Whatever you say, Jack.
I know what I saw, and I know how it felt. Do you think I’m going to accept the baseless, uninformed opinion of anonymous internet troglodytes over my own direct personal experience? Dream on, pal. As I’ve said before, I’m not trying to change anyone’s mind here – I’m only answering the question because Diogenes the Cynic asked politely.
KGS, I removed your link, which contains personally identifiable information. I think most people will believe that you had a grandmother who died, so that’s not really the part of your story that people will expect cites for.
Fair enough, and probably for the best. Thanks.
Nah. While I don’t think i’d go with Finn’s length of post, I have to agree that **Der Trihs **is quite the idiot. It just so happens that, in this particular case, he’s right.
KGS, a question, if I may; by what means have you determined that you have cured yourself? To give an example, i’d use a ruler to measure a short distance. What tool have you used to measure your relative sanity?
I’m not saying you shouldn’t believe your own senses.
I’m saying you should not expect ANYONE ELSE to believe the evidence of your own senses if it can’t be observed by theirs’, and to argue that this constitutes evidence is absurd. Millions of people claim to have had personal conversations with God – I will grant they they may have heard voices in their heads, but that is no more evidence than you’ve presented.
Everyone knows what they saw. The problem is, much of the time the things people know they saw isn’t what they saw, at all. Human perception isn’t objective, it’s influenced by all sorts of things–even things the observer isn’t consciously aware of. That’s why police investigating crimes can interview ten witnesses to the same crime and get ten different descriptions. It’s why science, while certainly fueled by human observation, doesn’t rely on it. We have things like balances, photometers and thermometers because they provide a purely objective means of measuring the things we observe. Whether your story is true or not, it’s useless because it’s entirely subjective and not subject to any kind of verification–not even by you.
First, I’m sorry about your grandmother.
Second, Isaac Newton actually tested his ideas and provided empirical evidence. And Newton was a stout believer in Christianity (albeit, unorthodox), and thought there was some sort of divine code hidden in the bible. His ideas he was able to prove where the ones that stuck and changed the face of science and humanity forever.
You, on the other hand, have a first-hand, anecdotal experience that occurred while you were in a questionable state of mind. You have no way of setting up an experiment to test what happened to be true. Do you? Can you conceive of a way to test this? I think we both know the answer to that.
When I was 6 years old, I thought I had a visitation of Jesus in the middle of the night. I remember it vividly as a bright light beside my bed. I could see Raggedy Andy on my bed sheets, but I couldn’t look directly at the light. He talked to me, but I couldn’t move, I could only nod in response. I’m 35 now, and I still think about that moment. I’m fully aware I could tell myself that that’s evidence that God exists… but despite that, I’m also aware I may have been experiencing a waking-dream. And it’s not science, so I’m not going to try to convince anybody what I experienced MUST be real. There’s no way I can use that as evidence, not even for myself.
It’s funny that you and dibble have to twist a fact based claim (like, for instance, Der habitually flames conservatives in GD and gets away with it) into something non-fact based and unreasonable. Dibble wants to pretend it’s because I don’t agree with him. You think that relating facts shows something about me other than that I trade in facts. Dibble has to lie and claim that I’ve posited some sort of conspiracy, rather than the fact that he’s simply not been banned for numerous ban worthy flames in GD. Lobohan seems to be annoyed that I’m “impotent”… exactly like each and every single Pit thread as posters don’t make policy and those with the power to do anything are only the mods and admins.
I do have to say though, the “you’re correctly pointing out his behavior, that shows what your true character is!” is a hoot of a meme.
But what does reveal a lot about a person is that some of you are actually willing to defend Der as a poster. What the fuck is wrong with you?
Ah yes, the old “atheists are psychopaths” line.
Invariably cited by people who don’t know what psychopaths are. Or atheists.
When you have your thesis ready, show us. Put up or shut up.
I appreciate the sentiment, and you would have a point if KGS was actually, legitimately, mentally ill, in which case piling on would indeed be cruel and pointless. But I don’t believe he is. I know a lot of people have professed experience with certain disorders, and say they recognize those symptoms in KGS’s behavior. Maybe they have a point; maybe I’m just not seeing it. But as far as I can tell, KGS is laboring under the same old garden-variety delusions as any other spiritualist believer. There are hundreds of millions of Christians in the world; are they all mentally ill? Of course not. The only difference between them and KGS is that he’s being more aggressive in trying to justify his delusions (and possibly win converts, though I bet he’ll concede that ship sailed a while ago), which perhaps points to a low-grade disorder in the narcissistic area. Other than that, he’s just a somewhat-better-adjusted lekatt. And neither he nor his delusions merit respectful treatment.
And for the record, merely being delusional does not by itself indicate mental illness. We all have falsehoods and fantasies to which we cling for various reasons. Shit, tens of millions of Americans insist that George Bush is doing an excellent job and should be regarded as one of our greatest Presidents. Are they all mentally ill? Should they all be reassured with a condescendingly sympathetic pat on the head, and treated with kid gloves? Is it cruel to mock their opinion and attack their cherished belief? Nonsense. And the same goes here.
Oh, and one more thing:
Coward.
Heee! He doesn’t have a thesis, he has a trite story idea.
Well, I haven’t been able to quit smoking yet, I am pretty lazy and not terribly bright and I spend way too much time at the SDMB.
I usually agree with DT but he does well enough that I don’t feel the need to chime in. That and he is much smarter than I am. I often think he is a little to soft on religionists but he gets the general point across…
Without revealing too many details, there are certain elements of my psyche (including agoraphobia) which seem to “disappear” during these Manic Events, and other periods of natural & man-made disasters. (BTW, the recent Economic Crisis – esp. the period from Sept. 29th to Oct. 15th, when banks stopped lending credit to each to each other – was a HUGE fueling factor of my recent “Event”; that’s probably why I went out so far.) Usually, they come back – but in this case, they haven’t.
That’s not to say these issues won’t come back…but it does feel more “solid” than before. It’s going to be a topic of discussion with my team for several weeks to come – we’re even discussing my possible return to the social world on some transitional level. Like I said, though, it’s too soon to tell.
You mistake my meaning. I don’t mean you’re impotent in that you can’t ban Der Trihs, I think you’re impotent because you can’t form a cogent argument against him.
How does one become a fundamentalist atheist, given that there are no texts of atheism so fundamental to the cause that they are judged inerrant?
Perhaps you mean fundie zealot.
Skald <---- usage asshole
Apologies for not being clear enough. I’m not asking what the evidence is that you are cured, but the tool by which you are examining the evidence. By what means do you take all these varied factors together and come to a conclusion? That was the purpose of my example, though I didn’t appear to choose a good one.
So you think the problem is that he’s not enough of an asshole when dealing with theists? You’d prefer that he cause even more hostility between theists and atheists?
Look, science deals with what can be proven and known. On subjects dealing with what lies beyond the realm of proof and refutation, science must remain mute. Faith deals with that which cannot be proven or known. On matters of veracity and refutation, faith must remain silent. Faith is an aesthetic choice, proof is an epistemological process. Confusing the two only makes you look like an angry jerk who’s intolerant of others’ differences. Science can no more refute (honest) faith than faith can help you design a skyscraper.
Foaming at the mouth because someone holds a religious view, especially if that religious view helps make them a better person, is the mark of an immature asshole. Most atheists went through a phase like that… when we were young teenagers. Getting stuck in that phase is a sign of tremendous emotional immaturity in an adult. If someone feels that Jesus or Ganesh or Cargo Cult dummies want them to treat their fellow man with dignity and respect, then you (plural) are an infected anus if you not only want to take that away from them, but also personally attack them for it. There’s a reason that most atheists on this board, myself included, are content to argue epistemology and point out why faith can never substitute for or replace proof, but still think that Der is a raving asshole who makes atheists look like motherfuckers.
And you probably shouldn’t admit that you believe Der is smarter than you are (besides, I’ve read your posts and he aint). He’s rather stupid, all in all, but when he really get babbling he gets Retard Strength to be as offensive and bombastic as he can. It’s not intellect, though.
On the edit: yes yes lobohan, I’m sorry you’re using “SAT words” which you don’t understand. Here, a dictionary. Consider it my gift to you.
Then again, since you’ve neither claimed any fact I related is false (nor disproven a single fact), nor shown how my logic is wrong and are instead just providing content-free sniping, you’re really just here to poke me with a stick, eh?
That’s so *cuuuuuuuuuute. *
For most people, this is true. However, I have the advantage of NOT being influenced or distracted by emotions – as a borderline Aspie, that’s actually a strong advantage. Yes, I’ve made mistakes in the past, and believed certain things to be 100% which turned out to be false – but that’s more related to how I connect the dots, as opposed to emotional distraction.
Besides, this is just a “keystone” event. I’ve experienced multiple spiritual encounters (most of them quite recently) and I’ve studied other sciences and philosophies, including chaos theory, synchronicity, and divination magick (which, to my perspective, might as well be divination science – ref. Arthur C. Clarke, again.) My “thesis” merely connects the dots together in a manner that I don’t recall ever reading about before – the only question (which has since been answered) is whether or not it’s worth resuming my formal education in order to express these ideas in a manner more acceptable to mainstream science. (No decision is ever final, though – and if it’s genuine science, somebody else will discover the same links eventually. It doesn’t have to be me.)
Triffids do.
Man this thread is hilarious.
BTW ** KGS** If you’re still in contact with your gran could you ask her for next saturdays winning lottery numbers. I’ll gladly share AND subscribe to your newsletter
The mere fact this vision had such an impact on you is all the evidence you need to know that, at the very least, this was a significant experience. Now, this does NOT mean who you saw was Jesus, or even prove it was an actual spirit – I’m willing to concede that your experience was probably just imagination. However, the interpretation doesn’t matter – it’s the experience that matters. That’s the bottom line: Experience.
First, I’m sure she’s busy elsewhere. Second, you’re assuming that spirits are omniscient. They are NOT. (What’s up with the “lottery number” argument, anyways? Are people really that fucking greedy?) I could try and divine said numbers using magick and my own pet theory on synchronicity & chaos theory (which is fully separate from the spiritual world – it’s more like the foundation on which both worlds rest) but even that’s a tall order.
Besides, things are already starting to come my way. In a symbolic way, I’m feeling like I’ve already won some cosmic “lottery” – hard to explain, since the exact details I don’t feel comfortable divulging here.