BS: Science and Religion

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: wysiwyg
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 12:56 PM

(sadly, If I'm right, I don't get to say "I told you so."

That's OK. With universal salvation, I can just come fetch you when it's time.

~S~

Ongoing jokes with my good friend Bill)

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Amos
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 01:07 PM

LH:

You can't use words any old which way. If you don't think EMF is physical, try standing in front of a microwave tower dish some cold afternoon and see if you can sense any physical experience, or put one of your dachshunds in the microwave for 45 seconds on high, and see if he reports anything physical.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 01:11 PM

hah, Now it is getting interesting. However:
at 3:19 am - LH: All those experiences generate feelings which are accompanied by measurable changes in one's physiology. They are, in fact, physical. So how can they not be "physical events"? As radio waves are also - that we feel them without recognizing it does not make them non-physical.
at 5:57 am - Slag: great ideas. What is the "you" who needs to be remembered? If I help one family raise one child better, that will continue to carry "me" into who knows how many generations of improved parenthood. Will the 10th generation remember "me". "I" do not give a flying fish cake.
at 10:12 am - Shimrod: I would not be surprised to learn there are people who do KNOW what will happen after death. Would we believe them? Who would believe whom? How would we know whom to believe? The one whom our own inner wisdom believes, if we listen to it.at 10:53 am - Amos speaks my mind, precisely.
Noon - I tried to get folks to define religion days ago! They, apparently, have more fun waffling.
12:26 pm - LH: Just as "feelings are not unlike the wind... neither can be touched and with neither is it necessary". Nice lines and I hesitate to argue with genius but I strongly question these lines. I believe both can be touched and, with feelings at least, it is
necessary. Clearly, my concept of "touching" may differ but, then, many of my concepts differ! Ain't life fun!
(You all have probably moved on while I tried to catch up. Oh well.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 01:30 PM

Yes, the non-physical and the various forms of energy can affect the physical in various ways. No doubt about it. And why wouldn't they? Everything is interconnected.

Does our civilization not define physical things as existing in 3 specific states? Solids, liquids, and gases? That's what they taught me when I was in science class back in high school.

Amos, my dachshund will indeed suffer a physical effect from the microwaves. That doesn't mean microwaves are themselves physical. They are a form of energy. A thought is also a form of energy. An emotion is a form of energy. If my dachshund experiences the emotion of excitement or irritation then his heartbeat will accelerate, his little furry head will get hot, his eyes will open wider, and he will salivate. He will also bark or growl. All this just on the basis of a shift in consciousness! That's why consciousness is king.

The study of spirituality, I think, is primarily the study of how to manage and govern one's own consciousness in such a way as to enhance the experience of life to the fullest. Consciousness is what it's all about. Consciousness is not a physical thing...but it profoundly affects the physical in both obvious and subtle ways. Consciousness decides...and the physical then responds.

If I were, for instance, to burst into your house and start throwing yellow paint all over your furnishings and walls....you would probably get red in the face and start yelling at me, and your whole body would tense up. I would have altered your consciousness, without any direct physical contact with you, and the conditions in your body would change dramatically. That's the power of consciousness.

If, however, you were already unconscious when I burst in, then your bodily state would not change one iota, no matter how much I trashed your house.

Consciousness is what makes life real to you, me, or anyone else.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 01:44 PM

Amos, I should really have said, "If, however, you were already unconscious when I burst in, due to Chongo having bopped you over the head with his trusty sap a minute or so previously, then your bodily state would not change one iota, no matter how much I trashed your house. It would change later...when you regained consciousness."

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Amos
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 01:57 PM

LH:

THey are not non-physical. That is a totally misleading description. Physical does not mean made ofparticles greater than some preferred minimum. The physical range of phenomena includes space and energy, time and solid accretions thereof such as atoms.

Your three-state description is a simplistic description of the states of matter only. It ignores the peculiarities of transition states, and the interesting range of phenomena of energy itself.

As to your example, why is it any different if your exertions transmit from you to your body to yellow paint to my house to my eyes, than if they transferred from you to your hand to a sharp stick to my eyeball? The contact is quite direct even though the coupling, I grant you, is a bit less solid. But it is still perferctly physical.

# "Of or relating to matter and energy or the sciences dealing with them" according to one of the AmHEr definitions of "physical".

A

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 02:25 PM

LH: I suspect that even unconscious there would be a physical reaction. But, not being a neurologist. We do know that children are affected in the womb and that persons who are in a coma are also.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 02:50 PM

Possibly, Dorothy.

Okay, Amos, I shall expand the definition of "physical" as you wish, to include energy waveforms as well as matter. (though matter may itself be an energy waveform that is at quite a low oscillating vibrational state)

Now what about consciousness? It is the nature of consciousness that really concerns me here. What would you say about that? Does consciousness mysteriously arise out of physical phenomena somehow (as materialists and reductionists would seem to see it)...and if so, how? Or is it the other way around and physicality arises out of consciousness? What do you think?

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Paul Burke
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 03:33 PM

Does consciousness mysteriously arise out of physical phenomena somehow (as materialists and reductionists would seem to see it)...and if so, how?

Does consciousness mysteriously arise out of spiritual phenomena somehow (as mystics and religionists would seem to see it)...and if so, how?

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Amos
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 03:40 PM

As far as I can see, the general pattern of life forms I have dealt with is that structure is subordinate to function.

Once you differentiate between S=>R chains (Pavlov and Skinner) and actual awareness, it seems highly likely to me that consciousness has far more effect on structure than structure has on consciousness, even though in some cases the individual consciousness pretends to be wholly fixated on S=>R inputs from a physical nervous system, for example.    Furthermore I have never seen evidence that a purely physical aggregate can make a postulated state begin to come about, the way life does every day.

So I am inclined toward the probability that attention and consciousness actually bring about postulated spaces which then get left on automatic and accruing and solidifying, gradually form the kind of spacetime we are so accustomed to.

But the truth is these are simply preferred hypotheses, until such time as I can figure out how to walk through walls and such.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Amos
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 03:41 PM

Paul:

Consciousness, if there is any spirituality to the universe, seems to be an innate attribute of spiritual existence, not something that rises out of it.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Paul Burke
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 03:43 PM

What evidence have you for that?

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 03:54 PM

"structure subordinate to function" As in Selye's work showing the effect of stress factors on the internal organs of rats? And the fact that the functioning of our organs is dependent on the stress factors/feelings we have, "positive" or "negative"?

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 04:01 PM

(No, Amos...if I'm wrong, THEY get to say "I told you so!"...if Susan hasn't 'spirited' me away first...*grin*)

My Mother-in-law was convinced that some sort of salvation would be forthcoming for 'leading a good life', no matter what I believe now. Nice attitude... I hope to earn it, whether it happens or not.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 04:29 PM

"Prior to the invention of those instruments which can detect or generate radio waves, people didn't believe there was anything such as a radio wave. Why? Well, their physical senses could not detect it.

Because their physical senses do not (generally) detect the presense of spirits, souls, and such spiritual phenomena, they tend to not believe those exist either. Some people, however, do detect the presence of spirits, souls, ghosts, whatever.....but it's easy for someone who hasn't done so to just dismiss their reports and say, "Oh, they were having a hallucination." or "They're not telling the truth.""

LH I think you're pushing analogies a bit too far here: At one time people couldn't detect radio waves, just as, at the present time, people can't detect 'spirits', 'souls' and ghosts'. We now know that radio waves exist, therefore 'spirits', 'souls' and 'ghosts' must exist ... uuuummm ... give me a minute ... sorry, LH, but it sounds like very bad logic to me.

The fact is I'm not an unbeliever - I'm a sceptic - there is a big difference!

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 04:48 PM

Life is biochemistry. Consciousness is electrochemistry. Very little mystery there. We don't know exactly how it works, but then nobody understands quantum physics, either. Doesn't stop us from using it.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 05:00 PM

Seems to me there is a great deal of mystery everywhere. Otherwise what is this thread about?

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 05:19 PM

I'm not saying that spirit MUST exist, Shimrod. I'm saying that it very well may exist. I think it probable. You don't. Neither one of us is in a position to state that it MUST or MUST NOT exist.

Paul Burke - Amos's last 2 posts will do fine for me to answer your question.

Mrrzy - I think you're imaginging that the cart is pulling the horse or that the tail is wagging the dog when you say "onsciousness is electrochemistry". ;-) Consciousness affects our electrochemistry. An outside intervention in our electrochemistry (by drugs, alcohol, etc) can also affect our consciousness as it attempts to function through the mechanism of the physical body.

Likewise, the horse pulls the cart...and an outside intervention (such as breaking one of the wheels on the cart or getting several men to attempt to impede the progress of the cart) can affect the horse (he'll struggle against the impediment)...but it is still the horse which pulls the cart, not the cart which pulls the horse. The cart is passive and without purpose. The horse is active and purposeful. Electrochemistry is passive and without purpose. Consciousness is active and purposeful.

You are surrendering your own recognition of your own freedom of will if you think your consciousness is just the result of some electrochemical processes. You're denying, in effect, your own intelligence. This would be rather like a god(dess) denying her own godhood and saying, "I'm a rock." or "I'm a worm."

If you have freedom of will...and you do...you can even use it to assert or deny that you have freedom of will. As you believe, so shall it be. You have the power.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Paul Burke
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 06:11 PM

What, LH, you're happy with a straw man, and a bald assertion? Nobody surely thinks feeling is behaviourist in origin- in fact behaviourism is based on feelings, otherwise there wouldn't be anything to choose between reward and punishment. And his statement "Consciousness, if there is any spirituality to the universe, seems to be an innate attribute of spiritual existence, not something that rises out of it" is merely begging the question.

Consciousness seems to be an innate attribute of organisation of material networks, not something that rises out of an external cause. How is that statement inferior to Amos's, without evidence?

But back to the original question. If it had been "Stories or facts", no one would have hesitated to answer BOTH OF COURSE.

There are many things and assertions that can't be proven. That doesn't mean that they are unexplorable, just that the method of exploration is metaphor rather than method. And that you should be aware of the limits of the metaphor, just as you should be aware of the fact that evidential proof is limited in scope. No conflict there.

But how do you assess one metaphor as against another? If you reject seeking for evidence (i.e. striving to make it scientific- for science is itself only a search for better metaphors), one assertion is as good as another, and if you base action on the metaphor, one action is as good as another.

When you oppose science to religion, you are introducing- especially on the religious side- emotionally loaded terms. It amazes me how, when pressed, religious people will deny the realities of religion as it has been practiced for most of human existence, and take refuge in some idealisation that reflects only their own, often admirable, construct. No real Scotsman....

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 06:18 PM

""Just over one hundred years ago the concept of talking to someone in America by wireless transmission, the concept of travelling in a vehicle without a horse in front, and the concept of reaching America in three hours in a flying machine would have been equally matters of blind faith for believers, and objects of ridicule for those of a scientific mindset.

Yet some DID believe, and have since been proved right. The concept of a deity may be similarly unbelievable to many, but it would be UNSCIENTIFIC to say that such an entity is IMPOSSIBLE.""

Come on all you scientific geniuses, which of you is going to take my final sentence and refute it so that you may be justified in your statement that "There is NO God"?

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 06:21 PM

JUST one condition.

I ASKED THE QUESTION, so will NOT accept any answer based on a requirement for ME to prove there is a God.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Paul Burke
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 06:24 PM

It's virtually impossible to prove a negative that doesn't involve a logical contradiction. It's possible to believe in all sorts of unprovable things. Whether such beliefs are socially useful is another matter.

However, it has long ago been shown that if a god exists, it can not have the traditional attributes of the Abrahamic God of infinite power, infinite knowledge and infinite goodness.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 06:31 PM

I'm happy with admitting that I don't know everything or have all the answers, Paul.

How about you?

I do not oppose science to religion/spirituality. I unite them into a single path of knowledge. I do oppose science AND rational spirituality, however, to the old traditions and superstitions that are clearly in violation of known scientific facts...as does any rationally objective human being. The spirituality that interests me has nothing to do with those archaic traditions and superstitions. It has to do with mastering my own consciousness and making it more positive. It has to do with becoming more forgiving, less reactive, more loving, less condemnatory. I'm not out to convert anyone to anything. I belong to no religious order or tradition or structure. I'm out to improve myself. Period.

Why do I talk about religion/science/spirituality here? Because I find the subject very interesting.

You said, " religion as it has been practiced for most of human existence "

Now, there's a glittering generality! ;-D What you really mean is "religion that fits the very pejorative definitions I like to give to religion".

Have you ever studied Taoism or Buddhism? Have you ever studied the spiritual traditions that are not built around a surrogate human-like god-deity? There are several such traditions in existence.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Stringsinger
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 07:02 PM

Here's the problem, Don. Religion poses a social problem today with the advent of "just wars", reproductive rights advocates being murdered, Catholic priests abusing children,
Rumsfeld's memos to Bush about the battlefield, denial of global warming and adherence
to a false doctrine of geological time, the evangelizing of the American military by right-wing religious Christians, the forcing of ID and Creationism into the science curriculum of American education, the censoring of reputedly anti-religious speech, the violation of the Separation of Church and State by the enforcement of tax money for religious social programs supported by the Obama Administration (Madison would turn over in his grave),
a national day of prayer which should be outlawed as promoted as a government edict,
the violence in religious disputes all over the world by adherents......religion has become dangerous.

As to the powers of imagination, the Acquinas argument can be expelled by imagining that there is no god and that would be true for the foreseeable future. There were many scientists who did not pooh pooh new tech developments that were shown to be empirically viable. Even today, new ideas in space travel, quantum mechanics, and other ideas which may at present be improbable next week are not rejected out of hand because there is scientific methodology being used to support these innovations. This was also true during Galileo's time but we know the real "enemy" toward the realization of scientific breakthroughs.

Radio waves, space travel, flying etc. were not that far-fetched by many of the scientific
community. If you reason that the bible is an index to clairvoyance, as many of the Christian persuasion do, it is untenable. This can also be said to be true of any of the "holy" books.

It is your right to believe as you wish (whether anyone can accept it reasonably) and I respect that you have studied the bible and have some scholarship chops. I commend to you Bart Ehrman from N.C. University as a person who debunks biblical historical accuracy.

With respect,

Frank Hamilton

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 07:05 PM

American fundamentalist religion has become dangerous all right. No doubt about that. So has Islamic fundamentalist religion.

That doesn't mean "religion" in general has become dangerous. It means that 2 specific forms of fundamentalist religion have become dangerous.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Stringsinger
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 07:21 PM

LH, wish it were only 2. AIPAC represents another threat. Hinduism is rife with violence in India. There are instances of extremist Buddhist groups and Shinto and ....and...
the list goes on. Scientology proclaims itself as a religion. Catholics and Proddies in Northern Ireland. (Both claim to be Christian). Sectarian violence based on religious principles in Iraq show that there are many forms of being Muslim.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 07:22 PM

That list Stringsinger posted is a pretty good set of reasons to at least find ways to limit religion's direct influence in governmental affairs and the educational system. Although, some 'believers' already are reasonable, others very belief system commands them to interfere and try to impose their values on the rest of society!
THIS is the crux of the problem.... now we need to maintain 'freedom OF religion', while allowing those who wish to have 'freedom FROM religion.'
   It will never be easy to juggle those conflicting views.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 07:32 PM

Yes, Strinsinger, wherever people unite political extremism with religion one has a dangerous situation. Wherever they unite other forms of extremism with politics, one has a dangerous situation.

The problem is not religion itself. The problem is not politics or race or culture. The problem is extremism.

I know people of all religions (or not), races, and cultures among my circle of friends and acquaintances, and none of them has shown any inclination to hurt anyone.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 07:35 PM

Sadly, Little Hawk, it only takes a tiny fraction of a %....none of whom YOU are likely to know... to cause a great deal of problems.


You wanna sit down with me and overhaul the entire educational system to weed out all these folks early? How far do you think we'd get?

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Slag
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 08:42 PM

Uncle_DaveO, re post @ 9:41AM, Huh, the Big Bullet? The Big Fuse? The Big Interstitial Brat with a cosmic hammer? Perhaps.

A real good discussion, again, as usual, here at the 'cat. It is noteworthy that this is pretty much the same discussion that has been going on for thousands of years with no clear winner as yet.

Some ancients noticed that there is always a little puff of air going in and out of living things, as they understood them. This "pneuma" or "spirit" must be the life force (they thought) that animates all living things (they thought). Whether it is still a popular idea today, I don't know, but we still use the term and mean, pretty much, the same thing.

So where did this breath of life come from...? ...and on it goes. We approach these things with the thought tools (words) and understandings that have been conveyed to us over the centuries.

Perhaps the better question is the one of consciousness. What is the body/mind connection? After all, it is the human consciousness that asks and then attempts to answer these questions. The galaxies don't ask and don't tell. Right in there is the Existential Question too. How we answer them or attempt to answer them, or even ignore them tells us who and what we are.

In the final analysis and in answer to Dorothy Parshall's 1:11AM post about who cares and flying fish cakes: The only mind you truly inhabit is your own. True, whether we are remembered or not, has little to do with on-going life on this planet. Without a theological perspective and an eye toward eternity, a "who cares" is really the RIGHT question. If it matters not then, it matters not now. In fact, life on Earth matters not at all. It is simply a minor anomaly, infinitesimal, in the scope of the space time continuum. Shakespeare's "...tale told by an idiot..." sums it up pretty well.

What I was trying to convey was that, for the preservation of life and our species, the one who reaches beyond himself or herself, the one who effects others positively and promotes the good that we assert life is, they have truly lived and have a heart, which in this age, seems to be a little more rare than in the past.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Riginslinger
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 09:59 PM

"Come on all you scientific geniuses, which of you is going to take my final sentence and refute it so that you may be justified in your statement that "There is NO God"?"

            With every hour that passes, science finds more evidence that there is no god. It's just a matter of time. More and more people everyday turn away from religion. When religion is finally determined to be a mental illness, we'll be on our way to a peaceful world.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 10:10 PM

I feel for what you're saying, Bill! ;-) Alas, I think it's too big a problem for you and me to tackle. Anyway, the fact is, the world will never be entirely safe, no matter what we do.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 11:06 PM

Slag, 10:42 What I was trying to convey was that, for the preservation of life and our species, the one who reaches beyond himself or herself, the one who effects others positively and promotes the good that we assert life is, they have truly lived and have a heart, which in this age, seems to be a little more rare than in the past.

I believe that this and LH's latter comment are more pessimistic than my take on the subject. I believe the world is getting smaller and people becoming more aware of this and of each other. Our young people - teens and 20s, at least - are connecting with people around the world (thanks to the wonders of science!) and learning more than any previous generation about their contemporaries and the way others think and view the world, hence will be more compassionate, knowledgeable and understanding of those differences which have separated people. My hope/dream - whatever anyone chooses to call it - is that this will bring about a more peaceful world. The young people will have the power before long and a very different, broader world view than ever was possible before this internet on which we have so much fun - and gain so much.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Amos
Date: 10 Jun 09 - 11:30 PM

Well, there are many instances of consciousness surviving without a body. There are many narratives of consciousness being able to take over inanimate forms or at least permeate them with perception.

The logic of insisting that all the consciousness a body is aware of comes from other bodies or parts of them, therefore consciousness must be a product of matter and energy, is (as I have said many times before) very similar to believing that cellphones can hold conversations. Such a belief would require that you steadfastly and completely ignore the presence of connected, remote elements (the owners or operators of cellphones). You could insist, two, that the life forms of planet Earth were boxy things with round rubber feet that lived on petroleum, occasionally infested by small bipedal parasites, but which had the innate ability (hidden somewhere in their internal-combustion systems) to navigate and manage themselves in traffic.

Attributing function inaccurately to structure is an easy, but very incapacitating error.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Bill D
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 12:17 AM

Rig: "With every hour that passes, science finds more evidence that there is no god. "

and THAT is as flawed an argument as those FOR a god. Science does not do that! That is not something 'evidence' is used for. Science studies what it can, and posits theories about the connections. If individuals wish to draw conclusions from 'what Science has 'not found', they are sorta free to do so, but you do not prove a negative!

Whether there is or is not any 'spirit' in the universe is not a direct CONCERN of Science.

It is important to keep such issues straight.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 12:53 AM

Thanks, Bill. You are quite correct.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 04:44 AM

"Well, there are many instances of consciousness surviving without a body. There are many narratives of consciousness being able to take over inanimate forms or at least permeate them with perception."

What!? Just run that past me again, Amos!

I'm trying to think of an 'instance' of "consciousness surviving without a body." ... Nope, can't come up with a single one.

So, let's try "narratives of consciousness being able to take over inanimate forms ..."? According to you there are "many" - so you should be able to supply me with several examples ... ?

Help!

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 07:52 AM

To me the concept of a God/Creator figure ranks with several science fiction stories that present an equally valid scenario.

Take "The Tunnel Under The World" by Frederik Pohl as an example.
This is based upon the premis that using computers and robotics of a sufficiently advanced nature a town is recreated and run over and over again, groundhog day fashion, to test out commercials and marketing advertisments. The inhabitants do not know that they are mechanical constructs that have been given the memories of real people.
When it was written this was very far-fetched but the concept cme nearer reality every day.

Another story that I don't remember the title or author of concerns a person who spots a flaw in reality and realises that his entire world experience is being staged in order to distract him from what is the actual reality (cities are dismantled when he is not there etc.). It is implied that a group of aliens have been contracted to do this by some unexplained method.

There is no way to say that either of these concepts is any less likely than the usual God myths.

Now, I have had experiences that I cannot explain with science, but I expect that one day science will be able to advance to the point where they can be explained, even if it does involve some other form of conciousness. The fact that such phenomena can be observed by the human eye/brain implies a physical element that should eventually be able to be detected.

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Riginslinger
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 10:24 AM

Bill D - I would agree, god is a negative!

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Stringsinger
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 10:34 AM

Bill D, the problem is that religion unwittingly at times enables extremism. Well-meaning religious folk are really part of the problem without realizing it. Whenever the lack of reality is glorified for whatever reason there will be consequences. I, too, know a lot of religious folk who I like very much but I attribute their character not to religious belief but to a rational morality and ethical behavior. I have learned to separate their propensity for attributions to a god from the way they treat others.

Religion in the future may find itself obsolete as a moral compass. I have reason to believe that it will be vestigial in the process of human evolution.

Frank

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 10:36 AM

"The greatest tragedy in mankind's entire history may be the hijacking of morality by religion." Arthur C. Clarke

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: wysiwyg
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 10:40 AM

Whether there is or is not any 'spirit' in the universe is not a direct CONCERN of Science.

At the moment, or necessarily so? Say more.....

Bill-- what is "Science"? The whole ultimate concept? The practitioners' collective work? The "results"? I know, I am asking a lot out of your old head, and a lot of thinkig and writing time-- no hurry-- it's such a GOD head-- say on. Submit it to some turning time and let me know what comes out. (A lot like my dish-washing time, I bet.)

Aaargh, I'm only asking BILL, but I know the rest of you will chime in too.... OK....

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Amos
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 10:44 AM

Shimrod:

Read up on OBEs, NDEs, and the small handful of well-documented reincarnation tales that have some substantiating evidence. Read up on "mystic" experiences. The literature is not usually in the form of peer-reviewed scientific journals. Read Ingo Swann's reports. Examine reports from Raymond Moody. Read up on Kubler-Ross. Read the research reports of Ian Stephenson.

The "model" of life as essentially a spiritual being having a physical experience, rather than the other way around, has been the preferred model for hundreds of millions of people through centuries--Buddhists, Taoists, Shintoists, and many other lesser knows groups. This alone is not an argument for its rightness, but it means as a student of human thought you might want to familiarize yourself with that side of things.

You'll find lots of chaff, but you will also find a handful of serious wheat.

A


A

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: wysiwyg
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 11:10 AM

PS for Bill-- and is that statement a fact you are reporting, or an opinion, and if so, whose?

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Amos
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 11:11 AM

As far as God is concerned, the obvious error is that the not quite bright insist on thinking of it as a noun, a thing or entity with attributes, about which one can properly make declarative statements with predicates just as you can about "My car..." or "The sky....".
THerein lies a cosmic mis-step.

God is a verb.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Bill D
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 12:34 PM

Now I have Frank and Amos and Susan I need to reply to.... mercy! (not Rig...he is just being silly)

Frank: yes...sure, I am so VERY much aware of religion & well-meaning 'religious folk' being part of a pervasive set of problems. This comes directly from the logical/philosophic principle that from false premises, anything follows. This means that IF a religious belief, no matter how sincere, is based on incorrect information, it is possible to derive any sort of conclusions and support any sort of behavior. This is WHY we get much 'good' done in the name of religion, as well as much silliness and just plain evil. You make a good point that basically good people will channel their religious beliefs into basic goodness....and we see every day what basically bad or confused or disturbed people will do.
   But... I also understand why religion came about and why it persists in the world. Just 200-300 years ago, almost everyone still attributed supernatural origins to what they saw... (insert 12 paragraphs of explication here)

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Amos is sorta easy: "..There are many narratives of consciousness being able to take over inanimate forms or at least permeate them with perception."

Yes indeed...but narratives are easy. *I* can make up a narrative..(you wouldn't believe me...but....)
Even when a narrative comes from someone totally honest & sincere, there are always alternative explanations for the belief/experience/memory.
What sort of explanations? Ummm...scientific ones.


That means answering Susan/WSY IS harder and more convoluted.
I may indeed have to contemplate my answer, Susan...at least the long form. The short form is that 'science' means the 'scientific method'...and there are reams of stuff written on that, and more cogently than I might do it.
   Those who 'practice' science are like practitioners of any field...they can do it well, with a full understanding of its principles, or poorly- inserting personal, subjective interpretations of data. It isn't easy, or we'd not have quite so many disputes.

"At the moment, or necessarily so?" .... ummm...both, I'd say. If, by definition, religious, spiritual, psychic and various superstitions are not subject to any known scientific test, they must remain in the realm of conjecture and..... well...narrative. (yeah, I know...some think it may be possible someday to 'measure' certain psychic stuff....but....)

And, the hardest part of all, Susan, is explaining about "...and is that statement a fact you are reporting, or an opinion, and if so, whose?"....

Some aspects of it are very like math & logic, in that it IS possible to determine the internal consistency of claims and to show whether or not basic scientific method is being followed correctly.....but some formulations of what is said is quite personal and tainted with careless language. What IS totally 'opinion' is which basic premises one accepts. Humans are strange in that **they are ABLE to ignore, deny, and reject** any data or contrary opinions they decide doesn't fit their pre-concieved opinions!...(including logic & math! remember attempts to legislate that pi=3?) I can barely contain myself sometimes when someone smugly asserts. "well, it's true for ME!"...arrgghhh. This is a basic misunderstanding of just what *true* means; and unlike Humpty-Dumpty, words do NOT "...mean just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less."

I often refer to the fallacy of 'equivocation'...and various other "informal fallacies". It is well worth reading thru them.........


(see....I really don't have time to write a short answer)

ah, well......

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Amos
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 12:56 PM

Bill:

Go on with you. We have been around this fire hydrant over and over, and yet you keep coming up and peeing on it as though you have never seen it before!! What breed of pup did you say you were? And aireheadale? (Just kiddin', my old amigo.)

The problem you are up against is using a map of New York to find your way around in the wilds of Nome. There is a rigid criteria for hard science involving replicability, peer-review, and "falsifiability" (an awful word), among other things. Within this environment, anecdotal is disallowed, or at best, looked highly askance.

However, if you are trying to achieve some scientific approach to the study of viewpoint, and are testing a model which says there is, in fact, a viewer independent of, seperable from, and qualitiatively different from the meshwork of mechanics involved in steering a body around, then you simply must find a way to take individual perception, self-determination, and creative acts into accout within the experimental framework. Absent an experimental framework, within the dataset being used for deduction.

It is completely understandable to want to discount subjective effects from completely non-agreed on realms -- fairy dust and pink ponies on the moon or some such.

But when a five-year old describes in details the connections and manner of death of a person who lived miles away, down to his name, with whom none of his present family has any traceable connection, you have to weigh the possibilities with a more open mind than the purely materialistic one or you doing yourself the extrenme disservice of prejudicial thinking.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 01:22 PM

Aren't "The literature is not usually in the form of peer-reviewed scientific journals" and "the small handful of well-documented reincarnation tales that have some substantiating evidence" rather contradictory? I mean, if it isn't in a scientific journal, how an it be WELL-documented?

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: wysiwyg
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 01:24 PM

(Keep mulling, Bill. Keep billing, Mull?)

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Science and Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 11 Jun 09 - 01:40 PM

The only kind of documentation on this Earth that's worth anything is that in scientific journals, Mrrzy???

Wow. Where did you come from anyway? Out of a test tube? ;-) Are you employed by Professor Bunsen Honeywell?