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Author | Topic: Who & what are the demons ? | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined:
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But demons either exist or they don't.
So regardless of whether we ever know whether demons exist or not some people are going to be wrong in their beliefs about the existence of demons aren't they? Either those who believe demons do exist are wrong or those who believe they don't exist are wrong. We may never know which. But we do know for a fact that some beliefs are just factually wrong. How can it be otherwise?
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined:
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I believe that demons are fictional entities invented by humans rather than real entities that exist outside of the human mind.
If you agree with this but want to say that demons exist anyway, exist in some sort of conceptual sense or as some sort of metaphorical sense as in personal demons, I hope you will forgive me for not going down that semantically quibblesome ontological rabbit hole.
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
Numbers writes: Are we getting back to the supernatural is not real because it can not be known. And if it could be known then science could study it.But then......it would not be super natural any more. Bahhhahhhaawwaaa hahaha ha!!!! No. If anything I suppose we are getting back to if it is empirically detectable or has an empirically detectable effect then science can study it and if it isn't empirically detectable then how on Earth is anyone detecting it to make claims about it? The Santa paradox...(Ho ho ho).
Numbers writes: What if the man on the street says a demon is as a demon does? Then the man in the street should be asked to clarify what he is talking about.....?
Numbers writes: Oh wait.... I got it, demons exist to those who believe in them. However, they are products of the human mind and exist as fiction. But for the average man on the street describing a demon he may not be able to distinguish a super natural demon from a natural one. I don't subscribe to your use of "natural" and "supernatural" as being, by definition that which science can study and that which it cannot. Science is restricted to studying the empirical not, necessarily, the natural.
This is even more off-topic than the rest of your post. Do you believe that demons exist and if so who or what do you believe they are? Do you - For example - Believe that president Obama is the anti-Christ?
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
What do you mean by "real"...?
In some sense you could say that Santa Claus is "real" to my 6 year old son.But (I hate to be the one to tell you) Santa isn't really real. So is president Obama the anti-Christ? Who, or what, are the demons? Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
Numbers writes: Hi Straggler, the point of my link was to show how frame of reference can dictate what we otherwise perceive is real. Sure. For example do you perceive this picture as moving? But is it really moving?
Numbers writes: Obama is not the anti-Christ. I agree. But given your apparent position on perception and reality how do you know that those who do perceive Obama to be the anti-Christ are in fact wrong?
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
Straggler writes: I hope you will forgive me for not going down that semantically quibblesome ontological rabbit hole. Dogma writes: Well we are talking about demons so I figured you were already about half way down... You do have a point there!!
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
Numbers writes: The picture is a optical illusion. It is not moving, that is how human brains are wired. I agree. But I want to understand how you think you know this. So - How do you know this?
Numbers writes: How many times have you had a dream that was perceived as reality? Could you distinguish what was a dream and what was not? Well I have had dreams about all sorts of things. Including things things that could be called demons. But I don't believe that these things were real rather than just dreamt. Do you believe everything you dream is real?
Numbers writes: I can not KNOW. I didn't say "KNOW". I said "know". Can you give an example of something we can know? Or do you consider knowledge impossible?
Numbers writes: We believe the things we do because we choose to believe them imo. Is not what is objectively real and what is not a rather important factor here?
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
Phat writes: yes, and i think you would agree with the following statement: Not really. I am not an advocate of objective morality (except in a very indirect, rather convuluted and rather abstract sense that is way way off-topic here........)
Phat writes: Thus for you, what is real is only what is provable or "evident" and i can respect that, though im more of a leap of faith subjectivist I don't think much outside of axiomatic logic (e.g. math) is provable.
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
Numbers writes: The picture is a optical illusion. It is not moving, that is how human brains are wired. Straggler writes: I agree. But I want to understand how you think you know this. So - How do you know this? Numbers writes: The same way you do. Which is.....?
Numbers writes: Indeed, but I ask again how do you know whilst dreaming that you are dreaming and not participating in reality? How do you know that the image isn't really moving? Cartesian doubt doesn't make knowledge an impossibility does it? It makes certainty an impossibility.
Straggler writes: Can you give an example of something we can know? Numbers writes: 1+1=2 Can you give a non-mathematical example of something we can know?
Numbers writes: Yes, my only point was humans have for ages have been grappling with what is knowlege, and how do we obtain it. Yes they have. And much of that grappling has focused on the differences between belief and knowledge and certainty. Where do you think the proposed existence of demons comes in on that "scale" and why.....?
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
Yeah, but it’s a .jpg that has been supernaturally enhanced by demons..
At least that’s what the demons told me.
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
Numbers writes: My opinion is no, but to others perhaps the sickness in her mind is a metaphor for demon snd how they make sense of the world. But metaphors for demons are metaphors rather than real demons. The question is where this idea of demons comes from and all the objective evidence indicates that they are things invented by humans for reasons that have everything to do with human psychology and nothing to do with the actual existence of real demons.
Numbers writes: Straggler writes: How do you know that the image isn't really moving? My experience. Let me correct you. You subjective experience suggests it is moving. But your wider, more objective, verifiable by others, experience tells us it isn't moving. Subjectively it is moving. But objectively you know it's an optical illusion. I'm sure there is a mataphor for demons in there somewhere..........
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
Phat writes: And as one who has had subjective evidence, I dont buy the idea that demons are not real. I don't doubt that subjective experiences can be very personally convincing. But you cannot justifiably cite some experience as evidence of something just because you happen to believe that the something in question is the cause of said experience. More objective evidence strongly favours less exotic causes of such experiences. Do you have any reason beyond belief to attribute the cause of this experience of yours to demons (or whatever supernatural entity it is you are alluding to)? If I had a deeply compelling subjective experience (e.g. a disturbingly vivid vision) and I happened to believe that this subjective experience was caused by empirically undetectable telepathic beams from mind controlling aliens would the fact of this experience qualify as evidence of the existence of mind controlling aliens? Or not? The problem with the whole ‘subjective experiences are evidence’ thing is that you have to believe/assume that the cause of the experience is the thing supposedly being evidenced in order for it to be evidenced by the experience. It’s circular.
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
Phat writes: Straggler writes: Do you have any reason beyond belief to attribute the cause of this experience of yours to demons (or whatever supernatural entity it is you are alluding to)? No. Then you are misusing the word "evidence".
Phat writes: I admit to a bias in favor of my explanation given. And yet you describe the experience in question as "subjective evidence" of demons (or whatever other supernatural entity you are alluding to). You attributing the experience to said supernatural entity is evidence only of your bias. It isn't evidence of demons any more than it is evidence of fluctuations in the matrix or any other conceivable explanation. Do you still think this experience constitutes evidence of the thing you believe in?
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
Can you explain how you have come to the conclusion that the existence of demons and the existence of buses are in some way comparable?
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Straggler Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 10333 From: London England Joined: |
Hawk writes: Do you accept the fact the most of them can't? No. There is a reason we distinguish between ancient Greek myths and ancient Greek history. For example. Plato is history. Zeus is myth.
Hawk writes: Among the 5000 written history of over 1000 nations, how much of them is evidenced? As far as I understand the question (which is grammatically non-sensical) the answer is - All of those that are considered history rather than myth. AbE - But what does any of this have to do with demons? Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.
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