Science and spirituality

[Outrider]

IF we experience it directly we don't need any confirmation through instruments.

Yes, we do. Notwithstanding things like hallucinations and neurological problems, we know that we are unreliable instruments. We detect gravitational, and because of the limitations of our sensory apparatus, we think of it like a force, but it isn't. We have no sensory capability for 'wetness', yet we think we do.

Regardless, that wrongly answers a different question - that's a wrong answer to 'why shouldn't we investigate it with science', but you aren't suggesting that we shouldn't, you're suggesting that we can't, that it's outside of science's capability somehow.

It is beyond science and therefore it cannot be measured directly.....but certain aspects of reality that science has investigated do offer hints at to their existence because reality is a spectrum. There is continuity but the nature of the reality changes. Psychological phenomena for example, are not as precise and predictable as physics.

And that 'variability', that vagueness is something that the science can accommodate; you've still not explained that claim, made again here, that this 'is beyond science'. How? How does something with discernible effects exist outside of science's at least notional capacity to investigate those effects?

You speak as though design and intelligence are automatically contraindicated just because evolution is true.

No, I'm showing that whilst design requires intelligence, evolution does not (it doesn't explicitly preclude it, intrinsically, but the practical realities do at least raise the question).

This is the idea that I am questioning. In the case of products, ideas, philosophies and so on, evolution does take place but through  intelligent design and intervention. Evolution and intelligent intervention are not mutually exclusive.  They can exist together.

They can, in theory, but there's no evidence that they do. Evolution does not require a guiding intelligence, and in the absence of anything from the available evidence to suggest that one is involved, why would you add in the unsupported contention of a guiding intelligence?

Introspection is not enough. Everyone introspects. If you really want to know about this in real terms....choose some guru and learn some meditation and yoga.  You will see what I mean.

Ah, no true Scotsman, the most subtle of ad hominems. If you can't explain it rationally, if you need to achieve some sort of altered mental state to just 'accept' the claim sans evidence, then you've failed to adequately support your contention.   

We cannot prove anything within the VR. Having an  insight about the world outside the VR or getting out of the VR, is the only proof.   NDE's offer some insights.

Only if you accept them at face value, and you can no more show that they are somehow a shortcut to reality than you can show that dreams strip away the layers - they are subjective interpretation of abnormal brain activity, and to try to substantiate anything meaningful from them requires a hell of lot more explanatory investigation than you or anyone is providing.

Anyone who keeps insisting on current scientific methods to investigate philosophical and abstract ideas is guilty of subscribing to scientism.

And, again, I'm not insisting on science, but I am insisting that you need more than 'it makes me feel nice' to expect anyone to take some other methodology seriously. What's your alternative? Meditate, and just presume that gives you some sort of hypercognitive insight to reality because.... what?

O.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

But we can only experience things through our senses that only react to physical stimuli. Therefore anything we experience thatches from external phenomena is measurable. Even if something were directly interfering with our thoughts by bypassing our senses in some way is detectable in principle thanks to the changes in brain activity

Too simplistic. What about the gaps between the raw and processed data where each process it in their own way to different conclusions and each have a different experience. E.g. your very post sets up disagreement from me but maybe warm agreement or even erotic frisson in others.

The gap between raw empirical data and experience is what some would call spirituality.

[Gordon]

Too simplistic. What about the gaps between the raw and processed data where each process it in their own way to different conclusions and each have a different experience. E.g. your very post sets up disagreement from me but maybe warm agreement or even erotic frisson in others.

The gap between raw empirical data and experience is what some would call spirituality.

I'd have thought experience was raw empirical data, else you wouldn't know you'd had said experience. What you refer to as 'spirituality' seems like just another experience involving raw empirical data - but with a meaningless label attached.

[jeremyp]

Too simplistic.

Are you? Sorry about that, but it really isn't that complicated. You have an idea about the World works. You have no idea if it is true until you compare it to the World.

What about the gaps between the raw and processed data where each process it in their own way to different conclusions and each have a different experience. E.g. your very post sets up disagreement from me but maybe warm agreement or even erotic frisson in others.

That's why science has all these techniques and protocols like double blinding etc. Scientists accept that our perception of reality is imperfect and they expend huge amounts of energy (sometimes literally) to account for that and eliminate the problems as far as possible.

[jeremyp]

I'd have thought experience was raw empirical data, else you wouldn't know you'd had said experience.

I don't agree. The raw empirical data is the photons hitting and stimulating the cells of a human eye. The experience is the brain of Bernadette Soubirous interpreting those data as an appearance of the Virgin Mary, instead of, say, just some odd shaped shadows or whatever it really was.

[Alan Burns]

I don't agree. The raw empirical data is the photons hitting and stimulating the cells of a human eye. The experience is the brain of Bernadette Soubirous interpreting those data as an appearance of the Virgin Mary, instead of, say, just some odd shaped shadows or whatever it really was.

Bernadette not only experienced the interpretation of photons hitting her eye.  She also experienced the vibration of air molecules hitting her ear drum which she interpreted to be words spoken to her by the apparition.  During the sixteenth vision, after three attempts to get the apparition to say who she was, the apparition eventually replied with the words "I am the immaculate conception".  Was this just some random gust of wind whistling through the trees?  I think not.

[Outrider]

Bernadette not only experienced the interpretation of photons hitting her eye.  She also experienced the vibration of air molecules hitting her ear drum which she interpreted to be words spoken to her by the apparition.

No, she may have experienced seeing something and hearing something, but we don't know if that experience was the result of photons hitting her retinae and vibrations reaching her eardrums, or if it was an artificial production within her brain. Whilst we generally accept that this is the way by which most experiences of sound and vision happen, we are aware of other circumstances.

During the sixteenth vision, after three attempts to get the apparition to say who she was, the apparition eventually replied with the words "I am the immaculate conception".  Was this just some random gust of wind whistling through the trees?  I think not.

I'd agree, it sounds like a psychological or neurological issue.

O.

[Alan Burns]

... it sounds like a psychological or neurological issue.

O.

For such words to come from the brain of a 14 year old girl living in extreme poverty and with poor abilities in reading and writing due to frequent illness  ...  I suggest there must have been a different source for these words.  A spiritual source perhaps?

[Gordon]

Bernadette not only experienced the interpretation of photons hitting her eye.  She also experienced the vibration of air molecules hitting her ear drum which she interpreted to be words spoken to her by the apparition.  During the sixteenth vision, after three attempts to get the apparition to say who she was, the apparition eventually replied with the words "I am the immaculate conception".  Was this just some random gust of wind whistling through the trees?  I think not.

How have you excluded the risk that she just made it up?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

I'd have thought experience was raw empirical data, else you wouldn't know you'd had said experience. What you refer to as 'spirituality' seems like just another experience involving raw empirical data - but with a meaningless label attached.

raw empirical data comes in volts and lumens and decibels and centibars Gordon.Hardly covers experience or consciousness does it?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

How have you excluded the risk that she just made it up?

How can you?

[ProfessorDavey]

Bernadette not only experienced the interpretation of photons hitting her eye.  She also experienced the vibration of air molecules hitting her ear drum which she interpreted to be words spoken to her by the apparition.

Not necessarily.

In order for us to experience something we see or hear there are two major elements in operation - first the sensory systems themselves (the eye, the ear) which convert physical stimuli (photons hitting sensory cells, vibration detected by sensory cells) into electrical signals that are transferred to the second element. This is the brain which receives these signals and interpolates them into something we consider to be an experience - something we see, something we hear.

In most cases these two elements work in tandem but not always. So there will be circumstances where signals from the eye or ear aren't interpreted by the brain. But more relevant there will be times when brain function is triggered in a similar manner to that typically occurring when interpreting signals from the eye or ear, but without those signal being present.

This second phenomenon is pretty common and involves people thinking they see or hear or feel something that isn't actually there or actually happened. So in a similar manner to a person who is 100% convinced they can still feel an amputated limb there will be people who may also be completely convinced that they hear or see things that aren't actually there - the experience is created entirely within the brain and not by the brain interpreting signals from sensory systems.

[ProfessorDavey]

During the sixteenth vision, after three attempts to get the apparition to say who she was, the apparition eventually replied with the words "I am the immaculate conception".

Hmm - child brought up in a devoutly catholic culture and society in which the notion of immaculate conception would have been drummed into her as incredible important from a very early age has visions in which immaculate conception features prominently. Hmm what are you going to tell me next - that the pope is a catholic.

Sounds exactly what you'd expect from neurological and psychological issues manifesting in a 14 year old girl brought up in such circumstances.

Now I'd be more interested if this was a 14 year old girl brought up in a society and culture devoid of catholicism where the concept of immaculate conception would be entirely alien.

[Alan Burns]

Hmm - child brought up in a devoutly catholic culture and society in which the notion of immaculate conception would have been drummed into her as incredible important from a very early age has visions in which immaculate conception features prominently. Hmm what are you going to tell me next - that the pope is a catholic.

You are making some unqualified assumptions here.
The doctrine of the immaculate conception does not feature in the major teachings of the Roman Catholic church.
In fact few Roman Catholics know what the phrase really means.  Many believe it refers to the virgin birth - but it actually refers to Mary being born without original sin.  A 14 year old child brought up in a poor family is highly unlikely to have any such knowledge.

[Gordon]

How can you?

Not my problem - not my claim, but a reasonable question to ask.

[Gordon]

raw empirical data comes in volts and lumens and decibels and centibars Gordon.Hardly covers experience or consciousness does it?

Experience derives from the processing of said raw empirical data: that is how you get to experience, say, the sound of a car horm in the distance.

[Nearly Sane]

You are making some unqualified assumptions here.
The doctrine of the immaculate conception does not feature in the major teachings of the Roman Catholic church.
In fact few Roman Catholics know what the phrase really means.  Many believe it refers to the virgin birth - but it actually refers to Mary being born without original sin.  A 14 year old child brought up in a poor family is highly unlikely to have any such knowledge.

And yet arguably the only doctrine declared ex cathedra under papal infallilibity.

[ProfessorDavey]

The doctrine of the immaculate conception does not feature in the major teachings of the Roman Catholic church.
In fact few Roman Catholics know what the phrase really means.  Many believe it refers to the virgin birth - but it actually refers to Mary being born without original sin.  A 14 year old child brought up in a poor family is highly unlikely to have any such knowledge.

Just nonsense on stilts.

The notion of immaculate conception has been an element of catholicism since medieval times. I agree that it didn't become a formal part of catholic doctrine until much later - in fact 1854 when Pope Pius IX declared it so in an apostolic constitution. This would, no doubt, have been disseminated throughout the church and therefore very likely this new element of doctrine would have been highly discussed at the time.

And guess when the 14 year old Bernadette started talking about immaculate conception - err 1858. Young impressionable girl latches onto the most recently embedded element within her catholic cultural and societal upbringing.

[Nearly Sane]

Jus nonsense on stilts.

The notion of immaculate conception has been an element of catholicism since medieval times. I agree that it didn't become a formal part of catholic doctrine until much later - in fact 1854 when Pope Pius IX declared it so in an apostolic constitution. This would, no doubt, have been disseminated throughout the church and therefore very likely this new element of doctrine would have been highly discussed at the time.

And guess when the 14 year old Bernadette started talking about immaculate conception - err 1858. Young impressionable girl latches onto the most recently embedded element within her catholic cultural and societal upbringing.

Though her knowledge of such a thing is irrelevant to whether she said it.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Experience derives from the processing of said raw empirical data: that is how you get to experience, say, the sound of a car horm in the distance.

Sounds like you need to get out more.

[ProfessorDavey]

Though her knowledge of such a thing is irrelevant to whether she said it.

It isn't irrelevant as to whether she felt this was something that would get her noticed were she to say it. Nor as to whether there is a level of 'suggestion' as to this being important.

And most importantly it is highly relevant that it is likely that this notion would have been swirling around in the catholic circles in which she moved.

It would be fairly remarkable, certainly unexpected, where a 14 year girl in a community whether immaculate concept had never been mentioned had come out this it. It is completely unremarkable, easily explained and therefore dismissed as miraculous for a girl in Bernadette's situation to come out with this.

[Nearly Sane]

It isn't irrelevant as to whether she felt this was something that would get her noticed were she to say it. Nor as to whether there is a level of 'suggestion' as to this being important.

And most importantly it is highly relevant that it is likely that this notion would have been swirling around in the catholic circles in which she moved.

It would be fairly remarkable, certainly unexpected, where a 14 year girl in a community whether immaculate concept had never been mentioned had come out this it. It is completely unremarkable, easily explained and therefore dismissed as miraculous for a girl in Bernadette's situation to come out with this.

There is no proof she actually said it, it could be a lie by a priest. That's why it's irrelevant.

[ProfessorDavey]

There is no proof she actually said it, it could be a lie by a priest. That's why it's irrelevant.

True.

But if we accept, for the sake of argument, that she did say it then it is unremarkable.

[Sriram]

Outrider...

Sam Harris

https://www.wakingup.com/

[Nearly Sane]

Outrider...

Sam Harris

https://www.wakingup.com/

Think the link is incorrect, Sriram.