Lost and Found

[Melanie]

Can science explain immediate answers to prayer like the one in this 4 minute CBS News story?
Coincidence? Not a chance. Watch as this atheist becomes a believer before your very eyes:
http://www.faithit.com/atheist-heroin-addict-gets-schooled-on-power-of-prayer/#.Un6hO_sYN3e.facebook
Coincidence? What's the scientific explanation for a coincidence like the one seen in this video?
Why does God answer the prayers of some and not others? (post#19)

[cafolini]

Can science explain immediate answers to prayer like the one in this 4 minute CBS News story?
Watch as this atheist becomes a believer before your very eyes:
http://www.faithit.com/atheist-heroin-addict-gets-schooled-on-power-of-prayer/#.Un6hO_sYN3e.facebook
Coincidence? What's the scientific explanation for a coincidence like the one seen in this video?

Nice video, Melanie. Indeed.
Atheists are poor people like all of us, always driving in reverse until we find first gear. Thank God.

[mal4mac]

It might be coincidence. Why think it would be anything else? Coincidences like this happen all the time, prayers or not. Scientists have considered whether prayer is effective or not, and actually gone to a great deal of effort to test the efficacy of prayer in controlled experiments. Conclusion:

"The largest and most scientifically rigorous study of prayer's efficacy, the 2006 STEP project, found no significant difference whether subjects were prayed for or not..."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efficacy_of_prayer

[cafolini]

It might be coincidence. Why think it would be anything else? Coincidences like this happen all the time, prayers or not. Scientists have considered whether prayer is effective or not, and actually gone to a great deal of effort to test the efficacy of prayer in controlled experiments. Conclusion:

"The largest and most scientifically rigorous study of prayer's efficacy, the 2006 STEP project, found no significant difference whether subjects were prayed for or not..."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efficacy_of_prayer

You misunderstood this. It is the person praying for him/herself that has the effect, not being prayed for, although we believe that also helps. But obviously it might not help if the person refuses to accept God.

[YesNo]

Nice video, Melanie. Indeed.
Atheists are poor people like all of us, always driving in reverse until we find first gear. Thank God.

Nice video, Melanie. And that's a nice way of putting it, cafolini, about driving in reverse until we find first gear.

[Melanie]

Thank you for your comments everyone. But, mal4mac, your Wikipedia link about a scientific study on the effects of prayer admittedly states, "The philosophical controversy on this topic even involves the basic issues of statistical inference and falsifiability as to what it may mean to "prove" or "disprove" something, and the problem of demarcation, i.e., as to whether this topic is even within the realm of science at all". So we agree that the efficacy of prayer falls outside the realm of science. If science has no alternative explanation then that only leaves God.

[mal4mac]

"The philosophical controversy on this topic even involves the basic issues of statistical inference and falsifiability as to what it may mean to "prove" or "disprove" something, and the problem of demarcation, i.e., as to whether this topic is even within the realm of science at all". So we agree that the efficacy of prayer falls outside the realm of science. If science has no alternative explanation then that only leaves God.

The scientists who performed the STEP experiment certainly believed it was in the realm of science, and I agree with them. It seems something amenable to science. Why not? The wikipedia paragraph you quote doesn't reference any sensible material, and is one of the many bits of wikipedia that should be ignored. But if you dig down into the published articles from that wikipedia page you'll see the scientific results, which show that there is no good evidence that prayer works. I wouldn't be surprised if there were millions of people praying to get some money each day, it's hardly surprising that a few of them actually get some. This isn't a miracle, it's a coincidence that happens quite often because of the millions hoping/praying/wishing for money and the fact that people do quite often get unexepected windfalls. For example, I recently got a tax rebate "out of the blue", for no reason I can make out. If I had lost my rationality, maybe through drug use, and had prayed the day before, I might be running around shouting, "It's a miracle!" and some alcohol powered news hack, short of sense & story, might have picked it up.

[YesNo]

But if you dig down into the published articles from that wikipedia page you'll see the scientific results, which show that there is no good evidence that prayer works.

I haven't read the article, but I suspect all it shows is that prayer doesn't work under the conditions of that experiment. That's useful information, but not the message that you are presenting.

If you like statistical studies, you might want to consider those done by Dean Radin and others on PSI phenomena that he summarized in Entangled Minds. I'm mentioning this because prayer and psi phenomena seem similar to me, and the results that Radin reports show significance and so show "good evidence".



I wouldn't be surprised if there were millions of people praying to get some money each day, it's hardly surprising that a few of them actually get some.

Getting well or getting rich or getting anything specific does not seem all that significant from an eternal perspective that a praying theist might view reality. I can see how an atheist might be looking for a repeatable technique to time the market correctly. I doubt that one exists or that works all the time.



This isn't a miracle, it's a coincidence that happens quite often because of the millions hoping/praying/wishing for money and the fact that people do quite often get unexepected windfalls. For example, I recently got a tax rebate "out of the blue", for no reason I can make out.

As a side note regarding the unexpected rebate, you might want to check with that taxing authority to make sure they did not make a mistake. They may request that money back.



If I had lost my rationality, maybe through drug use, and had prayed the day before, I might be running around shouting, "It's a miracle!" and some alcohol powered news hack, short of sense & story, might have picked it up.

Viewing a coincidence as if it showed a causal relationship is not irrational. It is just thinking causally and looking for a rule that might be applicable. People who trade the markets come up with many of these.

I'm puzzled by what you mean by losing your "rationality". I assume everyone is rational. If they weren't, why bother arguing with them?

What I see in Melanie's video is someone whose act of unexpected kindness might have helped change another person's life. Both of these people have adequate free will, so one should not expect a deterministic cause to be at work here. That other person has probably had many acts of kindness throughout his life and nothing happened, but for some reason this time he might have made a choice to change.

The best acts of kindness are done for their own sake without expectations of any deterministic results.

[Melanie]

I wouldn't be surprised if there were millions of people praying to get some money each day, it's hardly surprising that a few of them actually get some.
The video didn't say what he prayed for. He was a "deadbeat" heroin addict. The news anchorman doing the narrating guessed that the argument with his girlfriend was over money, but it was a guess. The girlfriend suggested he try prayer…she didn't say about what. The gift of cash wasn't about money at all. When the Secret Santa gifted him the money, the heroin addict said, "I didn't earn that". The secret santa said, "Yes you did, because you're a good person; when did anyone ever tell you that?". To know that someone believed he had worth, when no one else did (including himself) was when the heroin addict broke down. The answer to prayer was love, not money. That's what it was all about. God loves all sinners (not the sin). The money is here today, gone tomorrow but God's love is forever. That immediate and specific answer was from a "higher power", as CBS news said. There is something called a "stop-gap" where scientists have no answers. This is one of them, "coincidences".

[Volya]

I am not a religious person, nor am I an atheist. And although what happened in that news story may well be a miracle, I don't really see any reason to think it was God who did it, not a lucky coincidence. If a guy goes around handing out money to people every Christmas then it's only really a matter of time before it 'answers' a prayer.

[mal4mac]

What I see in Melanie's video is someone whose act of unexpected kindness might have helped change another person's life. Both of these people have adequate free will, so one should not expect a deterministic cause to be at work here. That other person has probably had many acts of kindness throughout his life and nothing happened, but for some reason this time he might have made a choice to change.


But how many junkies have taken the free handout and shot it up their arm? It would be much better if the rich dude gave the money to health & welfare programmes. Then the money would, more likely, be put to good use. You don't see Bill Gates, Warren Buffet or Barack Obama scattering money around at Christmas. They've made a more considered response to the problems of the disadvantaged.

[mal4mac]

The video didn't say what he prayed for. He was a "deadbeat" heroin addict. The news anchorman doing the narrating guessed that the argument with his girlfriend was over money, but it was a guess. The girlfriend suggested he try prayer…she didn't say about what. The gift (aka answer to prayer the night before) wasn't about money at all. When the Secret Santa gifted him the money, the heroin addict said, "I didn't earn that". The secret santa said, "Yes, you did because you're a good person; when did anyone ever tell you that?". To know that someone believed he had worth, when no one else did (including himself) was when the heroin addict broke down. The answer to prayer was love, not money. God loves all sinners (not the sin). The money is here today, gone tomorrow but God's love is forever. That immediate and specific answer was from a "higher power", as CBS news said. There is something called a "stop-gap" where scientists have no answers. This is one of them, "coincidences".

OK but the words of kindness,and the love, came from "Secret Santa". Why postulate a God from which that love came? You could easily imagine an atheist "Secret Santa" having the same impact, indeed I've seen atheist millionaires having a similar impact on the reality show "Secret Millionaire".

[MorpheusSandman]

Coincidence? What's the scientific explanation for a coincidence like the one seen in this video?Coincidence? Seriously, the fact that crap like this impresses people makes me ill. Most people have problems, a majority of those people pray for relief from those problems, and when you have a guy going around doing "random acts of kindness," the probabilities are astronomically high that at least ONE of those people would be in a dire situation and would've been praying for relief. So this isn't even coincidence, it's something that's highly probable would happen!

On the other hand, go visit, say, 100 addicts; let them pray for some miracle to "save them;" and then keep track of how many receive anything remotely similar. People who want to believe cherry-pick the examples that reinforce their faith, and ignore all of the other hundreds, if not thousands or millions of prayers that go unanswered. They ignore the countless addicts that destroy themselves, their families, and kill others around them, even after having prayed themselves. It's about the grossest example of selection bias I can think of, and I find its cheap, manipulative, blind, ignorant sentimentality disgusting.

[Melanie]

OK but the words of kindness,and the love, came from "Secret Santa". Why postulate a God from which that love came? You could easily imagine an atheist "Secret Santa" having the same impact, indeed I've seen atheist millionaires having a similar impact on the reality show "Secret Millionaire".
Yes, the Secret Santa in the video may well have been an atheist because his spiritual persuasion was never mentioned. But the heroin addict prayed to God (not santa), and God can use an atheist to deliver an answer to prayer if he wants to. Let's say, hypothetically, that the Santa was an atheist, then the man he helped shares that he had prayed to God the night before. The Santa is touched and becomes a believer through it. That's how God works. You don't realize it while it's going on but God could be working on both of them.


...go visit, say, 100 addicts; let them pray for some miracle to "save them;" and then keep track of how many receive anything remotely similar. People who want to believe cherry-pick the examples that reinforce their faith, and ignore all of the other hundreds, if not thousands or millions of prayers that go unanswered….Most people have problems, a majority of those people pray for relief from those problems, and when you have a guy going around doing "random acts of kindness," the probabilities are astronomically high...
You couldn't be further from the truth. You can't "keep track" of when and if prayers are answered because you don't know when God's perfect timing is. You don't know when those 100 addict's hearts are ready. Some addicts haven't hit rock bottom quite yet, and may need to in order to admit they're sinners in need of a savior. Only God knows when each individual is ready to repent. And yes, the probability of one in a hundred receiving an answer to their prayer IS astronomically high because God is just and faithful to open the door to a heart that's ready and willing to deny himself and follow Him.

[mal4mac]

Only God knows when each individual is ready to repent.

How do you know this? How do you know there even is a God? If the junkie says, "I prayed to God and he answered me", why on Earth would you believe him? Hallucinations are a noted side effect of taking junk!

[Melanie]

How do you know this? How do you know there even is a God? If the junkie says, "I prayed to God and he answered me", why on Earth would you believe him? Hallucinations are a noted side effect of taking junk!
You're last exclamation is suggesting I take drugs because I believe God's Word? I'm guessing you're losing your cool because my answers above have made sense and leave you with only emotional outbursts that are useless in productive discussions?

1st Question...Matthew 7:7-23, and the whole chapter of Matthew 13 (the parable of the sower and the seed), and Matthew 25:1-13 (parable of the 10 virgins…5 were ready and 5 were not) all answer your first question.

2nd Question...I could write a book to answer your second question so you'll need to be more specific…or you can read Evidence That Demands a Verdict by Josh McDowell. It's the size of War & Peace.

3rd Question...Your third question I must answer with a question…why not? Are you saying a junkie has no worth? God doesn't believe that. He loves the vilest of sinners (not the sin) Romans 5:8

[mal4mac]

You're last exclamation is suggesting I take drugs because I believe God's Word? I'm guessing you're losing your cool because my answers above have made sense and leave you with only emotional outbursts that are useless in productive discussions?

I didn't say that, I was thinking of the junkie. I'm not losing my cool, you're mistaking me for Sandman :)


3rd Question...Your third question I must answer with a question…why not? Are you saying a junkie has no worth? God doesn't believe that. He loves the vilest of sinners (not the sin) Romans 5:8

No. I take the view that everyone has worth, but I don't need some old guy in the sky to rubber stamp my adoption of that view.

[Volya]

I don't understand how this proves the existence of God rather than it just being a lucky incident. When I was a child I believed in God (I went to a Christian primary school and was unaware there was anything other than Christianity) and I don't remember any of my prayers being answered.

[Melanie]

The video's purpose is not to "prove the existence of God". It merely states that the heroin addict prayed the night before he received an answer. If you're a believer then you know it was God who did the answering. If you're not then you just scratch your head and claim everyone else must be "hallucinating' according to mal4mac.

Why didn't you get answers to your prayers? I understand Volya. You probably did get answers to your prayers and don't remember since you were a child at the time.

But for those who pray and have not received answers then God's Word tells us why:

1. Matthew 21:23….we don't really believe we'll get an answer. "If you believe you will receive".

2. James 4:3….we pray with the wrong motives.

3. Isaiah 59:1-2….Unconfessed sin separates us from God. You don't have to ask forgiveness after you become a believer but you have to admit your wrongs.

4. Ezekiel 14:3….we set up idols in our hearts that separate us from God. (idols can be any addictions to drugs, gluttony, shopping, laziness, hedonism, etc…whatever we put before God…whatever we fill our hearts and minds with).

5. Proverbs 21:13…We don't reach out to others. “If a man shuts his ears to the cry of the poor, he too will cry out and not be answered”.

6. John 15:7….We don't ever read the Bible. “If you remain in me and my word remains in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be given to you”.

7. John 8:47….We never sincerely gave ourselves to God. We must belong to God before we can communicate with God. “He who belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God”

8. Proverbs 3:5-6…Sometimes we don't understand God's answer. God is all-knowing and can see things that we can't. The Bible tells us to trust God, rather than our own understanding of what's best for us. Isaiah 55:8-9 God's thoughts and ways are not our thoughts and ways. 1Corinthians 13:12 says we see things dimly but someday we will see clearly and understand. So we need to just be patient and trust.

9. Sometimes God answers "yes". Sometimes God answers "no" because he knows it's not the best thing for us. Sometimes he answers "wait" because only he knows the perfect timing. Be patient and trust him.

[MorpheusSandman]

You can't "keep track" of when and if prayers are answered because you don't know when God's perfect timing is. Or you don't know when random, positive things will happen; how in the world do you tell the difference? What's more, how do you tell the difference between it being YOUR God answering prayers and any of the thousands of other Gods answering prayers, since surely you'd agree that good things happen to people praying to other Gods, yes?

Your point in posting the video seems to be that: "see, a down-and-out junkie prays for help, and receives help from a guy going around and doing random acts of kindness!" The implication is that there's cause-and-effect happening here between prayer -> God -> event. Yet, as everyone knows, correlation does not prove causation, and, as anyone even remotely scientifically literate knows, you can't even begin to think of causation until you rule out other variables, like sheer randomness.

Keep in mind that there are addicts who ARE believers, that pray for years and never manage to get over their addiction. I should know as my father is one of him, and he's struggled with addiction now for almost 50 years. What's more, one of his best friends from church was an addict too. They spent years praying for and supporting each other. My father's still alive, still fighting his addiction, still falling into periods where he finds himself drinking to excess; his friend died while driving drunk, and, what's worse, had his kid in the car at the time who died too. Please inform me as to precisely what God's plan was in this mess?

Even with the story you posted, we have no clue how that man's life will turn out. I'd put my money on statistics that this "miracle" does not cure this guy, that, eventually, he goes back to using and putting stress and strain on his family. Why? Because I've known too many addicts that have talked of receiving a "miracle," yet have gone right back to using. These "miracles" are momentary; the effects of most of them don't last long enough in the minds of addicts to "cure" them of addiction. What's more, the nonsense belief that they do (along with other nonsense beliefs like an individual can "beat" addiction through sheer willpower) probably prevents addicts from getting the kind of help that actually IS more successful long term.

If I seem to be having an "emotional outburst" it's because I've had 20+ years of first-hand experience with addiction. I know how ugly it is, and I know how "magical thinking" does diddly-squat to help, much less cure, it. So when people post videos like this all I can think is "you have no clue what the reality of addiction is like." That newsmen peddle sentimental slop like that is disgusting, and it's no less fictional than the most sappy Steven Spielberg film. However "emotional" I am, my logic behind this is unassailable. "Evidence" like this video fails in every way that evidence can fail logically, rationally, and scientifically. It's no better than people using those cable TV "reality" ghost shows as proof/evidence ghosts exists, or the Finding Bigfoot show as evidence/proof bigfoot exists.

[Melanie]

I see you posted #20 only a few minutes after my post #19 so you probably missed my answers as to why God answers the prayers of some believers and not other believers. You may want to scroll up to #19. Also, I'm not out to prove cause and effect. I acknowledge that my engine runs on faith…based on God's Word. I'm a believer because of what I've experienced personally and because of what I've observed around me. I haven't ignored it and I haven't shut it out. I've embraced it. I'm not pushing this on anyone. I only share the joy and the knowledge I've learned from God's Word when others ask me to...but that's it.

MorpheusSandman, I'm very sorry about your father's endless struggles with addiction. You're right, I "have no clue what the reality of addiction is like". I think AA says "once an alcoholic always an alcoholic" since it resurfaces and must be dealt with over and over. I can say that everyone has a story to tell of suffering, some seemingly more difficult that others but that doesn't diminish the struggle of drug or alcohol addiction. But God is not looking the other way. He's paying close attention to how we deal with our struggles. He's watching your father, he's watching you, he's watching me…every minute of every hour. His answers to prayer may be yes, no (because only he knows what is best for us), or he may answer "wait" (for the perfect timing). I choose to just believe and trust him.

You don't believe anyone can be cured of drug addiction but there are many examples of those who have changed radically…and go on to lead productive lives, like very effective motivational speakers that help others…lots of others. Your bitterness is an immense burden. I understand it but encourage you to redirect that negative energy into a positive productive direction. You can. And that's when you'll see change.

[Calidore]

You don't believe anyone can be cured of drug addiction but there are many examples of those who have changed radically…and go on to lead productive lives, like very effective motivational speakers that help others…lots of others. Your bitterness is an immense burden. I understand it but encourage you to redirect that negative energy into a positive productive direction. You can. And that's when you'll see change.

This is good advice regardless of one's religious beliefs.

[MorpheusSandman]

I see you posted #20 only a few minutes after my post #19 so you probably missed my answers as to why God answers the prayers of some believers and not other believers. You may want to scroll up to #19. Also, I'm not out to prove cause and effect. I acknowledge that my engine runs on faith…based on God's Word.No, I did read your post, but it just presumes as true the proposition (God exists and answers prayers) that your OP was out to provide evidence for; myself and others have stated why that video is abysmal evidence on any reasonable standard. Such things are only evidence if you believe beforehand, and then it's only evidence if you ignore the mountains of counter-evidence, which is what your post #19 has to "explain away." That post just reminds me of the LessWrong dictum that If you can explain every outcome, you have zero knowledge. (http://lesswrong.com/lw/ip/)

You believe God answers prayers, yet how do you explain the studies on intercessory prayer that show zero correlation between prayer and a higher rate of recovery? You believe God answers prayers, but have to cook up excuses why some prayers go unanswered. It's quite easy to convince yourself that those whose prayers haven't been answered have "prayed for the wrong reasons." It's easier to convince yourself of that than to actually, legitimately, challenge the belief that God exists and answers prayers, to consider the possibility that random sh!t happens for no cosmic reason, that humans are as important to the universe as a gnat in the Sahara is to us. Those things make people uncomfortable, so they, through the cognitive bias of Wishful Thinking, concoct comforting beliefs like "God exists and answers prayers," and then use other biases like hindsight bias, or selection bias, to support that belief.


But God is not looking the other way. He's paying close attention to how we deal with our struggles. He's watching your father, he's watching you, he's watching me…every minute of every hour. His answers to prayer may be yes, no (because only he knows what is best for us), or he may answer "wait" (for the perfect timing). I choose to just believe and trust him.The God that watches and does nothing is an evil SOB that we should curse rather than worship. There is absolutely nothing about dealing with addiction that is "best for us," just as there is nothing about dealing with chronic pain, something I also have extensive experience with, that's "best for us." That people make the best out of terrible situations is just human nature, but to assume that what is gained makes up for what's lost is nonsense. When there are examples of addictions that destroys families, children, and the addicts themselves, there's nothing, absolutely nothing, "good" that comes out of that situation.


You don't believe anyone can be cured of drug addiction but there are many examples of those who have changed radically…and go on to lead productive lives, like very effective motivational speakers that help others…lots of others. Your bitterness is an immense burden. I understand it but encourage you to redirect that negative energy into a positive productive direction. You can. And that's when you'll see change.I'm not bitter, I'm just ticked off when people propose magical thinking to fix problems, like addiction, that magical thinking can not and does not help at all, especially when they have zero experience with said problem. There are too many people that suffer through problems that they should get real help for, but instead they sit around believing that God will send some miracle and cure them. When it comes to addiction, or chronic pain, such miracles almost never happen, and even when they SEEM to happen, they're often illusory, temporary. I'm sure there are SOME people that have come to believe in God and then kicked addiction, but they are in the extreme minority, especially in comparison to the people who believe and pray and continue to suffer instead of seeking real help.

I mean, if you want to believe in your invisible, cosmic daddy then that's fine; but when you start posting videos proposing that this being answers prayers and helps addicts, I'm not going to sit by quietly because I know the reality of such a thing. Whatever "bitterness" I had over dealing with chronic addiction and pain is long past. I have redirected all of that towards positive endeavors, whether it's helping others deal with such problems, or in my passion for the arts, or in my poetry writing. However, I was only able to move past that bitterness once I got over the delusion about there being Gods out there that was going to dump miracles in my lap. Once I realized that the responsibility was solely on me to go out and make my life better, make it what I wanted it to be, was when I was able to do something. Despite all the stories about faith/belief "saving" people, I find that it paralyzes people far more often. It paralyzes them by allowing them to think that, eventually, God will wave his magic wand and save/heal/whatever them from their situation; and they keep waiting when they should be taking responsibility and doing the things that might actually help.

[cafolini]

No, I did read your post, but it just presumes as true the proposition (God exists and answers prayers) that your OP was out to provide evidence for; myself and others have stated why that video is abysmal evidence on any reasonable standard. Such things are only evidence if you believe beforehand, and then it's only evidence if you ignore the mountains of counter-evidence, which is what your post #19 has to "explain away." That post just reminds me of the LessWrong dictum that If you can explain every outcome, you have zero knowledge. (http://lesswrong.com/lw/ip/)

You believe God answers prayers, yet how do you explain the studies on intercessory prayer that show zero correlation between prayer and a higher rate of recovery? You believe God answers prayers, but have to cook up excuses why some prayers go unanswered. It's quite easy to convince yourself that those whose prayers haven't been answered have "prayed for the wrong reasons." It's easier to convince yourself of that than to actually, legitimately, challenge the belief that God exists and answers prayers, to consider the possibility that random sh!t happens for no cosmic reason, that humans are as important to the universe as a gnat in the Sahara is to us. Those things make people uncomfortable, so they, through the cognitive bias of Wishful Thinking, concoct comforting beliefs like "God exists and answers prayers," and then use other biases like hindsight bias, or selection bias, to support that belief.

The God that watches and does nothing is an evil SOB that we should curse rather than worship. There is absolutely nothing about dealing with addiction that is "best for us," just as there is nothing about dealing with chronic pain, something I also have extensive experience with, that's "best for us." That people make the best out of terrible situations is just human nature, but to assume that what is gained makes up for what's lost is nonsense. When there are examples of addictions that destroys families, children, and the addicts themselves, there's nothing, absolutely nothing, "good" that comes out of that situation.

I'm not bitter, I'm just ticked off when people propose magical thinking to fix problems, like addiction, that magical thinking can not and does not help at all, especially when they have zero experience with said problem. There are too many people that suffer through problems that they should get real help for, but instead they sit around believing that God will send some miracle and cure them. When it comes to addiction, or chronic pain, such miracles almost never happen, and even when they SEEM to happen, they're often illusory, temporary. I'm sure there are SOME people that have come to believe in God and then kicked addiction, but they are in the extreme minority, especially in comparison to the people who believe and pray and continue to suffer instead of seeking real help.

I mean, if you want to believe in your invisible, cosmic daddy then that's fine; but when you start posting videos proposing that this being answers prayers and helps addicts, I'm not going to sit by quietly because I know the reality of such a thing. Whatever "bitterness" I had over dealing with chronic addiction and pain is long past. I have redirected all of that towards positive endeavors, whether it's helping others deal with such problems, or in my passion for the arts, or in my poetry writing. However, I was only able to move past that bitterness once I got over the delusion about there being Gods out there that was going to dump miracles in my lap. Once I realized that the responsibility was solely on me to go out and make my life better, make it what I wanted it to be, was when I was able to do something. Despite all the stories about faith/belief "saving" people, I find that it paralyzes people far more often. It paralyzes them by allowing them to think that, eventually, God will wave his magic wand and save/heal/whatever them from their situation; and they keep waiting when they should be taking responsibility and doing the things that might actually help.

How do you know if the man who cuts a log will next be hit in the head with it by some criminal or the log will save his life if he falls in the river. You cannot know the next effect, no matter what you expect. So can only pray, verbally or not, as to what you wish. You are missing the point. Christianity might be a series of beliefs, but more fundamentally it is a series of realizations about the impossibility of determining outcome. God only knows. You don't get the fundamental because you have been led to believe it is just idiotic belief. But that's the ginger on the cake.

[Volya]

All these threads seem a bit pointless. They pretty much always come down to the same few members arguing against each other and no matter what the threads original intention was it always comes down to the same argument.

[cafolini]

All these threads seem a bit pointless. They pretty much always come down to the same few members arguing against each other and no matter what the threads original intention was it always comes down to the same argument.

So, who won the argument? You? By saying that? Obviously this thread is a lot less pointless than would be necessary for this condescending youdiot not ignoring it?

[Volya]

So, who won the argument? You? By saying that? Obviously this thread is a lot less pointless than would be necessary for this condescending youdiot not ignoring it?

Calm down.

[Scheherazade]

~

W a r n i n g

Please do not personalise your arguments.

If you are unable to show respect those whose opinions and beliefs are different from yours,

please consider not taking part in the discussions.

~

[YesNo]

But how many junkies have taken the free handout and shot it up their arm? It would be much better if the rich dude gave the money to health & welfare programmes. Then the money would, more likely, be put to good use. You don't see Bill Gates, Warren Buffet or Barack Obama scattering money around at Christmas. They've made a more considered response to the problems of the disadvantaged.

It doesn't matter. They make a choice to shoot it up their arm or they choose not to. The person handing out money makes a choice to hand out money. He doesn't have to. It's his business what he does with his money.

What I think happened to the addict is that he prays the previous evening because he fears his wife would leave him if he didn't. He didn't expect anything to happen because of it. The next day someone gives him some money. That shocks him and sets the stage for a religious experience which it seems like he had. After that, he tries again to get rehabilitated. The religious experience is real whether he ultimately succeeds with his rehabilitation or not.

It is his business (and choice), how he wants to interpret what happened. Just because onlookers, not themselves having the experience, feel the need to protect their metaphysics by calling it a "coincidence" does not mean it wasn't a legitimate religious experience.

Saying something is a coincidence assumes there is a deterministic, causal explanation that can't be established by that evidence. However, these religious experiences are not deterministic. One can look at them as a resonance between a divine reality and an organism that didn't have to happen in this conscious way for the person. When it becomes conscious, evidenced by the addict's emotional state, onlookers like ourselves have a choice to make: Was this caused by some sort of hallucination, since we don't want to accept the alternative, or did we just witness a dance between the addict and a real partner?

[MorpheusSandman]

You cannot know the next effect, no matter what you expect... Christianity might be a series of beliefs, but more fundamentally it is a series of realizations about the impossibility of determining outcome...My profession is online poker, so I'm well aware of the limitations of knowing what card is coming next. However, between the knowledge I have (of my hand, of my opponent's tendencies, of the remaining cards of the deck, of the community cards, etc.), and the knowledge I don't have (my opponent's hand, what card will come next, etc.), there are better and worse choices to be made. The exact same thing applies to life itself. We always know some things, we always don't know some things, and in that knowledge and ignorance there are choices to be made, and those choices define the direction of one's life.

Is it possible for people to make all the right decisions and end up in crappy situations, or for people to make all the wrong decisions in end up in great situations? Yes, just like in poker it's possible to do all the right things and lose on the last, random card; or do all the wrong things and win on that last card. The idea, though, is that the house always wins in the end. It is impossible, given enough trials, to make every right decision and lose in the long run, and vice versa. When you look at the most successful people in life they usually got there because they made lots of good choices, not because a miracle was dumped in their lap. When I spend time with people in miserable situations it's very frequently because of the exact opposite, a life full of bad choices.

There are, of course, lots of additional things one could say, such as the deck is stacked for and against some people at birth due to class, race, gender, and to greater/lesser extremes depending on geographic location. Sometimes, people have little chance from birth, like many impoverished children that take up with gangs and drop out of school just to survive. What's more, it often just takes one unforeseeable disaster to destroy a life of good choices (like, say, a drunk driver, or a heart-attack). Yet, despite all the exceptions, I tend to find that most people are mostly responsible for being in the situations they find themselves in, and it's much easier for them to pray than it is to take responsibility and do what they need to do to turn their life around.

[MorpheusSandman]

...After that, he tries again to get rehabilitated. The religious experience is real whether he ultimately succeeds with his rehabilitation or not.As I say about NDEs, I don't dispute the experience itself, I dispute the supposed/implied cause of the experience. I've had just as profound experiences with art before, but I don't need to propose that such experiences were divine for them to have such power.


It is his business (and choice), how he wants to interpret what happened. Just because onlookers, not themselves having the experience, feel the need to protect their metaphysics by calling it a "coincidence" does not mean it wasn't a legitimate religious experience. Once the story gets on the news it is now as much our business to interpret what happened. Like I said, such an event wouldn't even put the slightest dent in the beliefs of anyone who knows the first thing about probabilities and selection bias. It's no different than all the "miracle healing" stories done on The 700 Club, whom conveniently ignore the 100 non-miraculous deaths in the face of prayer in order to find the 1 "miracle healing" story. For anyone who is aware of the other 100 deaths, why in the world would the 1 "miracle healing" story impress them? Look at the same thing on the "holy water" healing thing that was ordained by the Catholic Church; you constantly hear miraculous healing stories from the thousands/millions that visit every year, but the statistical success rate is abysmal, with a miniscule amount receiving any relief at all.


Saying something is a coincidence assumes there is a deterministic, causal explanation that can't be established by that evidence.I have no clue how you're making this leap at all. Most would say coincidence is evidence for indeterminism rather than determinism.


One can look at them as a resonance between a divine reality and an organism that didn't have to happen in this conscious way for the person. When it becomes conscious, evidenced by the addict's emotional state, onlookers like ourselves have a choice to make: Was this caused by some sort of hallucination, since we don't want to accept the alternative, or did we just witness a dance between the addict and a real partner?One can also look at them as resonance between the Flying Spaghetti Monster and an organism and it's the same thing. I don't know what the "hallucination" is implied to be. People are programmed to look for "signs" that are "meaningful" to their life. The Coen Brothers parodied this wonderfully in A Serious Man: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUTyEEiulQk However much I don't believe this story is good evidence for anything divine, I don't deny the impact it had on an individual in a bad situation who was looking for a meaningful sign. It's not an "hallucination," it's a typical response from a typically biased, desperate, ignorant brain. It's just an example of the stupidity of humanity, especially the stupidity that ensues when we look for meaningful signs in the randomness of life and make ourselves the center of the universe. In fact, the entire film A Simple Man could be said to be about this.

[Melanie]

...just like in poker it's possible to do all the right things and lose on the last, random card; or do all the wrong things and win on that last card.….That's poker. Now let's look at real life. There are those who think if they do everything right they'll win but no one can possibly do all the right things in life because we're all sinners, including Christians. Daily we all make right and wrong choices. But we can win eternal life in paradise on that last card only if we make one ultimate right choice…admit we're sinners in need of a savior. What could be greater a win than an eternal life of peace happiness? Nothing is greater than that. Suffering now (and we all have a story to tell) is but a drop in the bucket compared to eternal life.

It is impossible, given enough trials, to make every right decision and lose in the long run, and vice versa…it depends on what "right decisions" you're talking about. There's only one right decision for the "long run" (long run = eternal life…doesn't get any longer than that).

When you look at the most successful people in life they usually got there because they made lots of good choices…it depends on your definition of "success" and what you consider to be "good choices"

When I spend time with people in miserable situations it's very frequently because of the exact opposite, a life full of bad choices. Apart from God we all make bad choices….including Christians because they sometimes lose focus and don't seek Him first in all things.

There are, of course, lots of additional things one could say, such as the deck is stacked for and against some people at birth due to class, race, gender, and to greater/lesser extremes depending on geographic location. The deck is stacked against all of us because of satan, sin, temptation, evil, etc


...it often just takes one unforeseeable disaster to destroy a life of good choices (like, say, a drunk driver, or a heart-attack). God doesn't look at death as a bad thing, quite the contrary…He's bringing us home for an eternity of peace and joy.

…it's much easier for them to pray than it is to take responsibility and do what they need to do to turn their life around… Now let's marry those two concepts and we'll have the perfect cocktail…pray AND take the responsibility to do what they need to do. That's the answer to life..
My comments are in blue within MorpheusSandman's post #30. I know you knew that but I had to type something because the pop-up was saying my message was too short :)

[mal4mac]

All these threads seem a bit pointless. They pretty much always come down to the same few members arguing against each other and no matter what the threads original intention was it always comes down to the same argument.

I'm probably one of those "same few members", and I can't remember the scientific studies on intercessory prayer being mentioned in any recent thread. So how is this "the same argument"?

[mal4mac]

... I had to type something because the pop-up was saying my message was too short :)

That's 'cause you are misusing the system. I though Morpheus had gone schizo :) Why not just keep Morpheus' quotes as quotes and your responses as normal text? The blue is prettier, and more concise, but sometimes it's better sticking with the old ways (and you do, normally, like sticking with the old ways :).)

[Melanie]

There's a system? Are you being facetious or does it really bother you? I can't tell. You've never seen it presented in that format before? I do it that way when there are too many parts to comment on individually. It's too labor-intensive and time consuming to put each part in separate quotes. Also takes up a lot more space. But if it bothers everyone then I won't do it ;)

[YesNo]

As I say about NDEs, I don't dispute the experience itself, I dispute the supposed/implied cause of the experience. I've had just as profound experiences with art before, but I don't need to propose that such experiences were divine for them to have such power.

We all have had similar experiences which is why we can understand what the person having an NDE might have experienced. Enjoying music or thinking of a loved one could be seen as similar to a more explicit religious experience although they don't have any specific religious context. One could even consider the use of drugs as a way to get an experience that is similar to a religious experience.

The existence of these experiences and their ultimate religious interpretation is part of the evidence that religion is based upon.

As a comparison, ask yourself what a deterministic machine might "experience".



Once the story gets on the news it is now as much our business to interpret what happened. Like I said, such an event wouldn't even put the slightest dent in the beliefs of anyone who knows the first thing about probabilities and selection bias. It's no different than all the "miracle healing" stories done on The 700 Club, whom conveniently ignore the 100 non-miraculous deaths in the face of prayer in order to find the 1 "miracle healing" story. For anyone who is aware of the other 100 deaths, why in the world would the 1 "miracle healing" story impress them? Look at the same thing on the "holy water" healing thing that was ordained by the Catholic Church; you constantly hear miraculous healing stories from the thousands/millions that visit every year, but the statistical success rate is abysmal, with a miniscule amount receiving any relief at all.

I don't see these things as "miracles". It is just the way nature is, surprisingly non-deterministic and personal, and it is to our advantage to do whatever helps the patient.

One of the early books by Deepak Chopra, Quantum Healing, seemed to describe the difference between the ayurvedic medicine he was promoting and the drug approach to medicine. I'll have to see if I can find his argument again.



I have no clue how you're making this leap at all. Most would say coincidence is evidence for indeterminism rather than determinism.

I see coincidence as failing to reject the null hypothesis in Fisher's interpretation: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_hypothesis). One cannot conclude anything about the coincidence itself. There could be some other cause. There could be no cause.



One can also look at them as resonance between the Flying Spaghetti Monster and an organism and it's the same thing. I don't know what the "hallucination" is implied to be. People are programmed to look for "signs" that are "meaningful" to their life. The Coen Brothers parodied this wonderfully in A Serious Man: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUTyEEiulQk However much I don't believe this story is good evidence for anything divine, I don't deny the impact it had on an individual in a bad situation who was looking for a meaningful sign. It's not an "hallucination," it's a typical response from a typically biased, desperate, ignorant brain. It's just an example of the stupidity of humanity, especially the stupidity that ensues when we look for meaningful signs in the randomness of life and make ourselves the center of the universe. In fact, the entire film A Simple Man could be said to be about this.

Who did this programming? If we are deterministic machines, one can trace that back to some Intelligent Design sort of deity. I don't believe in such deities, because we are not machines. I also don't believe in Spaghetti Monster deities since I didn't see the Spaghetti Monster when the addict had his emotional experience although it looked like a non-deterministic resonance of some sort took place.

Hallucination may not be the correct word, but your description, "It's just an example of the stupidity of humanity, especially the stupidity that ensues when we look for meaningful signs in the randomness of life and make ourselves the center of the universe" sounds like someone was making a mistake.

The point is there is an alternate explanation that these experiences are non-deterministic resonances with some divine reality.

[YesNo]

There's a system? Are you being facetious or does it really bother you? I can't tell. You've never seen it presented in that format before? I do it that way when there are too many parts to comment on individually. It's too labor-intensive and time consuming to put each part in separate quotes. Also takes up a lot more space. But if it bothers everyone then I won't do it ;)

I thought what you said was clearly formatted. People quote things in different ways.

The main reason I'm commenting is because I liked this point you made: "The deck is stacked against all of us because of satan, sin, temptation, evil, etc".

I hadn't thought of it like that, but it makes sense.

[MorpheusSandman]

Melanie, the easiest way to use quotes is this:

-Click the "Reply With Quote" button below the post you're responding to
-highlight the part that says "
"
-right click -> copy.
-Highlight -> cut the parts of the post you don't want to respond to
-Right click -> past before every section you want to respond to
-Add "{/quote]}" (replace "{}" with "[]") after each section you want to respond to
-Write your reply underneath each "{/quote}" section

Doing the above, you end up with formatting like this below:

[QUOTE=Melanie;1245626]That's poker. Now let's look at real life.There are tons of relevant analogies between poker and real life. One of those relevant analogies is that no amount of magical thinking will make you a winner. You can believe all you want that a magical, invisible force can change the next card by you believing in it, but your believing can not change the next card or make you a winner in the long term. Reality is what it is; it doesn't give a crap what you believe about it, and it will not change simply because you change your beliefs.


It is impossible, given enough trials, to make every right decision and lose in the long run, and vice versa…it depends on what "right decisions" you're talking about. Of course it's impossible to make EVERY right decision, but you can certainly endeavor to make more right ones that wrong ones, and, just like in poker, the more knowledge you have and the clearer and more accurate your thinking, the easier it becomes to make more right decisions. The "right decisions" I'm talking about are those that allow (or make it likely/possible) for a person to accomplish whatever goals they have for their life. EG, if one goal is to not die of lung cancer, then the right decision would be to not smoke and not be around those that do; if one goal is to not die of a heart attack, then the right decision would be to exorcize and not stuff your veins full of fat. Plenty of people can't even get THOSE decisions right.

Your goal is to reach a paradisaical afterlife, and you believe that by believing in myths from thousands of years ago you will accomplish that. Of course, there's not the slightest bit of evidence that your belief is accurate, and plenty of evidence that it's not, so while it's impossible to say definitively whether believing is the right or wrong decision, there are certainly better arguments to made that it's the wrong decision.


Apart from God we all make bad choices….I probably see believers make bad choices more frequently than non-believers if only because they sit around waiting for God to dump those miracles in their lap.


The deck is stacked against all of us because of satan, sin, temptation, evil, etcOr just nature, evolution, cognitive biases, etc. You know, things we actually know exist, rather than mythological characters and concepts.


God doesn't look at death as a bad thing, quite the contrary…He's bringing us home for an eternity of peace and joy.People certainly look at death as a bad thing. Hence all the efforts to prolong life; which, I might add, we only started achieving at the dawn of modern science. Until then, God pretty much allowed people to wallow for centuries in unbelievable suffering.


pray AND take the responsibility to do what they need to do. That's the answer to life..Or, do as I've done, and just dump the praying. My life now is far better than it ever was when I was believing and praying. Lesson being that you're better of just taking responsibility and making the best decisions you can to achieve your goals; praying will have absolutely no affect on the outcome, as all the current scientific literature shows.

[MorpheusSandman]

The existence of these experiences and their ultimate religious interpretation is part of the evidence that religion is based upon.

As a comparison, ask yourself what a deterministic machine might "experience". But there's no evidence for a religious interpretation, just an utterly baseless claim. Why religion rather than some aspect of human cognition we (or, at least, most people) don't understand? I think most "religious" experiences are rather easily explained as a brain desperately seeking meaningful signs, and then finding one in a startling, surprising way. I don't know what you mean regarding what a "deterministic machine might experience." What makes you think a "deterministic machine" programmed to look for signs and, when found, to have an unforgettable experience, would experience anything differently? Evolutionarily speaking, it's not hard to imagine that we'd be programmed to have powerful, emotional experiences upon finding signs that seem to relate something important about our life/survival. Evolution would probably favor an organism that would remember such a thing.


One of the early books by Deepak Chopra, Quantum Healing,Why in the world are you reading such a charlatan?


I see coincidence as failing to reject the null hypothesis in Fisher's interpretation: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_hypothesis). One cannot conclude anything about the coincidence itself. There could be some other cause. There could be no cause. Coincidence IS essentially the "null hypothesis" as coincidence is claiming that there's no connection between phenomena (ie, addict praying, addict receiving money). The only legitimate way to argue against coincidence would be to do an experiment where there were multiple trials in order to find some connection between the phenomena. I still don't know what you think that has to do with determinism/indeterminism.


Who did this programming?Evolution. Our cognition is precisely what you'd expect it to be if we were conditioned to survive and reproduce. So much of the biases we come "programmed" with, those same ones that have prevented us from understanding so many aspects about reality, of assuming incorrect things for years--sometimes decades and centuries--before we figured out the truth, can only be explained as existing because of evolutionary adaptation. Put it another way, if there were two mutations and one lead to a higher degree of accurate reality processing, but lessened our survival and reproduction abilities; and another that was the exact opposite; the latter would be what would be passed down, "programmed," into our cognition.


Hallucination may not be the correct word, but your description, "It's just an example of the stupidity of humanity, especially the stupidity that ensues when we look for meaningful signs in the randomness of life and make ourselves the center of the universe" sounds like someone was making a mistake. The man was making a mistake of causal interpretation, not seeing things that weren't there; the latter is an hallucination, and a very different kind of "mistake" from the former. If look to my right and see a wall and propose that wall was built by aliens, I'm making a mistake of causal interpretation; if I look to my right and see a Cheshire Cat head smiling at me from the wall, I'm probably hallucinating. People routinely make make mistakes of causal interpretation, usually because of cognitive biases, but hallucination is significantly rarer.

[YesNo]

But there's no evidence for a religious interpretation, just an utterly baseless claim.

The experiences that people have is the evidence.

Just stating that there is no evidence only means that there is no evidence that your metaphysics is willing to accept. I already know that. I could just as easily claim there is no evidence for the mechanism interpretation and that it is an utterly baseless claim, but you already know that as well.



Why religion rather than some aspect of human cognition we (or, at least, most people) don't understand? I think most "religious" experiences are rather easily explained as a brain desperately seeking meaningful signs, and then finding one in a startling, surprising way. I don't know what you mean regarding what a "deterministic machine might experience." What makes you think a "deterministic machine" programmed to look for signs and, when found, to have an unforgettable experience, would experience anything differently? Evolutionarily speaking, it's not hard to imagine that we'd be programmed to have powerful, emotional experiences upon finding signs that seem to relate something important about our life/survival. Evolution would probably favor an organism that would remember such a thing.

It is also easily explained with a religious explanation.

I am using the deterministic machine as a comparison. A machine doesn't experience anything. Perhaps it can be programmed to simulate the behavior of someone who might have such an experience, but it doesn't actually have the experience.



Why in the world are you reading such a charlatan?

I read a lot of different authors. Chopra expresses his views clearly. I don't think he's a charlatan.



I still don't know what you think that has to do with determinism/indeterminism.

The mechanistic metaphysics requires determinism. That means we have to think of ourselves as machines, not organisms. When QM showed that physics, something we thought was surely deterministic turned out not to be deterministic after all, then chance had to be introduced.

The goal of a mechanistic metaphysics is to remove consciousness and choice by replacing these with determinism and chance. It is an assault on the evidence of an organism's experiences. I don't think that metaphysics works.

[MorpheusSandman]

The experiences that people have is the evidence. An experience itself is not evidence alone for any cause. It is only evidence for a cause if an experience can happen differently if the supposed cause is removed, or if other variables and possible causes, are eliminated. If I see a tree, it is not evidence that an alien placed it there, especially when we have plenty of evidence of trees growing when there's a combination of seed, light, soil, and water, and no evidence that trees are planted by aliens. Similarly, if someone has a "religious experience," this is not evidence for the truth of religion, especially given that people can have similar experiences without it being related to religion at all. This (http://lesswrong.com/lw/jl/what_is_evidence/) article explains it quite clearly.

Again, it has nothing to do with metaphysics. If I propose the "cause" of a tree to be a combination of seed, soil, light, and water, I can "test" this propose cause by removing any of these elements and see if a tree grows. If a tree doesn't grow, then it's good evidence that the "cause" of a tree is dependent on those factors. If I say "the cause of a tree is seed, soil, light, water, and love," then I can test that by simply removing the "love" part and see if a tree grows. What's more, even if we knew nothing of how trees grew, we should automatically prefer the non-love version of this because it's simpler (that's Occam's razor). Taking it back to this case, saying that such an experience happens because of how a brain is programmed fits the given evidence and is far simpler than saying that it happens because of how a brain is programmed by some divine being, especially when the latter can't account for non-religious versions of such experiences.


It is also easily explained with a religious explanation.A rock rolling down a hill is easily explained by the lady down the street's a witch; she did it (http://lesswrong.com/lw/jp/occams_razor/) rather than gravity.


I am using the deterministic machine as a comparison. A machine doesn't experience anything. Perhaps it can be programmed to simulate the behavior of someone who might have such an experience, but it doesn't actually have the experience.All of these statements are just naked conjecture on your part. How in the world would you know what a deterministic machine would or wouldn't experience and how, if it all, it would be different from what we experience? I'm not talking about, say, how a sewing machine would "experience" anything, but how an AI programmed with a 1:1 digital cognition to our own would "experience" anything.


Chopra expresses his views clearly. I don't think he's a charlatan.Well, at least this simplifies our QM arguments. Every time you make an argument I can just copy/paste this quote and you'll lose credibility with everyone worthwhile having credibility with.


The goal of a mechanistic metaphysics is to remove consciousness and choice by replacing these with determinism and chance. It is an assault on the evidence of an organism's experiences. The former statement is plain wrong, the latter is laughable in the wake of almost every significant scientific discovery in the last 200-or-so years "assaulting the evidence of our organic experiences," and all of this still has nothing to do with someone having a "religious experience."

[cacian]

Morpheus I am liking the word 'charlatan'. I find the word fascinating.
on the same subject am I wrong/fastidious or correct replace this proverb
''believe in a stone and you will be healed''
with
''believe in religion and you'll be healed''

the question is: does religion make us gullible?

[YesNo]

An experience itself is not evidence alone for any cause. It is only evidence for a cause if an experience can happen differently if the supposed cause is removed, or if other variables and possible causes, are eliminated. If I see a tree, it is not evidence that an alien placed it there, especially when we have plenty of evidence of trees growing when there's a combination of seed, light, soil, and water, and no evidence that trees are planted by aliens. Similarly, if someone has a "religious experience," this is not evidence for the truth of religion, especially given that people can have similar experiences without it being related to religion at all. This (http://lesswrong.com/lw/jl/what_is_evidence/) article explains it quite clearly.

Here's a quote from the Yudkowsky blog you cited (http://lesswrong.com/lw/jl/what_is_evidence/):


This is why rationalists put such a heavy premium on the paradoxical-seeming claim that a belief is only really worthwhile if you could, in principle, be persuaded to believe otherwise.
I agree with that statement. For example, many worlds, which this author promotes, is that kind of belief. There is nothing about it that could refute it.

Whether some religious reality underlies a religious experience might be similar, however, the experience still exists and needs to be accounted for. Most people want to know what is actually the case. They don't want any explanation, no matter how simplistic. They want the truth. They don't want an explanation that fits someone's metaphysics, religious or otherwise. They want the truth.



Again, it has nothing to do with metaphysics.

It is all about metaphysics. Here's another quote from Yudkowsky, same link:


If what you believe doesn't depend on what you see, you've been blinded as effectively as by poking out your eyeballs.

Again, I agree with him although I don't support his metaphysics. What we see is the religious experience in others. We also have our own experiences, specifically religious or otherwise. That is the evidence. The metaphysics comes in when we think we have an explanation for the evidence when all we are doing is trying to keep our metaphysics afloat.

By the way, Yudkowsky should apply what he says to his own belief in many worlds.



If I propose the "cause" of a tree to be a combination of seed, soil, light, and water, I can "test" this propose cause by removing any of these elements and see if a tree grows. If a tree doesn't grow, then it's good evidence that the "cause" of a tree is dependent on those factors. If I say "the cause of a tree is seed, soil, light, water, and love," then I can test that by simply removing the "love" part and see if a tree grows. What's more, even if we knew nothing of how trees grew, we should automatically prefer the non-love version of this because it's simpler (that's Occam's razor). Taking it back to this case, saying that such an experience happens because of how a brain is programmed fits the given evidence and is far simpler than saying that it happens because of how a brain is programmed by some divine being, especially when the latter can't account for non-religious versions of such experiences.

One automatically prefers the truth unless one has a preconceived metaphysics that one has to support.

If simplicity is all that counts then believing that the universe is a deterministic simulation is simpler. However, since the universe is not deterministic, and therefore not computable, such simulations aren't possible. But that doesn't stop some people from believing in the impossible.

Who do you think programmed the brain? You believe in many worlds, so evolution, or more specifically natural selection, doesn't work. Did some clock-maker deity design these deterministic many worlds?

On the other hand, I am not saying that the brain was programmed at all. The brain was not programmed because we are organisms not machines. There is no programming required. However, that doesn't mean there aren't influences.



All of these statements are just naked conjecture on your part. How in the world would you know what a deterministic machine would or wouldn't experience and how, if it all, it would be different from what we experience? I'm not talking about, say, how a sewing machine would "experience" anything, but how an AI programmed with a 1:1 digital cognition to our own would "experience" anything.

How do you know such a machine experiences anything? That sounds like a "naked conjecture".

[MorpheusSandman]

I agree with that statement. For example, many worlds, which this author promotes, is that kind of belief. There is nothing about it that could refute it.Yes there is, and I've listed examples before. I think you have a profound selective amnesia when it comes to that topic. Here's a LessWrong article specifically on this subject (http://lesswrong.com/lw/q4/decoherence_is_falsifiable_and_testable/), read it 1000 times until you understand it, because, as I said in the last thread, I am sick to death of repeating myself on this subject. Seriously, how many times do you think I could find examples in the last several threads on this subject where you've postulated that Bell-like experiments disprove MW, despite the fact that myself, Cioran, et al. have repeated every time you've mentioned it that Bell assumes the collapse, and any test that assumes a collapse can not disprove MW?


Whether some religious reality underlies a religious experience might be similar, however, the experience still exists and needs to be accounted for. Most people want to know what is actually the case. They don't want any explanation, no matter how simplistic. They want the truth. They don't want an explanation that fits someone's metaphysics, religious or otherwise. They want the truth.I think you are quite wrong in your belief that most people want "the truth." If the truth is something that makes them feel insignificant, unimportant, insecure, etc. most people would vastly prefer to believe a comforting lie or fantasy, and that's precisely what they do. There's an entire bias/logical fallacy called Wishful Thinking, you know. Yes, such experiences need accounting for, but I'm putting my money on the field of cognitive science and research.

I remember once seeing a documentary on cognitive science and art, especially on music, and how scientists were starting to understand how brains responded positively to combinations of a certain level of predictability and surprise, especially when that surprise could be connected to that predictability. It ultimately goes back to our brain's delight in discovery patterns in reality; and I'm inclined to think that most "religious experiences" are nothing but an extreme version of that pattern finding, of connecting "surprises" to our "predictions" relative to their importance in our survival/reproduction and preserving things important to us. It doesn't take a genius to see how all of this is strongly in play in the "addict prays and becomes recipient of random act of kindness" situation.


What we see is the religious experience in others. We also have our own experiences, specifically religious or otherwise. That is the evidence. The metaphysics comes in when we think we have an explanation for the evidence when all we are doing is trying to keep our metaphysics afloat.Yudkowsky's "metaphysics" of observing the entanglement of different states of an object and its possible causes and factoring that into Bayes' Theorem is innately against believing/disbelieving anything "just to keep our metaphysics afloat," because you cannot do the later while espousing the former without being a hypocrite, and I dare you to point out any example of Yudkowsky being a hypocrite on this point.

I still see you insisting that "our experiences... is the evidence," but I just finished explaining why this is not the case. No experience by itself is evidence for any proposed cause or metaphysical belief. Until you disentangle the variables and see if any one variable is continually linked to a higher rate of occurrence of the experience, you can't possibly begin to speak of anything being "evidence" for a cause. You also can't say that "coincidence" is a "metaphysics" because it is, as I explained earlier, the null hypothesis, the initial assumption that needs to be proved wrong. It's the bulwark against the various False Cause logical fallacies. If you begin by believing that there is a causal connection then THAT'S when metaphysics is getting in the way; not when you start by believing mere coincidence.


By the way, Yudkowsky should apply what he says to his own belief in many worlds.He has. If you understood anything about Many Worlds, Bayesian Reasoning, evidence, etc. you'd know that.


If simplicity is all that counts then believing that the universe is a deterministic simulation is simpler. However, since the universe is not deterministic, and therefore not computable, such simulations aren't possible.Why is it simpler to believe the universe is a simulation rather than real? Any simulation would have to exist in another real universe, which would make any simulation hypothesis automatically more complicated (a real universe VS a simulation universe inside a real universe). You have never established that the universe is indeterministic beyond your metaphysical wish for it to be so. Your appeals to QM to believe in indeterminism rests solely on your near complete ignorance of QM and some kind of mental block against understanding it past the point that it would upset your metaphysical wish.


Who do you think programmed the brain? You believe in many worlds, so evolution, or more specifically natural selection, doesn't work.Why in the world doesn't evolution/natural selection work in MW?


The brain was not programmed because we are organisms not machines.Organisms still come programmed, that's the entire point of passing on DNA. That the programming is probabilistic and unpredictable (to an extent) doesn't mean it isn't programmed.


How do you know such a machine experiences anything? That sounds like a "naked conjecture"I don't/wouldn't know what they experience, but you were the one making the claim they wouldn't experience something, which would require you knowing something about it you couldn't possibly know. You should keep better track of who made what claims.

[YesNo]

Here's a LessWrong article specifically on this subject (http://lesswrong.com/lw/q4/decoherence_is_falsifiable_and_testable/), read it 1000 times until you understand it

Why do you keep referring to the LessWrong site?



Seriously, how many times do you think I could find examples in the last several threads on this subject where you've postulated that Bell-like experiments disprove MW, despite the fact that myself, Cioran, et al. have repeated every time you've mentioned it that Bell assumes the collapse, and any test that assumes a collapse can not disprove MW?

I think the evidence from the Bell-like experiments falsify many worlds or at least the claim that it is any more local than any of the other interpretations. Many worlds gets its wave function from the same source as Copenhagen and Consistent Histories. Many worlds cannot even create the simplest wave function without getting it elsewhere because it cannot generate the Born probabilities. If the Bell-like experiments leave these other interpretations with "non-separability", then it leaves many worlds with that as well.

Unless you can get past the above, then many worlds has been falsified.



I think you are quite wrong in your belief that most people want "the truth." If the truth is something that makes them feel insignificant, unimportant, insecure, etc. most people would vastly prefer to believe a comforting lie or fantasy, and that's precisely what they do. There's an entire bias/logical fallacy called Wishful Thinking, you know. Yes, such experiences need accounting for, but I'm putting my money on the field of cognitive science and research.

No, they want the truth.



I remember once seeing a documentary on cognitive science and art, especially on music, and how scientists were starting to understand how brains responded positively to combinations of a certain level of predictability and surprise, especially when that surprise could be connected to that predictability. It ultimately goes back to our brain's delight in discovery patterns in reality; and I'm inclined to think that most "religious experiences" are nothing but an extreme version of that pattern finding, of connecting "surprises" to our "predictions" relative to their importance in our survival/reproduction and preserving things important to us. It doesn't take a genius to see how all of this is strongly in play in the "addict prays and becomes recipient of random act of kindness" situation.

Or that pattern finding is nothing but a basic form of religious experience. I could agree with that.



Yudkowsky's "metaphysics" of observing the entanglement of different states of an object and its possible causes and factoring that into Bayes' Theorem is innately against believing/disbelieving anything "just to keep our metaphysics afloat," because you cannot do the later while espousing the former without being a hypocrite, and I dare you to point out any example of Yudkowsky being a hypocrite on this point.

It is not hypocrisy so much as being caught in a metaphysical box that one cannot see one's way out of.



I still see you insisting that "our experiences... is the evidence," but I just finished explaining why this is not the case. No experience by itself is evidence for any proposed cause or metaphysical belief. Until you disentangle the variables and see if any one variable is continually linked to a higher rate of occurrence of the experience, you can't possibly begin to speak of anything being "evidence" for a cause. You also can't say that "coincidence" is a "metaphysics" because it is, as I explained earlier, the null hypothesis, the initial assumption that needs to be proved wrong. It's the bulwark against the various False Cause logical fallacies. If you begin by believing that there is a causal connection then THAT'S when metaphysics is getting in the way; not when you start by believing mere coincidence.

In all of this I am not looking for a "cause" unless that cause is a non-deterministic explanation. The non-deterministic part of this gives the coincidence potential meaning. Consider a placebo effect in medicine as an example. It does not always work, but when it does the cure comes from the consciousness of the patient and not the drug.



Why is it simpler to believe the universe is a simulation rather than real? Any simulation would have to exist in another real universe, which would make any simulation hypothesis automatically more complicated (a real universe VS a simulation universe inside a real universe).

For the record, I don't believe we are in a simulation. However, a simulation is simpler than many worlds. In the simulation there are only two real worlds.



You have never established that the universe is indeterministic beyond your metaphysical wish for it to be so. Your appeals to QM to believe in indeterminism rests solely on your near complete ignorance of QM and some kind of mental block against understanding it past the point that it would upset your metaphysical wish.

Quantum indeterminism is standard physics. I don't need to wish for it.



Why in the world doesn't evolution/natural selection work in MW?

Evolution doesn't work in any deterministic universe where the determinism is at the quantum level. In such a universe, evolution would only be an illusion that nature does some sort of "selecting" when the real cause is a quantum configuration set up during the big bang. In many worlds, with the wave function encompassing the whole universe, any act of natural selection splits the universe into many different sets of worlds each containing a different outcome. Nothing is selected because everything is selected.



Organisms still come programmed, that's the entire point of passing on DNA. That the programming is probabilistic and unpredictable (to an extent) doesn't mean it isn't programmed.

There are a lot of factors affecting us. We do not have absolute free will. Organisms aren't programmed. They are involved in natural selection. DNA I suspect is overrated. What is underrated is psychic phenomena.



I don't/wouldn't know what they experience, but you were the one making the claim they wouldn't experience something, which would require you knowing something about it you couldn't possibly know. You should keep better track of who made what claims.

My computer, as a computer, doesn't experience anything. However, I can see that my cat does. In general it looks like organisms do. Perhaps even electrons do, since they are in perpetual motion and give uncertain answers when asked questions. The claim is that one day in the future we will create a deterministic object that can experience something requires a metaphysics suggesting this is possible. It is on the same order as assuming we could create a simulation world.

Perhaps the reason I would make the claim is a belief that totally deterministic entities don't experience anything.

[MorpheusSandman]

Why do you keep referring to the LessWrong site? Because it's accurate and insightful as to many of the problems you're having.


I think the evidence from the Bell-like experiments falsify many worldsOf course you do. Now go tell this to any quantum physicist and watch them laugh in your face.


No, they want the truth. Cognitive science says differently.


Or that pattern finding is nothing but a basic form of religious experience. I could agree with that.Or religious experiences are a basic form of pattern finding.


It is not hypocrisy so much as being caught in a metaphysical box that one cannot see one's way out of.The way out of it is Bayesian rationality.


In all of this I am not looking for a "cause" unless that cause is a non-deterministic explanation.So you've just admitted your own "metaphysics" of not accepting any deterministic explanation. No wonder you're so resistant to understanding MW.


However, a simulation is simpler than many worlds. In the simulation there are only two real worlds.This is factually incorrect, and you'd understand why if you'd read and understood the article I linked to.


Quantum indeterminism is standard physics."Standard" physics fails Occam's Razor and everything else we know about physics.


Evolution doesn't work in any deterministic universe where the determinism is at the quantum level. In such a universe, evolution would only be an illusion that nature does some sort of "selecting" when the real cause is a quantum configuration set up during the big bang. In many worlds, with the wave function encompassing the whole universe, any act of natural selection splits the universe into many different sets of worlds each containing a different outcome. Nothing is selected because everything is selected.This assumes that every big bang would have the same initial set of parameters. Within a set of initial parameters selected by the wavefunction there would be "natural selection" within those limits. This is identical to Game Theory where every game with its own set of rules creates a "correct" strategy. Natural selection is simply what we call the "correct strategy" given the universe and its parameters that we find ourselves in and, more specifically, the part of the universe we find ourselves in (meaning our galaxy, solar system, planet, etc., which creates its own "rules within the rules" of the larger universal game). While it's true that MW would exclude an indeterministic natural selection, this does not mean that natural selection as we understand it wouldn't still occur.


Organisms aren't programmed. They are involved in natural selection. DNA I suspect is overrated. What is underrated is psychic phenomena.Organisms being involved in natural selection has nothing to do with them being/not being programmed. DNA says you're overrated, and psychic phenomena cannot exist without the DNA that forms it.


My computer, as a computer, doesn't experience anything... The claim is that one day in the future we will create a deterministic object that can experience something requires a metaphysics suggesting this is possible. It is on the same order as assuming we could create a simulation world. I already excluded objects like your computer with the example of a sewing machine, same thing. Obviously AI is still in its infancy, but we've already managed to digitize all kinds of things we never would've dreamed of. If you can digitize photography, you can digitize an eye; if you can digitize music, you can digitize an ear. Now all that's needed is a digitized brain, which will, indeed, be much more complex and may or may not be possible. I'm agnostic on the issue, but things are currently pointing in that direction, and this is in no way on the same level of a simulation world as a simulated world would be magnitudes more complex than a lone human brain. This is like saying in 1940 that flying to the moon and flying to another galaxy are equally likely metaphysically speaking.

[YesNo]

"Standard" physics fails Occam's Razor and everything else we know about physics.

I'll stick with standard physics.

[MorpheusSandman]

Would you also like to stick with a flat earth and Geocentrism?

[Melanie]

An Atheist's View on Life

I will live my life according to these beliefs
God does not exist
It is just foolish to think
That there is a God with a cosmic plan
That an all-powerful God brings redemption and healing to the pain and suffering in the world
Is a comforting thought, however
It
Is only wishful thinking
People can do as they please without eternal consequences
The idea that
I am deserving of Hell
Because of sin
Is a lie meant to make me a slave to those in power
"The more you have, the happier you will be"
Our existence has no grand meaning or purpose
In a world with no God
There is freedom to be who I want to be
But with God
Everything is fine
It is ridiculous to think
I am lost and in need of saving


A Christian's View on Life
(read this bottom to top)


~Anonymous

[MorpheusSandman]

Well, it's somewhat clever that you can read it forwards and backwards and get two opposing meanings, but that's about the only redeeming quality. It's utterly prosaic: no striking images, no figurative language, no sense of musicality or rhythm, just banal propositions from beginning to end. It should go without saying that not all atheists think all those things, but it's typical of the Christian caricaturization of atheists.

[miyako73]

Morpheus, I don't think that is a poem. From above is a declaration of freedom and from below is a confession of faith. Both are expected to be prosey and yes, straight to the point. Melanie, be careful. Post your source. There's a plagiarism/copyright policy here.

[Melanie]

Oh, thank you Miyako! I never intended for that to look like something I wrote since this thread has nothing to do with writing poetry or prose! I just never thought of that. My apologies. It's actually anonymous as far as I know so I'll post that. It was posted on my Facebook as an image. If you know the author, please let me know.

I just googled it and no one seems to know the source. It's making it's way around the internet.