Satyr

eyesinthedark wrote:

3. Too much activity can be just as detrimental to order as too little. Asteroids and comets colliding with the earth can disrupt order, too much heat can cause the sun to explode/implode.

Where do I claim that activity is order?
I say activity is need, and need is a symptom of disordering.

eyesinthedark wrote:

4. I'm not an expert in physics, so bare with me. I'm under the impression nothing seems to drop in or out of existence, matter does not cease to exist because it is greatly divided or decreased in activity, it is merely temporarily imperceptible to us/can no longer affect us or other things we can perceive/be affected by, the moment it is infused with more matter and/or energy, we will be able to perceive it/be affected by it again. When something is divided to the point we can no loner perceive it, we don't assume it drops out of existence, we know if we had a microscope or an electron microscope, we would be able to detect it. When things reach/approach absolute 0 (assuming absolute 0 even exist (I doubt it), they do not disappear, they temporarily lie dormant, they can be reactivated by energy, heat, gravity or repulsion.

Exactly, so nothing ever drops out of existence but its activity slows to a point of becoming imperceptible.
There are no absolutes, so less activity is relative to the observer.

eyesinthedark wrote:

And should that not be the protocol?, when ordinary explanations cannot suffice, we should consider the extraordinary, but no, we should not jump to any extraordinary conclusion, and that's not what I'm doing here, perhaps those lights in the sky are extremely advanced government aircraft, light years beyond what they've told us about, though I doubt it, since the public and the military have reported observing such lights for... hundreds, thousands of years, at least 100 years, and I doubt they had the technology back then, it could be weather phenomenon, but some of these unidentified flying objects are metallic, so, that kind of rules that out, and some people from the public and the government have reported encountering extraterrestrial entities, not demons, robots, or whatever. There is an enormous amount of evidence that points towards us being visited by extraterrestrial intelligences, not weather phenomena, perhaps you're not familiar with it, for it's more than a little outside your paradigm.

There were times where large amounts of people swore that they experienced ghosts or were visited by dead relatives...in some circles this is still the case.
The impressionability of the mind is astounding; how we are affected by subliminal imagery, words, etc, is used by politics and marketing agencies.

The current image of an "alien" in fact began as a sfi-fi image. It somehow permeated the culture, infecting millions of minds who might not know or remember or care but are convinced that this is a "true depiction."
Culture uses symbols, by connecting them to sensations and to primal needs, fears, desires etc.
That certain symbols are o ubiquitous should be explained by using human biology.

The concept of something being possible is not the same as the concept of it being probable.

eyesinthedark wrote:

Who knows what the odds are of a civilization surviving, when we only know of our own civilization?

If by "looking back" you understand a focus on your own culture then you misunderstand what looking back means.
When I look back upon my own existence, the further back i look all the more people and events begin to be included, extending back like a pyramid.

eyesinthedark wrote:

Perhaps for you and your kind, it is less stressful to think this all there is, mysteries and perplexities frighten you, if human beings are going where no one has gone before, you have to face your biggest fear, you won't have a past to root yourself in, you'll be taken out of your familiar comfort zone, so it is more comforting for you too only consider the problems of space travel, and the challenges, and to not consider. For a man who constantly grounds himself in the past, it should come as no surprise to me, and everyone on this forum, that the prospect of a future beyond what Alexander, Aristotle and Heraclitus could have ever dream of, should frighten, the hyper conservative, past oriented mind is always afraid of innovation, broadening his horizons, leaving behind the certainties of the past and letting his imagination run wild and free. Such a mind would be damaged, couldn't handle the truth, if the truth is indeed that we're are being visited by extraterrestrials, or that we can travel through space, so, like the Christians, your sort of mind is the one the occultists may be trying to protect from a star trek like universe.

Yeah, this is a typical response. Using fear as a reason.
Looking back offers you guidance....we all project forward into the unknown. It grounds your projections so that you don't go off confusing your hopes and fantasies with legitimate probabilities.

Knowledge is a looking back...it is codified memory based on repetitive consistency...so is genetic and memetics.
Now, without knowledge an ignoramus can think afire is caused by spirits, whereas one with knowledge can try to explain fire by using more worldly and probable causes.
Perhaps you, as a liberal, are afraid of the past, as it defines and determines you...so you prefer to imagine an unlimited future, possibility unfettered from anything past so as to gain hope.
Hope is an antidote to fear. But not all hope is realistic.

Me hoping to win the lottery and escape the determining factors of my poverty is only as realistic as the odds against it...and the odds are determined by knowledge.

eyesinthedark wrote:

If there are anything like us, perhaps they overpopulated their home world, consumed it's resources, and the resources of other planets they've colonized, or perhaps they're curious, or maybe they even have compassion for life, and have made it their mission to monitor life, seed planets throughout the universe, help it grow, like human beings grow gardens, purely out of love for life, or aestheticism. You only seem to be able to imagine why they would not come here, like a true conservative, you are stuck there, but I am able to switch from the conservative mindset to the liberal mindset when need be.

I know...because if you really want to preserve or increase the probability of something you desperately cannot let go of then you can come up with many reasons. Christians have gone so far as to do away with the contradictions in their ideas by claiming that God is bored or that he's testing us, though He already knows the outcome...then they introduce the mystical aspect of free-will to do hide the stupidity.

Are there Leprechauns?
Sure...it is possible. My lack of omniscience, if honest, can only include it as a possibility.
Why then have we not seen them more often, except for a few who seem to see them all the time?
I don't know....maybe they are shy.....maybe they are tricksters and are having fun.....maybe they are evil and are trying to drive us insane....maybe....

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Where do I claim that activity is order?
I say activity is need, and need is a symptom of disordering.

Oh, well in that case I agree with you.

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There were times where large amounts of people swore that they experienced ghosts or were visited by dead relatives...in some circles this is still the case.
The impressionability of the mind is astounding; how we are affected by subliminal imagery, words, etc, is used by politics and marketing agencies.

Perhaps they were seeing ghosts, why do you have faith in the non existence of ghosts?

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The current image of an "alien" in fact began as a sfi-fi image. It somehow permeated the culture, infecting millions of minds who might not know or remember or care but are convinced that this is a "true depiction."
Culture uses symbols, by connecting them to sensations and to primal needs, fears, desires etc.
That certain symbols are o ubiquitous should be explained by using human biology.

That's not what I heard, the depiction of greys in the media was based on eye witness accounts.

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The concept of something being possible is not the same as the concept of it being probable.

What we don't know for certain is not necessarily an improbability or an impossibility.

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If by "looking back" you understand a focus on your own culture then you misunderstand what looking back means.
When I look back upon my own existence, the further back i look all the more people and events begin to be included, extending back like a pyramid.

I meant our civilization as a whole, has survived thus far, individual civilizations have perished, but civilization as a whole has remained and progressed since it began, unless of course you're talking about a civilization before the great deluge.
Where does a myth come from, is it a story used to explain some aspect of the human psyche, the human condition, the unknown, or is it an embellishment of historical events? I think it may be all of the preceding. Remember in elementary school when your teacher sat the children in a circle, and told one of the students a message, and then told him or her to pass it on to the next student in the circle? By the time the message got back to the teacher, it was often distorted.
Funny, in those experiments, I remember trying my best to pass the message along as accurately as I could. Unfortunately, most humans are not so, dedicated to the truth, as I am. Nevertheless, the message was always altered, but often resembled the original message.

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Yeah, this is a typical response. Using fear as a reason.

You can question my motives for thinking the existence of extraterrestrials is probable, I can question your motives for thinking the existence of extraterrestrials is improbable.

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Looking back offers you guidance....we all project forward into the unknown. It grounds your projections so that you don't go off confusing your hopes and fantasies with legitimate probabilities.

Perhaps it is you who have failed to use the past to make sense of these phenomena. Metallic, cigar and disk shape objects, some with windows and flying intelligently (i.e. not colliding with other cigar and disk shape objects, or with our aircraft, or with the ground, mountains and buildings), sometimes flying in formation or chasing our aircraft, best resemble our own aircraft, except they're more advanced than our own, which rules out the possibility they are our own, the government may be hiding technology from us, but there's no way they had this technology during WW2, or in the 50s, 60s and 70s. Since some of UFOs resemble aircraft in virtually every way, they probably are, aircraft, but not ours.

Edit- Also, the objects are symmetrical in shape, and some of them turn our missile offense/defense systems and other devices off and on.

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Knowledge is a looking back...it is codified memory based on repetitive consistency...so is genetic and memetics.
Now, without knowledge an ignoramus can think afire is caused by spirits, whereas one with knowledge can try to explain fire by using more worldly and probable causes.
Perhaps you, as a liberal, are afraid of the past, as it defines and determines you...so you prefer to imagine an unlimited future, possibility unfettered from anything past so as to gain hope.
Hope is an antidote to fear. But not all hope is realistic.

Who says I'm a liberal, I always enjoyed your rants regarding race, sex and psychology, and your realism regarding the antisocial, irrational side of human nature. I suppose I'm a liberal in some ways, and a conservative in others. What you call conservative is in many ways a revolt on the part of the agrarians and artisans against the historical tendency toward collectivism, and a society dominated by the bourgeoisie, bureaucrats and/or the warrior priest class.
I'm beginning to understand you more and more, as time passes. In many ways, you remind me of Alex Jones, just replace his, supposed Christianity with Social Darwinism, and his egalitarianism with agrarian, white, male elitism and supremacism, and we have something like your ideology. There were times when I sided with your cause, so I understand it, I understand it all too well, but for the now, it is not the direction I am headed, though I may incorporate elements of it in my vision. There was also a time I embraced something like the Joker's ideology. I'm a bit of slut when it comes to ideologies, but not a whore.

Now, do you think I'm so retarded that when I see a partially new phenomena, I think the past should be completely disregarded, no, in some respects that's what you're proposing, I am proposing we use the past to identify these phenomena as much as we can, whilst realizing that since they're a partially new phenomena, there's much about them we don't yet know and understand, so we must partially rely on wholly new observations and deductions/inductions in order to figure them out, and perhaps, that scares someone like you, having to rely on present observations as much or more than previous observations, and yes I am aware the present is not entirely the present, but a nano second ago. However, since man has probably been encountering these aircraft for thousands of years, I suppose we do have a past to root them in, so in this case it seems, I am the conservative and you are the liberal.

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I know...because if you really want to preserve or increase the probability of something you desperately cannot let go of then you can come up with many reasons. Christians have gone so far as to do away with the contradictions in their ideas by claiming that God is bored or that he's testing us, though He already knows the outcome...then they introduce the mystical aspect of free-will to do hide the stupidity.

Christian skeptix have also come up with many reasons for why dinosaur fossils can't be trusted- they're a hoax, they're only 6000 years old.. THE DEVIL PUT THEM THERE TO TEST OUR FAITH!!!

Perhaps, you, desperately clinging to your narrow world view, are only capable of thinking why, they wouldn't wanna come here, and not why they would, wanna come here. You're the one who attempted to decrease the odds of them wanting to come here to nil , I merely countered you and restored the odds of them wanting to come here to 50/50.

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Are there Leprechauns?
Sure...it is possible. My lack of omniscience, if honest, can only include it as a possibility.
Why then have we not seen them more often, except for a few who seem to see them all the time?
I don't know....maybe they are shy.....maybe they are tricksters and are having fun.....maybe they are evil and are trying to drive us insane....maybe....

Maybe they know certain minds would not be ready for contact.

eyesinthedark wrote:

Perhaps they were seeing ghosts, why do you have faith in the non existence of ghosts?

Because I respect my self and place more weight on my conception of reality than the blatherings of morons and half-wits.

don't you think this "Atheists believe in the non-existence of God" is a bit overused. That you use it diminishes you.
this is what I mean by top-down thinking.

For the top-down "thinker" any conception is as equally possible as its negation, in effect making anything possible.
So, for this type, Darwin's ideas about evolution are just as possible as Creationist dogma, and stating that the earth is not flat is at par as saying that it is.

what do ghosts have to do with the concept of God? nothing

what is a ghost? a term for something that was seen or experienced that can't be explained, currently.

of course there is no such thing as a leprechaun unless it's a midget dressed up as one.
of course, it can't be proven there is no two foot irish midget with pointed ears with a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow but given the entire story, it's leans toward unlikely.

however, there are people who have unusual experiences that can't be explained such as having a premonition and it occuring or actually having a vision that later takes place etc. of course, these can't be proven either but to those who have the experience, it's just something they don't have an answer for but can only be wondered about and cannot just be easily dismissed or brushed off as imaginary or a result of some type of mental disorder such as schizophrenia as people with no disorders have also had some unusual and compelling experiences. these types of experiences have more weight because of the nature of them given the later confirmation so it opens up questions as to our supposed logic behind events such as our limited knowledge of linear time etc.

big foot, the tooth fairy, leprechauns etc are not of the same subcategory which are obviously unrealistic and of those who have not had any unusual experiences see them all as unlikely.

let's consider this interesting story. there was a man who regularly speed home on a winding road. you know, the kind where you can't see what's coming around the bend. one day, he saw an american classic, relic of the past, drive past him. he turned to look and the man, who he recognized as his deceased father turning his head and looked at him with no expression, kept going and turned onto a dirt road. he followed and there was nothing.

this experience made him slow down considerably unconsciously as he was ruminating on his experience as he resumed his driving toward home. as he was rounding a bend, he saw there was a major accident and a semi had turned and completely blocked the road. had he kept speeding as he usually does, he most certainly would have crashed into the semi, probably resulting in fatality.

now, there are several ways to respond to such a story. one can claim that he was lying and made it up, that it was just extraordinary coincidence that the semi had blocked the road and that he was just daydreaming of his father or that perhaps we don't know how everything works or can work.

there are some issues with this that just can't be easily dismissed. perhaps he was projecting and daydreaming but it is extraordinary coincidence how events unfolded and why would he all of a sudden actually see a vision of his father? he was not consciously trying to and it was not a like a reminiscent memory but an actual vision that actually puzzled him.

say for instance, his subconscious was projecting this to protect or warn himself of this impending danger, that still does not correlate to our currently fixed beliefs of what we consider our senses capable of as most believe that it is only our five senses that can pick up on our environment.

then it leaves a possible conclusion that is most extraordinary and that perhaps it was the spirit of his father trying to warn him.

there are other types of unusual experiences that everyday people have, even if rare, in their lives which can't easily be explained away.

as for that particular individual, his 'intuition' was that it was not mere coincidence or random.

That's a beautiful story.
It almost made me cry.

I like stories.
I heard a story about some guy who came back from the dead to save mankind.
That was a nice story also.

Satyr wrote:

That's a beautiful story.
It almost made me cry.

I like stories.
I heard a story about some guy who came back from the dead to save mankind.
That was a nice story also.

see, you just dismissed it as bunk. that was convenient.

the point is if you had such an experience, you wouldn't dismiss it so easily but because you haven't you think it's ridiculous.

what would you do? keep it to yourself or share it and risk having some asshole laugh at your experience as if it was nothing?

what if you had a vision that later occured? tell yourself that your crazy and that it didn't? that's denial from fear because you can't figure it out or it goes against what you previously thought was not possible.

I heard of a story also. It was about some guy who heard voices in his head....called it "the voice of God".

Here is another thing: if I were born retarded, and I had a clue that I was retarded....then would I be retarded?

The best liar is the one who buys into his own bullshit. It's a survival mechanism.

Trivers wrote:

If…deceit is fundamental to animal communication, then there must be strong selection to spot deception and this ought, in turn to select for a degree of self-deception, rendering some facts and motives unconscious so as to not betray – by the subtle signs of self-knowledge – the deception being practiced. Thus, the conventional view that natural selection favors nervous systems which produce ever more accurate images of the world must be a very naïve view of mental evolution.

I have no doubt that many faith-healers, priests, psychics actually believe they have real powers or that their spirits exist and that they are channeling them or that God speaks through them.
I also have no doubt that when you believe something hard enough you experience something that justifies it and validates it.

This is a well-known human phenomenon...you might call it a psychological one.

I'll ask myself over and over and over again as I drift off to sleep the infinite question of "what if?":

"What if I levitated?"
"What if a porcupine crawled out of my anus?"
"What if I woke up to discover that I've been a woman all along?"
"What if...."
Shall we indulge in what ifs?

What was Pascal's wager again?
What if God DOES exist?" Oh shit!!! There's egg on my eternally damned face.

Shit, this is the oldest bullshit in the book.
"What if those U.F.O.'s were not alien ships at all - God knows they can't be anything earthly...what if they were the Olympian gods?
What if it were Zeus playing games with us, because we've forsaken him?
I mean, forget logic, reason, experience, knowledge...WHAT IF?

Place your bets, boys, and bet your life away.
Tell yourself that the "fun" is all worth it.
I know I'm having fun.

Carry on.

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Because I respect my self and place more weight on my conception of reality than the blatherings of morons and half-wits.

don't you think this "Atheists believe in the non-existence of God" is a bit overused. That you use it diminishes you.
this is what I mean by top-down thinking.

For the top-down "thinker" any conception is as equally possible as its negation, in effect making anything possible.
So, for this type, Darwin's ideas about evolution are just as possible as Creationist dogma, and stating that the earth is not flat is at par as saying that it is.

Nice try.

As Abby once indicated to me, you assume the retarded about people you disagree with.

I'm sure that works for you 90% of the time.. but not with me.

I never said eye witness accounts of ghosts were as credible as eye witness accounts of rocks, trees or even aliens. The material world has been confirmed, verified, it is our regular phenomenal experience, the spiritual world has not and is not. Therefore, anything material has more possibility of existing than anything spiritual. An alien has more chance of existing than a ghost. That being said, it doesn't rule out the possibility of the spiritual world and ghosts, or what Ilike to call, the world of minds without bodies.

You just provided an affirmation not a challenge.

If I were to take "your word" on it, or the word of some preacher on what he claims but cannot justify or provide evidence for, simply based on the position that "it might be so", then I would be a christian....or a godless Christian trying to find a substitute mysticism to replace the old one.

There's no "try"...as it is not up to me to prove a negative.
I can't prove the non-existence of Big Foote either, does this make this creature real?
In your world it does, because in your world everything, every single thing, is possible until proven otherwise.
So you work backwards...Top>Bottom.

When someone offers a possibility then it is up to him to provide the arguments and saying that "some guy told me so" or "I heard a story" or "I saw some lights in the sky so aliens are visiting" is about as reliable as a Christian's account of being healed from cancer by his local snake-oil salesman.

Oh and your "matter" allusion hinges on how you define it, as I do not define it as an absolute nor as something other than a form of activity, to which energy is related as it being a variation of it.
As for "spirit" here is another overused word, particularly by secular Christians who feel that God's death or the idea of god having been ridiculed into UN-respectability deserves a substitute.
For me spirit can be used in many contexts, but in the one you attempt to use it as, as this amorphous, Being, that is carried in the body but is other than it, I cannot ascribe to...so, for me, spirit denotes nothing more than the sum of all the past as it manifests in the present.
My spirit, my character, my personality, my nature, is the aggregate of past inter-activities.

I won't bother with the rest.
Have a nice night fantasizing.

In closing, I didn't come to a conclusion about extra terrestrial space craft over night.

I've always been fascinated by the prospect of their existence.

I've been wrestling with the problem since I was a small boy, they exist, they don't exist, they exist, they don't exist, even then I had a philosophical/scientific mind.

I've read several books and watched dozens of documentaries on the subject.

However, i didn't become a believer (and even now I'm not a firm believer) until I watched full disclosure, and this other documentary, I believe it was called- UFOs, the best evidence. Full disclosure and that documentary pushed me over the edge. Also, learning of the star child skull added credence to their claims. However, I'm more skeptical about it.

What am I supposed to do?
I can't ignore hundreds of the best and brightest, from the airforce to NASA, coming forward and telling me they've witnessed everything from bright lights in the sky to cigar and disk shaped craft (with domes and windows), darting from one horizon to another in a nano second and then coming to a complete halt, flying in formation, chasing our aircraft and turning our missile defense/offense systems and other devices off and on. Maybe you, a dogmatic, staunch conservative can ignore such overwhelming evidence, but I. Can. Not. We are not alone, Mr Satyr, we are almost certainly not alone.

Plus, there's much, much more evidence, but I don't feel like getting into it, we got into it a little already.

You're right when you say some of it can't be identified, perhaps some of the UFOs are weird weather phenomena.. or even lifeforms, mysterious, glowing lifeforms, or something presently beyond our comprehension and imagination, but of course most of them can be identified as hoaxes or ordinary, misinterpreted phenomena.

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You just provided an affirmation not a challenge.

If I were to take "your word" on it, or the word of some preacher on what he claims but cannot justify or provide evidence for, simply based on the position that "it might be so", then I would be a christian....or a godless Christian trying to find a substitute mysticism to replace the old one.

There's no "try"...as it is not up to me to prove a negative.
I can't prove the non-existence of Big Foote either, does this make this creature real?
In your world it does, because in your world everything, every single thing, is possible until proven otherwise.
So you work backwards...Top>Bottom.

When someone offers a possibility then it is up to him to provide the arguments and saying that "some guy told me so" or "I heard a story" or "I saw some lights in the sky so aliens are visiting" is about as reliable as a Christian's account of being healed from cancer by his local snake-oil salesman.

Oh and your "matter" allusion hinges on how you define it, as I do not define it as an absolute nor as something other than a form of activity, to which energy is related as it being a variation of it.
As for "spirit" here is another overused word, particularly by secular Christians who feel that God's death or the idea of god having been ridiculed into UN-respectability deserves a substitute.
For me spirit can be used in many contexts, but in the one you attempt to use it as, as this amorphous, Being, that is carried in the body but is other than it, I cannot ascribe to...so, for me, spirit denotes nothing more than the sum of all the past as it manifests in the present.
My spirit, my character, my personality, my nature, is the aggregate of past inter-activities.

I won't bother with the rest.
Have a nice night fantasizing.

The point is hundreds of the best and brightest on and off duty say they saw them, and have evidence captured on their computers, and are prepared to testify in front of congress. We're not talking about some drunken hic in the woods, claiming he saw angels and aliens.

I guess you don't believe in Mongolia either, or have you been?

I am NOT a Christian, but I think you're afraid of Jesus Christ existing, so because admitting anything out of your understanding is a partial confirmation of the possibility of Jesus Christ existing, you have painted yourself into a corner, you have built walls around your brain so you don't have to face the unknown, you are terrified of God, you are terrified of being a sinner and your dad being right, and you needing to humble self before the lord and confess your sins (you've been a naughty boy).
I've got it, I've unveiled Satyr's greatest fear- you're a Godphobe, or a Christphobe, that's it isn't it?
You're a sinner Satyr, no better than anyone else, love thy neighbor, judge not lest ye be judged, hahaha.

Admit it Satyr, it's possible Christ exists, it may be a long shot (1 out of a billion), but you cannot even admit those odds can you?
You are afraid of admitting it for you are afraid of becoming a Christian, like if a homophobe admitted he had a gay thought, it could me he's a gay man living a straight man's life, and he cannot even entertain the idea, he would rather die, hahaha, hahaha, Christianphobe!

Satyr wrote:

I heard of a story also. It was about some guy who heard voices in his head....called it "the voice of God".

Here is another thing: if I were born retarded, and I had a clue that I was retarded....then would I be retarded?

The best liar is the one who buys into his own bullshit. It's a survival mechanism.

Trivers wrote:

If…deceit is fundamental to animal communication, then there must be strong selection to spot deception and this ought, in turn to select for a degree of self-deception, rendering some facts and motives unconscious so as to not betray – by the subtle signs of self-knowledge – the deception being practiced. Thus, the conventional view that natural selection favors nervous systems which produce ever more accurate images of the world must be a very naïve view of mental evolution.

I have no doubt that many faith-healers, priests, psychics actually believe they have real powers or that their spirits exist and that they are channeling them or that God speaks through them.
I also have no doubt that when you believe something hard enough you experience something that justifies it and validates it.

This is a well-known human phenomenon...you might call it a psychological one.

I'll ask myself over and over and over again as I drift off to sleep the infinite question of "what if?":

"What if I levitated?"
"What if a porcupine crawled out of my anus?"
"What if I woke up to discover that I've been a woman all along?"
"What if...."
Shall we indulge in what ifs?

What was Pascal's wager again?
What if God DOES exist?" Oh shit!!! There's egg on my eternally damned face.

Shit, this is the oldest bullshit in the book.
"What if those U.F.O.'s were not alien ships at all - God knows they can't be anything earthly...what if they were the Olympian gods?
What if it were Zeus playing games with us, because we've forsaken him?
I mean, forget logic, reason, experience, knowledge...WHAT IF?

Place your bets, boys, and bet your life away.
Tell yourself that the "fun" is all worth it.
I know I'm having fun.

Carry on.

like i said you don't have an explanation for his experience so you just went off on a tangent/tirade of psychics, faith-healers etc when he isn't one or necessarily believed in it and ridiculous strawmen of porcupines magically crawling out of asses (because of course that definitely will not happen) as if it's an equal and valid analogy.

he had an experience and wasn't asking what if, that's your projections of your own to dismiss it.

what bothers you so much about such stories or experiences? that there is no definitive explanation for all experiences so therefore you think it has to be bullshit, because it's safer or confirms our own concept of reality at a given time.

why not just leave it be to 'we don't know' the answer to everything?

analogies such as the earth could be flat vs round are incorrect because we have proof.

but not everything has been figured out yet and our understanding of reality is still limited.

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When someone offers a possibility then it is up to him to provide the arguments and saying that "some guy told me so" or "I heard a story" or "I saw some lights in the sky so aliens are visiting" is about as reliable as a Christian's account of being healed from cancer by his local snake-oil salesman.

this is funny. i never had the delusion that there was proof of anything, i was merely showing that people have experiences that they share which they don't even have an explanation for. if, for instance, you had one then it would be up to you to share it or not.

whether one believes such occured is up to them. one may think they are just hoaxers and i'm sure there are plenty of them as well but some may be sincere and were tentative about sharing them because they were confused as well.

someone sharing an experience doesn't mean it's to 'sell' or 'dupe' anyone. they are not necessarily saying they have a sure explanation themselves.

they are simply sharing it just as we all share information. this is just more unusual.

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what do ghosts have to do with the concept of God? nothing

what is a ghost? a term for something that was seen or experienced that can't be explained, currently.

Ghosts are thought to be conscious, immortal and incorporeal, God(s) is thought to be conscious, immortal and incorporeal, the difference being, God(s) is thought to be omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, and the creator of the universe, ghosts are not.

No, unidentified object would be a term for something that can't be explained, currently.

Ghost is more specific, it means a transparent, intangible (commonly human(oid), why no one reports perceiving alien ghosts, or dog and cat ghosts, I'm not sure, the Hindu's tell us they have souls, maybe they're just not reported or documented as frequently for some reason.. or maybe the Hindu's are wrong) entity, that is only perceptible at certain times and in certain spaces for brief interludes.

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of course there is no such thing as a leprechaun unless it's a midget dressed up as one. of course, it can't be proven there is no two foot irish midget with pointed ears with a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow but given the entire story, it's leans toward unlikely.

You're begging the question. Why can't leprechauns/big foot be proven and premonitions can?
Perhaps a hunter will kill/capture a big foot or a leprechaun. Panda's were once thought to be a myth (a vegan bear.. give me a break). Native South East Asians informed Europeans of their existence. It took Europeans half a century or so to actually capture one, and we captured it by accident, we gave up looking for it. Even now, Panda's are incredibly, incredibly difficult to catch a glimpse of in their natural habitat. No why? Because in their world, we're out of our element. Panda's are elusive, they're adept at hiding, their numbers are comparatively small in forests that are relatively humungous and sparsely, sparsely populated by humans. The same thing could be true of big foot. Instead of assuming reports of big foot are untrue, we should be diverting money from sports and entertainment to fund teams of scientists and hunters to comb the forest and bag a big foot. Wouldn't hurt.
As for Leprechauns, the idea they shoot rainbows out of their asses is absurd, but perhaps there is a humanoid, elfish/hobbit like creature... nah, it's Ireland, we would've seen them by now, and there's no eye witness accounts, past or present, the creature is likely a myth, or it dates back to antiquity, and they went extinct.

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however, there are people who have unusual experiences that can't be explained such as having a premonition and it occurring or actually having a vision that later takes place etc. of course, these can't be proven either

No of course, demonstrate why.
If a woman has a premonition that a massive earthquake will strike Philadelphia Pennsylvania, on December 13th, 2011, she can make YouTube videos and attempt to contact the public and the government via internet, radio, phone or some other medium. If she's proven right, she'll gain notoriety, and if she's proven right about other starling predictions, she'll gain more notoriety, and eventually the philosophical and scientific communities won't be able to ignore her. They'll begin studying her, examining her physiologically, neurologically and psychologically, and begin asking themselves all sorts of metaphysical questions about psychic phenomena and synchronicity.

If she continues to be proven right again and again, philosophers and scientists will have no choice but to admit there's more going on here than mere coincidence, and then from there they'll attempt to determine just what that something is.

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but to those who have the experience, it's just something they don't have an answer for but can only be wondered about and cannot just be easily dismissed or brushed off as imaginary or a result of some type of mental disorder such as schizophrenia as people with no disorders have also had some unusual and compelling experiences. these types of experiences have more weight because of the nature of them given the later confirmation so it opens up questions as to our supposed logic behind events such as our limited knowledge of linear time etc.

No, they can prove it, if they have it, they just have to get off their asses and try.

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big foot, the tooth fairy, leprechauns etc are not of the same subcategory which are obviously unrealistic and of those who have not had any unusual experiences see them all as unlikely.

Thrice again, this looks like a double standard to me, explain yourself.

Got kicked off of ILP again.

It's no longer a matter of "if" I will be kicked off of ILP permanently.

It's now a matter of how long I will last before it happens.

Like Satyr, I no longer have the tolerance for idiots and assholes.

Of course, being condemned to the rest of my message board life with an asshole like Satyr seems like hell. But even at that, it could be worse.

At least I can tell Satyr to go fuck himself and he will take it as a compliment.

Hello d.

eyesinthedark wrote:

In closing, I didn't come to a conclusion about extra terrestrial space craft over night.

I've always been fascinated by the prospect of their existence.

I've been wrestling with the problem since I was a small boy, they exist, they don't exist, they exist, they don't exist, even then I had a philosophical/scientific mind.

I've read several books and watched dozens of documentaries on the subject.

Who, the fuck, gives a shit how long it took you to come to a stupid conclusion?
Being "slow" is exactly that.

eyesinthedark wrote:

However, i didn't become a believer (and even now I'm not a firm believer) until I watched full disclosure, and this other documentary, I believe it was called- UFOs, the best evidence. Full disclosure and that documentary pushed me over the edge. Also, learning of the star child skull added credence to their claims. However, I'm more skeptical about it.

Ah...well then, if you saw THAT documentary then it all makes sense now.
Shit, boy, we live in an age of information overload, you can find a "documentary" and an "expert" featured on it to defend just about any idea.

It's part of the control mechanism: flood the area with information so that any idiot cannot display the judgment to differentiate between probable and improbable.
All is equated in abundance.

eyesinthedark wrote:

What am I supposed to do?
I can't ignore hundreds of the best and brightest, from the airforce to NASA, coming forward and telling me they've witnessed everything from bright lights in the sky to cigar and disk shaped craft (with domes and windows), darting from one horizon to another in a nano second and then coming to a complete halt, flying in formation, chasing our aircraft and turning our missile defense/offense systems and other devices off and on. Maybe you, a dogmatic, staunch conservative can ignore such overwhelming evidence, but I. Can. Not. We are not alone, Mr Satyr, we are almost certainly not alone.

My God, douche-bag, are you this stupid or is it an act?
Who said we are alone?
Listen, you nitwit, let us take it for granted that mathematically speaking we are not alone in the universe, a given.
Now, you stupid fuck, consider how large the universe is, what the odds are that a civilization would spot us in the vastness or that one would develop at exactly the same time as ours (time being a dimension, you simpleton), and then how long we've been sending off electromagnetic signals in space for them to pick-up, directing them to our location.

Now, after all that, you stupid fucktard, think about what the odds are, given that with our meager human means we cannot find but a few planets, and then, moron, think about the mathematical odds of them, whomever they are, first finding us in the immenseness of space, then traveling here, and then, ironically, being inept enough to not be able to even avoid our weak technological methods of awareness. A species that can travel across light-years of space-time unable to evade the technologies of a primitive species. then consider the motive as to why they would even wish to remain hidden, given their superiority.
Then, you simpleton, retard, we can tackle the motives and the reasons, no matter the conspiratorial complications of keeping secrets like these.
After all that, you moronic, whore-spawn, maybe, just maybe, we can deal with the psychological reasons why an imbecile, like you, can give-in to such ploys, on the grounds that it "can be true" therefore it must be so...or on the grounds that other morons seem to support its delusions.

Now, I remind you, you stupid, imbecile, son of a bitch, that throughout history there have been "respectable", otherwise normal, with many socially accredited credentials and social positions of status who have proclaimed the truth of many stupidities.

eyesinthedark wrote:

Plus, there's much, much more evidence, but I don't feel like getting into it, we got into it a little already.

Please spare us the effort, you dumb-fuck, because if it is as convincing as what you've already provided then I cannot waste any more time on it.

I know that remaining unconvinced about every hair-brained idea some charlatan convinces thousands of retards is true, can be considered cowardice and a result of fear, but douche-bag this can be used against any naysayer.

eyesinthedark wrote:

You're right when you say some of it can't be identified, perhaps some of the UFOs are weird weather phenomena.. or even lifeforms, mysterious, glowing lifeforms, or something presently beyond our comprehension and imagination, but of course most of them can be identified as hoaxes or ordinary, misinterpreted phenomena.

Retard, a mind with self-respect and integrity, and most of all with a mere semblance of courage, does not conclude that what it senses and cannot explain is automatically the product of the extraordinary.

I remind you, imbecile, that stealth technology, which is presently considered "old news" was a matter of national top secrecy in previous times...just as internet technologies were.
I can suspect that if they can release the knowledge of such technologies now that they posses technologies that surpass them and remain unknown to us presently.

But more than this, you imbecile, you must consider the experiences one by one and not altogether, lending self-referential mutual support through numbers. Each particular incident might be due to different factors, and none of them can be mutually supportive, except in that they are all unknown or yet to be explained.

You stupid, fucked-up imbecile, that mathematically speaking aliens civilizations might exist, somewhere out there, does not lead to the conclusion and does not constitute an argument that they are here now, visiting us. Imbecile the odds that there are still undiscovered animal species out there does not increase the odds that one of them is living up my arse and is in control of my brain, as we speak...although in your case it is more likely.

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cranapple wrote:

like i said you don't have an explanation for his experience so you just went off on a tangent/tirade of psychics, faith-healers etc when he isn't one or necessarily believed in it and ridiculous strawmen of porcupines magically crawling out of asses (because of course that definitely will not happen) as if it's an equal and valid analogy.

he had an experience and wasn't asking what if, that's your projections of your own to dismiss it.

No, douche-bag it was you who used this second-hand account to defend a hypothesis with no other evidence than "what if?" and "he said so".
It was you, moron, who insinuated shit, and I merely did not buy into your insinuations.
If I did then why would I not also buy into the same tactics Christians use to prove the existence of their God and that He conducts miracles?

eyesinthedark wrote:

what bothers you so much about such stories or experiences? that there is no definitive explanation for all experiences so therefore you think it has to be bullshit, because it's safer or confirms our own concept of reality at a given time.

Because, moron, you use it as a definite proof, as if one or two or ten testimonies constitute definite evidence and not just evidence which requires an explanation besides the "supernatural' or the "extraordinary."

eyesinthedark wrote:

why not just leave it be to 'we don't know' the answer to everything?

I don't know the "answer to everything" imbecile, and that's why I read books and write essays. But, moron, that I do not know everything, in the absolute, does not mean that I know nothing, in the absolute.
Get it yet, you moron?

Let me be more precise, because despite my earlier efforts you seem to be too dense to understand....a negative, you imbecile, as in my hypothetical absolute ignorance, does not, NOT, constitute an argument for, or proof of, an absolute positive...as in your imaginative shared delusions.
Imbecile, another way of understanding it: my hypothetical ignorance does not make your hypothetical gnosis more plausible.

This is an argument based on negativity, and all can use it. It is so easy, you dumb fuck, that all HAVE used it throughout time to defend everything from spirits, to God, and from angels and ghosts to the centrality of the earth in the cosmos.
The "I do not know" and "You do not know" does not equate our ignorance, you Judeo-Christian fag. There is no uniformity of weakness here, stupid fuck...and it is not the meek who shall inherit the earth either.

One more way, because your kind is as thick as molasses...if I say I do not know what causes A or B phenomenon, which I've seen first-hand and not been told of it by another, and when I've discounted all psychosomatic probabilities, including neurosis and the effects of impressionability and social and cultural influences, then you stupid moron this still leaves me with an unknown.
That, hypothetically and mathematically the odds are for a possibility, taking it for granted that I've fully explored and analyzed the probabilities, this still does not make this hypothesis the one and only hypothesis.
In fact, you moron, it is ignorance itself that opens up the possibilities for any number of explanations which I am not aware of, despite the fact that I wish to pretend to myself that I know when I am an ignorant fuck.
Let me make it simpler, for a moron like you...in the Dark Ages a moron of that time, would be far inferior to the moron of our time...and to him the Northern Lights would be an unexplained phenomenon which he could not explain himself and which he can then use what he was told, i.e. that God exists and spirits roamed the earth, to explain it all and so that he can go to bed and sleep easily...thusly alleviating the natural anxiety caused by an unknown environmental element.


--------------------------

d63tark wrote:

Got kicked off of ILP again.

It's no longer a matter of "if" I will be kicked off of ILP permanently.

It's now a matter of how long I will last before it happens.

Like Satyr, I no longer have the tolerance for idiots and assholes.

Of course, being condemned to the rest of my message board life with an asshole like Satyr seems like hell. But even at that, it could be worse.

Who...the....fuck.....cares?

Add yourself to the many morons populating this and every other forum out there...only here we know what and who they are...and we use them in the appropriate manner.

Did you see lights in the sky, drunkard?
Maybe it was not due to your spinning skull and your alcohol drowning brain.

Now tell em how up to my level you are and how you've contributed to my awareness, as an equal.

Hey, did you know about our dungeon?
It's where we keep animals who are undisciplined. The more disciplined ones, or the ones that now wear different clothes and put on a more civil demeanor, we tolerate up here in the main event....the Agora....the town square.
I'm sure you will find many of your kind here....one or two wearing different faces, but smelling of the same sweats.

We are more tolerant here, because we do not so easily open the bedroom and dining hall doors to dirt, but we only lower the gates to the foyer where mud and flies and pigs can enter.

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Who, the fuck, gives a shit how long it took you to come to a stupid conclusion?
Being "slow" is exactly that.

This isn't an argument. On complex subjects such as this, it pays to come to a decision slowly, only a simpleton would come to a firm, quick decision prior to thoroughly analyzing all the data.

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Ah...well then, if you saw THAT documentary then it all makes sense now.
Shit, boy, we live in an age of information overload, you can find a "documentary" and an "expert" featured on it to defend just about any idea.

It's part of the control mechanism: flood the area with information so that any idiot cannot display the judgment to differentiate between probable and improbable.
All is equated in abundance.

I have watched documentaries from both perspectives, and have read books, and have considered both carefully, unlike you, who won't believe in something simply because "it isn't necessary". Right, it's not necessary for you to believe or disbelieve in aliens, nor is it necessary for you to believe in the great wall of China.

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My God, douche-bag, are you this stupid or is it an act?
Who said we are alone?
Listen, you nitwit, let us take it for granted that mathematically speaking we are not alone in the universe, a given.
Now, you stupid fuck, consider how large the universe is, what the odds are that a civilization would spot us in the vastness or that one would develop at exactly the same time as ours (time being a dimension, you simpleton), and then how long we've been sending off electromagnetic signals in space for them to pick-up, directing them to our location.
So if you and a group of people saw a vessel in the sky, fly by and abduct 100 people, you would not believe in it, because you think the odds of aliens locating and reaching us are slim to nil?

You assume life is rare, the universe could be teeming with life at all stages of development, including intelligent, for reasons I mentioned earlier. Life may pass from one planet to another via asteroids and comets. This would make life more prevalent and ubiquitous throughout the universe than your primordial soup theory.

Now, what makes you think they'd have to be at our stage of development? They could be thousands, millions, or even billions of years ahead. Imagine the technology they may have, or are you so small minded to think we've reached the summit of technological development? We continue to make progress annually. Imagine where we could be, centuries, or thousands of years from now. We may have thousands, or millions of vessels dedicated to the exploration of the cosmos, capable of reaching speeds we can only dream of, or accessing warm holes, or some other cosmic glitch.

You make assumptions that significantly reduce the odds of extraterrestrial intelligences ever reaching us. You could just as easily be right as wrong. I, however, make no such assumptions. The universe may be teeming with life, it may not be. Humans may have reached the summit of technological development, on the other hand, thousands of years from now, we may look back on this period as a dark age. You assume intelligent life would have no reason to come here, I assume nothing. Assume, assume, assume. When are you going to stop assuming, asshole, and start investigating at the facts?

Also worth considering, perhaps they discovered this planet millions of years ago. You make the window of opportunity for them to come here smaller than it is, so the odds of them coming here are dramatically less. They may have discovered this planet millions of years ago, and have been monitoring it's development ever since.

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Now, after all that, you stupid fucktard, think about what the odds are, given that with our meager human means we cannot find but a few planets,

The key word here is meager. It entails they'd have far, far superior means of locating us, if they could reach us.

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and then, moron, think about the mathematical odds of them, whomever they are, first finding us in the immenseness of space, then traveling here, and then, ironically, being inept enough to not be able to even avoid our weak technological methods of awareness. A species that can travel across light-years of space-time unable to evade the technologies of a primitive species. then consider the motive as to why they would even wish to remain hidden, given their superiority.

The prime directive, perhaps.. I take it you're probably not a star trek fan. Perhaps they're a species of observers and watchers. They may think we're too primitive for contact. They could be waiting for us to evolve, biologically and culturally.

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Then, you simpleton, retard, we can tackle the motives and the reasons, no matter the conspiratorial complications of keeping secrets like these.
After all that, you moronic, whore-spawn, maybe, just maybe, we can deal with the psychological reasons why an imbecile, like you, can give-in to such ploys, on the grounds that it "can be true" therefore it must be so...or on the grounds that other morons seem to support its delusions.

Retard, you're the one who thinks it can't be true, therefore it must not be true.

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Now, I remind you, you stupid, imbecile, son of a bitch, that throughout history there have been "respectable", otherwise normal, with many socially accredited credentials and social positions of status who have proclaimed the truth of many stupidities.

How you can compare missionaries, and other retards, with dozens of astronauts, thousands of police officers, and thousands of men and women from the army, navy and air force, who have witnessed extraordinary, documented phenomena, who have no agenda, who aren't selling a religion or anything, is beyond me. We're not talking about a bunch of drug addicted, retarded cult members here, we're talking about thousands of the best and brightest, and millions from all walks of life, you're simply going to dismiss all that, because it doesn't fit you're dumb fucking, conservative, Christian paradigm?

I remind you, fucktard, several centuries ago, philosophers and scientists thought it impossible for rocks to fall out of the sky, for there was no ground up there, so they ignored accounts of meteorites for centuries.

I'll deal with the rest of your bullshit later.

..and you call yourself an empiricist, bah, who the fuck are you trying to convince, yourself? You're an empiricist when it suits your agenda, and a rationalist, top-down thinker when it suits your agenda. Alien visitors don't exactly, fit in with your conservative, timocratic paradigm. You assume there is no extra terrestrial life, on pseudo-philosophical, quasi-rational and emotional grounds, so you don't have to deal with any empirical evidence.

eyesinthedark wrote:

So if you and a group of people saw a vessel in the sky, fly by and abduct 100 people, you would not believe in it, because you think the odds of aliens locating and reaching us are slim to nil?

I think more than hundreds of people, have seen sick people get "healed" on stage.

Maybe you should read up on the psychology of groups...Gustave Le Bon.

eyesinthedark wrote:

You assume life is rare, the universe could be teeming with life at all stages of development, including intelligent life, for reasons I mentioned earlier. Life may pass from one planet to another via asteroids and comets. This would make life more prevalent and ubiquitous throughout the universe than your primordial soup theory.

I know....the possibilities are infinite if one explanation is the only one which will do.

eyesinthedark wrote:

Now, what makes you think they'd have to be at our stage of development? They could be thousands, millions, or even billions of years ahead. Imagine the technology they may have, or are you so small minded to think we've reached the summit of technological development? We continue to make progress. Imagine where we could be, centuries, or thousands of years from now. We may have millions of vessels dedicated to the exploration of the cosmos, capable of reaching speeds we can only dream of, or accessing warm holes, or some other cosmic glitch.

I know...if I close my eyes and allow my imagination to roam free, turning into fantasy....the possibilities are endless.

eyesinthedark wrote:

You make assumptions that significantly reduce the odds of extraterrestrial intelligences ever reaching us. You could just as easily be right as wrong. I, however, make no such assumptions. The universe may be teeming with life, it may not be. Humans may have reached the summit of technological development, on the other hand, thousands of years from now, we may look back on this period as a dark age. You assume intelligent life would have no reason to come here, I assume nothing. Assume, assume, assume. When are you going to stop assuming, retard, and start looking at the facts?

No, boy...you assume all....you assume that they, whatever they means, exist...that they are technologically advanced, that they have the technologies to detect and then to travel to us in under 2000 years, that they want to do so, that they are benevolent and that they are in the vicinity, making such a possibility possible.

I'm convinced.
If you can imagine it and a few douche-bags can attest to it, then it must be true.

Oh, and by the way...if I see something like a ghost, the first thing I will try to do is explain it by blaming my self and my senses.

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I think more than hundreds of people, have seen sick people get "healed" on stage.

The difference is they're looking to get healed. Members of the army, navy, policemen, etc aren't looking for a close encounter, they're just doing they're job, and often reluctantly report their sightings, many at the risk of losing their career, or being ridiculed by their superiors, colleagues, friends and family.

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Maybe you should read up on the psychology of groups...Gustave Le Bon.

I'll add that to my list.

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I know....the possibilities are infinite if one explanation is the only one which will do.

Right back at ya hon. Sigh... the possibilities are less than finite if only one explanation...

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I know...if I close my eyes and allow my imagination to roam free, turning into fantasy....the possibilities are endless.

You're not hard to counter, all I have to do is rearrange your own sentences.

The possibilities are slim to nil if we lock our imaginations in a vault, or if we can only imagine why they wouldn't be able/willing to come here (conveniently).

You accuse me of making assumptions. I primarily base my conclusion (extra terrestrial intelligences are probably visiting us) on empirical grounds, not on theoretical possibilities. Theoretically speaking, it's 50/50, or perhaps even 90/10 in favor of your assertion, it's the empirical evidence that makes it probable.

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No, boy...you assume all....you assume that they, whatever they means, exist...that they are technologically advanced, that they have the technologies to detect and then to travel to us in under 2000 years, that they want to do so, that they are benevolent and that they are in the vicinity, making such a possibility possible.

No, I do not assume, it's what the evidence suggests.

If it was merely winos and hics reporting these events, I would not be convinced. If it was a few pilots, I would not be convinced. It's the overwhelming evidence that makes it probable.

Why 2000 years? Perhaps they detected life here a billion, or a million years ago, and then they launched some probes to further investigate. Maybe they're not benevolent, maybe these are just scouts, and the cavalry is on the way, or maybe they destroyed their planet, or someone or something else did, and they fled here. Maybe they just don't have the capability to destroy us.. yet, so they use our planet's resources for the time being, to repair their ships and feed themselves, with whatever it is they need (livestock innards?). They may not be that benevolent, imagine them as interstellar wild life photographers, or sexual perverts, they may like to play with our women, but they do not wish to disturb or significantly alter or interfere with the course of our civilization, or risk getting into conflict with us, they merely wish to observe, or to play.

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I'm convinced.
If you can imagine it and a few douche-bags can attest to it, then it must be true.

A few douche-bags, that's all it is.

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Oh, and by the way...if I see something like a ghost, the first thing I will try to do is explain it by blaming my self and my senses.

I wouldn't... assume... anything, I wouldn't immediately trust/distrust my senses, I would wait for more information. I have seen figures in the dark before, everything from paper that wasn't there, to spiders that vanished before my eyes, to wavy hands, leaves, and other bizarre phenomenon. They were almost certainly hallucinations, and not contact with some other dimension, for my mind was extremely fatigued when I saw them, and I have never seen them when I was fully awake and alert.

On second thought, Hallucinations definitely exist, other dimensions may not, so it is reasonable to, not assume, but think the ghost like phenomenon was more likely a hallucination than genuine, objective reality. However, if me and 9 others, each reported witnessing the exact same ghost simultaneously, and I new these people to be rational, sane people, and we weren't on drugs or stressed at the time, then I probably would conclude the encounter was likely genuine.