John Wayne, Chuck Norris, Bruce Lee, Jason Statham: these guys have got nothing on hardcore physicalists and their willingness to face ‘the ugly truth’.
Unclear whether the link will work, I copy/paste its entirety. As an offering about uncertainty/doubt...
Thoughts on Science and “God”
LFlournoy 3 days ago
I was communicating with someone who was proposing possibly valid constructs within the metaphorical box they had built around “what is suitable as a subject for science”, yet to me, it was still an incomplete box, and seems to miss some crucial aspects about science and the (ha!) completeness/certainty of scientific knowledge to date.
To over-simplify:
Proposition 1 — Science can only “prove” what we can measure or show as mathematically consistent at any particular point in time.
In reality, we might say there are no scientific “truths” but rather theories that are just the best interpretations we can come up with at the time about what we can measure/equate so far.
As a poor but immediate example:
We thought magnetism was ‘magic’ until we noticed patterns that led to methods to measure and equations to predict. Opening up whole new realms of possibility. No more ‘magic’.
Proposition 2— We have not yet measured everything. Period. And there are great prejudices and belief systems within classically-educated scientific communities about what sorts of phenomena and experiences are even permitted to be inquired upon. ( Here it might be useful to recall that the origin of science is experience.)
To whit and most significantly, anything to do with potential interactions between thought or feelings, and the physical world.
Without even looking at them (a most unscientific attitude), most scientists reject even the idea of, say:
- the experiments by the Engineering Dean at Princeton in the ’90s on whether people concentrating could alter the path of, e.g., a random number generator, or
- the significant work being done by HeartMath.com (I have experience with their measurement techniques; actually I have experience with everything I mention here) (both the Dean and HeartMath have shown neither time nor distance effects, that is, these are likely quantum field occurrences), or
- the interface and control of personal and impersonal subtle energies that one can develop through prolonged practice of techniques such as qigong, acupuncture, etc., or
- reports of interfaces with non-corporeal/energetic beings (e.g., angels), whatever they will turn out to be, or
- exploring without prejudice but with discernment, the ramifications of quantum physics and quantum computing, including far-out mathematics supporting multiple dimensions and potential for multiple worlds, or
- the thousands, likely millions, of people who report not only psychic phenomena, but also evidence of reincarnation, even on national television (e.g., the child who showed the Navy where he crashed his plane in WWII, in waters too deep to find until the present — like the black swan, once we have seen one, we can no longer declare "swans are only white" or "reincarnation does not exist".) (Plus all that CIA work on action-at-a-distance.)
The list goes on and on. But the point is, until a scientist personally experiences something outside the culturally “acceptable” dogma (like the Dean at Princeton — something beyond what we normally have the ability and willingness to measure), AND is then willing to Observe it without bias: to take note of and record repetition (a principle of proof), to explore other reports of such experiences (the initial means of measuring), to figure out ways to measure it (like magnetism), to SUSPEND one’s DISBELIEF in anything outside what has for a hundred plus years been a rigidly constructed box, then one is confining oneself to the box and missing out on an even more amazing, beautiful reality, with fascinating things to learn about and measure.
I posit that Science is the measuring (eventually) of everything. Science measures living things and their mystery, not just physics and elements. Some say Science and “God” are not related, but if “God” is everything, then science IS, specifically and only, the measuring of “God”, or rather, bits thereof.
And THOSE things that do turn out to be measurable outside that rigidly constructed box are often where we find our own experiential ‘proof’ of that Something sometimes called Divine Consciousness… Beyond which, upon experiencing the Oneness, the all-encompassing Inner Peace, one will never have Doubt again, even if you still don’t know ‘what’ ‘it’ is.
My current favorite term is “Infinite IS”, a verb, not a noun.
“The Hopium of materialists who need an omnipotent god in their lives but are afraid to admit it.” So much this!
[Steered your way by Thom Hartmann...]
May I offer my first Medium writing...
Unclear whether the link will work, I copy/paste its entirety. As an offering about uncertainty/doubt...
Thoughts on Science and “God”
LFlournoy 3 days ago
I was communicating with someone who was proposing possibly valid constructs within the metaphorical box they had built around “what is suitable as a subject for science”, yet to me, it was still an incomplete box, and seems to miss some crucial aspects about science and the (ha!) completeness/certainty of scientific knowledge to date.
To over-simplify:
Proposition 1 — Science can only “prove” what we can measure or show as mathematically consistent at any particular point in time.
In reality, we might say there are no scientific “truths” but rather theories that are just the best interpretations we can come up with at the time about what we can measure/equate so far.
As a poor but immediate example:
We thought magnetism was ‘magic’ until we noticed patterns that led to methods to measure and equations to predict. Opening up whole new realms of possibility. No more ‘magic’.
Proposition 2— We have not yet measured everything. Period. And there are great prejudices and belief systems within classically-educated scientific communities about what sorts of phenomena and experiences are even permitted to be inquired upon. ( Here it might be useful to recall that the origin of science is experience.)
To whit and most significantly, anything to do with potential interactions between thought or feelings, and the physical world.
Without even looking at them (a most unscientific attitude), most scientists reject even the idea of, say:
- the experiments by the Engineering Dean at Princeton in the ’90s on whether people concentrating could alter the path of, e.g., a random number generator, or
- the significant work being done by HeartMath.com (I have experience with their measurement techniques; actually I have experience with everything I mention here) (both the Dean and HeartMath have shown neither time nor distance effects, that is, these are likely quantum field occurrences), or
- the interface and control of personal and impersonal subtle energies that one can develop through prolonged practice of techniques such as qigong, acupuncture, etc., or
- reports of interfaces with non-corporeal/energetic beings (e.g., angels), whatever they will turn out to be, or
- exploring without prejudice but with discernment, the ramifications of quantum physics and quantum computing, including far-out mathematics supporting multiple dimensions and potential for multiple worlds, or
- the thousands, likely millions, of people who report not only psychic phenomena, but also evidence of reincarnation, even on national television (e.g., the child who showed the Navy where he crashed his plane in WWII, in waters too deep to find until the present — like the black swan, once we have seen one, we can no longer declare "swans are only white" or "reincarnation does not exist".) (Plus all that CIA work on action-at-a-distance.)
The list goes on and on. But the point is, until a scientist personally experiences something outside the culturally “acceptable” dogma (like the Dean at Princeton — something beyond what we normally have the ability and willingness to measure), AND is then willing to Observe it without bias: to take note of and record repetition (a principle of proof), to explore other reports of such experiences (the initial means of measuring), to figure out ways to measure it (like magnetism), to SUSPEND one’s DISBELIEF in anything outside what has for a hundred plus years been a rigidly constructed box, then one is confining oneself to the box and missing out on an even more amazing, beautiful reality, with fascinating things to learn about and measure.
I posit that Science is the measuring (eventually) of everything. Science measures living things and their mystery, not just physics and elements. Some say Science and “God” are not related, but if “God” is everything, then science IS, specifically and only, the measuring of “God”, or rather, bits thereof.
And THOSE things that do turn out to be measurable outside that rigidly constructed box are often where we find our own experiential ‘proof’ of that Something sometimes called Divine Consciousness… Beyond which, upon experiencing the Oneness, the all-encompassing Inner Peace, one will never have Doubt again, even if you still don’t know ‘what’ ‘it’ is.
My current favorite term is “Infinite IS”, a verb, not a noun.