GENIUS FORUMS

[Split from another topic]

Iolaus wrote:What is this phrase 'alien-God' that you and David are using?

A conscious being who isn't human and whose home is not here on earth. The traditional Christian God would be an example of such an alien.

If there was a five-year-old child, who, all of a sudden, started speaking in a dialect of the high-German of a century ago, perfectly fluently, even though the child had had no contact whatsoever with any German speaker, then I would regard that as possible evidence in favour of the hypothesis.

There have been quite a few cases more or less of this sort, involving small children.

A five-year old suddenly able to fluently speak an ancient language? I would need to see the evidence, and the evidence would need to be verified.

Old-wive's tales don't pass for evidence.

Memory has not been shown to reside in the brain. No such storage area has been found.

We know that when certain parts of the brain are damaged, in an accident for example, we lose certain types of memories. This indicates that memories are very closely associated with the brain.

Memory is really the main reason we keep our identity from moment to moment. If it followed us into the next lifetime, it would be too distracting and defeat the purpose of a partially clean slate.

That's why people get drunk and take drugs. And it's the same reason people want to believe in reincarnation — because they want to forget, at the same time as continue to exist.

Iolaus wrote:Kevin,

I say there "could be" in the same sense that I say there "could be" an alien-God who created our world, even though I've never see any evidence that would suggest that this is the case.

What is this phrase 'alien-God that you and David are using? Are you referring to actual extraterrestrials? I have come across quite a lot of evidence that this has indeed happened, and I think it is the most plausible scenario. But why call them gods?

You've come across evidence that suggests our world was created by aliens? What evidence?

Anna, if your answer involves mentioning the names Von Daniken or Sitchin, don't bother to reply, as that will only destroy any vestige of respect I have for you. :)

Kevin Solway wrote:For example, just before we die an alien being might somehow make a copy of the contents of our brain, using some kind of advanced technology. But because of a bug in the software that the alien can't get fixed for some reason, the memories are always lost.

True, it doesn't seem very likely — but it's possible.

Interesting. You mean given that the contents are somehow already stored, to transfer via some technology beyond our understanding from one storage location to another.

Have you ever considered that the mind might be a quantum computer of sorts housed in a biologically maintained apparatus? Or the memories might be stored "off site" and the mind is an apparatus to send and receive information to this unnamed location?

Any "evidence" would have to be examined and tested by experts before it was admitted as proper evidence.

Well in the hypothetical scenario i gave you in my last post, that is pretty much what happens. The narration of the unexpected "alien" or foreign material is witnessed by a professional, a psychiatrist who is a medical doctor and examined by his colleagues and their academic students and professional peers.

I guess I am asking what you mean as "admitted as proper evidence." Admitted by whom and to where? For you, Kevin Solway, to entertain the notion that it might indeed be as "authentic" as it could be, or at least make you want to examine the material yourself and thereby venture your own self as one of the "experts" you refer to. I see nothing wrong with that - I know I would want to at least study the material myself prior to accepting even "expert" review.

Carl G wrote:Mind you, I'm not saying I believe in reincarnation in the literal sense of which I'm speaking. It is only one of several plausible scenarios explaining such phenomena. I'm just saying there is evidence, whether or not you are aware of it.

Yes, that's what I'm trying to pin him down on, some kind of criteria. I gave a hypothetical scenario a couple of posts ago to find out what Kevin thinks is substantial evidence. There are cases on record where someone who should in no way possess certain information demonstrates knowledge of it, or a striking lucidity of expression about matters that the person had never learned about through schooling or reading. This is why I think Kevin is insisting on the "subject" to be a child. That would indeed make such an out-of-place manifestation of knowledge all the more remarkable.

Yes, Kevin appears to be a mere skeptic, giving in to his natural predilections, rather than a logician and wise man on this subject. What I mean is, he appears to be interpreting scripture according to his personal bias, on one hand, while on the other conducting no serious research himself. Admittedly he is hampered by having apparently absolutely no experiences of his own to suggest that such a thing as literal reincarnation could possibly occur. However, this alone should not stop a true scientist who is interested. And if it does, or if he is not truly interested, let him be scientific -- that is, logical -- enough to not make pronouncements on the subject.

The possibility of a form of literal reincarnation cannot be denied. I think the point is that there is insufficient evidence for a sane person to believe in it (and there most emphatically isn't). And, any evidence that you can point to is unlikely to provide any insight into the actual dynamic at work.

e.g. If life and this world (and aspects of our consciousness like memories) are all an alien holographic program, it may be that the programmers reinstall said aspects of consciousness into a new body. I can't think of a way to logically or empirically refute such a possibility. I also can't think of any form of evidence for such transmigration that would point to it and not be equally suggestive of half a dozen other scenarios.

brokenhead wrote:Have you ever considered that the mind might be a quantum computer of sorts housed in a biologically maintained apparatus? Or the memories might be stored "off site" and the mind is an apparatus to send and receive information to this unnamed location?

Anything is possible. It might also be true that mice rule this earth, and that the mice are doing experiments on us, as Douglas Adams hypothesized.

The narration of the unexpected "alien" or foreign material is witnessed by a professional, a psychiatrist who is a medical doctor and examined by his colleagues and their academic students and professional peers.

An "expert" would be someone who is intelligent enough not to jump to conclusions.

For example, if a person suddenly started speaking in a dialect that hasn't been spoken for two hundred years, the true expert would not immediately assume that he was seeing evidence of reincarnation, or channeling, or possession, etc. There are countless possible explanations, if indeed such phenomena are observed.

I guess I am asking what you mean as "admitted as proper evidence."

Ideally, the channeled entity, or wisdom, or whatever, will tell us the exact mechanism by which it is being channeled, and then we can verify it fully for ourselves. That would be the best evidence.

Ideally, the channeled entity, or wisdom, or whatever, will tell us the exact mechanism by which it is being channeled, and then we can verify it fully for ourselves. That would be the best evidence.

Don't get me wrong here, Kevin. I am not trying to talk you into believing in anything, especially since I do not think reincarnation can or does occur. Reincarnation implies some survival of selfhood into another lifespan on this planet. Re-in-carn: into flesh again. Let's strip it of any "selfhood" and restrict it to the possibility of information transferral. If the transferral technique, or mechanism, were of a sort beyond that of which humans on earth had experience, how could you hope to verify it? Wouldn't you have to learn the mechanism first? If you were learning the mechanism, that means information being transferred to you, which is not what we are talking about. In other words, how could you verify a mechanism which is technologically beyond your understanding? You may be able to verify the information, but not the transferral mechanism. If you are saying an alien species has accomplished this, which is logically consistent so far, they presumably had a reason or motive for doing so, which may not include enlightening us as to how they were doing it. This could be for any number of reasons. Let's pick one obvious possible reason as an example: it could be like training an ape how to build sophisticated bombs. It would take forever, and if it were possible, the results would be too dire.

So let's assume the above scenaro. How would Kevin Solway interpret a case of information transferral if he could verify the consistency and integrity of the information itself, yet could not account for the precise method of transferral, other than to rule out each and every method of which he is, or can find someone who is, personally knowledgeable about?

brokenhead wrote:If the transferral technique, or mechanism, were of a sort beyond that of which humans on earth had experience, how could you hope to verify it?

We couldn't verify it with any kind of certainty. The more details we know, the better we can verify something.

Unless we can find a mechanism, we couldn't verify it with any kind of certainty that would satisfy me.

Kevin Solway wrote:

brokenhead wrote:If the transferral technique, or mechanism, were of a sort beyond that of which humans on earth had experience, how could you hope to verify it?

We couldn't verify it with any kind of certainty. The more details we know, the better we can verify something.

Unless we can find a mechanism, we couldn't verify it with any kind of certainty that would satisfy me.

So if the four-year-old started speaking German which she could not have learned by any means "in this life," or heuristcally, you would deny that she is speaking German?

brokenhead wrote:

Kevin Solway wrote: We couldn't verify it with any kind of certainty. The more details we know, the better we can verify something.

Unless we can find a mechanism, we couldn't verify it with any kind of certainty that would satisfy me.

So if the four-year-old started speaking German which she could not have learned by any means "in this life," or heuristcally, you would deny that she is speaking German?

One should keep the mind open, scientifically, rationally to a whole collage of causes. When channeling of spirits or past-life experiences are raised as possibilities, one should be aware of the complexity and grand scale of the model implied.

Scientific method would suggest to look into other causes as well, trying to exclude them, like some unknown exposure to the language or other means for memory to be transferred, like on some microscopic level by transfer of RNA or whatever. These possibilities would be way more interesting to research as they could be formulated as a positive theory or hypothesis in quite some detail. As opposed to interdimensional causes - as how would one start to investigate these? Without forming a clear scientific hypothesis, there's no real measurement possible and as such science cannot yet say much about it unless a new cosmological model would be constructed first and that is a major undertaking and touches way more disciplines and generally takes more time (like described by Kuhns 'Structure of Scientific Revolutions').

As well to consider are the well established and recognized, but at times subtle differences between anecdotal evidence and scientific supporting evidence.

As Diebert says, there are many possible causes.

e.g,.
- The ability to speak the language is stored in the child's genes.
- The child is in fact a robot or an android.
- There is a computer chip in the child's brain, controlling their speech centres, and it is controlled by a researcher in the next room.

etc.


The more we know . . . the more we know.

Kevin Solway wrote:As Diebert says, there are many possible causes.

e.g,.
- The ability to speak the language is stored in the child's genes.
- The child is in fact a robot or an android.
- There is a computer chip in the child's brain, controlling their speech centres, and it is controlled by a researcher in the next room.

etc.


The more we know . . . the more we know.

You say "etc." implying you could go on listing possible causes. Instead, let's stick with just these three for the time being. How would you rate them from the most likely to the least likely? Since you are saying each of these causes is possible.

brokenhead wrote:How would you rate them from the most likely to the least likely? Since you are saying each of these causes is possible.

It doesn't matter how likely they are. All that matters is that they are possible.

The "likelihood" of each of these possibilities, that we would assign to them, would be dependent on our past experience, and how limited our experience is. If we had recently discovered a great many android children living in our midst, then the likelihood of the child being an android would be fairly high.

Kevin Solway wrote:

brokenhead wrote:How would you rate them from the most likely to the least likely? Since you are saying each of these causes is possible.

It doesn't matter how likely they are. All that matters is that they are possible.

The "likelihood" of each of these possibilities, that we would assign to them, would be dependent on our past experience, and how limited our experience is. If we had recently discovered a great many android children living in our midst, then the likelihood of the child being an android would be fairly high.

Well, exactly. The likelihood of these three causes doesn't matter because you know they are all equally unlikely. But you live in a world wherein you have not discovered a great many android children living in your midst. And computer chip technology has not advanced to where a chip with memories can be implanted in such a manner, and if it has, it would be easy enough to detect as would be the researcher sitting in the next room. So neither of these two methods could be carried out in a covert manner, correct? In other words, if we were allowed to probe matters we would come upon some material evidence of the method used. That leaves us with the ability to speak German has been stored in the child's genes. Now that, I confess, is intriguing. But necessarily evidence would exist, since the genes would have therefore been altered, nevermind the fact that our technology is not at the point where this can be done as yet. I personally know of no case where, say, large amounts of highly complex information such as a language fluency has been genetically transferred. While intriguing, to my mind this would be the least likey possible cause.

Yet you are aware that we live in a world where such information transferral seems to be possible as you have stated. What if, within the transferred information itself, were the keys as to how it has been transferred? Would you examine the information to find the key, or would not knowing the method beforehand prohibit you from doing so?

brokenhead wrote:. . . And computer chip technology has not advanced to where a chip with memories can be implanted in such a manner, and if it has, it would be easy enough to detect as would be the researcher sitting in the next room.

Not necessarily. It may be very difficult to detect.

While intriguing, to my mind this would be the least likey possible cause.

As I say, it doesn't matter how unlikely you think something is, from your position of ignorance as to the reasons why things happen in the way they do.

What if, within the transferred information itself, were the keys as to how it has been transferred? Would you examine the information to find the key, or would not knowing the method beforehand prohibit you from doing so?

As I say, if the message conveyed information as to the mechanism, then all the better. For example, if the child told us in plain language.

Kevin Solway wrote:As I say, it doesn't matter how unlikely you think something is, from your position of ignorance as to the reasons why things happen in the way they do.

Yes, I agree with this. You and I are both ignorant as to the reasons why things happen in the way they do. I, for one, am curious as to reasons. As they say, things happen for a reason. What I do is, I rule things out. That's the problem that I have with the Urantia Book. I need to know how it came about. It is a vast amount of information transferred in a scenario much like I described earlier in this thread. It "showed up" while the person receiving the information was under the care of a psychiatrist named Sadler. I honestly don't know what to make of it. Since it is about the things that interest you, I am surprised you have not tackled it. I admit parts of it are difficult to understand; but I also admit I am not a genius. The parts I do understand seem to be be extremely self- consistent. How would you approach it? The parts that speak of science appear to me to be largely incompatible with the scientific concepts with which I am familiar. Much of it is "alien" in character, yet it is clear that a high degree of intelligence is behind it. It doesn't sound like the ravings of a lunatic. Yet I can perceive no possible motivation for it, nor can I find anything with which to compare it. It must have a reason.

brokenhead wrote:It doesn't sound like the ravings of a lunatic. Yet I can perceive no possible motivation for it, nor can I find anything with which to compare it. It must have a reason.

The "reason" is that it's something that someone wanted to express, subconsciously.

Sometimes people have things they want to say, but don't particularly want to be conscious when they're saying them, because they can't deal directly with the truths they want to speak of. They don't want to be held personally accountable for them.

That's why some people get drunk. By dulling the conscious mind they are able to front-up to some thoughts that they wouldn't otherwise be able to. That's why it's called "Dutch courage." It's the thoughts that you're having when your not really having thoughts.

A typical piece of advice for coping with stress is to write down one's thoughts.

This is hopefully unrelated, otherwise it would be horribly ironic and probably is ---- but I think it would help brokenhead and others if you write a tutorial on logic and the empirical method, Kevin. Give it all in one piece of writing. No, it's not horribly ironic, it's helpful for learners.

Kevin Solway wrote:

brokenhead wrote:It doesn't sound like the ravings of a lunatic. Yet I can perceive no possible motivation for it, nor can I find anything with which to compare it. It must have a reason.

The "reason" is that it's something that someone wanted to express, subconsciously.

Sometimes people have things they want to say, but don't particularly want to be conscious when they're saying them, because they can't deal directly with the truths they want to speak of. They don't want to be held personally accountable for them.

That's why some people get drunk. By dulling the conscious mind they are able to front-up to some thoughts that they wouldn't otherwise be able to. That's why it's called "Dutch courage." It's the thoughts that you're having when your not really having thoughts.

That would be my first guess. And since his physician was also a psychiatrist, I would assume he at least considered that possibility. The transferral process took decades and he convened informal seminars where his practice was near Chicago to get colleague's opinions on this case. Ostensibly he did that because he knew of no other case in the literature to which he could compare it. He certainly did not make money from it as far as I have been able to tell, and I have been researching it as time permits for a number of years. The material the Sleeping Subject (SS) transmitted or "received" was almost entirely unknown to him in his waking state. It did not radically contradict his views, rather it seemed to be simlpy unrelated to his own personal set of ideas and experiences. The patient insisted on anonymity as he was a prominent business figure at the time (it is conjectured that he was Wilfred Kellogg). The breadth, depth, tone, and scope of the UB are such as to be mind-numbing, and it is written in a type of English prose that I have not encountered anywhere else and I consider myself fairly well-read. I am not about to proclaim that it is indeed what it purports to be. I'm looking for a way to rule it out. No one has ever given me a reason to do so, let alone a good reason. I was hoping you could do that. That is why I became a member here in the first place.

brokenhead wrote:The material the Sleeping Subject (SS) transmitted or "received" was almost entirely unknown to him in his waking state.

This is common in people who have psychological problems. A "split" is created, so that two sets of ideas don't interfere with one another, because it would be too painful if they did.

It's also common for drunk people to say things, and do things, they have no knowledge of when sober — at least, that's what they claim.

It did not radically contradict his views, rather it seemed to be simlpy unrelated to his own personal set of ideas and experiences.

"Seemed" is the operative word. It probably "seemed" that way to people who weren't very smart, and are easily misled. Being a psychologist doesn't make a person smart.

I'm looking for a way to rule it out. No one has ever given me a reason to do so, let alone a good reason. I was hoping you could do that. That is why I became a member here in the first place.

What, you came here so you could rule out the Urantia book?

If you are going to rule out such things, one by one, it will take you forever. But perhaps that's what you really want, and are compulsively obsessing over such things, probably because you are avoiding moving on.

It's not important to "rule out" such things. Either they speak the truth, which you absolutely know for yourself, through your own verification, or they don't. Nothing else matters.

Kevin Solway wrote:What, you came here so you could rule out the Urantia book?

No!!!! I came here so you could rule it out!

I needed somebody logical, intelligent, and sincere....

brokenhead wrote:No!!!! I came here so you could rule it out!

Why do you want someone else to rule it out?