Religious Experiences - Evidence of God(s)?

Visuals, voices (though often the voices aren't normal they are 'impressions of emotions or desires in a pseudo vocal fashion'). Feelings of euphoria, 'oneness', dissociation, egolessness, feelings of enlightenment, expansion of the centre of perception to a general objective 'observer' just about covers the generals.I've had so many though, and my memory has added mythos and filligree to some of them. So some of them are more...graphic...than others. There seems to be a correlation between age of memory and fantastical nature of the experience. I couldn't say if that is due to the nature of memory or the differing brain of an adolescent from and adult. I can voluntarily invoke a religious experience. That would suggest they come from me. Unless Allah, Jahweh, a pagan collection of advisors, the pantheist entity (both personal and impersonal), the leszi and me (I've had a couple of religious experiences which I was the figure of religious focus!) are all manifestations of some real supernatural agency or something which is at my beck and call.But I think they are just the shadows and illusions that are part of the normal activity of the human brain. Some people are still under the impression that their vision is a wide view totally coloured entirely in focus better than HD experience, when in fact their vision, like all humans, is basically crap with only a few degrees of the visual field actually being in focus at any time.Every element of our perception is a convenient lie, sometimes the deception is more blatant. Sometimes we take it for granted, to the point where we think people are crazy when they suggest an alternative. When understanding perception, we should probably default to 'what you remember perceiving is a convenient fiction based on the real truth'. If you see a semi-transparent salamander which is both red and yellow (I've seen things that are both, I thought they were auras and I spent several years studying them to become a 'psychic healer'...*sigh*) - that's more likely because you haven't slept, ate a bit of ergot rather than confirmation of ethereal salamanders

I can't speak for Dr A, but I've had experiences where I felt totally at one with a natural universe with no supernatural guiding agent present, elegant and beautiful. Awe-inspiring and frightening etc - a wonderful sense of dizzying structure forming from chaos, etc etc. They were just as powerful and real as when Allah called to me.He raises a good point: We should keep in mind the contradictory nature of the full range of numinous experiences when weighing them up evidence wise.

Normally I have a sense of self-as-seperated-from-everything. A feeling of independent awareness where there is 'me' and 'everything else'.That is quite a different state of mind from the kinds of experiences I was inadequately describing. If you've never experienced it, I'm guessing it would be like to trying to explain 'red' to a blind person. That's exactly what I was describing. When Allah, Jahweh, the Angels, Bylebog, the pantheist universe, and any number of other entities called to me, it didn't hinge on the presence or absence of deities in the universe but on various brain activities.Some people think that when there is a deity in the religious experience, it is evidence for said deity's existence. The question is: does the explicit (or implicit) absence of said deity from other similar experiences count as evidence against a deity's non-existence? Then perhaps I did not adequately describe it. I get a general feeling of wonderment and amazement when I do amateur astronomy. Only occasionally will I fall to my knees weeping at the majestic power of the universe and my fragile place carefully balanced on a lump of rapidly rotating rock and metal all the while losing my sense of singularity and personality. Sometimes accompanied by mild (or not so mild) hallucinations...I categorize them differently, though they are almost certainly related ends of a spectrum. Indeed, quite common you might say. Though if they occur often enough to get in the way then one should seek professional help.Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

It might be the case. But it might also be the case that it is the same 'type' of sensation only in the sense that water is the same 'type' of things as whisky.But yes - there are two general commonalities: Fear and awe, which are often heightened beyond anything that is remotely normal.But I think there is more zing going on than just that, though I lack empirical support for that. This is a perfect example. It's one thing to think you are being watched. It's also something to think someone might be working together. It is a whole kettle of fish to think that everything is working together in some elaborate network of tricks to fool and humiliate you ultimately leading to your suicide which you can see is the desire in everyone's eyes. Even that weirdo that appears in the mirror with you sometimes...The point being that it is perfectly possible to have fear, but to be consumed by it seems to indicate that something is being suppressed that would normally allow you to write off your fear as 'baseless' and to press on.I don't think it is *merely* a question of degree, though that is definitely in play. I think there are a suite of issues going on that cohere into the strange emotional states we sometimes see. A difficulty discerning ones internal thoughts from external voices, agency alertness, seeing patterns and significance where non exist...all come together to make someone suffer a paranoid delusion (or acute religious experience, in the case that the 'other' is benign).While some religious experiences may well be one emotion to extreme, I wouldn't be surprised to see a suite of things going on that form a coherent-appearing narrative. Maybe, but I think giving them a sub-name is just as useful as anything. It may cause problems, but those problems will arise anyway, no doubt. People find these things convincing even if they know they are on drugs or that someone had a very similar experience but with a different god figure involved. Not much more we can do here.The thing is, without empirical support all we can do is use the terms as we find them. That car is red as opposed 'the frequency of visible light that is presently being reflected from the surface of that entity which can be loosely named 'the car' is strongest between xHz and yHz.' One might help us avoid mistakes when we investigate - but for most purposes 'red' or 'religious experience' will have to suffice Especially given there are almost as many descriptions of religious experiences as there are experiencers...

Go right ahead. For the record (obviously not for your benefit but for the lurkers who don't know us) I'm an atheist. Not at all...to those that I thought would be responsive to such things (which turned out to be teenage girls with obsessions with dolphins and yin-yang symbols. Which was fine because I was a teenage boy).But to a potentially 'hostile' group? Not in person. I was on the internet with these beliefs, but I found talking about them quite frustrating. I figured some people just couldn't 'get it'. When an element of one's self identity is tied up on something failing to get that extraordinarily - ground breakingly important - facet of information across doesn't go as planned at first...it can be a knock the confidence.From a gambling perspective the answer should be obvious why one might be coy in this regard:1. There is very little to gain by telling the story.
2. There is everything to lose (or at least it feels that important).Who in their right might would take that gamble?From another perspective: You know that what you experienced was absolutely and trivially real. That isn't a question. I knew a God (sometimes: universal mind and others) existed just as passionately and vociferously as iano professes now. But you know that convincing somebody of that is going to be bloody difficult. The most likely outcome is someone will attempt to find a hole in the tale, an alternative explanation. If/When an argument breaks out, both parties lose respect for one another.So even if you don't end up disbelieving and have no fear (conscious or otherwise) of being out-argued or proven wrong...you could still look like a fool and lose social status/respect.The only mileage in sharing the story are amongst those that are likewise invested in creating a community of non-criticism. Like a church (as long as the experience can be interpreted in a suitably orthodox way) or spiritual circle or whatever.Besides which: the symptoms are quite close to the symptoms of mental illness. It's better to be thought of as crazy than to speak out and remove all doubt to paraphrase some guy. Yeah pretty much. I'm not sure it's something I can really teach and it is possible that it is not universally possible. Lots of meditation practice drawing bits of ideas from one place and another and just...experimenting for hours and hours is all I can really suggest. It works for Monks - and they really are the experts and achieving these things so try and take some rational wisdom from their ideas and see how it goes...though be prepared for potentially years of fruitless searching: I had the advantage of starting quite young (I assume its an advantage).You know how some people can make themselves vomit merely by thinking about the smell of dog poo? And how if you feel a bit nauseaus even thinking about it can bring on the urge?There's a bit of that in there: I know the kinds of triggers that can set me off. God yes! It's like someone dropping a bowling bowl on your foot. You are compelled to feel pain even though you know that it's just an electrical signal turned into an electro-biochemical pathway thing.Or better: A dream that seems really real.Or an optical illusion that you fall for even if you rationally know it's a trick. You can't.I have never done so.My religious experiences today are as mindblowingly powerful today as they were once in the past (though as I mentioned earlier I have to correct this somewhat due to potential memory embellishments), but whenever I've had one it has quite literally changed everything (for a moment).However:- what I was convinced was absolutely true varied depending on the biases I went in with. Last one I had I was convinced I had finally understood consciousness perfectly...I saw a beautifully complex deterministic system of signals and I knew exactly how it came together to produce the effect.But then, I was considering going to study neuroscience at Uni at that stage in my life (about a year or so ago I think it was). They'd be wrong. Mine are obviously more powerful and life changing than theirs. If there is a flavour of woo out there - there is a reasonable chance I've dabbled in it or a cousin of it. I've still got a ludicrous amount of books by Rajneesh Chandra Mohan - a cult leader I posthumously followed until very recently (the link goes to an article I wrote while I was still somewhat sympathetic, though the world wide web had started to expand (and I was starting to be able to afford long term internet access permanently) so that searching for his name had brought up pages that were critical of him and not just sycophants.)
Osho:

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Prayer has nothing to do with religion, prayer is basically the approach of the artist. Prayer is an aesthetic phenomenon, not a religious one. But if you start feeling grateful and thankful towards existence, slowly slowly you are surprised that a presence starts surrounding you which you had never felt before. It is only a thankful heart that starts feeling a vibe. That vibe is God. God only comes at a later stage, but then it comes as an experience. Then God is a liberartion, then God is nirvana.
But start by prayer, never start by God, because that God will be false. And if you are believing in a false God, then your prayer is false. First make your prayer as deep as possible, as heartfelt as possible, and the God comes of his own accord.

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He was a monist - which maybe helped my de conversion.It was both sudden and gradual. Christianity was quite sudden actually. I read Genesis when I was about 11 or 12. Then I read a book about Buddhism. Then I thought: Buddhism sounds more up my street. Though I was also into Law, and didn't publically declare that I wasn't a Christian until the day the law said I was capable of making the choice. My 16th birthday (I had probably completely abandoned Christianity by 13 or 14). I told my mother I would no longer celebrate Christmas. She told me off: Christmas isn't just about religion, but its mostly about family. I just didn't want to be a hypocrite.Then I bounced between that post-colonial new agey Buddhism to attempting ascetic forms of Zen and stuff. Someone I knew (and still do, but things have changed since then) claimed to by a cyber-pagan capable of astral projection. I had been attempting to pull off full astral projection for years (along with the Buddhist and new age stuff I was becoming adept at meditation and began to get the 'knack' for reaching the 'sweet spot' quicker and quicker) and all I had managed to do was commune with my pet rabbit in my garden.This cyber-pagan started telling stories of great battles he had on the astral plane, and his friend started agreeing with the accounts. But as the anecdotes poured in, I noticed they weren't consistent. Two different people would be saying completely different things had happened, but with rather obvious attempts to mutually patch up inconsistencies. I kind of laughed how sad they were: They had to make up the spiritual realm because they couldn't really get there even a bit -they had no idea how it worked and they didn't have the casual knowledge that an astral projector surely would.After that things started getting watered down as I tried to rid myself of the stuff that that could withstand the scrutiny I put others under (I was sure that it wouldn't be much). It was a little more than I had guessed: I started seeing that other people's ideas were so clearly at odds with my own personal experience. Eventually it went from a Monis reincarnationist Zen thing with a Nirvana afterlife to going towards became spiritual pantheism and then pantheism (how I described myself when I first came to this board) and then someone pointed out that pantheism is really just atheism for people afraid of calling themselves atheist. This is all simplified for the purposes of narrative - there was a Islamic hiccup in the middle of all that after I fell for the slick propaganda of my local Imam.I have every sympathy for those that read Genesis and didn't see what I saw. They are surrounded by millions of people reinforcing their ideas which must make it almost impossible to shake the idea.There isn't a great deal of stuff on the net with me being religious, but I told a similar (though probably inconsistent in some ways) story when I hadn't stepped into atheism over at Message 13, which is possibly of interest.Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

Maybe, but to be honest I couldn't say with certainty. If a person does have a thought about how silly something sounds, I'd be very surprised if that inner voice was particularly loud compared with the others. If it was - they'd be an atheist or something But yes - it is my opinion that everyone has some voice of doubt. Socially competent people are often asking themselves 'Am I making a fool of myself?' But generally only ambiguously at best (which is presumably why you asked why people aren't all that forthcoming with their experiences). Well, if you are going to point out the exceptional people... Absolutely - but then they know they are right so there's no danger there (yes, a grotesque characterisation). But if they base their beliefs on a profound religious experience or two, I'd be surprised if they were to give enough details of that so that the scientists here could de-construct it and come up with a purely neurological account.Think of the offence that people like LindaLou/kitsune had when people suggested that maybe it wasn't a ghost that moved a certain object and that maybe a person's memory of the event or perception of it is flawed. We might be saying "There is a perfectly normal, human explanation for this thing. We humans aren't the perfect perceivers we strongly believe we are." and they hear "You are delusional." (though in fairness, that's probably because some people were saying she was delusional) I was specifically talking about religious experiences: not just beliefs, ideas and the like.A religious experience is necessarily personal. You might as well ask people around here for details of their own masturbation habits. You'd probably only find onifre and the like willing to give you details since taboo is taboo to him You can get a hint, but you need to leave London behind. Look out into the cosmos and try to truly comprehend what you are looking at. First break the illusion that you are living under a dome (it's so damned strong that even if you know its not true, it kind of still seems like it is). You are looking at the biggest drop in the universe and it's only the weakest force in the universe that's preventing you from being consumed by it.Just try to really drive home the bigness of it all, that should trigger 'awe'. Continue piling up the 'awe' factor. Realize that planet is a lump of rock accelerating towards a sun. That you are just a bunch of atoms working together to avoid not being a bunch of atoms. Whatever floats your boat.I used this kind of technique inadvertently while I was observing Shoemaker-Levy 9 and I got a 'flash'.Or you can wait to get 'lucky'. Communal experiences can often help. Dancing/singing as a group can help produce the 'egolessness' sensation. So try going to church or a Hare Krsna meeting. These people might have weird ideas about what's going on - but they are the ones having these experiences so they've got something right, yes?You could try looking at some of the techniques that Osho pushed: but doing them had some negative mental implications for me, so I won't actually recommend them. There are lots of ideas out there, but it's probably analogous to playing a piano, sometimes you have to get out of the theory and start practicing. But when you look back at an optical illusion, you still fall for it. Even when you look at it and reflect at the same time. The face looks like it is popping out even though it is sunk inwards, for example. It's impossible to see it otherwise. That's the kind of helplessness I'm talking about here.Imagine if you had an inward pointing mask, you brought someone in and then escorted them out. They'd swear the mask pointed outwards, and they may believe that all their life...even if you explained how the illusion works. Well 'temporary' for me was probably about ten years. While you experience them, you are a slave to them. Afterwards, it's down to your epistemology. If you think your asshole don't stink (most people) - then you quite reasonably think you were touched by the divine and that's that.I have had the 'advantage' of taking powerful psychotropics, and of having actual delusional experiences. I know how compelling unreal things can actually seem. I have the personal experience that my mental asshole stinks as much as (if not more) than others.Maybe that's it? Yeah - it's been fun and a bit scary (and comparatively tame since I stepped out of the wardrobe, I can see why people might prefer Narnia). Incidentally I've got like three copies of Supernature if anyone wants a doorstop?

Glad to hear it.

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To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower

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Good luck - and maybe this article/paper, titled, Can an Atheist Have a Religious Experience? by Ian Robinson might be of use (it contains other descriptions of these experiences).

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And, if we can get beyond their cultural accretions, the familiar and learnt images we usually dress the experiences in, and pay attention to their core significance, they may teach us a very important basic truth about ourselves, that is, that self is a mental construct. In a sense, an illusion. Perhaps a useful illusion, but an illusion nonetheless. And knowing the self is a mental construct can have profound beneficial effects on the way you lead your life. Organised religions have always had an uneasy relationship with mystics, at worst persecuting them and at best trying to shoe-horn their experiences into pre-existing sets of religious beliefs. But if such experiences are to become simply adjuncts to the creeds and rituals of entrenched religious hierarchies, what is the point or value in them? An atheist, approaching the mystical without this religious baggage, has perhaps a better chance of making it a life-enhancing and life-changing experience.

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To radically misquote Karl Marx, religions have merely interpreted the mystical experience in terms of their various dogmas; the point is, to be changed by it.

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I see what you mean - but the point is that 'it seems to me' that the face is sticking out, that the lines are different lengths, that god is speaking to me. Obviously the consequences of believing the lines are different lengths (and some people will do so until the lines are actually measured) are quite different than the impact God speaking to you might have.The point is, one can't choose but to visually experience the illusion, even if one intellectually knows it is not true. The difference is that you can measure the illusion and see the error. One cannot measure the subject in religious experiences.OK, take a look at this picture. You might have seen it before, but take yourself back to when you first did. If I was to tell you that the tables not only had the same area but where the exact same shape with the same dimensions...you wouldn't be thought of as crazy if you didn't believe me.So imagine a world where for some reason we couldn't manipulate those two tables or measure them or whatever. Imagine a guy comes along and says: Those are the same shape, it's just your brain interpreting them in a funky way. Here are some examples of brains behaving in funky ways to produce similar (but not the same) results.You might be persuaded. But I'm sure you can see that many people would not. They can SEE the shapes themselves. They can tell with a casual inspection they are quite clearly different. Sure - there are some unusual effects, but that isn't evidence that in this case an unusual brain effect is occurring. Anybody who is denying those tables are different shapes is making a positive claim without any evidence to support it.So it is with religious experiences. They are absolutely convincing. You can 'feel'/'see'/'hear'/'know' something. Without a way to 'dispel' the illusion it can easily take an exalted place in a person's memory.There are magicians who have stood up, told an audience they are magicians, that they are not psychic, and then performed some illusion of some kind. It is not uncommon for some observers to report that
a) The magician has 'spooky powers'
b) The magician performed something which the magician (and a tape recording) will confirm never happened at all but is orders of magnitude more impressive than the original feat.I saw this recently with Derren Brown. He told a woman he was about to con her, using clever tricks to appear psychic. He did just that. Reminded her that he was using well studied techniques and she still reported that she believed he had a 'bit of power'.Though Derren was trying to convince us that psychics are charlatans, so she could have been a plant Of course, there are many differences with the religious experience to optical illusions. Although there is 'joy' in optical illusions and magic tricks - it doesn't really compare with the elation of the religious experience. Though the comparison to magic tricks might hold when it comes to how we later interpret/remember and report those experiences... Pink snot...

I can see why it would be difficult to see. One of their qualities seems to be their reported 'ineffability', in much the same way that my perception of 'red' might be.All I can say is there is a certain sense of conviction and revelation of true knowledge. In some way it would be like trying to explain deja vu as the feeling you've experienced something before. That's kind of it, but the sensation is...more than that somehow, it has a strange 'uncanniness' to it.As Dan Dennett would say: It really does seem to you that that is the way of things. When it stops - you have a choice. Do you take the red pill or the blue pill? One of them takes you further down the rabbit hole. Do you dismiss it as a 'funny turn' or believe it was a divine revelation as the surrounding culture massively reinforces? To be honest - I don't think it is all based on some un-explained religious experience. Some of what you see might be a result of the sunk-cost effect. Even competent people fall prey to it: sport coaches give more 'on field' time to people they paid more money for regardless of performance. People that pay more money for a concert are more likely to attend more concerts than those that pay less.People have invested a lot of their time and energy into their religious views, so it wouldn't be surprising to see that this can result in some irrational decision making. Sounds like a good starting point to me. Perfect weather for it!

To swing it back on topic,
Do you believe that your personal/private experiences provide you with evidence, appropriate to yourself only, that a deity exists?If so, could you attempt to describe those experiences?Secondly - is 'a deity exists' the most parsimonious explanation for the experiences you have had? If it is not, why is it your preferred explanation? "90% of the time it is a known psychological effect, 10% it is an unknown effect".The question is, since the deity explanation is just one of many possible candidates for 'unknown effect' - why do people insist that Straggler proves it is not a deity and that if he says that it is more likely that the unknown effects are simply as yet undiscovered psychological effects (since the 90% started at 0% and has risen through time, as new evidence and better technology has come along) that he is some kind of strident fundamentalist faitheist?No - Straggler, I'm sure, would be perfectly comfortable that there is a 1 in 10 chance any given religious experience does not have a suitable neurally based explanation. But what relevance is squeezing a deity into that gap, and what's so wrong with saying that bridging the gap with a deity was bad when it was done with medicine so it is wise not to do it with neuroscience?

Maybe so. But we are talking about people who, when asked why they believe say "I spoke with Jesus in a revelatory experience of love and transcendence , experienced 'the futureness of god', etc " I have already explained my experiences, closely co-related within a time frame of about 15 yearsWe don't need to postulate 'insane' when 'has a human brain' will suffice.I suppose some would argue that your having a brain is something I am taking on unsubstantiated faith - but that's not quite the same thing you mean. Why is 'truly experienced God' your preferred explanation over the multitude of neural effects that can cause similar things? Do you think something being about 'the future' or any confusion of space and time doesn't happen to people having strokes, epileptic fits etc? If you hold that your 'future' experiences are reason for you to believe that you 'truly experienced God', why not describe some of these 'future' experiences?Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

When I say 'they are not both faith based', I am not agreeing that they are both faith based. I even provided the definition of faith that I was using by implication: a type of trust in an explanation that is not based upon independently accessible empirical support.So let's not equivocate, OK?

It would be if I had said any of that. But you have assumed that technology cannot reach 'the afterlife' presumably as an explanation for why, despite looking, we haven't found any support for the idea, not me.However, the brain can be studied with technology. And it appears some of the most powerful experiences we've been able to study turn out to be explainable in terms of neural function. So if we know that a clogged up air filter can cause your car certain problems with certain symptoms when starting - and your car is displaying those symptoms...why would we bother hypothesizing Gremlins? Religious experiences. Experiences of speaking with God/Allah, a celestial chorus of spirits, leszi etc etc. The kinds of experiences I was asking you about, the kinds of experiences this thread is about. I have detailed some of my religious experiences in this thread. Why not explain yours? I have said before: I am for cancer research. I am not an oncologist. I have never seen cancerous tissue. Doesn't that completely answer your question? By not blindly believing myself or other's impressions of what we experience. That's a great way to end up believing in lies or errors.Personally - I'd rather NOT believe something is true when it was, than to believe something IS true when it is false. It seems a great defence against conmen, and any intrinsic biases I might possess. Well - to stay on topic. I understand the reticence, I explained my own reticence when I was a believer starting in Message 21. But I'm interested in learning the truth - you are the one that ran your 'superior' religious experiences up the flagpole, you brought them up. I was asking about them because either
a) you experienced god and that's very important.
b) you didn't, and you've made quite a mistake, which is also important.If you are confident that your experiences were divine - why not tell the world? Does reading counter-views upset you? But you know they are false. Why should false words matter? Have you asked yourself why you are so bothered when 'others jump on {you} like crazy'? They aren't really jumping on you, just offering alternative ideas which you may consider or reject at will - right? As you challenged- maybe the truth of your experiences lies outside your knowledge? Are you worried you might be wrong and prefer to remain 'comfortable' in your current views in which you have invested a great deal of time?Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

Blimey - could you try responding to my posts in just one post? Fragmenting the discussion is very confusing. Why would the 9 say that? Why wouldn't they just say 'can anyone find a gold coin'? And if someone says "I've got one.", then say "How do you know its a gold coin?" Not at all. If a person claims the coin they found was not gold, but was made of platinum. Another person puts it in their pocket and says that the coin answers all his questions and refuses to talk any further. Someone else says the coin is made of gold. A further person claims it is gold plated, with a bronze interior.My question to all of them would be: Why is 'gold plated with a bronze interior' (or whatever it happened to be in their case) your preferred hypothesis?And that's all I am asking you. How is that a fallacy? Of course, which is why I asked about it, and you refused to answer. Hardly my fault is it? I'm still unclear. Are you suggesting that you have had experiences of the actual future which have subsequently come true, and you used strict protocols to avoid bias to confirm that this is so?Then why not talk about it - it sounds fascinating? If that were true, why are you talking to me about it at all? Were you just trying to impress us with your spiritual awesomeness? Were you showing off that you have been touched by the True Gold Coin, and I merely had a gold plated one and couldn't understand the transcendent wonder you have personally experienced?Of course - you have absolutely no way of actually knowing my imagination's limitations nor my epistemic capacities. Perhaps you are just trying to convince yourself that you do, because it helps explain why your Truth, so Clearly and Obviously expressed, has been rejected or queried? Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

No. I said "you have assumed that technology cannot reach 'the afterlife' presumably as an explanation for why, despite looking, we haven't found any support for the idea, not me." I must make it absolutely crystal clear to you because you continue to get this so very wrong about my position. There are things we don't know. There are things that technology has not given us access to. I am not denying this, and I revel in it. Is that clear enough? Not at all. I just said that we can study the brain. Not that this therefore proves 100% that god doesn't exist or whatever. I'm not saying that I can say with absolute confidence any given religious experience was definitely a neural phenomenon. I'm just saying that we have evidence that neural phenomena can cause experiences just like those described 'in the wild'. We don't have evidence that some kind of intelligent transcendent being is responsible. So why do you prefer that hypothesis? Why not some other unfalsifiable concept? Why don't you prefer the 'unknown or undetected neural phenomena or something akin to that' explanation? How so? I was just talking about my experiences, the ones I have detailed on this thread. How does that mean all experiences should be viewed the same? I'm just asking for you to detail yours as I did mine. I know. That's why I said that my series of religious experiences were co-related too and I was able to summon up some words to try and express them. So why can't you? It means that I am brutally aware that we don't know everything, and I support spending money on learning more things. This means I am not of the opinion that we know everything now, that present technology or understanding is the pinnacle of all truth or any of the other nonsense you have been trying to tar me with for some reason. No. I even addressed the possibility of false negatives in the next sentence. Which you quoted too and responded to so presumably read. My personal preference has nothing to do with truth. However - my personal preferences are important when it comes to deciding my preferred method of epistemology. As for the thing you think you've already illustrated I couldn't comment since I have no idea how to parse the grammar I'm afraid. I appreciate it is a simple truth to you. I've experienced those same kinds of experiences which are clearly true, and people around me denied those simple truths! How could they? Etc.But anyway - I'm not denying that your experiences were actually caused by God. For all I know they were. I have no idea what they were - other than you claim they involved predicting the future in some sense. Again I ask - is there some reason that even asking questions about your experience and raising alternative possibilities and asking why you prefer yours over the alternatives is so upsetting to you? There has been no unpleasant attack. I have asked questions, you have impugned upon me various motives and opinions which are not true, but I have patiently answered your questions and tried to correct your erroneous view of me and my position.Why do you think an open-minded discussion on this topic is akin to an unpleasant attack? An effective method of defence no doubt. There is no compulsion for you to continue the discussion - and it is not my will that you be forced to continue. I appreciate how difficult it is to have those deeply personal experiences challenged by anonymous internet assholes. You may cease the discussion at any time - but this is a thread where we are putting the claim that religious experiences are evidence for a god/s so if you are going to stick around - get used to it.If it helps at all - I used to cite Matthew 6 when conversations started getting difficult, maybe that might soothe your dissonance? Who is 'we'? Do you want me to show the studies that have explored these kinds of experiences using observation? I don't know. When someone tells you 'they are not both based on faith', then something odd must be going on when you respond 'so you agree they are both based on faith'. Since clearly the agreement is explicitly denied, and to say otherwise is very unusual wouldn't you think? I am not assuming you are equivocating - I am merely asking for you to not take a statement of 'I think x' as agreement that 'not x'. OK? If we can both agree to debate in good faith - then discussion shouldn't be too difficult to achieve, but it means not adding things to what I am saying, making stuff up and generally misrepresenting my position and beliefs.Edited by Modulous, : replied to another orphan post Message 53