Saving Theists a Ton of Grief

[Crunchy Cat]

According to John Horgan (ex editor of Scientific American and an Atheist) Persinger's "God Machine" has been hugely overhyped. The most anyone has experienced is a vague sense of dissociation. No-one has had a mystical experience as a result of wearing his octopus helmet. It's neo-mesmerism as far as I can see! Quote from Edge

Correct, and this 'God' machine isn't the only variant that has been used. There have been quite a number of TMS experiments where electrical activity was drastically reduced in the part of the brain responsible for a 'sense of self'. The results were becoming one with everything, euphoria, and hallucination. The same effects are seen in people whom acquire brain damage in that same part of the brain. They run around in a euphoric frenzy shoting "I am god, you are god, we're all god".

The OOBE experiment sounds promising, but we need to know how many people have had OOBEs in that room, and incorrectly identified the frogs etc. Not seeing the machine may not be evidence - it depends how well it is visible. Absence of proof etc...

It's also not the only experiment being performed, and to grab a copy of the results at present, I think that particular hospital can be contacted and a request issued.

 

[Diogenes' Dog]

Correct, and this 'God' machine isn't the only variant that has been used. There have been quite a number of TMS experiments where electrical activity was drastically reduced in the part of the brain responsible for a 'sense of self'. The results were becoming one with everything, euphoria, and hallucination. The same effects are seen in people whom acquire brain damage in that same part of the brain. They run around in a euphoric frenzy shoting "I am god, you are god, we're all god".

Ho hum... It sounds like a legal alternative to MMDA/LSD, or that stuff (synthmesc) they used to drink in "A Clockwork Orange" - just plug in and meet Great Bog and all his saints and angels! However, I'm not totally convinced it will prove to be the same as a true mystical experience. The sort of experience I'm thinking of leads to a profound life-change. You remember the Samual L. Jackson character in Pulp Fiction having his "moment of lucidity" - something more like that! It is the lasting positive change in the person that marks a true experience of the divine e.g. inner peace or love or loss of addiction etc. - not the temporary psychedelic euphoria!

I'm not sure how brain damage might improve someone? Frontal labotomy anyone?

P.S. I don't think there is a specific area of the brain responsible for a "sense of self"? What is it called if there is?

 

[leopold]

Yea! that's true, you don't exist, so therefore your not alive either. :bugeye:

WAI=WhatAnIdiot.

to my knowledge scientists have been unable to create life from the elements
my original assertion stands

 

[superluminal]

to my knowledge scientists have been unable to create life from the elements
my original assertion stands

So, when they do, your fragile world will collapse and you and all the theists will gather at a cliff and toss themselves off in order to meet directly with god and demand an explanation. Right?

 

[superluminal]

P.S. I don't think there is a specific area of the brain responsible for a "sense of self"? What is it called if there is?

I think you are correct. It seems that most cognitive scientists think that the "self" or "conscious self awareness" is an emergent phenomenon that arises from the vastly complex interactions of a functioning brain.

 

[leopold]

So, when they do, your fragile world will collapse and you and all the theists will gather at a cliff and toss themselves off in order to meet directly with god and demand an explanation. Right?

you seem to think that i am making a case for god. i am not.
what i am trying to say here is that you among others are following a path with no proof.
answer me this, what is it in nature that leads you to believe that things become alive?

i, for one, believe that science has been pouring it's best minds and untold dollars to the task of being able to create life from the elements and they have failed. and yet they tout that we sprang from nothing even though they can not prove it.

 

[Crunchy Cat]

Ho hum... It sounds like a legal alternative to MMDA/LSD, or that stuff (synthmesc) they used to drink in "A Clockwork Orange" - just plug in and meet Great Bog and all his saints and angels! However, I'm not totally convinced it will prove to be the same as a true mystical experience. The sort of experience I'm thinking of leads to a profound life-change. You remember the Samual L. Jackson character in Pulp Fiction having his "moment of lucidity" - something more like that! It is the lasting positive change in the person that marks a true experience of the divine e.g. inner peace or love or loss of addiction etc. - not the temporary psychedelic euphoria!

I'm not sure how brain damage might improve someone? Frontal labotomy anyone?

P.S. I don't think there is a specific area of the brain responsible for a "sense of self"? What is it called if there is?

Check it out DDog,

I think you'll enjoy it

http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/neuro/neuro05/web1/emobley.html

 

[superluminal]

you seem to think that i am making a case for god. i am not.
what i am trying to say here is that you among others are following a path with no proof.
answer me this, what is it in nature that leads you to believe that things become alive?

i, for one, believe that science has been pouring it's best minds and untold dollars to the task of being able to create life from the elements and they have failed. and yet they tout that we sprang from nothing even though they can not prove it.

Ok leo.

1) I'm not following any "path".

2) First, living things exist, right? Now, either life arose from basic elements, beginning with simple replicators, or life was created (still from basic elements) by some intelligence, right? Well, we have a fossil record that goes back almost 3.5 billion years that demonstrates that life started very simply, and became more-or-less complex over time. yes? Now, without invoking a god (which you or I don't seem to be doing) we have two choices. An alien intelligence or abiogenesis. Without some very strong evidence in favor of an alien intelligence, Occams razor suggests abiogenesis. Clearly we have no direct evidence for abiogenesis. But the more complex building blocks of life seem to be abundant, even in interstellar clouds (e.g. amino acids, and many other organic compounds). Now, being a semi-rational person, I lean toward abiogenesis very strongly. Why doesn't everyone? That's what I can't figure out.

3) Just because modern science has faild at an attempt to do something, does not mean that it is impossible, obviously. As we learn more about how organic molecules behave, it may very likely become clear how life got started.

 

[leopold]

person, I lean toward abiogenesis very strongly. Why doesn't everyone? That's what I can't figure out.

the number one reason i do not believe is because nothing in nature leads me to the conclusion that things become alive.
another major reason is science cannot demonstrate how life arose.

you do however bring up a subtle point.
in your last post you mentioned that we either arose by abiogenesis or we were created. what if they are both wrong?
i have to admit that things becoming alive is about as rediculous as a god.
there must be other possibilities and i bet one of them is the correct one.
i can think of three off the top of my head and they are:
1. we aren't here at all
2. there is a conservation between time and life like there is between matter and energy.
3. we have always been here, we had no begining

i think we can rule out number one.
can you think of others?

 

[KennyJC]

the number one reason i do not believe is because nothing in nature leads me to the conclusion that things become alive.
another major reason is science cannot demonstrate how life arose.

Why are you talking about life? Why not the complicated patterns in Jupiters atmosphere? Nothing in science can demonstrate how these came to be or how they work. Science can also not re-create them.

So what is the difference between anything in science that can not be fully understood or re-created manually? Why your particular focus on life?

It seems to me that you are trying to imply that the existence of life is different to all other unknowns and related to 'God' (even if you already denied this).

 

[Woody]

SL said:

The discussions that follow will generally consist of the science-minded among us trying to explain to the non-scientists why what they have claimed is baseless due to the lack of evidence or the evidence being useless from a scientific standpoint.

What kind of censorship is this? I see --You preach and we listen to your lectures.

This is a philosophy sub-forum. Philosophy isn't based on science.

To really be consistent with your line of reasoning, please take religion out of the "philosophy" grouping and put it in the "science" grouping, where you feel like it belongs.

I hope you do that. State your guidelines, move it over there, and watch it die for lack of interest. I'm ready to let it go myself.

SW keeps saying this whole site is only supposed to be about science. OK. then remove Art, Pseudoscience, and parapsychology as discussion categories.

Save us all a ton of grief and just get rid of it -- move it to the anthropology forum. This forum consumes the most bandwidth anyway -- get rid of it.

I'd like to hear SkinWalker explain why the SciFi category belongs on sciforums. Let's hear it Skinny.

 

[superluminal]

Why are you talking about life? Why not the complicated patterns in Jupiters atmosphere? Nothing in science can demonstrate how these came to be or how they work. Science can also not re-create them.

So what is the difference between anything in science that can not be fully understood or re-created manually? Why your particular focus on life?

It seems to me that you are trying to imply that the existence of life is different to all other unknowns and related to 'God' (even if you already denied this).

leo is apparently classing life as being fundamentally different from "non-life" even though it's all the same atoms and molecules, just behaving differently. I can't figure it out.

 

[superluminal]

...

What kind of censorship is this? I see --You preach and we listen to your lectures.

Look, gentle readers. This thread was in response to theists telling US to leave them alone in this forum. The OP is a description of what is likely to happen in a religious sub on a science board. It's an observation. That's it.

 

[superluminal]

1. we aren't here at all
2. there is a conservation between time and life like there is between matter and energy.
3. we have always been here, we had no begining

i think we can rule out number one.
can you think of others?

No. 1 and 2 make no sense to me. 3 is not possible given our current understanding of how the universe began. The only logical conclusion given the torrents of evidence pointing toward it, is abiogenesis.

 

[leopold]

Why are you talking about life? Why not the complicated patterns in Jupiters atmosphere? Nothing in science can demonstrate how these came to be or how they work. Science can also not re-create them.

i disagree
two or more liquids that will not mix when stirred will create turbidity just like jupiters atmosphere

 

[leopold]

3 is not possible given our current understanding of how the universe began.

how we THINK it began. it hasn't been proven.

 

[leopold]

No. 1 and 2 make no sense to me.

and things becoming alive does?

 

[KennyJC]

i disagree
two or more liquids that will not mix when stirred will create turbidity just like jupiters atmosphere

So it's all that simple is it? I think not. I am asking for perfect knowledge that results in the forces and patterns seen in Jupiters atmosphere. I also want to re-create them perfectly.

Are you seeing my point?

 

[leopold]

So it's all that simple is it? I think not. I am asking for perfect knowledge that results in the forces and patterns seen in Jupiters atmosphere. I also want to re-create them perfectly.

Are you seeing my point?

i think so
you are asking to create an exact replica of jupiter in the lab right?

the point is not the same. if it were i would be demanding that science create a human from the elements in the lab. i am not.

i agree that the most plausible explaination for life on this planet is abiogenesis but there are problems with it.
first and formost is science cannot recreate life from the elements given all we know about organic chemistry and computers that can do billions of operations per second.
second, there is nothing, nada, zip, nil, that leads me to believe that things become alive.
and to elaborate on superluminals post there must be a fundamentel difference between inanimate objects and life, there has to be. if there isn't then we are not alive.

 

[KennyJC]

the point is not the same. if it were i would be demanding that science create a human from the elements in the lab. i am not.

then you say:

first and formost is science cannot recreate life from the elements given all we know about organic chemistry and computers that can do billions of operations per second.

second, there is nothing, nada, zip, nil, that leads me to believe that things become alive.

I don't even think we are in a position to know what being 'alive' is. If we had perfect knowledge of what consitutes life, we would probably have a fundamentally different view. The moment at which something becomes 'alive' is blurred. Is something considered alive when organic molecules begin to replicate? Something composed of one or more cells? Something that adapts and evolves to it's environment? Something that responds to stimuli? Something that reproduces?

Suddenly it doesn't seem to easy to have perfect knowledge of life let alone build it. Just the same as having perfect knowledge and ability to build the patterns of Jupiters atmosphere.

and to elaborate on superluminals post there must be a fundamentel difference between inanimate objects and life, there has to be. if there isn't then we are not alive.

Well thats a philisophical question. If there is no 'God', 'soul' or 'spirit', and the materialist perspective is correct, then are we even 'alive' in the first place?