No Evidence For God, Why Still Believe?

Philosophy Forums Religion and Spirituality
381

Hmm… so emotions are quite primitive.

Based on discoveries made through neural mapping of the limbic system, the neurobiological explanation of human emotion is that emotion is a pleasant or unpleasant mental state organized in the limbic system of the mammalian brain. If distinguished from reactive responses of reptiles, emotions would then be mammalian elaborations of general vertebrate arousal patterns, in which neurochemicals (for example, dopamine, noradrenaline, and serotonin) step-up or step-down the brain’s activity level, as visible in body movements, gestures and postures. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotion#Neurocircuitry

So emotions are communications on the animal level, which is distinct from higher cognitive cerebral processes. That’s why I say someone speaking on video or in front of an audience using animated tones is appealing to the most basic nature of people while bypassing cognitive processing.

Yes I’m mainly talking about public speaking, lectures, talking heads on tv, and the like. When one rallies the mob for a witch hunt, they employ emotions. If one is merely delivering facts, they tend to be less animated.

If he were less monotone, do you think he’d be more believable?

Maybe he was merely trying to make a living writing books.

My friend has tried every reason in the world not to like him: first was the monotone which led to my discovery, then he brought up the fact that he was rich and therefore hypocritical, and finally we had to stop talking about Alan since it was evident that he was determined not to like him.

Yes that’s probably right… I’m trying them on. Dad labeled me as “unconventional” and I find that’s about the only label that fits. :confused: I mean, I don’t even fit in with the outcasts :laughing:

Have you discovered a religion that allowed for eccentricities? Like, try not to sin, but also try to sin on occasion lest ye get too pious about it.

Yes, I think that’s what they are. Whether it’s an angry dog barking, growling, warning you to stay away or low blood sugar causing me to be irritable, my outburst are warnings to stay out of my way until I’ve eaten and relaxed. Crying is appeal for friendship for consolation and solution to a problem. Emotions have to be regarded as communications and since every action can only benefit the self, all emotions are also self-serving.

Sure, the child is not cognitively seeking to control the parent, but innately through emotional displays.

They say (and you’ll probably hate it) that the sound of the rain needs no translation. We do not need to be taught what emotions mean.

You could be right. It’s a confusing philosophical issue about whether emotions are communications or just chemical reactions, but the main point I wanted to drive home was concerning public speaking and not all emotions in general.

It depends who is listening. If I am listening, then I would interpret emotional content as compensation for something… like they say guys who drive big trucks are compensating for something :wink:

I suppose so, but usually when someone is on the losing end of an argument, they begin jumping up n down (metaphorically) because they’re out of ammo.

I don’t think I suggest they should. I like knowing who is pandering and who is not and if we take that indicator light away, then I won’t be able to tell :wink:

I think you get that impression because this happens to be the topic. Come hang out with me and you’ll quickly find I’m very emotional indeed lol! Especially when my neighbor starts acting like an idiot “that sock sucking, good fer nothing, motha trucking, son of a biscuit eater!” :angry-cussingblack: I get pissed fairly easy :confused: I get it from grandpa I think… the pride.

Yes but you wanted to convince someone.

But you wanted them to.

That’s a case where the cognitive approach didn’t work and they resorted to emotions to drive the point so you would finally get it.

But they did convince you because you said you appreciated it.

Calm talk is about convincing, but not by relying on emotional content.

No, but striving to convince is a red flag warranting further scrutiny.

Would you say “I think X is immoral” or “Jesus people, can’t you idiots see that X is immoral?”

If I set food out for an animal, am I forcing the animal to eat? Writing thoughts into a book is not forcing someone to believe the thoughts or even read the book. If you want to feed on the wisdom, that is fine. If not, that is fine. How is that line of thought inconsistent with Alan’s actions?

Whether he is trying to convince or not is inconsequential because at the end of the day I’m just worried about the truthfulness of his words. This topic evolved from why he talks in monotone and my developing a theory to explain such behavior.

I think it’s more convicing being unanimated because I know he is not having to resort to animation to further his point. Here is the info and you can inspect it and do with it as you wish. That’s better than high-pressure sales tactics.

Many times he is simply describing buddhism and not his own beliefs. For a long time I thought he was supporting logical positivism until I recently learned he was against it.

I sent my friend the bit about the gold in the vaults sinking into the ground, but the book-keeping was impeccable so it didn’t matter. My friend says “I don’t believe that really happened.” I said, “it’s a story, not history.” He said, “I can’t tell the difference.” That’s why I say you really have to listen and pay attention to the context. He could be telling a story or describing a belief he does not hold.

So do you believe we should cling to ideologies? He is saying we should not, except for sometimes lest the not-clinging itself becomes an ideology we cling to. It’s consistent with Mark Twain.

Nothing wrong with emotions and desires, but the clinging is the problem.

Reminds me of this bit:

[i]How do you know what’s good for others? How do you know what’s good for you?!? If you say you want to improve, then you ought to know what’s good for you. But obviously you don’t because if you did, you would be improved. So you don’t know.

If you ask for spiritual instruction, you are confusing yourself. Because you are looking outside for what you are asking for… as if someone else could give it to you… as if you didn’t have it.

If you ask me for enlightenment, how can you ask me for enlightenment? If you don’t know what it is, how do you know you want it? Any concept you have of it will be simply a way of trying to perpetuate the situation you’re already in. If you think you know what you’re going out for, all you’re doing is seeking the past… what you already know… what you already experienced. Therefore, that’s not it, is it? Because you say you’re looking for something quite new. But what’s your conception of something new? You can only think about it in terms of something old.

We WASPs have been on a rampage for the last 100+ years to improve the world. We have given the benefits of our culture, our religion, our technology to everybody. And we have insisted that they receive the benefits of our culture and even our political styles, our democracy. “You better be democratic, or we’ll shoot you.” And having conferred these blessings all over the place, we wonder why everybody hates us. Sometimes doing good to others, and even doing good to one’s self, is amazingly destructive because it’s full of conceit.[/i]

As I said, he got out of the ministry because he didn’t want to presume who are the swine and didn’t like evangelizing. He said it’s a good thing to spend 2 weeks in the forest alone, but it’s not for everyone. He said sailing is a good thing, but it’s not for everyone.

I think he would say “fine”. Like the student who asked “what’s this religious stuff all about then? Why not just forget it?” He said “Fine, forget it. Go away. But realize that by going away you’re still seeking. What a problem! If you stay here and listen to me or anyone else who comes around here, you’re fooling yourself, but if you leave you’re fooling yourself also. What a trap! What can you do?”

He is being natural. He can’t help his emotional handicap. Perhaps he’s on the autistic spectrum. Maybe you are being judgmental.

I don’t think he is.

Well we can’t abandon all reason in favor of the limbic nor vice versa.

He can’t be comprehensive about geese. It was just one aspect of nature that he wanted to convey.

He admits one cannot give up the ego nor desire.

He says:

[i]But actually the middle way is a little more subtle than that and it’s beautifully discussed in professor Bahm’s book “The Philosophy of Buddha”. A fascinating analysis in the form of a dialog:

The student brings a problem to the teacher and he says “I suffer and it’s a problem to me.”
The teacher says, “You suffer because you desire. If you didn’t desire, you wouldn’t suffer. So try not to desire.”
And the student returns and says “I am not very successful in this. I can’t stop desiring; it’s terribly difficult. Furthermore I find that in trying to stop desiring I’m desiring to stop desiring, now what am I to do about that?”
The teacher replies “Do not desire to stop desiring anymore than you can.”
The student says, “I still find myself desiring excessively to stop desiring and it doesn’t work.”
The teacher replies “Do not desire too much not to desire to stop desiring.”

Do you see what’s happening? Step by step the student is being brought together with himself to the point that he catches up with his own inner being and can accept it completely. And that is the most difficult thing to do… to accept ones self completely. Because the moment you can do that you have in effect done psychologically the equivalent of saying in philosophical terms you are the buddha. Because we are always trying to get away from ourselves in one way or another. And it’s only stop doing that through a series of experiments as we try resolutely to get away from ourselves as we are. That’s the middle way.[/i]

Of course, he is merely describing the Middle Way and not necessarily his beliefs, but I suspect they are. You must accept yourself completely, whatever you are and you do that by letting go of trying to change, get better, improve.

Maybe you’re right. Well let’s go on with refuting his ideas so I will stop pedestalizing him :wink:

382

double post

383

I get cranky below - meaning emotions, so we can conclude primitive, forcing you to believe and jumping up and down foolishly - but I want to be clear I’ve enjoyed and found the discussion useful, but I don’t want to continue, at least for a while. I’m sure we’ll meet elsewhere in here. KT

Not when it is an absolutely interconnected part of the most complicated thing in the universe found so far, the social Mammalian brain.

We are animals. And you are still finding ways to negatively judge emotions and justify cutting them out.

You also use logical or ‘logical’ arguments to rally the mob. You want to get a mob going, make a mostly emotional speech. YOu want to kill millions, you need long texts with justifications. The worst murderers in history have used cold reason - which does not mean it was logical, but the neocortex has to be involved. This however does not make me think the neocortex is bad.

More relatable, more human, more self-loving, less self-hating. But less convincing to people who think emotions are the problem. It was a good strategy on his part to use people’s fears of emotions.

Sure.

It sounds like your friend didn’t like him and then worked on justifying it. What turned him or her off could of course been wrong. But not liking monotone seems a fine reason to question the integration and intentions of someone.

There are practitioners even in the Abrahamic religions who believe that. Pagans, Wiccans. Some Western Buddhist groups are open to some eccentricities.

It’s the social mammals that are the most emotional, so that last idea is off. Let alone love, empathy, anger to protect, concern, etc. Emotions certainly are part of communication, but we will feel them when we are alone, even whne specifically not wanting contact with others.

No. It can be seeking control, though generally not from the beginning, but not usually it is reacting. You are confusing the adaptive reasons the crying trait took hold in animals with the intentions of the baby itself. It’s a category error. Just because genetically the adaption leads to parents getting cues when to help the baby, this does not mean the baby is consciously or unconsciously intending to control anything or anyone.

Again, what could be the case, is always the case for you. Perhaps this is what you experienced in your childhood, emotions used to manipulate and here to compensate. I have certainly experienced those things - though the neocortex is generally guiding the manipulative use - but I also experience other expressions of emotions without those facets and that includes public speaking.

Again, binary thinking and not even true. I have seen people do many other things, including focusing rationally and calmly on much earlier parts of the argument which have already been countered. IOW they do not acknowledge refutations and go in circles. They are many other methods. You see the presence of emotions in some people at the end of some arguments when they are losing as showing that when emotions are present people are being irrational. Universalizing from individual cases.

Again binary. Emotions present in a talk, the person is pandering, in this quote, manipulating in others, etc.

No, I didn’t. I was made, I made noise in my car.

Well, no, I didn’t. I certainly have wanted others to hear it. But not as a rule. again binary. Here, emotions must be about convincing, rational verbal thought need not be.

‘Resorted’. You live in a very Machievellian universe where all actions are planned for effects, all interpersonal, and all about control. I see that facet of the world, but it is not the only one.

  1. I am not arguing that emotions can not be part of convincing, I am saying that this need not be the only way they arise 2) I would say that the emotions burst out in reaction to my behavior and that caught my attention and my motivation because, because of my own emotions, to see what was happening.

And notice that rational arguments ALWAYS are trying to convince. Which is what you think Alan Watts was not doing for some reason, which is what you think is bad in communication, for some reason, yet for some reason think only happens when one is emotional when communicating with someone.

Honestly I think that’s on the cooky side. Rational argument and rhetoric is ALWAYS ABOUT CONVINCING. Not that that is bad. SEriously, Serendipity, I am losing patience here.

Convincing is not good.
Emotions present in communication mean that convincing is the goal.
Alan Watts was not trying to convince.
Alan Watts used reason and rhetorical devices to present what he considered to be true to people in dozens of books.
He was not trying to convince since he took emotions out of his voice - like that makes them go away.
Emotions as opposed to objective reasoning are subjective and not convincing.
Wise older people speak in monotones because this is impressive (but oddly this choice is not because they are trying to convincing)
When people argue without emotion they are not trying to convince.
Alan Watts didn’t want to be a guru though he chose to communicate in a way that you say is the way older smart people choose because it is impressive.

It’s a mess, Serendipity.

Though not, for some reason in Watt’s case. And here, finally, you admit this.

Well, calm talk then warrants a red flag. Everyone giving a public speech in a monotone is trying to convince people of things, unless they are just telling a story. Here’s what I think is true, neccessary, important and here is why. Convincing through reason, examples and rhetorical devices. So their speeches should definitely get a red flag, but the emotional ones, for you, even if there is the same reasoning present, get a red flag while the monotones do not. That is strange.

Depends on how well I know and trust them. Is it better to keep my tone neutral and pretend I am not also emotionally reacting to better convince them? Does this mean that Italians and Puerto Ricans are trying to convince more and are less rational because they come from cultures where emotions are expressed more openly? Is it better that we all go around and pretend we social mammal humans are not having the emotional reactions we are having? Are the people who care the least really the ones who should be making decisions? Is it possible to be both emotional and good and reasonable? Is the limbic system bad? You know that Damasio demonstrated that when there is damage to the emotional centers of the brain people cannot reason, especially when it comes to things human, like the subjects of Watts books for example.

Sigh. If you set out food for an animal to eat, spend months writing notes to the animal about why that food is good to eat, edit your notes to the animal, give talks telling the animal why it is good food to eat, using all the skills gained from your long education in a number of fields and subtle rhetorical devices and reasoning, you are trying to convince the animal to eat, you are hoping the animal will eat. I notice you suddenly introduce the word ‘forcing’. You are trying to convince the animal to eat this food, hence you to put in this particular bowl, one that is appealing, convincing, in a place where the animal will smell the food, cut in pieces to make it easy to eat and so on. No speech forces anyone to eat. And remember you have said that wise men impress by removing emotions from their speeches. They have learned, it is implied, that this is effective, an effective way to get the animal to eat.
Come on Serendipity.

[/quote]
You have gone to extraordinary lengths to defend the idea that is was very important whether he was trying to convince or not. It is the foundation for our entire discussion of emotions, which were bad, in speeches and perhaps in general, because they are trying to convince. Now suddenly, it is inconsequential.

I’ve had enough. This discussion feels precisely like a discussion with a fundamentalist about, say, Jesus. You have no problem suddenly dismissing something you have considered very important as unimportant. I am pointing this out and hopefully you can go back through our exchange and notice that I am correct. You have put a lot of energy into defending his not trying to convince, to damn emotions for meaning that one is trying to convince. And obviously it was important to Alan Watts that people view him as not trying to convince. Even the feeding the animal example above is part of this. The whole disagreement centers on this. Now it does not matter. I think the contradictions I listed earlier, the set of beliefs/assertions you’ve made about calm reason vs talks with emotions present simply does not hold. There are so many contradictions in this and I think this may be part of why suddenly ‘trying to convince’ does not matter. Obviously people like Noam Chomsky are trying to convince, even though they speak in monotones and use unemotional language. I am going to give this exchange a rest for two reasons 1) It feels like you will say anything to keep Alan Watts on the pedestal. 2) As a social mammal, I am now tired of seeing emotions and the expression of emotions judged so universally negatively. I did read that you are an emotional person in your private life and hopefully the fact that you are will perhaps affect the universal and what I would call Machiavellian way you view emotions.
I think it might be useful for you to go back through what we have written, using this last about face - about trying to convince suddenly not being important - as a sign that you are defending for reasons you are not conscious of. I hesitated to say that about you coming off like a fundamentalist, even though it does feel that way, since you have said you experienced fundamentalists and the impression is that it was not pleasant. But since it is my experience - X must be true, so I will say anything, even if it denies obvious real phenomena or contradicts other things I have said to defend that X is true - I decided to keep it in. Rhetoric on the table. None of this means you have to give up whatever it is in Watts writing that you value. Or maybe it does. It certainly seems possible that this is the fear.

I can imagine that a first way of eliminating contradictions will be to say that emotions manipulate in a primitive way, whereas reasoning convinces in an objective way. But 1) this does not fit with your saying that you like that people do not remove their emotions, because that helps you track them 2) number 1 raises an issue with Alan Watts since we cannot tell what his motivations are (and we should be wary of someone who says he has none) 3) it assumes that emotions and reasoning cannot go together 4) being reasonable and calm in style tells us nothing about what is actually going on in the person or the truth of what they are saying. People can and do justify their emotional choices after the fact. AND the people who cut off their emotions necessarily have cut off knowledge of them to that degree. IOW if you suppress and judge your own emotions, you will get less knowledge about them (and so will others) and not be able to know how they are affecting your reasoning, positively, neutrally, negatively, and also how our reasoning is affecting your emotions and intuition, necessary parts of reason. But the important part of all that is your own contradiction. 1 Alan Watts good, he presents without emotions. 2 Best if people do not remove emotions because this allows you to track what they are up to better. Those two ideas of yours do not fit together. And there are a bunch of others that also do not. Last all that binary thinking. If it can, then it always does or usually does. That is really problematic in relation to the complicated creatures we are. You did actually ask why I thought you judged emotions negatively. Give our exchange a read and perhaps you will realize why that seemed like a bizarre question coming from you.
[/quote]

384

Emotions, however, are no less existential contraptions.

We all come into the world with the biological/genetic capacity to feel particular emotions in particular contexts.

But in reacting to things like God and religion, different people will express very different emotions.

So, it still comes down to the extent to which philosophers are able to ascertain which emotional reactions rational men and women are obligated to feel in any particular contexts.

With emotions though it all gets trickier. “Feelings” would seem to be embedded in that part of the brain that comes closer to instinct, to id, to the “naked ape” aspects of the behaviors that we choose.

How then do we make that crucial distinction here between nature and nurture, genes and memes?

How much do we really know here regarding the extent to which they are really under our control?

Providing even that homo sapiens have some measure of autonomous control here regarding anything that we say, feel or do.

Ayn Rand once famously insisted there were no emotions that she could not pin to the mat “intellectually”, “philosophically”. And yet there are any number of books written about her which seemed to suggest quite the opposite.

She could be as flagrant and fickle and flaky as the rest of us in any particular context.

So, is there an “ontology” of emotions? Is there a way to grasp a “right feeling” and a “wrong feeling” regarding any particular behaviors that we react to?

Or are emotions just one more manifestation of daseins interacting in an essentially absurd and meaningless world that ends for each of us one by one in oblivion?

385

Well, you quoted me, but then wrote about things having nothing to do with what I wrote. Your mind got triggered by the word emotions and this, unsuprisingly, reminded you of you position, allowing you to express that position again, as if participating in the dicussion. Your thoughts reminded me of something I have said many times.

As opposed to other kinds of contraptions, LOL.

My emphasis. This ambiguous it. Here we have someone who focuses on dasein, but tells us what ‘it’ comes down to. Our implicit objectivist telling us what the real issue is, fuck whatever we were on about.

A determinist for some reason thinking that the emotions, which he disidentifies with, here in any case, would in this sense be less under control than any other facet of minds and brains. I don’t really find many determinists who seem to understand determinism. When I point out things like this they tend to assume I believe in free will and shift their focus on the absurdities of believing in that. As if they avoid being absurd themselves, if other people are absurd.

Why provide for that as a determinist?

Yes, let’s cite someone and then undermine the person cited.

Kierkegaard said X, but he said it when he was drunk and lying in a ditch.

Well, thanks for the pointless digression. Or is it just that you enjoy feeling superior to someone else’s hubris?

[/quote]
Why don’t you tell us? Oh, but you just did with rhetorical questions. OK, we get your position, which we already did. You can go back to your own threads where your solipsism belongs. I don’t think anyone here was suggesting right and wrong feelings. I certainly wasn’t. But I do resist your sense that depression is the right feeling to have.

386

Take your time; there is no hurry. Don’t worry about how you act; even if I did get offended, I forgive easily. Grandma used to say that everything comes out in the wash.

A super computer could churn out the answer to 2+2, but it wouldn’t mean it’s any less trivial. Emotions are common to some of the lowest forms of life, but cognition is specific to higher forms.

I like to solve puzzles and you keep presenting me with new ones lol. All I wanted to accomplish is establishing that Alan was monotone because he’s not trying to sell, but it’s branched out into this because you keep coming up with counterpoints to justify emotions when I never meant to attack them in general, only this specific instance. I’m just going where you lead.

The mob is too stupid to understand logic and calm speaking isn’t going to hype-up anyone.

This is how you get a crowd going:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJ3N_2r6R-o[/youtube]

More relatable. There you go. We use emotions to be more relatable in order to sell the product.

Yeah that could be, but I’ve found no one who likes him. Even people who say they like him, don’t really like him. I know he has fans, but don’t know where they are hiding. I tend to play devil’s advocate so if I hang around folks who like him, then I may discover a way not to like him :wink: But as long as people don’t like him, I’m going to think I’m onto something.

I don’t know anything about pagans and wiccans. I listened to a guy on youtube for a while who was head of the satanist church, but that got old quick. According to him, we are the result of aliens and genetic engineering for the purpose of mining gold and now we’ve been abandoned.

What I mean is that there is no such thing as an unselfish act. And that’s another Watts point: we can only love ourselves so the commandment to love god and our neighbor is not possible.

Just reacting? Like chemical reactions? Well, so, where does life begin? I’m confused because if we regard the baby as just reacting, then how am I not just reacting now? We could say all emotions and cognition is just chemical bubblings.

Can a baby do things that are neither conscious nor unconscious? It seems it would have to be one or the other because the sound is coming from the baby and it’s clear the baby is doing it.

Yeah, mom did run the guilt trips, but I never even noticed Alan’s monotone until my friend complained about it. Then I sat by a fire and listened and thought “So why would I seek to animate my voice?”

Yeah, generalizing, but I was speaking in general while being aware there are exceptions. For a while my siggy read “When people are out of ammo, they throw mud.” It’s a paraphrase of Socrates’ “Slander is the tool of the loser.”

This video says we default to the fight or flight mechanism when our beliefs are challenged:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qe5pv4khM-Y[/youtube]

A lot of the binary you’re noticing is just my countering your points as a possible objection. It doesn’t mean that I’m going to default to dismissing anyone who employs emotions. I’m just saying they’re a red flag warranting further scrutiny.

Poppycock! :smiley: You wanted them to hear you, just like people who yell at football games on tv want desperately to communicate to the ref just what a dumbshit he is. Just because they can’t hear you doesn’t mean you don’t want them to. A lot of people use the horn and middle finger along with the yelling lol

Sure, I’m seeking to substantiate my side and you’re seeking to support your side. Each of us are practicing confirmation bias. In reality I’m probably less binary since it’s only because you’re taking the other side that I’m on this side; otherwise I’d be more spread out, I’m sure.

Well, if memory serves, you said your family had gotten emotional with you at some point and you appreciated it. So I’m thinking “Hmm… how can I relate to this?” All I can figure is someone from your family tried other approaches that didn’t work as well as finally getting frustrated and becoming emotional which led to your seeing the light and feeling appreciative. So “resorted” seemed an appropriate choice of words. It doesn’t necessarily illustrate my worldview, but merely my interpretation of the example you gave.

Maybe we’re confusing the feeling of emotions with the display of emotions. I was only focusing on the displaying of emotions, but the feeling of emotions is motivational, I agree.

Yes the argument is trying to convince, but not the proponent of the argument. The adding of emotional content does not derive from the argument, but the person’s desire to push the point. So then I have to ask myself why this person feels a desire to make truth more believable. Why not just present the facts without all the added colorization? I remember the Star Trek movie where Spock described cuss words as “colorful metaphors” lol! Do you remember that? He was right, you know. The colorizing of speech with obscenities may not be unwarranted, but when reporting the news, why customize it? Just give me the facts.

Why are you trying to convince me? If we resolve it, then what are we going to argue about? If we agree perfectly, then what do we talk about? I’m having fun with this and there’s no need to speed it along to get to the end.

I think you were doing well up to this point. Why would he have emotions if he is not desiring to convince? Why would he display emotions he didn’t feel? He didn’t take emotions out of his voice because he didn’t have to; they were never there.

There is no objective reasoning.

It is impressive to a small, tiny, teenie weenie group of smart people. That’s not exactly pandering to the crowd.

It’s fixed now :wink:

I’m not sure I ever denied it. If a person speaks, obviously he is talking to someone. If he is talking to someone, obviously he wants to be believed. I can’t think of a reason to talk with the hope that the other person thinks I’m spewing shit. So anything I say is trying to convince someone of something or I wouldn’t say it. But I’m using “convince” in a different way than “coercion”.

1. to move by argument or evidence to belief, agreement, consent, or a course of action.

It doesn’t say “appeal by emotional coloration”.

I think in some situations you are right. The calm talk can be a flag.

I think it depends on the situation and I have to go with my gut. If the monotone seems suspicious, strange, out of place, then I’d investigate as to why.

That’s interesting. I’ve never considered the racial angle. So blacks, whites, asians, jews in order of increasing intelligence; does that correlate to animation? Maybe so.

No. I’ve often said never get married to your argument because it makes the divorce easier :wink: It’s better not to feel the extra emotions in the first place when arguing a point, but emotions are ok other times. Isn’t it better NOT to be frustrated in a debate? So how do we accomplish that? By striving for objectivity and not being married to an idea. That’s the only way, as far as I know.

Yes, I could probably argue that side of it. If there are choices A and B and Joe feels adamant about A but Sally doesn’t have an invested interest in the decision in order to feel anything, who is more likely to pick the correct choice B?

I don’t know; what’s good and bad?

I could see that since the limbic is tied into everything.

:laughing: I got a good laugh out of that.

I see him doing the research for his own knowledge, then it sprouted into book writing, probably to make a few bucks, then seminars and lectures and by the time he was rich, he didn’t give much of a shit. I wouldn’t. I’d just sit and talk on my houseboat and who cares what people think. Nobody ever heckled him, that I know of.

I should have said “coercing”.

Speech does force one to eat because it appeals to subconscious emotional cues which circumvent cognition.

Yeah that does seem odd. :-k What was the rest of the sentence? Voice animation or lack-of is inconsequential to the truth he speaks, but not inconsequential to whether he warrants a red flag.

Doesn’t that say more about you than me? I enjoy these conversations.

Nope, I corrected the misinterpretation. You jumped the gun due to emotions. You see? You got emotionally involved, got frustrated like with Jesus-people, and are displaying your frustration.

I’m not trying to damn emotions as I think they have good uses.

Well I feel like you’ve done a lot of misinterpretation of me and him, so why would I take him off the pedestal on that basis? I haven’t seem a good objection yet, but mostly I’ve been correcting your accusation of my being binary, my generalizing, my past emotional influences, your assessment on what Alan believes, and that’s not an exhaustive list. The only reason I’m bring that up is that I’m defending myself and otherwise I feel like I’ve been accommodating, but I can’t say “you’re right” unless I think you are. Surely you understand that. I don’t buy the argument that I’m being dogmatic.

That’s a misperception based on the context of the debate. It appears universally negative because I’ve been put into a position where it appears that way due to the particular points you raise. It’s ironic that on another forum, I’m the one arguing the benefits of emotional content.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LH1GFaw09hk[/youtube]

It takes a rascal to catch a rascal :wink: I know what people are up to because I do it myself.

Mom is a fundamentalist. How much more experience could I get?

That’s a good point nonetheless, but what I said or meant to say was that we shouldn’t make it a rule that people should not display emotions because then I won’t be able to tell if they would otherwise be displaying emotions. So no contradiction.

No I don’t assume that, but think emotions tend to circumvent reason. I don’t believe everyone who is emotional is unable to reason, though maybe not as well as when they are calmer.

Yes it does. It demonstrates there is nothing going on inside because there shouldn’t be in debate or lecture. You’re conflating lack of emotion with suppression of emotion.

There is no cut off. There was nothing to cut off. I would add some commentary, but I’m worn out after this post lol

I hope you don’t abandon it because we haven’t gotten to inspecting what Alan actually believes yet since we’re still trying to figure out if he’s believable. :laughing:

387

There is no convincing proofs about the existence of God in the same way that there is no convincing proof about the existence of other people’s consciousness, or about the existence of mind-independent objects in the external world.