Objective evidence of god/religion?

[Darkness]

Regardless, semantic quibbles aside, my point was that if we can perceive aspects of a thing - whether quantitatively or qualitatively - then we can test for it. Bringing the idea of doing something "scientifically" is a red herring here. Science is just the rigorous use of logic to derive conclusions from evidence. If a thing is somehow beyond the reaches of science, it's beyond the reaches of human knowledge generally.

How do you test for the existence of qualia?

 

[shawn001]

I wasn't going to participate in this thread, but you've got me curious. What metric is used to measure feeling? Fluid ounces? Cubic centimeters? Joules?

I can't say I've ever heard of anybody coming up with a good, quantifiable metric for feelings.

FMRI and Pet Scans

Loving with all your ... brain

• MRI scans show activity in caudate area of the brain at the sight of one's beloved
• When you're in love, caudate area flooded with dopamine, a pleasure chemical
• Researcher: "Exactly the same system becomes active as when you take cocaine"

Loving with all your ... brain - CNN.com

We can also measure the chemicals involved in a person. Dopamine, Norepinephrine, oxytocin.


Vilayanur Ramachandran has been called a Sherlock Holmes of neuroscience. Director of the Center for Brain and Cognition at the University of California, San Diego, and adjunct professor at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, California, Ramachandran has brilliantly sleuthed his way through some of the strangest maladies of the human mind.


Consciousness, Qualia, and Self (V.S. Ramachandran)

Dr. V.S. Ramachandran, Director of the Center for Brain and Cognition at UCSD, discusses consciousness, qualia, and self.

[youtube]jTWmTJALe1w[/youtube]
Consciousness, Qualia, and Self (V.S. Ramachandran) - YouTube

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

How do you test for the existence of qualia?

You perceive them.

I'm not really sure what you're getting at here.