Cont: Proof of Immortality, V for Very long discussion

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sackett said:
So now, at the end of all things, Jabba still thinks he's the best man in this argument.

"End of all things." Harh! It is to laugh harshly! He'll be back.
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Indeed, Jabba made a similar post in his Shroud of Turin saga, then continued arguing for two more years complaining that he had been treated unfairly. He's not done saving face.
 
Jabba said:
- I think I'm done...

- As you might expect, I still think I'm right -- but I also think that I've run out of steam.
- I kept hoping that I could figure out a way to express my opinion so that a couple of road dogs here would see what I mean and, at least roughly, agree -- but, no such luck.
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Note that Jabba is yet again implying that people don't agree with him only because they don't understand what he is saying.

Jabba: everyone understands what you are saying. They are disagreeing with you because you are wrong. They know you are wrong because they understand what you are saying.
 
Jabba said:
- As you also might expect, I can't resist repeating the basic idea -- i.e., seems like there has to be an infinity of potential selves/"souls" (whatever they are). And, if so, OOFLam must be wrong -- given OOFLam, the likelihood of my current existence should be virtually zero. And, any reasonably possible alternative explanation should outweigh chance and luck by a long shot.
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If "OOFLam" includes "an infinity of potential selves" then it is a strawman, and your argument fails.
 
Jabba I do hope you learn something from this discussion.

Fine you have what is obviously a very deeply held belief, one that on the surface is no different then belief structures held by the majority of mankind. At any point in the conversation you could have simply withdrawn your assertion that you could prove anything mathematically and declared your statements in the realm of religious belief and we would have really have had no end of a rope to keep a grip on. I, and many others, would have still disagreed with you but it would have made your argument no different then a thousand different religious discussions going on in a thousand different venues.

I'm sorry Jabba there's no nice way to put this but if after this half decade long discussion with a half dozen people explaining to you in both the most detailed and simplest terms multiple times you can't even understand that other people think you are wrong, hence the continued assertion that we would all "get it" if only you could describe it well enough, that is a problem. You simply should not be that immune to information.
 
Jabba said:
- [...]
- Though, I think I'll write to Marilyn vos Savant.
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This ought to be a hoot.

Didn't Susan Blackmore already blow you off?

That university Professor you had lunch with, and who never got back to you. What was his name?
 
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John Jones said:
This ought to be a hoot.

Didn't Susan Blackmore already blow you off?

That university Professor you had lunch with, and who never got back to you. What was his name?
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Yeah, Jabba sends a letter to vos Savant at Parade Magazine and should he get an answer containing any word or phrase that he can spin as being in the affirmative, he's golden. The "world's smartest person" has spoken; all of our objections are overridden.
 
It's awesome to me how many people, upon hearing Jabba withdraw from the discussion, are continuing the discussion.
 
I learned a lot from this thread. Not from Jabba of course, but from all the reasoned replies. Jabba himself though, well it just got old when he essentially settled into ignoring 99% of what was said. Folks let him get away with it, because ripping his statements to shreds was just too much fun, but I think he was cut waaaaayy to much slack in terms of ignoring responses and outright refusing to engage. He would have been booed of the stage in any formal debate.
 
Loss Leader said:
It's awesome to me how many people, upon hearing Jabba withdraw from the discussion, are continuing the discussion.
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Did he do that? I can't believe anything he writes.

If he has truly withdrawn, it will soon become apparent and I'll shut my trap.

I don't think anything but the personal appearance of the Grim Reaper will stop him.
 
JayUtah said:
I don't think Jabba is serious about withdrawing from this discussion.
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If it's some sort of gambit, he'd be playing some long odds (which, I admit, would be nothing next to beating the zero chance he ever gave himself of existing to begin with).
 
Loss Leader said:
If it's some sort of gambit, he'd be playing some long odds (which, I admit, would be nothing next to beating the zero chance he ever gave himself of existing to begin with).
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I think a person who manages to keep alive the same failed argument for going on five years is probably willing and capable of playing the long con. I predict it's a faux flounce. He'll wait a month or so until everyone else loses interest and wanders into other threads. Then he'll be back with "new" information (or with the same-old, same-old) expecting to snare a fresh audience for his antics.
 
Loss Leader said:
If it's some sort of gambit, he'd be playing some long odds (which, I admit, would be nothing next to beating the zero chance he ever gave himself of existing to begin with).
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What gambit? What odds?

Jabba's catalog of gambits is pretty limited: I'm confused. You're confused. It's hard to explain. Everybody believes it. Unnamed experts agree with it (when named, none of the experts agree with it). This unexamined citation supports it (upon examination, it doesn't support it) Almost is as good as always.

And, of course: I concede the point but not really.

I think it's entirely reasonable to read Jabba's latest post as simply that last gambit. He'll be back.
 
theprestige said:
And, of course: I concede the point but not really.

I think it's entirely reasonable to read Jabba's latest post as simply that last gambit. He'll be back.
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Exactly. He hasn't conceded the point, his argument, or any of its premises. His only admission is that he thinks he's too weary to continue in the present fashion. That concedes nothing, and just goes on to insinuate that the problem is and has always been that, for a variety of reasons, his critics just don't understand his argument or appreciate his genius.

So I figure we're faced with just a fringe super-reset, or a long sequel thread such as in the Shroud thread. The latter portion of that thread followed a similar admission that he was unable to get his point across, but was built around the insinuation that the problem was not his argument -- which he says would have been accepted in a different forum -- but rather that his critics refused to accept his "evidence." That led him to attempt a standoff where he refused to continue the discussion until his critics agreed ahead of time that his evidence was valid.

Keep in mind this thread too has languished in relative inactivity while Jabba argued the Shroud and its appendage thread on circumstantial evidence. I fully expect him to pick it up again in a few weeks or months with nothing more exciting than his standard reset.
 
JayUtah said:
I think a person who manages to keep alive the same failed argument for going on five years is probably willing and capable of playing the long con. I predict it's a faux flounce. He'll wait a month or so until everyone else loses interest and wanders into other threads. Then he'll be back with "new" information (or with the same-old, same-old) expecting to snare a fresh audience for his antics.
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Here's the last time it happened. October 2014:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=10293062#post10293062

And here's the reset, posted in a new thread ("I would have continued the old one, but I haven't been able to find it -- and, this one does have a significantly different conclusion...") in March 2016:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=11198401#post11198401
 
Mojo said:
Here's the last time it happened. October 2014:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=10293062#post10293062

And here's the reset, posted in a new thread ("I would have continued the old one, but I haven't been able to find it -- and, this one does have a significantly different conclusion...") in March 2016:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=11198401#post11198401
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Well? Did it have a significantly different conclusion?
 
Jabba said:
As you also might expect, I can't resist repeating the basic idea -- i.e., seems like there has to be an infinity of potential selves/"souls" (whatever they are). And, if so, OOFLam must be wrong -- given OOFLam, the likelihood of my current existence should be virtually zero. And, any reasonably possible alternative explanation should outweigh chance and luck by a long shot.
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I think I understand now what you're saying.
 
Mojo said:
That's no good: he needs a LCP who doesn't understand what he's saying so he can pretend that if people understood what he's saying they would agree with him.
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Actually he sometimes needs an LCP who seems to agree with some part of his argument. I bet he hangs his next reset on this "understanding".
 
theprestige said:
Actually he sometimes needs an LCP who seems to agree with some part of his argument. I bet he hangs his next reset on this "understanding".
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And if he does, he will have been successfully baited and hooked.

Jabba has stepped away from a losing argument. I cannot imagine any reason to reengage him.

I don't chase Jehova's Witnesses, shouting, "Tell me about your stupid theory of why we shouldn't celebrate birthdays!"
 
Loss Leader said:
Jabba has stepped away from a losing argument. I cannot imagine any reason to reengage him.
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I interpret the facts differently. I don't believe Jabba has stepped away from what he considers a losing argument. I believe he has stepped away from a particular body of commentators he no longer wishes to engage, because they no longer provide any sort of validation for him. He has not conceded his argument. He has merely spurned his critics.

I don't chase Jehova's Witnesses, shouting, "Tell me about your stupid theory of why we shouldn't celebrate birthdays!"
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No, but the experiment here is to reveal a true motive. If they tell you their theory and it make it sound altruistic, but then behave in a way that's inconsistent with their theory, you might take an interest in sounding out their real reasons.

If the argument is styled as "I may have something of great philosophical and mathematical interest," but the behavior is more like "Everyone please give me a round of applause," there will be ongoing interest in determining which is really the motive.
 
JayUtah said:
there will be ongoing interest in determining which is really the motive.
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Yes, but that's against the MA. Frankly, I hope Jabba is using this time to spend with his grandchildren. In the evenings, I hope he's going to BeliefNet or somewhere similar where people support each other's nonsense. Everyone deserves a little self-deception.
 
Well, that's a relief. It is good to know I don't have to worry about waking up as a sentient Dweezleblab in some faraway galaxy or universe. I would hate being a Dweezleblab. Or a Humonkey. Screw being a Humonkey. Or a barely sentient, devolved Humonkey. that would suck.

Being something like an Orca wouldn't be bad. But what are the odds?

We can all rest easy, secure in the knowledge that our one instantaneous flicker of sentience - in the midst of eternity, or aternity, or maybe just 50 trillion years or so - was only a freakish one-off anomaly, never to be experienced again.

Blessed nothingness, momentarily interrupted by an outlandishly unlikely series of events, will soon prevail forever.

This calls for an appropriate ode, or ballad, or whatever...

 
- I couldn't stay away for long. Though, I'm not sure how long I can stay around either.

- I think that I finally have a satisfactory answer for the Mt Rainier, Texas Sharp Shooter, bucket of sand issue. The simple answer is that we have no real reason to doubt their scientific explanations -- whereas, we do have real reasons to doubt the scientific explanation for my existence (actually, science has no explanation for my existence).
- I don't think that any of you agree with me about that, but I still do -- and, I still think that you guys don't agree because you can't, or aren't willing to, grasp the concept of "self" to which I'm referring. I perceive an aspect of me (my "self") that is not determined by my chemistry and cannot be replicated by replicating my chemistry.

- It's good to be back.
 
Jabba said:
- . The simple answer is that we have no real reason to doubt their scientific explanations -- whereas, we do have real reasons to doubt the scientific explanation for my existence (actually, science has no explanation for my existence).
- It's good to be back.
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Whiskey Tango Foxtrot does this double talk even mean?
 
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