Is J. Neil Schulman justified (logically) in believing in God?

[J Neil Schulman]

George, in your account you have yourself praying to God to remove pain, followed by pain being removed. This is the only direct communication between you and God in this entire account. Everything else is you arguing against the anti-sexual religious dogma you were raised into.

Nowhere in your account do you have God causing your pain. That was your own religious assumptions.

Nowhere in your account do you have God punishing you for making then breaking a promise to him that apparently he never asked you for.

In your account you do get mad at God and conclude that the net results was to raise serious doubts about your religious beliefs.

Here's my bullshit theist interpretation: I can't follow your logic of what you were blaming God for.

Me, I don't blame God for religious bullshit. I think people made almost all that shit up. Your story does make me feel sorry for God, if he made your pain go away, then got blamed for causing it.

Thanks for your bullshit interpretation. You don't seem to have a clue about what was going on. Perhaps this is because you were never a Christian and don't understand the mindset.

After my defiant challenge, it quickly became evident to me that God was neither the cause nor the cure of my pain. I was the cause of both. The experience was purely psychosomatic.

Ghs

I don't know what caused the pain. Maybe it was psychosomatic. Maybe you pulled a muscle. You don't know what caused it. But you're the one who brought up praying followed by the pain going away. Now, logic demands I note that just because one event followed another doesn't mean one caused the other. I don't know that this was a Divine healing or your prayer triggered a placebo effect.

But what I do know is that you assign this incident importance in your transfigurative rejection of religious repression. That's rational. That's liberating.

But you have as little basis to dismiss it as psychosomatic as to dismiss that you got an answer to your prayer, and couldn't bring yourself to believe it.

Edited January 11, 2011 by J. Neil Schulman

[J Neil Schulman]

Of course I've read Gardner's Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science.

Oh, good. I lose my bet, then.

What did you think of that book, and has your opinion changed much since your unusual experiences? My favourite chapter covers Wilhelm Reich. I wonder if you have any brief comments on Reich. Was he an inspiration to you, and do you think his orgone theory can fit in your cosmology?

You're asking me about a book I haven't looked at for decades. I've read a lot of debunking. Some of it is worthwhile taking out the trash. Other of it is throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

Given how real scientists change their paradigms as often as their socks, I try not to rule anything out of court. I grew up with the hallmark of science being the uniformity and homogeneity of physical laws throughout the universe. Now even that's not certain anymore as scientists contemplate how unseen factors like the distribution of dark matter might introduce variables in how physical laws operate.

But why "orgone" should be more ridiculous than all the extra forces subatomic physicists change their views on every couple of years is puzzling to me. The science of chemistry grew out of alchemy. To me, that means that there were seeds of chemistry already in alchemy, waiting for someone to water them. Unbridled skepticism leads to dust bowls where anything except for "acceptable" inquiries are stifled by the laughter of fools.

Edited January 11, 2011 by J. Neil Schulman

[william.scherk]

Given how real scientists change their paradigms as often as their socks, I try not to rule anything out of court. I grew up with the hallmark of science being the uniformity and homogeneity of physical laws throughout the universe. Now even that's not certain anymore as scientists contemplate how unseen factors like the distribution of dark matter might introduce variables in how physical laws operate.

Well, not quite yet. Assuming uniform physical law is what led to the inference of dark matter. It is the assumed ubiquity of gravitational forces that led to the puzzle. Science doesn't have to fudge the physical laws yet. You and the 'real' scientists are just dealing with the implications of observations within the paradigm. You can keep the socks on.

But why "orgone" should be more ridiculous that all the extra forces subatomic physicists change their views on every couple of years is puzzling to me.

Can you cite a single instance of an 'extra force' that has been suggested by physicists recently? Maybe you mean particle, rather than force?

You really just wing this stuff sometimes, don't you, Neil?

If you don't have a grasp of Reich, it's okay. If astrophysics strikes you as ridiculous, fine. If you think Reich's woo can be fudged into your wacked out cosmology, no problem. You have already managed to cram in M theory, astral travel, Geller, Hoffman, holographic pixies, god, your grandma, interstellar Bach and the kitchen sink -- not to mention the giddy notion of a self-denying psychic GHS.

If you want to romp free, romp free, my brother. It's a buffet of possibilities in eleven dimensions. Throw in the universal orgasmic energy of Reich, a little Psionics, a little polygraphy, a pinch of fairy dust and Mary Poppins too.

It must be a thrilling place, your mind. Me, I'd get dizzy and throw up, but if it works for you, as it obviously does, let her rip. Write a story, sell it, move to Alpha Centauri, and leave us fools behind in the dust.

Edited January 11, 2011 by william.scherk

[BaalChatzaf]

Given how real scientists change their paradigms as often as their socks, I try not to rule anything out of court.

No they don't. We still have the basic symmetries and the conservation laws. It would take a Damned Strange Thing to compel the physicists to give up the conservation laws. And the basic laws of thermodynamics are still intact. (after 170 years!) Entropy increases in closed thermodynamic systems and mass energy is conserved. The physicists have not yet and they do not expect to come up with perpetual motion and the Free Energy Lunch any time soon. You would be surprised how conservative the physicists can be. But..... if there are sufficient unaccountable for facts at a fundamental level, they will rebuild their house. That is how we got from classical to quantum physics. The facts of nature forced the issue.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Starbuckle]

JNS told GHS: "But you have as little basis to dismiss [your pain and relief from pain] as psychosomatic as to dismiss that you got an answer to your prayer, and couldn't bring yourself to believe it."

Taking the underlying assumption here to its logical conclusion, we find that we never have any basis EVER for preferring a naturalistic explanation (i.e., one based on the perceivable and inferrable identities of things) over the undetectable supernatural one. Whether it's food on the table (for which people give thanks to the lord rather than to their hard work), or walking through a door (for which task the ancient Romans could appeal to a team of door gods for sanction and assistance), or doctrinally spawned sexual guilt, we allegedly have as little basis to believe that things act in accordance with their identity as that impossible-to-see gods swooped down and manipulated events to chastise or encourage or just confound us.

What was the ONLY indication that "God" had anything to do with young-George's experience? Young-George's belief that it did (based upon what he had been taught and accepted, not on any evidence). If YG's belief in God constituted "evidence" that George might have "got an answer [from God rather than from his own mind] to [his] prayer," then belief per se is what constitutes evidence for any proposition that people might believe in. So, if I believe in door gods, maybe there are door gods. Who can tell? If you believe God mind-merged with you for 8 hours, maybe God mind-merged with you. Who could possibly dispute the "plausibility" of this "possibility," once the explanation-conditioning restraints of reality are set aside and once belief as such is deemed to be an overweeningly potent salvager of pseudo-analysis?

Edited January 11, 2011 by Starbuckle

[Brant Gaede]

After my defiant challenge, it quickly became evident to me that God was neither the cause nor the cure of my pain. I was the cause of both. The experience was purely psychosomatic.

I'd say it was something in the plumbing. Regardless, your answer is only speculative, especially as it was a one-time occurrence. Notice how you just stepped onto Neil's special epistemology.

--Brant

buddy up while you can or go wipe off your feet

[George H. Smith]

I don't know what caused the pain. Maybe it was psychosomatic. Maybe you pulled a muscle. You don't know what caused it. But you're the one who brought up praying followed by the pain going away. Now, logic demands I note that just because one event followed another doesn't mean one caused the other. I don't know that this was a Divine healing or your prayer triggered a placebo effect.

But what I do know is that you assign this incident importance in your transfigurative rejection of religious repression. That's rational. That's liberating.

But you have as little basis to dismiss it as psychosomatic as to dismiss that you got an answer to your prayer, and couldn't bring yourself to believe it.

I told my mother, an RN, about the pain later the same day (while leaving out the God stuff). She immediately took me to a doctor -- several, in fact, over the next few days, including two specialists. There was absolutely nothing wrong with me physically.

As for what "logic demands," I suggest you tend to your own garden first before advising me. There you will find many species of a weed called post hoc ergo propter hoc.

Here is what astonishes me about you, Neil: For all your preening about being an advanced thinker, your understanding of the human mind is on a par with an 11th century parish priest. History is filled with cases of psychosomatic maladies caused by religious hysteria, many of which are far more dramatic than mine. Demonic possession cured by exorcism is but one example. (Take a look at the YouTube videos of exorcism.) I suppose you will tell me that, well, maybe demons do take over human bodies, and maybe priests and ministers can use the power of Christ to drive them out. We should keep an open mind, after all.

Ghs

[PDS]

Ghs:

So you're saying the effects on a young Rascal's Wanker negate the effect of Pascal's Wager?

[anthony]

Ghs:

So you're saying the effects on a young Rascal's Wanker negate the effect of Pascal's Wager?

Excellent!

[George H. Smith]

Of course I've read Gardner's Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science.

Oh, good. I lose my bet, then.

What did you think of that book, and has your opinion changed much since your unusual experiences? My favorite chapter covers Wilhelm Reich. I wonder if you have any brief comments on Reich. Was he an inspiration to you, and do you think his orgone theory can fit in your cosmology?

You're asking me about a book I haven't looked at for decades. I've read a lot of debunking. Some of it is worthwhile taking out the trash. Other of it is throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

Given how real scientists change their paradigms as often as their socks, I try not to rule anything out of court. I grew up with the hallmark of science being the uniformity and homogeneity of physical laws throughout the universe. Now even that's not certain anymore as scientists contemplate how unseen factors like the distribution of dark matter might introduce variables in how physical laws operate.

But why "orgone" should be more ridiculous than all the extra forces subatomic physicists change their views on every couple of years is puzzling to me. The science of chemistry grew out of alchemy. To me, that means that there were seeds of chemistry already in alchemy, waiting for someone to water them. Unbridled skepticism leads to dust bowls where anything except for "acceptable" inquiries are stifled by the laughter of fools.

Having lived with a Reichian therapist for nearly a decade, I know more than the average bear about Reich. Reich's theory of body armoring and other aspects of the therapy itself have some merit, but not his theory of the orgone. Reich's orgone accumulator (sometimes called the orgone box) is a joke. Even many Reichian therapists don't believe this crap.

Ghs

[Brant Gaede]

George, didn't somebody go to jail because of the orgone box?

Edit: Reich was sentenced to two years in prison, where he died. The Feds burned a lot of his literature too.

--Brant

Edited January 11, 2011 by Brant Gaede

[George H. Smith]

After my defiant challenge, it quickly became evident to me that God was neither the cause nor the cure of my pain. I was the cause of both. The experience was purely psychosomatic.

I'd say it was something in the plumbing. Regardless, your answer is only speculative, especially as it was a one-time occurrence. Notice how you just stepped onto Neil's special epistemology.

--Brant

buddy up while you can or go wipe off your feet

Whether the problem was psychosomatic or physical is not really relevant. The relevant point is that I became very skeptical about God's involvement in the matter. Did God literally put his hand on Neil's heart? Neil believes he did, but my experience convinced me that God's hand was not squeezing my balls.

If I was wrong, then the same hand that touched....Jeez, this is too sick to contemplate, even for me.

Ghs

[Selene]

George:

Geez...cosmic CBT!

Gag!

Adam

[George H. Smith]

George:

Geez...cosmic CBT!

Gag!

Adam

There is a lesson to be learned here: Be extremely cautious before you ask to be touched by the hand of God, because you never know where that hand has been.

Ghs

[Brant Gaede]

After my defiant challenge, it quickly became evident to me that God was neither the cause nor the cure of my pain. I was the cause of both. The experience was purely psychosomatic.

I'd say it was something in the plumbing. Regardless, your answer is only speculative, especially as it was a one-time occurrence. Notice how you just stepped onto Neil's special epistemology.

--Brant

buddy up while you can or go wipe off your feet

Whether the problem was psychosomatic or physical is not really relevant. The relevant point is that I became very skeptical about God's involvement in the matter. Did God literally put his hand on Neil's heart? Neil believes he did, but my experience convinced me that God's hand was not squeezing my balls.

If I was wrong, then the same hand that touched....Jeez, this is too sick to contemplate, even for me.

Ghs

Was there a priest in the mix that you may have forgotten about? You know, repressed memory.

--Brant

trying to help, really, really

[Brant Gaede]

George:

Geez...cosmic CBT!

Gag!

Adam

There is a lesson to be learned here: Be extremely cautious before you ask to be touched by the hand of God, because you never know where that hand has been.

Ghs

At least it got to Neil afterwards, not before.

--Brant

does God wash his hands?--profound metaphysical question

[George H. Smith]

Was there a priest in the mix that you may have forgotten about? You know, repressed memory.

No, just an "old maid" aunt (also an RN) who was uncommonly fond of giving "sponge baths" to boys.

Ghs

[Brant Gaede]

There is also the question of which hand God uses for what.

--Brant

sort of reminds me of the nurse when I was 14 in the hospital who had the hots for me--yes, she touched me, gave me a rubdown after she got me starkers

[Brant Gaede]

Adding sex to a thread is like adding cheese to food: it generally tends to help.

--Brant

[George H. Smith]

does God wash his hands?--profound metaphysical question

Not nearly as profound as some questions I discuss in "Some Irreverant Questions Concerning God," a chapter in Why Atheism? -- especially "Can God Have an Orgasm?" Now that is truly profound.

We may have just stumbled upon the true cause of rain....

Ghs

[Selene]

does God wash his hands?--profound metaphysical question

Not nearly as profound as some questions I discuss in "Some Irreverant Questions Concerning God," a chapter in Why Atheism? -- especially "Can God Have an Orgasm?" Now that is truly profound.

We may have just stumbled upon the true cause of rain....

Ghs

What kind of flowers do golden showers bloom in May?

A cosmological question...

Adam

Brant is right on so many things

Post script: I am not sure that I will ever view a rainbow the same way after this thread!

Edited January 11, 2011 by Selene

[George H. Smith]

Adding sex to a thread is like adding cheese to food: it generally tends to help.

--Brant

Objectivist types should discuss sex more often and more candidly than they typically do. I have frequently noted that Rand and Augustine had much in common in their theories of sex, specifically, in their attempts to explain the relationship between sex and reason. I discussed Augustine's approach in the OL thread "Augustine's Boner."

One thing that fascinates me about Christianity is the extent to which it is a sex-obsessed religion. If you want to see how weird this really gets, read Malleus Maleficarum (The Witch's Hammer , 1486), a handbook for witch hunters that was a standard text for 300 years. Consider this chapter title: Whether Witches may work some Prestidigatory Illusion so that the Male Organ appears to be entirely removed and separate from the Body.

It was commonly believed that witches had the power to steal the male member (to use the delicate term) and then demand something in return before restoring it. The problem for Spenger and Kramer (the authors of the Malleus) was whether witches could actually remove the penis or whether they merely created the illusion of doing so. In another chapter, How, as it were, [Witches] Deprive Man of his Virile Member, the authors give these supposedly well-documented accounts:

We have already shown that they can take away the male organ, not indeed by actually despoiling the human body of it, in the manner which we have already declared. And of this we shall instance a few examples.

In the town of Ratisbon a certain young man who had an intrigue with a girl, wishing to leave her, lost his member; that is to say, some glamour was cast over it so that he could see or touch nothing but his smooth body. In his worry over this he went to a tavern to drink wine; and after he had sat there for a while he got into conversation with another woman who was there, and told her the cause of his sadness, explaining everything, and demonstrating in his body that it was so. The woman was astute, and asked whether he suspected anyone; and when he named such a one, unfolding the whole matter, she said: “If persuasion is not enough, you must use some violence, to induce her to restore to you your health.” So in the evening the young man watched the way by which the witch was in the habit of going, and finding her, prayed her to restore to him the health of his body. And when she maintained that she was innocent and knew nothing about it, he fell upon her, and winding a towel tightly about her neck, choked her, saying: “Unless you give me back my health, you shall die at my hands.” Then she, being unable to cry out, and growing black, said: “Let me go, and I will heal you.” The young man then relaxed the pressure of the towel, and the witch touched him with her hand between the thighs, saying: “Now you have what you desire.” And the young man, as he afterwards said, plainly felt, before he had verified it by looking or touching, that his member had been restored to him by the mere touch of the witch.

A similar experience is narrated by a certain venerable Father from the Dominican House of Spires, well known in the Order for the honest of his life and for his learning. “One day,” he says, “while I was hearing confessions, a young man came to me and, in the course of his confession, woefully said that he had lost his member. Being astonished at this, and not being willing to give it easy credence, since the opinion of the wise it is a mark of light-heartedness to believe too easily, I obtained proof of it when I saw nothing on the young man's removing his clothes and showing the place. Then, using the wisest counsel I could, I asked whether he suspected anyone of having so bewitched him. And the young man said that he did suspect someone, but that she was absent and living in Worms. Then I said: ‘I advise you to go to her as soon as possible and try your utmost to soften her with gentle words and promises’; and he did so. For he came back after a few days and thanked me, saying that he was whole and had recovered everything. And I believed his words, but again proved them by the evidence of my eyes.”

But there are some points to be noted for the clearer understanding of what has already been written concerning this matter. First, it must in no way be believed that such members are really torn right away from the body, but that they are hidden by the devil through some prestidigitory art so that they can be neither seen nor felt. And this is proved by the authorities and by argument; although is has been treated of before, where Alexander of Hales says that a Prestige, properly understood, is an illusion of the devil, which is not caused by any material change, but exists only in the perceptions of him who is deluded, either in his interior or exterior senses.

The complete text can be found here. .

A popular story during the Middle Ages, which had a number of variations and appears to have been a satire of the above, goes something like this:

Some guy managed to piss off a witch, so she stole his penis and hid it in a basket in a tree, along with other penises. Understandably enough, the guy became desperate and apologized profusely to the witch. She then told the guy to climb the tree, look through the basket, and find his penis so she could restore it. But the guy took not his own penis but an exceptionally large one, hoping the witch wouldn't remember which one was his. But she wasn't fooled at all, and this deceit pissed her often even more, since the big one was the crown jewel (so to speak) of her collection. The witch refused any more help, and the poor guy was doomed to live the rest of his life as a dickless wonder.

It would be difficult to find a more insightful fable about the male ego. Of course, Neil may object that it may not be a fable at all. Can we positively affirm that such a thing could never happen? Perhaps if we removed our Objectivist blinders and considered new possibilites....

Ghs

[George H. Smith]

A brief addendum to my last post....

Given how well known the Malleus is to historians, and given how educated the Python crew was, I find it curious that they never did a skit based on the material I discussed. I can see John Cleese wandering about in a daze, asking his wife, "Excuse me, dear, have you seen my penis? I seem to have misplaced it." Then Terry Jones, dressed as a frumpy housewife, responds in his falsetto voice: "Why are you asking me? I haven't seen it in years." Then Cleese says, "I'm sure I had it last night when I went to bed. Are you sure you haven't seen it? Have you checked your sewing basket?"

The possibilities are endless.

Ghs

[J Neil Schulman]

Can you cite a single instance of an 'extra force' that has been suggested by physicists recently? Maybe you mean particle, rather than force?

You really just wing this stuff sometimes, don't you, Neil?

I'm 57. The encyclopedia given to me when I was 16, was the Britannica's 1968 edition.

Find "strong force" or "weak force" in that. In my lifetime the number of basic forces has doubled.

There used to be three dimensions; now there are eleven.

I've lost track how many new particles there are.

There used to be one universe; now several different theories propose n universes.

The only thing that seems to have shrunk is the number of planets in the solar system -- nine when I was born, now with Pluto downgraded to a dwarf, eight.

And "orgone" seems to be a restatement of eastern religious notions about living things producing energy fields, most recently tagged "the Force" in Star Wars.

But detecting electrical activity in the human brain now seems the frontier of mind-reading. On Christmas I played with a device my daughter was given as a present called Mindflex which reads your mind through sensors while you think where you want a foam ball to go.

Edited January 11, 2011 by J. Neil Schulman

[PDS]

Ghs:

So you're saying the effects on a young Rascal's Wanker negate the effect of Pascal's Wager?

Excellent!

Thank you.

[The lack of respect for this better than average effort was about to make me quit this thread and call everybody else an asshole.]