Amos

"3) the ridiculousness of trying to place human thought under the standards of repeatability of condition by which molecules are held to perform in clinical situations, given the fundamental and qualitative differences in their natures"

Why is this riduculous? Unless you are talking about specifics rather than underlying structures of how the brain functions, memories are stored, etc. thought is to the physical structure of the brain as music theory, notes and instruments are to a song. I have a fairly high level of certainity that thought occurs through the mechanism of the brain.

You seem to imply (apologies if I missed it) the existence of "mind" or "spirit" as being necessary to deal with thought. That seems unnecessary. I would also argue that what the differnces in the nature of though is qualitative, not fundamental. Chaos Theory could accont for the qualitative differences. (Though I haven't seen it specifically related to same. It just seems intuitive).

There seems to be an underlying "feel" that skeptics, the scientific method, et al, are trying to make the entire human condition deterministic. There are people that are. However, I would argue that those who extropolate from the material nature of thought to some deterministic, absolute logical, causal model, are in the same class as ESP, past lives and all the rest. Dressing up a theory with the trappings of science doesn't make it so. And using this group as an example of what science is all about begs the question.

Not aimimg this at you, but it seems to be a common theme running through this (and other) threads. If ther's going to be substantive discussion, each neds to understand where the other stands.

Regards John