Excellent reminder that our modern world view is the product of generations of dedicated people making painstaking observations of reality.  Galileo’s life is also an example of the dangers and difficulties of pointing out the errors and inconsistencies of religious hierarchies.

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My favorite part of the Galileo story is when he offered church officials a view through the telescope, they ‘refused’ to see what it was pointing at, thereby clinging desperately to their, soon to be, outmoded beliefs. Thanks to Galileo!

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My favorite part of the Galilean myth is when he proved to a doubting Church that the tides were caused by the motion of the earth and not by the “occult” attraction of the moon.

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“My favorite part of the Galileo story is when he offered church officials a view through the telescope, they ‘refused’ to see what it was pointing at, thereby clinging desperately to their, soon to be, outmoded beliefs. Thanks to Galileo!”

This refusal to look deeply into mysteries is not just limited to religion. Although religion might be the biggest culprit. Once while talking to some atheists on the net I mentioned a book entitled, “no living person could have known” a book about a spirit or spirits coming through a medium and making statements about something that no living person could have known.

Like the year that a penny was minted and where it was hidden by this deceased person when alive he hid this penny under a rock. Sure enough there it was when the person that was the sitter looked for it. It was as exactly where the “spirit” said it would be. The point being not if this is a valid story every person will have to decide that for themselves; the point being like the religious priests with Galileo and his telescope they were unwilling to investigate anything not in their existing belief or paradigm.

And if I were to tell those atheists that they are responding exactly like the religious with the Galileo story they would have been upset and hostile towards me. We see in others what we cannot see in ourselves. Me included.

The atheists laughed and would not even considering reading such a book. Their materialistic paradigm would not allow them to even consider such a book. This same paradigm effect exists in all aspects of our lives. Atheists, religious, agnostic, scientist, teacher, government, or whatever; it is alive and well.

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Researcher:

I may have laughed too - but because you had presented an anecdote. Anecdotes are not evidence.

Now, if this penny-under-a-rock scenario - and others like it - could be repeated reliably and consistently, that’s another story.

But anecdotes are not evidence.

It seems to me that presenting anecdotes, analogies, and ignorance as if they were evidence are the biggest red flags for pseudoscience.

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“The greatest skeptic concerning paranormal phenomena is invariably the man who knows the least about them.” H.H. Price

“There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof
> against all arguments, which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting
> ignorance; that principle is contempt, prior to investigation.”
> Herbert Spencer

“I may have laughed too - but because you had presented an anecdote. Anecdotes are not evidence.”

Well you are in good company as many have been laughing at evidence that does not agree with their paradigm for thousands of years. You may want to look at some synonyms for evidence. Does qualitative data ring a bell?

The scientific method is about probabilities not absolutes. I have found few in the world that understand that simple axiom.

Only a fool would call this type of evidence an anecdote. This experience does not prove that the evidence was valid but it does lead one with an open mind to do further investigation.  The materialistic paradigm is so slippery that further investigation into areas not materialistic cannot be tolerated. Likewise to the religious further investigation into areas threatening to the religious paradigm cannot even be considered.

You can bet many laughed at Galileo and in those days worst. You proved my point far better than anything I could ever write about paradigms. That has been my point on this blog; this may not be a blog about reasoning but a group that has already made up their minds that it is a materialistic universe. And that matter creates consciousness.

Kind of like the scientists that worked for the cigarette manufactures their research supported the beliefs they were paid to find.

Your response is what I get 99% of the time from atheists. You see the religious say and respond the same way as the atheists. Contempt before investigation. I find that fascinating the two groups that despise one another are more alike then they ever could have imagined.

When I started my research almost two decades ago into the mysteries of life I thought the atheist would be the least biased because they are not overwhelmed with religious beliefs to my surprise there is little difference between atheism and religious fundamentalism when it comes to being open to the investigation of topics outside of their cherished beliefs.

Harris did mention mystical or transformational experiences and it appeared that he may be leaving a window open to move beyond just a materialistic paradigm. Time will tell.

This comment I suspect will be removed from this blog. That is the power of paradigms.

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http://sites.google.com/site/iscatus/review-of-my-big-t

This is an interesting article written about a physicist who dared not to laugh at the unknown. One of the few physicist’s that did not laugh at one of the great mysteries of life i.e. consciousness.

This is not about convincing anyone of anything or any beliefs, as that is impossible in fact trespassing. Religion tries to do just that all the time and look at the results. The greatest creators of atheists are religions.

Like the atheist organization that put the sign “there is no god” on the side of buses in a major city. This had the opposite affect of their intentions as more people thought about god when they read the signs every day on the city buses.

This is about the human mind and how it can convince itself that it knows truths and any data that comes into its mind is rejected without investigation. Why is that?

That is an interesting topic for discussion that every group   doing research should undertake.  But few do, why is that? The answer lies in the paradigm effect and confirmation bias. This is one of my research interests and no one is immune from this paradigm effect or confirmation bias. No one.

We see what our mind believes it should see in spite of the evidence. In fact we will laugh or worst at anyone that even introduces data that challenges our existing paradigm.  Politics and religion are two prime examples of this phenomenon.

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researcher, you make some valid points.  We must always at all times, be open to evidence and experiences that are outside our usual way of viewing the world.  In history, there are lots of examples of paradigm shifts and invariably people were skeptical of the new evidence.

For example, in the late 19th century physicists really believed that all the fundamental problems of nature had been solved.  Then, careful researchers published observations that either disagreed with the established norms (e.g. existence of aether) or that could not be explained at all (e.g. Frank-Hertz observations of quantization of energy).  These experiments ushered in two of the 20th century’s great discoveries:  relativity and quantum mechanics.  Our world view changed, not overnight, not without arguments and inflamed passions, but it changed.

Change is difficult and delicate.  Skepticism and the discipline of ruthless questioning are critical.  But we also need the emotional detachment to separate what is said from the person who has said it.  Its important to focus on truths and evidence not on personalities and labels.  In my experience, the language that we use can help.

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Researcher, I would be interested in knowing what book you were referring to and if you can provide any hard evidence for what you espouse. I like to watch shows like Ghost Hunters, but I seldom believe any of it. The best evidence they ever get are EVP’s and even those are pretty vague. There is another poster that talks about ESP a lot, but I’ve never seen it to be actually proven in a controlled setting (ei The Randi Paranormal Challenge)

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researcher: it is up to believers and proponents of ESP and psychic powers to prove to the scientific community that it exists or is worthy of more research. All studies that I have heard of that have investigated these paranormal claims have been negative or inconclusive as to the existence of this phenomenon. As soon as your ‘research’ is published in a well respected science journal, let me know and I will read it with an open mind, because it takes a very solid argument full of strong logic with lots of evidence to back it up to make it into a respected scientific journal like Nature.

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“researcher, you make some valid points.  We must always at all times, be open to evidence and experiences that are outside our usual way of viewing the world.  In history, there are lots of examples of paradigm shifts and invariably people were skeptical of the new evidence.”

Often not only skeptical but also hostile. When I started my research I really expected to find nothing but materialism. It took years of research to find something I could sink my teeth into beyond materialism. But I got little hints along the way that made me ever more curious about what is reality.

Thank you for having some understanding. I started out almost two decades ago almost an atheist as religion had turned me off so to speak as much of this religious dogma being presented to not only adults but also children. To teach an eternal hell and chosen people, etc to young minds is very harmful from my point of view. My research indicates there is no such thing as an eternal hell. It appears we can make most of our own hell in this world and the next.

This is a quote from the book TOE that you may find of interest the critique of this book on the net. It uses 21st century jargon to explain the author’s description of reality. I just found this crituqe of TOE and found it interesting. The language used is not my cup of tea but has some interesting insights and statements by a physicist.

http://sites.google.com/site/iscatus/review-of-my-big-t

“Your belief systems limit your reality to a sub-set of the solution space that does not contain the answer.” This quote is from the book TOE not the critique.

Of course many materialists and atheists claim they do not have beliefs so there is another hard problem at work. We all have beliefs it is a matter to what degree those beliefs influence our ability to conduct valid research. I.e. bias factor.

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“Researcher, I would be interested in knowing what book you were referring to and if you can provide any hard evidence for what you espouse”

The book is entitled “no living person could have known”. One of the stories in the book is called the R 101 case and is considered by some the best case for the paranormal to date. And too complicated to explain in this short post. As far as hard evidence if you want what I think you are referring to as hard evidence you need to stay with doing research into the material world.

The paranormal does not give up its evidence as to what you may refer to as hard evidence. Research into the paranormal is not for the confirmed materialist or the faint of heart. But it can be rewarding and give one a whole new perspective on life but it takes years of study and what I call research. Religion hints at the paranormal but is so full of dogma it will turn off a serious researcher.

If you want to get your truths from preachers, that may be a long, lonely, and downright scary road to travel. From my point of view most of Christianity died on the cross.

Thanks for asking about the book. It is unavailable (to my knowledge) and out of print. As far as Randi’s challenge that was and is a publicity stunt; a brilliant publicity stunt but never the less a stunt to get publicity. Read the fine print in his contract and you may understand.

My point was not for anyone to read such a book as I am not on this website to convert anyone, but the fact that most materialists or even the religious will not take the time to investigate such a book, you are the only person to ever ask about it. Most just laugh or call it antidotal evidence.

Part of my research is into the human mind and how it can take information and data and completely dismiss it without investigation. And really smart people do this all the time whether religious or atheist or whatever.  Including myself as no one is immune from this phenomenon. But everyone thinks that the other person is bias, but not them.

“I like to watch shows like Ghost Hunters, but I seldom believe any of it”

The word seldom is important here as it leaves the door slightly open. I am not big into ghosts or ghost hunting. To me that is some of the weakest evidence for the paranormal but it is qualitative evidence but too weak for me. The spiritualists call these ghosts earth bound spirits. I don’t like the idea of ghosts but reality cares less what I like or dislike that is the tough part of this research you discover things that may be a reality that you are not fond of knowing.

This reason this website was of interest to me; after seeing Harris on Bill’s show and not mentioning the world atheist in his book and wondering to Bill what causes the brain to act the way it does often realizing a higher purpose to life.

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Hey, b00ger.  I’m addicted to Ghost Hunters, too.  Can’t turn it off!  What’s that all about?

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“All studies that I have heard of that have investigated these paranormal claims have been negative or inconclusive as to the existence of this phenomenon.”

A couple of names come to mind. William Crookes and Lodge two very respected scientists in their time. I am willing to suggest that those studies you have heard of were conducted by materialists with very strong beliefs and subject to bias.

“As soon as your ‘research’ is published in a well respected science journal, let me know and I will read it with an open mind”

The term open mind is an oxymoron and from my point of view any researcher that fails to understand that simply stated by profound axiom has yet to understand the reality of research. Again I am not here to convert or convince anyone of the existence of the paranormal as that is an impossible job and is indeed trespassing. It is my contention that paradigms influence our research and most are unaware to what degree of that influence.

Most if not all the people into paranormal research reject my writings so don’t look for any articles published soon by researcher. The paranormal folks can be as biased as the materialists.

“because it takes a very solid argument full of strong logic with lots of evidence to back it up to make it into a respected scientific journal like Nature.”

Some things I have read about Nature that it is one of the most bias journals out there in the land of scientism and materialism. Now I come from the academia and I know first hand how biased academia is and how their journals can be bias. I suspect that the Nature journal is very deep into materialism and I also suspect it often prints articles that are theory as fact. But that is my bias at work. We all have them.

Don’t make the mistake of treating these academia and scientific journals as bibles they are not infallible. Scientism can be a very invalid road as we humans have much to learn about reality. Tunnel vision is alive and well even in academia especially in academia; history tells us that. As it is with religious and political and economic and etc beliefs. Do your own journey and research, trust no one completely. No one.

There is a herd mentality in academia as well as everywhere else in life. Get over we are logical and everyone else is not mentality. It will fail you every time.  Whoops giving unsolicited advice, trespassing again. Darn.

See all phenomena as degrees or levels of intelligence. The intellect will fail us every time as it reveals itself as intellectualism. Coming from academia I have been witness to intellectualism as it is rampant in those institutions. The best-kept secret in the world: intellectualism is not intelligence.

lots of dialog, much appreciated. retiree here.

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“All studies that I have heard of that have investigated these paranormal claims have been negative or inconclusive as to the existence of this phenomenon.”

A couple of names come to mind. William Crookes and Lodge two very respected scientists in their time. I am willing to suggest that those studies you have heard of were conducted by materialists with very strong beliefs and subject to bias.

“As soon as your ‘research’ is published in a well respected science journal, let me know and I will read it with an open mind”

The term open mind is an oxymoron and from my point of view any researcher that fails to understand that simply stated but profound axiom has yet to understand the reality of research. Again I am not here to convert or convince anyone of the existence of the paranormal as that is an impossible job and is indeed trespassing. It is my contention that paradigms influence our research and most are unaware to what degree of that influence.

Most if not all the people into paranormal research reject my writings so don’t look for any articles published soon by this researcher. The paranormal folks can be as biased as the materialists.

“because it takes a very solid argument full of strong logic with lots of evidence to back it up to make it into a respected scientific journal like Nature.”

Some things I have read about Nature that it is one of the most bias journals out there in the land of scientism and materialism. Now I come from the academia and I know first hand how biased academia is and how their journals can be bias. I suspect that the Nature journal is very deep into materialism and I also suspect it often prints articles that are theory as fact. But that is my bias at work. We all have them.

Don’t make the mistake of treating these academia and scientific journals as bibles they are not infallible. Scientism can be a very invalid road as we humans have much to learn about reality. Tunnel vision is alive and well even in academia especially in academia; history tells us that. As it is with religious and political and economic and etc beliefs. Do your own journey and research, trust no one completely. No one.

There is a herd mentality in academia as well as everywhere else in life. Get over we are logical and everyone else is not mentality. It will fail you every time.  Whoops giving unsolicited advice, trespassing again. Darn.

See all phenomena as degrees or levels of intelligence. The intellect will fail us every time as it reveals itself as intellectualism. Coming from academia I have been witness to intellectualism as it is rampant in those institutions. The best-kept secret in the world: intellectualism is not intelligence.

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http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/0801/0801.0337.pdf

an interesting approach to explaining the universe through the eyes of a computer professor.

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Researcher , in all due respect , you must be going out of your mind by now if you are honest about researching the paranormal for 20 years. I think you may already be infected with the mind virus..You might like to read a basic science book on the human body then you may find the secrets to life. ..Are you aware that there are 200-400 BILLION stars in our universe and there is OVER 100 TRILLION cells in the average human body…I gather you did not complete the Darwin and Evolution science course, you are missing out ...Look into you own mind before you lose it to the spooks ...Then people will listen to you,,,I will always listen to you , but you sound like you earn an income from this sort of voodoo, which if true, you are guilty of immoral earnings…But I want to help you ..

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Dougie

Thanks for the warm comments. Well you have proved my point beyond anything I could write or say. You see as I suspected that the reason project or at least some that blog on here are as stuck in the materialistic paradigm as the religious are with their religious paradigm.

You see both the religious and materialistic paradigm are identical in nature and severity. Now either side knows they have such powerful paradigms that influence their views of the world. Yet each side thinks the other is either insane, stupid, or evil. The religious paradigm and the materialist paradigm are like two sides of the same coin.

Both the religious and the materialists use a method of put downs, which is a hidden approach to showing hostility towards anyone not sharing their beliefs. This is not about the paranormal it is about the human mind that knows little about the influence those beliefs have on one’s view of the world.

The religious are somewhat content with their god made in their image and the materialists are content to some degree with their meaningless world where matter creates consciousness and they worship at the altar of scientism.

To the atheist their god is their intellect and they will not waste any time telling anyone how much smarter and more rational they are than others that do not share their beliefs.

About once a year I blog on a website such as this to see if anything has changed in the world of materialism. Not much has changed although some of the comments were encouraging as a couple of bloggers appeared to see my point about how difficult it is to be open to ideas that they do not personally share.

You see it is not certainty that causes one to attack or put down others that have different beliefs but it is doubt. Now doubt is beneficial because sooner or later one may decide to show interest in other views of the world. It usually takes a significant emotional event such as an NDE for this interest to take hold of one’s mind.

How unaware and with due respect uneducated and maybe even ignorant to suggest one can read a basic science book and understand the secrets of life. From my point of view we have barely even begun to understand the secrets of life or the mysteries of the universe.

This is how powerful scientism and materialism is that they can overwhelm the rational and reasoning mind. The same phenomenon occurs with religion and some of their ideas about a personal god made in the image of man.

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researcher, some of your comments and your overall tone leave me feeling uncomfortable.

I am reminded of the early 90s when I was a grad student and the talk of the coffee room was of a guy who was sending emails to some of the professors insisting that no one was listening to his brilliance, and everyone was prejudiced and small minded, etc.  We all had a bit of a laugh at his incoherent ramblings.

This fellow was Valery Fabrikant and about a year after all the emails he went to Concordia University where he worked, shot and killed 4 people.

Now, I’m not saying you’re a shooter.  I’m only saying that your certainty and your anger at dullards who won’t listen to you leave me feeling the same way as my very tangential brush with Fabrikant all those years ago.

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If you are referring to my use of the word ignorant then think of ignorance and the synonym for ignorance is unawareness. Now we are all unaware of something. No one is immune from that unawareness. I noticed you believed I had much anger and certainty and compared me to a person that became a shooter.

My interest in is in the human mind and how it can convince itself it knows but others do not. Now if I come across that way then I will work on that deeply. If I come across with certainty without realization that certainty is based in doubt not a knowing beyond knowing.

Once being an almost atheist myself I know the mentality of thinking I know when I do not know. It took years of research to see past both materialism and religion. It is fortunate that I was not raised religious and what religion I was exposed to even as a child it looked ridiculous. I mean a god that has chosen people so they can kill whole cities to have a homeland.

And really smart people believe that that is an ok god but of course some really smart people believe they are here by chance and the brain matter creates consciousness. Go figure.

But also materialism has so many gaps but the materialists overlook those gaps like the religious overlook their jealous angry god that condones genocide. Now this is the first time I have ever been accused of being like a shooter they knew. That is a new one I think I touched a very sensitive area of your ego.

I take all comments to heart and will meditate on that one. Thank you for those comments. Often if not always others see in us what we are unable to see in ourselves.

So far the comments have accused me of earning income off my voodoo and being compared to a shooter and I have never read a basic science book that would have taught me the secrets of life. Those are called attacks or put-downs when someone challenges our cherished beliefs. We all have such beliefs myself included. That has been my point in these posts.  These cherished beliefs become paradigms and those paradigms lead to paradigm paralysis and they are hidden from our view but greatly effect our view of the world.

Now there is nothing evil about atheism or religion as all evil, sin, or error has its home in ignorance, which is simply unawareness. If we were not unaware we could not exist as separate unique humans. That one should fly high like a kite. Not.

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@ researcher

I’m curious to learn how you “know” hell is not real

“My research indicates there is no such thing as an eternal hell”

what research indicates that?

i’ll be interested to know.

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One has to do their own research to discover such things. My discoveries may not be your discoveries. I have discovered long ago it does no good to reveal our sources or the direction of your research. One must show interest and curiosity and then do their own research. And it won’t happen in weeks but year’s, even decades of dedicated research and you will not find proofs but probabilities.

The key devoted interest without preconceived notions. Research into the mysteries of life can be very frustrating to the ego. Lots of false starts, fraud, and a whole host of teachers claiming to know truths. Trust no one to have truths one must discover these “truths” for themselves.

Most people that ask about my research never take the time to even investigate the books or stories or research findings that I recommend. They to a person state something to the effect that cannot be or whatever. It is always the person that has done the least research on a subject that has the greatest of opinions.

Go for it. One must go into any research without any preconceived notions or the evidence will elude you. Also I think it helps to go into any research with the realization or understanding that the paradigm effect is at work at our sub conscious level unknown to us. Also wishful thinking and preconceived bias affects our research findings.

Research into the mysteries of life is not for the faint of heart and a waste of time for those that have already made up their mind whether atheist, religious or materialist. Also anyone that goes into mysteries of life research claiming to have an open mind or no beliefs will find research into the mysteries of life a waste of time.  The axiom if you think you have an open mind you don’t; if you know you are biased that is a good start.

Shoot I was hoping someone would ask about the statement I made about our unawareness is why we exist as unique Beings. That is written about in no book or article that I know of.

“If we were not unaware we could not exist as separate unique humans.”

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.This article is about Galileo.
2. Copernicus developed the lens for the ‘telescope’.
3. Both were scantioned by the magisterium of the Catholic church.
4.Copernicus was commisioned by the magisterium to find a substanative (read more holiday celebrations) reason to combine the Julian & Pagan calenders. The church was running out of members.He did. The (very) Archbishops who hired him,  were agast at his revelation. He was astute enough religiously/politically to accede to their power.
5. About fifty years later, Galileo developed the tube. We have been enamored with it ever since.
6.Peter, please. Darwin was an “in power” mucky, muck in the Royal Society. Besides the original title to his deterministic tome the subtitle was “The Preservation of favored Races in the Struggel for Life”. This tickled the jowls of the developed mind set of the aristocracy. We owe the actual insight to Alfred Russel Walllece & Baptiste de Lamark, a commoner and a biologist of notoriety , respectively. Reputiated by Barron Quevin because Lamark’s observation said, “even animals have a consciousness to evolve” LaMark’s eulegy was given by B. Quevin. Again science was allowed the privledege of having the Fox of Royalty chase the Chickens of Ignonomy. Progress may have been held up.
7. Get facts, Peter. Go to Epigenitics:The Biology of Belief by Dr. Bruce Lipton.
8. The rest of the tribe of “ghost hunters’ please go to shiftinconsciousness.com or to http://www.noetic.org.
9.Please, I am joking about tribal affiliation. Weirdness is on a continum.

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“Alfred Russel Wallace, OM, FRS (8 January 1823 – 7 November 1913) was a British naturalist, explorer, geographer, anthropologist and biologist. He is best known for independently proposing a theory of natural selection which prompted Charles Darwin to publish his own theory.”

“Wallace was strongly attracted to unconventional ideas. His advocacy of Spiritualism and his belief in a non-material origin for the higher mental faculties of humans strained his relationship with the scientific establishment, especially with other early proponents of evolution. In addition to his scientific work, he was a social activist who was critical of what he considered to be an unjust social and economic system in 19th-century Britain” From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Wallace when he came out in defense of spiritualism that pretty much did him in with the materialists. When William Crookes did his research with the mediums Holme’s and Cook, his peers would not even travel a few miles to document his research. They already knew that anything beyond the physical world was impossbile. Paradigm paralysis again.

The scientific method only works if one can somewhat overcome their preconceived ideas and beliefs of what is reality. Nothing should be off limits even the paranormal.

Crookes was considered the greatest scientist of his time and he came out in defense of a non physical reality and paranormal phenomena (as did Wallace) from what he experienced with Holmes and Cook. The point of this comment is not whether Crookes research is valid or invalid; the point is that his peers steeped in materialism would not travel a few miles to see for themselves if his research findings had validity.

This response to not examine Crookes findings is not true to the scientific method but shows how paradigms can influence our rational and reasoning minds. Even those that claim to understand the scientific method the very best.

Isn’t life interesting.

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