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Why on Earth are you downvoted? Some new norm rule about neural network compilers that people blindly follow?
As a molecular and cellular biologist trained in cancer studies, of the original arguments listed by AI against the theory, no. 6,7,8,11,12 all depend on directly contradicting the theories, not allowing a combination of them, and are thus weak counter points. But all other points discredits the theory on its own merits.
I came back to this post to draw inspiration from it and found several issues with it, that I now spot as a much older and more mature adult, almost 30.
- God and other spiritual or/and religious topics are placeholders to be tabooed, so there can be many individual beliefs behind them. What is sound? Is it the wave or the phenomenon in the brain? Same with God. Every theist has his or her own little bubble of belief.
We cannot refute the ARGUMENTS for God easily, we have to refute the THINKING.
That is what the article indeed argues and tries to explain, but I feel it fails to highlight that some of the beliefs hiding behind a theists worldview are likely TRUE and VALID. It is hard to let go of the false beliefs, because they are entangled with true beliefs. This is the case of religion etc., not of specific false beliefs. The larger the Mystery word, the more stuff you can throw behind it. - There are broad and vague claims here, such as Occam's razor being more productive than faith in history. Given how new the idea is, I wonder in what sense? And what evidence is there for this? Although I am inclined to agree, this is far from obvious.
- Not all children of atheists grow up to be atheists. I feel this is worth pointing out
There are hard limits to scientific knowledge and what can be mathematically provable. Any belief, whether about God or something more specific, can hide behind our general ignorance.
In truth, this is why God IS the simplest explanation for many theists. We cannotexplainprove within current paradigms how the always-has-been universe works, yet somehow we also claim to know it is growing in complexity and expanding all on its own. This may be true, but it is far from what a ten year old can easily grasp.So let's say God made it instead.
I feel this IS the Occam's razor argument for theists. How can we refute existential off-the-shelf answers to someone who DOES NOT want to go through the rigor of experimental science and rational query in order to investigate the origins of everything? When we know from the start that we will most likely never find a perfect answer anyway? It is much simpler to reference a God who always was. The same goes for any field where there is a mystery that can be hidden behind our ignorance.
I know you did ;) I liked your comment. But do notice, this is not a post about being rational (allthough it constantly references the sequences and the pinned material). I updated the intro now thanks to your excellent feedback!
Hi Seth, thank you for voicing this.
I will tell you this: although this ideally would be common sense stuff, I have yet to see a single self-identitying clever person (including subset rational) actually apply these ideas instead of winging his/her love life, at the first instant the primal drivers fully kick in. I have heard this echoed elsewhere too, by very successful "dating coaches".
(This is where observation and experience matter. As I wrote, there is no real, formal authority on dating and you can't find much peer reviewed research on this.)
There is also the whole topic of "you don't know what you don't know", but it's outside the scope of this primer. There is perhaps more to this text though, than meets they eye at the first read.
I am glad to hear you have seen some of this advice before, because it is supposed to be fundamental, not novel. (If you want significantly more novel stuff, I have a book in editing atm.) I love to find basic advice that actually makes sense. Humanity needs much more of that "common sense".
PS. The second part of the intro had a header with the words SKIPPABLE. I see that it didn't do its job too well.
I think the autobiographical element is that he understands the getting out of the car allegory. Eastern spiritual wisdom. A rare thing to bring up here.
I think the DMT aspect was to underscore the perceived folly of adhering to potentially "deep mysteries" without proof that they make any rational sense. DMT works as a reference to the people who take drugs and lack critical thinking, but believe they have seen the light.
One point of the story then is to at least partly say: but hey, what if they happened to be on to something after all?
Another point: If a divinity is real and unfathomable to your reason, why would you assume that divinity to try and convince you with reason?