David M

I do understand the need for rigorous objective "measurements" and adherence to procedures and methods etc when practicing philosophy. I get how vulnerable we all are to erroneous suppositions. I'm completely sold on the "scientific method". I love science and I've got a B.S. in Engineering. Where I part company with Stefan already in part 1 (and I do intend to continue listening) is when he throws in these little digs and says things like "there is nothing mystical about consciousness or there is certainly nothing proved about the soul or anything like that". Proved?? Well if you are one, it's proved. Look, science needs proof because because that is the nature of science. It's external to us. We learn about science bit by bit and we really haven't even scratched the surface of science yet, so of course we've got to be careful and rigorous in our exploration of it. Our soul or our being or our consciousness is not a part of science. It's us! I don't become more familiar with myself by looking outside of myself. A map of my DNA, a brain scan, a biochemical analysis, is not going to inform any of the ideas I've laid out here in this topic. Fundamentally, I'm just calling attention to something we all have. You have to ignore it to be an atheist. There is more in this universe than matter. There are thinking beings in it. You don't need proof of this because presumably you are one! And if there is one or more gods or deities or creators or designers then it will be a conscious being just as we are, or maybe it will differ from us the way we differ from say, a dog. I don't know, but I'm not going to petulantly demand proof to see such a being in this life anymore than I am going to demand to see you! Should I expect to be able to "mind-meld" with you??

Thanks guys. Wow, 18 parts,.. but I'm interested, I'll check them out.

Thanks Pepin, I'm actually curious myself as to what response these comment may get. To be frank, most of what I hear from atheists is reactionary. Running from the black robes of the Preisthood usually means running right into the white lab coats of the scientsts. So all that ever gets discussed is ancient slime or fairy tales. Wuzzums, I'm only guessing that you are a conscious being. I don't have any proof.

If you accept the premiss that consciousness in an effect of matter, then of course the arguments for atheism are going to loom large. I don't accept that premiss. For me there is nothing more real than my consciousness, my thoughts, my awareness, my being. We take the reality of matter for granted of course, but what is matter? No one knows really what matter is!! Scientists can yammer on all day about protons and electrons and quarks and what all of that stuff appears to be doing and all of the "rules" that are seemingly being followed, but at the end of the day all scientists will ever come away with are measurements and more measurements. So why should we put matter in the drivers seat, and our own "being" in the trailer? When you hold a memory in your mind of something simple, like having been shown a card with a square printed on it, what is the grey matter in your head doing to give you that memory? Are little swimmers in there swimming into a square formation?? Are other swimmers beholding that and giving a thumbs up signal? Maybe it's morse code, or a binary code or neurons are dancing around like beads on an abacus or transistors on a chip or trillions of tiny little dominoes are sent cascading into formations and there is a picture there to behold. But of course whatever the system or code or arrangement of grey matter there is in there won't change the fact that there is no one else in there to behold it but ourselves. Why reduce our "knowing" of things to an illusion given to us by matter? If anything is illusionary it's the matter, and not our consciousness. What leads us to the absurd conclusion that for something to be real it has to be composed of matter? Well again, scientists like to measure stuff. How do you measure your own "being"? Scientists are very proud of what they do I think, and are likely to contemptuously spurn whatever they can't measure. I believe that our body is like an antenna. It's a machine, unfamiliar to us, that draws us in for a few short years. It's there to give us participation in this world of matter. Matter is subject to cause and effect and beginnings and ends and begs every question about origins and organization and it even begs the question "what is it?". But my "being" is not matter, and in fact is the only thing that begs no question at all from me. I "know". Your "being" is hidden from me, but from what I can interpret, you are like me in that you are also a "being". There are apparently billions of us and we are all truly hidden from each other despite all the animating we give for a time to our bodies. So it would be with any sort of being that is a being whether we would be inclined to deify them or not. I don't know if one special being is running the show, or a small group, or billions, but I'm not going to attribute all of this around us to the random chance of matter bumping into matter! Especially when there are billions of examples of "beings" running around all over the place, coming and going, and we are each intimately aware of what it is to be a "being"!! And while of course there is random genetic mutation going on in the world, to seize on that stupid puke of a theory and attribute all that is and all that we are to it, has got to be the crowning thoughtless idea among all the ideas ever "thought" of in the universe. How can I say that the universe is dead when I am alive? I can't see you and you can't see me and yet it's still considered a cop-out to believe in the unseen. No, the cop-out is believing only in the seen.