The Afterlife

[anotherlife]

I think this logic fails, because even if everyone on Earth believes that talking plants are real, it may still be false, and even if nobody believes that talking plants are real it can still be true. Same is true for the fire. Many martyrs of Christianity didn't experience the burning even when they were totally crispy.

No, utter nonsense. What you are now attempting to do is paint any truth as subjective, and therefore "all truth is equally subjective". No, houseplants do not talk, no matter what anyone believes. And claiming there is a non-zero probability that is false is not the same as saying it is subjective. While humans long ago accepted that nothing could ever be "100% known", we also correctly surmised that some things are so well proven that we shpuld proceed as though theyvare fact. Like, evolution. Evolution is a fact, regardless of what you or I believe.

This is all about belief. Every truth is about belief. Even 1+1 is a belief only, because unless you are a machine, you don't arrive at it logically, but just compare the problem with what you were told for it before. So it is all subjective. It is by choice that you decide to accept or deny that plants talk, and it is subjective what you base your decision on, such as various statistics of other people.

"This is all about belief. Every truth is about belief."

No, no it isn't. I could prove this universal statement wrong any of a trillion ways. This is utter nonsense. And, there is no way you really believe it, anyway. You, sir, are a physical , deterministic system, bound by all the same physical laws as any other. No amount of belief or disbelief will change this. Now, if you would like to add a layer of magic, feel free. But certain things stand true, regardless of your belief or disbelief.

Yes to most but no because we don't know all physical laws and forces and we don't know the relationship between physical forces that determine me and the unknown forces that also determine me plus alter the physical forces.

But now you are changing lanes. Where before you claimed that there was a non-physical we don't understand, you bmnow claim that we simply don't or may not understand all that is physical. Surely you see these are very differwnt claims. I would not disagree with the second. Maybe their are higher spatial dimensions, and their brief interactions with our observable dimensions may appear as magic to us, but actually aren't. This is a fun topic, really.

It doesn't matter. Define non physical. Non physical can easily mean anything that can't be measured physically. This does include things outside our universe like my canvas example stated above.

 

[anotherlife]

If information from other lives were made available in your current life, then every current life would be ruined and would lose its meaning and purpose.

So you are stuck without knowledge. So the only choice you have is some belief system that you can pick from other people's assembly.

Why not just accept you don't know?

Because I can't accept that people invalidate other people's observations in the physical sense, only because they themselves haven't observed it. That is too unscientific.

How many people do you think believe simply because they've been told to believe?

Pretty much every student in elementary school or middle school or home school, even high school, and now even college mostly.

Yeah, we make kids believe, we put them into churches, they see all these people around them believing this stuff, so they believe too.

How many of them have actually felt anything? How many of them have actually had any reason to believe that anything they have been told is true?

Even a totally illiterate orphan arrives at some belief system. This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

Agreed to a point. I believe science can explain everything we observe, meaning everything inside the Natural Universe. What it can't do is explain what came before existence; what is outside that Natural Universe.

science | Definition of science in English by Oxford Dictionaries
The intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behaviour of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment.

By definition, anyone who tries to define spiritual existence or God using science is not comprehending the differences between the physical universe and what is beyond it.

No, because the definition in your post doesn't restrict the scientific method to physical applications only. In physical applications as well as paranormal applications, the scientific method is sometimes inadequate. Scientific mysteries exist. Even science has developed a model for example, where life is represented as a process mostly outside the observable physical universe, thus converging with religion, and all this supported mathematically.

I've been involved in paranormal psychological studies. There is nothing there. Makes for good reality TV shows though!

After you mix it with marketing and organize studies to profit, you have diluted the whole thing to the point that you original question is now just a needle in a haystack. So everything disappears. This is why conspiracy theories are written too, they hide things excellently.

Proof is proof. There's no proof of the paranormal. Zero. Zip. Nada.

Like 90 % of everything never gets proof. Then even those that do, can easily lose their proof. For example, the Volyager space crafts seem to over act the laws of gravity. Proof is always a fragile thing forever.

"Then even those that do, can easily lose their proof. "

But again, that comes in degrees. No, certain things, we can be certain, are not going to be completely debased. Your Voyager example (with which i do not agree), even if true, does not debase the greater theory of gravity to any significant degree. Finding footprints of bipeds from 5.7 million years ago does not upend the theory of evolution, nor will likely anything, ever. You have yet to agree with this notion, or the similar notion that NOT all truth is equally subjective. why not? Surely you agree. and if you don't, you are either lying to yourself or to everyone else, because there is no way such a person could even function.

 

[anotherlife]

Just because you can't turn something into a repeatable experiment, it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Scientifically, if you imagine the physical universe as a canvas in a greater theater structure, and physical life as shadows projected on the canvas, then you acquire the possibility that someone walks up to the canvas and touches your shadow. If that shadow is you physical life, then you have just experienced a ghost from the afterlife.

You can't turn this into a repeatable experiment, because you can't control the ghost, as you can't force the person to touch your shadow again or to touch everybody's shadow like he touched yours.

"You can't turn this into a repeatable experiment, "

I disagree. We can do clinical, repeatable studies of dementia, hallucination, of foolong people and being fooled, and of people confusing dreams or delusion for actual memories. People have done many studies on fooling people into believing something.

But this doesn't cover every story of the afterlife, in fact doesn't cover a large statistics of them.

Saying all yhe stories are untestable nonsense does, in fact, cover all the stories.

Even those doctors themselves say that they are on a case by case basis. That is essential.

They are only saying that no two brains are exactly alike. They are not saying that some delusions "are actually real". they are not saying that, "Hey, this guy seems otherwise normal, maybe there is truth to his claim that his houseplants talk to him". No, a clinical diagnosis is what it is, and it is based on empirical evidence.

Delusions, hallucinations, lying, and false memories are all much simpler explanations for deviant beliefs and claims than introducing magic or the idea that all truth is subjective. In fact, doing so explains exactly nothing at all.

It is only your belief system talking here. All those psychiatric medications have a statistics of effects, but there is no connection to the obsercation of the symptom, it is only connected to altering the brain. So what you call magic remains in the picture. It is not magic though, but observed and reported physical events by some of the patients, many not, many hallucinate for real.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

Why not just accept you don't know?

Because I can't accept that people invalidate other people's observations in the physical sense, only because they themselves haven't observed it. That is too unscientific.

How many people do you think believe simply because they've been told to believe?

Pretty much every student in elementary school or middle school or home school, even high school, and now even college mostly.

Yeah, we make kids believe, we put them into churches, they see all these people around them believing this stuff, so they believe too.

How many of them have actually felt anything? How many of them have actually had any reason to believe that anything they have been told is true?

Even a totally illiterate orphan arrives at some belief system. This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic.

"This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic."

Maybe, a human never exposed to logic. That same, illiterate orphan also does not naturally "play the cello", or "plant crops". Humans evolved not to play the cello or plant crops, but rather to do other things.... like, kill large animals, including each other.... like, pick fruit and eat it... You are not making a case for spirituality, you are making a case for materialism! the fact that all humans share so many of the same, general traits and tendencies is completely explained by evolution. there is not a single time or place where spirituality is required to explain ANY of it. All that is left of the word "spirituality" is to use it to describe the behaviors of physical systems, those systems being humans. We can say they have "spiritual" experiences, when reading poetry, or listening to music. we can still speak of 'spirit", but there is no need to enter anything extra-physical into the idea.

 

[anotherlife]

No, because the definition in your post doesn't restrict the scientific method to physical applications only. In physical applications as well as paranormal applications, the scientific method is sometimes inadequate. Scientific mysteries exist. Even science has developed a model for example, where life is represented as a process mostly outside the observable physical universe, thus converging with religion, and all this supported mathematically.

I've been involved in paranormal psychological studies. There is nothing there. Makes for good reality TV shows though!

After you mix it with marketing and organize studies to profit, you have diluted the whole thing to the point that you original question is now just a needle in a haystack. So everything disappears. This is why conspiracy theories are written too, they hide things excellently.

Proof is proof. There's no proof of the paranormal. Zero. Zip. Nada.

Like 90 % of everything never gets proof. Then even those that do, can easily lose their proof. For example, the Volyager space crafts seem to over act the laws of gravity. Proof is always a fragile thing forever.

"Then even those that do, can easily lose their proof. "

But again, that comes in degrees. No, certain things, we can be certain, are not going to be completely debased. Your Voyager example (with which i do not agree), even if true, does not debase the greater theory of gravity to any significant degree. Finding footprints of bipeds from 5.7 million years ago does not upend the theory of evolution, nor will likely anything, ever. You have yet to agree with this notion, or the similar notion that NOT all truth is equally subjective. why not? Surely you agree. and if you don't, you are either lying to yourself or to everyone else, because there is no way such a person could even function.

If evolution is your question, which is off topic here, I am honest enough to admit that I believe in evolution for whatever reason , in the same time as being Christian. As discussed above, logic of various evidences is secondary in every human function.

 

[frigidweirdo]

Because I can't accept that people invalidate other people's observations in the physical sense, only because they themselves haven't observed it. That is too unscientific.

How many people do you think believe simply because they've been told to believe?

Pretty much every student in elementary school or middle school or home school, even high school, and now even college mostly.

Yeah, we make kids believe, we put them into churches, they see all these people around them believing this stuff, so they believe too.

How many of them have actually felt anything? How many of them have actually had any reason to believe that anything they have been told is true?

Even a totally illiterate orphan arrives at some belief system. This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic.

"This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic."

Maybe, a human never exposed to logic. That same, illiterate orphan also does not naturally "play the cello", or "plant crops". Humans evolved not to play the cello or plant crops, but rather to do other things.... like, kill large animals, including each other.... like, pick fruit and eat it... You are not making a case for spirituality, you are making a case for materialism! the fact that all humans share so many of the same, general traits and tendencies is completely explained by evolution. there is not a single time or place where spirituality is required to explain ANY of it. All that is left of the word "spirituality" is to use it to describe the behaviors of physical systems, those systems being humans. We can say they have "spiritual" experiences, when reading poetry, or listening to music. we can still speak of 'spirit", but there is no need to enter anything extra-physical into the idea.

Well, how much of spirituality is to explain away fears, to impose fears, to keep people in line?

If religion actually existed, then surely in different places around the world, the same thing would have evolved, rather than completely different religions.

Now, the most popular ones, Christianity and Islam are kind of polar opposites. Christianity is "oh, shit, I did something wrong" and the Priest or Vicar or Pastor says "don't worry about it son, just say you're sorry and then come back next week when you've done the same thing again, and say sorry again". Islam is "don't do bad shit or we'll cut your fucking hand off bitch".

Christianity is popular because it allows people to be free, Islam is popular because it prevents people from being free. Weird, but true.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

"You can't turn this into a repeatable experiment, "

I disagree. We can do clinical, repeatable studies of dementia, hallucination, of foolong people and being fooled, and of people confusing dreams or delusion for actual memories. People have done many studies on fooling people into believing something.

But this doesn't cover every story of the afterlife, in fact doesn't cover a large statistics of them.

Saying all yhe stories are untestable nonsense does, in fact, cover all the stories.

Even those doctors themselves say that they are on a case by case basis. That is essential.

They are only saying that no two brains are exactly alike. They are not saying that some delusions "are actually real". they are not saying that, "Hey, this guy seems otherwise normal, maybe there is truth to his claim that his houseplants talk to him". No, a clinical diagnosis is what it is, and it is based on empirical evidence.

Delusions, hallucinations, lying, and false memories are all much simpler explanations for deviant beliefs and claims than introducing magic or the idea that all truth is subjective. In fact, doing so explains exactly nothing at all.

It is only your belief system talking here. All those psychiatric medications have a statistics of effects, but there is no connection to the obsercation of the symptom, it is only connected to altering the brain. So what you call magic remains in the picture. It is not magic though, but observed and reported physical events by some of the patients, many not, many hallucinate for real.

"You can't turn this into a repeatable experiment, "

I disagree. We can do clinical, repeatable studies of dementia, hallucination, of foolong people and being fooled, and of people confusing dreams or delusion for actual memories. People have done many studies on fooling people into believing something.

But this doesn't cover every story of the afterlife, in fact doesn't cover a large statistics of them.

Saying all yhe stories are untestable nonsense does, in fact, cover all the stories.

Even those doctors themselves say that they are on a case by case basis. That is essential.

They are only saying that no two brains are exactly alike. They are not saying that some delusions "are actually real". they are not saying that, "Hey, this guy seems otherwise normal, maybe there is truth to his claim that his houseplants talk to him". No, a clinical diagnosis is what it is, and it is based on empirical evidence.

Delusions, hallucinations, lying, and false memories are all much simpler explanations for deviant beliefs and claims than introducing magic or the idea that all truth is subjective. In fact, doing so explains exactly nothing at all.

It is only your belief system talking here. All those psychiatric medications have a statistics of effects, but there is no connection to the obsercation of the symptom, it is only connected to altering the brain. So what you call magic remains in the picture. It is not magic though, but observed and reported physical events by some of the patients, many not, many hallucinate for real.

Clearly it is not just "my belief system", but statements based on empirical facts, and which statements can be considered empirical facts themselves. all of that evidence is quite independent of what you or I had for breakfast, or what of gods we worship. delusions, hallucinations, suspension of incredulity... all are not only extremely well-documented, but are so well-understood as to come, at times, under our control. As in, we can induce them in others. I can make you hallucinate with some chemicals. i can make you suspend your incredulity, and then fool you.

And just because we can't alter the brain to our will yet does not mean it cannot be done.

My point being, there are simpler explanations for people who really, truly believe absurd things (no, I am not including all people who believe in an afterlife). But first we have to agree those things are absurd. And you have so far completely refused to admit that some things CAN be more well-known than others, and, no, the ability of new evidence to arise does not mean we, for instance, jump off our roofs, thinking we will "fall up".

You simply refuse to admit it. You either are very stubborn and don't want to concede this point, or you actually believe that all knowledge is equally subjective.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

How many people do you think believe simply because they've been told to believe?

Pretty much every student in elementary school or middle school or home school, even high school, and now even college mostly.

Yeah, we make kids believe, we put them into churches, they see all these people around them believing this stuff, so they believe too.

How many of them have actually felt anything? How many of them have actually had any reason to believe that anything they have been told is true?

Even a totally illiterate orphan arrives at some belief system. This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic.

"This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic."

Maybe, a human never exposed to logic. That same, illiterate orphan also does not naturally "play the cello", or "plant crops". Humans evolved not to play the cello or plant crops, but rather to do other things.... like, kill large animals, including each other.... like, pick fruit and eat it... You are not making a case for spirituality, you are making a case for materialism! the fact that all humans share so many of the same, general traits and tendencies is completely explained by evolution. there is not a single time or place where spirituality is required to explain ANY of it. All that is left of the word "spirituality" is to use it to describe the behaviors of physical systems, those systems being humans. We can say they have "spiritual" experiences, when reading poetry, or listening to music. we can still speak of 'spirit", but there is no need to enter anything extra-physical into the idea.

Well, how much of spirituality is to explain away fears, to impose fears, to keep people in line?

If religion actually existed, then surely in different places around the world, the same thing would have evolved, rather than completely different religions.

Now, the most popular ones, Christianity and Islam are kind of polar opposites. Christianity is "oh, shit, I did something wrong" and the Priest or Vicar or Pastor says "don't worry about it son, just say you're sorry and then come back next week when you've done the same thing again, and say sorry again". Islam is "don't do bad shit or we'll cut your fucking hand off bitch".

Christianity is popular because it allows people to be free, Islam is popular because it prevents people from being free. Weird, but true.

"Christianity is popular because it allows people to be free, Islam is popular because it prevents people from being free. Weird, but true."

yep.

I've been involved in paranormal psychological studies. There is nothing there. Makes for good reality TV shows though!

After you mix it with marketing and organize studies to profit, you have diluted the whole thing to the point that you original question is now just a needle in a haystack. So everything disappears. This is why conspiracy theories are written too, they hide things excellently.

Proof is proof. There's no proof of the paranormal. Zero. Zip. Nada.

Like 90 % of everything never gets proof. Then even those that do, can easily lose their proof. For example, the Volyager space crafts seem to over act the laws of gravity. Proof is always a fragile thing forever.

"Then even those that do, can easily lose their proof. "

But again, that comes in degrees. No, certain things, we can be certain, are not going to be completely debased. Your Voyager example (with which i do not agree), even if true, does not debase the greater theory of gravity to any significant degree. Finding footprints of bipeds from 5.7 million years ago does not upend the theory of evolution, nor will likely anything, ever. You have yet to agree with this notion, or the similar notion that NOT all truth is equally subjective. why not? Surely you agree. and if you don't, you are either lying to yourself or to everyone else, because there is no way such a person could even function.

If evolution is your question, which is off topic here, I am honest enough to admit that I believe in evolution for whatever reason , in the same time as being Christian. As discussed above, logic of various evidences is secondary in every human function.

"If evolution is your question, which is off topic here"

No, it's germane to my point, which itself, I think, is germane to talking about magical ideas in general. I want to demonstrate that some things are more "known" than others. So, do you think evolution is only as true as someone thinks it is? No. you don't. I think I can confidently say that now, which is good.

 

[anotherlife]

Because I can't accept that people invalidate other people's observations in the physical sense, only because they themselves haven't observed it. That is too unscientific.

How many people do you think believe simply because they've been told to believe?

Pretty much every student in elementary school or middle school or home school, even high school, and now even college mostly.

Yeah, we make kids believe, we put them into churches, they see all these people around them believing this stuff, so they believe too.

How many of them have actually felt anything? How many of them have actually had any reason to believe that anything they have been told is true?

Even a totally illiterate orphan arrives at some belief system. This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic.

"This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic."

Maybe, a human never exposed to logic. That same, illiterate orphan also does not naturally "play the cello", or "plant crops". Humans evolved not to play the cello or plant crops, but rather to do other things.... like, kill large animals, including each other.... like, pick fruit and eat it... You are not making a case for spirituality, you are making a case for materialism! the fact that all humans share so many of the same, general traits and tendencies is completely explained by evolution. there is not a single time or place where spirituality is required to explain ANY of it. All that is left of the word "spirituality" is to use it to describe the behaviors of physical systems, those systems being humans. We can say they have "spiritual" experiences, when reading poetry, or listening to music. we can still speak of 'spirit", but there is no need to enter anything extra-physical into the idea.

This is patently incorrect. Spirituality is required to explain the modeling capability of all humans and all animals and of al everything. Without that you can look at the fruit in front of you but you don't see it. And that is why the gospel of John was able to write it out directly that first there was the word, and that gods words were made well known for absolutely everything in this universe.

 

[K9Buck]

Atheists don't want an "afterlife". They just want to die. Perhaps their wish will be granted and, upon their physical death, their soul will also perish and they will simply no longer exist. Our creator is not going to require anyone to be with him if they don't want to be with him.

 

[frigidweirdo]

How many people do you think believe simply because they've been told to believe?

Pretty much every student in elementary school or middle school or home school, even high school, and now even college mostly.

Yeah, we make kids believe, we put them into churches, they see all these people around them believing this stuff, so they believe too.

How many of them have actually felt anything? How many of them have actually had any reason to believe that anything they have been told is true?

Even a totally illiterate orphan arrives at some belief system. This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic.

"This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic."

Maybe, a human never exposed to logic. That same, illiterate orphan also does not naturally "play the cello", or "plant crops". Humans evolved not to play the cello or plant crops, but rather to do other things.... like, kill large animals, including each other.... like, pick fruit and eat it... You are not making a case for spirituality, you are making a case for materialism! the fact that all humans share so many of the same, general traits and tendencies is completely explained by evolution. there is not a single time or place where spirituality is required to explain ANY of it. All that is left of the word "spirituality" is to use it to describe the behaviors of physical systems, those systems being humans. We can say they have "spiritual" experiences, when reading poetry, or listening to music. we can still speak of 'spirit", but there is no need to enter anything extra-physical into the idea.

This is patently incorrect. Spirituality is required to explain the modeling capability of all humans and all animals and of al everything. Without that you can look at the fruit in front of you but you don't see it. And that is why the gospel of John was able to write it out directly that first there was the word, and that gods words were made well known for absolutely everything in this universe.

I think the point here is that humans will revert to religion when they don't know any better. Hence why in the first world religious levels are at their lowest point since before religions existed.

It doesn't suggest in any way that religion is actually true.

 

[frigidweirdo]

Atheists don't want an "afterlife". They just want to die. Perhaps their wish will be granted and, upon their physical death, their soul will also perish and they will simply no longer exist. Our creator is not going to require anyone to be with him if they don't want to be with him.

Maybe atheists don't feel that if you want something to be true, that it is true.

Maybe that's why atheists wouldn't vote for Trump either. Just because he said something, they know it doesn't mean it's necessarily true.

 

[K9Buck]

It doesn't suggest in any way that religion is actually true.

Religions are ideologies on how we're supposed to live. There's nothing wrong with belief systems. It's what the belief systems teach and what their followers do with them that can be bad. You know, atheism is also a belief system.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

But this doesn't cover every story of the afterlife, in fact doesn't cover a large statistics of them.

Saying all yhe stories are untestable nonsense does, in fact, cover all the stories.

Even those doctors themselves say that they are on a case by case basis. That is essential.

They are only saying that no two brains are exactly alike. They are not saying that some delusions "are actually real". they are not saying that, "Hey, this guy seems otherwise normal, maybe there is truth to his claim that his houseplants talk to him". No, a clinical diagnosis is what it is, and it is based on empirical evidence.

Delusions, hallucinations, lying, and false memories are all much simpler explanations for deviant beliefs and claims than introducing magic or the idea that all truth is subjective. In fact, doing so explains exactly nothing at all.

It is only your belief system talking here. All those psychiatric medications have a statistics of effects, but there is no connection to the obsercation of the symptom, it is only connected to altering the brain. So what you call magic remains in the picture. It is not magic though, but observed and reported physical events by some of the patients, many not, many hallucinate for real.

But this doesn't cover every story of the afterlife, in fact doesn't cover a large statistics of them.

Saying all yhe stories are untestable nonsense does, in fact, cover all the stories.

Even those doctors themselves say that they are on a case by case basis. That is essential.

They are only saying that no two brains are exactly alike. They are not saying that some delusions "are actually real". they are not saying that, "Hey, this guy seems otherwise normal, maybe there is truth to his claim that his houseplants talk to him". No, a clinical diagnosis is what it is, and it is based on empirical evidence.

Delusions, hallucinations, lying, and false memories are all much simpler explanations for deviant beliefs and claims than introducing magic or the idea that all truth is subjective. In fact, doing so explains exactly nothing at all.

It is only your belief system talking here. All those psychiatric medications have a statistics of effects, but there is no connection to the obsercation of the symptom, it is only connected to altering the brain. So what you call magic remains in the picture. It is not magic though, but observed and reported physical events by some of the patients, many not, many hallucinate for real.

Clearly it is not just "my belief system", but statements based on empirical facts, and which statements can be considered empirical facts themselves. all of that evidence is quite independent of what you or I had for breakfast, or what of gods we worship. delusions, hallucinations, suspension of incredulity... all are not only extremely well-documented, but are so well-understood as to come, at times, under our control. As in, we can induce them in others. I can make you hallucinate with some chemicals. i can make you suspend your incredulity, and then fool you.

And just because we can't alter the brain to our will yet does not mean it cannot be done.

My point being, there are simpler explanations for people who really, truly believe absurd things (no, I am not including all people who believe in an afterlife). But first we have to agree those things are absurd. And you have so far completely refused to admit that some things CAN be more well-known than others, and, no, the ability of new evidence to arise does not mean we, for instance, jump off our roofs, thinking we will "fall up".

You simply refuse to admit it. You either are very stubborn and don't want to concede this point, or you actually believe that all knowledge is equally subjective.

Atheists don't want an "afterlife". They just want to die. Perhaps their wish will be granted and, upon their physical death, their soul will also perish and they will simply no longer exist. Our creator is not going to require anyone to be with him if they don't want to be with him.

"Atheists don't want an "afterlife". They just want to die."

That is so stupid and wrong-headed. Everyone would love to live forever. Atheists generally just don't accept that they will.

 

[anotherlife]

How many people do you think believe simply because they've been told to believe?

Pretty much every student in elementary school or middle school or home school, even high school, and now even college mostly.

Yeah, we make kids believe, we put them into churches, they see all these people around them believing this stuff, so they believe too.

How many of them have actually felt anything? How many of them have actually had any reason to believe that anything they have been told is true?

Even a totally illiterate orphan arrives at some belief system. This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic.

"This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic."

Maybe, a human never exposed to logic. That same, illiterate orphan also does not naturally "play the cello", or "plant crops". Humans evolved not to play the cello or plant crops, but rather to do other things.... like, kill large animals, including each other.... like, pick fruit and eat it... You are not making a case for spirituality, you are making a case for materialism! the fact that all humans share so many of the same, general traits and tendencies is completely explained by evolution. there is not a single time or place where spirituality is required to explain ANY of it. All that is left of the word "spirituality" is to use it to describe the behaviors of physical systems, those systems being humans. We can say they have "spiritual" experiences, when reading poetry, or listening to music. we can still speak of 'spirit", but there is no need to enter anything extra-physical into the idea.

Well, how much of spirituality is to explain away fears, to impose fears, to keep people in line?

If religion actually existed, then surely in different places around the world, the same thing would have evolved, rather than completely different religions.

Now, the most popular ones, Christianity and Islam are kind of polar opposites. Christianity is "oh, shit, I did something wrong" and the Priest or Vicar or Pastor says "don't worry about it son, just say you're sorry and then come back next week when you've done the same thing again, and say sorry again". Islam is "don't do bad shit or we'll cut your fucking hand off bitch".

Christianity is popular because it allows people to be free, Islam is popular because it prevents people from being free. Weird, but true.

Yes, true. But in terms of the afterlife, all religions reflect various aspects of the aft life many times with overlaps. This could be used as a proof for my earlier post where I explained why all of the choices of the multiple choice OP are true.

 

[K9Buck]

Atheists don't want an "afterlife". They just want to die. Perhaps their wish will be granted and, upon their physical death, their soul will also perish and they will simply no longer exist. Our creator is not going to require anyone to be with him if they don't want to be with him.

Maybe atheists don't feel that if you want something to be true, that it is true.

Maybe that's why atheists wouldn't vote for Trump either. Just because he said something, they know it doesn't mean it's necessarily true.

No problem. Perhaps atheists will have a change of heart upon meeting the creator. If not, I presume our creator will allow them to simply not exist. Everybody's happy.

 

[K9Buck]

Saying all yhe stories are untestable nonsense does, in fact, cover all the stories.

Even those doctors themselves say that they are on a case by case basis. That is essential.

They are only saying that no two brains are exactly alike. They are not saying that some delusions "are actually real". they are not saying that, "Hey, this guy seems otherwise normal, maybe there is truth to his claim that his houseplants talk to him". No, a clinical diagnosis is what it is, and it is based on empirical evidence.

Delusions, hallucinations, lying, and false memories are all much simpler explanations for deviant beliefs and claims than introducing magic or the idea that all truth is subjective. In fact, doing so explains exactly nothing at all.

It is only your belief system talking here. All those psychiatric medications have a statistics of effects, but there is no connection to the obsercation of the symptom, it is only connected to altering the brain. So what you call magic remains in the picture. It is not magic though, but observed and reported physical events by some of the patients, many not, many hallucinate for real.

Saying all yhe stories are untestable nonsense does, in fact, cover all the stories.

Even those doctors themselves say that they are on a case by case basis. That is essential.

They are only saying that no two brains are exactly alike. They are not saying that some delusions "are actually real". they are not saying that, "Hey, this guy seems otherwise normal, maybe there is truth to his claim that his houseplants talk to him". No, a clinical diagnosis is what it is, and it is based on empirical evidence.

Delusions, hallucinations, lying, and false memories are all much simpler explanations for deviant beliefs and claims than introducing magic or the idea that all truth is subjective. In fact, doing so explains exactly nothing at all.

It is only your belief system talking here. All those psychiatric medications have a statistics of effects, but there is no connection to the obsercation of the symptom, it is only connected to altering the brain. So what you call magic remains in the picture. It is not magic though, but observed and reported physical events by some of the patients, many not, many hallucinate for real.

Clearly it is not just "my belief system", but statements based on empirical facts, and which statements can be considered empirical facts themselves. all of that evidence is quite independent of what you or I had for breakfast, or what of gods we worship. delusions, hallucinations, suspension of incredulity... all are not only extremely well-documented, but are so well-understood as to come, at times, under our control. As in, we can induce them in others. I can make you hallucinate with some chemicals. i can make you suspend your incredulity, and then fool you.

And just because we can't alter the brain to our will yet does not mean it cannot be done.

My point being, there are simpler explanations for people who really, truly believe absurd things (no, I am not including all people who believe in an afterlife). But first we have to agree those things are absurd. And you have so far completely refused to admit that some things CAN be more well-known than others, and, no, the ability of new evidence to arise does not mean we, for instance, jump off our roofs, thinking we will "fall up".

You simply refuse to admit it. You either are very stubborn and don't want to concede this point, or you actually believe that all knowledge is equally subjective.

Atheists don't want an "afterlife". They just want to die. Perhaps their wish will be granted and, upon their physical death, their soul will also perish and they will simply no longer exist. Our creator is not going to require anyone to be with him if they don't want to be with him.

"Atheists don't want an "afterlife". They just want to die."

That is so stupid and wrong-headed. Everyone would love to live forever. Atheists generally just don't accept that they will.

There are many atheists who hate our creator and want nothing to do with him. Where have you been?

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

How many people do you think believe simply because they've been told to believe?

Pretty much every student in elementary school or middle school or home school, even high school, and now even college mostly.

Yeah, we make kids believe, we put them into churches, they see all these people around them believing this stuff, so they believe too.

How many of them have actually felt anything? How many of them have actually had any reason to believe that anything they have been told is true?

Even a totally illiterate orphan arrives at some belief system. This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic.

"This is how humans function. Pattern matching as opposed to logic."

Maybe, a human never exposed to logic. That same, illiterate orphan also does not naturally "play the cello", or "plant crops". Humans evolved not to play the cello or plant crops, but rather to do other things.... like, kill large animals, including each other.... like, pick fruit and eat it... You are not making a case for spirituality, you are making a case for materialism! the fact that all humans share so many of the same, general traits and tendencies is completely explained by evolution. there is not a single time or place where spirituality is required to explain ANY of it. All that is left of the word "spirituality" is to use it to describe the behaviors of physical systems, those systems being humans. We can say they have "spiritual" experiences, when reading poetry, or listening to music. we can still speak of 'spirit", but there is no need to enter anything extra-physical into the idea.

This is patently incorrect. Spirituality is required to explain the modeling capability of all humans and all animals and of al everything. Without that you can look at the fruit in front of you but you don't see it. And that is why the gospel of John was able to write it out directly that first there was the word, and that gods words were made well known for absolutely everything in this universe.

" Spirituality is required to explain the modeling capability of all humans and all animals and of al everything."

Says you. I don't need it to explain anything, and science doesn't, either. We can explain something, and then you'll just point at it and say, "Look, spirituality!". People who explain things empirically don't have that luxury. And, when we run into something we (often only temporarily, which should be a red flag for you) don't understand, you say, "look, spirituality!". Empiricists also do not have that luxury. Empiricist have to back up their claims of fact with rigor, and evidence, and mathematics.

But, most importantly, you haven't really explained anything at all, have you? In neither case have you contributed any useful knowledge whatsoever. you have not explained the events, or the mystery you chosen to embed into them.

To everything you say, we could only ever say, "maybe!". And no further. Ever.

 

[frigidweirdo]

It doesn't suggest in any way that religion is actually true.

Religions are ideologies on how we're supposed to live. There's nothing wrong with belief systems. It's what the belief systems teach and what their followers do with them that can be bad. You know, atheism is also a belief system.

Potentially.

However often they'll be like "if you do this, you'll burn in hell". Well you won't, because there's no hell. So they make stuff up to force people to accept that something is right or wrong.

Is being gay wrong? Is having sex wrong? Well I'd say no, but religion says yes.

My person view is that if you try and fix a problem by looking at the wrong problem, you'll get the wrong solution.

When people weren't educated, religion worked well to keep people in their place. In the modern era religion has changed from that. Now it's more about keeping people in comfort in their minds, and I have no problem with this.

That God loves you, that someone is there for you, the community around it, it's all fine, but much of it is based on false stuff, but it's better than alcohol I guess.