Searching for GOD...

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Only the truly indoctrinated deny the possibility of being indoctrinated

So it's possible to be oblivious of being indoctrinated. Why then is it seemingly not possible to be oblivious of other things..............like Goddodging for instance?

[Nearly Sane]

So it's possible to be oblivious of being indoctrinated. Why then is it seemingly not possible to be oblivious of other things..............like Goddodging for instance?

Because one's an active verb, and one's a passive one. The active one implies intent.

[Stranger]

Ho-hum. Each time I'm away from the forum for a while I come back to find you still mindlessly repeating the same idiocy...

You continue to demonstrate the reality of your ability to control your own thoughts.

Are to too stupid to see that this is false, or are you just lying through your teeth?

Either way, it's just a silly baseless and obviously false assertion. You never even attempt to logically justify it. Nothing anybody could possibly say would be able to demonstrate something that is clearly logically impossible.

How in earth do you think this demonstrates your logically absurd claim? You never tell us. You never engage with the counterarguments, you just go on mindlessly repeating it like it's some sort of obvious fundamental truth, rather that the obvious idiocy it actually is (for the reasons people keep on explaining to you).

The basic problem you have is the impossibility of applying logic without having control of your thoughts.

More idiocy. Yet again: 'conscious control' requires a thought process itself, so, in computer terms, you've turned each thought into a recursive function with no termination criteria, so we would not be able to ever think anything at all if it were true.

Can you not see that you have just demonstrated your ability to consciously control your own thought processes in composing this reply?

See above.

Or do you honestly believe that it all takes place on your subconscious before it pops into your conscious awareness?

The concept of conscious control of your thoughts logically leads to infinite regress regardless of what other role consciousness may have.

[Alan Burns]

Ho-hum. Each time I'm away from the forum for a while I come back to find you still mindlessly repeating the same idiocy...

Are to too stupid to see that this is false, or are you just lying through your teeth?

I am witnessing to the truth of my freedom to control my own thoughts and which I am using right now to compose these words.

Either way, it's just a silly baseless and obviously false assertion. You never even attempt to logically justify it. Nothing anybody could possibly say would be able to demonstrate something that is clearly logically impossible.

Nothing can take away the freedom I have been given to choose my own destiny.

How in earth do you think this demonstrates your logically absurd claim? You never tell us. You never engage with the counterarguments, you just go on mindlessly repeating it like it's some sort of obvious fundamental truth, rather that the obvious idiocy it actually is (for the reasons people keep on explaining to you).

Of course it is a fundamental truth.
Without it I would not be able to constantly witness to this truth

More idiocy. Yet again: 'conscious control' requires a thought process itself, so, in computer terms, you've turned each thought into a recursive function with no termination criteria, so we would not be able to ever think anything at all if it were true.

I am not a computer.
I am the source of my conscious control.

The concept of conscious control of your thoughts logically leads to infinite regress regardless of what other role consciousness may have.

There is no infinite regress, because I am a conscious entity with the ability to invoke my own will.
My ability to pray is all the evidence I need.

[Stranger]

I am witnessing to the truth of my freedom to control my own thoughts and which I am using right now to compose these words.

Vacuous assertion.

Nothing can take away the freedom I have been given to choose my own destiny.

Vacuous assertion.

Of course it is a fundamental truth.

Then why can't you address the obvious infinite regress? Why do you always run away into unargued assertions? Why do you seem to be too afraid to address the logic?

Without it I would not be able to constantly witness to this truth

Vacuous assertion.

I am not a computer.

Irrelevant. It was just another way of expressing the infinite regress that is the logical consequence of an ability to control our own thought process.

Again, you seem to be terrified of even trying to address the logic.

I am the source of my conscious control.

Meaningless and irrelevant assertion. The question here is how your mind ('you') works, i.e. how your mind exercises control.

There is no infinite regress, because I am a conscious entity with the ability to invoke my own will.

Gibberish. The infinite regress is a direct result of conscious control of our own thoughts. "I am a conscious entity with the ability to invoke my own will" is utterly meaningless in the context. You need to think logically about this and come up with a counterargument, not spout daft, meaningless mantras.

Exercising control over something is itself a thought process, so if you are trying to control your own thoughts you have clearly set up an infinite loop that will never terminate. Why don't you have the courage to even try to address that?

My ability to pray is all the evidence I need.

Extreme dimwittery.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

I am witnessing to the truth of my freedom to control my own thoughts and which I am using right now to compose these words.

I’ve noticed that religious people will often claim to be “witnessing” something when what they actually mean is something like “making unqualified and unsubstantiated claims and assertions”.

“Witnessing” just means describing an experience. “Explaining” on the other hand means justifying with reason or facts, which you never do.   

Nothing can take away the freedom I have been given to choose my own destiny.

Mindless, likely indoctrinated bullshit. Stranger just told you you that you never engage with the actual arguments ranged against you, and you replied by…

...not replying to the actual arguments ranged against you.

Why the egregious dishonesty?

Of course it is a fundamental truth.
Without it I would not be able to constantly witness to this truth

See above. You haven’t “witnessed” anything – you’ve just re-asserted the same mindless idiocies you always assert.
 

I am not a computer.

I know you struggle with the concept of analogies, but even for you this is embarrassing. He wasn’t calling you a computer, he was telling you that your claim is analogous to a phenomenon in computing.

I am the source of my conscious control.

Not in the reason- and evidence-denying way you think you are you’re not.

There is no infinite regress, because I am a conscious entity with the ability to invoke my own will.

Yet another fallacy – this time the non sequitur. This idiocy leads unavoidably to infinite regress because a supposed stand-alone entity to which it outsources thinking would also have to do some thinking of its own – and your “but magic” attempt to escape from that is desperate stupidity.     

My ability to pray is all the evidence I need.

That seems to be true at least – which is why you’re so consistently wrong about everything. Why not instead finally address some sound reasoning and actual evidence though?

[Enki]

I am witnessing to the truth of my freedom to control my own thoughts and which I am using right now to compose these words.Nothing can take away the freedom I have been given to choose my own destiny.Of course it is a fundamental truth.
Without it I would not be able to constantly witness to this truthI am not a computer.
I am the source of my conscious control.There is no infinite regress, because I am a conscious entity with the ability to invoke my own will.
My ability to pray is all the evidence I need.

When faced with arguments to which you are unable to respond then the last refuge is to simply state various assertions and hope that they stick, eh, Alan?

[Alan Burns]

When faced with arguments to which you are unable to respond then the last refuge is to simply state various assertions and hope that they stick, eh, Alan?

I  will continue to use my God given gift of free will to witness to this simple, fundamental truth.
All the (well thought out!) attempts to refute our freedom to consciously control our own thoughts simply reinforces this truth.

[Alan Burns]

Meaningless and irrelevant assertion. The question here is how your mind ('you') works, i.e. how your mind exercises control.

You do not need to know how gravity works to know what it does.
Similarly you do not need to know how your mind exercises control to know that it does.

[Stranger]

I  will continue to use my God given gift of free will to witness to this simple, fundamental truth.

Yet another vacuous assertion.

All the (well thought out!) attempts to refute our freedom to consciously control our own thoughts simply reinforces this truth.

Idiotic non sequitur. How have you come from this:

My view that conscious awareness can't be generated from material reactions alone is not just personal incredulity.  It is based upon sound logic on which I could write many pages.

to your current state of apparent logic-phobia? Why do you now run scared when anybody puts any logic to you at all?

[Stranger]

You do not need to know how gravity works to know what it does.
Similarly you do not need to know how your mind exercises control to know that it does.

Yes but you are telling us (in part, at least) how our minds work. That's what the claim that we have 'concious control of our own thought processes' is doing. The point being that we obviously don't have such control. It neither stands up to introspection nor to logic. It is a seriously idiotic claim.

Just try to consciously decide what your next concious thought will be before you think it.

Can you not see a tiny little problem in doing that? If that's not what you mean by concious control of our thought processes, then what the hell do you mean?

[Gordon]

Alan will always run away from challenge because, for him, his 'conscious control of thoughts/free will' nonsense is code for 'therefore God' to the extent that him conceding that the former assertion is suspect implies that the latter one is too and Alan can't allow himself to address that consciously, or perhaps his subconcious is protecting him (mental defence mechanisms and all that), which is quite deliciously ironic in the circumstances.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

I  will continue to use my God given gift of free will to witness to this simple, fundamental truth.

No you won’t

All the (well thought out!) attempts to refute our freedom to consciously control our own thoughts simply reinforces this truth.

No they don’t.

You seem to think that telling lies on a mb will persuade people with functioning intellects that your beliefs are justified. It won’t. If you have any interest in doing that you need to try at least to engage with the arguments that falsify you rather than endlessly repeat assertions of your blind faith.

It’s up to you though.

[Alan Burns]

Just try to consciously decide what your next concious thought will be before you think it.

A silly question

My choices and conscious thoughts occur at the moment I make them.

[Stranger]

A silly question

Conscious control of our own thoughts is a silly concept. As I asked, if that's not what it means, what does if mean?

My choices and conscious thoughts occur at the moment I make them.

What the hell is that supposed to mean? You can't consciously control something in zero time. You seem to be admitting that thoughts just appear in your concious mind (which they obviously do) but still desperately clinging to the notion that you are exercising some sort of conscious control over them (which you obviously can't be). You really can't have it both ways.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

A silly question

No it isn’t. If you want to claim to control your thoughts then, if not for choosing which thoughts to have to do the controlling, what else could that mean?

My choices and conscious thoughts occur at the moment I make them.

No process (making a choice for example) can happen “at the moment”. Your attempted way out of that (ie, “but magic”) is infantile.

If instead you actually do have some sound reasoning to justify your claims, then why not after all this time finally tell us what it is?

Why keep it a secret?

Or were you lying about that too? 
 

[torridon]

My choices and conscious thoughts occur at the moment I make them.

Thoughts occur.  They are not 'made'.

[Alan Burns]

Alan will always run away from challenge because, for him, his 'conscious control of thoughts/free will' nonsense is code for 'therefore God' to the extent that him conceding that the former assertion is suspect implies that the latter one is too and Alan can't allow himself to address that consciously, or perhaps his subconcious is protecting him (mental defence mechanisms and all that), which is quite deliciously ironic in the circumstances.

You have it the wrong way round, Gordon.
The last few posts show ample evidence of people using their own powers of conscious control to try to give reasoning why they do not have conscious control in order to maintain their belief that there is nothing supernatural about the workings of the human mind.

[torridon]

You have it the wrong way round, Gordon.
The last few posts show ample evidence of people using their own powers of conscious control to try to give reasoning why they do not have conscious control in order to maintain their belief that there is nothing supernatural about the workings of the human mind.

Oh dear. Magic isn't real Alan.  Grow up.

[Stranger]

The last few posts show ample evidence of people using their own powers of conscious control to try to give reasoning why they do not have conscious control...

On the contrary, you are demonstrating Gordon's point perfectly. Instead of engaging with the logic, you've just run scared from it and yet again tried to hide away behind silly, dimwitted or dishonest assertions like this.

Despite endless requested to do so, you have never once even tried to justify how anything anybody could say would be evidence for your impossible and absurd claims. It's just another of your meaningless mantras. You have a whole collection now.

"The ever present state of conscious awareness"
"We can consciously control our own thought processes"
"What you say is ample evidence of what I say"

You either can't or won't try to explain or logically defend any of them. You just mindlessly repeat them and call it 'witnessing'. You never engage with the logic that is put to you that demonstrates how daft they all are. You seem to be terrified to actually think about the subject any more.

[Gordon]

You have it the wrong way round, Gordon.
The last few posts show ample evidence of people using their own powers of conscious control to try to give reasoning why they do not have conscious control in order to maintain their belief that there is nothing supernatural about the workings of the human mind.

You really aren't getting this, Alan.

The reason people are rejecting your claims of 'conscious control' is because your idea is illogical, as is the notion that there is supernatural interference in the biological processes of our mental activities.

You are trying to assert nonsense compounded by yet more nonsense and yet, ironically, you seem unable to 'consciously control' your thoughts sufficiently well so as to apply a reasonable degree of scepticism and critique to your own position.

[Alan Burns]

So
From the evidence and logic quoted on this thread we have established beyond any reasonable doubt that there can be no natural explanation for conscious control of our human thought processes.

But how did we all come to this profound conclusion?
Could we have consciously contemplated the properties and behaviour of all the natural processes found in nature to draw this conclusion?
Could we have consciously invoked the "critical thinking" often quoted on this thread to reach this conclusion?
Could this conclusion be achieved without any power to control and direct and verify the carefully thought out logical steps needed to reach this conclusion?

Can you see that the next logical step would be to conclude that these consciously controlled activities must have been derived from a supernatural source if there is no possibility for a natural explanation?

[torridon]

So
From the evidence and logic quoted on this thread can say beyond any reasonable doubt that there can be no natural explanation for conscious control of our human thought processes.

But how did we all come to this profound conclusion?
Could we have consciously contemplated the properties and behaviour of all the natural processes found in nature to draw this conclusion?
Could we have consciously invoked the "critical thinking" often quoted on this thread to reach this conclusion?
Could this conclusion be achieved without any power to control and direct and verify the carefully thought out logical steps needed to reach this conclusion?

Can you see that the next logical step would be to conclude that these consciously controlled activities must have been derived from a supernatural source if there is no possibility for a natural explanation?

Consciousness may be hard to understand but it represents a failure of will to understand to therefore regress into magical thinking to explain it.  Magic is not an explanation for anything, it is an explanation avoidance strategy.

[Stranger]

So
From the evidence and logic quoted on this thread can say beyond any reasonable doubt that there can be no natural explanation for conscious control of our human thought processes.

Once again you are confusing nature with logic. It's got nothing to do with the limitations of being 'natural'. It's a logical impossibility because it produces an infinite regress.

You called the challenge I posted before─just try to consciously decide what your next concious thought will be before you think it─a "silly question" but that is the obvious interpretation of 'conscious control of our thought processes'.

So, instead of launching into another bumbling, incompetent, and incoherent attempt at arguing for god-magic (which can't really help with a logical impossibility anyway) that the rest of your post is, you need to first define what you actually mean. Making sure that all your terms are properly defined and understood by everybody is the first step in any logical process and one that you always run away from.

As I said in my previous post, you now have at least three meaningless mantras that you keep repeating and always refuse to even try to explain:

"We can consciously control our own thought processes"
"The ever present state of conscious awareness"
"What you say is ample evidence of what I say"

If you want to be taken at all seriously, you need to define exactly what you think they all mean in a logically significant way (not just vague hand-waving). Off you go...

[Alan Burns]

Consciousness may be hard to understand but it represents a failure of will to understand to therefore regress into magical thinking to explain it.  Magic is not an explanation for anything, it is an explanation avoidance strategy.

Just analysing what you are saying here:

a failure of will to understand

In this expression you are conceding that you have a "will to understand" something, but in trying to invoke this will you are failing to understand what is in question.  Can you not see the obvious that in trying to understand something you must be consciously driving your conscious mind to reach this understanding?  Whether or not you succeed, you must be invoking your power to consciously control your thoughts in order to attempt any understanding.

Magic is not an explanation for anything, it is an explanation avoidance strategy.

and you arrived at this conclusion by what means?

And you have consciously substituted the word "magic" for "supernatural"
They do not have the same meaning - magic is an illusion.  Your freedom to think things out is no illusion.