# Feelers, help a Thinker understand emotional validation!



## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

Unethical feelings are not inherently any different from ethical feelings. If you think of humans as biological robots, emotions are simply bits of coding governing our behaviour - merely a more complex form of {if} {then}. Hitler's brain was giving him logical commands based on his life trajectory - genes, upbringing and so on. So is a psychopath's brain when it releases dopamine upon a murder. (Psychopaths in themselves may be a free rider issue caused by certain sociobiological dynamics present in groups of **** sapiens.)

The ethical problem lies not with the individual but with the society. Bear, chimp, gorilla, lion etc. males regularly kill cubs sired by other males (the females involved become more quickly available for reproduction and rival genes are exterminated). In a bear "society", this behaviour is normal, whereas in (modern) human society, it is outlawed. The human society imposes rules on its members to safeguard certain critical factors - stability, procreation etc. Why is it we have a problem with a brother and sister having protected, consensual sex?

Neither Hitler, Stalin nor Pol Pot acted illogically or harboured "wrong" emotions. Their emotions were fully valid based on their life trajectories. Their brains were simply running programs that were incompatible with wider human flourishing, hence they had to go.

If your Feeler friend is displaying lots of emotion, they simply happen to have a brain that runs such a program, while yours does something different. Both your brain and your friend's are doing their best to govern the survival machine your genes inhabit (= you).


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## outsidedogdiner (Mar 15, 2014)

im entp and do understand your point and need. please do not upset the universe as we know it.....please


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## g_w (Apr 16, 2013)

OrchestraInside said:


> Unethical feelings are not inherently any different from ethical feelings. If you think of humans as biological robots, emotions are simply bits of coding governing our behaviour - merely a more complex form of {if} {then}. Hitler's brain was giving him logical commands based on his life trajectory - genes, upbringing and so on. So is a psychopath's brain when it releases dopamine upon a murder. (Psychopaths in themselves may be a free rider issue caused by certain sociobiological dynamics present in groups of **** sapiens.)
> 
> The ethical problem lies not with the individual but with the society. Bear, chimp, gorilla, lion etc. males regularly kill cubs sired by other males (the females involved become more quickly available for reproduction and rival genes are exterminated). In a bear "society", this behaviour is normal, whereas in (modern) human society, it is outlawed. The human society imposes rules on its members to safeguard certain critical factors - stability, procreation etc. Why is it we have a problem with a brother and sister having protected, consensual sex?
> 
> ...


Nice attempt at trolling.


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## WickerDeer (Aug 1, 2012)

Feelings should not be invalidated because they exist beyond that. They cannot be torn down like an invalid argument. They are tied to someone's core truth and invalidating them is like invalidating the person...which is bad. One of the reasons it's bad is when someone invalidates their own feelings, they freeze them and are unable to feel most the spectrum anymore, including love.

When people express their feelings honestly and gently, they are able to work through them enough to find the roots of the feelings. 

But feelings interact with thoughts intimately. Feel free to destroy those and rebuild them. That's usually the point of working through negative feelings for yourself or with another.

To "hear" someone's feelings, hear your own. Put yourself in their position and see it their way (even if the way they see it is wrong...because they interpreted the information wrong or they didn't receive vital information). If I feel like you stabbed me in the heart, and I've told you I love you...then, what would you feel if you loved me and I stabbed you in the heart?

Did you really stab me? Did I stab you? No. It's feelings. Also, it probably hurt you if I said that, right? 

If so, that's expressing hurt by projection. Instead of saying, "I feel hurt" I am mixing it with your actions...I am also making you feel my hurt, but in a way that will also make it harder for you to empathize...because now you will have to work through your own hurt. (I'm not sure about this...but it does seem like people "express" feelings in many destructive ways. Like...hitting someone would be an example of expressing hurt or um...crossed boundaries...a lot of times...at least in children.)

The only reason that I can think of, why a feeling would be "invalid" is because the thoughts that motivated it are invalid. BUT the feeling is never "invalid." Just as...when you watch a movie where a little girl is raped or something...and she dies...you might cry. Your feelings of sadness aren't invalid just because you are reacting to actors on a screen. All the feelings...hate, anger, jealousy, hurt....they stem back to desire and ultimately something that can only be described as "good/bad." And we need to be able to express that to ourselves and to our loved ones.

So the responsibility of "empathy" lies in both parties. We need to communicate feelings in a safe way and also to listen to them. It's tricky business.

Maybe...and I just thought of this connection...feelings are like the electromagnetic spectrum. The more "positive" ones...like love, happiness, etc. can be expressed in a sloppy way. We can shine them all over people with "you" statements. You're so beautiful, smart, sexy...etc. I love "you." It's like the rays from the sun that feed the plants and give us vitamin D. 

But the more "negative" ones...that express hurt, anger, hatred, and fear, need to be treated as if they are those radioactive particles...or waves or something. If you lavish those on someone, they will hurt and probably fear you. If you accept and digest them with responsibility. "I feel" not "you made me feel." And also..."I thought" not "you did," and especially never, "you are." So those have to be treated very carefully...to work them back to the more digestible ones...because you don't want to make your partner wear a lead vest which will block out everything, including the light and warmth.

Man. I was supposed to be talking about validating feelings. I think that's just empathy. And i agree that most don't need to be validated unless they are about the other person.


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## g_w (Apr 16, 2013)

AlliG said:


> I mean, I guess it would depend on the situation. The example that was given of a friend dying, there's nothing to fix. It just has to heal. And keep in mind, my mindset isn't in the context of "romantic relationships" because.... well, it's just not. So who knows if my response would be different in reference to a thinker that I was in a relationship with. I have my "armor", too, and I usually prefer to just leave it alone rather than someone trying to fix it for me. Remember, when I want to bury my Fi, I don't have anywhere else to run like you lucky NT types. It's right there at the top of the stack. Cynicism is all I've got to lean on :dry:


Find a mature INTJ alpha-male. They will guard you from all harm under their mighty armored shield.
...if you haven't evaporated it with INFP magical healing rays.


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## TuesdaysChild (Jan 11, 2014)

g_w said:


> Find a mature INTJ alpha-male. They will guard you from all harm under their mighty armored shield.
> ...if you haven't evaporated it with INFP magical healing rays.


It's likely that INTJs have more armor-evaporating capability than I do anymore. Even if it doesn't come from within their soul, they can at least design and build one out of spare parts.

In the meantime, I'll be over here in my ice cube.


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## g_w (Apr 16, 2013)

AlliG said:


> It's likely that INTJs have more armor-evaporating capability than I do anymore. Even if it doesn't come from within their soul, they can at least design and build one out of spare parts.
> 
> In the meantime, I'll be over here in my ice cube.


INTJs cannot evaporate armor: and being hit by another INTJ's laser simply causes a quick decision: "duel to the death" or "quick submission" or "mutual respect".

It's kind of like how you seldom find more than one dragon in the same country...

But our armor can be evaporated by xNFPs.

You need someone with Te to latch onto to pull you out of the raging torrent of your emotions until you can start your own Te and dry out a bit...until you need to recharge by plunging back into the surge. :tongue:


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## TuesdaysChild (Jan 11, 2014)

g_w said:


> INTJs cannot evaporate armor: and being hit by another INTJ's laser simply causes a quick decision: "duel to the death" or "quick submission" or "mutual respect".
> 
> It's kind of like how you seldom find more than one dragon in the same country...
> 
> ...


See, that's just it. I'm not having a raging torrent of emotion. I've drowned it with romantic cynicism, leaving the rest of my Fi free to worry about other things like hungry squirrels and starving orphans, etc.

Everybody wins


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

g_w said:


> Nice attempt at trolling.


If I wanted to troll, I'd be much more creative.

This I actually believe in.

"Seeing through the illusion of free will has lessened my feelings of hatred for bad people. I’m still capable of feeling hatred, of course, but when I think about the actual causes of a person’s behavior, the feeling falls away. It is a relief to put down this burden, and I think nothing would be lost if we all put it down together. On the contrary, much would be gained. We could forget about retribution and concentrate entirely on mitigating harm."

- Sam Harris


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## TuesdaysChild (Jan 11, 2014)

OrchestraInside said:


> If I wanted to troll, I'd be much more creative.
> 
> This I actually believe in.
> 
> ...


Just to play devil's advocate for a minute, isn't he choosing to not feel hatred of his own free will? If free will is an illusion, how is he able to abandon his former opinion by choice? This seems to negate objective truth in favor of subjective truth, ie, morality is nothing more than what people decide it is, rather than being an autonomous, universal truth.


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

AlliG said:


> Just to play devil's advocate for a minute, isn't he choosing to not feel hatred of his own free will? If free will is an illusion, how is he able to abandon his former opinion by choice? This seems to negate objective truth in favor of subjective truth, ie, morality is nothing more than what people decide it is, rather than being an autonomous, universal truth.


You could pull up the pool table argument: the universe is an (probably) infinite pool table with inifinite amounts of balls bouncing around. These balls bump into each other and hence affect each other's trajectories. If Harris changes his opinion, it's because he has been hit by balls (opinions, bits of information, people etc.) that change his trajectory. Because the pool table and the balls are inifinite and we only see a tiny fraction of them, the trajectories seem chaotic and somewhat random to us.

I don't 100 % agree with Harris, to me it seems more likely that free will comes with a scale from 0 % to 100 %. But for the sake of this particular argument, his quote is decent.

In terms of neuroscience, I and Harris would argue that our decisions are made in the subconscious mind (there are fMRI/EEG studies that provide some evidence to this) and our conscious mind only becomes aware of them afterwards and believes it made a choice - when in fact the decision was made by deeper parts of the brain we do not have conscious access to. We'd further argue that those deeper parts are deterministic - simply a complex computer figuring out an optimal outcome based on the data available.


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## TuesdaysChild (Jan 11, 2014)

OrchestraInside said:


> You could pull up the pool table argument: the universe is an (probably) infinite pool table with inifinite amounts of balls bouncing around. These balls bump into each other and hence affect each other's trajectories. If Harris changes his opinion, it's because he has been hit by balls (opinions, bits of information, people etc.) that change his trajectory. Because the pool table and the balls are inifinite and we only see a tiny fraction of them, the trajectories seem chaotic and somewhat random to us.
> 
> I don't 100 % agree with Harris, to me it seems more likely that free will comes with a scale from 0 % to 100 %. But for the sake of this particular argument, his quote is decent.


It just seems that both the tyrant and the humble wise man both end up with the same conclusion: That they have managed to break free from the chained masses to realize an ultimate truth. They simply employ it to different ends, as it has always been.

"What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun. Is there such a thing of which it is said, 'See, this is new'? It has already been done in the ages before us." -Solomon

Does that make free will an illusion, or are we just lacking in imagination?


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

AlliG said:


> It just seems that both the tyrant and the humble wise man both end up with the same conclusion: That they have managed to break free from the chained masses to realize an ultimate truth. They simply employ it to different ends, as it has always been.
> 
> "What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun. Is there such a thing of which it is said, 'See, this is new'? It has already been done in the ages before us." -Solomon
> 
> Does that make free will an illusion, or are we just lacking in imagination?


"I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, _that_ I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore *choose *life, that both thou and thy seed may live."

- Deuteronomy 30:19

If we can *choose*, then we must have free will. I don't know what Solomon made of that, but he must have read it many times, being well-versed in the scriptures.

I ask this: If a brain scan reveals your choice *several seconds before* you yourself become aware of making a choice, where is your free will? It is certainly not in your conscious mind. It could theoretically be in your subconscious mind, but if you have no conscious control over it, how free is it?


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## TuesdaysChild (Jan 11, 2014)

OrchestraInside said:


> "I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, _that_ I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore *choose *life, that both thou and thy seed may live."
> 
> - Deuteronomy 30:19
> 
> ...


I would have to know the parameters of the experiment to really comment on it (what kind of choices were the subjects being asked to make? What to have for breakfast? Choices of morality? And how was the determination made what signals were being measured by the scan and how were they able to pinpoint what action of the brain the signal was stemming from?)

But I will say, we can also choose to act against our own will.


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## g_w (Apr 16, 2013)

OrchestraInside said:


> "I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, _that_ I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore *choose *life, that both thou and thy seed may live."
> 
> - Deuteronomy 30:19
> 
> ...


You're assuming that the part of the mind which *makes* the choice, is the same one which "keeps track of" and remembers things.
Yawn.


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

AlliG said:


> I would have to know the parameters of the experiment to really comment on it (what kind of choices were the subjects being asked to make? What to have for breakfast? Choices of morality? And how was the determination made what signals were being measured by the scan and how were they able to pinpoint what action of the brain the signal was stemming from?)
> 
> But I will say, we can also choose to act against our own will.


I added a video above.

I would ask "who made the choice to act against what you perceive as your will?"


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## g_w (Apr 16, 2013)

OrchestraInside said:


> You could pull up the pool table argument: the universe is an (probably) infinite pool table with inifinite amounts of balls bouncing around. These balls bump into each other and hence affect each other's trajectories. If Harris changes his opinion, it's because he has been hit by balls (opinions, bits of information, people etc.) that change his trajectory. Because the pool table and the balls are inifinite and we only see a tiny fraction of them, the trajectories seem chaotic and somewhat random to us.
> 
> I don't 100 % agree with Harris, to me it seems more likely that free will comes with a scale from 0 % to 100 %. But for the sake of this particular argument, his quote is decent.
> 
> In terms of neuroscience, I and Harris would argue that our decisions are made in the subconscious mind (there are fMRI/EEG studies that provide some evidence to this) and our conscious mind only becomes aware of them afterwards and believes it made a choice - when in fact the decision was made by deeper parts of the brain we do not have conscious access to. We'd further argue that those deeper parts are deterministic - simply a complex computer figuring out an optimal outcome based on the data available.


Circular reasoning.
If we assume the universe is a pool table, then things are deterministic.
Therefore, there's no free will.
Because, _*science*_.

*snerk*


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

g_w said:


> You're assuming that the part of the mind which *makes* the choice, is the same one which "keeps track of" and remembers things.
> Yawn.


No. All I'm saying is, the part of you that identifies itself as you (your conscious mind) does not make your decisions. That seems to be true, in which case we need to ask what those other parts of you (which the conscious you has no access to) are doing and on what kind of grounds. If self-awareness (the conscious you) is what sets us apart from cats and dogs and your self-aware part isn't making any decisions, what sets you apart from cats and dogs?


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

g_w said:


> Circular reasoning.
> If we assume the universe is a pool table, then things are deterministic.
> Therefore, there's no free will.
> Because, _*science*_.
> ...


Not circular reasoning but yes, if we assume A, then B. A may not be true, but the best science we have seems to suggest it is.


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## g_w (Apr 16, 2013)

OrchestraInside said:


> No. All I'm saying is, the part of you that identifies itself as you (your conscious mind) does not make your decisions. That seems to be true, in which case we need to ask what those other parts of you (which the conscious you has no access to) are doing and on what kind of grounds. If self-awareness (the conscious you) is what sets us apart from cats and dogs and your self-aware part isn't making any decisions, what sets you apart from cats and dogs?


*snerk*

Turns out the Libet experiment didn't do controls, and so they f*cked it up. 
Brain might not stand in the way of free will - life - 06 August 2012 - New Scientist


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

g_w said:


> You obviously don't know much physics. Do you even know the difference between elastic and inelastic collisions, or idealized frictionless surfaces vs. real friction?
> Not to mention the impossibility of measuring with infinite precision, and the consequent propagation of increasing uncertainty over time.
> Or the fact that the idealized billiard balls are stateless with no internal structure or communications: unlike the brain composed of however many neurons, arranged into multiple structures at different scales, all of which communicate via multiple chemical messengers and receptors.
> To call your characterization of the mind as superstition is being generous.


No, nor do those apply in this case. My pool table is only a metaphor. Nor does my pool table have to be two-dimensional, it can have however many dimensions we need. With an infinite number of balls and infinite collisions from infinite (?) angles, there is too much data for limited beings such as ourselves to ever see more than a tiny fraction of it. Only a theoretical perfect being could have all the data and know every single trajectory in exact detail.

Edit: Calling it a pool table is probaby not a good description of a multi-dimensional universe. I don't really need to invoke a table, an infinite, multi-dimensional space with infinite balls colliding describes it better.


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## TuesdaysChild (Jan 11, 2014)

OrchestraInside said:


> Case in point - if there is no need to punish out of vengeance but simply to protect society, we would rehabilitate everyone, not merely the mentally impaired. They actually do that in Norway, something which many other countries tend to sneer at as "socialistic bs".


I find in most criminal cases (and I did work in criminal court for five years) punishment was not out of vengeance, but out of justice, and not revenge justice, but diplomatic justice. Now, the prison system, on the other hand......





OrchestraInside said:


> In which case there is little reason to assume that the spirit is anything but neurons firing off in our brains.


Well, that is where I am most definitely immoveable no matter how many balls you throw at me. And I have in the past gone through a very deliberative and thoughtful process on the matter. It is, however, concrete in the present :wink:


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

AlliG said:


> I find in most criminal cases (and I did work in criminal court for five years) punishment was not out of vengeance, but out of justice, and not revenge justice, but diplomatic justice. Now, the prison system, on the other hand......


I think Jared Diamond's excellent article on vengeance highlights how human it is to wish for revenge. Many legal cases involve no vengeance, while others involve plenty (Law Abiding Citizen is an excellent case study), depending on who has been wronged and how. One of Sam Harris's great shortcomings is his inability or unwillingness to understand the validity of all emotions, from hatred to love, vengeance to reverence.



> Well, that is where I am most definitely immoveable no matter how many balls you throw at me. And I have in the past gone through a very deliberative and thoughtful process on the matter. It is, however, concrete in the present :wink:


That is your prerogative  I am something of a possibilian - I merely cannot see how dualism could be true based on what I know today. I cannot know what I will know tomorrow, nor what will be known after my death. I do understand the often tremendous subjective importance of faith in a soul/spirit, and I often use them as metaphors while not claiming that they exist outside of my brain circuitry. I personally have an active spiritual life for the same reasons I actively enjoy music - though my subjective experience of spirituality is much more powerful than my very powerful subjective experience of music. The two are often intertwined.

I must say, though, that our unwillingness to accept the subjectivity in these matters often brings about much pain and suffering, perhaps unnecessarily. That is a more universal observation of confidence in our beliefs.


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## TuesdaysChild (Jan 11, 2014)

OrchestraInside said:


> That is your prerogative  I am something of a possibilian - I merely cannot see how dualism could be true based on what I know today. I cannot know what I will know tomorrow, nor what will be known after my death. I do understand the often tremendous subjective importance of faith in a soul/spirit, and I often use them as metaphors while not claiming that they exist outside of my brain circuitry. I must say, though, that our unwillingness to accept the subjectivity in these matters often brings about much pain and suffering, perhaps unnecessarily.


As I always say, "A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still." (unknown source, too lazy/tired to look it up.)

A person can only have faith by their own free will :tongue:


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

AlliG said:


> As I always say, "A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still." (unknown source, too lazy/tired to look it up.)
> A person can only have faith by their own free will :tongue:


...of what they perceive as their own free will :tongue: You're unlikely to be a Jain in Kansas or an Evangelical Christian in Tehran.


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## TuesdaysChild (Jan 11, 2014)

OrchestraInside said:


> ...of what they perceive as their own free will :tongue: You're unlikely to be a Jain in Kansas or an Evangelical Christian in Tehran.


These do exist, despite the known danger to their personal safety in areas where they can be killed for such (well, maybe not in Kansas, but they might want to die after the ******* treatment for a while). As do Caucasian Jihadists from the American Midwest.


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

AlliG said:


> These do exist, despite the known danger to their personal safety in areas where they can be killed for such (well, maybe not in Kansas, but they might want to die after the ******* treatment for a while). As do Caucasian Jihadists from the American Midwest.


Yes. 'Unlikely' does not mean 'absolutely not' 

I am sure you will find millions of Muslims in the Middle East proclaiming to believe in Allah of their own free will. I used to believe in Jesus "of my own free will", and growing up in a highly religious family in a deeply Christian area surely had nothing with my choice of faith to do... The chances of me picking Bahá'i instead were probably somewhere close to 0.1 %.


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## TuesdaysChild (Jan 11, 2014)

OrchestraInside said:


> Yes. 'Unlikely' does not mean 'absolutely not'
> 
> I am sure you will find millions of Muslims in the Middle East proclaiming to believe in Allah of their own free will. I used to believe in Jesus "of my own free will", and growing up in a highly religious family in a deeply Christian area surely had nothing with my choice of faith to do... The chances of me picking Bahá'i instead were probably somewhere close to 0.1 %.


My family was, meh, so-so religious. I think it was more for keeping up appearances with them. My INTJ half-brother, who was raised by his atheist mother, is very devout as an adult. It bothers him when people proclaim that only the stupid are religious. He's freakishly brilliant and very successful, so it's a stereotype that really irks him.

As for me, I've never been able to shake the belief that there is purpose in everything. Much like C.S. Lewis, I spent a long time as a skeptic, but somehow ended up with an interest in religious history and through that, came to some conclusions that I couldn't deny anymore. As Lewis said "I was starting to be afraid it was actually true." And as far as I'm concerned, Ecclesiastes is the meaning of life summed up in 12 chapters roud:


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

AlliG said:


> My family was, meh, so-so religious. I think it was more for keeping up appearances with them. My INTJ half-brother, who was raised by his atheist mother, is very devout as an adult. It bothers him when people proclaim that only the stupid are religious. He's freakishly brilliant and very successful, so it's a stereotype that really irks him.
> 
> As for me, I've never been able to shake the belief that there is purpose in everything. Much like C.S. Lewis, I spent a long time as a skeptic, but somehow ended up with an interest in religious history and through that, came to some conclusions that I couldn't deny anymore. As Lewis said "I was starting to be afraid it was actually true." And as far as I'm concerned, Ecclesiastes is the meaning of life summed up in 12 chapters roud:


I like Solomon - Ecclesiastes and the Song of Songs are my favourite parts of the bible along with the book of Daniel - especially the King James version, which is linguistically very enjoyable literature. The meaning of life goes a bit far for me, but there's some decent philosophy there, considering the age of the book.

I used to study theology and I know many theologians are highly intelligent. IMHO religious people tend to lean towards type I pattern-matching errors (false positives) as explained by Michael Shermer no matter how intelligent they are. John Nash, while AFAIK not religious, has a brilliant mind that is pathologically prone to type I errors.

Conservative religious people tend to be more fear-focused and less creative, but to dismiss religious people as stupid is an inefficient strategy.


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## TuesdaysChild (Jan 11, 2014)

OrchestraInside said:


> I like Solomon - Ecclesiastes and the Song of Songs are my favourite parts of the bible along with the book of Daniel - especially the King James version, which is linguistically very enjoyable literature. The meaning of life goes a bit far for me, but there's some decent philosophy there, considering the age of the book.
> 
> I used to study theology and I know many theologians are highly intelligent. IMHO religious people tend to lean towards type I pattern-matching errors (false positives) as explained by Michael Shermer no matter how intelligent they are. John Nash, while AFAIK not religious, has a brilliant mind that is pathologically prone to type I errors.
> 
> Conservative religious people tend to be more fear-focused and less creative, but to dismiss religious people as stupid is an inefficient strategy.


I like how you always put the links as if I'm going to click them. I admit, I'm guilty of never clicking on anyone's links. :tongue:

And it doesn't surprise me that there are scientific terms for the "error" of thinking that causes religious belief. The non-acceptance of other beliefs isn't synonymous with the religious. It is universal.


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

AlliG said:


> I like how you always put the links as if I'm going to click them. I admit, I'm guilty of never clicking on anyone's links. :tongue:
> 
> And it doesn't surprise me that there are scientific terms for the "error" of thinking that causes religious belief. The non-acceptance of other beliefs isn't synonymous with the religious. It is universal.


False positives do not describe religious belief per se, merely seeing patterns where none exist. This could be anything from maths to chess to kitchen conversations... If you haven't seen "A beautiful mind", do watch it. It has nothing with religion to do.

**** sapiens is a narrow-minded, ignorant species full of arrogance and bigotry. Which I just proved, Q.E.D...


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## TuesdaysChild (Jan 11, 2014)

OrchestraInside said:


> False positives do not describe religious belief per se, merely seeing patterns where none exist. This could be anything from maths to chess to kitchen conversations... If you haven't seen "A beautiful mind", do watch it. It has nothing with religion to do.
> 
> **** sapiens is a narrow-minded, ignorant species full of arrogance and bigotry. Which I just proved, Q.E.D...


Many times, if a pattern doesn't exist, it's because it hasn't been seen yet. It seems like a way to cherry pick people's thought processes and put them into categories of correct and incorrect as a way to rationalize an established opinion, which is human nature. Clearly, people like Nash and my older brother see patterns that the very same people wouldn't deny they exist. It's my brother's job to see patterns and he's hired by private companies and governments all over the world to do just that. Nash won a Nobel Prize. But he's also schizophrenic and it's difficult to compare because, well, he saw _people_ that didn't exist :tongue:


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

AlliG said:


> Many times, if a pattern doesn't exist, it's because it hasn't been seen yet. It seems like a way to cherry pick people's thought processes and put them into categories of correct and incorrect as a way to rationalize an established opinion, which is human nature. Clearly, people like Nash and my older brother see patterns that the very same people wouldn't deny they exist. It's my brother's job to see patterns and he's hired by private companies and governments all over the world to do just that. Nash won a Nobel Prize. But he's also schizophrenic and it's difficult to compare because, well, he saw _people_ that didn't exist :tongue:


That's the thing with human brains. The circuitry that is good at detecting novel patterns (creativity, imagination, fantasy) sucks at understanding when a detected pattern doesn't really exist. On the other hand, "dull" minds (the archetypal laboratory scientist springs to kind) may be very good at detecting false patterns for what they are, but fail to detect novel patterns (which is a type 2 error, false negative). Ideally, we would have a good balance of the two, but that is rarely the case - both in individuals and in societies.

What we typically have are brilliant creative minds sprouting ideas that dull, systematic types then plow through to find the errors and refine the gems. This is, naturally, a caricature, but you get the idea.


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## g_w (Apr 16, 2013)

OrchestraInside said:


> Case in point - if there is no need to punish out of vengeance but simply to protect society, we would rehabilitate everyone, not merely the mentally impaired. They actually do that in Norway, something which many other countries tend to sneer at as "socialistic bs".
> 
> 
> 
> In which case there is little reason to assume that the spirit is anything but neurons firing off in our brains.


That's the rub: since the material can only detect, and can only affect the material ("how many angels can dance on the head of a pin" cannot be examined experimentally), there is no way by considering only the material, whether the spiritual even exists.
The problem is confusing possible limitations of physics, for intrinsic evidence / conclusions about metaphysics.


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## g_w (Apr 16, 2013)

OrchestraInside said:


> Of course they could, your brain is way too complex to say "balls" colliding within it wouldn't cause all of that.
> 
> Where would you have free will reside?


Not yet known. You are allowed to freely say "Gee, we don't know yet" instead of shoehorning everything into a model.
Secondly, one needn't conflate physics with metaphysics, nor take overly simplified models used to communicate a putative concept, for essential consolidations of the actual state of the universe.
(Materialism falls apart at the fact that mere thought -- a byproduct of random molecular motion -- is veridical, that it bears essential significant relationship to the external world, through abstraction, logic, and math. Fact vs. meaning, qualia, self awareness. Evolution is insufficient because the earlier stages of intellect do not enable the possessor to alter the environment in a any significant ways, while at the higher levels intellect is an individual trait which does not confer individual fitness--a genius may still die of whooping cough or cholera or get eaten by a lion as an infant; and intellectual outliers are often outcasts (don't get laid as much, so don't pass on their genes), while evolution is a mass statistical effect.)


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## g_w (Apr 16, 2013)

OrchestraInside said:


> No, nor do those apply in this case. My pool table is only a metaphor. Nor does my pool table have to be two-dimensional, it can have however many dimensions we need. With an infinite number of balls and infinite collisions from infinite (?) angles, there is too much data for limited beings such as ourselves to ever see more than a tiny fraction of it. Only a theoretical perfect being could have all the data and know every single trajectory in exact detail.
> 
> Edit: Calling it a pool table is probaby not a good description of a multi-dimensional universe. I don't really need to invoke a table, an infinite, multi-dimensional space with infinite balls colliding describes it better.


Doesn't help because your model is by definition deterministic--which is the very putative characteristic of the mind which is in question. You are subtly pre-determining your conclusion by your set-up.


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## g_w (Apr 16, 2013)

OrchestraInside said:


> There are studies which suggest this happens in perfectly healthy brains as well - it is simply more obvious in damaged brains where the hemispheres cannot communicate with one another. Again, we do not know for certain (which you seem to imply me wanting to say). All I'm saying is, there are findings that should make us strongly suspicious of our conscious agent, "me", and its ability to act of its own volition.


Your last sentence is self-contradictory: both the word "should" and "suspicious" are the voluntary acts of a free mind.
Atheists tend to love to beat down objective truth with "random chance / determinism" but forget to do so towards their OWN mind and arguments for the brief period that they are making such arguments. Their own thinking is sprinkled with "magical Prometheus dust" which render them exempt from determinism and therefore efficacious for finding 'truth'.

Fail.


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## g_w (Apr 16, 2013)

OrchestraInside said:


> Yes. 'Unlikely' does not mean 'absolutely not'
> 
> I am sure you will find millions of Muslims in the Middle East proclaiming to believe in Allah of their own free will. I used to believe in Jesus "of my own free will", and growing up in a highly religious family in a deeply Christian area surely had nothing with my choice of faith to do... The chances of me picking Bahá'i instead were probably somewhere close to 0.1 %.


Oh, so you're one of those crusading apostates. I'll send liver.


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## Dosto Yevsky (Feb 9, 2014)

g_w said:


> Oh, so you're one of those crusading apostates. I'll send liver.


I'm not. I'd like to understand your thinking better - can you link to websites, articles, authors you find illuminating on this subject?


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## g_w (Apr 16, 2013)

OrchestraInside said:


> I'm not. I'd like to understand your thinking better - can you link to websites, articles, authors you find illuminating on this subject?


No, I'm quite sui generis. One line PM coming.


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