Dinosaurs in the bible?

POSTED BY: midori
UPDATED: Friday, March 14, 2025 19:10
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HKCAVALIER

Friday, August 19, 2005 8:35 PM

Oh, and calling something "essentially subjective" is circular reasoning; something essentially unvarifiable through scientific means. The fact that people make these reports isn't subjective. The question of why so many people describe such strikingly similar experiences has yet to be adequately explained.

HKCavalier

Hey, hey, hey, don't be mean. We don't have to be mean, because, remember, no matter where you go, there you are.

SIGNYM

Friday, August 19, 2005 8:41 PM

Well, if I were to do a scientific study, one of the things I would be looking for is whether this phenomenon always occurs when people die and are revived. If it only occurs sometimes or rarely, then I would wonder whether it is really a reliable indicator of what we call the "supernatural" or truly unknown phenomenon or whether it's related to some special circumstance- I would look specifically at how ppl died who experienced this phenomenon v how people died who didn't. Although it would be difficult, if I had an idea of what circumstances were involved I might try to reproduce them (minus the dying part), or perhaps see if electrical brain stimulation could reproduce the same effect. (For example, "out of body" experiences can be triggered by stimulation w/ electrodes.) http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/obe.html

BTW- calling something "subjective" isn't circular reasoning. Feeling hot is subjective, but temperature can be verified. I'd try to verify what people were subjectively reporting.

SERGEANTX

Friday, August 19, 2005 8:42 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by HKCavalier:
Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
I guess scientists would like to examine something other than "self-report" because it is essentially subjective?

But that doesn't make it "wrong." On the contrary, to my mind, it makes it "likely."

But, HK, it does make it much more likely to be an experience that originates in the mind. I think that explanation, rather than discounting the phenomenon altogether, is the more common assumption of scientists. Of course, they're leaving out a whole rash of other explanations that you've mentioned.

I agree with you that 'something' is going on. It's far too universal and well-reported to be a hoax, or tall tales.

SergeantX

"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock

HKCAVALIER

Friday, August 19, 2005 9:15 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SergeantX:
Quote:
Originally posted by HKCavalier:
But that doesn't make it "wrong." On the contrary, to my mind, it makes it "likely."
But, HK, it does make it much more likely to be an experience that originates in the mind.

See, now here's a totally unprovable assumption of materialistic thought: something called "the mind" is located in a thing called "the body." And yet there is no varifiable organ or location. The mechanism for feeling heat is located in heat-sensing nerves in the body which send information to the brain which relays the information to an extremity to pull it out of the fire, for instance, but where is the mind?

What if "mind" is a universal field of which we only "pick up" certain frequencies? Unable to sense the field as a whole, many people imagine that the field is a few billion localized entities. Others have some inkling of it, but it comes and goes very unreliably, so they call it "God." Still others of us perceive the larger field on a daily basis and call it the conscious world.

EDITED TO ADD: the concept of God as a partial perception of universal mind accounts nicely for the phenomenon of holy wars. People perceive that God exists within a local or national population and that those outside of that locality or nation have no God, meaning that they have no mind, meaning there is no stigma in killing them.

HKCavalier

Hey, hey, hey, don't be mean. We don't have to be mean, because, remember, no matter where you go, there you are.

SERGEANTX

Friday, August 19, 2005 9:52 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by HKCavalier:
See, now here's a totally unprovable assumption of materialistic thought: something called "the mind" is located in a thing called "the body." And yet there is no varifiable organ or location. The mechanism for feeling heat is located in heat-sensing nerves in the body which send information to the brain which relays the information to an extremity to pull it out of the fire, for instance, but where is the mind?

What if "mind" is a universal field of which we only "pick up" certain frequencies? Unable to sense the field as a whole, many people imagine that the field is a few billion localized entities. Others have some inkling of it, but it comes and goes very unreliably, so they call it "God." Still others of us perceive the larger field on a daily basis and call it the conscious world.

EDITED TO ADD: the concept of God as a partial perception of universal mind accounts nicely for the phenomenon of holy wars. People perceive that God exists within a local or national population and that those outside of that locality or nation have no God, meaning that they have no mind, meaning there is no stigma in killing them.

This is such fascinating stuff to me. I really wish I could find someone who's read GEB, that book I mentioned in the other thread. One of the themes of the book is presenting a *possible* materialistic explanation of the mind despite the difficulties you mentioned. A really interesting byproduct of the ideas is that they imply the possibility of he kind of universal mind you mention as well.

My son is majoring in neurophilosophy so you can imagine we have some really cool conversations on the topic.

SergeantX

"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock

RUE

Saturday, August 20, 2005 4:15 AM

I've read many books on the nature of 'consciousness' and I'm no closer to understanding the answer than before. But I do come down on the side that it is due to the physical functioning of the brain.

(I haven't made a specific study of the following, so if I'm wrong I hope someone will point out how.) As I understand it, when the EEG was first developed, it was recognized that a flat one indicated no higher brain function, and was associated with brain death and coma. Then there came a realization some drugs (like barbiturates) could suppress brain function and also produce a flat EEG. http://www.emedicine.com/med/topic207.htm However, assuming the person was simply in a drug-induced coma, the flat EEG was reversible as the drugs wore off and the person regained - consciousness.

So as a start, there has to be higher level brain activity for consciousness. (There is other support for this idea, but it's been too long since I read the arguments and I couldn't reproduce it here.)

Medical technology is getting better and better at looking at the brain's function at ever finer levels. What started out at as crude gauge of consciousness - ie the flatness of an EEG - has evolved into a more sophisticated understanding of the brain's workings.

For example, they know that there are several levels of perception: the one which bypasses your thoughts and connects directly with the limbic system (DOG ! SNARL ! FEAR !), the one of which you are aware (My that's a nasty looking dog), and the one which you register without conscious awareness (subliminal) but which nevertheless primes your consequent perceptions and actions.

So 'conscious' awareness is not the be-all and end-all of human thought.

I'd like to continue, but I have to be somewhere. I look forward to catching up with this fascinating topic being intelligently discussed by this wonderful crowd later.

Nearly everything I know I learned by the grace of others.

REGRESSION

Saturday, August 20, 2005 7:38 AM

Quote:
Anyone who claims that "shortfalls" in scientific knowledge invalidate the scientific method clearly doesn't know anything about science! Scientists do not claim to know everything, nor do they make the claim that all hypotheses are correct.

SignyM, I think you misunderstand what I was getting at. I am not saying that the scientific method is incorrect, rather I am presenting two viewpoints.

One, where science attempts to explain the universe, and the creation of mankind. As you yourself have put it, science does not claim to have the final answer, and there are holes in scientific theories today, (else scientists would all be out of work)

The second is a religious viewpoint, with an all-powerful being as the creator of the universe. And with this, there are no flaws.

SIGNYM

Saturday, August 20, 2005 10:52 AM

"God done it" is flawless because it is empty. Unlike hypotheses- which lead to testable predictions- "God/ the devil/ insert- invisible being here done it" doesn't predict planetary orbits, antibiotic mechanisms or the behavior of electrons. Being an empty statement means it is not testable, but also not useful. I think that everyone who wants to promulgate "intelligent design" should swear off using all the fruits of science- an endeavor which is obviously flawed. Stop using electricity and stop posting on the inet. Don't use antibiotics or plastics. Don't eat unless the food was produced the good old-fashioned way (organically). Dig your own well and haul up the water by hand. I wish you could stop using gravity, but you can at least stop using the weather forecasts which depend on satellites. Otherwise you're being a hypocrite. (Oh wait- when did that ever bother the right wing?)

-------------------------------

For people who think that "intelligent design" is a discussion limited to evolution, did you know that the religious are attacking the theory of gravity? YUP! Because there is no "unified field theory", the theory of gravity is obviously flawed and should therefore be replaced by "intelligent falling". When I heard about this today, I thought it was a parody. But the folks attacking evolution are willing to take their proposal to its logical extension- since science doesn't explain everything we should replace it with a system that explains nothing.

SERGEANTX

Saturday, August 20, 2005 12:07 PM

Signym,

That bit about intelligent falling WAS a parody.

http://www.theonion.com/news/index.php?issue=4133&n=2&id=4309

SergeantX

"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock

SIGNYM

Saturday, August 20, 2005 12:44 PM

Wow- that's what I get for asking someone to look it up for me!!! I asked a friend to google it. She said- yup- it's real- nelgecting to tell me it was in The Onion. Sheesh! Next time I'll be sure to do my own research.

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