I just wanted to see Lore spit his coffee across the room.
I'm not even sure what we would discuss here:
* Timeline was simultaneously a good/not good novel?
* Consistency is
I'm opening the door for comments one this one glorious aspect of this glorious universe we inhabit.
21 comments:
"I just wanted to see Lore spit his coffee across the room."
I nearly did with that line!
In Quantum Mechanics, the result changes if it's observed. See the double slit experiment.
http://tinyurl.com/5zzmhz
The thing is, God is the omnipresent observer, and thusly collapses every waveform. Either that or God is extra dimensional and is unable to interact with our reality.
"In Quantum Mechanics, the result changes if it's observed. See the double slit experiment. "
Seen it. Wonderful!
"The thing is, God is the omnipresent observer, and thusly collapses every waveform. Either that or God is extra dimensional and is unable to interact with our reality."
Does not follow. God made the universe and surely incorporated Himself into in whatever way He chose, so the effects we see already take into account his presence. Plus, "God is [a] spirit". Immaterial spirits would interact with cosmos in a different way.
Analogy: actually observing may alter quantum behaviour, but just thinking about observing probably wouldn't. Immaterial spirit is closer to thinking that watching.
DNF.
In fact, I would argue the opposite -- it makes miracles much more plausible, as God controls his interactions with the cosmos as a deep level.
Am I reading right? Are you saying that God is an "immaterial spirit?"
Yes.
John 4:24 "God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth."
The Greek can either be translated as "God is spirit", which I think is best, or, "God is a Spirit".
Not only that, my friend, but, your brain is about to explode with this one, put down your coffee, grab the sides of your chair, plant your feet firmly in front of you...
Man is a tripartite being consisting of spirit, soul (mind, will, emotions), and body. So not only am I asserting that God is spirit, but that man has an immaterial dimension to his existence.
You're not a duelist?
Only as it pertains to debating with you.
I could also use dualist terminology -- Biblical terms like "soul" are imbued with different senses by different biblical writers. So, body/soul can work, in which case soul would encompass spirit and body/soul would represent outer/inner.
But, I think the tripartite view is crisper, more focused and more forensically accurate. It is the spirit that is regenerated upon conversion, it is with our spirits that we commune with God.
Our minds are renewed, our will is reformed, our emotions healed, but it is our spirits that are made alive. As someone said, Christ didn't come to make bad men good; he came to make dead men live.
Which happened to me.
I see, that's a bit different.
Is it a requirement to have physical proof of a duelist or triumvirate reality to your argument?
Well, it really wasn't an "argument", more like a statement of understanding rooted in a happy convergence of the experiential and the revelatory.
Rather than asking for physical proof, you might be better to ask for "is there proof", or, better still since I distinguish between proof and evidence, "is there evidence?".
Which gets us into epistemology -- ways of knowing. Surely you don't believe that physical proof is the only way of knowing, or believing something?
Imagine a conference of unfeeling, uncaring psychopaths who deny the objective reality of moral sense, of empathy, of love. They don't "see" it. They can't "feel" it. So they declare with robust confidence, it doesn't exist, and "you can't prove to me that it does". They develop literature and websites and support groups to mutually affirm themselves in their belief, grounded in their experience of material reality.
This really ought not greatly disturb the person who feels compassion, or empathy or love. This person is quite confident in the existence of these qualities, "knows" that love is real, even if it can't be reduced to a physical proof or an observable experiment that satisfies the doubter. The doubter will always raise the bar of proof higher.
You say, "Put the brain under a brain electron microscope, and 'see' the love." Of course, you will not see love. You will see a hot spot in the brain, perhaps. The rest is interpretation.
You say, "But we can see the effects of love". Effects can always be explained away. The doubter will always find a way, and a reason, not to believe.
So it is with atheists and believers.
(In the case of the psychopath, it may because he has his mother's head in the trunk of his car.)
We're close to having physical proof for emotion, we're largely there already. The "Hot spots" on the brain are a strong starting place for that.
Sociology is Applied Biology, is applied Chemistry, is Applied Physics, is Applied Mathematics, is applied Logic.
*huggles*
Materialistic? Maybe, I don't know if your definition and my definition are the same. Does that mean that a consciousness cannot appreciate love without duality (or greater) being true?
I don't think that's evidence for such an existence.
There can be no real soul, we are a mere collection of atoms that come together and simulate consciousness. A simulation of consciousness must be conscious itself.
Do you follow me? Or do you need something broken up a bit?
"There can be no real soul, we are a mere collection of atoms that come together and simulate consciousness."
Why can't there be?
"A simulation of consciousness must be conscious itself."
Great. You've added to my collection.
We have a beginning with the Big Bang, but it's really just the appearance of a beginning (if you don't believe this, others do.)
We have the appearance of design throughout the universe, but it's all just a grand illusion.
We have the appearance of upward progress in evolution, but that's just an illusion too, since darwinian evolution is mindless, has no goal, so there can be no progress.
And now, we have a sense of consciousness, but it's just a simulation. So, we are not really conscious beings, we are atoms and molecules with simulated consciousness. Kind of like chips with simulated ketchup (if you're American) or simulated salt-and-vinegar (if you're Canadian) or simulated prawns (if you are Asian).
Beautiful.
Keep going.
"Do you follow me? Or do you need something broken up a bit?"
I think I got it.
How about will. You are filled with rage. You want to smash something or somebody. You "get a hold of yourself, tell yourself to calm down". You do an Archie Bunker and "stifle yourself". The rage shows up as a hotspot in the brain. Where does the will show up? What does it consist of? Competing atoms? Did "you" direct the atoms, or did the atoms direct "you"?
Or is "youness" an illusion, too?
(You'll be a hindu before the day is out.)
Your simulated example isn't the same.
It comes down to how you measure consciousness. What makes a being conscious? If you simulate those effects, then by definition, you've created a consciousness.
I'll reply more later.
My simulated examples were meant as a joke. No need to rebut them. My atoms made me do it.
Consciousness takes even the hardened materialist perilously close to the immaterial -- and he has to live with it 24/7.
Oh, the humanity!
*giggles* I know you were joking, but I was refuting for the sake of the reader, just in case they got confused, or didn't get it.
The thing with consciousness is, if it could be ascribed to a soul, or spirit, then our "consciousness" could necessarily exist outside of our body and reside in some sort of extra dimensional existence.
The other issue with this is, our consciousness would thusly be able to be transferred from one "container" to another. Viewing a Human being as a "Container" of the soul is frightening. I think this is why so many religions have little compunction for the death of fellow humans of differing belief.
"I sent his soul to be judged" and whatnot.
The problem is, no such transfer is possible. It's never been documented that a person has recovered from a vegetative state. The soul should remain unaffected by the tampering of it's container (brain). Or if the activity of the being (and soul) rests in the quality of the container, could not the container be changed?
Tough questions, eh Rick?
I'm kind of working in this field right now, as I'm building a digital consciousness, bootstrapped from my own. Now, if I am successful, would I have the sense of my new container? Would I be a true triumvirate? Or would the created consciousness simulator be a new being with a different set of feelings non ascribable to my own? Does its truly duelist soul that doesn't have physical feeling feel a connection to mine, and mine it?
There's a strong rebuttal for you here, "If you could only create consciousness by bootstrapping it with consciousness then that shows something about the nature of consciousness, it must be created."
Except that it doesn't have to be, I just don't want to wait the many years it would take for it to develop.
I'm an impatient God! *giggles*
Lore: this is your mind speaking. Believe me, it is; I know you are thinking these thoughts along with me.
Explain to this unbelieving amaterialist that consciousness is an "epiphenomenon" of molecules.
A six-syllable word that starts with "epiph" is sure to set his religious genes a-quiver and excite his religious molecules.
Back to you (or your youness, as the case may be).
"The thing with consciousness is, if it could be ascribed to a soul, or spirit, then our "consciousness" could necessarily exist outside of our body and reside in some sort of extra dimensional existence."
Why is this a problem?
"The other issue with this is, our consciousness would thusly be able to be transferred from one "container" to another."
DNF -- depends on how we are constituted. We are promised new, spiritual bodies when the general resurrection occurs, so I am looking forward to a "new container".
" It's never been documented that a person has recovered from a vegetative state."
There are documented cases of resurrection from the dead -- perhaps these could be offered as inferior substitutes for recovering from a so-called vegetative state.
"The soul should remain unaffected by the tampering of it's container (brain). Or if the activity of the being (and soul) rests in the quality of the container, could not the container be changed?
Tough questions, eh Rick?"
Only to your mind. I was arguing consciousness and you segued into "soul" (whatever that is).
"I'm an impatient God! *giggles*"
And your godlike powers will be more awesome when you discover that there is an "a" in dualism.
"It's never been documented that a person has recovered from a vegetative state." Would these people qualify: Terry Wallis & Christa Lilly
DJeffery, no, I mean that a brain that can no longer physically function, not one that repairs its faculties in coma.
Rick; I view "Consciousness" as "Soul" because really, are they different?
“This is a miracle,” Lilly's neurologist, Dr. Randall Bjork, tells us. He checked to see how her brain is functioning. He says he's as surprised as everyone else. "This is all mystical and I can't explain it.
Jesus said that skeptics would not believe even if one came back from the dead, so recovery from a vegetative state is not going to convince the willful skeptic. If they stay asleep, they're vegetative and we should pull the plug; if they wake up, then, by (their) definition, they weren't vegetative.
"I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob" - God is not the God of the dead but of the living.
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