Challenge: I'm willing to convert if.......

[Koldo]

I don't understand what you are asking. Can you rephrase.

Sure. Imagine that I "independently investigate over a period of a few years a reasonably good sample set of reincarnation claims and conclude by a discussion of the case studies that none (or statistically insignificant number of them) pass the bar of being genuine cases.", as you put it.

What would stop you or anyone else from saying: "The fact you didn't come across any genuine case has absolutely no bearing on whether Tucker did." ?

Imagine a 1000 different people reach the same conclusion: None coming across any genuine cases.

That would call into question Tucker's integrity, but even so it is impossible to say that Tucker did not come across genuine cases. It could merely be the case that those cases are very rare and that Tucker was lucky to find them. In other words, it is impossible to actually debunk his work. Best case scenario, we can cast doubt upon it.

 

[sayak83]

Sure. Imagine that I "independently investigate over a period of a few years a reasonably good sample set of reincarnation claims and conclude by a discussion of the case studies that none (or statistically insignificant number of them) pass the bar of being genuine cases.", as you put it.

What would stop you or anyone else from saying: "The fact you didn't come across any genuine case has absolutely no bearing on whether Tucker did." ?

Imagine a 1000 different people reach the same conclusion: None coming across any genuine cases.

That would call into question Tucker's integrity, but even so it is impossible to say that Tucker did not come across genuine cases. It could merely be the case that those cases are very rare and that Tucker was lucky to find them. In other words, it is impossible to actually debunk his work. Best case scenario, we can cast doubt upon it.

But this is true for every scientific field.
Assume a reasearch group A investigates a phenomena and identify a trend in the data.
Later another research group B investigates the same phenomena at a later time and identifies a very different trend.
This creates a problem of inconsistency and is usually solved by further study of the phenomena by other research groups and they reporting what they find.
Eventually a full scale review and meta analysis is done which would identify, among the various results from various groups, which set of works is more internally self consistent and the results of which groups are outliers. Eventually a consensus is arrived among the community studying that specific phenomena.

 

[YoursTrue]

God is sovereign. What He chooses to do or not do is entirely up to Him.

And yes, my faith was/is stronger than those whom He doesn't heal. It's irrelevant if you think that is presumptive and arrogant.

Without getting too involved, I wonder if you think prayer to Mary, the mother of Jesus, is ok. Many people do pray to her. I ask for a reason in reference to miracles and what you think about them.

 

[Spice]

I know there are no miracles because there is no evidence of any taking place?

Out of this whole discussion, no one, has yet to show any remote chance of a miracle taking place.

Okay, here's one. I'm being very vulnerable here, as this is still emotional after more than 40 years.

First off, miracles can't be proven. If they could they wouldn't be miracles.

Secondly, I don't necessarily believe a miracle can be prayed forth. I'm more inclined to believe they happen on a much broader span than an individual request granted.

So 40+ years ago my infant son had to undergo many surgeries due to a multiple genetic anomalies. Before he reached his first birthday one of these problems that had not reached the top priority position made itself top priority.

His malformed kidney swelled to the degree of pinching off the ureter. Easily they drained the kidney, however the ureter did not correct itself. With all thus little body had already been through they did not want to operate this soon.

At this time angioplasty had become standardized for coronary procedures, but nothing more. Our doctor consulted with another after hours, his wife, a radiologist, and they thought it viable to do angioplasty on my son's ureter. It was successful, but only momentarily. It shut back down. The next week they tried again with the same results. This was twice they had administered lite sedation for a nonsurgical proceedure, and three weeks of having a tube continuously draining that kidney to prevent swelling. Sure enough, infection set in. After getting that under control, it was decided the risk of not operating was higher than the full anesthesia need for surgery. So they scheduled the procedure.

In the operating room they ran an ultrasound in preparation. Something wasn't right. They postponed the anesthesia for a full series of pictures (I don't remember if MRI, CAT, or whatever) and "lo and behold" the uretre was perfect.

That's my miracle story. And BTW, the doctor said it was not his first, but as rare as they may come, he had learned not to fret over what happened; just be grateful and move on to the next patient in need.

 

[Ignatius A]

Anyone can prove that the miracles of any kind in the major religious texts, actually happened.

Yes, that's right I am happy to become a Christian or a Muslim.

However, if these miracles cannot be proven, then you must reflect on your belief and the possibility that you believe in what you do, because of your upbringing.

Do not be afraid.

Are you an atheist? If so I will make the same kind of challenge to you. I will become an atheist immediately upon you or any atheist doing one thing. If you do this one thing I would be required to become an atheist if I am to remain intellectually honest. The only thing you have to do to make me become an atheist is: create something from material not presently in existence. I admit im kind of scared you can do it but let's see what you got.

Do not be afraid.

 

[Ignatius A]

Without getting too involved, I wonder if you think prayer to Mary, the mother of Jesus, is ok. Many people do pray to her. I ask for a reason in reference to miracles and what you think about them.

The early church fathers taught that it was ok. Mary is revealed as an intercessor to her son in scripture. The wedding at Cana.

 

[danieldemol]

From what I gather and what I've watched in the video so far is that there is no implication that reincarnation rarely occurs, but that memory or impressions of past lives are usually associated with a traumatic death.

To expand on this, you are more likely to remember the day you got into a car accident and the circumstances surrounding it than you are to remember what you had for dinner on 2 November 2006.

But the video claims it takes an evidence based approach, so if you have no memory of a past life what evidence do you have that it occurred? Again you don't get to simply insert your preferred religious narrative and call it science.

 

[danieldemol]

Firstly, it is not a discussion among two believers.

Yes it is, the psychologist speaks of his hope that we have a larger self without providing any evidence for it and the other guy speaks of his own alleged past life experience demonstrating the two are not sceptical of the conclusions drawn in my view.

Second, you are talking about the part where the host and the guest speculate about possible mechanisms. Yet, none of the mechanisms have to be true for the phenomena itself to be true.

Correct, but for the conclusion to be true (ie reincarnation) the mechanism has to be true.

The phenomena itself that quite of lot of children remember past lives for a period of time and among them there are a good fraction whose memories can be verified.

"a lot"? What percentage of these children as a fraction of all children that come from societies without a pre-existing belief in reincarnation are we discussing here.

Third. There is nothing unscientific about posting a non materialistic paradigm within science as long as it's effects are observable. In quantum mechanics, the QBism approach considers information as the primary realm of scientific study and hence seeks to move science away from a materialistic ontology to a purely information centric worldview where information is a primitive prior. Methodological Naturalism does not imply that the outcome of such an approach will lead to ontological materialism.
Fourth. It is unnecessary for me or anyone else to support some explicit theory explaining past life memories. I only need to note that good quality scientific investigation has shown the prevalence of veridical past life memories which provide evidence for the existence of rebirth after death (at least for some people). I can also note that this is currently unexplained in any mechanistic materialistic paradigm while some non materialistic paradigms have predicted the occurrence of such phenomena. Hence, by Bayesian logic, the current evidence provides support for these latter paradigms and weakens support for the materialistic paradigms.

I don't see how we can know that the information transfer source wasn't simply forgotten by the child which would also predict what we see.

Then there are the various non materialistic paradigms you are hand waving away such as ESP, demon projection etc which are just as accurate a fit for the evidence as reincarnation in my view.

 

[SalixIncendium]

But the video claims it takes an evidence based approach, so if you have no memory of a past life what evidence do you have that it occurred? Again you don't get to simply insert your preferred religious narrative and call it science.

I'm inclined to say that hypotheses are arrived at through inductive reasoning, and inductive reasoning would reveal that if there is evidence that a subset of humans having lived past lives, humans in general would have lived past lives.

But I'm not sure I'm correct in this, so I'll defer to a scientist.

 

[leroy]

Anyone can prove that the miracles of any kind in the major religious texts, actually happened.

Yes, that's right I am happy to become a Christian or a Muslim.

However, if these miracles cannot be proven, then you must reflect on your belief and the possibility that you believe in what you do, because of your upbringing.

Do not be afraid.

This is a very easy task….

If we define Miracles as “an event that can’t happen according to the laws of nature”

(if you have a different definition in mind please share it)

Then I would answer to the challenge as follows….

1 We *know* that matter/energy can’t be created nor destroyed (first law of TD)

2 We *know* that Matter/energy was created at some point in the past

3 therefore this event was a miracle (according to the definition above)



*in this context to *know* means “to know with a high degree of certainty”….. if your challenge requires 100% certainty then I admit that I failed to answer to your challenge.

So there is your proof for a miracle…….. Awaiting for your excuses for not converting as you said in the OP

 

[SalixIncendium]

1 We *know* that matter/energy can’t be created nor destroyed (first law of TD)

2 We *know* that Matter/energy was created at some point in the past

My brain just melted.

 

[SeekingBalance]

This is a very easy task….

If we define Miracles as “an event that can’t happen according to the laws of nature”

(if you have a different definition in mind please share it)

Then I would answer to the challenge as follows….

1 We *know* that matter/energy can’t be created nor destroyed (first law of TD)

2 We *know* that Matter/energy was created at some point in the past

3 therefore this event was a miracle (according to the definition above)



*in this context to *know* means “to know with a high degree of certainty”….. if your challenge requires 100% certainty then I admit that I failed to answer to your challenge.

So there is your proof for a miracle…….. Awaiting for your excuses for not converting as you said in the OP

Hi leroy,

New here. The big bang is crazy but we might be able to predict a few things. The Higgs field which gives things mass was probably less interesting in the early universe.

I hope all is well.

 

[YoursTrue]

The early church fathers taught that it was ok. Mary is revealed as an intercessor to her son in scripture. The wedding at Cana.

Jesus taught his disciples to pray to their Father in heaven.

 

[YoursTrue]

Are you an atheist? If so I will make the same kind of challenge to you. I will become an atheist immediately upon you or any atheist doing one thing. If you do this one thing I would be required to become an atheist if I am to remain intellectually honest. The only thing you have to do to make me become an atheist is: create something from material not presently in existence. I admit im kind of scared you can do it but let's see what you got.

Do not be afraid.

you're funny.

 

[danieldemol]

I'm inclined to say that hypotheses are arrived at through inductive reasoning, and inductive reasoning would reveal that if there is evidence that a subset of humans having lived past lives, humans in general would have lived past lives.

But I'm not sure I'm correct in this, so I'll defer to a scientist.

Bit like saying if a subset of humans lead wealthy lives then all humans lead wealthy lives in my view.

 

[Watchmen]

Science can enhance the knowledge of the material world, create skepticism about religious mythologies and is useful in eradicating superstition, but it is not capable of providing a moral dimension to humanity. All of the world's wmd's were created by scientists and engineers.

​

And the religious have murdered millions and stunted education and stomped on basic civil rights. They certainly seem incapable of providing a moral dimension to humanity.

 

[YoursTrue]

And the religious have murdered millions and stunted education and stomped on basic civil rights. They certainly seem incapable of providing a moral dimension to humanity.

Yes, many have, and God will take a rendering of judgment.

 

[Madsaac]

Are you an atheist? If so I will make the same kind of challenge to you. I will become an atheist immediately upon you or any atheist doing one thing. If you do this one thing I would be required to become an atheist if I am to remain intellectually honest. The only thing you have to do to make me become an atheist is: create something from material not presently in existence. I admit im kind of scared you can do it but let's see what you got.

Do not be afraid.

I struggle to see how me creating a material not presently in existence, has to do with you becoming an atheist? Can you clarify, please?

What point are you trying to make?

 

[YoursTrue]

I struggle to see how me creating a material not presently in existence, has to do with you becoming an atheist? Can you clarify, please?

What point are you trying to make?

Come on, that's like asking Einstein or Dr. Hawking to clarify...and worse -- Spinoza...no, not worse -- equal.

 

[Madsaac]

This is a very easy task….

If we define Miracles as “an event that can’t happen according to the laws of nature”

(if you have a different definition in mind please share it)

Then I would answer to the challenge as follows….

1 We *know* that matter/energy can’t be created nor destroyed (first law of TD)

2 We *know* that Matter/energy was created at some point in the past

3 therefore this event was a miracle (according to the definition above)



*in this context to *know* means “to know with a high degree of certainty”….. if your challenge requires 100% certainty then I admit that I failed to answer to your challenge.

So there is your proof for a miracle…….. Awaiting for your excuses for not converting as you said in the OP

Yeah your definition forgot to include 'scientific laws'

Miracle definition - an extraordinary and welcome event that is not explicable by natural or scientific laws and is therefore attributed to a divine agency.

Disagree, 1 and 2 can be most likely be explained because of natural or scientific laws and not by a divine agency, so in other words they are not miracles.

I'll make it easier for you, what if, in the context of religious miracles, I only need to 'know' 50.1% to be convinced. I'll accept that. No need for a high degree of certainty.