The Blasphemy Challenge

I found a nice test: which face is happier? If you said right side, then you use your right for emotion, pattern recognition and intuition. If you said left side, then your left hemisphere does the patterns and emotions.

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"Der Mensch kann was er will; er kann aber nicht wollen was er will." (Man can do what he wills but he cannot will what he wills.) - Arthur Schopenhauer

So all participants utilized both parts of the brain equally? Yet there is a difference in 'how' they used them? I do not quite understand the 'calibration' thing. Without a question of dominance, how do you account for the different results? I understand this. I guess I am curious if there are other types of people who seem to have the same results in detecting abstract patterns as do relgious people. Actually I can research it a bit myself, it is one of those things where I want to know more about it and it is hard to narrow down my questions.

The thing is, the imagination is not limited to the creation of things that are true. Which is its strength, obviously; but that same strength basically discounts imagination alone as a tool for truth-seeking, which is something I think you admit here: I agree, but we definitely should not make the mistake of confusing this process with one that leads to truth. Which is what religion's proponents invariably do; which is what results in so much bloodshed when people with made-up beliefs assert theirs are true and others are false.People like to assert that there's no harm done when make-believe is substituted for truth, and it seems that you just did that. But the history of human religious conflict makes it very clear indeed how harmful that behavior can be.

OK, so let us review your post that I commented upon:

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So, now you want to say there is no god-sense, but a made-up story to fool the gullible. If this is your belief, then you do indeed have no religion, nothing beyond the natural to explain your existance, nothing but science to appease your searching mind. I can't imagine limiting my mind so much, when it has been given to me with so much capacity for something more.

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I asked: You replied:

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Of course not. All of us are welcome to observe and study phenomena, whether we believe God created it or not.

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But you seem to be saying in your first post quoted above that one is limiting their mind by sticking to naturalistic explanations of natural phenomena instead of also including supernatural explanations of natural phenomena.IOW, you seem to be saying that it's "limiting", in your opinion, to not allow "Godidit" as an explanation for phenomena.Please correct me if I'm misrepresented you.The reason I bring this up is that it has been shown through many centuries that the best way to learn anything reliable about anything natural is to study it using methodological naturalism i.e. the scientific method.Supernatural explanations are investigative dead ends that freeze inquiry in it's tracks.Tell me, would you actually like to return to a Dark Age mentality, where superstition and irrationality ruled over all?

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'Explanations like "God won't be tested by scientific studies" but local yokels can figure it out just by staying aware of what's going on have no rational basis whatsoever.' -Percy"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool."- Richard Feynman"Science is like a blabbermouth who ruins a movie by telling you how it ends! Well I say there are some things we don't want to know! Important things!"
- Ned Flanders

Yes, the difference is between dominance and participation. Right Hemisphere dominance would mean that right brain would have taken over more of the pattern recognition, which doesn't happen. Enhanced Right Hemisphere participation though, which I'd say is the case here, is that believers take more notice of what the RH is telling them.

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"Der Mensch kann was er will; er kann aber nicht wollen was er will." (Man can do what he wills but he cannot will what he wills.) - Arthur Schopenhauer

Nah, you have forgotten already this; we need to dictate more if our imagination takes us beyond the scope of sanity. It is not belief in religion alone that can drive men to insanity; there is lust, money, ambition, and power, to name a few.

And non-believers are lacking this 'enhancement'?

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Nah, you have forgotten already this; we need to dictate more if our imagination takes us beyond the scope of sanity. It is not belief in religion alone that can drive men to insanity; there is lust, money, ambition, and power, to name a few.

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Nobody is saying anything about "insanity".There are, and have been over the millenia, plenty of sane people killing, oppressing, abusing, discriminating, and hating because they believe that their god requires/allows them to.I mean, all those good Christians who orchestrated, cheered on, or fought in the Holy Crusades were, by and large, perfectly sane.

Equivocate all you must. I'll quote what my friend once said when I told him about such research: "I'm going to be very annoyed if lack of oxygen to a certain part of the brain during development causes me to miss out on heaven."

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"Der Mensch kann was er will; er kann aber nicht wollen was er will." (Man can do what he wills but he cannot will what he wills.) - Arthur Schopenhauer

Why do you keep making science and relgion competitors? It is so unneccesary when you could just accept the fact that they deal with different areas. You seem to be having difficulty understanding. I said; It is limiting to dictate your imagination so much that it can not concieve of anything beyond the natural, not 'instead of' the natural.

It won't, don't worry. You have been given all that you need, a conscience. There is no religion required.

Indeed. There's nothing insane about killing two women in a ditch because the local religious belief dictated that they could be sold for more money as "ghost brides" than as living brides, as recently happened in China. It's a perfectly rational financial decision, based on make-believe.

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Why do you keep making science and relgion competitors? It is so unneccesary when you could just accept the fact that they deal with different areas.

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Of course they do, and I don't believe it is me that is making them compete. I do think that you are, though.Remember, it is you who seems to have chosen the supernatural "explanation" and rejected the naturalistic one WRT the origins of moral behavior.

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It is limiting to dictate your imagination so much that it can not concieve of anything beyond the natural, not 'instead of' the natural.

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Well, nobody does this. Everybody imagines stuff, and makes stuff up, and dreams up makebelieve.What we are talking about, however, is the way to find out what is true about the world.And "making stuff up" and deciding to accept it as truth is not a good way to do that.

There's also nothing insane about tearing the foreskin off the penis of your newborn child for religious custom, even though there is no medical reason to do so.And the vast majority of Nazis and Nazi supporters weren't insane, even though they participated in or condoned terrible acts.The Stanford Prison Experiment, and the Milgram Experiment both show that otherwise normal, perfectly sane people can be rather easily and quickly led to do, and even enjoy, despicable and horrible acts against fellow human beings, given the correct social influences.

Unless you can prove that there is no God, no creator of nature, there is no conflict. Making stuff up and deciding to investigate whether it could be true, is exactly what scientists do. I am not a fundamentalist, remember. There are many, many ways to incorporate spirituality into one's life. I have chosen to do that, and I will continue to do so.I am not going to continue in this vein any longer. If there is something you would like to discuss about atheist indoctrination, this would be the place to do it.