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andru235
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[continued from a discussion with 42 usc 1983 on the watch_dafreman_lose_grip_on_reality page]
====I’m testing out my reasonable assumptions [...] Could I be wrong about my assumptions? Sure, but you still haven’t told me whether and how I’m wrong.===
your initial assumptions are mostly incorrect. but if i don't tell you what was wrong, nor why, that doesn't do much to tell you what is, in fact, correct! you could continue operating under those assumptions for years, and i could choose to correct you...or not. if other entities in existence possess the ability to withhold such corrections, we wouldn't necessarily know. as such, we assume that only *humans* could possess the cunning to pull off deception. yet, if something else has such cunning, we wouldn't necessarily know.
====so tell me where I was wrong so I can reevaluate my assumptions.====
the rest of existence isn't necessarily going to do this. that some incorrect assumptions will reveal their erroneousness is no guarantee that others will also. doesn't trial and error depend on this being otherwise? trial and error *assumes* that trial will reveal error. and so, much progress has been made in realms where this is so. but no progress has been made where it is not; at least not by "sci"ence.
====Or don’t, since all I was doing was casually presenting an alternate explanation for your experience that didn’t require us to invent an unseen psychic world.====
and all i am doing is casually presenting an alternate explanation for your experience that doesn't require us to ignore an unseen psychic world.
no, i'm not incredulous that you believe 2/3s of people are wrong. practically everyone believes that about everyone else. welcome to 5326 b.c.
====All I was saying is that if you think about it, thinking about a person just before that person calls is not that strange and requires no psychic ability on your part.====
unless you concede that there is such thing as psychic ability, and declare that it has certain effects and restrictions, you can't really say what does and doesn't require psychic ability, nor what constitutes it. if i don't believe in stalagtites or stalagmites, i'm in no position to make claims about what constitutes one or the other.
====Are _you_ actually saying that if two-thirds of the population believes something it has to be true?====
there is a difference (and oh, how this has been argued about through ages, and oh, how the argument rages on) between things that are true for individuals and things that are true for groups. if i believe that i am abducted by strontium-elephants every night while i sleep, then it is, for me, true. to everyone else, it may be false to say that i am abducted by strontium-elephants. they could watch me all night, and no, i was not abducted. but if i believe it, and experience a corrolary experience, then it is true, if one is to base one's knowledge upon what is observable.
99/100ths of the world's people are religious. i think religion is idiotic. but for them, religion is totally true, while for me religion is totally false.
obviously we disagree on the very matter about which we are arguing. but the difference between us is not our stance, specifically. the difference is this (my turn for some assumptions):
me : i agree that the world you see is the world you see. you're right! but the world i see is also the world i see (which in my case includes a world i don't see), and i am also right. they are two different worlds that have emerged from one common world. cellular mutation and division. "my copy of DNA is more accurate than yours!" compared to what?!?
you : the world you see is the world you see. you're right. the world i see is not the world you see, and so i cannot be right unless you see it also.
====people believe that fire is hot because fire is (demonstrably) hot; fire isn't hot because people believe it is hot.====
but the fire isn't necessarily hot. to plasma, it's frigid. the fire is not inherently hot. it is hot because we believe it to be hot.
====We’re dealing with a situation where in credible studies, psychics have been unable to prove their claims.====
and what methodology is used for such assessments? the scientific method? analysis that works for the physical world? what i am specifically saying is that there may be things that escape the scope of proof, and likewise, faith. the studies assume that people have ultimate power over their 'psychic' power (i have never claimed this). i don't think people have ultimate power over much at all.
now, in such studies, were the psychics selected using a double blind? and can the studies be certain that if these people were psychic, they would be able to demonstrate it on demand? i have erections, and can more or less solicit them of myself if desired, but i'm no porn star, and if there is too much pressure to get an erection, i might not be able to. does that mean an onlooker can assume that i don't have erection powers? the very fact that i was being studied would make it more difficult for me. and if i *didn't* know i was being studied, i would never think to make a demonstration suitable for basing a scientific conclusion upon. it's not that different.
====For instance, researchers have tested self-professed clairvoyants’ ability to “read auras” and said clairvoyants have failed.====
====If psychics could actually see the purported energy fields, one wonders why [...] their composition "is the subject of conflicting opinions." She states: "No two clairvoyants see exactly the same aura...====
some people go to a concert of symphony #X by the composer Y. "such startling dissonance," says one. "such uplifting consonance," says another. "what a work of despair," says one. "what a work of mirthfulness," says another.
for the record, i ran into an 'auras' person some years ago, and i persisted for her to tell me about my aura. at last, she said, "you must look into the depths of your soul and find out for yourself." laughable, indeed!
so i am somewhat empathetic to peoples skepticism. but i don't think this stuff can be solicited any more than we can solicit physical stuff. when i really, really have focussed, i have on a few occasions played the b-flat piano sonata of schubert without any mistakes. but most of the time i make lots of mistakes. and if tomorrow i tried to prove i was able to play it flawlessly, i wouldn't necessarily be able to do it on cue. in fact, i probably couldn't. but i know it is within me to do so. it is an ability i have. but, i cannot say the same of the a-major piano sonata (the late one) of schubert. if i didn't know i was being observed, it would hardly matter. there is a chance, if i really practiced for weeks, that i could play it flawlessly. but maybe not! and similarily, i might sit down tomorrow afternoon, and, not having played it for months, really be feelin' it and get it technically correct (which could still be stylistically all wrong, according to someone else's tastes).
as to the story on the aura study, it does make aura stuff sound bogus. but where does it make mention the possibility that perhaps this stuff cannot be tested for? that perhaps it is an ephemeral event? that perhaps it is something that descends upon people, and think they have control of it, they come to believe it, and it becomes their strontium-elephant, a truth for them that is a false for others?
====If you don’t believe that there is a difference between believing something based on proof and accepting something on faith, then I don’t know what to say to you.====
sure you do. it has been at the core of the discussion all along. perhaps you say, proof constitutes proof of proof. i say, proof constitues faith in provability. so to me, believing something based on proof means having faith that it has been sufficiently proven.
given that 2*2=4, and given the distributive property of multiplication, 2x*2x=4x, since 2x*2x=(2+2)*x. so, if x=0, then 2x+2x=5x, or 6x, or -7x. so 2x*2x=1529x. because of this the property is ammended to not include zero. that's nice: this piece of evidence doesn't suit our little theory, so it must not count!
if something as simple and seemingly provable as 2*2=4 has controversy surrounding it, then i am leary of ever relying too heavily on proof, especially in matters of spiritual or mystic (or whatever) considerations; these considerations are founded in the belief that there is existence external to the physical realm; such an existence cannot be proven nor disproven, at least, not while anchored in a physical existence. lack of evidence, however, is not proof against something.
some say zero isn't a number, it is a state. some say that means all numbers are states. one idea, fifteen stances. everyone sure that they are correct. eventually an ego dominates the discussion and that becomes the accepted truth. later, a different ego dominates the discussion and the truth is again changed from this to that.
====Now, is it seldom or often that someone gets upset when you say something mean?====
you continually use these simplified models to make big declarations. relativity, relativity. for starters, what constitutes mean? i will assume you mean that malicious behaviour will upset the recipient thereof. i'd at best say this is 50% likely. situations vary so greatly. but it also depends how you mean 'upset'. if you mean 'upset' that they feel bad, not necessarily. some people are energized by negativity directed at them; others are delighted to have a fight at hands. if you mean 'upset' in that they change their behaviour, not necessarily. some people are immobilized by something that disturbs them. if by upset you mean that they have a reaction of any sort, well, goody. of course they do. but then, all that really is being said is that people react to stuff. and that reaction isn't always predictable. the fact that people fall into routine isn't evidence of anything other than that they have fallen into a routine. someone might eat bacon every morning, but that doesn't necessarily mean it is their favorite breakfast food. but then, how does one define favorite?
====I’m not sure I understand what you’re trying to say, but if what you’re saying is that the end result is unlikely, then I both agree and disagree with you.====
yes, yes! now we are getting to the root of things. for i have both agreed and disagreed with you, every step of the way. and i have also both agreed and disagreed with myself, every step of the way as well. i know exactly what you are trying to say, and exactly what i am trying to say. yet, i don't know how to say it. and also, i'm not entirely sure what you or i am saying. so perhaps i don't know what you are trying to say, nor i myself, for that matter.
welcome to the even dimensions of paradoxia. the end result *is* unlikely. and yet, that's the end result, so in fact it is totally probable. but since the probability is improbability, does this mean things are probable or improbable? it seems that the danger is in definition.
====I mean, I will more likely become a lawyer than a rock star===
and i will more likely become a rock star than a lawyer, but only because i am a composer. shoot me, please, if i become either of the others.
====Are you saying that in order to know whether people are psychic I have to be psychic?====
nope. but i am saying you have to be open to the possibiliy that people *can* be psychic. cuz' if you are certain they cannot, of course you won't know if they are. if i don't believe its possible for people to play 'jai alai', and i see some people playing it, i'll write it off as some people catching a ball with nets - defining the event identically, but perceiving the ramifications of the event differently.
====Also, I think the galactic being is supposed to be omniscient, so by definition his perspective is infinite.====
say, hypothetically, that earth is an atom. as you are composed of over 5,000,000,000,000,000,000 pulsating atoms (assuming you are relatively petite), formed into rotative clusters, which form non-rotative clusters, which for double-helixes, which form clumps of this and that, which form bigger clumps, etc, and there you are. are you omniscient? i sure am not. a being built out of galactic-superclusters might know a lot about what it is like to be built out of galactic-superclusters. but what would it know of our tier of existence? either it is the same, or it is different, and either statement is remarkable. but though we might see billions of galaxies, it's hard to know what that looks like from the perspective of something the size of decadillions of galaxies. and if something that size looked at earth with a microscope (or whatever), it would see a little blip orbiting a larger, central blip. in short, it would see atoms. let us hope we aren't the target of it's fission!
====Are you saying I have to believe in psychic ability or be psychic to assess the veracity of psychic claims?====
do you have to believe in sanskrit to develop an ability to read it? can you correctly interpret the meaning of a sanskrit passage if you don't believe sanskrit exists?
is simply believing in sanskrit sufficient to read it? or if you only knew a few words in sanskrit, you might occasionally be able to read it, but if someone demanded you 'prove' that you read sanskrit and gave you a selection of sanskrit to read, you'd be completely at the mercy of whether that selection contained the words you knew.
and if you do not believe in sanskrit, and someone shows you sanskrit, you could say, "oh, that's just messy urdu." and upon evaluating the urdu, you would conclude that it was meaningless, because it doesn't make sense in urdu. and from then on, when people talk about sanskrit, you'd think back on the messy urdu, and recall how sanskrit was a bunch of senseless bullshit.
if there *is* a psychic "language," (and i believe there is, but that there are many) i really doubt anyone has even mastered a single one. why? because it has never been taken seriously. the manipulative have long used 'psychicness' as a tool to influence the gullible, and the concept of 'psychicness' has been maligned. i can't blame people for thinking it's b.s. when i look at how it is portrayed, and the claims people make about it. but many seem to through the baby out with bathwater, so to speak.
i for my part don't have too many specific beliefs about it. all i know is that sometimes knowledge about things pop into my head, and then, there it is. i.e. phone calls. or numeric stuff. there have been many times that i have thought about a piece of music within hours turn on the one classical station here, and that very piece is playing.
are there many possible explanations for this? of course! perhaps we are subconsciously aware of radio waves. and the classical station tends to play standard repetoire stuff (i.e. classical music everyone has heard), which explains the times that it has happened with common music, but makes the occurences with rarities all the more peculiar.
someone i know well takes the words out of my mouth, and i am amazed, but we know each other well, so that could be why. but then, what's the explanation for when that happens with a total stranger?
sometimes simple answers beget complex questions. sometimes simple questions beget complex answers.
====I disagree with that statement [previous quotation], but is it enough that when I was younger I used to believe in God and the Devil and all sorts of magic?====
is it enough for you? it's not for me to say! you are obviously an articulate thinker; you'll make your own conclusions (i hope; it would be shame if you didn't) about stuff.
seems to me that when people are "born again," whether it be into religion, or into science, or into spirituality (or whatever), they come back twice as strong. religions people who switch to science or mysticism become science or mysticism zealots. science people who switch to religion or mysticism become religious or mystic zealots. blah blah blah blah zealots. and there are more than three, of course.
such transitions always fascinate me. between 10 and 20 i believed only in science. i was brought up in a science-type household. no religious bullshit, thank god (ha ha). i was certain, for most of that time, that there was no meaning to anything, that existence was merely a big mathematical-chemical construct, that our feelings were mere chemical reactions, that there was little hope for the resolution of one's torments, that psychic and magic and spirit was ridiculous hoo-ha, etc etc etc. while (for myself) i still disdain religion, i have come to also disdain science (big secret), but only because it presumes to have the only set of keys to knowledge and what is 'real'. on a planet where even identical twins argue; in a galaxy where every star differs; in a universe where every proton has a slightly different weight; i am wary of any claims of there being 'one' true reality or 'one' true path to this or that. the only such claim that makes any sense (to me) is the claim that everything exists, and we are in a finite section of infinity. thus it_all_exists.
likewise, i think there is great danger in homogenization of pretty much anything. that is, the only homogeny i can accept sans souci is that everything be heterogenous. snowflakes. stars. subatomic particles. species. 'identical twins'. plant scions. performances of bruckner symphony #3. the actual score for bruckner symphony #3 (there are several very, very different editions). everything is different! yet i am to believe that there is only one route to knowledge, when i have benefitted from several?!?
====Okay, but science doesn’t claim to capture any subjective perspective. That’s not what science is about. Science is supposed to be objective.====
why do you enjoy [food / sex / drugs]? is it solely because of your objective awareness that these things are serving you a practical purpose? or do you take pleasure from the subjective experience, getting lost in the heat of the moment and forgetting the realities of it? which is more real? the objective reality that no one experiences, or the subjective realities that is every sentient being's sole reality?
====So who cares if I never know what it’s like to be an apple or a quark or Tim Robbins? I really don’t care at all.====
that's fine. hopefully you never transgress against any of them. but if you don't know what it is like to be them, you don't know them. for the core of what someone is is their experience of being themself.
====I want to know whether or not certain chemicals, when mixed together, relieve my headache, but I couldn’t care less what those chemicals were feeling when they were mixed together.====
see? the reason you care about that objective mix of chemicals is because if its effect on your subjective life experience.
====Science is science because it works. It’s not perfect, just like knowledge isn’t perfect, but it gets shit done. It makes medicine, rocket ships, and my computer.====
if science's nukes blow up the planet, it sure works well. glad we relied on that. if carbon life is overwhelmed by silicon *gasp* life, way to go, science. if the science's toxic byproducts cause us a fate worse than death, how super science must be.
these developments are not inherently good. i, for my part, am ready to die and move on with my lives. if i became ill and was forced to accept a medical treatment i did not want, i would not be happy about that. that is my personal truth. and though that may differ from the person truths of others, it remains my personal truth.
=====“b-b-b-billions of people claim to have occasional or regular extra-sensory perception(s).” Is that your best evidence? You’re just going to appeal to numbers without evaluating the plausibility of such claims?=====
you seemed quite comfortable with that same tactic when you listed three things as evidence that science gets things done: medicine, rocket ships, and my computer. surely you meant didn't mean these things to be marks against science? you meant them as examples of science's benefit. but did you just appeal to numbers without evaluating the plausibility of such claims to their benevolence? for you, i don't doubt that you are being quite truthful. but it isn't truthful for me. how can science be the only pure truth when i am sitting right here, aware of other truths? you may not like the truths. you may not agree with the truths. they might be false to you. but they are still true to me, and are truths all the same.
do i believe in jesus? how can i not, when there are a billion people who won't shut up about him, already? there is no need to evaluate the plausibility of such claims. if two billion people believe in such a character, then the character is a truth for two billion people. i see these people at the supermarket and stuff, and they are quite real to me. those people are part of my 'true reality'. so some imaginary person they talk about unceasingly is therefore also a part of my true reality, no matter how implausible or unevaluated jesus might be.
but that doesn't mean i believe in jesus to have any greater effect on my life than his followers inflict upon me. the 'greater' things i *really* believe in are of a very different nature. and since i almost never directly speak of such things, they are not a part of other people's realities. but they are at the core of my reality, and this is (for me) not true of religion or science.
====Wouldn’t an objective test, like the one in that aura study above, be a better way to evaluate whether psychic powers exist or not?====
no. that would be the worst possible way to evaluate psychic powers. objective analysis cannot accrue 'facts' about subjective realtities. it assumes that psychicness is a) a 'power' that can be 'controlled'; b) that if psychic stuff exists it would be reiterative and constant; c) that the subjective reality known inside of the 'psychic' during the 'psychic moment' about the 'psychic target' can be completely known to the researcher and d) accurately compared to the subjective reality of the 'psychic target' itself.
psychic stuff (sixth sense, ESP, whatever) occurs within the subjective individual. the 'psychic moment' is subjective to every single imaginable factor present: mood of the psychic, type of psychic target, wind direction, music playing, itchiness, recent nintendo games played, number of bagels consumed during the past year, etc etc. anything could be a factor, no matter how absurd. abstract consideration cannot be hindered by concrete practicalities. science is too matter-of-fact to accept the nature of certain potential influences, and it lacks the power to even remotely recreate even the corporeal events under which ethereal mysteries (of any nature) occur. and even then it assumes that ethereal mysteries have corporeal manifestations that can be examined, which is completely contrary to the concept of 'ethereal'. ethereal is not synonymous with air, nor does it usually refer to the chemical 'ether' (sometimes, though).
so no, an objective test like the aura study above, is not the best way to study psychicness - nor spiritual auras, for that matter.
what kind of test would be best? a subjective, genuine-belief-in-possibility-of-it test. science would laugh and laugh, which is why science doesn't deserve a monoply on the 'sci' prefix (it is a form of 'sci'-ing, but not the only one). but one cannot fake genuineness; if one doesn't believe, one doesn't believe. in short, i don't think it can be tested for. like many things.
====I remember reading either on this page or another where you spoke of testing psychic ability by guessing playing cards, and how that method is flawed because no one has the psychic power to guess cards====
understandably, you're close but not quite there with what i said. blather can be a maze, i know. and my statement was vague.
these studies (there have been several, if i recall) used a deck of cards specially made for the test. there were five types of cards in the deck: a heart, a square, a pentacle, etc. (how corny). someone might very well have psychic card moments - but if it is unlikely to begin with, it is especially unlikely when you are talking about a uniquely generated deck specifically to test if people are really psychic. and the repeated conclusion was that 'no, there is no evidence of human psychicness', as if it comes in only one form!
====It’s a little different, of course, because I guess you’re supposedly not just able to turn psychic power on and off, but at the same time, isn’t it convenient that psychics aren’t psychic all the time for all purposes?====
i was - and still am - put off by most public claims of psychicness. however, it is only 'inconvenient' if stands to gain by an exploitation of it. else, it is a wash. but it isn't so different from other senses, its just more remote. we are not always aware of touch, or smell, or taste, or hearing, or sight, even while experiencing relevant stimuli. sometimes one person with bad hearing hears something in the distance that goes unnoticed by someone with excellent hearing.
"if you are really capable of hearing brahms third symphony, why can't you hear it right now?" has to be playing somewhere, doesn't it? otherwise one can only imagine or remember.
"oh, you think you're mister funny man? do something funny. say something funny right now." certain skills become inoperable when demanded.
====[...]because a psychic can’t just turn her powers on and off[...]Isn’t that exactly what someone would say if she had no psychic power and were trying to trick you?====
"i love you" (maybe if i say it we'll get married and spend our lives together)
"i love you" (maybe if i say it i can fuck'em later)
sure, people say things to be tricky all the time. doesn't mean the underlying concept is impossible.
i also believe in an endless cycle of existence, tempered by occasional life. but where would one begin testing for previous life? there's no physical evidence, and unless there is some sort of psychic something or other, there can be no memory of it. does this negate the possibility? not at all. you might say the lack of evidence is convenient, and i might say it is inconvenient. or vice versa. we'd both be right, either way. and it would be true to us, whatever we felt. it would be as subjectively true as gravity is objectively true...more or less, anyway.
as a final note, i don't think people can ever be wholly objective, though some like to think it...that is, we can only be objective about our subjectivity, and we tend to deny how subjective we are about objectivity.
paradox, paradox. it is. no, it isn't. oh, yes it is! but how could it be? no. yes. no again. OH YEAH, BABY!
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