https://evolutionnews.org/2023/01/brain-scientist-consciousness-didnt-evolve-it-creates-evolution/

Scientist claims evolution springs up from consciousness.

We're still waiting for consciousness, so, evolution.

“The total number of minds in the universe is one. In fact, Consciousness is a singu-larity phasing in all beings.” Edwin Schrodinger

Evolution is a real, proven thing. But it's not the only thing. Natural selection does not explain how complex systems came into being when they could only evolve after they existed. It's the problem of irreducible complexity, touted by the ID crowd. Consciousness as the ground state of being puts the "intelligence" in nature rather than in a deity. Put another way, complex biochemical structures exist "in the spirit" forming a blueprint of life. That is why spiritual practices matter. They address that aspect of biophysics, the one beyond the physical world.

Ah yes, the spiritual creation before the physical one. That's brilliant: it's also Mormon.

Good luck with your recovery.

I have to give credit to the inventor of Mormon doctrine for discovering that language. It's Plato's "laws of form" meets 19th Century spiritualism. A kind of precursor to Rupert Sheldrake's morphic resonance, which is the Akasha or Book of Life repackaged by a trained biologist.

Those of us educated in the 20th century eventually have to come to terms with the failures of physical materialism. Separation from spirit, the hallmark of our age, did not work as advertised.

No credit to Joseph Smith for discovering the formula. Every charlatan who wants to persuade people to give him their money realizes he must teach them that non-existent things are true .

You'd be surprised how many morons buy it.

As Voltaire said, "The first priest was the first rogue who met the first fool."

Note to Admin:

I noticed when trying to respond to a post in this thread that you have made the word "singular-ity" (without the hyphen) taboo on the Board, presumably because of the overuse (and often misuse) of this word by SC. (See how he now gets around this taboo.)

Fortunately, or unfortunately "singular-ity" (without the hyphen) is a perfectly good word which is necessary in certain scientific discourse, including contexts as potentially related to religious discussion. Please do not let overuse of this word by one person make it unavailable to others who can and do use the word appropriately.

Just a suggestion. :)

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. An article about a "computer simulation" on an Intelligent Design (ID) apologist web site does not make the cut. It is going to take considerably more than that to convince me even that the Big Bang might have been conscious, much less that it was.

The woo is strong with this one.

I didn’t realize it was Discovery Institute.
Nevermind.
Yeah it seems like woo.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. An article about a "computer simulation" on an Intelligent Design (ID) apologist web site does not make the cut. It is going to take considerably more than that to convince me even that the Big Bang might have been conscious, much less that it was.

COMMENT: So, you are judging this article (interview) simply because the blog presenting it is sponsored by the Discovery Institute, even though neither the interviewer (Robert Kuhn), nor the interviewee (Donald Hoffman) are associated in any way with the Discovery Institute?

I am not a fan of Donald Hoffman, but he is a serious scholar who is not affiliated at all with either Intelligent Design or the Discovery Institute. Moreover, there is nothing inherently wrong with a computer simulation artfully designed as an attempt to explain or support some theory. After all, there are plenty of cosmological and evolutionary 'computer models' that are also questionable as to whether they touch down with actual reality.
___________________________________________

"The woo is strong with this one."

COMMENT: What is your definition of "woo?" Hoffman in particular has a well-thought-out theory of consciousness, notwithstanding its grossly speculative nature. It is informed, articulate, and interesting to those who understand the consciousness debate, and are not afraid to look beyond strict scientific materialism for potential answers. (After all, consciousness itself is resistant to materialist explanations, which is why it is universally deemed to be a 'mystery'!) And if you actually read his book, or even watched this interview, you would know that, unlike the Discovery Institute, religion has nothing whatever to do with Hoffman's motives.

I wasn't conscious when consciousness and evolution started so I really can't answer that.

However, because I "evolved" first from sperm, egg and momma's womb and then became conscious after birth, I would say evolution came first.....and I say that with a clear conscience.

I very rarely post on this forum, but I cannot resist commenting on this.

First, there isn't a singular consciousness in human experience, but several distinct consciousnesses related to our thoughts and senses (such as auditory and visual consciousnesses). The interaction between these different consciousnesses happens unconsciously. The idea of a singular consciousness which experiences everything is illusory. It cannot be found in actual experience (as the Buddha pointed out 2500 years ago), nor can it be found in the brain (as modern neuroscience points out).

Second, the word consciousness is an abstraction like the word weather. You can have sunny weather, rainy weather, cold weather, warm weather and so on. There is no such thing as "weather itself", or "pure weather" apart from the different kinds of atmospheric conditions we collectively label "weather". While we can use the word in abstract, is always a particular set of atmospheric conditions in actual experience. Talking about weather as if it could have a separate existence from atmospheric conditions would be delusional.

The same is true of the word consciousness. It can refer to any kind of experience we have, but those experiences are always particular. There is no such thing as consciousness itself without content. Nor is consciousness a background screen on which things happen. The concrete things we experience are what we refer to when we talk about consciousness.

For instance, the awareness/consciousness of a piece of music is inseparable from the music itself. The distinction is purely conceptual. There can be no music in my subjective world without consciousness of it, and the music itself has no existence (for me, subjectively) without consciousness. The same is true for the other senses.

If you touch your arm, you don't experience two things, the consciousness, and the sensation of touch on the skin. It is one singular thing, without any background, but since there is such a thing as being touched without noticing (for instance while asleep) we can refer to one state as being conscious and the other not.

Thinking deeply about stuff like this, and perhaps practicing some mindfulness or other kinds of meditation to see it directly, ends belief in the kind of "hindu light" mysticism that flourishes on the web. Sure, consciousness is mysterious in the sense that we don't understand how it arises, but it is not "god" or the stuff the universe is made out of. It is intimately connected with sensory experience and inseparable from it.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/06/2023 08:44AM by Yor.

Great insights Yor.
Thanks for sharing them.
I don't remember ever seeing you post before.
Great to hear from you.
I read an interesting report on Big Think about consciousness being linked to entanglement, and perhaps instead of thinking of it in terms of classical physics and chemistry, we should start thinking of it more in terms of quantum entanglement.

https://bigthink.com/hard-science/brain-consciousness-quantum-entanglement/

Perhaps what both god and consciousness have in common is also what they have in common with Schrodinger's Cat, both alive and dead, until you observe it, a wave, a combination of all possible states, which collapses, the moment you observe it.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/130812-physics-schrodinger-erwin-google-doodle-cat-paradox-science



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/31/2023 11:35PM by schrodingerscat.

"First, there isn't a singular consciousness in human experience, but several distinct consciousnesses related to our thoughts and senses (such as auditory and visual consciousnesses)."

COMMENT: Consciousness *is* a singular phenomenon that manifests itself through multiple modalities, including the five senses and the conscious centered self. Visual experience, auditory experience, and other sensory experiences are NOT separate consciousnesses, but rather modalities in which consciousness is affected by sensory input. Note that when having surgery and receiving general anesthesia you do not get separate drugs for 'vision' consciousness, auditory consciousness, etc. Consciousness is shut down completely by interrupting modally non-specific neural processes in the brain. Also, the singular nature of consciousness is manifested intuitively in the persistent sense of self, as a centralized singular conscious entity. This sense of self survives in contexts where all sensory experience is, more or less, suppressed and therefore is not dependent upon such sensory experience for its existence.
______________________________________________

"The interaction between these different consciousnesses happens unconsciously. The idea of a singular consciousness which experiences everything is illusory. It cannot be found in actual experience (as the Buddha pointed out 2500 years ago), nor can it be found in the brain (as modern neuroscience points out)."

COMMENT: Nonsense! Again, there is no such thing as 'different consciousnesses', but only how sensory and cognitive modalities affect consciousness as a singular, global, phenomenon. This is entirely born out by conscious experience, as noted above. (Note: There *is* however different definitions of consciousness, depending upon context of use, which is a different matter entirely.)
_____________________________________________

"Second, the word consciousness is an abstraction like the word weather. You can have sunny weather, rainy weather, cold weather, warm weather and so on. There is no such thing as "weather itself", or "pure weather" apart from the different kinds of atmospheric conditions we collectively label "weather". While we can use the word in abstract, is always a particular set of atmospheric conditions in actual experience. Talking about weather as if it could have a separate existence from atmospheric conditions would be delusional."

COMMENT: Again, complete nonsense. The term "weather" *is* a conceptual abstraction that does not have ontological existence independent of specific atmospheric patterns to which the word applies. Consciousness, on the other hand is directly *experiential*, which means that it exists as an ontological empirical reality. "Consciousness" is not about language or concepts. It is about a distinct reality of human experience, which we all experience firsthand. The fact that science does not understand it, has nothing to do with its rather obvious ontological status.
_________________________________________

"The same is true of the word consciousness. It can refer to any kind of experience we have, but those experiences are always particular. There is no such thing as consciousness itself without content. Nor is consciousness a background screen on which things happen. The concrete things we experience are what we refer to when we talk about consciousness."

COMMENT: This Humean notion of consciousness is just false, for reasons already explained. Again, you can take away all sensory experience and all thought from a conscious subject and there remains a centered, conscious self, without content, waiting for sensory input to affect conscious states and the conscious processing associated with environmental information.
______________________________________

"For instance, the awareness/consciousness of a piece of music is inseparable from the music itself. The distinction is purely conceptual. There can be no music in my subjective world without consciousness of it, and the music itself has no existence (for me, subjectively) without consciousness. The same is true for the other senses."

COMMENT: Again, NO! Are you suggesting that the experience of music is indistinct from the concept of 'music itself.' If that is true, why do people experience music differently? The fact that music has no existence without consciousness (as you say) is further evidence that consciousness is a singular, ontological phenomena through which we experience and enjoy music. "Music" as a concept in language is one thing, the experience of music is quite another. The latter is NOT merely conceptual, which could not be more obvious.
_____________________________________

"If you touch your arm, you don't experience two things, the consciousness, and the sensation of touch on the skin. It is one singular thing, without any background, but since there is such a thing as being touched without noticing (for instance while asleep) we can refer to one state as being conscious and the other not."

COMMENT: If you touch your arm, you experience a sensation, which experience is grounded in your conscious awareness. Upon simple reflection you can 'see' that there is indeed a conscious self that is having such an experience, whatever the source of that self is.
______________________________________

"Thinking deeply about stuff like this, and perhaps practicing some mindfulness or other kinds of meditation to see it directly, ends belief in the kind of "hindu light" mysticism that flourishes on the web. Sure, consciousness is mysterious in the sense that we don't understand how it arises, but it is not "god" or the stuff the universe is made out of. It is intimately connected with sensory experience and inseparable from it."

COMMENT: I am not a fan of Easter mysticism in any form. But your understanding of consciousness as described here is deeply problematic. It reminds me of some materialist philosophers who seek to avoid the problems of consciousness by denying its existence, denying the 'self,' and making consciousness merely conceptual, which is absurd. See, for example, Dennett, Consciousness Explained (1991)

There are instances The Cat seems to be championing that form of mystic consciousness known as "Deconsciousness".

It's almost an art form!

Especially sticking the landing!!

I have no degree in physics, astronomy, chemistry, philosophy, metaphysics, religion, or any other discipline that might help me understand what is and is not consciousness, nor how to describe it.

But my hunch (aka intuitive thinking) tells me that consciousness - and what is referred to as the soul - is simply memory.

Memory gives the illusion of consciousness, of the soul. We don't remember the time when our newly formed brains held nothing but the scaffolding we inherited genetically . But through learning, memories became stored. That is my own sense of what is consciousness. That is what people describe as "the soul".

Don't beat up on me. I'm not trying to convince anyone else.

"But my hunch (aka intuitive thinking) tells me that consciousness - and what is referred to as the soul - is simply memory."

COMMENT: But then, what is memory, if not the conscious retrieval of prior conscious states? At some point you also have to equate memory with some sort of strictly neurological storage and retrieval process. Then consciousness by your definition also becomes merely the brain. Yet, the main focal 'mystery' of consciousness is its subjective, experiential, character, which now is entirely lost, or explained away.
_____________________________________

"Memory gives the illusion of consciousness, of the soul. We don't remember the time when our newly formed brains held nothing but the scaffolding we inherited genetically. But through learning, memories became stored. That is my own sense of what is consciousness. That is what people describe as "the soul".

COMMENT: So, then, neurological memory processes in the brain give the 'illusion of consciousness?" Do you really want to say that consciousness is an illusion? What about memories that are conscious, which we all have every day? Are conscious memories an illusion also? The only thing that is real is the brain? Fortunately, that cannot be right.
________________________________________

Don't beat up on me. I'm not trying to convince anyone else.

COMMENT: No problem, but I am curious as to where you came up with all this.

If the answer to the above question is a requirement for living a good life, then many of us are in a pickle.

I see it as an intellectual exercise.  But way low on that spectrum.

Outside of a very arcane classroom, 99.08% of Earth's sentient population (which includes quite a few dogs, cats, crows, parrots, etc. who are smarter than an alarming percentage of the human population) don't know the question exists, much less care about the answer.

It's like a crossword puzzle; no one likes a puzzle they can't complete; we like the ones that make us look good.  

Having an answer to the cited question is right up there with knowing the temperature at the highest point on Venus at noon on perihelion; scientists might come up with some idea as to the answer, but what's the point?

But at least mormons are okay with mental masturbation (thank ghawd!!).

You aren't curious at all about how I came up with this. (Out of my bony little head if you must know!)

What you really want is another opportunity to display in public what EOD calls mental masturbation.

I don't fully agree with you, but I think it's an interesting question.

Let me take your observation in a different direction. Could it be that memory is identity? Obviously, a large part of who we are is genetically programed: a Belgian Shepherd will tend to herd things, be they sheep or stray children; a Doberman Pincer will tend to guard his family and home; and dogs of EOD's breed will sit in a corner and scratch themselves. So the template is set at birth.

But otherwise, what is a person if not her memories? No one is the same person now as a decade ago or will remain the same a decade from now. Our character at any point in time is the sum of biological predisposition, which is relatively static over time, and experience, which is highly variable and cumulative in its form as memory--which is to some degree protean, meaning that we unconsciously revise our pasts as our total volume of experiences increases. To the extent that our consciousness of ourselves--our identities, if you will--grows and changes, it is as a result of the accumulation of memories.

Does that sound reasonable?

Absolutely that sounds reasonable. And I agree with it.

You are much more sophisticated in your understanding and descriptions than I, but that is how I too see identity. Accumulated memory = Consciousness = Identity = what people call the Soul. (Which BTW, I do not believe survives death.)

At the risk of encouraging HB to further disect and evaluate my words, let me try to answer his question - where I "came up with all this".

Mostly through Steven Pinker's work, ("The Blank Slate", "The Language Instinct", "How the Mind Works");
Also, David J. Linden, ("The Accidental Mind");
Thomas Moore, ("The Care of the Soul", "The Re-enchantment of Everyday Life")
Oliver Sacks, (The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat", "Musicology")
Alan Jasanoff, ("The Biological Mind")

I truly believe that eventually there will be a physical understanding, and scientific recognition and understanding of what makes us who we are and how we think - aka "consciousness".

Well, I suspect Henry has a couple of books from the 1950s that disprove everything written since then.

But we'll see.

https://singular-ityhub.com/2022/10/25/could-consciousness-be-a-memory-system-new-theory-says-yes/

You'll have to remove the hyphen from the url to get it to work

The first hyphen I should say must be removed.

This is very, very funny. Thanks for sharing. :)

So now we have a "Singular-ity Hub." I am sure SC and LW will be thrilled: A new internet site from which to ground their extensive scientific understanding.

Now, why don't you try to defend this wild and ludicrous view so that we can then have some fun with it. You can start by explaining "the conscious brain" and work your way toward explaining "the unconscious brain."

Why ‘s!ngular!ty’ is a banned word on RfM is an eternal mystery to me!

Singularity was probably blocked because of your never ending OT babbling on and on and on and on and on and on about it.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/02/2023 01:56PM by Susan I/S.

Susan I/S Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Singularity was probably blocked because of your
> never ending OT babbling on and on and on and on
> and on and on about it.


LOL, like I’m the only one who mentions the s!ngula!ty around here?

Certainly the most. By far. The VAST majority of the others are replies to you. Throw it in search. Those are just the ones that have NOT been pulled. Most other people get the hint after something has been repeatedly pulled, but not you. You just go on and on and on and on and then whine about them getting tired of it. Try being a more considerate about the time of others. They don't get paid to babysit you.

We have no clue what color the sky is in The Cat’s world, but I’m certain you have made his day.

It is so rude to waste the time of others. It gets pulled and he is back with the same crap a few days later.

The numbers for mentions of "singularity" in the eight years since El Gato discovered the phenomenon are as follows:

Total: 234

Koriwhore: 44

SC: 68

In other words, The Cat is directly responsible for 48% of all singular activity on RfM.

Given that a high proportion of the remainder is responses--not all of them charitable--to The Cat, I think we can ascribe to him responsibility for 2/3, and perhaps much more, of all uses of that word.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 02/02/2023 04:49PM by Lot's Wife.

Henry Bemis Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> So now we have a "Singular-ity Hub." I am sure SC
> and LW will be thrilled: A new internet site from
> which to ground their extensive scientific
> understanding.

That hurts my feelings, Henry. I acknowledge that your understanding of science and scientific method excels mine every bit as much as your grasp of law does.

First, I apologize for offending you by commenting on your post. That was not my intention and is never my intention.

Second, I own and have read countless books on the subject of personal identity, including those that have in one way or another incorporated memory into their theories. Traditionally, this includes John Locke, and more recently, Anthony Quinton, and H.P. Grice. At the present time, this view has been mostly dismissed in favor of physical, brain-based identity theories. Psychology is just too vague and elusive for scientific purposes for establishing identity.

In traditional memory theories, memory is deemed to be a more or less continuum of *mental* states arising from personal experience. Thus 'memory' on such views is a mental phenomenon rather than a physical one. Memory theories of identity are offered as an alternative to materialist physical theories of identity that ground identity in the human body or brain. The best single book on this topic is John Perry (Ed.), *Personal Identity* 2nd Edition (2008). For memory theories see Parts II and III. Note: You may find this a bit philosophically "heavy," (you know, "mental masturbation") but it will give you the gist of what a genuine memory theory of identity involves, and why they have been rejected.
___________________________________________

"At the risk of encouraging HB to further disect and evaluate my words, let me try to answer his question - where I "came up with all this".

COMMENT: Why is it a "risk" to have your views commented upon and if necessary corrected, either by me or anyone else? What is so offensive about having one's opinions "dissected?" I don't get it. Really, isn't that the Mormon attitude that we on RfM so soundly reject? So, why is it so difficult to have our own views challenged? SOMEONE PLEASE ANSWER THIS QUESTION FOR ME!
_____________________________________________

Mostly through Steven Pinker's work, ("The Blank Slate", "The Language Instinct", "How the Mind Works");
Also, David J. Linden, ("The Accidental Mind");
Thomas Moore, ("The Care of the Soul", "The Re-enchantment of Everyday Life")
Oliver Sacks, (The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat", "Musicology")
Alan Jasanoff, ("The Biological Mind")

COMMENT: Thank you for sharing. However, none of these books advocate and argue for a memory theory of personal identity, whatever merits they might otherwise have. I own and have read the 1st, 3rd, and 4th books. The 2nd and 5th books were written by neuroscientists and from their titles and descriptions have a typical materialist (rather than memory) view of human identity. This is the mainstream view, which is articulated in any number of popular books by philosophers and neuroscientists. In any event, perhaps you might share what you gleaned from these works that you found compelling.
________________________________________

"I truly believe that eventually there will be a physical understanding, and scientific recognition and understanding of what makes us who we are and how we think - aka "consciousness".

COMMENTS: Perhaps so, but most would say that the gap between the physical brain and mental experience is fundamentally unbridgeable given the distinct differences between what is deemed to be mental, e.g. consciousness, and the physical. That is why consciousness is universally deemed to be "mysterious."
__________________________________________

Now, as for the claim that one's personal identity can be established by one's memories, again, this is not a materialist view, but rather a traditional view of personal identity that is more akin to the idea of a soul, or mind, but without Cartesian substance. The soul, upon this view is simply deemed to be the continuity of one's experiences and memories. But we can see upon immediate reflection that this cannot be right.

Memories are transitory mental states ("engrams") as produced by experience, which are notoriously unstable, not contiguous, and unreliable. As such, it is difficult (if not impossible) to identify any collection of such memories stable enough to ground the singular identity of a person through time. For example, a physical object, like an apple, has uniquely identifiable particles and structure that persist in space and time such as to distinguish the identity of one apple from another. There is an underlying stability to make identity determinations. However, a complex of memories has no such underlying material substance or structure. (Rather, it is a mental, or psychological construct.) Moreover, the content of such complex of memories changes over time, such that today my complex of memories might be much different from the complex of memories I had yesterday, years ago, or will have at any time in the future. In short, there is nothing about memories per se across time, that could possibly preserve one's personal identity, without being further associated with a singular "self" or "soul." As such, personal identity must be grounded in something else; either an underlying mental "self" (or soul) or a physical brain or body.

Since memories are mental states, not physical states, the most logical mental grounding is in a persistent self or soul. On this view memories, rather than being isolated complexes of experiences, are associated with a persistent self or soul. It is this association that grounds personal identity, not the memories themselves.

So, then, what about grounding personal identity in the brain. There are unique problems here as well, but for purposes here, I will only point out that making the brain, or brain states, identical with personal identity leaves out what is most important about being human, namely, our mental lives, including our memories. Again, scientifically, there is nothing mental that is naturally associated with any physical system, including biological systems.

Nowadays, it is difficult to find competent scholars who advocate for souls as the ground for personal identity, but I do have one recommendation, if you are interested in an alternative point of view: M.C. Baker and S. Goetz, *The Soul Hypothesis: Investigations into the Existence of the Soul.* This is a compilation of several essays by people who reject materialist attempts to ground personal identity in the brain.

> . . . I do have one
> recommendation, if you are interested in an
> alternative point of view: M.C. Baker and S.
> Goetz, *The Soul Hypothesis: Investigations into
> the Existence of the Soul.* This is a compilation
> of several essays by people who reject materialist
> attempts to ground personal identity in the brain.

You know what's missing from your description of this book? Any indication that you have read it.

I don't think you have. Why? Because you usually read serious thinkers, and this book is by a linguist who specializes in grammar and a professor from Ursinus College, that bastion of scholasticism, who sometimes publishes through vanity presses. I think you were desperate to find something from the 21st century and did a quick Amazon search.

The way you recommended the book without actually recommending it is instructive.

Yes, I have this book, and yes, I have read it, and yes, I recommend it. The contributors are all serious thinkers, and the essays are generally well written and informed. I particularly recommend the two essays by Robin Collins.

As I recall, most or all the included authors have a religious orientation, which I am aware of from their other writings. But I don't care about that, if their arguments are scientifically informed and cogent, and even if at the end of the day I don't agree with such arguments and conclusions.

I don't read books or essays in order to simply validate my pre-existing anti-religion, pro science, humanistic, point of view. I read books to keep such views informed, fine-tuned, and challenged. The perspective of the reality of the soul, whether religious based or not, is an important one; particularly when consciousness, subjective experience, and personal identity remain a mysterious part of reality that is resistant to the standard scientific-materialist worldview.

Finally, I have never, ever, cited or recommended a book here on RfM that I did not personally own and have read.

Anyway, time for me to go back to sleep. :)

Well, co-editor Baker is a linguist who specializes in grammar and for whom the soul is an afterthought.

As his biography states, he "specializes in the syntax and morphology of less-studied languages, particularly those of the Americas, Africa, and Asia. He seeks to bring together generative-style theories, data collected from fieldwork on diverse languages, and typological comparison in a way that illuminates all three–an approach sometimes called Formal Generative Typology. . . . He is also interested in studying the human mind, including the possibility of nonbiological, dualistic approaches."

And co-editor Goetz is professor at a tiny religious institution, Urinus College, and has had to self-publish some of his work, including a Mormon-sounding "The Purpose of Life: Answers to Life's Greatest Questions."

As for Collins, whom you recommend, he is professor at the even tinier Messiah University--whose motto is Christ Preeminent--in Mechanicsburg, PA. There is a section on his homepage listing "Other Articles for God's Existence."

A linguistic grammarian who dabbles in religion, a vanity publisher, and a man who thinks "articles for God's existence" is academic: I don't share your opinion that these are objective researchers or that their book is objective analysis--and there is no possibility that any of this would "challenge" your views.

A linguistic grammarian who dabbles in religion, a vanity publisher, and a man who thinks "articles for God's existence" is academic: I don't share your opinion that these are objective researchers or that their book is objective analysis--and there is no possibility that any of this would "challenge" your views.

COMMENT: Well, assuming your characterization is fair, my answer is an emphatic NO! I go by what they write, their arguments and logic. Period! That is all that matters. I am very capable of assessing such views, as you should know by now. I do not have to take them, or anyone else, for their word only, or assess their writings by evaluating their credentials. Moreover, I have read multiple books and essays that were pure uninformed nonsense by PhDs from major universities. It is simply totally irrelevant.

After all, I myself do not have impressive credentials, and I hope people take my writing and arguments seriously, for their arguments and logic alone, whatever they are worth.

Finally, as I said, I do not agree with everything. But there are important insights and perspectives here, which are worth considering for reasons stated.

Sure.

"The contributors are all serious thinkers"


That phrase always make me laugh even unto falling on the floor.

Serious thinkers. hahahahahaha What a hollow empty laud that is.

There are serious thinkers in the world although I have never encountered one from Messiah University.

Who are the non-serious thinkers then besides EOD?

Well, I hate to burst your bubble of optimism regarding humanity but in my view there aren't a lot of clear thinkers in the species. . . Probably somewhere north of fungi but that's all I can confidently say.

EOD, by contrast, is pretty insightful once you learn his language. At the risk of overstatement, I suspect he ranks among the brighter prokaryotes.

Yes. I was only kidding of course. I would agree. I especially appreciate his way of disguising his serious thinking and sort of decorating it. He has quite a few contributions in my saved quotes.

The phrase, serious thinker just strikes me wrong. I can't help it. Who wouldn't consider themselves a serious thinker?

Probably, but for my own purposes I tend to identify people who fit that category. I think most of them would view themselves that way although they tend to be too busy doing serious things to entertain such questions.

EOD is singular, isn't he? So much so that we could term him the RfM singularity?

Years ago I was frightened of him. Not his writing per se, not his masculinity or his handlebar mustache, not his, well, lots of things; but his ability to deduce facts from people's writings on this and other boards. It was clear that he could infer all sorts of data from what people post, extrapolate patterns, and reach conclusions with a high degree of accuracy. I was not surprised when he later told the board that he'd previously worked in an investigative capacity.

"Dude is wicked smart."

--Judic West, three sheets to the wind

"I am constantly evolving as my consciousness accumulates memories, and processes them based on what I have decided the Truth to be."

--Judic West, evolving at the speed of life

Matter.
Matter came first.
Adaptable matter.
Could become anything matter.
Matter took many forms. Some of them good. But much of it turned into humankind though. We know how that turned out.

I’m always worried about changes that come in the twinkling of an eye!

Although truth be told, I will admit to having suffered that fate. Not proud of it but whatyagonnado?



I can hear The Cat asking, “What’s the matter with energy?”

Now you're just being dark.

The chicken, had to be the chicken.

Agreed. Eggs are too expensive right now.

Costco still has their $4.99 rotisserie chicken, but now if you’re not there when they bring them out, you’re not getting one.