In article ,
says...

On Monday, October 29, 2018 at 1:54:30 PM UTC-6, Paul Schlyter wrote:

In article ,
says...

On Sunday, October 28, 2018 at 3:50:13 PM UTC-6, Paul Schlyter wrote:

On Sun, 28 Oct 2018 12:11:44 -0700 (PDT), Gary Harnagel
wrote:

My point is that why should one draw the conclusion that there is no
afterlife nor God from absolutely NO evidence when there is SOME
evidence that there is?

Well, if you think those meager data is some evidence for a God -
which God? The catholic God? The protestant God? The orthodox God?
The Sunni Muslim God? The Shia Muslim God? The Jewish God? The Hindu
God? The Zoroastrian God? The Bahai God? The Norse God (which one of
them)? The Roman or Greek God (which one of them)?

The human race has invented a LOT of gods. Some founders of religions
may have had some experience with The One True God and then added
trappings (and subtracted things) from them. Others founded religions
based upon certain concepts of there own. The question is, which GOD
would you be most comfortable with? (You, of course, would prefer a
nonexistent one :-)

You see? With your question "The question is, which GOD would you be most
comfortable with?" you admit that man created God, for the purpose of
getting comfort. Because that's your criterion for "The One True God":
the one you feel most comfortable with.... Since people have different
dreams and different desires, they will choose different "One True God"
and all of them are creations by the human imagination.

But that's what most humans do, even atheists. They choose a nonexistent
God not because it makes sense but because it makes them more comfortable.
Yet they hypocritically assert that it is scientifically correct.

I don't know anyone who motivate their religious belief on scientific
grounds. Do you? Instead it is generally recognized that the existence or
non-existence of some supreme being cannot be determined by science, at
least not by our science today. Now, if the "One True Supreme God" would
choose to reveal itself to us humans on a larger scale, the situation
would become very different. But for some strange reason that hasn't
happened in modern times, despite the description of numerous such
revelations have been described, both in the Bible and in the Holy
Scriptures of other religions. How come? Does the "One Supreme True God"
enjoy playing hide-and-seek with us?


Which one? And don't just tell your own belief, instead evaluate the
meager data and tell which one of these gods those data support the
existence of. And do motivate your choice.

Actually, the data only supports that "something" leaves the body at
death that can't be accounted for scientifically.

HOW DO YOU KNOW THAT?

Because it hasn't been accounted for scientifically, just like dark matter
hasn't been accounted for scientifically.

There are many measurements of the universe confirming that the visible
matter alone cannot account for the observed movements in and among the
galaxies.

The only measurement of a human body losing weight you can point to is
one single measurement made by one individual in isolation. Even you
admit that it is a very meager set of empirical data. More empirical data
is needed before any reasonably reliable conclusion can be made, either
way.


Not your words here. You didn't write "that hasn't been accounted for
scientifically", instead you wrote "that can't be accounted for
scientifically". Thus you are making claims about the ultimate capacity
of science, and in particular about future science.

No, I'm not. English isn't precise enough for you to claim that I was
talking about all future science or just present science. In fact. I
believe that spirits will be detected scientifically some day.

The you shoudln't claim that they "can't be accounted for
scientifically"...

WHY DO YOU BELIEVE YOU CAN PREDICT THE FUTURE? Isn't that quite arrogant?

You sure do jump to unwarranted conclusions fast, don't you :-)

I'm just drawing the natural conclusions from your claims to show you how
exaggreated they are...


It is ASSUMED to be spirit (we might as well call it that since we have
no other name for it, just like we have no idea what dark matter is).

By religious people like you, it is assumed to be a spirit, of course. A
lot of people are victims of wishful thinking.

Just like atheists are.

Only the hard atheists which claim there cannot be any suprebe being in
existence. You cannot accuse the soft atheists for this, they merely
claim we don't know if there is a supreme being or not. I mean, who would
wish lack of knowledge? Some religious people of course, but not others.


You also assume that those meager data (one measurement by one signle
person, which has never been replicated by anyone else) are trustworthy.
Any sane person would instead want confirmation by other intependent
measurers before finding it worthwhile to even start speculating what it
is. Girst it must determined whether it is, or not.

You keep applying strict scientific procedures as an argument, but you
seem to keep forgetting that I have stated that the PROBABILITY that
spirits exist (and therefore God exists) must make atheists question
their position. Although there are no additional experiments that
confirm MacDougall's data, there are also no experiments that refute it.

And you strongly exaggrregate this probability, calling it "almost
certain", "99%", "99.9%" or whatever.

If it's ACTUALLY a conscious spirit, then it supports a number of
religions and implies that there is life beyond the grave. It seems
to me that the pure Christian religion taught in the Bible supports a
loving, personal, prescient God

Here you sound like a Jehovas Witness. Are you a Jehovas Witness?

No :-))

Well, your belief seems quite close to theirs, so perhaps you should
consider joining them?


whose goal is to make us become like Him.

Do God really want competitors? Because that's what would happen if we
became like him - that would make us God-like, right?

So you're off with another false assumption. Jesus prayed that we would be
one as He and His Father were one. There is NO competition.

You want Christianity to become polytheistic on a massive scale? That we
all should become gods?

Btw do you, or do you not, believe in the trinity of the Father, the Son
and the Holy Spirit? Or do you belive that the Father is the one and only
god?


All other religions would have us either be groupies to God (even some
Christian religions today advocate that - see Mark Twain's "Letters
from the Earth")), or we "transmigrate" from lower animals to higher
animals to human to ? or we attain nirvana or whatever. They don't seem
reasonable to me. That' what "motivates" my choice. We're all free to
choose, but:

"He chose ... poorly" -- Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

Anyway, George Carlin, in his video "Religion is bull****" (can easily be
found on YouTube), was indeed very very right. I quote from it he

------------------------------------------------------------------------
In the bull**** department, a businessman can hold a candle to a
clergyman. Cause I got to tell you the truth. When it comes to bull**** -
big time, major league, bull**** - you have to stand in awe, in awe of
the all-time champion of false promises and exaggreated claims: religion!
No contest! No contest!

Religion easily has the greatest bull**** story ever told. Think about
it! Religion has actually convinced people that there is an invisible
man, living in the sky, who watches everything you do, every minute and
every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does
not want you to do! And if you do any of these ten things he has a
special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and
anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and
scream and cry, for ever and ever till the end of time!

But he loves you! He loves you, and he NEEDS MONEY! HE ALWAYS NEEDS
MONEY! He's all-powerful, all-perfect, all-knowing, all-wise, but somehow
just can't handle money! Religion takes in billions of dollars, they pay
no taxes, and they always need a little more...

Now, you talk about a good bull**** story - HOLY **** !!!

The fallacy is that he's picking and choosing certain Christian religions,
like the televangelists and a few others (including Reverend Jeff on the
Young Sheldon show). It is not good for a religion to have a paid clergy.

So how should the clergy get food on their table? Or do you expect the
clergy to starve, or to be fed only by the Holy Spirit? :-)