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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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You keep going around in this little circle. Skepticism is not bias. It is uncertainty. It is the unwillingness to believe without evidence. You keep insisting it is biased or closed minded, yet neither of those is implied by the word.
Bias means: prejudice in favor of or against one thing, person, or group compared with another, usually in a way considered to be unfair.
This has nothing to do with skepticism. If anything, skepticism is a refusal to have any bias at all.
Skepticism is not a neutral position, because people are hardly ever neutral. If you were truly a skeptical, you would doubt existence all the way down to solipsism.
Try this out, because I think you have a romanticized view of skepticism. Watch how people use the word, when they use it, and what they do after they use it.
It is doubting something, not remaining neutral about it.
Russian-Tank, your mother has made a claim. Is she willing to back those claims up with more than just her verbal statements? There is a simple method. Ask her to put to paper EVERY instance (including time she made the note) she had a premonition. Then just examine these notes on a frequent basis.
There is a vast difference between hearing about another's demise then stating "oh, I had a feeling last night", and actually having documented proof that she had that feeling the night before.
Here's a female perspective: I worry about a million things a day. I think too much all of the time, and come up with all possible scenarios, mostly the doomy and gloomy kind. So on any given day, I predict my own death at least 5 times, as well as see/think about/predict the possible deaths of other people. I'm guessing most women, moms especially, worry a lot.
So my view is: perhaps your mom just thinks a lot. And occasionally, she thinks about someone who dies. It happens. But even a broken clock is right twice a day.
I've predicted the deaths of several celebrities. Not specific people, but I just think: "Oh, someone has probably died", then I browse the news to see if I got bingo, and sometimes that just happens to be the case. A lot of the time, no one has died. Apart from the bombing victims and such.
Hey, perhaps your mom could start predicting terrorist attacks. That'd be neat.
Also, there are no souls. Or if there are, I submit that there are shitloads of soulless people, and zero soulless dogs.
But in any case, predictions of deaths do not souls into existence make.
:)
@Panaka
You said that you live in Scandinavia, I can't remember which country. I know that that area of the world has the highest depression rate among industrialized nations. Most likely due to the location and the effect of constant darkness and constant sunlight depending on the time of year. Do you think that you might have what is known as the Scandinavian effect, a low-grade depression?
@mykcob4 I live in Finland, and yes, a lot of us have what's called S.A.D., aka seasonal affective disorder. And I do think I have some form or grade of depression, but it has nothing to do with sunlight or the lack thereof. (I actually really enjoy the dark months and hate summer.) It's just how I roll. I always see the dark side of things first, worry about everything in advance, and curl up on my bed occasionally due to hating the world and myself in it. But I'm a highly functional depressionist, and most of the time I smile and laugh more than an average Scandinavian.
I also happen to think that my depression (which is a word I dislike and never use) is the cause of seeing the world how it really is, facing the ugly truths head-on, and unfortunately, letting it all get to me a tad more than I should.
Oh, and we also have one of the highest suicide rates, I think. It might be due to our alcoholism or the lack of light.. Or perhaps we drink too much coffee (also a true/fun statistic).
@ Pakana
I have PTSD and am an alcoholic. I don't drink or take any medication. I understand low-grade depression and how to cope with it. Like you said I smile and laugh as much as the next person. It is the quiet moments when I am affected.
I love to hear and read about how people function with it. I learn something new every day. Most of the time I am too busy to indulge my depression.
Funny thing about depression, it generates creativity. Don't know why that is, it just is. Van Geoff for example.
I bet you have a creative streak in you.
@mykcob4 Apart from the PTSD and alcoholism, I can relate to everything you mentioned. Quiet moments are the worst, which is why I watch too many movies/tv-shows and read too many books - anything to keep my mind quiet. I'm very much into escapism, which has become somewhat unhealthy for me.
And you nailed it: I'd say I'm very creative. Always doing something with my hands. I can't draw to save my life, but I make all sorts of crafty things. Or I used to. I still do, occasionally, but my depression tells me that what I create isn't perfect enough, and any and all effort put into making less than satisfactory crafts is useless and a waste of time, and we're all going to die some day anyway, so why bother. And so I end up watching movies and reading books to hide from my failures.
I could talk your ear off about how I function with my depression. It's a hoot, I tell ya.
Sorry to hear about your PTSD. Is it a constant struggle/issue that you have to cope with daily?
@Pakana
Sure it is but it isn't that hard to deal with. Blocking things out is the worst thing I can do. That is blocking out realities. You seem to have fantasy depression, which everyone has to a degree. I write. I have a degree in creative literature. I have a certain talent but I hate being judged. So when I create a piece I cringe when someone reads it. The thing is, is that it is exposure. You are exposing an inner part of you and risking ridicule.
You have a fatalistic component to your depression.
Remember that every story you read or watch several people have exposed themselves for your approval. They need your criticism whether it is good or bad. They have exposed themselves to your judgment. Yet they take that risk. Some make a living at it. I would guess that all of those people suffer a level of depression.
You must never forget that you are important. Yes we have but one life to live, but that one life means so much. There is no insignificant person. If you are suddenly gone there will be an untold number of people that will be at a lost for losing you. Take me. I have an immediate connection with you because of the way you phrase things. I identified with the subliminal message that you were not even aware you were conveying. I wrote a short essay entitled 'A Brave New Facing'. I'd post it but I boxed it up because I am moving in a couple of days. It's about walking through the storm of life not knowing if you will live or die but doing so anyway.
Depression is like that. You don't know anything except the finality of things so you recoil from what you perceive as a storm. In my case, I break through the storm every day.
I'm rambling, so I'll stop now. Nice to talk to you!
My depression used to be very real and bad, and only as I got older did it turn into fantasy or escapism. I was just too tired to deal with the mess that was my life and my mind, so I shut it all off. I suppose when you get kicked down too many times, eventually you just stay down.. and avoid it.
I'll be the first to admit that I could use a bit of help, and perhaps I'd live more fully than I do now.
But to your point about me not being insignificant.. I'm afraid I disagree. We're only important to other humans, but on a grander scale, we're utterly insignificant. Or even a detrimental burden on the earth and the rest of its inhabitants. I'm not saying we have to keep the entire planet in our everyday thoughts, or to live like we're useless, but I do think it's healthy to realise how unimportant we are so as to not get crushed when things don't go our way.
I guess what I'm trying to say is: having a healthy perspective on things can help.
And also, in about a hundred years, you and I won't matter. That's also my mantra. Still trying to figure out if it's a useful one.
Thanks for rambling. It was a pleasure to read. And I'd love to read your short essay someday.
Good luck with the move!
No, your mother cannot detect one's death and there is no such thing as a soul.
We've probably all experienced similar events but have not attributed it to anything spiritual, religious, magical or whatever you choose to call it.
you said, "this kind of stuff has happened at least 30 times."
then later part you said "It has happened at least 20 times"
look Russian-Tank, if i tell you that i can see your lying.and you just made these all up, would you believe me with just face value?
John 6IX Breezy "This is why I think skepticism is dumb. People are calling this nonsense, for no other reason than because they think its nonsense. I think its nonsense too, but I'm also not going to dismiss it as if it weren't happening, or it was a scam, I'm going to try to understand it."
--------------------------------
I'd forgotten about this post, what a delight, "scepticism is dumb because people think a claim is nonsense", but you thinking the same clam is nonsense isn't dumb, well what can one say.
Your assertion is made all the more bizarre because you also state the claim is nonsense, yet presumably you have escaped the trap "people" are falling into because you don't use scepticism to arrive at the same conclusions that this claim is nonsense?
Sadly, as a middling intellect, and with a fairly mediocre formal education, I need YOU to explain how you are going to understand something, you have claimed is nonsense? as if defining it as nonsense is not a claim to have understood it as such??
How easy is it to convince people something spooky supernatural is going? Here's how easy!
I downloaded one of those ghost photography apps a few years ago. You know, the sort where you can insert a "ghost" into another photo? I was pretty pleased with my efforts so I posted them on my social media, making it very plain they were fakes. I was still asked if the photos were real. ( facepalm)
But here's the craziest part. I was particularly proud of two photos. In one, I had a ghost child sitting in a chair in the far corner of the living room. In another, I had a ghost standing at the kitchen bench. Both photos were taken from the vantage point of my usual seat on the sofa. And I creeped myself out. Even though I'd faked the photos myself, my kitchen and living room gave me the heebee jeebees for a while. Isnt that ridiculous? That's how easy it is. Cognitive dissonance rules, ok?
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