Rationality gone mad!

Well done on getting dattaswammi's spam removed geeser. It does his organisation no credit! I'll respond to your second post tomorrow (I'm in a rush).

 

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I'm saying you need to be aware of any conscious or unconscious bias on the part of the researchers (you) in for instance selecting the subjects (sciforums.com - who tend to be atheists) and designing the poll (e.g. your wording).

You have to exclude all possibilities to prove something does NOT exist. You also should account for why some people (e.g. me) experience such a need.

A better line of attack would be to show that it exists but is a disguised need for something else (e.g. unmet developmental needs). You could join forces with theoryofrelativity who is looking at Freuds legacy of just that view.

So, your evidence for the statement that...

...is religion which is obviously false or delusional because there is no verifiable evidence for it and lack of verifiable evidence obviously means something can only be false or delusional?

Ever heard of the fallacy of the circular argument?

So, by the same logic I hereby prove that an experience of God exists by showing you everybody in a church praying. That was easy!

Ah yes, just as humour doesn't exist in reality. There are no real jokes, only delusional ones.

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"So, by the same logic I hereby prove that an experience of God exists by showing you everybody in a church praying. That was easy!" not so.
With humour, people react to visual, audio, stimuli, even smell, but with religion there is nothing that reacts with the senses.

 

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correct,

yes, but the fact, you have no evidence, does not make mine, a lack of evidence, my irrefutable evidence is you have none. if you can produce one instant, a minute particle of evidence. then my statement would be fallacious in the extreme, but as you cant, mine stands up as factual, you've said it yourself, your's is a leap of faith.
so not circular at all.
incidently I and james randi will both give you a million dollars, for such proof, http://www.randi.org/

the next part was answered by fahrenheit.
I see no error there.

 

geeser, lack of evidence for is NOT the same as evidence against.
As for the terms you use:
- it would be delusional to hold something as true when there IS evidence AGAINST.
- it would be irrational to believe something as true when there is no evidence FOR.

All that can be said about the existence of anything is (a) the thing exists (when there is evidence to support the existence) or (b) it is unknown if the thing exists or not (when there is no evidence to support the existence).

It is irrational to say something does not exist when there is no evidence at all.

 

So, is the "humour" in a joke reducible to a specific sound, sight or smell? If so, it should be easy to become a brilliant comedian - you just have to reproduce the sound, sight smell etc. and people will laugh. Just blow that raspberry! Louder!

I think most humour is much more subtle, and subjective. There is no way to "prove" something is "objectively" funny, because it is a subjective experience. Fortunately, most of us find something funny so we agree that humour exists. Imagine trying to prove a joke was "funny" to an alien with no sense of humour though.

People do have experiences of "God" which are ineffable and often life-changing. That such experiences are not of the senses, and are not a 'response to a stimulus' makes it hard for them to be described and impossible to repeat. It may be impossible to convince a skeptic therefore, but this does not mean such experiences are not real.

 

Quote from Wikipedia on the fallacy of begging the question (of which the circular argument is one form).

1) Lack of evidence for a belief means it is false or deluded.
2) Evidence for this belief (1) comes from religion which is false or deluded.
3) Religion is false or deluded because there is lack of evidence for it.

Sound familiar?

Sarkus is a believer in "evidentialism", so I don't agree with him, however, you should take note of what he says above.

 

agreed, though I appreciate your input we are discussing a supposition made by diogenes regarding a god spot in the human psyche,

agreed, but we can still say no evidence for,
else we must accept every other fanciful imagining as true, fairies unicorns, dragons etc.. they have yet to discover any evidence for or against a fairy.
it cannot be conclusively proved we have'nt got fairies, but it's delusional and irrational to believe we do. we must leave those imaginings for the children.

delusional:
1, A false belief strongly held in spite of invalidating evidence.
2, something that is falsely or delusively believed or propagated.
3, a persistent false psychotic belief regarding the self or persons or objects outside the self

irrational:
1, Not endowed with reason.
2, Affected by loss of usual or normal mental clarity
3, Not according to the dictates of reason; contrary to reason; absurd.

To put that another way: -
When the existence of a thing is denied, This can be proven wrong by producing one single instance of the thing said not to exist. else it becomes delusional/irrational.

Proving Existence or Non-Existence.
The existence of a thing can be conclusively proved by producing one single instance of the thing.

To put that another way: -
When the existence of a thing is denied, This can be proven wrong by producing one single instance of the thing said not to exist

The non-existence of a thing can never be conclusively proved because there is always the theoretical assumption that the thing exists but has not been seen yet or it exists in a place that can not be visited. Unless all places in the universe have been visited and are being constantly observed, we can not be absolutely certain.

From this we can say that there are only two possible statements we can make about the existence of a thing:

The thing exists.
It is unknown if the thing exists or not.

It is not possible to prove that a thing "does not exist" without further qualifying criteria.

If a thing does NOT exist it can not leave any evidence of it's non-existence. Only things that DO exist can leave evidence. From this we can derive that conclusive proof can only come from the person that claims that a thing exists. It is nonsensical to demand proof of non-existence.

i've posted this on numerous occasions, you can gather from this it is irrational, and delusional to believe something without any qualifying evidence.

 

Point taken.

Had never heard of that.
I'm not a "believer" in it - but having now read a bit of what it says on this in Wikipedia, it does seem to closely match my thought processes in such things. I'll have to have more of a read!

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Oh, that's much easier to demonstrate! If just one person says they experience a "God spot", it must exist (unless they are lying). As there are quite a few (i.e . from your poll, and atheists like Dennett) with no reason to lie, I think we can conclude a "spiritual need" aka a "God spot" exists.

In fact I thought you were arguing that a belief in God was false or delusional! It is hard to produce evidence for God, because it is unpredicatable, ineffable and in the subjective realm of experience. However, I would argue that evidence can be seen in the effects that such an experiences have on peoples lives. So there is not an absence of evidence.

If no-one experiences these things, one might question why someone would believe in them. However, people DO have religious transcendent experiences of "God". They usually only happen to those receptive to them, i.e. theists.

So, would you accept as evidence an account of a mystical encounter with "God"?

 

how so.

from my poll, we can conclude thus far that it seem we have an affinity, with the spiritual, but theres no such thing as a god spot. we can be at one with our nature, but a deity is excess to requirements.

so from that, we can then say, that the schizophrenic or any of a group of psychotic disorders usually characterized by withdrawal from reality, illogical patterns of thinking, delusions, and hallucinations, and accompanied in varying degrees by other emotional, behavioural, or intellectual disturbances are real, because they have a profound effect on them.

the schizophrenics are the only ones receptive to there delusions too, notice a simularity here.

no of course not, I would have to accept ever other crazy persons idea of reality as fact too.

 

From your own previous post:
Proving Existence or Non-Existence.
The existence of a thing can be conclusively proved by producing one single instance of the thing.

I agree with you....

I don't think we can infer that from your poll at all. That's just YOUR belief.

If only "schizophrenic or [those with] any of a group of psychotic disorders" had religious experiences you might be right to associate them with madness. However, this is far from the case. Many very sane people not suffering "withdrawal from reality, illogical patterns of thinking, delusions, and hallucinations" etc. have very profound experiences.

The fact that you do not accept people's experiences as anything but "delusion" means that you automatically exclude a huge chunk of possible evidence for religion. It is not surprising that you believe there IS no evidence. This is the opposite attitude to the open mindedness of skeptical enquiry that characterises science.

 

how is this relevant here, where is this one instant.

well there hope for you yet.

no not my believe when ask by

two of those atheist who voted yes replied thus

so I thing I can, state that.

how are they different.

yes, but completely subjectively, so how is that different, from the schizophrenic.

well is there any.

I think you'll find no scientist believes the irrational, to be valid. all scientist and myself are open to suggestion, but it must have a rational foundation, else it is just disgarded.
I repeat, "a hypothesis must contain nothing which is at variance with known facts or principles:
it should not postulate conditions which cannot be verified empirically.
a hypothesis is not genuinely scientific if it is destined always to remain a hypothesis : it must be of such a nature as to be either proved or disproved by comparison with observed facts." can religion do this, no.

 

you are kidding.
most definitely yes, can it be any other way.

 

With concession to light's point about stimulous, etc., it follows clearly that all human knowledge is faith-based.

You have to believe you're typing this, or whether or not you have is inconsequential. If you do not believe it, it cannot be asserted.

Regardless of how "evidential" it may be that I have typed this, it is a leap of faith to assert it... a leap so small that perhaps it's generally not noticed.

This was discussed ad-nauseum in this thread some time ago: The taoist trap