Posted by Gabbette on July 4, 2009, at 18:13:22
In reply to Re: Occam's razor, posted by Timne on July 3, 2009, at 20:40:03
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> The answer that assumes the fewest postulates.Semantics the question remains, postulates defined by what?
There can be hanging chads when we go counting postulates, but generally evidence that can be repeated is not considered speculative.
>Exactly "generally" but your faith has to be in what is generally accepted.
Forty years ago it was a fact that smoking was good for you.30 years ago formula was an improvement over breastfeeding
15 years ago it ulcers were caused by
excess stomach acid.and on it goes
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> > It works in many areas, but belief systems isn't really one of them.
>
> Oh. I thought that's where it was best used -- to separate beliefs from experiential knowledge.The two are not mutually exclusive unless one area of authority is trusted as omniscient usually that's because of ethnocentricity and not borne out by facts. I could give statistics, but the disasters caused by our current authorities "beliefs" and that's what they are.
are easy enough to findScience gained our current respect by violently eradicating any other form of knowledge and healing. By burning female healers at the stake
as witches. By destroying Pagan culture using hideous tortures.
People suffering during the bubonic plague could be healed, but anyone caught using traditional medicine to achieve this was killed.
And what do you know, the myriad methods used before patriarchal eradication are once again being used with success -and sometimes even promoted by by mainstream medicine now that they understand enough about how the ingredients affect the body.
I really don't want to discuss this anymore.
Not at all because I'm irked, or won't sincerely enjoy a discussion with you on a different topic.
It's my own fault really, for bringing it up.
My personal belief is that human beings are outrageously egocentric believing they have the
final answer on almost any subject.> > Much of our "reality" is cultural indoctrination, it's subjective, there
> > are other simple explanations, but validation by mainstream science is still almost synonymous with what is considered reality. Habit? I don't know but it baffles me. Scientists have been dreadfully slow at allowing us to believe what we already knew..
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> > "We will now allow you to believe that fire does actually make you feel warm because we can now explain using our definitions how it can have that effect"
> >
> > Okay, that was a stretch but unfortunately not much of one.
> >
> > I'm not remotely dismissing it's value but it's stubbornly limited.
> >
> > As to Dinah's question: Residual energy - termed " psychic imprinting"
> > would be the Occam's razor to those who have a different level of knowledge, ancient intelligent but not given the O.K by the guys in lab coats. Well... so what?
>
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> Thing with this new age ancient intelligence, there is seldom a cultural continuum to support the notion of "ancient." I often hear claims of people speaking for some "ancient" persona, but it's a far, far stretch for me to accept that as a genuine residual delivery of some element of a long-dead person's ego when the far more reliable definition is that they are in fact engaging in a form of narrative that can be explained in psychological terms -- often related to needs to be recognized as an unquestioned authority after being nurtured early in life by authority figures who refused to allow their authority to be questioned.
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> So we get back to loose definitions. "Residual energy" Yes, in the cerebral cortex, created by repeated exposure to a circumstance followed by abrupt termination of the circumstance. Like phantom pain after an amputation, we reach out for lost loved ones as if they are still there. Our mind has well-explained mechanisms for this -- we analyze internal perceptions along the same pathways as we analyze external perceptions. Memories float up through our roughly six layers of cortical neurons while incoming signals float down. It can be difficult to recognize the difference. So it's reasonable that we look toward our cultural constructs we've assembled to help us remember the difference -- science -- it is the harsh definition of reality that tells us, gone is gone is gone. We still feel it here, the energy is here, the smells are still reaching our nose, sounds come from that part of the house in familiar wavelengths we once used to recognize the presence of a life. No presumptions there -- all measurable forms of energy.
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> Residual energy with actual agency as a living being after death? Could very well be, but the presumptions we have to build to get there from here number in the dozens. That's the sharp edge of Occums razor.
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> > Science has dismissed, scoffed loudly and then acknowledged the validty of "quacks, old wives tales, and anecdotal evidence" as a matter of course.
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> Not as a universal matter of course. Some science has scoffed at some wive's tails, some of which later found some basis in empirical evidence.
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> > I haven't a clue what I believe; mystification and fascination are about as rigid as I get in that regard.
> >
> >
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> Ah, same. I practice that stuff -- the paranormal, and most of my public life is related to some paranormal purpose, but I jealously guard the darkness against false light.
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poster:Gabbette
thread:904378
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20090624/msgs/904955.html