Religion Instinct?!

[Spud]

Hi Susan,

It's because a book he's decided must be correct tells him so. Only he doesn't care much about some of these "sins" (wearing mixed fibres, gathering kindling on the sabbath, eating shellfish etc) so he's not so fussed about those. Other of these "sins" that play to his preferences and prejudices on the other hand he cares about quite a bit, so he'll judge you harshly if you do them.

And yes there really are people like that still in the 21st century. Extraordinary isn't it?

No, it's because I know I'm one, and can (sometimes) tell when someone else is being one.

[bluehillside Retd.]

ekim,

Incidentally, one among Sriram’s litany of mistakes is to say that there’s no “aura meter”, therefore there can be no evidence for his assertion “aura”.

This is wrong too. His “meter” would be to conduct a trial with control groups respectively “working with auras” and doing nothing at all, then comparing the results. If the former showed statistically better outcomes than the latter that wouldn’t necessarily be evidence for “auras” (there could be other causal factors at play) but it would at least suggest that something was going on.

If there was no difference at all on the other hand, that would tell you either that his claim “aura” is the utter bullshit it appears to be, or that for some reason the auras in the control group decided to switch themselves off as soon as someone bothered to replace anecdote with evidence. 

Of course he’ll ignore this too, but that doesn’t change the fact of the matter.

[ekim]

ekim,

Yes it might, just as it might be that some people have dormant leprechaun-sensing faculties.

Sriram's huge error though is to jump straight from "might" to "is" without any connecting logic to validate the claim.

In which case those who might wish to have the leprechaun experience could seek a way to awaken that dormant faculty.
Perhaps it is a fact to Sriram because he has the faculty to sense what he calls an aura and he has no way to validate the claim through words.

[Stranger]

How do you know the tendency to sin is a design flaw rather than that everyone chooses to sin?

Everybody having a "tendency to sin" would be a design flaw in itself. If people had genuine freedom (leaving aside the logical impossibility for a moment - see below), then at least some would choose to be 'good'.

Being all powerful doesn't mean God would necessarily use his power to control us. And being all-knowing doesn't mean he wouldn't create us with free will.

So in that respect Christianity is logically consistent.

No - you've missed the point. We, as people, are the products (in some combination) of our nature and nurture. An omniscient and omnipotent creator would, in the very act of creation, be deciding everybody's nature and nurture and would know exactly what that would mean and what our choices would be (unless there is some genuine randomness).

The only notion of "free will" that makes any sense at all is compatibilism - which makes no sense for an omniscient and omnipotent creator, because it would necessarily be making all our choices for us at the moment of creation, unless there is some element of true randomness. We could not be sensibly (or justly) blamed by such a god for the choices we make.

[bluehillside Retd.]

ekim,

Why do you keep ignoring the point of the argument? Do you think that the assertion “some people lack the leprechaun-perceiving faculty that I have, therefore leprechauns are real” is a good argument for leprechauns or not?

If you do, you’re as lost in a world of illogic as Sriram is.

If you don’t, you need to ask Sriram why he’s trying precisely the same argument for “auras”.

In which case those who might wish to have the leprechaun experience could seek a way to awaken that dormant faculty.

Except of course of all the millions of possible logic- and evidence-free claims someone could make, why would you invest time in the practices that supposedly lead to any one of them specifically rather than to any other and, even if you did and you decided that what you were experiencing were auras (or leprechauns), how would you propose to eliminate all the other possible explanations for what you’d actually experienced?   

Perhaps it is a fact to Sriram because he has the faculty to sense what he calls an aura and he has no way to validate the claim through words.

Still not getting it then. Yes, “perhaps it is a fact to Sriram because he has the faculty to sense what he calls an aura and he has no way to validate the claim through words” just as perhaps leprechauns are a fact to bluehillside because I have the faculty to sense leprechauns and I have no way to validate the claim through words.

You can “perhaps” anything you like. His epic mistake though is to jump straight from a “perhaps” to an “is” with no connecting logic to bridge the gap. I just explained this to you though, but for some reason you’ve ignored it.   

[jeremyp]

People do actually perceive the aura and even work with it.

Until you take steps to make sure they are not fooling themselves. Then these auras stop working.

[Udayana]

What are these auras supposed to be doing anyway?

[torridon]

Incidentally Robin Dunbar, whose work on empathy and social linking, was mentioned as part of the original article by Sriram, was interviewed this morning by Jim Al Khalili on Radio 4. The same interview is repeated tonight at 9.30pm. It is well worth listening to in my estimation.

Just listened, very interesting, thanks for the heads-up enki

[Sriram]

Hi everyone,

The Aura/Prana are all facts as far as I am concerned and there are millions perhaps billions, who also know these to be a fact.  Now, that is not what I am trying to establish here. That some atheist folk don't have a clue, is neither here nor there.

Perceiving these energies requires certain faculties and a certain type of training (which obviously enables suitable neural connectivity to grow). It is not something that can be perceived normally even though everyone can see its effects subjectively in terms of how our emotions and feelings get churned everyday.   Ippy's post about his house is one example. Almost all other feelings such as love, hate, jealousies, sexual attractions etc.etc. can be understood through these energies/chakras. Quite commonly, many people use chakra cleansing and energizing for health reasons and for mental harmony and peace. 

Chakras by the way, are only vortices that form at various points due to the flow of energies in and around the body. The Aura and its energies form a fundamental part of the mind and our conscious experience.

If any of you want, you can take up serious Yoga practices and  maybe after 10-15 years you might get somewhere. However, most of you would recoil at the idea, I know. That is because of the very restricted cultural background in some places.

Most of you probably wouldn't even join Yoga classes for health reasons, let alone for deeper aspects. That is the amazing level of fear and reluctance to venture into unknown areas that is in evidence among certain groups.   Thankfully most people around the world are not like that.

And the continued asking for 'evidence' is childish and shows a complete lack of understanding of what the discussion is about. 

Cheers.

Sriram

[Stranger]

The Aura/Prana are all facts as far as I am concerned and there are millions perhaps billions, who also know these to be a fact.

An evidence- and reasoning-free assertion and a blatant argumentum ad populum fallacy.

Now, that is not what I am trying to establish here.

Well it should be, if you want to be taken seriously by anybody with a rational mind.

That some atheist folk don't have a clue, is neither here nor there.

Perceiving these energies requires certain faculties and a certain type of training (which obviously enables suitable neural connectivity to grow). It is not something that can be perceived normally even though everyone can see its effects subjectively in terms of how our emotions and feelings get churned everyday.   Ippy's post about his house is one example. Almost all other feelings such as love, hate, jealousies, sexual attractions etc.etc. can be understood through these energies/chakras. Quite commonly, many people use chakra cleansing and energizing for health reasons and for mental harmony and peace. 

Chakras by the way, are only vortices that form at various points due to the flow of energies in and around the body. The Aura and its energies form a fundamental part of the mind and our conscious experience.

More unsupported assertions.

If any of you want, you can take up serious Yoga practices and  maybe after 10-15 years you might get somewhere. However, most of you would recoil at the idea, I know. That is because of the very restricted cultural background in some places.

Most of you probably wouldn't even join Yoga classes for health reasons, let alone for deeper aspects. That is the amazing level of fear and reluctance to venture into unknown areas that is in evidence among certain groups.   Thankfully most people around the world are not like that.

Yes, yes, yes, you're so superior and everybody who disagrees with you is inferior, lacking something, and fearful...    -YAWN-

And the continued asking for 'evidence' is childish and shows a complete lack of understanding of what the discussion is about. 

What is actually rather childish is blindly accepting things as objectively true because they are in your culture and because you have had some (by your own admission) subjective experiences, without ever questioning what objective evidence there is for them.

You have been provided here with substantive arguments and questions, all of which you've totally ignored in favour of just asserting your position over and over again - effectively just preaching at us and ignoring any responses...

[Gordon]

Hi everyone,

The Aura/Prana are all facts as far as I am concerned

Which would be fine if we all got to choose our own 'facts': but we don't, and to establish a 'fact' requires rather more than just  a personal allegiance to whatever the cause is.
 

and there are millions perhaps billions, who also know these to be a fact.

Which is as good an argumentum ad populum as I've ever seen.

Now, that is not what I am trying to establish here. That some atheist folk don't have a clue, is neither here nor there.

Perceiving these energies requires certain faculties and a certain type of training (which obviously enables suitable neural connectivity to grow). It is not something that can be perceived normally even though everyone can see its effects subjectively in terms of how our emotions and feelings get churned everyday.   Ippy's post about his house is one example. Almost all other feelings such as love, hate, jealousies, sexual attractions etc.etc. can be understood through these energies/chakras. Quite commonly, many people use chakra cleansing and energizing for health reasons and for mental harmony and peace. 

Chakras by the way, are only vortices that form at various points due to the flow of energies in and around the body. The Aura and its energies form a fundamental part of the mind and our conscious experience.

If any of you want, you can take up serious Yoga practices and  maybe after 10-15 years you might get somewhere. However, most of you would recoil at the idea, I know. That is because of the very restricted cultural background in some places.

Most of you probably wouldn't even join Yoga classes for health reasons, let alone for deeper aspects. That is the amazing level of fear and reluctance to venture into unknown areas that is in evidence among certain groups.   Thankfully most people around the world are not like that.

And the continued asking for 'evidence' is childish and shows a complete lack of understanding of what the discussion is about. 

Cheers.

Sriram

It seems to me your chakras and aura idea operates on the same basis as, say, the Christian idea of the Trinity - as a personal faith-based conviction with associated ideas and activities (be they yoga or theology) that reinforce the belief: but these aren't objective facts. 

[torridon]

    And that reluctance for new information and new experiences, is the problem..!   How can you understand even a word of what I am saying?    Your are looking out of one window and don't even want to look out of the window on the other side to see the other side of reality.

If there really was some 'other side of reality', then it would be fundamental physics that would guide us to an understanding of it.  If it cannot be found by science, then probably that other reality is just an induced state of mind, a mental intoxication that distances people from a sober grip.

In the era of climate change, the last thing we need, is more delusion. We all need to wake up, do the maths, and get real.  Otherwise, our inability and unwillingess to let go of our fantasies about the human condition and confront reality will be the end of us all.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Sriram,

The Aura/Prana are all facts as far as I am concerned and there are millions perhaps billions, who also know these to be a fact.  Now, that is not what I am trying to establish here. That some atheist folk don't have a clue, is neither here nor there.

Perceiving these energies requires certain faculties and a certain type of training (which obviously enables suitable neural connectivity to grow). It is not something that can be perceived normally even though everyone can see its effects subjectively in terms of how our emotions and feelings get churned everyday.   Ippy's post about his house is one example. Almost all other feelings such as love, hate, jealousies, sexual attractions etc.etc. can be understood through these energies/chakras. Quite commonly, many people use chakra cleansing and energizing for health reasons and for mental harmony and peace. 

Chakras by the way, are only vortices that form at various points due to the flow of energies in and around the body. The Aura and its energies form a fundamental part of the mind and our conscious experience.

If any of you want, you can take up serious Yoga practices and  maybe after 10-15 years you might get somewhere. However, most of you would recoil at the idea, I know. That is because of the very restricted cultural background in some places.

Most of you probably wouldn't even join Yoga classes for health reasons, let alone for deeper aspects. That is the amazing level of fear and reluctance to venture into unknown areas that is in evidence among certain groups.   Thankfully most people around the world are not like that.

And the continued asking for 'evidence' is childish and shows a complete lack of understanding of what the discussion is about. 

Arrogant ignorance from beginning to end. I could falsify every part of this nonsense line-by-line just I've done several times already, but as we both know you'll just ignore every falsification there's not much point is there.

Let's just dismiss it as arrant nonsense then and save time.

[Udayana]

Sriram,

Arrogant ignorance from beginning to end. I could falsify every part of this nonsense line-by-line just I've done several times already, but as we both know you'll just ignore every falsification there's not much point is there.

Let's just dismiss it as arrant nonsense then and save time.

BHS, I agree with your arguments but not with your conclusion. We just end up in endless repetitions of these arguments following that line - in "Searching for God" just as in Sriram's threads.

Some people see auras and associate them with particular emotions or meanings. The arguments about whether they are "real" or not is pointless - what might be interesting is knowing how or why they come to see them and associate them with other characteristics - or what they think they can do with them.

Sriram, do you see auras? If so, how many years of study or yoga have you spent to get to that point? How is it that some people see auras without any training? What meaning or purpose do you ascribe to auras?

[jeremyp]

Hi everyone,

The Aura/Prana are all facts as far as I am concerned and there are millions perhaps billions, who also know these to be a fact.  Now, that is not what I am trying to establish here. That some atheist folk don't have a clue, is neither here nor there.

Perceiving these energies requires certain faculties and a certain type of training (which obviously enables suitable neural connectivity to grow). It is not something that can be perceived normally even though everyone can see its effects subjectively in terms of how our emotions and feelings get churned everyday.   Ippy's post about his house is one example. Almost all other feelings such as love, hate, jealousies, sexual attractions etc.etc. can be understood through these energies/chakras. Quite commonly, many people use chakra cleansing and energizing for health reasons and for mental harmony and peace. 

Chakras by the way, are only vortices that form at various points due to the flow of energies in and around the body. The Aura and its energies form a fundamental part of the mind and our conscious experience.

If any of you want, you can take up serious Yoga practices and  maybe after 10-15 years you might get somewhere. However, most of you would recoil at the idea, I know. That is because of the very restricted cultural background in some places.

Most of you probably wouldn't even join Yoga classes for health reasons, let alone for deeper aspects. That is the amazing level of fear and reluctance to venture into unknown areas that is in evidence among certain groups.   Thankfully most people around the world are not like that.

And the continued asking for 'evidence' is childish and shows a complete lack of understanding of what the discussion is about. 

Cheers.

Sriram

Yes, you’ve told us all this before.

The reason is why you’re getting so much pushback is your insistence that we, who ask for evidence, are the childish ones, not you the person who still believes in fairy tales.

[Sriram]

If there really was some 'other side of reality', then it would be fundamental physics that would guide us to an understanding of it.  If it cannot be found by science, then probably that other reality is just an induced state of mind, a mental intoxication that distances people from a sober grip.

In the era of climate change, the last thing we need, is more delusion. We all need to wake up, do the maths, and get real.  Otherwise, our inability and unwillingess to let go of our fantasies about the human condition and confront reality will be the end of us all.

Not necessary that science should automatically 'know' or indicate anything about such matters. Just as Physics cannot automatically extrapolate or indicate about matters connected with biology or psychology.

You just keep assuming that all this is delusion. And that is the problem...!!!  Microscopic thinking.....what cannot be seen through the little hole you are used to looking through, cannot exist. Wrong!

Some of you continue to connect these matters with religion and belief rather than as natural phenomena that are yet uncharted. Long way to go....guys!  Lots of religious baggage and programming to be deleted before any progress can be made in understanding such matters. 

Possibly youngsters growing up in a broader cultural environment will find it easier.

[ekim]

ekim,

(1)  Why do you keep ignoring the point of the argument? Do you think that the assertion “some people lack the leprechaun-perceiving faculty that I have, therefore leprechauns are real” is a good argument for leprechauns or not?

If you do, you’re as lost in a world of illogic as Sriram is.

If you don’t, you need to ask Sriram why he’s trying precisely the same argument for “auras”.

(2) Except of course of all the millions of possible logic- and evidence-free claims someone could make, why would you invest time in the practices that supposedly lead to any one of them specifically rather than to any other and, even if you did and you decided that what you were experiencing were auras (or leprechauns), how would you propose to eliminate all the other possible explanations for what you’d actually experienced?   

(3)  Still not getting it then. Yes, “perhaps it is a fact to Sriram because he has the faculty to sense what he calls an aura and he has no way to validate the claim through words” just as perhaps leprechauns are a fact to bluehillside because I have the faculty to sense leprechauns and I have no way to validate the claim through words.
You can “perhaps” anything you like. His epic mistake though is to jump straight from a “perhaps” to an “is” with no connecting logic to bridge the gap. I just explained this to you though, but for some reason you’ve ignored it.

(1)  Why do you keep changing what I have said to a false assertion of your own making and comment on that?

(2)  Why does anybody do anything?  It could be potentially beneficial, satisfy a desire, expand knowledge, experience something new, escape from the straight jacket of logic and live a little.  As regards exploring possible explanations, for a start I wouldn't be interested in leprechauns but if I were interested in the possibility of auras I might join a group of parapsychologists and engage with the instruments that they use.

(3) Still not getting it then.  "Perhaps" is a tentative expression that one might use as a preliminary to an exploration of possibilities and I have not jumped from a "perhaps" to an "is".  If you think Sriram has then take it up with him, not me.  I'll end with a quote from you as you seem fond of that style .... "Try reading what I said.  Try to grasp this because you keep not getting it.  Got it yet? Good."

[Stranger]

You just keep assuming that all this is delusion. And that is the problem...!!!

The problem is that you have provided not one hint of an iota of a rational reason to think it is anything but a subjective experience internal to each mind.

You seem to think everybody should accept it because you do.

Microscopic thinking.....what cannot be seen through the little hole you are used to looking through, cannot exist. Wrong!

Some of you continue to connect these matters with religion and belief rather than as natural phenomena that are yet uncharted. Long way to go....guys!  Lots of religious baggage and programming to be deleted before any progress can be made in understanding such matters. 

Possibly youngsters growing up in a broader cultural environment will find it easier.

Just asserting that everybody else is not seeing clearly is no substitute for actually addressing the problems with what you are saying and answering the points people are making - and it makes you look like a deranged fundamentalist preacher, rather than somebody with any real insight.

If you want thinking people to take these things as "natural phenomena that are yet uncharted", rather than religious beliefs you need to stop the silly preaching and start engaging with the rational arguments that are being put to you...

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hi Udayana,

BHS, I agree with your arguments but not with your conclusion. We just end up in endless repetitions of these arguments following that line - in "Searching for God" just as in Sriram's threads.

Some people see auras and associate them with particular emotions or meanings.

I think you’re overstating it: some people believe they “see auras" – a very different thing.

The arguments about whether they are "real" or not is pointless –

Why? When people believe things to be real they act accordingly, which has a real world effect (not seeing a doctor for example because you think the alternative will cure you instead). Actually I think the arguments about whether something is real are anything but pointless – without them we have no means to distinguish reality from fantasy.   

…what might be interesting is knowing how or why they come to see them and associate them with other characteristics - or what they think they can do with them.

But if the answer to “how they came to see them” is the disastrously wrong arguments that Sriram attempts, then there’s no reason to think they came to see them at all. 

Sriram, do you see auras?

Wrong question. Rather the relevant question is “why do you think you see auras?” And when the answers continue to be laughably wrong, then we can safely conclude that there’s no good reason to think he does see auras even though he may think he does.

If so, how many years of study or yoga have you spent to get to that point? How is it that some people see auras without any training? What meaning or purpose do you ascribe to auras?

There’s no cogent reason to think anyone “sees auras”, or that they exist at all in order to be seen. You may as well ask me how many years of four-leaf clover burning on a full moon it took me to see leprechauns. 

[bluehillside Retd.]

Sriram,

Not necessary that science should automatically 'know' or indicate anything about such matters. Just as Physics cannot automatically extrapolate or indicate about matters connected with biology or psychology.

You just keep assuming that all this is delusion. And that is the problem...!!!  Microscopic thinking.....what cannot be seen through the little hole you are used to looking through, cannot exist. Wrong!

Some of you continue to connect these matters with religion and belief rather than as natural phenomena that are yet uncharted. Long way to go....guys!  Lots of religious baggage and programming to be deleted before any progress can be made in understanding such matters. 

Possibly youngsters growing up in a broader cultural environment will find it easier.

Additional arrogant ignorance noted.

[bluehillside Retd.]

ekim,

(1)  Why do you keep changing what I have said to a false assertion of your own making and comment on that?

I haven’t. Sriram attempts a disastrously wrong line of reasoning – “auras are real; other people don’t have my magic aura-detecting ability; therefore auras are real”. It’s a basic common-or-garden fallacy of the premise and the conclusion being the same (called "affirming the consequent"), and I’ve explained it to you by substituting leprechauns for auras and asking whether you’d give the same house room to that argument too. If you don’t want to answer that’s fine, but it’s still what he’s trying.   

(2)  Why does anybody do anything?  It could be potentially beneficial, satisfy a desire, expand knowledge, experience something new, escape from the straight jacket of logic and live a little.

You think logic is a straight jacket? Well, as philosophy, technology, medicine and pretty much anything else I can think of that enables you to “live a little” relies on it, we’ll have to disagree about that.

The question though was why anyone would invest time in practices that allegedly lead to un-evidenced outcome A rather than to un-evidenced outcome B. And if even if you did have an answer to that, the a priori question is why you’d even begin without first establishing some basis to determine whether you’d actually experienced that outcome rather than just reached for it as a conveniently persuasive but wrong answer.   
 

As regards exploring possible explanations, for a start I wouldn't be interested in leprechauns but if I were interested in the possibility of auras I might join a group of parapsychologists and engage with the instruments that they use.

What instruments?

(3) Still not getting it then.  "Perhaps" is a tentative expression that one might use as a preliminary to an exploration of possibilities and I have not jumped from a "perhaps" to an "is".

No-one said that you did. Try again – you were defending Sriram’s mistakes by saying that perhaps he was right. No-one says otherwise, but it’s a vacuous point – perhaps anything at all is right. You cannot though defend his practice of jumping straight from a perhaps to an is.

If you think Sriram has then take it up with him, not me.

You were defending him remember, albeit wrongly (see above).

I'll end with a quote from you as you seem fond of that style .... "Try reading what I said.  Try to grasp this because you keep not getting it.  Got it yet? Good."

Oh dear. By all means go back and re-read to see where you’ve gone wrong. Or don’t. It’s up to you, but the arguments are the same either way. 
 

[Sriram]

Oh...oh.....so many words....so much emotion....but so little understanding!  Painful!!

[Roses]

bluehillside #96 and #97

A pleasure to read both and I do of course, nod in agreement. It really is sad how the woo pedlars persist in ignoring rational argument.

I think what is most worrying is that there is a persistent refusal even to admit or own that they might be wrong.

I agree.

[Enki]

Oh...oh.....so many words....so much emotion....but so little understanding!  Painful!!

So why not try using less words, try reducing your emotional involvement and try making a big effort to understand the arguments ranged against you. That way everyone would benefit, and you just might find it less painful.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Sriram,

Oh...oh.....so many words....so much emotion....but so little understanding!  Painful!!

Yes, but you could fix it easily enough:

1. Use fewer words.

2. Dial down the appeal to emotion.

3. Do something about your misunderstanding by finally trying a little honesty and actually engaging with the arguments that falsify your assertions.

What's stopping you?