We have ample hard evidence that hallucinations, fraud and delusions exist, and no evidence that ghosts exist.
“The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, but that’s the way to bet.” -Damon Runyon
lol
I am surprised you even asked such a question. The answer is obvious, nothing coming from you or anyone that wasn’t there would change anything. I have spiritual experiences on an almost daily basis. Let me repeat experience, that means up-font in-your-face experiences. I don’t ask for them, I don’t expect them, they just happen. Now there is nothing rational or logical about making up some imaginary story as a replacement for spiritual experiences.
Yes.
I’m just saying, NONE of my predictions were ever supposed to come true. They were supposed to be humorous. Yet I had a better record of these totally off-the-wall predictions coming true, than whoever was doing the predictions for Parade magazine, don’t remember her name.
<B>lekatt</b>, have you ever heard an account of a spiritual experience that you did not believe?
Were you the one with the toy vaccuum cleaner? You posted that it was “explained” (though you didn’t say how) so I thought that was the end of it.
You were unclear about whether you had been able to verify that it was definitely the toy. You said you heard it from another room and from the same room, but not whether you’d picked up the toy while the noise was going on pon and confirmed it for sure as the source. Suggestion can be powerful. Our brains interpret sights and sounds in ways that make sense to it.
Heaters and pipes, for instance, can make popping sounds. Hearing a heater fire up could sound like one of those popcorn vaccum cleaner toys.
Alternatively, there could have been something going on mechanically with the toy. That’s not unusual or extraordinary. I’d have to know something specifically about the mechanics to give a specific answer, though.
I do know that a lot of toys these days are programmed to turn on automatically at given intervals to try to stimulate kids to play with them. More than one of my kids’ toys has scared the shit out of me in the middle of the night.
And the answer is yes. I have written off NDEs, OBEs, and other so-called spiritual experiences when they didn’t meet the logical expectations of the experience.
Now the problem is, we have solid, clear evidence that consciousness is non-local, that it continues to live after the death of the brain and body. That means you will live after the death of your body, and this is real evidence coming from real scientific research. That evidence is not be allowed on this board because it is real.
Understanding that, it means there is a spiritual dimension, which in turn means there could be ghosts, and other spiritual phenomenon associated with a spiritual dimension.
So you either pursue knowledge or you go back to sleep.
I’ve moved a total of eight posts by Drew Kit and myself to ATMB, which is where they belong because they are almost entirely a discussion of moderating. Further discussion on that topic should go in that thread.
And yet I don’t think I’ve ever seen you do it on this message board. Perhaps you could give us an example?
My experience is that spiritual encounters are all fabrications, hallucinations, or misinterpreteations.
How dare you disrespect my experiences!
The problem is you don’t have any experiences of a spiritual nature, all you have are assumptions, opinions, and guesses.
Which is exactly the same as what you have. You’ve never in your life had a “Spiritual Experience”, you’ve mistaken normal experiences for spiritual ones because that’s what comforts you.
It’s understandable, but irrational.
So are you admitting that you are close minded?
It seems to me that the charge you lay against the skeptics is one that you would have to affirm. Correct?
No, not on this board. Never. If I ran into one I suspected might not be real, I would not tell the poster about it, and I would not ask to post it on my site. The have to be logical and rational spiritual experiences to make it on my site.
I have no idea what you are talking about.
And you are assuming, opining, and guessing about something you know nada about.
You stated, earlier in this thread (last page):
“Very soundly put. Skeptics call everything they haven’t personally experienced as false, woo woo, or some other derogatory term as if it could never exist simply because they never seen it. Sometimes they will make-up an imaginary story they label as “what really happened”, then they claim that as scientists they will change their beliefs if the facts change. The facts changed 35 years ago and they are still in denial. Posting about spiritual experiences is falling on dumb ears even though literally millions of people have them every day. Best to let them alone to live in their closed mind world. I have noticed not one ghost story posted here has been debunked, only mauled by the so-called scientists.”
(bolding mine)
So then I ask you:
“Would any amount of evidence or reasoning convince you that you did not have a genuinely supernatural experience?”
To which you say:
“I am surprised you even asked such a question. The answer is obvious, nothing coming from you or anyone that wasn’t there would change anything. I have spiritual experiences on an almost daily basis. Let me repeat experience, that means up-font in-your-face experiences. I don’t ask for them, I don’t expect them, they just happen. Now there is nothing rational or logical about making up some imaginary story as a replacement for spiritual experiences.”
Bolding mine.
So then I wrote: "*So are you admitting that you are close minded?
It seems to me that the charge you lay against the skeptics is one that you would have to affirm. Correct?*"
It seems to me that you are admitting you are closed minded and no evidence will persuade you otherwise.
Is this a fair appraisal of your position?
If it is, then should we, the members of the SD, take your advice: “Best to let them alone to live in their closed mind world”
I know that humans are fallible and make mistakes. I know that people can see a natural event and think it’s supernatural. And I know that you have a vested interest in your beliefs, they make death seem less scary.
I know that you have zero evidence for what you claim. I know that you post other people’s unfounded opinions and self-delusions as supporting evidence.
I know that you really, really, really want your wishes to come true, but that doesn’t make it so. I’m sorry, but living in a fantasy world is an ultimately childish thing to do. I know, I’m a Star Trek fan. 
Here’s my supernatural experience:
People who refuse to accept even the possibility that their experiences could be explained by known phenomena insist on continuing to post to a message board dedicated to the eradication of ignorance.
Explain *that *one.
Easy-it’s like this…well…ummm…
I don’t want to hog all the glory, so I’ll let Dio take this one.