The beliefs on this board...
« on: October 18, 2018, 08:54:38 PM »
I started scanning through the Bill Nye thread (which is obviously locked now) and it seems I am the only "idiot" here?

On record I did not watch that debate, as Nye is an idiot, and Hamm is even worse.

It really amazes me how a subject this complicated can be so easily "open and close" for some people. Yet people with such mentality attempt to claim the intellectual High Ground on someone who doesn't see it as such. Too me this is either deflection of inner doubt, or simply unintelligent.

There is as much need for blind Faith in either viewpoint, so why the hostility and attempted belittling? (Yes, I am fully aware creationist can be hostile, however the high majority comes from the other side)

Rama Set

Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #1 on: October 18, 2018, 09:47:41 PM »
The claims that YEC make are, to be fair, not complicated. They are demonstrably false. In that respect Hamm’s position and Nye’s position should not be equated.

Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #2 on: October 20, 2018, 06:15:57 AM »
It really amazes me how a subject this complicated can be so easily "open and close" for some people.

Thinking about non approved topics can be overwhelming for some people, it's much easier to submit to the most popular opinion rather than to risk being ostracised by the herd for having an opinion which isn't reinforced and validated by media, celebrities, magazines and radio 24/7.

A long time ago I recommended a book called "The Crowd". This meme sums it up all too well.





Quote
In the book, Le Bon claims that there are several characteristics of crowd psychology: "impulsiveness, irritability, incapacity to reason, the absence of judgement of the critical spirit, the exaggeration of sentiments, and others..."[1] Le Bon claimed that "an individual immersed for some length of time in a crowd soon finds himself – either in consequence of magnetic influence given out by the crowd or from some other cause of which we are ignorant – in a special state, which much resembles the state of fascination in which the hypnotized individual finds himself in the hands of the hypnotizer."
« Last Edit: October 20, 2018, 06:22:21 AM by disputeone »

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Offline stack

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Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #3 on: October 20, 2018, 05:45:44 PM »
Thinking about non approved topics can be overwhelming for some people, it's much easier to submit to the most popular opinion rather than to risk being ostracised by the herd for having an opinion which isn't reinforced and validated by media, celebrities, magazines and radio 24/7.

A long time ago I recommended a book called "The Crowd". This meme sums it up all too well.


I lost interest in Le Bon right about here:

Quote
It will be remarked that among the special characteristics of crowds there are several--such as impulsiveness, irritability, incapacity to reason, the absence of judgment and of the critical spirit, the exaggeration of the sentiments, and others besides--which are almost always observed in beings belonging to inferior forms of evolution--in women, savages, and children, for instance. However, I merely indicate this analogy in passing; its demonstration is outside the scope of this work.


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Offline Dr Van Nostrand

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Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #4 on: October 22, 2018, 09:19:01 PM »

Quote
In the book, Le Bon claims that there are several characteristics of crowd psychology: "impulsiveness, irritability, incapacity to reason, the absence of judgement of the critical spirit, the exaggeration of sentiments, and others..."[1] Le Bon claimed that "an individual immersed for some length of time in a crowd soon finds himself – either in consequence of magnetic influence given out by the crowd or from some other cause of which we are ignorant – in a special state, which much resembles the state of fascination in which the hypnotized individual finds himself in the hands of the hypnotizer."


I think this statement reveals a lot about the dude who wrote it. It sounds like he was the type easily influenced by the 'consequence of magnetic influence given out by the crowd.'

He might have the potential to become the hypnotized individual in the hands of the hypnotizer but I don't.
Round Earther patiently looking for a better deal...

If the world is flat, it means that I have been deceived by a global, multi-generational conspiracy spending trillions of dollars over hundreds of years.
If the world is round, it means that you’re just an idiot who believes stupid crap on the internet.

Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #5 on: October 25, 2018, 06:23:28 AM »
None of us are immune to propaganda, we all only believe that we are.

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Offline Dr Van Nostrand

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Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #6 on: October 25, 2018, 01:39:08 PM »
None of us are immune to propaganda, we all only believe that we are.

Actually, that's just you.

We aren't immune to propaganda but by being a critical thinker, we can avoid its influence. It is more important than ever to be an educated consumer of information. We need to question and fact check our most deeply held beliefs even more than we question the beliefs of others.

Just believing things we read or hear without questioning is like eating something you find on the sidewalk. It doesn't matter how appetizing it looks, don't eat it.
Round Earther patiently looking for a better deal...

If the world is flat, it means that I have been deceived by a global, multi-generational conspiracy spending trillions of dollars over hundreds of years.
If the world is round, it means that you’re just an idiot who believes stupid crap on the internet.

Rama Set

Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #7 on: October 25, 2018, 01:44:15 PM »
None of us are immune to propaganda, we all only believe that we are.

Actually, that's just you.

We aren't immune to propaganda but by being a critical thinker, we can avoid its influence. It is more important than ever to be an educated consumer of information. We need to question and fact check our most deeply held beliefs even more than we question the beliefs of others.

Just believing things we read or hear without questioning is like eating something you find on the sidewalk. It doesn't matter how appetizing it looks, don't eat it.

Eh, Disputeone is probably right.  Information we take in (aka Propaganda) must necessarily affect us in some way.  It is pretty arrogant to think that you can think yourself out of the limitations of your brain.

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Offline Dr Van Nostrand

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Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #8 on: October 25, 2018, 02:04:45 PM »
None of us are immune to propaganda, we all only believe that we are.

Actually, that's just you.

We aren't immune to propaganda but by being a critical thinker, we can avoid its influence. It is more important than ever to be an educated consumer of information. We need to question and fact check our most deeply held beliefs even more than we question the beliefs of others.

Just believing things we read or hear without questioning is like eating something you find on the sidewalk. It doesn't matter how appetizing it looks, don't eat it.

Eh, Disputeone is probably right.  Information we take in (aka Propaganda) must necessarily affect us in some way.  It is pretty arrogant to think that you can think yourself out of the limitations of your brain.


I readily accept the limitations of my brain, I understand that we could be living in a simulation matrix type thing while NASA overlords feast on moonshrimp fettuccine. Part of being a critical thinker is the understanding that we don't know it all.

Part of why I come here is to find something that will challenge my beliefs. But if they are going to tell me that the South Pole doesn't exist, I'm going to need something tangible to back it up.

I really like the line, " Information we take in (aka Propaganda) must necessarily affect us in some way." We each must understand this when we read something on Facebook that pisses us off or makes us horny. We have to recognize that we are affected and have to mitigate our reactions accordingly.


I try to give my beliefs only as much credence as they can produce predictive results in the world. 
Round Earther patiently looking for a better deal...

If the world is flat, it means that I have been deceived by a global, multi-generational conspiracy spending trillions of dollars over hundreds of years.
If the world is round, it means that you’re just an idiot who believes stupid crap on the internet.

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Offline RonJ

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Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #9 on: October 25, 2018, 06:11:44 PM »
Take a look at Tom Campbell on YouTube.  Your outlook is too narrow.  Yes, we could be living in a simulation, but NASA is too.  Everyone might be just a character in a video game being played by some unknown entity (not NASA).  According to Tom Campbell we all have free will and all our circumstances are probabilistic.  It's all just a roll of the dice.  If Tom Campbell's notion is true I don't know whether to be comforted or afraid. 
You can lead flat earthers to the curve but you can't make them think!

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Offline Dr Van Nostrand

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Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #10 on: October 25, 2018, 06:23:27 PM »
Take a look at Tom Campbell on YouTube.  Your outlook is too narrow.  Yes, we could be living in a simulation, but NASA is too.  Everyone might be just a character in a video game being played by some unknown entity (not NASA).  According to Tom Campbell we all have free will and all our circumstances are probabilistic.  It's all just a roll of the dice.  If Tom Campbell's notion is true I don't know whether to be comforted or afraid.


Imagine how freaked out that unknown entity running the video game simulation will be when he finds out that he's in a video game simulation run by another more powerful unknown entity.


Definitely will look at Tom Campbell's stuff...

Round Earther patiently looking for a better deal...

If the world is flat, it means that I have been deceived by a global, multi-generational conspiracy spending trillions of dollars over hundreds of years.
If the world is round, it means that you’re just an idiot who believes stupid crap on the internet.

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Offline RonJ

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Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #11 on: October 25, 2018, 07:33:53 PM »
Yea, we all could be stuck in a recursive subroutine with ever higher entities in control...buckle up!
You can lead flat earthers to the curve but you can't make them think!

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Offline Dr Van Nostrand

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Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #12 on: October 26, 2018, 02:24:17 PM »
Take a look at Tom Campbell on YouTube.  Your outlook is too narrow.  Yes, we could be living in a simulation, but NASA is too.  Everyone might be just a character in a video game being played by some unknown entity (not NASA).  According to Tom Campbell we all have free will and all our circumstances are probabilistic.  It's all just a roll of the dice.  If Tom Campbell's notion is true I don't know whether to be comforted or afraid.

OK... trying to stay on topic "the beliefs on this board..."   LCS (large consciousness systems) are one of the beliefs on this board so I think we can safely explore it in this thread. No one wants to be sent to the lower fora because the walls there are smeared with feces, blood and it smells bad.

I saw some of Tom Campbell's videos and he's exploring some ideas that our reality is a virtual reality of some larger consciousness. There are other physicists that also talk about our existence being a simulation. He does a good job of approaching it scientifically and has some compelling arguments. Many FE Youtubers spend their clicks trying to disprove RE rather that laying out reproducible tests to prove FE. Also LCS theories don't call for the assumption of a global conspiracy involving millions of people.

But anytime I look at a theory that creates a frame of reference so large to include all possible frames of reference, there is a point where you reach the unknowable. If we establish that everything knowable is a work of something beyond what's knowable, we can endow that larger consciousness with whatever qualities we choose.

Is the large consciousness good or evil?
Is its name God, Allah or Seymour?  Maybe it's a musical doo-op group...
What's its agenda?

Then some a-hole like me can come along and propose that the entire LCS and its creator are just a dream in the mind of a sleeping dog.

 Still, given the strange quantum relationship between the observer and the observed, I'm not going to dismiss this theory as I would the 'dome' theory.



Round Earther patiently looking for a better deal...

If the world is flat, it means that I have been deceived by a global, multi-generational conspiracy spending trillions of dollars over hundreds of years.
If the world is round, it means that you’re just an idiot who believes stupid crap on the internet.

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Offline RonJ

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Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #13 on: October 28, 2018, 03:07:03 PM »
See Tom Campbell's videos on the double slit experiment.  That's how I got started with his stuff in the first place.  His arguments are compelling.  It certainly appears that mankind can't have simultaneous knowledge about certain things because the software of the virtual world we exist in wasn't written that way.  I don't know whether to be afraid or comforted.  It seems that we all have free will, but everything is probabilistic and it's impossible to know 100% about anything.  I find the possibility of a virtual reality very interesting.  I've never been much of a video game player because it was addicting to me.  I started playing video games once and didn't do some important things that had to be done on time.  After learning my lesson I put the games away and never went back.  My only thoughts now are time spans.  Allegedly, mankind has existed for millions of years and has had a natural progression toward better and better things over that time.  If we are in a virtual reality the time perception of whose video game we are in must be a lot shorter, or they just can exist for an infinite amount to time.  One of the first video games out there was Kingdom.  I played that on one of the first commercial personal computers out there.  You set up all the variable about your 'Kingdom'.  Planted so many acres of corn, dug so many wells, spent some of your gold for weapons, and took some of your concubines out of the field and gave them certain other duties.  After you had all your variables set up the game would generate a random number and that would effect the outcome of your kingdom.  I remember something like 'the Huns would attack, a herd of locusts would eat half your field crop, wells would go dry, concubines would run off, ect.  You then had to analyze the new situation and reallocate all your resources.  Isn't that about what's happening on a continuous basis in the real world? 
You can lead flat earthers to the curve but you can't make them think!

Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #14 on: October 30, 2018, 02:20:10 AM »
None of us are immune to propaganda, we all only believe that we are.

Actually, that's just you.

We aren't immune to propaganda but by being a critical thinker, we can avoid its influence. It is more important than ever to be an educated consumer of information. We need to question and fact check our most deeply held beliefs even more than we question the beliefs of others.

Just believing things we read or hear without questioning is like eating something you find on the sidewalk. It doesn't matter how appetizing it looks, don't eat it.

Eh, Disputeone is probably right.  Information we take in (aka Propaganda) must necessarily affect us in some way.  It is pretty arrogant to think that you can think yourself out of the limitations of your brain.

Not only arrogant but this belief that you are immune to propaganda actually makes the propaganda that much more effective.

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Offline Dr Van Nostrand

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Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #15 on: October 30, 2018, 11:25:05 AM »
None of us are immune to propaganda, we all only believe that we are.

Actually, that's just you.

We aren't immune to propaganda but by being a critical thinker, we can avoid its influence. It is more important than ever to be an educated consumer of information. We need to question and fact check our most deeply held beliefs even more than we question the beliefs of others.

Just believing things we read or hear without questioning is like eating something you find on the sidewalk. It doesn't matter how appetizing it looks, don't eat it.

Eh, Disputeone is probably right.  Information we take in (aka Propaganda) must necessarily affect us in some way.  It is pretty arrogant to think that you can think yourself out of the limitations of your brain.

Not only arrogant but this belief that you are immune to propaganda actually makes the propaganda that much more effective.



If I was immune to propaganda I wouldn't have to worry about propaganda.  But being aware of and avoiding syphilis is not the same as being immune to syphilis.

There are people and organizations spending  millions of dollars trying to manipulate our awareness. We must fight for control of our consciousness against internal and external forces. I may lose the fight but I refuse to surrender.

If we simply throw up our hands and say there's nothing that can be done, we are doomed to become drones

It may be arrogant for me to believe I can fight for the sovereignty of my awareness but  I think it is sad that anybody wouldn't.
Round Earther patiently looking for a better deal...

If the world is flat, it means that I have been deceived by a global, multi-generational conspiracy spending trillions of dollars over hundreds of years.
If the world is round, it means that you’re just an idiot who believes stupid crap on the internet.

Rama Set

Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #16 on: October 30, 2018, 12:05:30 PM »
All I mean by that is that even if you think you are doing a good job guarding against propaganda, it is prudent to continue to question where your beliefs come from and try and sort out whether they are post hoc rationalizations from influences you are aware of, or not.

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Offline Dr Van Nostrand

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Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #17 on: October 30, 2018, 12:25:47 PM »
All I mean by that is that even if you think you are doing a good job guarding against propaganda, it is prudent to continue to question where your beliefs come from and try and sort out whether they are post hoc rationalizations from influences you are aware of, or not.


Yes!  This^^^^^


Question everything!



Over the course of my life, I have believed some stupid crap and found that the more deeply we believe something the more we have to question it.

It turns out that Sea Monkeys are just brine shrimp and despite what the internet ad banners say, there are not hot, young babes in my local area looking to hook up with older married men.

Question God, Sea Monkeys and everything.
Round Earther patiently looking for a better deal...

If the world is flat, it means that I have been deceived by a global, multi-generational conspiracy spending trillions of dollars over hundreds of years.
If the world is round, it means that you’re just an idiot who believes stupid crap on the internet.

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Offline Dr Van Nostrand

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Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #18 on: October 30, 2018, 12:46:49 PM »
See Tom Campbell's videos on the double slit experiment.  That's how I got started with his stuff in the first place.  His arguments are compelling.  It certainly appears that mankind can't have simultaneous knowledge about certain things because the software of the virtual world we exist in wasn't written that way.  I don't know whether to be afraid or comforted.  It seems that we all have free will, but everything is probabilistic and it's impossible to know 100% about anything.  I find the possibility of a virtual reality very interesting.  I've never been much of a video game player because it was addicting to me.  I started playing video games once and didn't do some important things that had to be done on time.  After learning my lesson I put the games away and never went back.  My only thoughts now are time spans.  Allegedly, mankind has existed for millions of years and has had a natural progression toward better and better things over that time.  If we are in a virtual reality the time perception of whose video game we are in must be a lot shorter, or they just can exist for an infinite amount to time.  One of the first video games out there was Kingdom.  I played that on one of the first commercial personal computers out there.  You set up all the variable about your 'Kingdom'.  Planted so many acres of corn, dug so many wells, spent some of your gold for weapons, and took some of your concubines out of the field and gave them certain other duties.  After you had all your variables set up the game would generate a random number and that would effect the outcome of your kingdom.  I remember something like 'the Huns would attack, a herd of locusts would eat half your field crop, wells would go dry, concubines would run off, ect.  You then had to analyze the new situation and reallocate all your resources.  Isn't that about what's happening on a continuous basis in the real world?

Back to the good stuff...

Large Consciousness systems and the Matrix we live in...

People might be surprised how many seriously scientific physicists talk about the virtual reality simulation theory. The PBS series 'Space Time' did an episode on it.

But for me there are still some holes in it.

It might be that the quantized nature of matter, energy and information in our universe simply behaves the way data in a computer behaves. We look at its behavior and the only analog our minds can come up with is a virtual simulation.

Even if we carry forward the analogy of the video game simulation, it wouldn't necessarily mean there is intention or intelligence behind it. A video game simulation can run on its own with no input from anyone. We could imagine that the super entity that started the video game simulation is now passed out completely unconscious on the couch with a bong in one hand and the other hand stuck in a can of Pringles. In this case, we are still in control of our own destinies.

We could even take it a step further. What if the gaming console and the simulation it's running is simply a natural occurrence that arose by chance over an unimaginable span of time. Perhaps it organized itself and arranged Itself by chance just like a quartz crystal or a daimond.

Regardless of the nature of the Matrix, I can never remember if I'm supposed to take the red pill or the blue pill.



Round Earther patiently looking for a better deal...

If the world is flat, it means that I have been deceived by a global, multi-generational conspiracy spending trillions of dollars over hundreds of years.
If the world is round, it means that you’re just an idiot who believes stupid crap on the internet.

totallackey

Re: The beliefs on this board...
« Reply #19 on: November 01, 2018, 11:55:10 AM »
All I mean by that is that even if you think you are doing a good job guarding against propaganda, it is prudent to continue to question where your beliefs come from and try and sort out whether they are post hoc rationalizations from influences you are aware of, or not.


Yes!  This^^^^^


Question everything!
Ah...

You fell for the good ole..."...question everything..." propaganda...

Too bad really...

You were, of course...the last and greatest hope for all humanity...