TheMadFool

Mysticism is appealing. I too am drawn by the esoteric, especially secret wisdom. I think that fascination hasn't been dampened by science to the exte...

I think psychology reveals how our minds work and to put nirvana in that context does reveal interesting stuff. Why would somebody leave a comfortable...

Well, it's not a crime to analyze stuff. Nirvana is game of course. Yet, as you already know, nirvana is beyond rationality, so they say. I like the w...

Suffering seems to be great!

I thought logic was a barrier to nirvana. One may use it as a tool to analyze nirvana but not as a means to attaining it. A stumbling block, yes, a st...

Peace, one of the greatest goals of mankind and yet, by their nature, unattainable, is docility isn't it?

Ahimsa is non-violence isn't it? Non-violence is a soft stance as opposed to, say, the on-going malady of terrorism. Isn't it? I'm currently reading a...

I feel there is an oddness if not a clear paradox. People who are of moral bent are generally docile. They like peace, quiet, harmony, you know, all t...

I was just reading about salesmen and them being a good example of people with credibility issues. However, Hitchens seems genuine and the book seems ...

:up: :clap:

:grin: :ok:

Ok. That's sensible but is it true? Is Hitchens doing nothing more than hatching a conspiracy theory? What of his ''evidence''? Religious apologists, ...

The way Hitchens writes the first few chapters leaves nothing to the imagination about the rest of the book. As advised I'll finish the book. Thanks

I'm not an expert on the subject so bear with me. Thanks for the psychological definition of empathy. I may have used the wrong word ''knowing'' inste...

Could these be done to serve a vile purpose? To become centers of religious indoctrination and produce an army of fanatics? Perhaps God isn't the prob...

Have you read the book? He cites many authorities on varied subjects from religion to science. I believe he's done his homework on the subject. He mak...

To think that so many people were misled by few and that this, if nothing, deception is an instrument of manipulation by those who are rich and powerf...

There are many types of impossibility of which the two that is of concern are: 1. Logical impossibility as expressed in the law of noncontradiction 2....

Your post reminded me of a feature missing from our memory mechanism - a delete button. We can forget something unconsciously but not deliberately. Yo...

I like eating meat. Some people have become vegans on moral grounds. They think, rather feel, it's wrong to kill animals because they know, through em...

That goes for everything. What I find worthy of note is that if you take humanity as a whole then intelligence is fragmentarily distributed among the ...

You have a point. I agree there's a difference between a tree in the real world and an imagined dancing tree. Is this analogy apt to the issue? Mathem...

You are an other to everyone else. Right? You can't truly know how others feel. It's probably impossible. However, you can safely assume that most, ba...

Really? How would one know how to act, following the golden rule, if you don't put yourself in the other's shoes (empathy) and imagine how one feels w...

Yes, causation can't be be backwards but a causal argument can refer to all phases of time, past, present, future. Some empirical observations, such a...

Perhaps I'm using the term ''scientific hypothesis'' in a broader sense and you're using ''empirical statement'' in a narrower sense.:chin:

Well, this logic would surely apply and has been applied in the past. Religious ethics is bases on an authority figure -God. When God is missing, as i...

Yet, the picture wouldn't make sense if one lacks empathy. Yes, the whole scheme of matching actions to facial expression may work but not for long be...

I guess this has to do with identity. The essence of identity is the set of qualities that the identity requires (is necessary) to set itself apart (a...

Your issue is not with infinity per se but its corollaries. Who can deny that the natural numbers are infinite. If you do then you'll have to furnish ...

That the Earth is spherical is a scientific hypothesis. There were two competing hypotheses: 1. Earth is flat 2. Earth is spherical Hypothesis 1 is na...

The fourth dimension is a mass murderer. It's time and it kills.

@"Inis"@"aletheist"@"andrewk" Imagine making a set of observations X. We then construct hypotheses A, B, C to explain X. A explains X in whole means A...

@"Inis"@"aletheist"@"andrewk" Scientific hypotheses are causal arguments. Causal arguments are inductive. To say hypothesis A explains observations B,...

Thanks. The scientific method: 1. Identify problem (observational findings) 2. Construct hypothesis 3. Test hypothesis. This involves making and check...

I get it. Very interesting perspective on the universe. I'm inclined to think along similar lines.

:rofl: :ok:

I disagree with this. If one is unconvinced tye right thing to do is neither affirm nor deny anything. Atheism, logically, shouldn't follow an unconvi...

Isn't this the ad ignorantiam fallacy? You can't conclude the negative just because the affirmative hasn't been proven. Suspension of judgment seems t...

Thanks. I'm still not clear on the connection between given hypothesis and predictions thereof. There are 3 possibilities: 1. Hypothesis implies predi...

Well, considering science is the archetype of clarity, precision, logical rigor, it's odd that they don't have a theoretical definition of time. I sur...

Yes, it could be that we're designed to be spiritual, and by ''design'' I inlcude evolution through natural selection and also, the favorite, God. If ...

Hi andrewk I want to run the following by you for your criticism: According to the link I posted above: The scientific method (TSM) is the fallacy of ...

There's a difference, in the eyes of theists, between ignorance and atheism. This is not an idiosyncratic observation as it's just an instance of the ...

:smile:

Is the Scientific Method a Logical Fallacy?

If clarity and precision are virtues then science must be God. That said, even science lacks a theoretical definition of time. Time in science, if I r...

:clap: :up: interesting

I don't find this reasonable at all. Theists differentiate between the ignorant and the heretic. I'm reading Christopher Hitchens' book "God is Not Gr...

So, atheism isn't a belief. What is it then? Ignorance? A lack of belief has another term more apt to it viz. Ignorance. A child who is god-naive is i...