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Free Talk Live => The Polling Pit => Topic started by: voodoo on September 06, 2010, 07:32:25 PM

Title: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: voodoo on September 06, 2010, 07:32:25 PM
I can't stop watching these SyFy pseudo-science shows like Ghost Hunters and Faked or Fiction.  They are so fake and contrived, it's comical.

But, I'm curious.  Do do you believe in ghosts?
Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: anarchir on September 06, 2010, 07:46:36 PM
No sir I do not.
Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: BonerJoe on September 06, 2010, 08:16:08 PM
Haven't seen any visual proof, or experienced them personally. So no. I am open to the possibility, though.
Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: mikehz on September 07, 2010, 12:18:29 PM
Ghosts don't, and can't, exist. If the supposed immaterial things did exist, and cannot interact with ordinary matter, then I'd supposed they'd sink to the center of the earth. If they could interact with ordinary material, then they would be in some way physical phenomena, and not supernatural at all.
Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: gibson042 on September 07, 2010, 03:28:05 PM
If they could interact with ordinary material, then they would be in some way physical phenomena, and not supernatural at all.

I'm pretty sure that's the question. Do you believe that a materially-anchored consciousness can either become unanchored or create an unanchored consciousness?
Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: Sam Gunn (since nobody got Admiral Naismith) on September 08, 2010, 03:59:39 PM
I can't stop watching these SyFy pseudo-science shows like Ghost Hunters and Faked or Fiction.  They are so fake and contrived, it's comical.

But, I'm curious.  Do do you believe in ghosts?
Those Ghost Hunter shows are so stupid.  I have been hating SyFy channel so much since they started doing shows like that.  Ugh.  Bugs me so much.  I wish they actually did more Science Fiction shows like they used to.
Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: Diogenes The Cynic on September 08, 2010, 04:18:55 PM
No.
Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: Rillion on September 08, 2010, 04:30:35 PM
I'm pretty sure that's the question. Do you believe that a materially-anchored consciousness can either become unanchored or create an unanchored consciousness?

Given what happens to a person's consciousness when their material anchors are affected-- whether by a disease such as Alzheimer's or by brain lesions caused by some kind of damage-- it's surprising to me that people believe that the answer to that question is "yes."  Damaging certain parts of the brain has a direct correlation to altering corresponding parts of that person's mental capacity and personality.  That's a good chunk of how we discover what those parts of the brain do.  If you damage my amygdala, I may lose the capacity to recognize and react to danger.  If you then damaged my Broca's area, I may lose the capacity for speech.  And so on, and so on.  If you damaged all of my brain to the point that it is utterly destroyed (as eventually happens to us all), why would any person believe that there is a me that still exists, let alone as anything remotely close to the me that exists now? 

Now, maybe in the future it will be possible to upload your consciousness to some other material anchor than the brain, but it will still be a material anchor-- some kind of substitute for the grey matter.  And that certainly isn't what we're doing at present, because we don't have the ability.  So currently when we die, we're replacing the material anchor with....nothing.   And how exactly is consciousness supposed to continue beyond that?  It's like insisting that even though I've unplugged a lamp, the light will still continue.  You just can't see it.  But it's there....really. 
Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: Pizzly on September 08, 2010, 04:57:09 PM
No, I'm not retarded.
Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: gibson042 on September 08, 2010, 08:17:20 PM
Given what happens to a person's consciousness when their material anchors are affected-- whether by a disease such as Alzheimer's or by brain lesions caused by some kind of damage-- it's surprising to me that people believe that the answer to that question is "yes."

The question almost answers itself when phrased properly, doesn't it?

Quote
Damaging certain parts of the brain has a direct correlation to altering corresponding parts of that person's mental capacity and personality.  That's a good chunk of how we discover what those parts of the brain do.  If you damage my amygdala, I may lose the capacity to recognize and react to danger.  If you then damaged my Broca's area, I may lose the capacity for speech.

I hereby accord you one internets and one Phineas Gage award.
Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: Bill Brasky on September 08, 2010, 10:29:49 PM
I don't believe in ghosts.  I believe there are alternate dimensions, and those dimensions may be occupied by beings.  I believe that any mistaken encounters with "ghosts" is probably more along the line of random encounters where the fabric is thin, for whatever reason.  Magnetic anomalies, lightning strikes, who knows.  Even that is more speculation than I'll normally allow myself. 

Mathematical infinity supports this layering of dimensions. 

But I don't really care about it, either.  Because my reality is here, on this plane which we occupy.  Its interesting stuff, but I don't really like listening to the people who speculate on it- because they act like its fact and I find that annoying. 

Theres an Asian physicist who routinely speaks on these topics on History, and him I kinda like because he's very informal about it, and just digs the astrophysics..  And he's good at dumbing the concepts down for the layman, such as myself. 
Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: gibson042 on September 08, 2010, 11:12:41 PM
Theres an Asian physicist who routinely speaks on these topics on History, and him I kinda like because he's very informal about it, and just digs the astrophysics..  And he's good at dumbing the concepts down for the layman, such as myself. 

Michio Kaku (http://mkaku.org/)?
Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: Bill Brasky on September 08, 2010, 11:39:29 PM
Theres an Asian physicist who routinely speaks on these topics on History, and him I kinda like because he's very informal about it, and just digs the astrophysics..  And he's good at dumbing the concepts down for the layman, such as myself. 

Michio Kaku (http://mkaku.org/)?

Yes. 

I don't know anything about the man himself, I'll have to check it later in depth.  I like his personality, though. 

Good catch. 

Title: Re: Do you believe (ghost edition)?
Post by: The ghost of a ghost of a ghost on September 09, 2010, 01:53:31 AM
Every time my dog farts aloud, it acts as if it has seen a ghost.

So, I vote yes.