Tippaporn

Freedom of choice is there but limited by our capacity to think, our life experience, and what it takes to get through the day. What we can actually do and what we are likely to do. I could do anything right now. No god to stop me. But I don't do stuff - why. Freedom of choice by Devo has the lines: Freedom of choice is what we got Freedom from choice is what we want I think the feeling of too much freedom can be difficult and upsetting. 20 choices of Muesli and soap powder at the supermarket. Starting a day of work right now rather than sitting on a beach in Thailand. For peace of mind many, if not all of us, limit our freedom so we don't think too much - we put blinkers on ourself, like for a horse, so we can stay somewhat focused. It's the same with politics - I see it in your Trump posts and you see it in the democrat posts. A self imposed internal bias and limitation. There is what we are too that explains that bias. Freedom to take action is limited by our bodies and circumstance e.g. physical attributes, ability, appearance, financial situation. Some can be altered some cannot. In the longer term our freedom and ability to think becomes limited. Our place in society, perception of our self that develops over time, having been hurt in relationships etc - they have an effect on us, make our shoulders slump or sit back confidently, our heart be a bit tired or full of spark, how 'open' our face is, and over time in reality this limits our likely decisions and options. Limits our ability to communicate and limits our actual thoughts and feelings. Hard to overcome this. So freedom becomes limited to avoid pain and maximise pleasure available to us. Different for different people. So we have absolute freedom in terms of thoughts but not actions. But even our thoughts and feelings become limited as we close off some parts and open up others so the sense of freedom becomes distorted. I'm going to set aside the entirety of your post, for now, and focus on the most important statement within it. Not only is it the most important statement but it's a kernel of absolute truth. You are to be commended for arriving at that most accurate of conclusions. ". . . we have absolute freedom in terms of thoughts . . ." No truer words have ever been spoken. Now here's the money question: What do thoughts do? In order to avoid having the question sound too ambiguous I'll ask it in a more pointed way. Do thoughts create real effects?

"Ask yourself how much you think you know to be true but it "just ain't so." How convinced are you that everything you think you know is indeed true? " As I've tried to explain, I believe in the 'Methodology of Science' which begins with a Hypothesis and can gradually develop into a Theory, if and when calculations and sound experiments, which must also allow a falsification process, eventually support the Hypothesis. Both Hypotheses and Theories can be shown to be wrong as new evidence and data become available, so it's quite possible I might be wrong about many issues. However, I tend not to change my mind until I become aware of new evidence that meets my own standards, based on my own interpretation of the 'Methodology of Science'. Regarding 'how much I know', I accept that I know very, very, very little, compared to the whole of human knowledge, and the whole of human knowledge is very, very little compared to what remains to be known. Okay? ???? Let's step away from your methodology of science, scientific theories and hypotheses for a moment. If the only things you would allow yourself to believe are true are those things that have been proven by science to be true then you would, I imagine, have an extremely difficult time discussing much of anything with anybody. Most of your discussion would be an endless refrain of "I don't know." In other words, would it be fair to say that, in practicality, there is much that you have an opinion or belief about as to it's truth despite the fact that science has yet to prove it? My point is that everyone harbours as-yet-unproven-by-science beliefs about most everything; with many of those beliefs personally accepted as being true. Now I never asked the question, "How much do you know." I asked specifically, "Ask yourself how much you think you know to be true but it "just ain't so." How convinced are you that everything you think you know is indeed true?" Would you agree that there are things you say you believe you know for sure? You can take it on faith that these questions are leading to other points. One step at a time.

Okay, I'll stop beating the dead horse over definitions and try a different tact. From my understanding, based on what you wrote and your offered definitions, you are saying that you believe there is a cause for all things. Can we take that further to say you also believe there is a reason for or purpose behind any cause? Say you were in a hypothetical automobile accident. You slid into the vehicle in front of you due to an icy patch in the road. The technical cause would obviously be the ice, thereby neutering your braking system. Would you be able to identify and assign a reason or purpose for the accident?

I'll trade ya. Your youth for my wisdom.

bannork, mate, I'd lend you my glasses but I can't seem to find them. I'm the guy way in the back excitedly waving his arms. Not everyone on this thread is an Isaan farmer blaring psychedelic music 24/7 to his chickens to produce psychotropical altered eggs such as these. And then passing them out to the party goers at your annual sock hop in your barn out in far, far, over-the-edge left field. BTW, how's your doing head today? Time for more hair of the dog? Can with Mother Sky off of their '70 Soundtracks LP. Don't be put off, folks. There's some awesome guitar work in this number. For the impatient skip to 6:30 or so.

I must be a lot older than you, DBath. Traffic with Dear Mr. Fantasy off of their '69 Mr. Fantasy debut album.

Well, I just watched one of the best movies I've seen in a long time. The Spy Who Came In From The Cold (1965). A superb movie in all ways based on the book of same name by one of the best spy novelists ever, John le Carré. A true spy thriller. Richard Burton was nominated for the Academy award for Best Actor but Lee Marvin beat him out for his performance in Cat Ballou. Having seen both movies my pick would have been Burton. A shame for a great actor; Burton had in his career one nomination for Best Supporting Actor and six for Best Actor but never walked away with an Oscar.

I'm eager to reply but, unfortunately, as chance would have it I'm a bit under the weather. As Arnold is famous for saying. "I'll be back."

It was a simple multiple choice question. It can't be that difficult to pick the one you believe in.

Blanket generalisations never work well. Neither does speaking for others.

I'll buy your edited version of Twain's quote as being more technically correct. I think Twain wrote it as such to put the emphasis on the second part of his observation. I think we're all capable of thinking of examples for either part of the statement. That's easy enough. But what about answering the point I was making with that Twain quote?

I'd like to see you honestly address my contention that you do believe in "chance" and "accidents." First you tried to pull the "let's redefine the terms." That didn't fly. Your next attempt was to pass it off as a common and innocent misuse of terminology. That didn't pass muster either. So you now just ignore it entirely in the hope that I won't pursue it any longer and let it fade away. No such chance (excuse the pun).

It's good to see that you understand that chance, accident, and luck are human conceptual constructs. Now, allow me to throw you a curve ball, Fat is a type of crazy, with a simple question. Or a boomerang in your case. Do you believe in freedom? More to the point, absolute freedom? I doubt anyone would be in disagreement with the idea that freedom exists. The only debatable question is the extent of freedom we possess. None, some, or full - full meaning 100%. Three choices. The correct answer to that question would answer the question of the existence of chance. Whether chance exists outright as a determative force in life or whether chance merely has the appearance of reality. So, what is your belief as to the extent of our (and every other living thing's) freedom?

I'd like to comment that much of what is considered "chance" or "accident" is not at all too complicated for humans to understand. It is more a matter that the underlying assumptions being used are erroneous. An explanation of why, for example, one got into a car "accident" can be unraveled more easily than is supposed. Or why one person's house was robbed rather than their neighbor's. Or why one person gets sick and another does not. The "causes" are not so complex to understand. Any chance of understanding, though, requires not just new knowledge but even more so the relinquishing of knowledge thought to be true. Learning is easy. Unlearning . . . not so much. I can't quote Mark Twain enough. “What gets us into trouble is not what we don't know. It's what we know for sure that just ain't so.” Think about the implications of that statement. The vast extent of the implications. Ask yourself how much you think you know to be true but it "just ain't so." How convinced are you that everything you think you know is indeed true? Do you believe that it's only a matter of acquiring more knowledge? Do you believe that Twain's astute observation does not apply to you? Do you truly believe there is no chance that you subscribe to faulty ideas? Do you sincerely believe that science has cornered the market on "truth?" That sans science it's an impossibility that truth can ascertained? I'm not trying to beat you down, VincentRJ. I simply want you to think. And rethink if necessary. The greatest human fault, in my humble opinion, is to never examine the beliefs one holds once a belief is accepted as true.

I'm busting up my response due to the images I provided. There's more I'd like to add pertaining to the rest of your post. I've covered your explanation regarding "chance" and "accident" being terms that are simply and innocently used improperly. So let's move on. I care not for the degrees of certainty with which science declares a theory or hypothesis to be "fact." I care only whether or not it makes sense; whether or not there exist flawed logic in any given determination; whether or not there exist gaps that must be filled in with guesswork or otherwise to give a theory or hypothesis continuity in logic that otherwise doesn't hold without the application of band aides or duct tape to tie a theory or hypothesis together. As far as the search for the answer to the origins of life my contention, which I cannot overemphasise, is this: that in their search science is necessarily relying on many assumptions to be true; and which I deem to be false. Perhaps foremost is the assumption that physical reality is the one and only reality in all of existence. And the assumption that if any other realities do indeed exist (the theory of parallel universes, for instance) that they, too, are all physically based. Those are huge assumptions which would, if proven false, utterly destroy current scientific thinking as to the origins of life (among much else, obviously). I am in the camp that recognises that there exist other realities and not all realities are physically based. So you can see that given the disparity in thought between you and I that we can never hope to agree. Your cherished scientific method is wholly dependent on a reality which is physical in nature. If it is true that other realities exist and that not all are physical then in those realms which are not physically based the scientific method would be quite meaningless. This should be quite logical. In my most honest and sincere opinion I believe that science, in their effort to understand the origins of life in particular, will forever chase their tails as long as they rely on their current assumptions as being true.

When science uses "chance" or "accident" in their explanations - theories or hypotheses - they either 1) believe in the existence of these concepts and thus use the correct terminology or 2) they are entirely sloppy in their choice of verbiage thereby creating unnecessary confusion. You are arguing 2). I'm arguing that they indeed intend 1); they do believe in the existence of "chance" and "accident." Again, I reject your argument that you were using the wrong terminology. I believe you are trying to walk back what you truly believe, which would be that "chance" and "accident" are actual mechanisms that are determinative forces in life. That you truly believe in some invisible God of Chance. I rely on the evidence of your response to Nemises in which you clearly jokingly and sarcastically stated, with emoticon for emphasis, "Don't you know that nothing occurs by chance or accident?" ???? "We all know that life is like a roll of the dice." Shear nonsense, which I reject wholeheartedly . . . and with plenty of solid reasoning and logic to back up my stance. Again, faith in a creator is to be laughed at and ridiculed but the creator being "chance" is to be "scientifically" accepted. Also on pure faith. Now this is to @Fat is a type of crazy: do you now see the plain, in-your-face hypocrisy? New Scientist New Scientist, the world's leading science & technology weekly magazine, was launched in 1956 "for all those men and women who are interested in scientific discovery, and in its industrial, commercial and social consequences". The title of the book is "Chance" but the image is too large to post. Here's the back cover.

The tool to answer every question is yourself. I hope you don't assume I'm religious. Not at all.

Great advice. Most difficult to expect to be taken to heart when the overbearing mantra is "proof, proof, proof" and nothing else can be accepted as existing without it.

Are we redefining words now? Chance: noun a : something that happens unpredictably without discernible human intention or observable cause b : the assumed impersonal purposeless determiner of unaccountable happenings c : the fortuitous or incalculable element in existence Don't you know that nothing occurs by chance or accident? ???? I don't buy that what you meant in the above is what you are now attempting to redefine. Especially within the context of what you were replying to. I would say that b: fits what you were suggesting. I would argue also that that is how most people would define "chance." The operative word in that definition is "purposeless." In other words, for no reason. The crux of my point is that science, in general, does not believe that there is a reason or purpose to existence. It all came about by chance. No reason for any of it appearing. The Big Bang and all that followed, and follows to this day, is due to an impersonal purposeless determiner of unaccountable happenings. Sure, science can uncover the processes. And it does an excellent job doing that. Kudos and many thanks for science's great contributions. But science cannot uncover the reasons for the processes existence in the first place. Those reasons apparently don't exist. Or science refuses to deal with them. And again, the methodologies of science have naught to do with uncovering the mystery of life.

Hubris.

Eventually the science types reach a dead end and run out of plausible arguments to counter with. So far no bite in an attempt to prove the existence of chance and accidents. Or the existence of a God of Chance. They just move on and continue to believe in a whole lot of unproven assumptions which they base their lives on.

For our or any other reality to function in a practical sense requires a flow of information which technology can never hope to replicate. In dreams we have access to much more information. The rules governing dream reality are not the same as those governing waking reality. The information we receive in dreams needs to be distilled and packaged in a way that allows us an understanding. There's translation occurring. It's not so much a lack of control of our own abilities. Rather it's because we've been taught that dreams are meaningless. Therefore no one attempts any serious study of them.

LOL. Are you trolling him, mauGR1? Of course the Big Bang was an accident. From nothing everything appeared. And if we grant that theory as correct then God only knows what triggered it. I know that the triggering mechanism is rarely discussed. Best just gloss over that. In fact the Big Bang was the Greatest of Great Accidents. It was the Father of all accidents. Maybe the mother, too. Of course with the emergence of LGBQT+ it might be politically proper to use any number of other sexual orientations. It was the Zim or Zee of all accidents.

No hypocrisy in science? Perhaps you haven't read my subsequent post. Facts themselves are a weak brew of reality. The truthiness of any fact is relative to the reality from which the fact resides. That statement may make no sense to you, Fat is a type of crazy, but that is only due to a lack of knowledge. The lack of knowledge is regarding who and what we are and what the true nature of this or any other reality is. I'll throw in that this reality isn't the only one. If there's any one assumption that's taken for granted that is erroneous, but incorporated into so many theories about existence, it is that physical reality is the only reality. Perhaps one day our species will move away from the "one world, one God" paradigm.

Sorry, VincenRJ, but I've gotta harp on this ridiculous notion of chance and accident you put forth as "fact." You laugh at faith and then quickly turn around and castigate people for refusing to believe in chance and accident. Yet you can't prove that what these terms represent is indeed a functioning mechanism of the workings of reality. You yourself operate wholly on faith that chance, accidents, or other such synonyms used to describe unexplained events are real. If what you say is true, that these terms are definitively operative in the workings of reality, then do explain what laws govern them. Or what triggers them? Or how they work in the grand scheme of things? Do get as detailed in your explanation as you can. I'm pulling your leg here, VincentRJ, because the questions I posed to you are purely rhetorical. We all know, as do you, that you are incapable of coming up with any explanation of their functionality. And that is because they do not exist. As much as you believe that sh!t just happens it doesn't. I'll challenge you to prove me wrong on any of the above.