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Author | Topic: Peanut Gallery | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Panda Member (Idle past 3712 days) Posts: 2688 From: UK Joined: |
RAZD writes:
Wow. A typo. Call the spelling police.
(1) it's RAZD, "Rebel American Zen Deist" not RADZ ... (you aren't actually reading the signature, are you? ) RAZD writes:
The basis of my comment is that your reply is a non sequitur where you have ignored what was asked and answered. (2) If one of these is demonstrated to be a product of the imagination in this conversation, then please post a link to it. If none have, then what is your basis for your comment?I was hoping that my comment about you not reading the conversation would have encouraged you to actually...you know...read the conversation. But it seems not. Always remember: QUIDQUID LATINE DICTUM SIT ALTUM VIDITUR Science flies you into space; religion flies you into buildings.
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RAZD Member (Idle past 1405 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: |
Hi Panda,
Wow. A typo. Call the spelling police. Except that it's the second time I've seen it, I just though you might like to know.
The basis of my comment is that your reply is a non sequitur where you have ignored what was asked and answered. I was hoping that my comment about you not reading the conversation would have encouraged you to actually...you know...read the conversation. But it seems not. It was intended as a non-sequitur to the conversation, because the conversation was a non-sequitur to the purpose of the peanut gallery (to talk about the Great Debate posts rather than be a debate thread). Just thought I could nudge things back to the topic . . . and bluegenes' failures to provide evidence that substantiates his claims that he claimed he had. It's rather amusing to see both my brother and straggles struggling to define supernatural, and discuss how it could be detected, which I find confirmation that the whole issue is not really testable. Enjoy.by our ability to understand Rebel American Zen Deist ... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ... to share. Join the effort to solve medical problems, AIDS/HIV, Cancer and more with Team EvC! (click)
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1466 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined:
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The issue is what you can measure and test and determine from such evidence. If not by evidence, then by what basis should reasonable people arrive at conclusions, given the frequency with which the human brain has experiences that are not rooted in any physical reality? In 2000, one in sixteen Americans suffered from a profound mental illness. I would estimate that frequency to be perhaps ten times the frequency of reported experiences of the supernatural, and that's a very generous estimate. (A factor of ten too generous, perhaps.) Of course, every living human being has regular nocturnal experiences of impossible things, unmoored in any reality; we call them "dreams." Given this enormous propensity for the human brain to invent "experiences" from whole cloth - experiences that frequently cannot be discerned as fictions until much later - is it reasonable for a person to substitute experience for evidence? I think we all implicitly understand that it is not, as evidenced by the way that we do not particularly privilege second-hand accounts of "supernatural" experiences. Some people make an exception for their own experience but I see no reason why they should. Why should I privilege an experience I would otherwise discount simply because I'm the one it happened to? There's nothing special about me.
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Chuck77 Inactive Member
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RAZD writes: This is your analema: that scientists will only be able to see\observe the "natural" elements and that their explanations will necessarily be limited to the "natural" elements by what they see\observe. It's sort of like asking, why do we dream? wiki:
During REM sleep, the release of the neurotransmitters norepinephrine, serotonin and histamine is completely suppressed.[22][23][24] As a result, motor neurons are not stimulated, a condition known as REM atonia. This prevents dreams from resulting in dangerous movements of the body. According to a report in the journal Neuron, rat brains show evidence of complex activity during sleep, including the activation in memory of long sequences of activity.[25][26] Studies show that various species of mammals and birds experience REM during sleep,[27] and follow the same series of sleeping states as humans.[25] And, God certainly may have designed us to dream and can/does influence our dreaming. Detecting God per say is not possible right now emperically but it doesn't rule out the possibilty that God created us to dream just because something has a natural explanation. I think Straggler is trying to misrepresent Xongsmith's position too(on top of yours). Or, he is just ignorant and doesnt quite understand it. It's amusing to see Straggler call Xongsmith a militant atheist in almost every comment he makes now when he himself demonstrates it here everyday. He is best at twisting what everyone says to suit his argument. If he actually had to read and understand someones position being more logical than his own he surley wouln't have over 300 posts in this thread. Straggler, as long as you go along with bluegenes theory (still of which he has not come up with a test to test what it is he claims to know) you are as militant as they come. I wouldn't say it's ignorance but seeing what he wants to see (making things up) rather than seeing what people actually say. Edited by Chuck77, : No reason given. Edited by Chuck77, : No reason given. Edited by Chuck77, : No reason given.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17822 Joined: Member Rating: 2.2
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quote: Curiously, your objection is completely irrelevant. I illustrated the content of your post, not your writing style.
quote:Of course the confusion is yours, and therefore your problem. And it is a fact that you are either confused about the whole concept of detection or unable to remember the point we are discussing.
quote: RAZD, we are discussing a case where we have quite thoroughly tested for "evidence of the other", to the point where we have eliminated the possibility. To be precise, by watching brain function we have no inputs that are unaccounted for and all point to a natural origin of the experience, thus we can say that the experience is the product of natural causes, and it does not detect supernatural beings - for the simple reason that given the same natural causes the same experience would occur whether there were a supernatural being present or not. To say that a method of detection works merely because the thing it supposedly detects happened to be present when it went off - despite evidence beyond any reasonable doubt that the thing in question had nothing to do with the " detector"'s outputs we would be engaging in confirmation bias of the worst sort. And yet, this is the argument that you appear to be putting forth.
quote: And I am pointing out that this is completely irrelevant to what we are discussing, which is how we might determine if religious experiences are detections of supernatural beings or not. Once we have hypothetically determined that the experience is entirely due to natural causes the question of whether a supernatural being happens to be present or not becomes an irrelevance for the reasons I have given.
quote: Alternatively we can examine the detector, find that it's behaviour is governed entirely by factors unrelated to the thing it supposedly detects and therefore conclude that it does not work. You have presented no valid argument against such a test.
quote: The confusion here is yours. The test does not seek to detect supernatural elements. Instead it determines if the known natural elements are sufficient to explain the experience (measured at the level of brain function). You may argue that finding a gap in our understanding is not sufficient to conclude that a supernatural explanation is needed and you would be correct, but that is not the point of the test. Thus despite your continuing use of innuendo, you have failed to address my actual argument once again. Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.
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Chuck77 Inactive Member |
PaulK writes: RAZD, we are discussing a case where we have quite thoroughly tested for "evidence of the other", to the point where we have eliminated the possibility. That's good. So you are a #7 on the "Dawkins scale" I take it? After a comment like this no other option fits. This is astonishing, quite literally. Listen, im no one to talk about someone being a 7 on Dick's scale because im the total opposite (although I do believe it's more logical and reasonable to be a #1 than a #7 as you cannot have an "experience" NOT detecting the presence of God but you CAN have a positive one). Just because there is no detection doesn't mean that something does not exist. See RAZD and Thomas Jefferson. Im still not sure how you can be sure that one's experience can be tested to not be SN? Brain funtion shows it's due to natural causes? Lets see.
PaulK writes: To be precise, by watching brain function we have no inputs that are unaccounted for and all point to a natural origin of the experience, thus we can say that the experience is the product of natural causes, and it does not detect supernatural beings Which experience? Let's look at speaking in tongues. Brain scans of people speaking in tongues:A group of researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine used Single Photon Emission Computed Tomography (SPECT) to analyze brain activity within individuals as they spoke in tongues. It was the first study of this kind. During this technique, a small quantity of a radioactive drug is injected into a person's vein. The scanner then makes detailed images of tissues as cells take up the drug. During an interview on 2006-SEP-20 by Steve Paulson, Andrew Newberg -- Associate Professor of Radiology, Psychiatry, and Religious Studies and Director for the Center for Spirituality and the Mind, at the University of Pennsylvania -- said that the region of the brain involved in language is not activated when a person speaks in tongues. He said: "Speaking in tongues is a very unusual kind of vocalization. It sounds like the person is speaking a language, but it’s not comprehensible. And when people have done linguistic analyses of speaking in tongues, it does not correspond to any clear linguistic structure. So it seems to be distinct from language itself. That’s interesting because we did not see activity in the language areas of the brain. Of course, if somebody is a deep believer in speaking in tongues, the source of the vocalizations is very clear. It’s coming from outside the person. It’s coming through the spirit of God. 11 They found decreased activity in the brain's frontal lobes, an area associated with self-control. One of the researchers, Andrew Newberg, said: "It’s fascinating because these subjects truly believe that the spirit of God is moving through them and controlling them to speak." The data partly confirms the subjects' beliefs. In fact, the subjects are not in control of their usual language centers as they spoke in tongues. It seems not all tests are being reported, well, read I mean. Let's just place you at a #6 on Dicks scale for right now.
Newberg, who is Principal Investigator in the study, was later interviewed about his team's article in the journal Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging. He stated: "We noticed a number of changes that occurred functionally in the brain. Our finding of decreased activity in the frontal lobes during the practice of speaking in tongues is fascinating because these subjects truly believe that the spirit of God is moving through them and controlling them to speak. Our brain imaging research shows us that these subjects are not in control of the usual language centers during this activity, which is consistent with their description of a lack of intentional control while speaking in tongues." Reference:SPEAKING IN TONGUES: Glossia and Xenoglossia. scientific studies Good enough for me. Doesn't seem at all a closed case.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17822 Joined: Member Rating: 2.2 |
quote: Obviously you don't agree with RAZD's approach at all, jumping to conclusions like that.Since you have missed it, we are discussing a hypothetical case and the question is whether religious experiences should be considered detections of supernatural beings or not. Given that even someone who was considered a 1 on Dawkins scale could reasonably accept my argument your conclusion is seriously divorced from reality. (They could easily hold that investigation would NOT lead to the hypothetical situation we are discussing, and in fact that quite likely would - to raise just one point) quote: RAZD has badly confused you, to the point where you keep missing all my corrections. I hope he will apologise to you for misleading you so badly. The question of whether supernatural beings exist or not is not part of my argument at all.
quote: Religious experiences, as the term is usually used. And let me remind you that we are dealing with a hypothetical situation. Your report is interesting, but not really relevant. Self control in this context seems to refer to inhibiting inappropriate actions. It isn't really that surprising that a rather exhibitionistic action is possibly associated with a lack of inhibition. I say possibly associated because the frontal lobes do a lot, so jumping on one function seems rather premature. The absence of language function is a little more interesting, but tends to support the idea that the "speech" is meaningless babble - just as your link says that it seems to be. Do you really think that your God would make people babble meaninglessly ?
quote: And this is why you should be careful about jumping into conversations. You have completely missed the fact that we are talking about a hypothetical situation. You can't rate someone on Dawkin's scale by simply considering the situations they are prepared to entertain for the sake of argument.
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Wounded King Member Posts: 4149 From: Cincinnati, Ohio, USA Joined:
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It seems not all tests are being reported, well, read I mean. On the contrary it seems they are being reported and twisted to fit the preconceived beliefs of the religious. I particularly like how after the quote from Andrew Newberg ...
It’s fascinating because these subjects truly believe that the spirit of God is moving through them and controlling them to speak. ... the writer of that piece claims that the evidence supports this and then goes on to describe something which doesn't support it at all. The fact that there is a lack of intentional control is in no way any confirmation that God is moving through them and controlling them.
Good enough for me. That says more about you than it does about this research. The actual paper is available in pdf form here. TTFN, WK
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 284 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
Im still not sure how you can be sure that one's experience can be tested to not be SN? Brain funtion shows it's due to natural causes? Er ... yes. Yes it does. What with the brain being natural. And really, I hardly know what to say to people who think that glossolalia is miraculous. Apparently the Christians of these latter days don't have the ability to heal the blind or raise the dead ... but they do have the miraculous power to talk gibberish. The only less impressive miracle is the Toronto Blessing, where people are gifted with the miraculous power to fall over. It seems that while useful miracles are left undone, God busies himself with making the devout behave like stroke victims. If you really believe that this is the way in which a supposedly omnipotent God has chosen to manifest his power and his glory, then does this not raise some awkward questions? Such as: "Seriously, God, what the fuck?" Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.
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Chuck77 Inactive Member
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Wounded King writes: On the contrary it seems they are being reported and twisted to fit the preconceived beliefs of the religious. Good one. Here from the Pdf
3. Results The data between the glossolalia and singing state revealed several significant rCBF differences (see Table 1 and Fig. 1). There were significant decreases in the prefrontal cortices, left caudate and left temporal pole while there were increases in the left superior parietal lobe (SPL) and right amygdala. There was a significant negative correlation (R=−0.90, P=0.03) between the singing and glossolalia thalamic LI, indicating that the more the thalamic activity was asymmetric to begin with, the more the asymmetry reversed during glossolalia. It seems you are twisting it, not the researchers.
Wounded King quotes writes: It’s fascinating because these subjects truly believe that the spirit of God is moving through them and controlling them to speak. How about the rest of your cherry pick now:
Our brain imaging research shows us that these subjects are not in control of the usual language centers during this activity, which is consistent with their description of a lack of intentional control while speaking in tongues." Fail
The fact that there is a lack of intentional control is in no way any confirmation that God is moving through them and controlling them. Wow, you got me. Yes, good point. See PaulK for further experiments/studies which disprove beyond all doubt that the SN does indeed not exist.
That says more about you than it does about this research. Wow, again, you are not making a case by simply saying "your wrong chuck". It was a simple study that says Our brain imaging research shows us that these subjects are not in control of the usual language centers during this activity Wounded King writes: The actual paper is available in pdf form here. Yes, that is ummm, the actually paper. And?
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fearandloathing Member (Idle past 4144 days) Posts: 990 From: Burlington, NC, USA Joined: |
Let's look at speaking in tongues. I think the area of the brain that causes people to speak in tongues is the same one that is used when creationist compose incoherent word-salad rants. Writing in tongue if you will. Now I will moderate myself....
"No sympathy for the devil; keep that in mind. Buy the ticket, take the ride...and if it occasionally gets a little heavier than what you had in mind, well...maybe chalk it off to forced conscious expansion: Tune in, freak out, get beaten." Hunter S. Thompson Ad astra per aspera Nihil curo de ista tua stulta superstitione.
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Chuck77 Inactive Member |
PaulK writes: the question is whether religious experiences should be considered detections of supernatural beings or not. Detections or reigious experiences? The next time im praying and God speaks to me what would you like me to do? How about when the holy spirit speaks to me in my spirit what test should we conclude that I am lying and in no way is it really happening and im just imagining it?
Given that even someone who was considered a 1 on Dawkins scale could reasonably accept my argument your conclusion is seriously divorced from reality. Of course it's possible I missed it. What did i miss?...what does this meanTo be precise, by watching brain function we have no inputs that are unaccounted for and all point to a natural origin of the experience, thus we can say that the experience is the product of natural causes, and it does not detect supernatural beings ??
PaulK writes: The question of whether supernatural beings exist or not is not part of my argument at all I understand Paul. The religious experiences have to be brought about by a specific being of the SN. Religious experiences are not just eureka moments of enlightenment. They are meetings with God. Who is....SN.
Your report is interesting, Well thanks
but not really relevant. Well, I thought it would add to the experiements that are hypothetically disproving the SN as simply brain funtion.
The absence of language function is a little more interesting, Well, thank you again. You should help Wounded King learn how ro read like you do.
but tends to support the idea that the "speech" is meaningless babble Indeed it is."Tongues" as it were, is a Heavenly language and doesn't make any sense to our natural minds. It's a gift from God for us to be able to communicate with him from our spirit man. Romans 8:26 says:
Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. It's not meant to be understood. Unless you have the gift of interpretation Seriously tho.
PaulK writes: You can't rate someone on Dawkin's scale by simply considering the situations they are prepared to entertain for the sake of argument My bad. So what are you on the scale if you don't mind me asking?
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RAZD Member (Idle past 1405 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined:
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Hi crashfrog,
If not by evidence, then by what basis should reasonable people arrive at conclusions, given the frequency with which the human brain has experiences that are not rooted in any physical reality? And if you don't have a means to gather empirical objective evidence, a means to actually test for supernatural presence, then can you justify elimination of concepts supported by subjective evidence? It is important to distinguish between those things that can be measured and cataloged and tested and replicated, from those that can't. It is also important to note that those things that can be measured and cataloged and tested and replicated, do not necessarily form a complete picture.
In 2000, one in sixteen Americans suffered from a profound mental illness. I would estimate that frequency to be perhaps ten times the frequency of reported experiences of the supernatural, and that's a very generous estimate. (A factor of ten too generous, perhaps.) Of course, every living human being has regular nocturnal experiences of impossible things, unmoored in any reality; we call them "dreams." Given this enormous propensity for the human brain to invent "experiences" from whole cloth - experiences that frequently cannot be discerned as fictions until much later - is it reasonable for a person to substitute experience for evidence? Aren't you just lumping religious experience with "profound mental illness" to imply one is the other? Aren't you just lumping religious experience with "nocturnal experiences of impossible things, unmoored in any reality" to imply one is the other and that religious experiences are "unmoored in any reality" by association? But, your question of evidence raises, are you not including the lack of any measurement of supernatural presence in your opinion here, when no means of measuring or detecting supernatural presence has been employed? Consider Ben Franklin with his kite flying in a storm and no means to measure electricity. Can he claim that electricity is present in the lightening?Can he claim that electricity is not present in the lightening? OR is there insufficient evidence to determine whether or not electricity is present?
I think we all implicitly understand that it is not, as evidenced by the way that we do not particularly privilege second-hand accounts of "supernatural" experiences. ... You speak your opinion and attribute it to everyone. This is a logical fallacy. Not everyone believes as you do, there are people that "privilege second-hand accounts of "supernatural" experiences" (or in more simple terms, believe them).
... Some people make an exception for their own experience but I see no reason why they should. Why should I privilege an experience I would otherwise discount simply because I'm the one it happened to? There's nothing special about me. So if you were in the swamps of Louisiana and saw an Ivory Billed Woodpecker, you would automatically discount the experience as an hallucination because it happened to you and there is nothing special about you? Enjoy.by our ability to understand Rebel American Zen Deist ... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ... to share. Join the effort to solve medical problems, AIDS/HIV, Cancer and more with Team EvC! (click)
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PaulK Member Posts: 17822 Joined: Member Rating: 2.2 |
quote: RAZD is the one suggesting that they might be detections. I am pointing out that his assertion that we cannot possibly determine if that is true or not is false. As to your questions, submitting to a scientific study, if there were one available. I hope you will at least admit that there are reasons to be skeptikal of the idea that it is real communication.
quote: It means that normal people are capable of considering hypothetical situations without believing that they are true or even might be true. Do you lack this capacity ? Or did you not only miss the fact that we were discussing a hypothetical situation, but my explicit statements to that effect ?
quote: Clearly you do NOT understand. I said nothing like that at all.
quote: The fact that people who are babbling nonsense sounds in public have low brain activity in areas which help form coherent speech and areas which might act to prevent them doing something silly like babbling nonsense sounds in public is actually helpful in that respect. Although the fact that they are babbling nonsense sounds is more important.
quote: The linguistic analysis suggests that it has no meaning to anyone (and why would anyone need to have God put words in a special language into their mouths to communicate with Him?). And how can actually uttering noises be "groanings that cannot be uttered"? Wouldn't it make more sense to see that passage as referring to purely spiritual communication?
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1466 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined:
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And if you don't have a means to gather empirical objective evidence, a means to actually test for supernatural presence, then can you justify elimination of concepts supported by subjective evidence? I can justify the elimination of anything for which there is no evidence by the simple fact that there is no evidence. Absence of evidence is evidence of absence. And if "subjective evidence" is, in fact, not evidence, then anything "supported by subjective evidence" can be so discarded.
It is also important to note that those things that can be measured and cataloged and tested and replicated, do not necessarily form a complete picture. I'm not talking about whether the picture is complete - obviously, human knowledge being contingent we know that the picture is not complete - but whether there's anything that can fill in the picture besides drawing conclusions based on verifiable evidence. The question isn't whether something exists if science has no knowledge of it. The question is: if science has no knowledge of it, from what basis can we claim that it exists? Ignorance cannot be the basis of knowledge.
Aren't you just lumping religious experience with "profound mental illness" to imply one is the other? Not at all. I'm simply suggesting that, given the likelihood that a random person is suffering a profound mental illness this year, there aren't many conclusions that we can draw from someone's report of having an experience we can't otherwise explain. Even if the "report" is your report to yourself.
But, your question of evidence raises, are you not including the lack of any measurement of supernatural presence in your opinion here Not at all.
Consider Ben Franklin with his kite flying in a storm and no means to measure electricity. Under those circumstances it would be better for Ben Franklin to return inside and not attempt to draw any inferences at all about whether lightning is an electric phenomenon. But that doesn't seem to be analogous to your position on the supernatural; you seem to believe that the lack of knowledge and evidence about the supernatural forms a convenient void in which to pour your own conclusions about it, and then declare them proof against challenge because nothing can be known about them. When we don't know something, the appropriate response is to say "I don't know", not to jump to conclusions.
Not everyone believes as you do, there are people that "privilege second-hand accounts of "supernatural" experiences" (or in more simple terms, believe them). Perhaps a small number of overly-credulous individuals do; they may have a mental illness or be deficient in some other way. But such a person attempting to believe all second-hand accounts of the supernatural would be put in the position of believing a large number of mutually contradictory things. After all, as many visions of Mohammad affirming Islam as the true faith have appeared to Muslims as visions of the Virgin Mary affirming the primacy of Christianity have appeared to Christians. Many have experienced the Buddha's claim that all other faiths are in error, and that one must "escape the net" or lose one's chance of enlightenment. And, of course, the secular atheist's experience of the non-existence of the supernatural in all its forms must be taken into account, as well. So we see that the truth is that all people, even yourself, reject at least some second-hand claims about the supernatural.
So if you were in the swamps of Louisiana and saw an Ivory Billed Woodpecker, you would automatically discount the experience as an hallucination because it happened to you and there is nothing special about you? No, but I wouldn't consider it ironclad proof that the scientific consensus that the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker is extinct was wrong, either. I would apply no less skepticism to my account than I would the same account by someone else. Did I hallucinate? Did I misidentify a common bird? My own certainty of the veracity of the reported experience should be no more significant or meaningful to me than someone else's certainty of the veracity of theirs. What's so special about me?
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