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Author Topic:   Peanut Gallery
PaulK
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Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


(1)
Message 1589 of 1725 (632370)
09-07-2011 1:11 PM
Reply to: Message 1586 by RAZD
09-07-2011 10:24 AM


Re: "detectable but not in an empirical manner"
quote:
Certainly if you base your conclusions on your assumptions and opinions, and find that your conclusions conform to your assumptions and opinions, you would not see that there is a problem -- this is a process called confirmation bias. This does not mean that there is no problem.
However, the case we are discussing is one where the evidence strongly favours one conclusion. That you might refuse to draw it based either on a principled but hopelessly impractical demand for absolute proof in everything or out of bias against that conclusion is hardly my problem. It would seem to be yours.
quote:
I had to parse this run-on word salad this way to make sense of it:
The writing was intended to illustrate the confusion of your ideas. It seems to have been successful. Your problem however is in failing to consider the context. The alleged method of detecting supernatural entities is religious experiences, and it is more yours, than mine. And you might have noticed that that is the ONLY possible means of detecting supernatural beings that either of us has proposed. I am afraid that your obsession is leading you into error here.
quote:
Again, it is like Ben Franklin flying a kite in a storm, with the kite being hit by lightening, and now he just assumes that he will recognize if electricity is present? If he measures everything else and the measurements are all "naturally occurring" phenomena (light, heat, sound, etc) and nothing is not explained about the "naturally occurring" phenomena -- is he justified in assuming that electricity is not present?
It is not like that at all. Again, we are not addressing the question of whether supernatural beings exist. We are addressing the question of whether the alleged method of detection (religious experiences) works or not. Now, obviously any proposed method of detection must distinguish between the presence and the absence of the thing it supposedly detects. If we find that it's behaviour is fully determined by other factors, we must conclude that it does not work. For instance if Jefferson chose a detector sensitive to sound, and the results it produced were entirely explained by the sound of the thunder, he could not claim that it was a detector of electricity just because electricity in the form of lightning just happened to be present.
quote:
Which, curiously, does not show that confirmation bias is not evident.
There is nothing curious about it. The mere observation that you resort to innuendo rather than valid criticisms is sufficient to make my point.
quote:
Confirmation Bias, Cognitive Dissonance and ide fixes, are not the tools of an open-mind or an honest skeptic, and continued belief in the face of contradictory evidence is delusion.
Would you agree that one should avoid these to reach a valid rational conclusion?
Of course. I would further add that attempts to imply that an opponent is engaging in any of these - sometimes to the point of ignoring the actual point of discussion (as in your point which I answer at the top of this post) is hardly the tool of someone interested in honest discussion.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1586 by RAZD, posted 09-07-2011 10:24 AM RAZD has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 1630 by RAZD, posted 09-09-2011 6:10 PM PaulK has replied

PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


(1)
Message 1640 of 1725 (632778)
09-10-2011 3:54 AM
Reply to: Message 1630 by RAZD
09-09-2011 6:10 PM


Re: "detectable but not in an empirical manner"
quote:
And yet, curiously, I do not write that way, nor have you quoted me writing in that manner.
Curiously, your objection is completely irrelevant. I illustrated the content of your post, not your writing style.
quote:
Your confusion is not my problem.
Of course the confusion is yours, and therefore your problem.
And it is a fact that you are either confused about the whole concept of detection or unable to remember the point we are discussing.
quote:
In your opinion. When you haven't tested for evidence for the other, then you are biased in your approach, and will end up with biased results.
RAZD, we are discussing a case where we have quite thoroughly tested for "evidence of the other", to the point where we have eliminated the possibility. To be precise, by watching brain function we have no inputs that are unaccounted for and all point to a natural origin of the experience, thus we can say that the experience is the product of natural causes, and it does not detect supernatural beings - for the simple reason that given the same natural causes the same experience would occur whether there were a supernatural being present or not.
To say that a method of detection works merely because the thing it supposedly detects happened to be present when it went off - despite evidence beyond any reasonable doubt that the thing in question had nothing to do with the " detector"'s outputs we would be engaging in confirmation bias of the worst sort. And yet, this is the argument that you appear to be putting forth.
quote:
But I'm not asking for absolute proof -- that is apparently more of your confusion -- I am asking how you are able to ascertain whether or not supernatural essences are present, rather than just assume it to be the case (based on your personal opinions).
And I am pointing out that this is completely irrelevant to what we are discussing, which is how we might determine if religious experiences are detections of supernatural beings or not. Once we have hypothetically determined that the experience is entirely due to natural causes the question of whether a supernatural being happens to be present or not becomes an irrelevance for the reasons I have given.
quote:
Which is precisely my point -- you cannot claim that something is present or absent if you don't test for it with a methodology that is known to test positive when present and negative when absent.
Alternatively we can examine the detector, find that it's behaviour is governed entirely by factors unrelated to the thing it supposedly detects and therefore conclude that it does not work. You have presented no valid argument against such a test.
quote:
Here you seem to be confused between what you are testing for and what you expect to be able to determine. You will only be able to determine what you are testing for, so if you are only testing for natural elements that is all you will determine.
The confusion here is yours. The test does not seek to detect supernatural elements. Instead it determines if the known natural elements are sufficient to explain the experience (measured at the level of brain function). You may argue that finding a gap in our understanding is not sufficient to conclude that a supernatural explanation is needed and you would be correct, but that is not the point of the test.
Thus despite your continuing use of innuendo, you have failed to address my actual argument once again.
Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1630 by RAZD, posted 09-09-2011 6:10 PM RAZD has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 1641 by Chuck77, posted 09-10-2011 4:58 AM PaulK has replied
 Message 1712 by RAZD, posted 09-15-2011 11:47 PM PaulK has replied

PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 1642 of 1725 (632783)
09-10-2011 5:51 AM
Reply to: Message 1641 by Chuck77
09-10-2011 4:58 AM


Re: Brain function
quote:
That's good. So you are a #7 on the "Dawkins scale" I take it? After a comment like this no other option fits.
Obviously you don't agree with RAZD's approach at all, jumping to conclusions like that.
Since you have missed it, we are discussing a hypothetical case and the question is whether religious experiences should be considered detections of supernatural beings or not. Given that even someone who was considered a 1 on Dawkins scale could reasonably accept my argument your conclusion is seriously divorced from reality. (They could easily hold that investigation would NOT lead to the hypothetical situation we are discussing, and in fact that quite likely would - to raise just one point)
quote:
Just because there is no detection doesn't mean that something does not exist. See RAZD and Thomas Jefferson
RAZD has badly confused you, to the point where you keep missing all my corrections. I hope he will apologise to you for misleading you so badly. The question of whether supernatural beings exist or not is not part of my argument at all.
quote:
Which experience? Let's look at speaking in tongues.
Religious experiences, as the term is usually used. And let me remind you that we are dealing with a hypothetical situation.
Your report is interesting, but not really relevant. Self control in this context seems to refer to inhibiting inappropriate actions. It isn't really that surprising that a rather exhibitionistic action is possibly associated with a lack of inhibition. I say possibly associated because the frontal lobes do a lot, so jumping on one function seems rather premature. The absence of language function is a little more interesting, but tends to support the idea that the "speech" is meaningless babble - just as your link says that it seems to be. Do you really think that your God would make people babble meaninglessly ?
quote:
It seems not all tests are being reported, well, read I mean. Let's just place you at a #6 on Dicks scale for right now.
And this is why you should be careful about jumping into conversations. You have completely missed the fact that we are talking about a hypothetical situation. You can't rate someone on Dawkin's scale by simply considering the situations they are prepared to entertain for the sake of argument.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1641 by Chuck77, posted 09-10-2011 4:58 AM Chuck77 has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 1647 by Chuck77, posted 09-10-2011 6:44 AM PaulK has replied

PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 1649 of 1725 (632802)
09-10-2011 9:19 AM
Reply to: Message 1647 by Chuck77
09-10-2011 6:44 AM


Re: Brain function
quote:
Detections or reigious experiences? The next time im praying and God speaks to me what would you like me to do?
How about when the holy spirit speaks to me in my spirit what test should we conclude that I am lying and in no way is it really happening and im just imagining it?
RAZD is the one suggesting that they might be detections. I am pointing out that his assertion that we cannot possibly determine if that is true or not is false.
As to your questions, submitting to a scientific study, if there were one available. I hope you will at least admit that there are reasons to be skeptikal of the idea that it is real communication.
quote:
Of course it's possible I missed it. What did i miss?...what does this mean
It means that normal people are capable of considering hypothetical situations without believing that they are true or even might be true. Do you lack this capacity ? Or did you not only miss the fact that we were discussing a hypothetical situation, but my explicit statements to that effect ?
quote:
I understand Paul. The religious experiences have to be brought about by a specific being of the SN. Religious experiences are not just eureka moments of enlightenment. They are meetings with God. Who is....SN.
Clearly you do NOT understand. I said nothing like that at all.
quote:
Well, I thought it would add to the experiements that are hypothetically disproving the SN as simply brain funtion.
The fact that people who are babbling nonsense sounds in public have low brain activity in areas which help form coherent speech and areas which might act to prevent them doing something silly like babbling nonsense sounds in public is actually helpful in that respect. Although the fact that they are babbling nonsense sounds is more important.
quote:
Indeed it is."Tongues" as it were, is a Heavenly language and doesn't make any sense to our natural minds. It's a gift from God for us to be able to communicate with him from our spirit man.
The linguistic analysis suggests that it has no meaning to anyone (and why would anyone need to have God put words in a special language into their mouths to communicate with Him?). And how can actually uttering noises be "groanings that cannot be uttered"? Wouldn't it make more sense to see that passage as referring to purely spiritual communication?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1647 by Chuck77, posted 09-10-2011 6:44 AM Chuck77 has not replied

PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


(1)
Message 1670 of 1725 (633019)
09-12-2011 1:29 AM
Reply to: Message 1668 by RAZD
09-11-2011 10:18 PM


Re: Knowledge - vs - Confidence: Empirical Confidence
quote:
As I said in Message 1666 "... we know with certainty that the evidence, test methods and information we currently have show the earth to be over 4 billion years old."
And you DON'T know that with 100% certainty. You haven't dealt with, for instance, Descartes demon or the similar "brain-in-the-box" scenarios. In other words, you dismiss unfalsifiable, yet (apparently) possible scenarios to claim to have knowledge. And unless you do so, you cannot even "know" that the tests have even been performed, let alone their outcomes.
So, is it acceptable to dismiss unfalsifiable and implausible scenarios that - for all we know - could be true ? Or do we need to give them serious consideration ? This is one of the central considerations of this discussion, and it appears that you are taking both sides.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1668 by RAZD, posted 09-11-2011 10:18 PM RAZD has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 1677 by RAZD, posted 09-12-2011 8:00 AM PaulK has replied

PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 1679 of 1725 (633045)
09-12-2011 8:17 AM
Reply to: Message 1677 by RAZD
09-12-2011 8:00 AM


Re: Knowledge - vs - Confidence: Empirical Confidence
Let's look at your statement again:
"... we know with certainty that the evidence, test methods and information we currently have show the earth to be over 4 billion years old."
How can it be true if all you have is false reports of evidence and if the test methods would show a different date if they were applied (or worse, HAVE been applied and shown different date) ? You are implicitly assuming access to an external reality where the evidence exists and where the tests have been carried out with the results you claim. And therefore you are implicitly dismissing those non-falsifiable possibilities where that is not the case.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1677 by RAZD, posted 09-12-2011 8:00 AM RAZD has seen this message but not replied

PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 1714 of 1725 (633747)
09-16-2011 2:32 AM
Reply to: Message 1712 by RAZD
09-15-2011 11:47 PM


RAZD uses imagination, brain malfunction, hallucination, and insanity as catch-alls
quote:
Curiously there are people who are not confused by my posts.
And what you don't seem to realize is that your testing will never result in "evidence of the other" because you assume you have covered all the bases so that you don't need to look for anything else.
In other words you are asserting not only that does this alleged "detection of supernatural beings" use informational channels unavailable to natural methods, but that it CANNOT produce any noticeable differences in brain function, even indirectly.
Retreating to unfalsifiability would be bad enough. But insisting that the supernatural is utterly incapable of producing any detectable evidence is going much further. Your mind is closed to the possibility that the tests might work.
Needless to say, your dogmatic refusal to accept that even quite weak evidence of the supernatural could exist does not in any way affect the validity of the tests.
quote:
You look at the brain scans, and you conclude there is either normal or abnormal behavior.
In fact the proposed test is to look at the scans and determine whether the observed behaviour is accounted for by known inputs and interactions or whether the evidence suggests that there is an additional input.
IF that possibility is ruled out then we can conclude that the experience is not detection of supernatural beings.
quote:
Because it cannot detect supernatural beings. It never has and it never will, even if one is standing there.
What is "it" in the post here ? The religious experience is the only thing claimed to "detect supernatural beings".
quote:
But you haven't "determined that the experience is entirely due to natural causes" -- you have just put them in tidy categories that pretend to explain them as due to natural causes, categories that are "catch-alls" for anything you cannot otherwise categorize as natural causes: imagination, brain malfunction, hallucination, insanity.
In fact my proposed tests make no judgements of that sort at all. They operate on the lower level of brain function, simply looking for evidence of unexplained inputs.
quote:
It is not my job to do your work for you. You claim to have a methodology that you believe detects a lack of supernatural presence. You have not substantiated that claim by showing that it can produce a positive result.
Of course you are criticising the wrong test here ! The test that you are attacking makes no such claim. If the test found an unexplained input it would not mean that the input was definitely from a supernatural source. The point of the test is to FALSIFY that claim, by testing for unexplained inputs. If all the inputs are fully accounted for by natural sources then the hypothesis is falsified. It is not proven simply by the detection of an unexplained input, simply NOT falsified !
quote:
I point out to you, again, that you (a) do not have a tested and validated methodology that is known to produce positive results, and (b) that without such a test method/ology you are like a Ben Franklin flying his kite in a storm without a means to test for the presence of electricity.
Well, you keep saying it, but it remains false. The test you are attempting to criticise attempts to determine if your "detector" can be said to work or not, by seeing if it's behaviour is completely accounted for by factors OTHER than the things it supposedly detects.
quote:
I am not confused at all by what you claim, I can see clearly that it does not have the ability to test for supernatural presence, because you can explain any brain behavior in various tidy catch-all categories, such as imagination, brain malfunction, hallucination, and insanity.
On the evidence of this post, I would have to say that you are greatly confused. I repeat that the test you are talking about is intended to look only at the level of brain function and only looks for evidence of unexplained inputs. It does not make any judgements as to the state of mind of the person having the experience.
Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1712 by RAZD, posted 09-15-2011 11:47 PM RAZD has seen this message but not replied

PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


(1)
Message 1719 of 1725 (633781)
09-16-2011 12:15 PM
Reply to: Message 1717 by RAZD
09-16-2011 11:11 AM


RAZDs failures
Or some of them...
I will address only the part of RAZD's reply that seems to be aimed at my points. I say "seems to be aimed" since RAZD misses very badly.
quote:
The assumption that measuring natural causes will somehow turn up evidence for supernatural essences, and the failure to turn up supernatural essences means that natural causes are a complete explanation uses begging the question and affirming the consequent logical fallacies.
Of course, this is not at all what I proposed. Rather I proposed that if the supernatural had effects on the natural world - as RAZD suggested might be the case - that by examination we could falsify the claim by examining the causes of the event and seeing if natural explanations fully sufficed or if a gap was left that might potentially be due to supernatural influence. RAZD has failed to refute this suggestion.
[quote] When
[list=a]
  • a person has a religious experience, and
  • it is categorized as imagination, brain malfunction, hallucination, insanity, etc, and
  • then it is claimed that these natural causes fully explain the experience, and
  • that this shows that supernatural presence was not detected
    \[/quote\]
    Let us note that RAZD seems to completely miss the fact that my suggestion was based on brain scans, not on psychological investigation. The "explanations" he proposes are simply not applicable to my suggested test, which operates at the level the workings of the material brain rather than the mind.
    Perhaps he has confused this with the second test I proposed which did intend to look at reports of religious experiences. However, that test only looks for positive evidence of supernatural involvement, and a failure is not taken as falsifying the existence of supernatural beings at all.
    All in all while this description echoes RAZD's recent attacks on my proposals the content is largely RAZD's own imaginings. A serious failure indeed.
    quote:
    The analogy,
    • of having a Ben Franklin flying a kite in a storm
    • without any means or methodology to test for electricity,
    • demonstrates vividly, fully and completely
    • that not having a proper, applicable test method and methodology means
    • you cannot detect the presence or absence of electricity, and
      1. that you cannot assume that electricity is not present in spite of
      2. all the tests and all the evidence and all the information that was collected
      3. because they did not relate to the presence or absence of electricity.

    ...is a repeated failure. It is not analogous to my proposed test at all. And I have corrected RAZD more than once on this issue, however,in his confusion RAZD fails to notice and repeated the same error again and again.
    Franklin was attempting to detect electricity, my test does not propose to detect anything, rather it tests an alleged detector, to see if it might possibly work. This is already a major difference.
    My test - which RAZD has failed to rebut, answering a strawman of his own invention instead - despite my corrections - does not require a means of detecting supernatural beings.
    To make a genuine analogy, if I claimed that my room light detected supernatural beings whenever I operated the switch we could point out that the operation of the switch combined with the electricity supply and the circuitry was sufficient to explain the light coming on, and come to the conclusion that the light was not detecting supernatural beings. The question of whether a supernatural being was present or not is irrelevant - indeed that is the point of the test, it establishes that the presence of a supernatural being IS irrelevant to the observation.
    quote:
    The assumption that the results of any tests did not show the presence of electricity and that ...
       • therefore there is no reason to hypothesize or investigate further to see if electricity was involved
    We will note that RAZD cannot even accurately get the conclusion of my test right. The conclusion is only that the alleged detector does not in fact work as a detector. The argument he is supposedly addressing never claimed to be able to falsify the existence of supernatural beings.
    quote:
    The proper conclusion would be that the presence or absence of electricity was not tested rather than absent.
    And of course, having concluding that the alleged detector did not work, in my argument we would conclude that it was NOT a test for the presence of supernatural beings ! RAZD therefore agrees that my conclusion is the proper one to draw !

  • This message is a reply to:
     Message 1717 by RAZD, posted 09-16-2011 11:11 AM RAZD has seen this message but not replied

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