On Saturday, November 3, 2018 at 4:43:19 AM UTC, palsing wrote:
On Friday, November 2, 2018 at 3:54:06 PM UTC-7, Quadibloc wrote:
On Friday, November 2, 2018 at 3:35:22 PM UTC-6, Gary Harnagel wrote:

That depends on how you define "extraordinary." I find LOTS of supporting
evidence, most of it anecdotal, but one would have to be a very suspicious,
distrusting soul to write off millions of people who report such experiences
yet have NO evidence to the contrary, IMHO.

One of the unstated assumptions that leads people to say that you're the one who
is being scientific is that scientists should be more skeptical of findings that
would tend to fall in with their wisful thinking.

The assumption is that everyone's wishful thinking is that a God would exist, so
we wouldn't perish when we die, and so we don't have to consider the opposite:
that it might be wishful thinking to believe we don't have to worry about a God
watching over us.

So you have the convention backwards.

In any event, while I find MacDougall's experiments unconvincing, to say the
least, I don't need them to be convinced of the existence of the human spirit.

As I understand these terms, the "soul" is, in the Bible, supposed to be a vital
spark which allows both humans and animals to be alive, whereas the "spirit" is
the immaterial component of the human mind.

In that sense, while I don't believe in the "soul" I certainly do believe in the
"spirit". From direct observation. I see what I see, I hear what I hear, I
think, therefore I exist.

Human consciousness is something science has not even _begun_ to get to grips
with explaining. It does not have the tools to even approach the job.

So, from this, I conclude other people have feelings, how we treat them matters,
because like me, they experience life, sensations don't just rattle around in
silent dead brains the way information rattles around inside a computer or time
rattles around inside a cuckoo clock.

I don't *need* an experiment like MacDougall's to convince me of this - which is
a good thing, as his experiment isn't much help. But that there is more to
reality than mechanistic matter and energy - that is something I thought we all
knew.

John Savard

I just read this editorial in Astronomy magazine and I think it would be a good thing for everyone to read, to remind each other about just how science actually works... and reminding us that opinions or beliefs have no place in science... a small fact that often gets overlooked all too often...

http://www.astronomy.com/magazine/je...making-sausage

Enjoy.

\Paul A

Astronomical composition is like music composition, if it doesn't resonate with the observer then it will always sit awkwardly or be avoided. Anyone filtering astronomy through late 17th century experimental sciences descends into a perspective cave that has little or nothing to do with astronomy.

People here can be bullied into conformity so they are left to argue over pseudo-intellectual scraps or figments of their imagination.