What do you believe happens when we die

El_Duderino 09

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118987583#Comment_118987583

Your bunches have grown in strength based on these exchanges? Which part makes your hunch grow in strength? Is it the bit where you assert what you think or the bit where someone else asks if you have any evidence and you say you don't? I can't see anything about these exchanges, or any other exchanges, that l could make a hunch stronger unless they reveal some additional evidence.

Being asked for evidence of a belief isn't unreasonable. It only feels unreasonable when a cherished belief isn't based on evidence.

BarneyJ

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118986831#Comment_118986831

"I now say "Have you any arguments, evidence, data or reasoning that can lend for me any credence whatsoever to the claim that our existence in this universe is explained by the machinations of a non-human intelligent and intentional agent?""

Ha ha, that's a serious mouthful. Was the person you were addressing still standing there giving you their full attention when you got to the end of that sentence? Or had they a gun to their head?

smacl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118989059#Comment_118989059

Mod warning: Play the ball and not the man please, personal attacks won't be tolerated. Thanks for your attention.

nozzferrahhtoo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118987583#Comment_118987583

I do not think a question can be a fallacy? That seems not to make sense to me. A question is a question. It is not a conclusion in and of itself. Therefore I fail to see how it can be fallacious? A question can be inspired by a fallacious premise I am sure. And a question can be nonsense to a degree (Like for example to ask what color jealousy is). But I see nothing "fallacious" about the OPs question.

Your attitude to conversation here is not really in good faith. Phrases like "banging on" say everything about you and your position here, not me or mine.... nor how I have expressed myself. You are letting only yourself down with phrases like that. I did no such thing as "bang on" about anything. As you said yourself you struggled to understand what I was saying. That is on you, not me. But conversation is a two way street and I am happy to help your understanding what I am saying, in much the same way I would hope you do for me should I struggle as you have.

You said you were not sure, for example, why I mentioned 23 or the bible. These were examples. Examples are perfectly valid in discourse.

They are examples of two situations where hunches, exacerbated by anecdote and personal experience, and confirmation bias and cherry picking the evidence.... can lead people to conclusions that are in every way entirely unsubstantiated. The former is an example where armed with nothing more than a hunch, the world around them will lead them to think their conclusion appears true. The latter is an example where this very human flaw is positively recommended by a text which wishes to lead the user to a conclusion or belief.

Further you appear to be ascribing positions to me I never once expressed. For example, where did I even once say that "gut instinct is not part of the human psyche"? You demand to know who I am to make such a claim. But I did not make such a claim, or any claim even remotely similar, anywhere. Ever. At all. You invented it and inserted it into my mouth.

In fact I said quite the opposite. I said that you offering "gut" feelings is something I can perfectly understand. But I explained why the intellectually honest listener can go no further in that direction. "Gut" feelings might be interesting to a degree, but intellectually they can only be dismissed out of hand unless validated in some way by arguments, evidence, data or reasoning. Our "gut" can inspire us to turn out attention and inquiry in certain directions. They are a first step. So is anecdote as it happens. Anecdote is not evidence, but it is often a good lighthouse for where we should direct our attentions in the effort to find evidence.

Suffice to say that at this time there is nothing on offer that I am aware of that suggests and instance consciousness or subjective human experience can operate independently of, let alone survive the death of, the human brain. Nor that consciousness is external to the brain and the brain is some kind of "receiver". And least of all that consciousness is a precursor of matter. All pretty ideas, but ideas devoid of substantiation in this moment it seems.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118989059#Comment_118989059

The poor form of your question aside, and the rhetorical nation of the question, I would still feel the question warrants an answer. In that yes, when I discuss deep topics I tend to do so with people who are not of the twitter generation who think anything longer than a handful of characters is a treatise or novel. I tend to direct my discourse on and off line, on and off forums, towards people with attention spans longer than a tik tok video.

The point of my sentence above is not to be long, but to be open minded, inclusive, and to set a lower bar than merely demanding irrefutable "proof" when it is patently obvious to everyone.... theists and their ilk included.... that they can not offer any. It is a petulant and immature "gotcha" I feel to set the bar so high that your interlocutor can never reach it. This is not the "win" many people like to pretend it is.

So instead I feel it more mature and open minded to ask such people if they have anything that can at least bring us together into the opening of a conversation, on the first steps towards credibility for their claims or ideas.

And by using a phrase like "arguments, evidence, data or reasoning" I am not limiting the conversation to something like.... say.... purely scientific evidence. Instead I am saying to them "Tell me what YOUR claims are and what YOU feel is evidence for these claims and why. Not what you think I believe the evidence is or should be".

So to answer your question more directly.... yes. I have found that this openness, honestly and open mindedness has indeed brought more intellectually honest people more willingly into discourse with me. Rather than having conversation shut down from the outset by petty demands born of petulance.