Oh, all you want is a quote from the book? How about the first sentence on the inside flap?
Right off the bat we have a classic false dilemma.
I noticed you didn’t address the criticisms of the study you cited. I wonder why.
Well, I didn’t say much about the content cuz I didn’t see any mention of methodology, or controls, or pretty much anything normally associated with a scientific study. All I have is the claim that all the visionaries looked in the same direction at the same time. And this claim comes from a religious group, and was published in a religious publication, so the question of bias does in fact become relevant.
Well I don’t. Did the scientists who peer reviewed their publication have any?
I had to read this paragraph a few times to make sure it actually says what I thought it did, but, despite my great hopes to the contrary, it does. I can’t even bring myself to point out just how ironic you speaking of intellectual honesty in light of those claims is, but, luckily, to everybody who’s ever read a thread of yours (except, it appears, to you), that will be readily apparent.
Which doesn’t refute hallucinations – it merely refutes that they are created by projecting a false reality over the real one; hence, he goes on to propose his own alternative to that hypothesis (or at least a very rough sketch for one).
And this justifies your claim that the book is full of creationism how?
That is untrue. You have a huge amount of medical data, of which the focus of the visionaries eyes is only one small point. I’ve already pointed this out twice. Here’s the link again if you’d like to refresh your memory. You can’t make this false claim true by repeating it over and over. As for your complaint about methodology, that article is a summary; other articles cover methodology in more depth, including the one linked below.
Since the findings were published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal, the answer is apparently “no”. Frankly, though, I doubt that will change many minds here. People who lecture me about how peer-reviewed science is always right usually switch to lecturing me about why peer-reviewed science is often wrong once they see an article that they don’t like.
Not necessarily. There’s a certain survival advantage in reacting to things that are not fully sensed, by which I mean if you were walking through the jungle or whatever and thought you smelled a tiger, it’s possible that you’re not really smelling a tiger, but you should probably act as though there really might be a tiger around, because one day there will be and if you’re not ready for it - blammo.
This is more elegantly described as a Type I error, but I don’t get nearly enough opportunities to say “tiger” and “blammo” in the same paragraph. The gist is that we’re wired to make connections even on insufficient information. While this sometimes leads us to waste time pursuing baseless connections, it also benefits us when we make the right connection at the right time.
My experience changed my life forever. That is the nature of near death experiences. Just because you can’t see and hear my thoughts, feelings, emotions, dreams, and experiences, don’t mean in the least they are not real.
Oh holy crap, lekatt is out to sink another thread.
Exactly. Contrary to what you have proposed before, your beliefs do not change reality. For example, your belief that citing your own blog constitutes actual evidence does not change the reality that you are still completely without evidence.
Well then, consider the EEG findings in conjunction with the visual light-bulb tests. As mentioned in the article, researchers set of an enormous (1000 Watt) light flash directly in front of the eyes of the visionaries. There was no physical reaction, the EEG showed no change in pattern, the visionaries did not even blink. Somehow their bodies had become such that they were not responded to light from the physical world. Yet at the same time, the EEG assures us that “most of the brain is devoted to visual processing” during the entire apparition.
So to summarize the brains of the visionaries are processing information that comes through the eyes (established by EEG) yet their eyes do not receive any stimulus from the physical world (established by the response to the flash bulb) so their eyes must be receiving stimulus from some other source that is not within the physical world.
Randall Sullivan’s book The Miracle Detective presents the scientific evidence in great detail. What I posted about alpha and beta cycles is taken almost verbatim from a quote from one of the Italian doctors.
Funny thing. I cite books by experts including some that are considered definitive in their field, peer-reviewed scientific studies, and summaries of scientific research, and I’m told that such sources are “a joke”. Atheists cite tabloid articles, and apparently these are supposed to be definitive.
The tabloid article is mostly about a priest in Medjugorje who (gasp!) had sex. This, to state the obvious, has nothing whatever to do with the visionaries or their visions. In fact, the priest in question wasn’t even there when the visions began. The only mention of the visionaries is that they (gasp!) own houses and are married. To state the obvious, this is also irrelevant. The implied accusation that they faked it all to get money is absurd, given the way that the visionaries and their families were arrested, tortured, and threatened with death by the atheist authorities when the visions first started. (All documented in Sullivan’s book, if you wish to read about it.)
We seem to be falling into the same pattern that we’ve been through in other threads. I back up all my claims with books by experts, peer-reviewed articles, and research summaries. You dismiss those claims by launching juvenile insults at my sources. At the same time, you make far-fetched claims and make exact no effort to back up any of them with anything. I know from previous experience that asking you for a cite is probably a waste of time, but I’m going to do it anyway. Why don’t you, for once, hold your own posts to the same standard that you demand from me? Why don’t you provide an outside source–not yourself, but someone else, preferably someone with credentials–to back up your claims?
This looks like a fine place to start. I use the correct definition of “hallucination” from Webster’s Medical Dictionary:
“a perception of something (as a visual image or a sound) with no external cause usually arising from a disorder of the nervous system (as in delirium tremens or in functional psychosis without knownneurological disease) or in response to drugs (as LSD)”
I assume that all the sources I’m citing are using that same definition. So when Diogenes says “If everybody else can’t see it, you’re hallucinating,” that’s not in agreement with the definition. (In any case, consider Medjugorje. There are six visionaries, so each one is seeing something that five other people can see. Further, numerous other people have participated in some of the visions, providing yet more confirmation. This even includes some of the communist authority figures who were sent to disrupt the gatherings and arrest the visionaries.)
Now suppose we consider two scenarios:
(1) A being has the ability to make himself or herself apparent to only certain persons, and chooses to do so.
(2) A being exists that can only be sensed by a person who has gone through extensive spiritual development.
In those cases, it would simply be factual that this being would be seen and heard by some persons but not others. Hence anyone who said that the visions and locutions must be hallucinations because only some persons had them would come to an incorrect conclusion.
Let’s apply these standards to the visions at Medjugorje. First of all, the visions have happened regularly over a long enough time and in enough different locations that optical illusions, magic tricks, and swamp gas are not the likely cause.
As for whether the Virgin Mary gave the visionaries factual information that they couldn’t have gotten elsewhere, the answer is yes. The visionaries have successfully reported on a number of events before they took place, including the liberation of Croatia from Serbia and the Bosnian War. They even predicted beforehand that the town of Medjugorje would be spared from the war, and it was–one of the few places in Bosnia that can say so.
Those at Medjugorje have made quite a lot happen. Many well-documented medical miracles have taken place there. Consider the case of Diane Basile:
Interesting then that you elected to frame your disagreement solely in terms of “A brain is not a computer”, which as compared to your true reasoning would be really quite sloppy in and of itself. And I disagree, beyond that; the aspect of the human brain that makes a decent analogy with software is the “I” part, the set of computing impulses that run in the meat hardware. And I disagree that there is no such set of instructions - it’s just a vastly complicated and hugely ranged set of such instructions.
And I disagree that that’s what the Panskepps were referring to. I’d imagine they were talking in terms of genuine psychological models, actual attempts to conceptualize and understand how the brain works, not a simple analogous comment. I’ll point out that I of course haven’t read the context, so you might be right, but I apologise for saying in the past your interpretations of texts have pretty considerably diverged from mine, so i’m unwilling to take it on your word.
But that doesn’t mean that what they see is actually what is there. Too, something may be influenced by outside sources and yet additional information arises from within - for example, if a plastic bag gets moved by the wind in the corner of my eye, I might mistake it for a moving animal. There’s certainly an outside stimulus, but my own perceptions are adding to and altering that stimulus. That’s not a hallucination by your definition, either, and like i’ve said I agree with your main point though not your arguments, and it’s probably akin to what i’d consider to be occuring in many religious experiences.
I really wouldn’t be so quick to assume that all the sources you’re using are using that definition, by the way. I can only speak from my experience, but any kind of hypothesis working from that as a definition would be far too vague for much use.
What is the ratio of later discovered incorrect information versus correct information?
I mean, it seems like a large population with at the least some and the most enormous familiarity with an area are going to be able to predict, without aid, some later happenings pretty well. What would be interesting is whether the prediction correctness rate was higher than that of those without those experiences. So what’s the ratio?
This kind of depends on the standards of the peer reviewing process… For instance, when you cite a journal that lists among its articles numerous UFO reports, an article arguing that there once was a humanoid civilization on Mars (called by its authors ‘The Cydonia Hypothesis’, after that famous Martian ‘face’), several about Psychokinesis, astrology, dowsing, and one gem titled “A Case of Severe Birth Defects Possibly Due to Cursing”, some scepticism regarding its scientific rigorism is probably warranted. In other words, when a peddler of woo is reviewed by other peddlers of woo, nothing is gained in the matter of scientific accuracy.
Besides, it is entirely valid to reject or attack cites in a discussion (you yourself did the same thing – rightly – with pointing out the research calling into question the results by Dr. Persinger and his team; however, as for more modern results seemingly corroborating a link between temporal lobe activity and religious experiences, V. S. Ramachandran has carried out research in that area – here’s the first part of a video of him talking about it). Otherwise, since you can find an ‘expert’ opinion agreeing with your own tastes on pretty much any subject, there would be no discussion at all – people would just dump their respective cites on each other, and then that would be that. For instance, imaging we were talking ancient astronauts – as a cite, one could offer up the entire oeuvre of Erich van Däniken. What’s the opposition then to do? Withdraw all their arguments and come to the conclusion that yes, the pyramids were built by aliens? No. They’ll rightly point out that van Däniken is a fuckwit and his ‘theories’ devoid of any shred of credibility.
So, when you offer up a few fringe claims against basically the entire history of scientific exploration, you really shouldn’t act quite so butthurt when their veracity is called into question. Supposed miracles such as the one in Medjugorje have been exposed either as fraud or error time and time again; at some point, one starts to loose that ‘I’m sure this time it’s genuine!’-enthusiasm. I’m reminded, for instance, of the case of the Creery sisters, the somewhat famous first investigation of the then-newly founded Society for Psychical Research. It wasn’t a religious apparition, but a claim of telepathy that was being investigated, but there are some similarities – five people professing to possess a special talent, and a six years long scientific investigation that – at first – seemed to uncover astonishing evidence for the reality of the phenomenon. For instance, card guessing tests produced results that had a likelihood of being due to pure chance of one in 142 million! The short answer, then, is that they weren’t due to chance. It was a fraud – the girls used both verbal and nonverbal codes to communicate with each other. Something similar would be trivial to devise in order to coordinate eye movements and the like, in a virtually undetectable manner.
Regarding the specific claims about the Medjugorje apparitions, as far as I know, not even the Catholic church accepts them as genuine, and Bishop Ratko Perić reportedly said regarding them: “Three episcopal commissions as well the entire Bishops’ Conference have already been convinced that on the basis of the investigations that have been carried out to date it is impossible to confirm that there have been supernatural manifestations and messages in Medjugorje”
Or, for instance, the claim that within one fifth of a second all the visionaries looked at the exact same spot, so very scientifically documented according to your cites, and so easily refuted by these photos of the visionaries definitely not looking at one and the same spot. How does that mesh with your assertion that they must be looking at something real?
And what about the claim that they don’t react to external stimuli when receiving a vision? Well, on January 14, 1985, Jean-Louis Martin decided to put that claim to the test, and made a movement with two outstretched fingers towards one of the supposedly tranced-out seers, who reacted with a clear start. Later, questioned about the incident, she claimed that she was afraid that Mary was going to let baby Jesus slip (!), and that she reacted to that. Here’s a somewhat more detailed discussion of the incident – and two videos showing it (the second one is in English, by the way). Frankly, I can’t conceive of any other explanation for this other than wilful deception.
One gets to wondering, when two of the supposedly scientific claims can be shown to be so egregiously wrong so easily, whether the other assertions aren’t maybe of a similar quality.
So, it seems that the case for the reality of the Medjugorje apparitions isn’t quite as rock solid as you made it out to be.
Spiritual as in spirits? Sorry, don’t believe in those either
I can agree to that. Yet a tiger is an actual thing that exists, and walking through a jungle, one might expect that tigers are abound. Believing that some robed human figure is descending from the sky to talk to you is a little bit more problematic. One could say it was similiar to the tiger experience, but taken way way waaaaaaaay too far. Just as it may be healthy to release one’s anger occasionally and yell, it is unhealthy to do it all the time, in situations that don’t call for it, over minor and trivial things. Religious experiences are like seeing flying tigers everywhere
It was the only criteria you gave as necessary for proof.
First, we don’t have the medical data. We have the conclusions drawn from that data.
Second, the methodology, as described by your link, is quite obviously lacking. Yes, they find several odd things. Eyes not blinking with bright light, not noticing loud sounds, etc. But after finding this the paper just starts offering guesses:
They don’t bother to look for any other explanations or even bother to use controls.
This entire thing can explained by the visionaries simply practicing the actions until they can do them in unison. They’d all be able to look at an agreed upon spot, kneel down, start a prayer they’ve practiced saying together, and then finish in unison. Their voices stop working during the vision? They stop talking. The paper’s proof that the visionaries weren’t doing the voice thing themselves is:
That’s it. Yes, the not blinking and not hearing thing are odd, but not necessarily supernatural. People in deep meditation can do this. Nothing that I’ve said here can be conclusively eliminated by the investigation described in the paper you linked. Their conclusion?
This is some very weak methodology.
Peer review is not ‘always right’, nor does it make the paper automatically correct. Who reviewed this paper? I can’t seem to find anything on that. I was able to pick holes in it just reading through it once. I’m quite certain an actual scientific review could do more.
If Dawkins really is using the hardware/software analogy for the brain/mind, then that would seem to be an endorsement of mind-body dualism, which he rails against in a later chapter. But never mind; I concede I should not have put that in the OP, and now it’s merely become a distraction from my main thesis, and the same is true for the attempts to precisely define hallucination or debate the events at Medjugorje.
The first point that I made was that not all religious experiences involve a vision or a locution (or a sense touch, sight, movement, etc…). In fact, the majority of religious experiences don’t involve any such thing. William James testifies to this, later researchers testify to this, and nobody in this thread has questioned it. So regardless of whether we use the definition that I posted, or the more expansive one that was posted on the first page of the thread, hallucinations are not an adequate explanation, because what occurs in religious experiences and hallucinations does not correspond.
The second point is in regards to mental illness. Some definitions of hallucination say that mental disorder is a requirement while others only say that a mental disorder is a frequent cause, but all agree that there is a strong relationship between mental disorder and hallucination. Hence we can check whether there is a positive correlation between religious experience and mental illness. Well, Abraham Maslow’s research shows that there is a negative relationship between the two. In other words, those who have religious experiences are generally in good mental health. Maslow, too, has been corroborated by more recent research, and nobody in this thread has disputed his findings.
Given those two facts, Dawkins’ attempt to dismiss “The argument from personal experience” as hallucinations and insanity does not stand up, because it does not match the established facts.