People have a sense of time - of past, present and future. They cannot just do away with that sense of time.
An important part of being happy now is taking care of the future.
And time at college is a preparation time.
Life after death
- Thread starter James R
- Start date
People have a sense of time - of past, present and future. They cannot just do away with that sense of time.
An important part of being happy now is taking care of the future.
And time at college is a preparation time.
And we're back to the argument that it cannot be shown there is anything to prepare for.
What you do at college (i.e. the courses you take) is preparation, granted, but surely the idea is to do as well as possible while you are there, no?
What can be readily shown is that people have children, and that these children then live in the environment affected by their parents, for better or worse.
From this perspective, it certainly makes sense to prepare ahead, given that children will inherit the environment from their parents.
Sure, and you try to do well with the goal in mind - ie. becoming eligible to get a good job.
(Although there are people who go to college because they think it would be fun or an "enriching experience".)
Er, we are talking about life as preparation (or not) for an afterlife.
That goal is decided before you start college, no?
Hence, at college all you have to do is make the most of it while there.
Yup, I did that the second/ third time around. Maybe I'm in favour of reincarnation.
Sure. There is the popular notion that "people live on in their children".
This is the minimum notion of "preparation for an afterlife", but it is evident from it that preparing for the future is important.
(Old spinsters and bachelors perhaps face different problems, of course.
)Sure, and you do it according to the goal.
Yes!
It can be both: a good friend's father owned an insurance company. My friend was was told by his father when departing for the state university (only choice his father would pay for): To party as much as he could, but don't bust out, and make lots of friends writing down all he could about them. That prepared him to sell a lot of insurance, and after graduation, he did.
starscream84
Registered Member
Well I was just stating my opinion did not really want to get into a discussion about it. If life is created by the Big Bang or some other random act then there is a chance that random act could be duplicated could it not? I am curious why you put the proof of burden on me. Why do I have to prove that there is life after death why can 't you prove there is no life after death?
You cannot prove a negative.
Fraggle Rocker
Staff member
That isn't true in every case. But the scientific method does indeed put the burden of proof on the person who makes an assertion. Otherwise science would grind to a halt as all of its resources are dissipated on peer-reviewing every crackpot hypothesis that is submitted without evidence.
Because the default is that there is no afterlife.
We see cows, monkeys, frogs and humans die and rot every day. They become part of the earth again.
For all practical intents and purposes, the burden of proof usually rests on those who are less proficient in debate.
Fraggle Rocker
Staff member
I answered that question:
The oxymoronic fantasy of "life after death" is one component of the larger fantasy that underlies all religion: that an invisible, illogical supernatural universe exists, full of creatures and forces which capriciously and whimsically interfere with the behavior of the natural universe. This fantasy claims to falsify the fundamental premise upon which science is based: that the natural universe is a closed system whose behavior can be predicted by theories dervied logically from empirical observation of its present and past behavior. This premise has been tested exhaustively for the half-millennium since science as we know it has been practiced, and it has never come close to being falsified.
Therefore, life-after-death, like all of religion, is an extraordinary assertion, and before we are obliged to treat it with respect, extraordinary evidence must be presented to support it. No such evidence has ever been presented. In fact, no ordinary evidence has ever been presented. Religion is based on an irrational faith in stories that have been handed down from one generation to the next, since the Stone Age.
Professional scientists present new hypotheses every day. That's the only way science advances. They have no problem accepting the burden of proof, and quite often their hypotheses are proven "true beyond a reasonable doubt" and integrated into the canon of science.
Apparently only the religionists and other crackpots have a problem with proficiency in debate. Hmmm, do you see a connection here? Debate requires reasoning, and people who make a practice of believing unreasonable things are not very good at debating?
the problem is that the claim isn't lodged within the parameters of empiricism (in fact its logically impossible to) , so you are being unreasonable to discount it simply because it doesn't fall within the folds of controlled environments and the like ... and downright dishonest when you attempt to contextualize the means given to evidence the claims as conquests of social hereditary etc
:shrug:
Is there any way to tell what the total number of voters was? The ability to do multiple selection makes it impossible to know how many believers vs. nons there are.
If voters were logical then 38 +50 +16 = 104 so 100 is not a bad guess.
I agree with your position, but I would change it up just a little to say that theories aren't really derived logically from empirical observation. They are dreamed or just dumped in our brains by our subconscious. When we are lucky enough to stumble on or figure out a possible explanation for what we see, we postulate its truth/reality and test its predictive power to see if it allows us to understand, predict and control those phenomena is it posited to explain. The better it works, the nearer the truth/reality we think we are. This is the scientific method. Postulate and test. It isn't the logical deduction from observations that the Empiricists thought it was.
And as you essentially point out, it really isn't a presumption at all, but a postulation which has been tested a zillion times, and keeps on ticking. It has a much better success rate than trying to get your prayers answered.
I hope you mean you intend to live a long time. Otherwise, you might want to see a counselor.
To R.O.G.
On intuition.
Intuition is real and is the source for a great many scientific hypotheses. However, there is no 'magic' about it. Research shows that intuition is a lot more reliable when it is about something the intuitor has a lot of knowledge on.
In other words, intuition is an unconscious deduction process, where your mind is putting known 'facts' together to come up with a conclusion which is intuited.
Word of warning, though. The unconscious mind is very undisciplined, and many of those 'facts' it combines may not be real facts at all. They may be superstitions, prejudices, biases, or just plain fiction. This makes intuited conclusions sometimes very unreliable. Intuition is much more reliable when it comes from people with disciplined minds, who are very clear about what is real and what is not.
In science, we have the correcting factor that hypotheses all have to be thoroughly tested empirically. False intuitions are soon weeded out. Outside of science, false intuitions can do an awful lot of harm. They have even begun religions. 'Nuff said!
On intuition.
Intuition is real and is the source for a great many scientific hypotheses. However, there is no 'magic' about it. Research shows that intuition is a lot more reliable when it is about something the intuitor has a lot of knowledge on.
In other words, intuition is an unconscious deduction process, where your mind is putting known 'facts' together to come up with a conclusion which is intuited.
Word of warning, though. The unconscious mind is very undisciplined, and many of those 'facts' it combines may not be real facts at all. They may be superstitions, prejudices, biases, or just plain fiction. This makes intuited conclusions sometimes very unreliable. Intuition is much more reliable when it comes from people with disciplined minds, who are very clear about what is real and what is not.
In science, we have the correcting factor that hypotheses all have to be thoroughly tested empirically. False intuitions are soon weeded out. Outside of science, false intuitions can do an awful lot of harm. They have even begun religions. 'Nuff said!