial killer, the end for both is the same - non existence.

 

[lightgigantic]

lg,



So they don't know how consciousness works.

That doesn't provide any credibility to suggesting that magic must happen, e.g. a supernatural concept that has no supporting precedent. We have no basis on which to take those suggestions seriously either.

The absence of knowledge does not provide any credibility to fantasy supernatural assertions as a default cause.

So where does that leave the idea that souls or spirits exist and there is an afterlife or pre-life? Nowhere - the concepts remains pure unsupported fantasies.

You misunderstand.

I am dismantling the term on the authority of the said discipline.

IOW, unlike your foray into analyzing/evidencing theistic claims, I am not circumventing terms, under-riding epistemolgical/ontological categories or otherwise super-imposing the parameters of other disciplines upon others.

IOW I am simply pointing out how, on the authority of science, the claims you speak of have no or at best an extremely weak scientific credibility.

Whether it is acceptable to extend the authority of science to all claims of knowledge is an entirely different subject.

 

[Arioch]

@wynn --

And yet when people have all that, they are still deeply unhappy, have a sense that something is lacking.

You're right, some people, but not all, are unhappy in their lives despite what science has done for them. However your statement is an absolute statement and, as you worded it, applies to all humans, and this just isn't the case.

I personally know thousands of people for who find happiness in science through one thing or another, and I'd be willing to bet that there are hundreds of millions more out there. You should know better than to make absolute statements about humans by now, they're virtually always wrong.

 

[wynn]

There is no rule that says that life must be just, will provide happiness, will be safe, will be painless, satisfying, etc.

Such is life.

Creating fantasies about gods etc to make people think that there is something looking out for them and when they die all will be revealed, is simply a crutch to help people ignore and/or deal with the harsh realities that life throws at us. It might make some people feel better to believe that fantasies are real, but it doesn't change the end game that death is ugly and final and life sometimes is just hard.

Many of us learn to deal with it and overcome the harshness as best we can without leaning on fantasies and similar delusions.

Doesn't matter. All religions make promises based on fantasies to make their adherents feel better about themselves. Most religious fantasies include some form of reward and punishment mechanism. And they either stress the reward part or the punishment part, e.g. the fire and brimstone versions of Christianity stressed the power of fear, and this perspective dominated Christianity for most of the past 2000 years. It has only been this recent century that the love and peace angle has been exploited more.

The choices tend to be a utopian paradise, e.g. a heaven, or a hellish domain. Or perhaps a return to life after death in an animal or lesser form, or perhaps a higher or more godlike form. Take your pick, there are countless thousands of various religious fantasies and interpretations.

The only real evidence we have about death is that there is no credible evidence that death is anything other than total and final. And how you behave in life is not going to change any aspect of that final non-existence. Be as altruistic as you like or be a raging serial killer, the end for both is the same - non existence.

Looks like you are already convinced of your omniscience.

:shrug:

 

[wynn]

You're right, some people, but not all, are unhappy in their lives despite what science has done for them. However your statement is an absolute statement and, as you worded it, applies to all humans, and this just isn't the case.

I personally know thousands of people for who find happiness in science through one thing or another, and I'd be willing to bet that there are hundreds of millions more out there. You should know better than to make absolute statements about humans by now, they're virtually always wrong.

I don't think happiness is as relative as you suggest.
And many people whom you claim are happy, don't seem happy to me at all.

 

[Cris]

lg,

I am dismantling the term on the authority of the said discipline.

IOW, unlike your foray into analyzing/evidencing theistic claims, I am not circumventing terms, under-riding epistemolgical/ontological categories or otherwise super-imposing the parameters of other disciplines upon others.

Please be more specific otherwise I am left to guess at your intent.

IOW I am simply pointing out how, on the authority of science, the claims you speak of have no or at best an extremely weak scientific credibility.

And I didn't disagree. As I said, we don't yet know how consciousness operates.

But the scientific pursuit of consciousness is a different issue to your claims for consciousness. The scientific hypothesis for consciousness is that it is grounded in a naturalistic cause. Whether that investigation makes progress or not is of course of interest but not relevant to our current concern, i.e. the religionists claim for consciousness.

While you are very prepared to oppose the scientific perspective you appear very reluctant to demonstrate any credible support for a non naturalistic alternative.

Whether it is acceptable to extend the authority of science to all claims of knowledge is an entirely different subject.

No it is not. It is the crux of the entire discussion. If there are non naturalistic causes as you maintain then we need to understand a credible mechanism to view them. Something that can be clearly distinguished from personal delusion and fantasy. And in all our discussions around this I have not seen anything that qualifies. And in the absence of any credible approach we only have evidence based logic that forms the basis of the scientific method as our only meaningful approach.

 

[lightgigantic]

lg,



And I didn't disagree. As I said, we don't yet know how consciousness operates.

yet you use this as the platform for dismantling any other claims about consciousness.

But the scientific pursuit of consciousness is a different issue to your claims for consciousness. The scientific hypothesis for consciousness is that it is grounded in a naturalistic cause. Whether that investigation makes progress or not is of course of interest but not relevant to our current concern, i.e. the religionists claim for consciousness.

If you are holding that any claims made in the theistic sphere must be accountable to whatever models are on the cutting edge of naturalistic explanations you are effectively ...

circumventing terms, under-riding epistemolgical/ontological categories or otherwise super-imposing the parameters of other disciplines upon others

While you are very prepared to oppose the scientific perspective you appear very reluctant to demonstrate any credible support for a non naturalistic alternative.

at the moment I am simply pointing out how , as far as you are concerned, the discussion never leaves the arena of naturalistic attempts to explain the phenomena. I am reminding you that in doing so you have no credibility (no credibility by the authority of the very discipline of knowledge you are advocating ... as opposed to no credibility by the authority of super-imposing one discipline of knowledge on top of another .. which is what you do when you talk about theistic claims about the nature of consciousness being delusional and a fantasy and so forth)

IOW I am simply pointing out how, on the authority of science, the claims you speak of have no or at best an extremely weak scientific credibility

No it is not. It is the crux of the entire discussion. If there are non naturalistic causes as you maintain then we need to understand a credible mechanism to view them.

Sure, but if you think that mechanism is "if something existed beyond the mind and senses an investigation with the mind and senses would have revealed it by now" you are being irrational (with, more than likely, your values holding your intelligence hostage)

Something that can be clearly distinguished from personal delusion and fantasy. And in all our discussions around this I have not seen anything that qualifies.
And in the absence of any credible approach we only have evidence based logic that forms the basis of the scientific method as our only meaningful approach.

Well such a discussion would begin by looking at how the two models differ in their approach to problems (as opposed to making one method necessarily subservient to the methodologies of the other at the onset ... which is of course precisely what you are doing).

And even if you don't go that far, its personal delusion and fantasy to think that there is an authorative "scientific" as an alternative

:shrug:

 

[Balerion]

Looks like you are already convinced of your omniscience.

:shrug:

Translation: You raise some excellent points, and I have no way to defend my position...but since I would never admit this, I'm simply going to insult you and pretend your post has no merit.