Psychics And The Paranormal

[Seth C Triggs]

Frankly, if someone can use spirituality to further their life or help them get through...I say that's all good. As long as they don't have to force me to use spirituality.

 

And the world could never be fully explained. Science is great for explaining natural processes. But supernaturality (like the realm of physics) is completely unprovable. You're using the wrong tool to work with supernatural things, Dave.

 

If it does end up bothering you though, you could safely ignore supernatural things. I do for myself, personally, just because I have no use for supernaturality. But plenty of people have the gifts necessary to work with supernaturality. So it'll be fine for people to look for ghosts. They could very well exist. But they'll almost definitely be undetectable by science.

 

(On edit: I do not believe Kurari is guilty of an ad hominem because she was not arguing any of your ideas. In other words, Kurari did not say "Your idea is stupid because you're a jerk." She is saying that you are behaving like a jerk by being rather gratuitously combative and nasty to people.)

 

-Seth

[Kurari]

 

Dave, you've made your views abundantly clear and are being a total jerk about it.

And your ad hominem makes you a total jerk.

 

Don't try to claim logic fallacies if you cannot recognize them. I never said your ideas don't have merit, just that you seem incapable of presenting them without acting like a fundy throwing a temper tantrum.

 

Thank you for proving my point anyway with that rather lame comeback though. I'm done.

[Dave]

Dave, you've made your views abundantly clear and are being a total jerk about it.

And your ad hominem makes you a total jerk.

Don't try to claim logic fallacies if you cannot recognize them.

I've recognized all the ones you've used so far. I've even recognized your reliance on the ad hominem. Why do you feel the need to use personal attacks? Don't you have a rational or logical base for any of your arguments? If you think this psychic crap exists all I got to say is; PROVE IT!

[LosingMyReligion]

Oh...well...haha. I didn't expect this thread to get heated...lol...

 

Anyway, I do believe in certain things considered "paranormal" but based on science...

 

I do think we humans have an aura and that it serves some evolutionary purpose...I also believe that our life force goes on and transforms after we die...Maybe we become stars or something...I also think we see our own versions of heaven before we fade out...One last dream that makes way to that gentle good night...

 

But I no longer believe in god or any of the concocted characters in Holy books...

 

So I guess that makes me athiest, perhaps....

[dibby]

I'll stay out here in the real world.

 

Whats that then? Or do you mean the world according to Dave?

 

 

I'll stand behind the science and logic that tells me that all this psychic stuff is pure BS.

 

You talk as though all scientists are unanimous about the subject. Which they are not.

 

 

Dave, I have tried to understand where you are coming from but I can see that you are not interested in an open and honest debate. It seems to me that you have fled from fundamentalist christianity into a fundamentalist materialist science.

 

I still don,t know how you know that my friend who says he saw a ghost is gullible. How well do you know him?

[Dave]

Oh...well...haha. I didn't expect this thread to get heated...lol...

It always does when someone has the audacity to speak up about their non belief in someone else's tightly held beliefs and especially when those beliefs are held on an emotional level instead of a rational one. Look at the arguments given here, they're exactly like the ones that christians use and they also attack like christians. They attack the person like there is something wrong with the person. They make wild claims and state those claims as if they were a part of reality. When someone doesn't accept those claims, and says so, then they attack the person and tell them that they cannot make claims like that. The hypocrisy is obvious.

Anyway, I do believe in certain things considered "paranormal" but based on science...

If they were based on science, they wouldn't be considered paranormal.

I do think we humans have an aura and that it serves some evolutionary purpose...

We have no auras. The belief in them may have some evolutionary purpose, but we don't have an aura that can be "read" by others.

 

Here; this article might be of some help for you. Here is one small quote from that article:

For every other object of color we have scientific devices which can measure any energy emitted from the object, as well as the wavelengths of light reflected from the object. Even though equipment exists capable of measuring extremely minute energy levels, no one has ever detected an aura or the alleged energy that gives rise to an aura using scientific equipment. Human tissue is about a million times less sensitive than something like a PET scanner, yet we are supposed to believe that some special people can "see" what cannot otherwise be detected.

 

 

I'll stay out here in the real world.

Whats that then? Or do you mean the world according to Dave?

WYSIWYG.

I'll stand behind the science and logic that tells me that all this psychic stuff is pure BS.

You talk as though all scientists are unanimous about the subject. Which they are not.

There is no debate in the scientific community about this topic. It is, almost, universally seen as junk science. A few oddballs on the fringe do not make the topic controversial.

Dave, I have tried to understand where you are coming from but I can see that you are not interested in an open and honest debate. It seems to me that you have fled from fundamentalist christianity into a fundamentalist materialist science.

Your personal attack is noted. Of course you need to see it that way in order to protect your beliefs. I was never a fundamentalist christian but your need to think I was is just another way of compartmentalizing your beliefs. It seems that you are the one not interested in an HONEST debate since you feel the need to attack me instead of actually debating the topic.

I still don,t know how you know that my friend who says he saw a ghost is gullible. How well do you know him?

Don't have to know him at all. Ghosts don't exist so he must have seen something else, or believed he saw something that wasn't actually there. If you believe ghosts exist, then bring me one for examination.

[Kurari]

Dave, you've made your views abundantly clear and are being a total jerk about it.

And your ad hominem makes you a total jerk.

Don't try to claim logic fallacies if you cannot recognize them.

I've recognized all the ones you've used so far. I've even recognized your reliance on the ad hominem. Why do you feel the need to use personal attacks? Don't you have a rational or logical base for any of your arguments? If you think this psychic crap exists all I got to say is; PROVE IT!

 

The basis of an ad hominem is this:

 

A makes claim X.

There is something objectionable about A.

Therefore, claim X is wrong.

 

Look it up.

 

I never said anything about your ideas. In order for it to be an ad hominem, I would have to do that.

 

No, I'm just attacking your behavior. I'm the fourth one so far who has pointed it out to you. Time for you to get a clue by four on that, maybe?

 

BTW, I'm another athiest. I haven't engaged you in debate because I don't want to.

[Dave]

The basis of an ad hominem is this:

 

A makes claim X.

There is something objectionable about A.

Therefore, claim X is wrong.

 

Look it up.

I have. You got it wrong. Try using such inane sophomoric arguments on someone else. I'm not stupid enough to fall for them. Here is the real explanation of Argumentum ad hominem.

I never said anything about your ideas.

That's right, all you've done is attack me.

 

IF you are an Atheist, then stop whining and arguing like a christian.

 

Again, cut through all the BS and prove it. If you do you'll be the first person in history to prove that anything considered "paranormal" is real. And you could win a million dollars. Got proof?

[trashy]

Anyway, I do believe.....

I do think.....

I also believe.....

Maybe we.....

I also think we.....

 

But I no longer believe in god or any of the concocted characters in Holy books...

 

So I guess that makes me athiest, perhaps....

Your argument for the paranormal seems to be based on your opinion. Your opinion also seems to have shifted regarding religion. But neither is apparently based on research, fact or science. Without the proper study, you are very subject to slipping back into religion. You should abandon religion based on something more than "I no longer believe" just as you should believe in the paranormal only if you can base that on something more than "I believe."

[Eric_PK]

I think I'm an athiest, because I don't believe in the supernatural anymore.

 

However, sometimes, because of psychics, I find myself wondering about supernatural things and thinking, "what if there is something to it?"

 

Like I remember once watching a television talk show where this little kid fell out of a three story window. Long story short he fell, fractured his arm, but--otherwise--was unscathed.

 

The little kid said that some guy named Earnest caught him. It turns out that Earnest was his dead grandfather that he'd never even met...The dad says he never talked to him about Earnest, so he couldn't have possibly known...

 

That is the sort of thing that keeps me from being all the way athiest....

 

Other things...

 

1.) How do psychics, like Sylvia Browne, seemingly know everything? Well most look fake anyway...they are always guessing...But she seems to not guess as much as others...

 

2.) What about ghosts and paranormal activity? the unexplainable...

 

3.) Alien abductions?

 

4.) Psychic children

 

5.) are people trained to be psychics?

 

These are just questions I've always had.

 

You might want to read a copy of Shermer's "why people believe weird things" (or something like that...)

 

You could also join CSICOP (www.csicop.org) - they have a magazine named Skeptical Inquirer that covers a lot of that ground.

[Gaura]

I just don't have the time or the energy right now to back up my assertions. I'm dealing with a very sick dog (cancer) and that is taking up a lot of time (it always does). So I just don't have time to say much. Let's leave it at this: I know that energy from our nerves does create a layer of energy around us. Working with that assertion is a little more complicated, though.

[Dave]

I just don't have the time or the energy right now to back up my assertions. I'm dealing with a very sick dog (cancer) and that is taking up a lot of time (it always does). So I just don't have time to say much. Let's leave it at this: I know that energy from our nerves does create a layer of energy around us. Working with that assertion is a little more complicated, though.

Yet people call me an asshole because I make statements but when a believer makes statements they praise them. Can you say; double standard? You BELIEVE this energy/aura thing and you hold on to that belief in spite of all the evidence that points to your belief being wrong. People that claim to be able to see these auras have been tested and they failed miserably every time.

[Seth C Triggs]

I just don't have the time or the energy right now to back up my assertions. I'm dealing with a very sick dog (cancer) and that is taking up a lot of time (it always does). So I just don't have time to say much. Let's leave it at this: I know that energy from our nerves does create a layer of energy around us. Working with that assertion is a little more complicated, though.

Yet people call me an asshole because I make statements but when a believer makes statements they praise them. Can you say; double standard? You BELIEVE this energy/aura thing and you hold on to that belief in spite of all the evidence that points to your belief being wrong. People that claim to be able to see these auras have been tested and they failed miserably every time.

 

I think the problem is that you're being rather gratiuitously abusive about it. And really, you started with the abuse with the intimations that those subscribing to any supernatural explanations are by definition stupid. (I'm paraphrasing and condensing.) I, too am most likely an athiest (though I'm probably a weak one in that my position is that I have no need for spirituality, thus I don't care) and don't subscribe to spirituality. Yet I'm not going to just say to people, "This can't exist. You're stupid for believing this."

 

I must agree with Kurari in that she is only remarking on your behavior here. Which I must chime in and say that you really did start out being abusive. And that's seriously not cool. I don't think that's what atheism should be about.

 

Because supernaturality is at its base untestable. Science and spirituality are not supposed to mix. In a sense I would not be able to "prove" any supernatural phenomenon I do encounter because they fall outside natural laws.

 

Hope this helps,

 

 

Seth

[Acolyte]

Dave, do you mind if I jump in and remind you that you're being an asshole?

 

It's easy to dismiss everyone else's experiences because they're not yours. Get over yourself. Nobody has the answers to everything and neither do you.

 

Jesus fucking Christ, it pisses me off when militant asses like yourself preach to everyone else how they know better about What Really Happened than the people who were really there do.

 

I'll say it once and probably again: This website and people like you have seriously made me hate atheists. I'm so damn sick and tired of their thinking that all they have to do is say "It's bullshit" and their making that statement proves to them that it's fact. Then when somebody calls them a fundamentalist they get all pissy and whine about how open-minded they are and how everyone else is the poor half-brained loser for not agreeing with everything they say.

 

It never occurs to them that perhaps they're putting themselves through the same mind-filtering false-intelligence bullshit that fundy Christians and Muslims do.

 

So I seriously fucking hate you, and everyone like you. In fact I may very well leave this board, because I'm damned nauseous over the Richard Dawkins fellatio, the raising of atheism to the very salvation and pinnacle of human development, the hypocrisy, and the blind single-minded asshood of so many atheists. At least Christians teach themselves to be humble. You people make me sick and I've had it.

 

Thank. You. So. Frigging. Much.

 

I very well may leave this website before I start hating atheists.

 

Dave, you've made your views abundantly clear and are being a total jerk about it.

And your ad hominem makes you a total jerk.

Don't try to claim logic fallacies if you cannot recognize them.

I've recognized all the ones you've used so far. I've even recognized your reliance on the ad hominem. Why do you feel the need to use personal attacks? Don't you have a rational or logical base for any of your arguments? If you think this psychic crap exists all I got to say is; PROVE IT!

 

Oh, and it's only an ad hominem if he's using it to discredit you. Not all insults qualify as logical fallacies.

[Kurari]

The basis of an ad hominem is this:

 

A makes claim X.

There is something objectionable about A.

Therefore, claim X is wrong.

 

Look it up.

I have. You got it wrong. Try using such inane sophomoric arguments on someone else. I'm not stupid enough to fall for them.

 

You're making this too easy. Go ahead. Prove me right:

 

Here is the real explanation of Argumentum ad hominem.

I never said anything about your ideas.

That's right, all you've done is attack me.

 

Thanks again for proving my position that I did not make an ad hominem argument. Did you even READ this link? Those examples are still based on the above formula. Check it out, other people are even backing me up on it.

 

Yes, I'm attacking your behaviour. So are a bunch of other people. So far I haven't said anything about your assertions on the paranormal, which is the topic of this forum. Without that, your claims of me creating an ad hominem are FALSE, and it's been proven why.

 

IF you are an Atheist, then stop whining and arguing like a christian.

 

Again, cut through all the BS and prove it. If you do you'll be the first person in history to prove that anything considered "paranormal" is real. And you could win a million dollars. Got proof?

 

Prove what? I DON'T BELIEVE IN THE PARANORMAL. The end.

[Dave]

I think the problem is that you're being rather gratiuitously abusive about it.....

Oh, I see... they can be abusive but what people perceive as me being abusive is wrong.

I must agree with Kurari in that she is only remarking on your behavior here.

She is doing no such thing. She cannot respond with logical, rational, arguments so she must attack me instead.

Hope this helps,

It didn't. Something being called "supernatural" does not excuse it from having to be proven. In fact, they must provide EXTRA proofs. Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proof.

 

Prove what? I DON'T BELIEVE IN THE PARANORMAL. The end.

Well.... if you can't be honest about it then why bother?

[The Sage Nabooru]

I have decided, that from now on I will use my sense of smell to determine whether or not things exist.

 

I cannot smell paper. Therefore, paper cannot exist. However, food exists, because I like food, and I know a lot of other people who do too, and I generally like those people. Some people don't like the kind of food I like, though. Those people are therefore dumbasses. God damn it, why do people who hate Chinese food have to live in this world. They and their curry can eat my shit.

 

BTW, Dave, this isn't directed at you. I wouldn't dream of arguing with your superb logic, which, surprisingly, has yet to make an appearance within this topic.

 

Maybe that's because you know deep down that your logic is not entirely foolproof, seeing as you have outright denied obvious facts (that the science community at large is divided on these matters) and dragged yourself into insults and dismissal rather than actual arguments to prove your point.

 

In fact your view that you are not abusive but in fact the victim only hints at your childishness. But is that really here or there?

 

But can only Dave can determine who is a "real" scientist and who is not? Because "real" scientists are only those that agree with him?

 

Dave, perhaps you're not an Atheist, so much as an EGOtheist...... But still a fundamentalist.

At any rate, on the subject at hand.......

 

Perhaps psychic phenomena cannot be tested in kilowatts, teslas, or degrees? Perhaps we are trying to force something into a box into which it won't fit? It would be like trying to measure time with a ruler, or temperature with a adding machine. Perhaps the definition of what can be admitted and tested into science is too narrow, or at least science lacks the tools to properly measure or test the question at hand.

 

Science deals with the physical world. What is commonly described as "the paranormal" would, in a nutshell, deal with what could possibly exist outside that physical world. Therefore most if not all the current tools within science could not or would not apply to it. That's why I'm totally open to the possibility of ghosts, but when I see investigators jumping excitedly about a temperature fluctuation, I don't share their enthusiasm. Just a thought.

[Dave]

I have decided,....

Rude, asinine, and off topic ad hominems noted.

[Delicate_Catastrophe]

I don't have the time to read through all of this right now, but what sums it up for me is this: Why can't the paranormal and supernatural simply be a further realm of basic science that we don't yet understand? At one time, bacteria, etc was unknown, and diseases were a mystery. Long before that, ancient people really didn't have a clue what menstrual cycles were or what exactly caused a pregnancy. What makes people so sure that we have all the answers now, and that things that cannot be easily seen are untrue?

 

Psychics that are on T.V. are probably all fakes that are good at what they do, but that's not to say being psychic is impossible. Things such as ghosts and near death experiences may very well be real without some religious explanation, we just may not understand the science of it yet (although they've figured NDEs out pretty well, there are instances where weird shit happens that isn't as simple as a white light, etc.) Energy is a funny thing, and scientists are studying consciousness more closely to see if it can be a seperate entity from our bodies. This could even be the answer to an atheistic afterlife.

 

There could be any number of explanations for "para"normal/"super"natural happenings, and I don't write them off as untrue just because I am an atheist, I just think about how science might prove some of them valid.

 

As for aliens, I don't see anything unusual about the idea of an infinite universe having life in more than one place.

[The Sage Nabooru]

Delicate Catastrophe, I actually, if you want my personal opinion, think it would be rather stupid to NOT think that there could be life elsewhere in the universe.

 

Which brings up another thing for me with science.....don't get me wrong, I love science, it's what (quite literally) keeps my body alive. But they say that only a tiny fraction, if that, of known planets in the universe could possibly contain life. This is because life as we know it needs water.

 

Life.......as we know it.

 

Think about it, if there's other planets in the universe, that means that it's entirely possible that other elements and conditions which are totally unknown to us on our single miserable measly planet and moon, could exist; and that life could develop of those elements, totally independent of oxygen, water, and our particular gravitational pull.

 

I mean, considering that the only planet we've managed to explore is our own (and even that not very well), and the only other body we've walked upon is our moon, we really don't have a lot of room to talk as to what exists elsewhere in the universe.

[Dave]

I don't have the time to read through all of this right now, but what sums it up for me is this: Why can't the paranormal and supernatural simply be a further realm of basic science that we don't yet understand?....

Because you can't base an argument on what you believe they might find in the future. If there was any evidence that any of this paranormal stuff might be real, you might have something to base that on. But as of yet all the evidence presented and tested has failed to live up to the claims. Science has made some pretty amazing advances in the past 100 years or so and not one of them has been towards anything called "paranormal."

As for aliens, I don't see anything unusual about the idea of an infinite universe having life in more than one place.

I go along with the math on that one; with billions of galaxies with billions of stars in each one there is a pretty good probability that at least one of them has some form of life on it. It's also possible that we are the only life in the Universe. That's even scarier.

[trashy]

There could be any number of explanations for "para"normal/"super"natural happenings, and I don't write them off as untrue just because I am an atheist, I just think about how science might prove some of them valid.

I used to approach the Bible that way - all those discrepancies, like the Sun standing still and the global flood and the fossil record, etc. - surely one day science might prove the Bible true.....and since the Bible is also a major source of the world's ideas regarding the supernatural, well......as you can imagine as I have discarded the mythology of the Bible the whole idea of dragons and witches and prophecy, etc. have gone with it.

 

Paranormal? Supernatural? I'll believe it when I see it.....

[Kurari]

I think the problem is that you're being rather gratiuitously abusive about it.....

Oh, I see... they can be abusive but what people perceive as me being abusive is wrong.

I must agree with Kurari in that she is only remarking on your behavior here.

She is doing no such thing. She cannot respond with logical, rational, arguments so she must attack me instead.

 

I just beat you to hell and back with one, and you even unwittingly contibuted to proving me right. So now your recourse is once again to whine about how mean I am and everyone else is to you.

 

Prove what? I DON'T BELIEVE IN THE PARANORMAL. The end.

Well.... if you can't be honest about it then why bother?

 

I hope everyone else is getting a good a laugh at this as I am.

[Dave]

I just beat you to hell and back with one,....

Since it's your childish game, I'll let you win.

[Delicate_Catastrophe]

Because you can't base an argument on what you believe they might find in the future. If there was any evidence that any of this paranormal stuff might be real, you might have something to base that on. But as of yet all the evidence presented and tested has failed to live up to the claims. Science has made some pretty amazing advances in the past 100 years or so and not one of them has been towards anything called "paranormal."

 

I'm not arguing FOR the paranormal, just pointing out that we don't really know either way. We can only go on what makes the most sense. To me, it makes more sense that SOMETHING is going on in SOME cases, rather than believing that thousands of people are all making up having the same experiences. For example, it makes more sense to me that a "haunting" that multiple people experience independantly of each other is the result of an energy anomaly, rather than say that it's "nothing."

 

What are your sources to say that all evidence has failed to prove anything is going on? There are the little things like indescrepencies in temperature readings and odd effects on electronic equipment that have not been explained in ALL cases. There is a study in which a parrot was able to identify picture cards held by it's owner in a seperate room. These things are not proof for anything, but they mean there are things we have yet to prove are baseless "nothings." Failure to provide evidence doesn't really mean much in this case, since if we don't know what we are dealing with, we don't know if we even have the capability to test or prove whatever it is.

 

This differs from deities, for me, in that it makes sense to me that there may be more to science than we currently know of. Deities make no sense no matter how I look at it/them. None of this needs to point to any higher powers or anything beyond what we have as atheists, it just means that there may be more going than what meets the eye of the average person. Or maybe there's not. But I think writing all of it off without a second thought would be ignorant. There is so much of our brain that we don't use, and the five basic senses have a documented range much further than what most will ever experience, so who's to say that some don't have valid, freaky experiences?

 

For me, first hand accounts by people I trust are enough "evidence" for me that something goes on, though not proof that it's a matter of psychics and ghosties. Just that we can't currently say what it is, and I think humans need that ego check.