To Believe or Not to Believe - Is that the question?

Pup · Apr 12, 2015

Navigator said:
There is no need to support these facts with evidence. The evidence is in the fact.

I think the word you're looking for is assertion rather than fact.

dlorde · Apr 12, 2015

Daylightstar said:
dlorde said:

I suspect the response will be along the lines of 'the evidence is obvious, but you are blind to it', or words to that effect.

Click to expand...

Or the following, specifically:

Navigator said:

...
The evidence for earth consciousness is accessible to you. It is everywhere. You just don't appreciate fully what is going on in relation to birth and death. ...

Click to expand...

Ah; good spot - quite possibly a good example of subconscious priming!

dlorde · Apr 12, 2015

Navigator said:
There is no need to support these facts with evidence.

So, there we have it...

Daylightstar · Apr 12, 2015

dlorde said:
Ah; good spot - quite possibly a good example of subconscious priming!

Leumas · Apr 13, 2015

Navigator said:
As I have said, you are within the evidence.

Fact: Individual consciousness altogether attributes to global.

What evidence do you have for that? Are you able to communicate telepathically with other consciousness directly .... or indirectly through the conduit of Earth's consciousness?

Navigator said:
Fact: The evidence for earth consciousness is accessible to you. It is everywhere.

Seriously?

What evidence do you have that I missed? I sat on the ground in my garden this afternoon and told Earth what you said and all I got was some ants biting my hind.

I tried again after annihilating the ants and all I got was a bloody carpenter bee buzzing around trying to eat my house.

So I swatted it to death and tried again to access this according to you "accessible Earth's consciousness" and heard not a single whimper or whisper.

Navigator said:
Fact: You just don't appreciate fully what is going on in relation to birth and death.

Navigator said:
Fact: Your individual life time can seem long and is linear and subjective so it appears to be the main event.

Navigator said:
Fact:The flow of consciousness is not static or divided. It is a continuous stream literally snowballing and propelled always in the state of now. The moment. But the main event is not your individual life, or anyone elses.

And you know this how? Please point us to the evidence you have for all this!

Navigator said:
Fact: The main event is the whole process.

Navigator said:
Fact: Life and death flow through the situation referred to as reality and this flow carries with it data necessary for human consciousness (earth consciousness with human consciousness at the helm) to continue evolving and understanding itself.

Kumbaya my Lord, kumbaya
Oh Lord, kumbaya

Someone's singing Lord, kumbaya
Oh Lord, kumbayah

Someone's laughing, Lord, kumbayaOh Lord, kumbaya

Navigator said:
Fact: None of the above is based on belief. It is a matter of fact.

If only you new what the word fact meant you would not have made the above statement.

Navigator said:
Why do you think these facts are fiction?

Because, you do not know the difference between the two words and are confused that your fiction is fact.

Navigator said:
There is no need to support these facts with evidence. The evidence is in the fact.

Except that we have not seen any evidence other than for your fiction.

If you knew the meanings of the words fact and evidence you would not have confused your fictions and assertions as facts which are their own evidence.

This is a lot of UNSHAKABLE FAITH you have in in the veracity of your BASELESS BELIEFS.

punshhh · Apr 13, 2015

Navigator said:
What is there to discuss?

They are facts.

This process has been going on for as long as consciousness has existed. Human consciousness has assisted this evolution of consciousness considerably.

[snipped for brevity]

We can speculate on certain possibilities within the constraints of physics, but it is obvious that we are very limited.

You introduce two interesting concepts here, which are beyond the scope of science and hard materialism.

Purpose and endless evolution.

Purpose in existence, or what exists and the principle of an eternal evolution.

Both very interesting fields of enquiry, but never given airtime around here.

Leumas · Apr 13, 2015

punshhh said:
You introduce two interesting concepts here, which are beyond the scope of science and hard materialism.

Purpose and endless evolution.

Purpose in existence, or what exists and the principle of an eternal evolution.

Therein lies the whole problem....

Leumas said:
The real core of the problem is that people are willing to delude themselves and let others dupe them because mentally they are frightened pathetic wretched children. They are trembling lumps of insignificant debris floating on the waves of space-time trying to construe by any self-delusion a significance for their fleeting moment of existence punctuated by terror, and inexorable calamities.

Impotent to exact justice or to stem the currents of time, they raise their arms up like children begging in supplication to an imagined sky daddy to lift them up and give them a comforting hug and to beat up the neighboring children.

The major tragedy of course is that this psychological condition was and is viciously and cynically and predatorily exploited by clever brigands and wily poltroons to huckster and bamboozle the quivering shivering sheep. Much like all the other cons, scams and hoaxes discovered or invented by numerous hoodwinkers and mountebanks throughout the ages and are still being utilized even today despite all available knowledge.

I've said this like three hundred times already... isn't that sufficient air time for you?

punshhh said:
Both very interesting fields of enquiry, but never given airtime around here.

ynot · Apr 13, 2015

Navigator said:
Fact: The evidence for earth consciousness is accessible to you. It is everywhere.

Now where have I heard that before? Oh yeah – “The evidence for god is accessible to you. God everywhere.”

Merely another paranormal believer claiming that their beliefs are facts.

punshhh · Apr 13, 2015

Leumas said:
Therein lies the whole problem....

I've said this like three hundred times already... isn't that sufficient air time for you?

You refer to the purposes of humans (although this could presumably be extended to all living things). This equates to purposes in the minds of life on Earth. I am referring to any purposes in existence, or behind existence. For example the purpose of a creator God. Navigator's comments refer to the later.

Perhaps you will now give airtime to any purposes behind the world we find ourselves in?

Leumas · Apr 13, 2015

punshhh said:
You refer to the purposes of humans (although this could presumably be extended to all living things). This equates to purposes in the minds of life on Earth. I am referring to any purposes in existence, or behind existence. For example the purpose of a creator God.

What you do not realize is that this search of yours for an external purpose beyond you and behind the universe is nothing more than your own internal search for purpose.

It is just your own internal struggle and not any actual external purpose that exists and you can find it if only you searched hard enough.... there is no such thing.

The universe is nothing but CHURNING CHAOS which has as much purpose behind it or in it or outside it as a Volcano does or an Avalanche or a Tsunami or a Hurricane.

Two meteors happening to fall within the gravity well of Earth and one eventually striking earth surface as a meteorite while the other just burning upon entry into the atmosphere both have as much purpose as each other and as a rock falling out of the side of a mountain after eons of weathering. And all three share the same purpose as that of the universe or human existence or a supernova..... which is PRECISELY NONE.

Your quest for an external purpose is a manifestation of nothing more than hyperactive attribution.

The human brain as part of its defense mechanism evolved an ability to anticipate intentions of animals trying to eat it and social competitors trying to mount it; whether sexually or as part of a power climb or even as children trying to beguile it into giving in to their benefits.

So a human brain is the result of millennia of selective pressures favoring the sexual reproduction of brains more able to detect purpose behind rustling leaves and moving grass and wily alpha males and coy females and tricky youngsters so as not to be eaten or mounted or tricked out of nutrition and sexual opportunities.

This apparatus already wired for purpose detection cannot help but attribute purpose even when the rustling leaves are only due to the wind and not predators.

This hyperactive attributive tendency also tends to attribute intentions to lightning and storms and the rising sun and the waxing moon and the tides and so on and so forth.

Your search for universal purpose is just one step more sophisticated than the attribution of purpose to tsunamis or to the movement of the planets.

punshhh said:
Navigator's comments refer to the later.

Yes, I agree.... his are nothing but the same beliefs as any theistic ones and his faith in his beliefs is just as staunch as those of the theists in theirs.

Trying to label an unshakeable faith in unsubstantiated beliefs as atheism is linguistic chicanery.

punshhh said:
Perhaps you will now give airtime to any purposes behind the world we find ourselves in?

Here is the mature adult answer... Warning!!!... only suitable for strong mature adult personalities who want to face reality:

If the real answer makes you uncomfortable... then here is the more child soothing answer:

dlorde · Apr 13, 2015

punshhh said:
...I am referring to any purposes in existence, or behind existence. For example the purpose of a creator God. Navigator's comments refer to the later.

But he claims not to believe in a creator God (or anything else for that matter).

bruto · Apr 13, 2015

punshhh said:
You introduce two interesting concepts here, which are beyond the scope of science and hard materialism.

Purpose and endless evolution.

Purpose in existence, or what exists and the principle of an eternal evolution.

Both very interesting fields of enquiry, but never given airtime around here.

Phrasing that as if it were a complaint suggests you are confusing airtime with credence.
There is no fairness doctrine here that requires ideas to be discussed by anyone but the person holding them. Nothing is stopping you.

punshhh · Apr 13, 2015

Leumas said:
What you do not realize is that this search of yours for an external purpose beyond you and behind the universe is nothing more than your own internal search for purpose.

It is just your own internal struggle and not any actual external purpose that exists and you can find it if only you searched hard enough.... there is no such thing.

Psudo psychology, aye?

The universe is nothing but CHURNING CHAOS which has as much purpose behind it or in it or outside it as a Volcano does or an Avalanche or a Tsunami or a Hurricane.

Is that a belief?

Two meteors happening to fall within the gravity well of Earth and one eventually striking earth surface as a meteorite while the other just burning upon entry into the atmosphere both have as much purpose as each other and as a rock falling out of the side of a mountain after eons of weathering. And all three share the same purpose as that of the universe or human existence or a supernova..... which is PRECISELY NONE.

I'm not talking about cause and effect in this world. But purposes for the existence, we find ourselves in, the first place.

Your quest for an external purpose is a manifestation of nothing more than hyperactive attribution.

The human brain as part of its defense mechanism evolved an ability to anticipate intentions of animals trying to eat it and social competitors trying to mount it; whether sexually or as part of a power climb or even as children trying to beguile it into giving in to their benefits.

So a human brain is the result of millennia of selective pressures favoring the sexual reproduction of brains more able to detect purpose behind rustling leaves and moving grass and wily alpha males and coy females and tricky youngsters so as not to be eaten or mounted or tricked out of nutrition and sexual opportunities.

This apparatus already wired for purpose detection cannot help but attribute purpose even when the rustling leaves are only due to the wind and not predators.

This hyperactive attributive tendency also tends to attribute intentions to lightning and storms and the rising sun and the waxing moon and the tides and so on and so forth.

Your search for universal purpose is just one step more sophisticated than the attribution of purpose to tsunamis or to the movement of the planets.

Pseudo psychology again? Your assertion that the principle of purpose as understood by the human mind is not applicable to the external world is derisive. As usual, the answer is humanity is frail and stupid and should just accept scientist thinking.

NONE WHATSOEVER!

Is that a belief?

If the real answer makes you uncomfortable... then here is the more child soothing answer:

There there .... sky daddy will make it better .... he will fix the boo boo and give you ice-cream and will hit the nasty boys.

More pseudo psychological twaddle. You don't actually know what I'm talking about, do you?

punshhh · Apr 13, 2015

dlorde said:
But he claims not to believe in a creator God (or anything else for that matter).

Yes, I realise this, I only used that as an example.

punshhh · Apr 13, 2015

bruto said:
Phrasing that as if it were a complaint suggests you are confusing airtime with credence.
There is no fairness doctrine here that requires ideas to be discussed by anyone but the person holding them. Nothing is stopping you.

Whenever I bring it up it is not comprehended, or perhaps the word is ignored.

bruto · Apr 13, 2015

punshhh said:
Whenever I bring it up it is not comprehended, or perhaps the word is ignored.

If you believe a thing strongly, rejection may seem like incomprehension. It rarely is.

Leumas · Apr 13, 2015

punshhh said:
Psudo psychology, aye?

Just because you think it is pseudo-psychology (by the way notice the e) does not make it less true.

Trying to lessen the impact of reality by using linguistic chicanery might be a soothing cognitive dissonance assuaging casuistry.... but reality still remains there no matter how much you wish it to be different.

punshhh said:
Is that a belief?

Yes it is belief based upon Practical Realism... but your wishful thinking is an illogical fallacy.

If you'd care to demonstrate otherwise then please go ahead.... but so far as we can see, the reality of the matter is that human existence in the overall universal space-time has as much purpose to it as the existence of a cockroach.

punshhh said:
I'm not talking about cause and effect in this world. But purposes for the existence, we find ourselves in, the first place.

Thinking that human existence is more transcendental and spiritual than that of ants is nothing but wishful thinking and special pleading.

And with the way things are going humanity has as much of a survival prospect beyond its niche habitat in this universe as the colony of bacteria inside the intestines of a kangaroo road kill on the side of a long stretch of road in the middle of the scorching arid outback of Australia.

And even if we do manage to hitch a ride inside a carnivorous eagle until we find another kangaroo to infest, it will still be nothing more than repeating the cycle of meaninglessness all over again.

[imgw=250]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/WedgetailEagleCarrion.jpg[/imgw]

punshhh said:
Pseudo psychology again? Your assertion that the principle of purpose as understood by the human mind is not applicable to the external world is derisive.

Straw man.

What exactly is the "principle of purpose"?

Every living creature that consumes energy and reproduces has a "purpose" .... which is to consume energy and reproduce.

Nonliving things might also "have" a "purpose" akin to the living things... which is to exist.

That is all there is to it.

If you are trying to EXTEND anthropomorphic "purpose" to beyond the individual human then you are engaging in hyperactive attribution.

Even if you want to fantasize about some possible evolution to a human-earth-consciousness-hive or Borg-collective or "ragtag patchwork god" it still is purposeless.

In fact it becomes even less purposeful.... as individuals we have our own purpose to make good.

As a single consciousness cell in a hive or borg-collective of consciousnesses we in fact become less purposeful and less significant and less meaningful and less worthy.

Does a cell in the body of a slug have more meaning and purpose because it is part of the overall cell-hive of a slug than a bacterium or a virus or an amoeba or the cell in the body of a human?

How many bodily cells do you flush down the loo every day along with many more bacterial cells? Did the bodily cells acquire more significance because they were part of a body than the individual bacterial cells that infested the body?

punshhh said:
Is that a belief?
More pseudo psychological twaddle. You don't actually know what I'm talking about, do you?

I know exactly what you are talking about.... it is called Wishful Thinking WOO... yes WOO.

It is you who does not know what you are talking about because your Cognitive Dissonance is hindering your ability to recognize how much woo you are wishing for in order to construe a "purpose" that is more in accordance with your wishful thinking than what reality is indicating it is.

punshhh said:
As usual, the answer is humanity is frail and stupid and should just accept scientist thinking.

Straw man
Appeal to ridicule

It is not science that has been shoving stuff down people's throats.... rather it has always been sky-daddy followers who have killed and tortured people to make them accept their god-delusions and it is still them who are trying to do it right now.

Leumas said:
No, we are only trying to make them stop shoving their world view down everyone's throat whenever they can get away with it.

We are only trying to demonstrate how their world view is wrong only because they think that it is so correct that they cannot resist the need to enforce it upon everyone by making it the laws of the land.

It is not positive atheists that are

Persecuting Gays and denying them equal citizenship privileges.

Targeting and killing abortion clinic staff and flying airplanes into buildings.

Impeding scientific Research and Development because of their delusion.

Obstructing education based upon rational realities and trying to shove their delusions into children's education.

Machinating and supporting things that will cause world destruction because they want to hurry their delusion's long awaited consummation of his marriage to them behind closed doors.

Hindering action to stem global worming because they believe those disasters are part of their delusion's plan

Fomenting civil unrest in the defense of their delusion,

Please read some history to find out who are the ones that have done harm for millennia to the whole world.

While we are busy fending off allegations of being "scary nasty totalitarian fundamentalist atheists" hurled at us by self-admitted reformed hateful "fundamentalist atheists" this stuff is going on:

Vision America's Rick Scarborough was a guest on Gordon Klingenschmitt's "Pray In Jesus Name" program recently, where he explained that God is blessing the state of Texas because "Christians have infiltrated" and taken over the state GOP. Scarborough was discussing his efforts to mobilize right-wing pastors to get involved in politics across the nation and noting that he has had a great deal of success in Texas; so much so that if one now attends an annual Republican Party convention in Texas, it feels as if one is attending a revival meeting.

It is not positive atheists that are trying to enforce their world view wherever they can.

It is not atheists that are insidiously trying to dominate the "seven mountains of power" and take over the country.

While we argue on forums whether negative atheism is nicer than the positive one they are pressing on quietly with their strategic plans.

From Here

The George Grant quote cited below comes from a book he published in 1987 with Dominion Press, entitled The Changing of the Guard. Yes, they have been aiming for this for a very long time. And for a very long time they have worked under the cover of our ignorance. Who could have predicted a few nut cases could ever acquire such influence in our politics and our military? (No apologies to Condoleeza Rice).

"Christians have an obligation, a mandate, a commission, a holy responsibility to reclaim the land for Jesus Christ-to have dominion in the civil structures, just as in every other aspect of life and godliness.
But it is dominion that we are after. Not just a voice.

It is dominion we are after. Not just influence.

It is dominion we are after. Not just equal time.
It is dominion we are after.

World conquest. That’s what Christ has commissioned us to accomplish. We must win the world with the power of the Gospel. And we must never settle for anything less.

If Jesus Christ is indeed Lord, as the Bible says, and if our commission is to bring the land into subjection to His Lordship, as the Bible says, then all our activities, all our witnessing, all our preaching, all our craftsmanship, all our stewardship, and all our political action will aim at nothing short of that sacred purpose.

Thus, Christian politics has as its primary intent the conquest of the land – of men, families, institutions, bureaucracies, courts, and governments for the Kingdom of Christ. It is to reinstitute the authority of God’s Word as supreme over all judgments, over all legislation, over all declarations, constitutions, and confederations."

[imgw=400]http://spagmonster.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/christian-persecution.jpg[/imgw]

[imgw=400]http://i176.photobucket.com/albums/w194/orphia/bcf6a53b82badb9a8503facb73b2a45d_zps8558b72f.jpg[/imgw]

[imgw=400]http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/imagehosting/thum_512824eb207d719dc1.jpg[/imgw]

Belz... · Apr 13, 2015

Navigator said:
But some atheists do have beliefs, so therefore - at least according to them, belief does have something to do with Atheism.

People won't don't play soccer also engage in other activities, but that doesn't make them another sort of soccer player.

wea · Apr 13, 2015

Leumas said:
How many bodily cells do you flush down the loo every day along with many more bacterial cells? Did the bodily cells acquire more significance because they were part of a body than the individual bacterial cells that infested the body?

please don't insult my symbiotic bacteria, not nearly infesting me

but yes, "purpose" is a funny word when used for local decreases in entropy of an open system; natural language is definetely ambiguous

Leumas · Apr 13, 2015

wea said:
please don't insult my symbiotic bacteria, not nearly infesting me
but yes, "purpose" is a funny word when used for local decreases in entropy of an open system; natural language is definetely ambiguous

To Believe or Not to Believe - Is that the question?

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