Ask an American, agnostic and atheist man pretty much anything

[RevolutionThroughReason]

That's an almost understandable mistake, but to confuse science and Scientology, or science and religion? Not so much...

he's just not that educated, he was telling us once about some story where a biology professor made fun of him for being a Muslim

something a professor could get discharged for and also nonsense since some of the faculty in the Stony Brook University Bio department are Muslim themselves. He thinks we don't know the difference so he jumps on these words.

[کیش]

Oh wow RTR got a new boyfriend. Amazing, going to impress him by making up stuff how cute.

Ozymandius,

Your cool. Don't belief in god is popular these days.

[RevolutionThroughReason]

Oh wow RTR got a new boyfriend. Amazing, going to impress him by making up stuff how cute.

Ozymandius,

Your cool. Don't belief in god is popular these days.

This isn't a bacha berish Khana in your home village. Here men can interact with other men without it leading to something sexual.

try it sometime Kais.

[ozymandias]

Oh wow RTR got a new boyfriend. Amazing, going to impress him by making up stuff how cute.

Ozymandius,

Your cool. Don't belief in god is popular these days.

Why thanks -- but I don't do it to be cool. I do it because I find it to be impossible to be anything else. I am unable, and unwilling, to pretend that belief is a choice, which leaves me my only option -- to be who I am.

[Afghanistan2010]

RTR at kissing ozy's ass ,you sycophant you found your boyfriend

[Afghanistan2010]

I like you. You are a great example of how religion and science can work together. Science does not need to replace religion (although for many it can). There are many devoutly religious people that accept science and use it to complement religion. The only problem is when you take religion literally and try to replace science with it.

And in all honesty -- wouldn't a creator want you to be all you can be, and use all the gifts given to you to explore their creation? Every artist I have ever met was the same way -- they wanted people to explore every inch of their creation and study it -- not cover most of it up and ignore the parts that they didn't like...

Science is one thing,a blind follower another....

[RevolutionThroughReason]

RTR at kissing ozy's ass ,you sycophant you found your boyfriend

You assume that because that's how you operate in debates that others do I agree with Ozy because his views are logical. If someone says something valid should I deny it?

i'm not like you who just looks for something that agrees with my ideology. I'm Muslim and I can agree with someone who is not as long as their logic is sound. You only agree with people if they say nice words about suicide bombers and Taliban extremists. That's the epitome of kissing ass.

[RevolutionThroughReason]

Science is one thing,a blind follower another....

you are a blind follower of Talibanism

[faye]

Well Evolutionarily we have an intrinsic fear of dying because physiologically our bodies , despite decaying want to increase their maximum survivability So it ascends up into our cognitive realm , the idea of surviving in some way after death allows us to offset the shock of death. and thus we developed these various comfort tales to cope with dying and death and that got jumbled up with other things.

That answers your question on "why"

We actually have many evidences of what people of bygone days have thought, Notice for example in Egyptian Tombs, they had rooms for the dead with THEIR stuff, believing that these people would need this stuff for later. Or Kurgan burial mounds with similar things. Some even with freshly killed young women who would go on to "serve" in the "other worlds".

The framework which defines reincarnation itself is rather nebulous. LIke what is it that actually reincarnates. Is it the Soul? Well what is the soul? Is it the seat of of our conscious existence? our "life force"? The Sum-total of our Gibb's Free Energy in our bodies? Is it some sort of electrical field inside the body?

The question you pose applies similarly for proponents. They themselves do not know what it is that they speak of. Their terms breakdown under examination.

What we have though is evidence; if reincarnation is an actual event where the brain's conciousness or faculties of personal identity and awareness, is the soul and it transmigrates. well then look at Alzheimers patients. Their brains work on some level, they're conscious but many don't even know who they are or or who anyone in their life is, many lose motor functions,, many can't do the things they were able to do. So that scratches that out of our candidates.

Or let's say that reincarnation is a "lifeforce"; lifeforce ....like some sort of vital capacity that drives the organism? Well look at people who become braindamaged after a coma, in terms of their brain they are dead, their brain isn't alive, the electrical activity has more or less shutdown. So why does this "lifeforce" persist, its not migrating, it should have migrated. Yet the body still lives despite the person being effectively dead.

Ok the whole "energy" or the "electricity" angle; which appears to be the most superficially consistent with scientific semantics. Well Ok we do carry this body electric field and yes our bodies carry energy in them. But When we die this is what happens. Yes the electrical processes of our central nervous system stops ...BUT molecules in our body are still channeling electrons, we still have an electric field. If we're reincarnating why does this electricity remain? Same with energy. w know that the body still retain some of that energy. So what's going on here are we only partially reincarnated?. Even when that body decays these electrical forces in our atoms and/or molecules still persist. They mix with others and yes sometimes that matter gives rise to plant life and other forms of life but the matter that went into making them goes comes from so many sources. So if we claim that this is reincarnation what are they a reincarnation, of this person/plant/animal and or that person/plant/animal or maybe an amalgamate? And if we change goal posts and say that "the whole universe is interconnected and it's all really one thing" as a way to salvage the idea of reincarnation. Then that nullifies reincarnation at its core, since this would no longer be a "reincarnation" but an already present state, there would be no "re", it would just be the standard cycles of thermal and electromagnetic energy transferrence that we see all around us in living and non-living bodies alike

so you see ....we don't know everything, but Based on the evidence we do have , that ALL the models of reincarnation are falsified.

So it's not at all what we CHOOSE to see, it's what nature has revealed to us freely.

lots of assumptions with no proof. try again.
what you believe is what you CHOOSE to believe.

[RevolutionThroughReason]

lots of assumptions with no proof. try again.
what you believe is what you CHOOSE to believe.

No assumptions that's what the possible reincarnative models explain. And thus the evidence falsified it.

That's how science works, there's no "choosing" it really, it happens independent of us.

[faye]

hahahah did Afghanistan2010 thank a post which was advocating reincarnation!?!?!?!?

the desperate will latch on to anything to salvage their failed ideas even if that thing contradicts their belief system.

you're the deperate one, making fake accusations. where is the advocation of reincarnation in my statement?

[faye]

No assumptions that's what the possible reincarnative models explain. And thus the evidence falsified it.

That's how science works, there's no "choosing" it really, it happens independent of us.

this is where the asharites got it over the mu'tazillah. you try to use greek logic outside of the realm it is useful for. spirituality, religion, philosophy are not the place for your microscopic inspections.
science is limited by the imagination of humans like yourself, who already believe that evolution is the only story acceptable.

[RevolutionThroughReason]

this is where the asharites got it over the mu'tazillah. you try to use greek logic outside of the realm it is useful for. spirituality, religion, philosophy are not the place for your microscopic inspections.
science is limited by the imagination of humans like yourself, who already believe that evolution is the only story acceptable.

There's no such thing as "Greek Logic" in the defacto sense. There is nature, and how nature works, simple sequences of events we can trace back.

Listen it's your LIMITATION of mind that thinks that Logic is not useful for understanding Spirituality or Religion. But if we examine religion and spirituality LOGICALLY. Both are attempts at giving explanations of the UNIVERSE and NATURE and EXISTENCE ITSELF right? Well Logic is the Instrument by which can acertain properties and characteristics about the universe. Therefore it is perfectly suited for testing the claims of Spirituality.

The only reason you're so anxious or desperate to rescue these New Age Pseudo-Spiritual claims from the scrutiny of logic and science is because you feel intimidated that under scrutiny it will show that your beliefs were just self delusion and that's a painful demon (metaphorically speaking) to confront.

[faye]

Whether you agree with reality or not, it's still reality.



There you go confusing the terms again. When discussing the relation between a flower and an insect, they may use the term 'purpose' (but very rarely do), but they are describing why something evolved the way it did -- not some higher purpose. The purpose of thumbs is to provide a better grip, and an evolutionary advantage -- not some supernatural purpose. Terms often have multiple, and subtly different, meanings.



Except that's not true at all. The fact that it's a fallacy is not a matter of belief, it's a matter of logic, semantics, and language. Admit it, or not, it's still a deeply flawed assumption to assume that everything in reality has a deeper meaning and purpose beyond the fact that it exists.

prove that the idea that 'life, the universe and everything', having a deeper meaning and purpose, is a just a 'deeply flawed assumption'. that is your flawed arrogance and prejudice. perhaps you have a deeply flawed reaction against a relifgious upbringing.

then you have put yourself in a box, tagged, agnostic atheist.

reality for you is a dependence on a greek logic. my reality is more expansive than that. i also read my feelings and intuitions plus am not dependent on scientists to tell me what reality is or isn't. if i don't believe in the same things as you, does not mean i have no reality that i believe in. that is just your flawed assumption.

[faye]

There's no such thing as "Greek Logic" in the defacto sense. There is nature, and how nature works, simple sequences of events we can trace back.

Listen it's your LIMITATION of mind that thinks that Logic is not useful for understanding Spirituality or Religion. But if we examine religion and spirituality LOGICALLY. Both are attempts at giving explanations of the UNIVERSE and NATURE and EXISTENCE ITSELF right? Well Logic is the Instrument by which can acertain properties and characteristics about the universe. Therefore it is perfectly suited for testing the claims of Spirituality.

The only reason you're so anxious or desperate to rescue these New Age Pseudo-Spiritual claims from the scrutiny of logic and science is because you feel intimidated that under scrutiny it will show that your beliefs were just self delusion and that's a painful demon (metaphorically speaking) to confront.

is that why you light your black candles to satan as you recieve the secret knowlede from death metal?