No, debate and the scientific method is OK. From: Josh Reynolds Sent: Friday, April 28, 2017 12:51 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [AFMUG] OT Pissed off PhD
So we've cut out politics, but religion is ok? - Josh On Apr 28, 2017 1:42 PM, <[email protected]> wrote: This guy wrote an op ed piece in the Salt Lake Tribune today criticizing a doctor for claiming that divine intervention saved his wife's life, and the doctor had the temerity to make this announcement on earth day. So Mr. PhD had to take him to task in the news paper. I looked up the guys email address and sent him the note (at the bottom of the thread). Not sure if I will get any further replies but I did have some fun this morning... -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] Sent: Friday, April 28, 2017 12:35 PM To: Gregory Arthur Clark Subject: Re: Letter in the tribune So odd and unexpected. A truth seeker that resorts insulting someone that disagrees and then slams the door? Is that part of the scientific method? Personally, I prefer my pet theories to be disproved so I can continue the search. (BTW, countless anecdotal beyond the veil stories that reveal previously unknown information. But it seems your search for truth in that direction is clearly halted. ) See you in 150 years mate! -----Original Message----- From: Gregory Arthur Clark Sent: Friday, April 28, 2017 12:28 PM To: [email protected] Subject: RE: Letter in the tribune Replies below. -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Friday, April 28, 2017 12:04 PM To: Gregory Arthur Clark <[email protected]> Subject: Re: Letter in the tribune Hmmm, I note some emotion there. Odd indeed that you are so worked up when if you parse what I wrote, I was not conveying any information about my beliefs in anything. Nor was I defending at all what Daniels said. I don't. Odd that you seem to immediately judge me as a dishonest person. --------------- GC: Curious that you object to my inferences while making so many of your own. Your irrelevant ad-homs are telling and typical. ======== Just simply pointing out that it is difficult to prove that something does not exist. You seem to want to debate. I do know stats and null hypothesis analysis, I am educated. I am an engineer. ---- GC: Some educated people still tout nonsense. Your opening proving-a-negative trope explicitly wrt religion reflects ignorance, trolling, or both. Lose-lose-lose. ========== Just teasing a bit. You seem to want to reject even the possibility that some form of us will exist in 150 years such that we can communicate with each other. ---- GC: As Hitch says, that which can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. But it's worse than that. Psychics are frauds, as are all who claim to relay or receive messages from beyond the veil. There is compelling concrete evidence that, when put to the test, consciousness does not exist without brain function. • Clark, G.A. “Science doesn’t support life after death claims.” Guest commentary. Standard-Examiner, October 22, 2014 (on-line); October 24 (print). Those who return from beyond the veil never tell us anything they couldn’t have said without going anywhere at all. There is no demonstrable awareness after brain shutdown. That’s what this scientific study actually shows--despite trumpeted claims otherwise by the popular press. http://www.standard.net/Guest-Commentary/2014/10/26/Science-doesn-t-support-life-after-death-claims.html ============================= I don't reject that idea at all, I hope for it. GC: Your inabilities are clearly stated and understood. But not respected. ============== If it doesn't happen I will never know. But if it does, expect a visit! Cheers, Chuck -----Original Message----- From: Gregory Arthur Clark Sent: Friday, April 28, 2017 11:56 AM To: [email protected] Subject: RE: Letter in the tribune Thanks for your input, Chuck. My replies are interdigitated below. -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Friday, April 28, 2017 10:46 AM To: Gregory Arthur Clark <[email protected]> Subject: Letter in the tribune Dr. Clark, “Because when it comes to the real world, science works. Religion doesn’t.” You can prove a negative? Just because you have not yet found the knobs that control how religion works, does not mean they do not exist. ---- GC: From a pure epistemological standpoint, science and empirical evidence and inductive logic can't "prove" anything, positive or negative, with 100% certainty. So what? Science deals with probabilities. That's why scientific journals indicate the probabilities associated with rejecting the null hypothesis. What science can do is to disconfirm hypotheses beyond a reasonable doubt. Absence of evidence is indeed evidence of absence -- if the evidence should be there, but repeatedly and reproducibly is not. Science often *does* reject negatives. So do we as people. We reject the hypothesis that saying "abracadabra" cures all cancers, immediately. We reject the hypothesis that Godzilla just devoured all of Salt Lake City. We can reject the God hypothesis with much the same certainty as we reject the God hypothesis. Stop making dishonest, special-pleading exceptions for God. ============= I think you would agree that the placebo effect is a real thing. So in the case where religion triggers the placebo effect religion arguably does work. --- GC: Don't move the goal posts. Of course thinking and prayer and all sorts of mental activities can affect *the person doing them*. But it's self-evident and explicit that my op-ed refers to intercessory prayer regarding the *external physical world.* Praying to God has the same effect on the external physical world as praying to horse manure: None. ========== Not trying to be a troll, I am serious. I think that there is some chance that we do live in “the matrix” or perhaps our universe is contained in a small charm dangling from the collar of a cat. Will make you a wager, in 150 years if some of my ideas are correct, I will look you up and you will owe me the equivalent of a cosmic cup of coffee. Deal? --- GC: I call your bluff. Why wait? Pray, now, that God will heal all adult human amputees by re-growing their missing limbs. It's in the power of an omnipotent God to do so. And yet you know and I know and Professor Daniels knows and essentially *every* sane adult knows that you will fail. Stop making excuses for God. God "answers" prayers the same way that horse manure "answers" prayers: Not at all. Religion is ridiculous, repugnant, and deeply dishonest. Stop lying to yourself. And to others. ======== Over and out, Greg ============ Warm Regards, Chuck McCown
