Quote:
Originally Posted by yossarian  There are many rational explanations but that doesn't mean there is proof for them. Rational does not imply proof, rational implies logical.
Reasonable means what? Accepted by the mainstream?
Does it really matter if these highly coherent messages being delivered in identical fashion to various people who have no contact or similarities with each other, etc... Does it really matter if they are explained by Jung's Collective Unconscious or by Erin's Spirit Guides or by Elkin's UFOs?
Does that really matter?
Does it really matter if they are just a common human phenomenon that occurs when people tap into their subconscious, or if they are aliens communicating with us telepathically?
What really matters is the message. You won't find a piece of hard impersonal solid proof. That doesn't exist.
If your standard of proof is so high that you can just brush off people like Erin Pavlina or Don Elkins and repeat your mantra that "That isn't good enough!"
The explanations disbelievers use to dismiss the phenomena are just as untested as the explanations that believers use to support the phenomena.
Erin Pavlina cannot prove anything to you, she can only suggest some place for you to search in. This inner searching will have to be done by yourself, with an open mind.
They usually can't explain it, and only rarely can they barely control it. They develop theories that are useful to them, but most of them will readily admit they can't prove their theories. It's a mystery.
I look at an aura on a person, and I know that I see it. I don't really know what it is. I don't know how it's created. I've never heard a proven scientific explanation or even a slightly sensible scientific explanation nest with myself
I've seen lots of crazy things but in the end I know nothing. It's a mystery. Maybe I'm still dreaming and have yet to wake up.
In the former, you literally die without your proof because 100% proof of anything is impossible whether it's electrons or aliens. |
>Reasonable means what? Accepted by the mainstream?
Objective thinking, critical examination of the arguments for and against the existence of paranormal is needed to describe as a rational, reasoned truth.
>Does it really matter if these highly coherent messages being delivered in identical fashion to various people who have no contact or similarities with each other, etc...
>In the former, you literally die without your proof because 100% proof of anything is impossible whether it's electrons or aliens
Yes and no, Many problems in the world are arguably due, at least in part, to people's gullibility. Too few people learn how to exercise basic skepticism and critical thinking which they can apply in a conscious, systematic manner to the claims they encounter. Skepticism is important because truth is important: the more reliably we can differentiate the likely true from the likely false, the more reliably we can navigate through our world. Its about truth not proof. Paranormal beliefs today fulfill many religious functions for people. Almost everything in the area of the "paranormal" is connected to religion or has close analogs in religion — not the least of which is the manner in which people hold paranormal beliefs. Defenders of the paranormal use similar standards of evidence and reasoning as religious apologists.
>What really matters is the message. You won't find a piece of hard impersonal solid proof.
Especially if the piece if proof you are looking for are a fabrication of the imagination, you can not disprove someones imagination, so in the end it comes down to personal preferences. If guilibleness towards mystery makes u tick better, thats all good, but that is surely hampering the growth of humanity.
>If your standard of proof is so high that you can just brush off people like Erin Pavlina or Don Elkins and repeat your mantra that "That isn't good enough!"
For many years at Cape Town University I taught a course entitled Philosophy of Science and the Occult. The aim of the course was to get students to be critical about the claims of the occult. Students had the relevant knowledge and even skills but had not acquired the tendency to apply them to new situations. People have a right to believe anything they want. They can believe the world is flat, for that is their right and privilege. What disturbs me is people who would claim evidence for the flatearth belief, or who would lie and distort findings to support their belief. I don't think it's fair that some people are persuaded of the veracity of psychic phenomena because they are given false or misleading evidence. People may stake critical decisions on the advice of a psychic, believing there's some veracity to these powers. And there are cases of people who went to psychic healers who had tumors that could have been operable if they had gotten to a doctor in time.
>Erin Pavlina cannot prove anything to you
I'm not arguing that :-)
>I look at an aura on a person, and I know that I see it. I don't really know what it is.
'"aura'' can be a vision produced by the alterations on the blood vessels in the brain go see a neurologist