UFOs: are they really just a fictitious phenomenon?

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BDFL - Memuneh
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#504543 10-Aug-2011 17:20

cgrew:
freitasm: That doesn't prove anything, if not that he was a good talker. For years some services have experiemented with things like ESP, drugs, etc. There's alway some "believer" that green lights those projects.

For a good talker he had a lot of (at the time) well known & important people be his proteges, including L. Ron Hubbard - The founder who established the Church of Scientology.

Would you listen to someone that partook in dark rituals & Satanism? Not to mention these people later joined this cult knowing full well what they were getting themselves in to.

I was not worried at all on his "dark rituals" and "satanism". What worries me is the mention of L. Ron Bubbard and Scientology. Now things are getting out of control...

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#504547 10-Aug-2011 17:25

cgrew:Would you listen to someone that partook in dark rituals & Satanism?

I don't think that's any different to a goverment official listening to a Catholic minister or another religious authority, as long as we're talking about rituals, superstition and patent absurd spiritual nonsense.

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#504549 10-Aug-2011 17:30

I'm going to go with the guy with the Sagan avatar on this topic...
The Demon Haunted World pretty much sums up my feelings on extraterrestrials and other things of that nature.

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#504552 10-Aug-2011 17:32

Mooseboy:The Demon Haunted World pretty much sums up my feelings on extraterrestrials and other things of that nature.

It really should be in every school, along with Pale Blue Dot.

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#504558 10-Aug-2011 17:38

BurningBeard: I don't think that's any different to a goverment official listening to a Catholic minister or another religious authority, as long as we're talking about rituals, superstition and patent absurd spiritual nonsense.

What about partaking in sex magick & incestuous behaviour? If you are going to exclude the "superstition" out, then yes there is a difference between the two.

Also on the subject of this being "superstitious" not mention patent & absurd, why has there for example, been encounters with entities when using a weegie board?? And that's someone anyone can have access to. The occult and important people that have done & still are playing apart in history believe in the "other side."

Why label it as absurd?

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#504564 10-Aug-2011 17:51

freitasm: What worries me is the mention of L. Ron Bubbard and Scientology.

He later joined the Ordo Templi Orientis.

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#504565 10-Aug-2011 17:51

cgrew: What about partaking in sex magick & incestuous behaviour? If you are going to exclude the "superstition" out, then yes there is a difference between the two.

Like I said earlier, all they used him for was some advice on horoscopes. Hardly scandal of the century.

cgrew:Also on the subject of this being "superstitious" not mention patent & absurd, why has there for example, been encounters with entities when using a weegie board?? And that's someone anyone can have access to. The occult and important people that have done & still are playing apart in history believe in the "other side." .

The Ouija board first came out as a toy invented by some business men. I suggest you learn more about the ideomotor effect, and the history of fraudulent practitioners who used common magic tricks to freak people out.

Why label it as absurd?

What, belief in demons, gods and magic?

Because there's no evidence for it, that's why. All the proponents of the paranormal I used to follow have turned out to be either completely full of it, deluded, naive, mentally unwell or mistaken.

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#504570 10-Aug-2011 18:04

BurningBeard: turned out to be either completely full of it, deluded, naive, mentally unwell or mistaken.

So you obviously think that the Bible is full of it then? Not to mention people that hold credit to this book are mistaken & mentally unwell?

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#504574 10-Aug-2011 18:12

cgrew: So you obviously think that the Bible is full of it then?

Yes.

Not to mention people that hold credit to this book are mistaken & mentally unwell?

Possibly some, but probably no more than any other popular book you could think up. I'm not sure what you're driving at there.

I'm certainly not saying you have to be mentally unwell to believe that stuff*. Mistaken, misinformed or deliberately ignoring contradicting evidence in order to avoid cognitive dissonance, perhaps.

*I've seen first hand what damage the mixture of mental illness and religious fanaticism can do.

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#504581 10-Aug-2011 18:33

BurningBeard: Yes.

Fairenough - Atheist I take it?

BurningBeard: Possibly some, but probably no more than any other popular book you could think up. I'm not sure what you're driving at there.

I'm certainly not saying you have to be mentally unwell to believe that stuff*. Mistaken, misinformed or deliberately ignoring contradicting evidence in order to avoid cognitive dissonance, perhaps.

*I've seen first hand what damage the mixture of mental illness and religious fanaticism can do.

People have different views & different beliefs, they're not ignoring evidence. And I don't go around calling people mistaken or delusional. Also I might add, that book is the most published & most sold in history. It deserves at least some credit ;-)

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#504589 10-Aug-2011 18:50

cgrew: Fairenough - Atheist I take it?

Yes.

People have different views & different beliefs, they're not ignoring evidence. And I don't go around calling people mistaken or delusional.

Not true. Many paranormal proponents ignore, brush away and flat-out distract other people from evidence that totally refutes their stance. Need I make a list? Even I did it myself when I believed in all sorts of silly things I no longer believe.

Many people ARE mistaken or delusional. I was probably both for a while. I remember with my night terrors, back when they started, I thought were psychic attack! Now I understand what it really is. I was mistaken. Nothing to see here. Move on.

Also I might add, that book is the most published & most sold in history. It deserves at least some credit ;-)

Not really. It's a poorly written cobbling together of all sorts of unsupported nonsense and I make no apologies for rejecting it as anything ever worth reading, considering or letting into my life. And I tried.

I don't care how popular it is - The Koran is extremely popular and it's a disgusting piece of work. Catholicism is popular and it's corrupt and anti-woman. Britney Spears sold millions, but she's a joke. One could argue it serves as a good moral compass but I disagree. There's some atrocious stuff in the Bible and I absolutely stand by the concept that we don't need a concept of God to be good.
Of course people have different views and beliefs - but you cannot change what IS. As I've said before - We're all entitled to our own opinions, but not our own facts.

Reality is that which when you stop believing in it, does not go away. ;)

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#505361 12-Aug-2011 10:16

I felt obliged to write back.

I find it rather strange in way that people can believe in absolutely nothing, & yet the people that do choose to believe in something are delusional? Negative.

Stephen Hawkins once claimed that the events prior to the Big Bang theory are irrelevant - Interesting words from a wonderful and very intelligent quantum physicist. To the contrary he later theorized that the events leading up to the Big Bang are much more relevant than he & a lot of people took for granted. What lit the spark? That is a good question.

George Lucas called it "The Force" some call it God, others choose to ignore it or accept only the "facts" & or reality in the "now" dimension.

The person you idolize on your avatar (BurningBeard) is an agnostic, not an atheist. And I think to this discussion an interesting event occurred when he (Carl Sagan) had Voyager 1 turn around & take a photograph looking back at Earth almost 4 billion miles away. That event made a lot of people including the scientists realise the reality of what and where our planet stands in the cosmos; Are we really alone in the universe? Is this reality as we know it? Did we get here by chance or did something create this fusion of life?

Carl Sagan wrote:

"From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it's different. Look again at that dot. That's here, that's home, that's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there ? on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbour life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known."

Earth & the people that inhabit it have probably not made any contact or encountered extra-terrestrials at this stage or as we know it, but perhaps there could very well be an alternate reality in another dimension? It was once written in a simplistic term; "The Heavens" But the possibility that there is an alternate reality seems very relevant even in today's standards. And I say it like that because I think people worry too much on relying only in the "facts" when in actual fact it was curiosity that got them where they are today. I think it's important to hold on to a little bit of curiosity at times, even if it is only a little bit.

Some of my favourite quotes:

"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education."

-Albert Einstein

"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind."

-Albert Einstein

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#505383 12-Aug-2011 10:53

cgrew: I find it rather strange in way that people can believe in absolutely nothing, & yet the people that do choose to believe in something are delusional? Negative.

What? I never said everybody who believes in magical and paranormal stuff are delusional. I said SOME. The fact that you said "choose to believe in something" does point out quite a flaw in religious and magical thinking - there's so many different crazy ideas out there - they can't ALL be right. It's not a matter of choosing.

I didn't choose not to believe in God. I was born atheist (as we all are) and never had anything compel me to believe. It's a nice thought. But I'm more interested with what actually IS, not what feels nice.

Besides, I believe in lots of things! It's almost insulting when people say atheists believe in nothing. I believe in evolution. I believe in gravity. I believe in rocks and animals and stars. I believe in love.

Not confusing atheism with nihilism are you?

I just don't believe in god, gods or a higher power. I'm willing to be swayed. I suppose you could call me an agnostic-atheist. Based on the evidence at hand, I'm going to assume there is no god, and will live my life accordingly.

cgrew: George Lucas...

...wrote fiction. And it's not particularly good.

cgrew: *Irrelivant Sagan quote snipped*

Earth & the people that inhabit it have probably not made any contact or encountered extra-terrestrials at this stage or as we know it, but perhaps there could very well be an alternate reality in another dimension? It was once written in a simplistic term; "The Heavens" But the possibility that there is an alternate reality seems very relevant even in today's standards. And I say it like that because I think people worry too much on relying only in the "facts" when in actual fact it was curiosity that got them where they are today. I think it's important to hold on to a little bit of curiosity at times, even if it is only a little bit.

You seem to be suggesting (correct me if I'm wrong) that scientific discipline stifles curiosity. It does not. That's religion's forte.

cgrew: "Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind."

-Albert Einstein

Brilliant misquote!

The very same Einstein ho called religion "childish" and "primitive."

"The word god is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. No interpretation no matter how subtle can (for me) change this."

- Einstein.

The quote YOU used, is from this excerpt from his Science & Religion essay:

...Even though the realms of religion and science in themselves are clearly marked off from each other, nevertheless there exist between the two strong reciprocal relationships and dependencies. Though religion may be that which determines the goal, it has, nevertheless, learned from science, in the broadest sense, what means will contribute to the attainment of the goals it has set up. But science can only be created by those who are thoroughly imbued with the aspiration toward truth and understanding. This source of feeling, however, springs from the sphere of religion. To this there also belongs the faith in the possibility that the regulations valid for the world of existence are rational, that is, comprehensible to reason. I cannot conceive of a genuine scientist without that profound faith. The situation may be expressed by an image: science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.

Though I have asserted above that in truth a legitimate conflict between religion and science cannot exist, I must nevertheless qualify this assertion once again on an essential point, with reference to the actual content of historical religions. This qualification has to do with the concept of God. During the youthful period of mankind's spiritual evolution human fantasy created gods in man's own image, who, by the operations of their will were supposed to determine, or at any rate to influence, the phenomenal world. Man sought to alter the disposition of these gods in his own favor by means of magic and prayer. The idea of God in the religions taught at present is a sublimation of that old concept of the gods. Its anthropomorphic character is shown, for instance, by the fact that men appeal to the Divine Being in prayers and plead for the fulfillment of their wishes...

Einstein had several ideas of "religion," and I think in this case he was referring to that sense of awe and mystery - a drive to experience the universe as a single significant whole. Not an actual, real, "god."

Sagan used the word "spiritual" bet never mean it to be in relation to actual spirits. More the worderment he felt when he pondered the universe.

Paranormal enthusiasts are always misquoting scientists like this - quote mining bits that suit them. Always hijacking Hawking, Einstein etc. Twisting words like "energy" and "quantum." Particularly in the new-age, UFO and psychic circles.

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BurningBeard

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#505389 12-Aug-2011 11:05

I also suggest that if you are going to quote Sagan, read, or listen to his Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark (The full version, not the lite one) and you'll see he finds every supernatural concept just as nonsensical as I do.

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UnrealWarCheek

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#505391 12-Aug-2011 11:06

On the sub topic of quotes...

"For those who believe, no proof is necessary. For those who don't believe, no proof is possible." - This quote by Stuart Chase is one of my favourite.

L.

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