“The brain controls” may be overreaching. What is observed is that the brain is part of the overall process. WE do NOT know (it has not been shown) that the brain is the overall controller.
I agree but would add that there is also no reason to believe there is not. That question is still completely wide open. That being the case, it should be approached without belief either way.
Either/or is no path to solution. Rather, it is the material in which dogmatism is carved.
Please read what I wrote. I wrote
This is fact. Involuntary tics due to neurological disorders like Tourette syndrome are one of many examples.
You introduced three competing alternatives (either/or), not me.
I compared the alternatives to the evidence, noted which best matched known facts and which required the most speculation. I did opine (although I think reasonably) on the relative value of those alternatives based on their relationship with facts and speculation. You are free to make the counter-case in opposition to facts and in favor of speculation. Nonetheless, I don’t see how that can be construed as dogmatism. Such an accusation seems more like a knee-jerk reaction to having someone critique your “exploration” of the paranormal.
It’s the conventional definition of occultism. Why? Am I wrong?
Thanks for the offer, but I am skeptical in my bones, and there are very many people offering to show such things. So I would need you to pass some gatekeepers. Have you taken it to the paranormal scientists? I’m not your guy for a beta run.
I am also a poet from time to time, so I think I am pretty open if those guys want to say something.
Sure. My narrator isn’t nearly so creative as those guys.
First, I don’t know what the riddle says. This was an ancient language and culture. I do not believe that the words he (supposedly) heard can reliably come down to modern English.
Second, Jewish culture is famous for its storytelling. Imagine how many stories we haven’t heard. This is just one story which has survived, among millions of them, and now gets special attention. I don’t know why it gets special attention except that it is a cultural icon now. I distrust cultural icons.
Yes, I am skeptical of the entire Bible. To me it looks like a mess of old stories from a primitive culture.
Modern neuroscience. Maybe read Incognito by Eagleman.
That the unconscious is us. It’s the deep machinery, plus a lot of weirdness if you ask me. It is full of strange symbols and has the ability to build new and absurd ones and show them to the narrator. It can even put on a show, as in dreams. It can produce voices.
Well, if they are part of my brain, then they would be natural.
Not sure what you mean. Science is a way of controlling our natural instinct to believe weird and apparently wrong things.
I am naturally a scientific thinker, by which I mean that I don’t trust my mind just because my mind tries to convince me of a thing. I want to run the tests.
As I say, there is enough in the natural world for me to figure out, and I’m well aware of the mind’s power to deceive us.
I don’t even understand the concept—coherent interaction with the unconscious.
Although I can see how it would be easy to convince myself of it.
Sorry. That’s just how I see it.
Yes. The “conventional” came about through a mix of ignorance and misdirection.
THat is what the opening post points out. Did you read the OP?
Defend your use of the word “paranormal” because I have never argued for any claim from supernaturalism.m Rather the thread is against such notions.
I am not arguing that this is a “paranormal” thing. I have no interest in supernaturalism or supporting any attempt at bringing such arguments into this thread.
Also - I am not offering to do the work for anyone else. Just witnessing the work that I have done and showing therein that others can do the same work if they want to but cannot dismiss such as w work of whatever “paranormal” is to them.
May you just supply the evidence that this particular science has explained idoemote=or effect and why it works.
[quote=“BestGuessYet, post:84, topic:2610”]
Not sure what you mean. Science is a way of controlling our natural instinct to believe weird and apparently wrong things.[/quote]
Again, which is the best science you have available to you and what weird and apparently wrong things and why are you conflating the thread subject with these “things”?
I too, am naturally a scientific thinker, by which I mean that I trust my mind since t is my mind which is doing the since, and my mind doesn’t try to convince me of a thing. Rather what is discovered reveals A thing I would rather not ignore. I want to run the tests, so I run the tests.
You wrote of “the mind” as something unnatural and deceptive, as if it were some strange otherworldy thing. Can you show me the science behind that kind of thinking?
It means "become conscious of what one hadn’t before been conscious of. This, either through common or wilful ignorance rather than engaging with research.
So, it is really all about a lack of trust on your part to some part of yourself you do not know and thus, don;t understand.
I used to be like that myself…
You have a lot of studd to deal with. Regardless of your overreaching scepticism, the phrase “I Am That I Am” is brilliant for both its brevity and its depth.
I am not interested in debating whether the story represents an individual’s brain-hallucination or something more, than needs to explain itself if only there was a way to do so…I am more interested in finding out if there is a way to do so, and if so, what can be revealed through that science…
Your OP is about the ideomotor reflex. You also seem interested in ciphers.
THe OP is about much more than those.
Those seem the most interesting parts.
You might find it useful to analyse what is going on in other forms of divination.
They all follow a similar pattern. There is a process in which the medium, or diviner reads and interprets information produced through the practice of the particular system of divination being used.
Ouija boards are slightly different in that there isn’t an interpreter as a message is spelt out during the process. The participants play the role of the medium, or diviner through the way they jointly, or one person with the others following directs the upturned cup.
The jury’s out as to whether disembodied spirits are involved, or there is some unconscious dialogue going on. This falls under the wider field of study of the paranormal which was debated extensively on the James Randi forum a few years back. I was involved in many of those debates and it boiled down to the difficulty of isolating such phenomena in a laboratory setting. Leading to many skeptics concluding that the whole thing was false and there is no such thing as the paranormal.
Spells and magic potions aside, occultism is the belief that the laws of nature can be controlled, or beings can move independently of natural law and interact with other realms of being. This done through codes, or the hosting of these beings.
A spell is basically a flamboyant way of using a code in this way.
Do topics such as God, immortality, consciousness and souls come under the subject of supernaturalism and the occult?
That’s a tautology. Sorcery and magic are exactly that.
If it bothers you, I withdraw it. It has no bearing on my larger point, which you haven’t responded to.
No. I know nothing about it.
Science in based on the observation that our minds cannot be trusted when it comes to embracing beliefs. It’s just too easy to believe anything we like.
If you believe so. But my entire theology is based on that very observation.
So scientists have run the tests on your technique?
A mind cannot objectively examine it’s own conclusions. We need outside science for that.
Nah. That’s not a thing I would think. Deceptive, sure, but not otherworldly.
We could say it that way. I know that my mind works hard to convince me that my beliefs are the finest of all beliefs and that anyone who says otherwise is obviously wrong. Confirmation bias and such.
And perhaps you will be again some day.
If you think so. To me it looks like an everyday tautology.
Really, I don’t even understand what you are claiming. I think the unconscious is accessible to us in many ways. I see no reason to believe it is more than simply our unconscious.
You used the word ‘predictive’ earlier, but then you seemed to wander away from it.
Yes, I’m converting it into sanitised language, which we might be able to discuss philosophically. To remove the baggage around ideas like sorcery, magic and the occult.
It’s simply that there are ways and means to alter, or step outside of the world we find ourselves in. I don’t know if philosophy addresses this sort of thing as a possibility?
Here is the supernaturalist definition of “divination”
Divination is the practice of seeking hidden knowledge, guidance, or future events through supernatural, magical, or occult methods
One of the main aims of this thread is to expose the dominant use of supernaturalist definitions for what they are - the Rattling Chains of fraudulent and misleading words and phrases/terminologies.and ideas.
I am aware of some of those tests and arguments divined. The problem is with the claim itself. For example, we do not yet know if death of the body is the end of the conscious experience of they (we) who have a human experience. That being the case, and IF it turns out to be the case that we do, we have no reason to call such anything but natural, so have no reason in the mean time to treat such a thing as “paranormal” or for that matter, use any phrasing which places the focus of supernaturalist terminology into the mix.
In other words, "the whole thing can still be true, while there is still no such thing as paranormal.
From recollection, the Randi experiments focused on the blindfolding of the practitioner and turning the board around without their knowledge and through that getting the predicted result - no coherent intelligent messages -therefore the users being tested were simply relying on their own memory to move the pointer (planchette - " upturned cup" - indicator, pointer et al), thus "all users were doing this - whether consciously or unconsciously.
I found the experiments more farcical than scientific and would have done things differently, based upon what I already knew in my own experience and study of ideomotor effect, before seeing these debunking videos.
Not on my watch. Those are the rattling chains of supernaturalist definition which announce the hidden as being ooky spooky territory which we are warned not to investigate in order to attempt to uncover any truth therein. The “truth” has already been told by the supernaturalists in their telling of it. Whether they are telling of “God”, what happens after our bodies die, “souls” et al.
There is no such thing as the “supernatural” even if we do exist within a created thing, (thus the “God/Gods” which created it) even if there are immortal entities, “souls” et al.
What we need to question is if such things are real, then why we should think of these as anything but natural?
Perhaps the first step toward that is to question why we would think consciousness should be regarded as anything but natural.
How is that relevant to the OP and this thread? Is there something in my arguments, my evidence or my witness that in any way suggests we should all believe anything we like?
It is not belief. It is knowledge. My mind presents the consciousness that I am, and the consciousness I am deduces.
What is your workaround then? If you cannot trust your mind to shape your beliefs, what do you trust to shape your beliefs?
What is your “mind” in relation to consciousness?
Also, do you think belief is necessary and if so, why?
1: There appears to be some confusion among posters in this thread when it comes to which science and scientists are best employed to examine and test ideomotor effect.
The best thing for you to do in relation to your question is to examine the evidence I have already submitted and if you can - point out exactly where you think I have failed to apply “science” or be “scientific” therein…
What conclusions have I expressed and how can we examine these together?
That a start. Now how to work on the deceptive aspect. Perhaps by examining supernaturalist language and leaving that out of the discussion would be a great place to start the dismantling… If deception is a problem, a good place to start is by removing the language that enables it.
That is a good knowing to have, but how do you take control of that so that you mind functions in a more trustworthy way? How does consciousness tame a mind that consistently wants to drift said consciousness into belief?
If you want to be true to truth, and if you recognize the tendency to drift, what implements do you have in place to correct that drift to enable you to navigate the fog of conformation bias?