Do we have evidence against the supernatural?

""Need" (we don't need to invoke) is a utilitarian concept. Science and scientific theories are utilitarian. There's no need to invoke them... for science." -BenThen under what conditions must we invoke the supernatural or a god?"For "truth"? There's no argument for or against invoking supernatural for that. There's no reason to invoke supernatural when talking about "truth"... and there's no reason against it. "Truth" is, by the definition given by 1..61803 in this thread, supernatural. Parsimony is not a guideline applicable for the "supernatural", and therefore not applicable to "truth" -BenI stand by my statement that 'supernatural' is meaningless. The 'truth' is that which is so: what we think about it is irrelevant. We could believe that dragons live in the fridge. The truth is that they are not. You have to take a stand and say "if there were dragons we would detect evidence of dragons". If we lack the means to detect them what gave us the idea they were there in the first place? Some vague feeling? A dream? A book?"It serves the purpose for explaining the unexplainable. It definitely can retard scientific inquiry. But it's definitely not meaningless, and definitely serves some purpose."Some people simply seem unable to be satisfied with the answer "I don't know". Even labelling something, which gives the appearance of understanding, is more comfortable to people (in general) than simply leaving it "untouched" (a pure "I don't know"). Supernatural is then, in this regards, useful." -BenYeah I agree with you here. However, we need to get away from lablling what we don't know as 'supernatural'. This stops people wondering and testing evidence with their balony kit (I love that phrase! Good old Mr Sagan)."It's crazy to delude ourselves and describing ourselves as "rational animals." (pending definitions), we most certainly are not. We should face the reality of our psychological traits. "Supernatural", or "explaining that which we do not know", is critical to what we are." -BenAgain here we agree. However the use of the word supernatural in place of "we don't know yet" is very bad for the reason I stated above.What is wrong with "I don't know yet"? This response may get someone else to ponder the question. If he/she is smart he/she has an opportunity to increase humanity's knowledge base. If you say the equivalent of "goddunit" he/she stops pondering.When we stop pondering we may as well lay down and die.

I addressed this (among other things) in a new thread I launched in the Miscellaneous forum.In my opinion, people who prefer the "Goddidit" approach, or are satisfied with it, simply do not like the idea of living in a world that is not "complete". Tentativeness feels uncomfortable to them. I think they feel better when they can pretend to themselves that things simply are the way they should be. And no further questions need to be asked, no uncertainty to worry about. God takes care of everything.I guess you could compare it to the attitude of some people that everything is determined by fate. That everything that will ever happen to them, is already plotted out. So they feel they don't have to worry.

"In my opinion, people who prefer the "Goddidit" approach, or are satisfied with it, simply do not like the idea of living in a world that is not "complete". Tentativeness feels uncomfortable to them. I think they feel better when they can pretend to themselves that things simply are the way they should be. And no further questions need to be asked, no uncertainty to worry about. God takes care of everything." - AnnafanI agree. Thats what makes science so damn wonderful; it is a tool to expand our knowledge. We should teach our kids to think of uncertainty as an opportunity explore. If we don't know whats over that ther hill, go on have a look! Cultures that have "goddit" will never get anywhere. I'm English and had no idea that creationism was ever mentioned in American biology text books. Or even that there was a counter current to evolution. "Goddit" is a cultural maliase. Belief in the supernatural is acceptance that we should stop looking for answers.End rant. This message has been edited by Larni, 10-07-2005 10:41 AM

I don't think so. I was thinking in terms of beings not things. It makes sense to me to speak of an incorporeal mind, but it seems ridiculous to speak of an incorporeal stream where the incorporeal fishes play. Gravity, I think, is an abstraction--like a quality: the curviness of space-time.

This makes no sense to me.

If abstractions are real, God is real. No. "space-time" is, I think, an abstraction.
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Only if he was saying that the IPU was natural because of things like air or a few parts of the set, would he be commiting composition, by applying that to the whole.But he's not, he simply saying that many natural things have the qualities of the IPU, so the IPU isn't necessarily inferred as supernatural.I think Ben's position is correct, in that there is neither evidence for or against supernature dependent upon which qualifies "evidence".Is the universe evidence of the supernatural? To the fundy next door it might be. But it has to be be decided as reasonable to suggest evidence should be there.Don't forget the argument from ignorance Lammy boy. If there is no evidence X did it then he didn't.
If there is no evidence X didn't do it he did.It's most easy to stumble upon these assumptions.

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If abstractions are real, God is real.

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The entity God as opposed to the concept of God is seen as a concrete entity, not an abstract. Thus your sentence is either a non-sequitur or essentially tells most thests that they are completely wrong about their own beliefs.

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No. "space-time" is, I think, an abstraction.

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I would certainly not agree with that.

Mike, since when did you become an agnostic? Is irrefutability a thing of the past? If so, join the club. The only thing that I am sure about is that I am sure about nothing!Back on Topic, DO we have evidence against the Supernatural?

It does not occur on a documentable, regular, or predictable basis. It could be, however, that "it" has intelligence and is hiding from us.

Many many documented personal encounters with the unknown. Aside from the sensationalist hoaxes, are we to conclude that ALL of these people were simply mentally ill or deluded?

In a word: Yes.I'll post more tomorrow...

Sure, why not? I've never met anyone with a credible - or documented - personal encounter with anything "supernatural." Might we say that, say, one in 1000 people have a supernatural story that approaches credibility?Well, one in five Americans a year suffer from a diagnosible mental illness. (We say "per year" because some of them get better.) One in five. That's 20 percent, or roughly 54 million Americans every year. Now, is it really so hard to believe that most or even all of the 300,000 people we've just estimated have supernatural experiences suffer from a mental illness, just like 53 million of their peers? I don't find it hard to believe at all.

You have a point, but you are a fundamentalist atheist, so that *could* skew the interpretaions of the results, somewhat. Who can say who is sane or insane? Logic is not limited to the sane.At least I've been told that you were a fundamentalist atheist....is that true?This message has been edited by Phat, 10-15-2005 02:40 PM

Psychologists, for one. My statistics are from the National Institutes of Health. I'm an atheist, but a former believer, and I've always been absolutely clear about what conditions or proofs I would accept that would convince me in the existence of God or the supernatural. You'll find no statement of mine on this entire board where I've said "I refuse to believe in God no matter what." I've always been very open and forthcoming about what it would take to convince me that my belief is wrong. To date no religionist has ever been able to meet that standard.Therefore it's not surprising to me that my detractors characterize me as a "fundamentalist atheist"; implying that I'm unconvincable. Nothing could be farther from the truth. It's simply the case that those who have attempted to convince me have presented arguments that were laughably impotent, and now, naturally, those people blame their own failure not on their poor logic and debate skills but on my imagined "fundamentalism."No, I'm not a "fundamentalist atheist."This message has been edited by crashfrog, 10-15-2005 05:05 PM

God is either a being or an abstraction. If one claims that abstractions are real, then God has to be real, since a being is real.

If the supernatural has physical evidence it ceases to be supernatural.