The Good Place

Maybe, in our universe, the property of the fundamental units is the potential to become our universe.

Isn't that literally the theory of implicit order?

I fully support your right to reference a non doctrinal, non religious God. The naïveté is to be surprised when someone misconstrues or is confused by the concept. For example, the devout, reading your strong evidence for (your version of) God, might see it as a justification for their own homophobia.

What's my strong evidence ? Veridical OBE/NDE's ?? It's never been strong enough to make the blindest bit of difference to your entrenched position, has it !

And when have I ever presented a near death experience specifically to make a case for the existence of God ? Furthermore, why have you right out of the blue, introduced the topic of homophobia (not a term I like) > better to say prejudice against homosexuals ? Do you automatically assume everyone who describes themselves as devout (religious) are paid up bigots ? What a load of nonsense, Malf !

Isn't that literally the theory of implicit order?

I’ve no idea.

What's my strong evidence ? Veridical OBE/NDE's ?? It's never been strong enough to make the blindest bit of difference to your entrenched position, has it !

Sorry. Maybe I was being over polite. For strong read voluminous.

And when have I ever presented a near death experience specifically to make a case for the existence of God ? Furthermore, why have you right out of the blue, introduced the topic of homophobia (not a term I like) > better to say prejudice against homosexuals ? Do you automatically assume everyone who describes themselves as devout (religious) are paid up bigots ? What a load of nonsense, Malf !

It was just one example of potential confusion. I never suggested that all devout adherents are anti-gay. A sizeable proportion appear to be.

I don't think it would make any difference to what I said if you substituted "non-physical" for "immaterial" throughout.

I don't have any difficulty in understanding that you think anomalous phenomena have a physical/material basis. The question you put to me was "Why would something defined as immaterial remain so after it's nature is known?" That's what I was explaining.

You wrote. 

The soul's nature - or at least its action - would be known as well as we could hope to know it scientifically, but that still wouldn't make the soul material.

That's not an explanation it's a take my word for it statement. Do you see?

I'll leave it to the community at large to evaluate for themselves whether Steve's approach is consistent with what I highlighted in bold or not.  For me that is not how I have read his words over the years.  Its been significantly stronger (i.e., back to that so very offensive word to you: "Faith") and much more dismissive of potential alternative explanations.

I don't have a problem with "faith". I recognize that some of my ideas are faith-based. I just think it's helpful to be precise.

I think that Steve001 weighs alternative explanations on the basis of validity/evidence (as do I), and that's why he tends to be dismissive (it's thin on the ground for psi). I think that I hold out more hope for psi than Steve001, but I recognize that this is one of my faith-based ideas. I would like to see parapsychologists focus on obtaining decent validity/evidence results and have had many discussions over the years on ways to accomplish this. While others may think this is a waste of resources (Steve001?), and they may be right, I'm not ready to give up.  

I do think there are plenty of skeptical thinkers here, btw.  I just don't think most of them subscribe to a materialist worldview.  Or, if they do, they do a really nice job of keeping that aspect of their persona muted.

I'm not sure that anybody here subscribes to a materialist world view. I wasn't sure if Steve001 might, but I think his statement that scientists couldn't care less about materialism shows that he isn't, either.

I don't know why materialism keeps coming up given that nobody seems to subscribe to that metaphysic.

Linda

I don't know why materialism keeps coming up given that nobody seems to subscribe to that metaphysic.

I'll wait for Steve to chime in for himself if you are cool with that.  Who knows, there may be others?

That said I'm going based on posting history over a relatively long period of time.  Statements of what metaphysic one subscribes to aside, the community in which you dialogue also considers everything you say when trying to understand your perspective.  Seems fair.

Sorry. Maybe I was being over polite. For strong read voluminous.


It was just one example of potential confusion. I never suggested that all devout adherents are anti-gay. A sizeable proportion appear to be.

"Sorry. Maybe I was being over polite. For strong read voluminous".

Voluminous it certainly is, Malf which is possibly why you've been put off looking fairly at any of it.  

"It was just one example of potential confusion. I never suggested that all devout adherents are anti-gay. A sizeable proportion appear to be."

Confusion or being confused has nothing to do with it.

"I never suggested that all devout adherents are anti-gay"

You did more than suggest, you stated it as though it was a fact  ! See again below

 For example, the devout, reading your strong evidence for (your version of) God, might see it as a justification for their own homophobia.

And you didn't answer my question. So here it is again.

why have you, right out of the blue, introduced the topic of homophobia (not a term I like) > better to say prejudice against homosexuals ?

Sorry. Maybe I was being over polite. For strong read voluminous.


It was just one example of potential confusion. I never suggested that all devout adherents are anti-gay. A sizeable proportion appear to be.

I know that you are making a point about believers and the use of the word "god" but let's just introduce some perspective here. I often use the word God as a convenience. It may be wholly inadequate to summarise what I mean or what I believe but it suggests a oneness, a creative impetus and a source of all that is. I should not need to provide a disclaimer, as I find I need to do on a regular basis even after all these years of airing my views, that I am not a believer in any religious sense.

I get that you have a beef about many devout adherents. So do I. Last night I went to the cinema and watched a film called Black Klansman about the KKK in the 1970s. It contained parts of speeches from leaders of that organisation and I sat there fuming in my seat. Much of their vile rhetoric was couched in religious language. There is no way on earth that I could entertain beliefs about any god that David Duke would appeal to. I hope that goes for all of us here (though I'm deliberately avoiding the CT/Politics sub-forums these days).

So while you are right in saying that the word is inadequate, so are words like nature (or Nature) which inevitably have a naturalistic connotation in common with physical or material. So perhaps we can, one day, get to the point where proponents here are not asked to answer for God's work as opposed to scientific inquiry. We can have, and have had many a discussion about our concepts of god or the nature of reality but to reduce those concepts to a binary choice between science and religion is something that only atheists and the religious are comfortable with.

That's not an explanation it's a take my word for it statement. Do you see?

No, it's not. I gave you a hypothetical example to explain how something could be scientifically understood but not material (not that I should really have needed to). If you read the whole thing, starting with "For example, suppose ..." I think it should be clearer.