A revolution in thought

[Spacemonkey]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

Call me a liar. You blew it big time.

What are you talking about? I didn't call you a liar. I just pointed out that you wrongly claimed you had said you were again going to send me the book. You were obviously mistaken about what you had said.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

I'm not sending you the book.

Why? What is your excuse this time? Why are you reneging and going back on your word? Why are you breaking your promise?

Originally Posted by peacegirl

Don't ever ask me for a copy of the book again. Blame me all you want.

I do blame you. You are breaking your promise and giving no reason for doing so. Is my blame preventing your conscience from correctly operating here?

Originally Posted by peacegirl

This has everything to do with your game playing and your manipulation.

What are you talking about? You said your final proof had arrived, so I asked when you'd be sending me the copy you promised. You then threw a tantrum and decided to renege on our agreement, and since then I've been trying to work out why.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

I am done talking about this, so don't post anything related to this issue. I hope you hear me, or I will take it upon myself to delete your posts.

As I've reminded you before, you don't have the ability to delete my posts. As long as you persist in breaking your word, I think I'm entitled to ask why.

[LadyShea]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

I really don't care. Only time will tell who is right.

How will time tell who is right? Why is more time necessary to make this determination? What information is needed that won't be available until some time in the future?

Originally Posted by peacegirl

So then why are you fighting me on this so hard? Lessans' definition of determinism 100% accurate and useful.

You seem to think that if someone doesn't believe in free will, that makes Lessans description of determinism more believable to them. That's why you're searching for those who accept determinism already.

His explanations and definition are not compelling. His reasoning was poor and fallacious.

You're missing the entire concept of what having no free will actually implies.

Not what it implies, what Lessans inferred from it. I am not missing anything. I understand your position I just don't find any reason to think it's the best description of reality.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

Thus, you are using the word "choice" as if we actually have one, but in reality we don't have a choice.

If we cannot be forced to do something we don't want to do, as Lessans said, we have a choice in actions based on what we don't want to do.

Perhaps we don't have a choice in what we want or don't want and our desires are determined, but I can absolutely choose how and whether to act on those desires. That's enough for me.

No, science has not offered hard evidence that light is all we need to decode an image. This is a logical assumption.

Sure it has offered hard evidence that the eyes are a sense organ. You just refuse to study it.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

You are concluding that his observations are flawed just because he didn't dissect the eye. His observations are accurate and they contradict the established theory of afferent vision.

I am concluding he was wrong because he made a demonstrably wrong statement about the structure of the eyes.

That 1+1=2 can be demonstrated to anyone at any time and even transcends language.It can be proven with a couple of apples, so that's a bad analogy.

As I already said, he didn't have to dissect the eye to understand how the brain and eyes work. Dissecting the eye doesn't give us ample evidence either as to what the brain and eyes are doing. There is a lot of unmapped territory when it comes to understanding the brain, so for you to so adamantly say he made glaring mistakes is foolhardy.

Dissection gives us ample evidence that the eyes contain afferent receptor neurons, which he said don't exist. He made a really incorrect statement, so why should I consider anything he says about vision at all since he didn't even know the most basic thing?

And, there is absolutely zero unmapped territory when it comes to photography, we know 100% how cameras work. They have no brains to worry about. They absolutely use received light to create an image, and that means the image created is subject to the light travel time delay. If photographs match what we see, that proves we don't see in real time.

This man worked for 30 years on making his demonstration as clear as possible. For you to judge him in any way is wrong and out of bounds.

You should quit calling what he did science then if you don't want the work judged as science is judged.

Oh my god, you don't know what you're talking about. There are no mistakes; and when you say it was poorly thought out, you are sounding assinine. There are absolutely no fallacies, no flaws, and no leaps of faith.

LOL, and you sound like a dogmatic fundie talking about the Bible

Once again, you need to stop using your criteria to judge this knowledge. It's incomplete.

Who's criteria should I use then? And you keep saying "incomplete" meaning I am missing a criteria. Imagine a checklist of criteria for evaluating claims, what's missing from mine do you think?

[Vivisectus]

Originally Posted by Peacegirl

It depends on who you talk to. Some people don't care about having another planet to go to. Not everyone believes in using their tax dollars on a private enterprise. Healthcare is something everyone needs.

Then you concede my point, and your objection is refuted: there is ample benefit to believing in a flat earth.

Originally Posted by Peacegirl

I'm not asking you to wait for empirical evidence to materialize.

Au contraire - the plaintive call of "Why can’t you wait for the empirical evidence?" used to resound from this board like the eery call of Gavia Immer. You have told me and others exactly that on many occasions. Are you that forgetful or are you just telling a convenient lie?

You can continue to believe that the eyes are a sense organ and man's will is free, if you want to. But he has offered more than an assertion, which is what you're all making it out to be.

I am not talking about that at all: I am talking about the shameful way in which you are dismissing the flat-earth theory out of hand, joining in with your cronies to attack an idea just because it upsets your cosy little world-view. The flat-earth theory has a lot of evidence in favour of it, as you would see if you actually bothered to study it. Tell me, what are the two different models proposed by flat-earth theory scholars? I bet you cannot even tell me, and here you are shooting of your mouth and discrediting these brilliant scholars, ruining it for everyone.

Originally Posted by Peacegirl

I appreciate how you have tried to compare me to a flat earther, but you can't compare the two. Lessans does have proof that man's will is not free, they have no substantial proof that the earth is flat. If taxpayers want to use their money in that direction, that's their business, but it's not their business to use my tax money in this direction if I don't want it used this way. Lessans is not asking for funding.

And here we go again – a “flat-earther” is automatically something that you would be ashamed to be compared to, and you assume that they do not have proof to back up their ideas without even studying the evidence that they offer. Unlike some people I could mention, they have at least made an attempt to make a case for their idea. But without even having studied the proof that they offer, you have dismissed this idea out of hand, poisoning the minds of all the other posters with your queen-bee attitude. I am disgusted by the way you never even give this idea a chance, and all that before the empirical evidence is even in!

What makes this particularly unfair is that they offer a lot more evidence than you offer for your positions on conscience and the nature of sight. This just proves how biased you are, and that your rejection is just an emotional reaction to the challenge to your world-view.

This is hypocritical in the extreme, since:

1: You have not read the book(s), so your opinion on any part of the book(s) that have been explained to you is automatically invalid.

2: You yourself advocate that in such cases as these, where someone has acutely observed some relations, it is vital that we believe him completely and assume he is correct while we wait for empirical evidence to materialize.

3: It would be great if the earth was flat, for we would get a lot of spare money to do good with, and we would have a perfect argument to make people more environmentally conscious, not to mention the further beneficial scientific discoveries that could follow should all scientists embrace the correct (flat) theory.

4: Something else could be going on – science does not deal in certainties, and since there are no certainties in science, this particular idea must be plausible!

[LadyShea]

Some critical thinking criteria checklists for your perusal, perhaps to help identify what criteria I might be missing

Critical Thinking: Critical reading checklist
Critical thinking checklist : s3 : University of Sussex
Critical Thinking Checklist
A Practical Guide To Critical Thinking

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by Spacemonkey

What are you talking about? I didn't call you a liar. I just pointed out that you wrongly claimed you had said you were again going to send me the book. You were obviously mistaken about what you had said.

That's not the reason you blew it Spacemonkey. You blew it because you are disrespectful to my father's work.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

I'm not sending you the book.

Originally Posted by Spacemonkey

Why? What is your excuse this time? Why are you reneging and going back on your word? Why are you breaking your promise?

I am reneging because it makes no sense for me send the book to you. You're not interested in reading it because you think it's a non-discovery, remember? I don't need you to help me. I have enough universities here without spending $50 to send the book to you in New Zealand when it will probably collect dust since whomever you give it to will know what you think about it, and be turned off before he even starts.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

Don't ever ask me for a copy of the book again. Blame me all you want.

Originally Posted by Spacemonkey

I do blame you. You are breaking your promise and giving no reason for doing so. Is my blame preventing your conscience from correctly operating here?

Nope, because I feel justified. If you have no intention of reading the book, I have no reason to send it to you.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

This has everything to do with your game playing and your manipulation.

Originally Posted by Spacemonkey

What are you talking about? You said your final proof had arrived, so I asked when you'd be sending me the copy you promised. You then threw a tantrum and decided to renege on our agreement, and since then I've been trying to work out why.

You still don't understand why you hurt me so deeply, do you?

Originally Posted by peacegirl

I am done talking about this, so don't post anything related to this issue. I hope you hear me, or I will take it upon myself to delete your posts.

Originally Posted by Spacemonkey

As I've reminded you before, you don't have the ability to delete my posts. As long as you persist in breaking your word, I think I'm entitled to ask why.

I told you why. If you had said to me "Of course I want to read the book; you're going out of your way to send it to me, that's the least I could do before I ship it off to some university to get a 'biased' review from the same compatibilist philosophers that hold my position," I would at least know that you were going to give it your undivided attention and read the book in the way that it should have been read from the very beginning. And you know what I meant when I said deleted. It was off the cuff. I meant ignore.

[Vivisectus]

While looking into Flat Earth theory, I came across an awesome resource: the Encyclopedia of the American Loon. Guess who was the very, VERY first entry?

Mighty Mike!

I will inform the person who runs this enclyclopedia that he is missing a very important entry under the L section.

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by Spacemonkey

Why? What is your excuse this time? Why are you reneging and going back on your word? Why are you breaking your promise?

I seem to remember that when she got her copies of this edition the margins weren't quite perfect, so I can understand that she doesn't want to send you an imperfect copy of a perfect book. Perhaps when she sells both copies of this edition, she'll send you a copy from the next edition, but that could be awhile, maybe months?

[Stephen Maturin]

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

Mighty Mike!

Mike Adams, a pyromaniac in a field of strawmen

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by LadyShea

How will time tell who is right? Why is more time necessary to make this determination? What information is needed that won't be available until some time in the future?

The information that you feel is not enough. Therefore, it may take others to recognize the validity of these claims, or to similate a world in which proof can be verified. Time and patience are often required. How many instances has something been said to be wrong when it later turned out to be right?

Originally Posted by peacegirl

It is so inferior that it makes me disgusted that someone like you could come off like such a big shot that she could actually shut this thread down by people joining her bandwagon.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

I have no desire or intention or power to "shut this thread down". You are just spewing sour grapes because you have been unable to convince me that Lessans was anything but a well intentioned man with a flawed idea.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

That is why I am moving on to people who already have a deep intuition that man does not have free will.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

I do not believe man has free will, as I told you when you first started this thread and multiple times after. I don't think free will is a coherent or useful concept at all, actually.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

So then why are you fighting me on this so hard? Lessans' definition of determinism 100% accurate and useful.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

You seem to think that if someone doesn't believe in free will, that makes Lessans description of determinism more believable to them. That's why you're searching for those who accept determinism already.

He only explains it from a different angle but it means the same thing. Determinism means what it says. Our choices are not free and it doesn't matter what definition you are using.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

His explanations and definition are not compelling. His reasoning was poor and fallacious.

This is humorous.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

Did you listen to the lecture I posted? This professor is very much on target. I'm finding more and more people that have come to the conclusion that compatibilism and libertarianism cannot be right, although we need to act as if free will is compatible in order to justify punishment which is the cornerstone of our civilization as it stands.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

The fact that we have the ability to choose whether and how to act, or choose not to act at all, based on our own brain states including contemplations of the factors and possible consequences, is enough for me to conclude that we can be held responsible for our actions.

You're missing the entire concept of what having no free will actually implies.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Not what it implies, what Lessans inferred from it. I am not missing anything. I understand your position I just don't find any reason to think it's the best description of reality.

No, I meant implication.

Decline and Fall of All Evil: Chapter Two: The Two-Sided Equation

p. 66 We have been growing and developing just like a child from
infancy. There is no way a baby can go from birth to old age without
passing through the necessary steps, and no way man could have
reached this tremendous turning point in his life without also going
through the necessary stages of evil. Once it is established, beyond a
shadow of doubt, that will is not free (and here is why my discovery
was never found; no one could ever get beyond this impasse
because of the implications), it becomes absolutely impossible to
hold man responsible for anything he does. Is it any wonder the solution
was never found if it lies hidden beyond this point? If you recall, Durant
assumed that if man was allowed to believe his will is not free it would
lessen his responsibility because this would enable him to blame other
factors as the cause. If he committed crimes, society was to blame; if
he was a fool, it was the fault of the machine which had slipped a cog
in generating him. It is also true that if it had not been for the
development of laws and a penal code, for the constant teaching of
right and wrong, civilization could never have reached the outposts of
this coming Golden Age.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

Thus, you are using the word "choice" as if we actually have one, but in reality we don't have a choice.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

If we cannot be forced to do something we don't want to do, as Lessans said, we have a choice in actions based on what we don't want to do.

Of course we have a choice based on what we don't want to do, but the word choice is misleading because we must move in the direction of greater satisfaction and there is only one possible choice that can be made at each moment in time.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Perhaps we don't have a choice in what we want or don't want and our desires are determined, but I can absolutely choose how and whether to act on those desires. That's enough for me.

That's very true, but just because you can choose how and whether to act on your desires does not mean your will is free. That is the conventional definition of free will, but in actuality being able to choose does not mean will is free in any sense of the term.

p. 43 We are not interested in
opinions and theories regardless of where they originate, just in the
truth, so let’s proceed to the next step and prove conclusively, beyond
a shadow of doubt, that what we do of our own free will (of our own
desire because we want to) is done absolutely and positively not of our
own free will. Remember, by proving that determinism, as the
opposite of free will, is true, we also establish undeniable proof that
free will is false.”

Originally Posted by peacegirl

There is something misguided by the idea that the eyes work like the other four.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

No, there isn't. You have been unable to point out any rational or valid reason to think that. You have simply formed a strong belief in your father's teachings to you and desire others to share your belief. Again this is not my problem, or a problem with science, or a problem with reality.

You're right about that, but whose reality are we talking about? Science in this case is making certain assumptions, and those assumptions are inaccurate.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

No, science has offered hard evidence, not assumptions at all. That you parrot Lessans on that, and refuse to review the evidence, just indicates your dogmatic adherence to the teachings from Lessans you got your whole life.

No, science has not offered hard evidence that light is all we need to decode an image. This is a logical assumption.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Sure it has offered hard evidence that the eyes are a sense organ. You just refuse to study it.

It has not offered the hard evidence you think it has. You just refuse to believe it.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

That's what this whole thread has been about; the eyes. And there's no way for me to overcome it.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

That's because Lessans was just completely and demonstrably wrong about the eyes. He said there were no "similar afferent structures", meaning similar to those found in the other senses, which is easily refuted by the fact that eyes contain millions of afferent sensory neurons...called rods and cones. Lessans didn't seem to know about them.

All he said was that there were no similiar afferent nerve endings that made direct contact from the outside world to the internal world, except for light which strikes the optic nerve. He did not say the eyes didn't contain nerve receptors.

You are concluding that his observations are flawed just because he didn't dissect the eye. His observations are accurate and they contradict the established theory of afferent vision.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

I am concluding he was wrong because he made a demonstrably wrong statement about the structure of the eyes.

I don't think he did.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

You will continue to use your knowledge of what determines truth to dispell what Lessans has observed.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Of course I will, as will all people. What do you expect people to use to determine what is likely true other than what they personally use to determine what is likely true? Everyone has their own criteria for evaluating claims, I've stated mine plainly and repeatedly.

But don't you see that in this case the criteria you are using is incomplete?

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Why would I "see" that? It isn't the case at all from my perspective.

That's what I mean when I say that you're criteria to determine what is true is incomplete. This isn't a matter of opinion LadyShea. That's like saying I don't see how one plus one is two. According to my perspective, it's 11. That doesn't mean your perspective is right.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

That 1+1=2 can be demonstrated to anyone at any time and even transcends language.It can be proven with a couple of apples, so that's a bad analogy.

This knowledge also transcends langauge. Just because it's more difficult to observe than one plus one equals two doesn't mean it's not part of the real world and observed by those who can see it.

“But,” you might reply, “that’s just common sense;
everyone knows that.” Well it is just this common sense; that sense
common to us all that I am making the very foundation of this book.
It is for this reason that what I write will be understood not only by
those who can read the English language, but by the entire literate
world.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

You will come across people with other criteria that they will use...it's how human beings are. Why do you act like this is some strange phenomena that only I display?

I didn't say it's just you that displays this strange phenomena. But what I am saying is that Lessans saw something different when it comes to the eyes based on his observations, and I believe it is worth investigating.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

I disagree that they are worth investigating, because he made some very glaring mistakes, such about the anatomy of they eye as I described above. He apparently knew nothing at all about the eyes...so why are his "observations" regarding their form and function worth anything at all?

As I already said, he didn't have to dissect the eye to understand how the brain and eyes work. Dissecting the eye doesn't give us ample evidence either as to what the brain and eyes are doing. There is a lot of unmapped territory when it comes to understanding the brain, so for you to so adamantly say he made glaring mistakes is foolhardy.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Dissection gives us ample evidence that the eyes contain afferent receptor neurons, which he said don't exist. He made a really incorrect statement, so why should I consider anything he says about vision at all since he didn't even know the most basic thing?

To repeat: He didn't say that the eyes have no afferent receptor neurons. He said that there were no similar afferent nerve endings that make direct contact from the outside world to the inside world as is the case with sound, taste, and hearing and smell.

Decline and Fall of All Evil: Chapter Four: Words, Not Reality

p. 116 What is seen through the eyes is an efferent experience.
If a lion roared in that room a newborn baby would hear the sound
and react because this impinges on the eardrum and is then
transmitted to the brain. The same holds true for anything that
makes direct contact with an afferent nerve ending, but this is far
from the case with the eyes because there is no similar afferent nerve
ending in this organ. The brain records various sounds, tastes,
touches and smells in relation to the objects from which these
experiences are derived, and then looks through the eyes to see these
things that have become familiar as a result of the relation. This
desire is an electric current which turns on or focuses the eyes to see
that which exists — completely independent of man’s perception —
in the external world. He doesn’t see these objects because they strike
the optic nerve; he sees them because they are there to be seen. But
in order to look, there must be a desire to see. The child becomes
aware that something will soon follow something else which then
arouses attention, anticipation, and a desire to see the objects of the
relation. Consequently, to include the eyes as one of the senses when
this describes stimuli from the outside world making contact with a
nerve ending is completely erroneous and equivalent to calling a
potato, a fruit. Under no conditions can the eyes be called a sense
organ unless, as in Aristotle’s case, it was the result of an inaccurate
observation that was never corrected.”

Originally Posted by LadyShea

And, there is absolutely zero unmapped territory when it comes to photography, we know 100% how cameras work. They have no brains to worry about. They absolutely use received light to create an image, and that means the image created is subject to the light travel time delay. If photographs match what we see, that proves we don't see in real time.

You're assuming the very thing that is being argued. No one is denying that light must be at the film but to say that the image created is subject to light travel time delay long after the object or event is no longer present, remains a theory.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Nobody is fully objective in this world, because each person is an individual with a brain full of knowledge, experiences, memories, and chemistry. That's what makes evidence a much better way to evaluate claims.

It's a good way, but not all truth is found this way. How could he have gathered data when he didn't start out with a hypothesis? He never intended to make a discovery LadyShea.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

So? Hypotheses always come after observation in science, why didn't he take the next step?

This man worked for 30 years on making his demonstration as clear as possible. For you to judge him in any way is wrong and out of bounds.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

You should quit calling what he did science then if you don't want the work judged as science is judged.

This is just as much a scientific discovery as any other scientific discovery made in the history of our world. You don't like it because he didn't use the method that you believe is necessary for proof. Sorry to say that it's not the only tool in the toolbox that can be used to determine the accuracy of the observations made.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

His reasoning was nothing but opinion, because he gave us nothing to review independently to see if we reached the same conclusions or even determine if his conclusions followed from his observations. We have no idea what he observed ata ll...what behaviors or what phenomena did he see with his own eyes? I followed his reasoning, but I think it was poorly thought out and he committed fallacies and huge leaps of logic. What part of that is difficult for you to understand?

Oh my god, you don't know what you're talking about. There are no mistakes; and when you say it was poorly thought out, you are sounding assinine. There are absolutely no fallacies, no flaws, and no leaps of faith.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

LOL, and you sound like a dogmatic fundie talking about the Bible

That's your safety net when things get tough. Telling me that I sound like a fundie which gets you immediately off the hook is an easy cop-out.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

This has put you on equal footing when you don't come close to his abilities. Because of the fact that he didn't have empirical data, you have called this an assertion which is the farthest thing from the truth.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Without data, without information or facts, it is all assertion by the definition of the word assertion.

Once again, you need to stop using your criteria to judge this knowledge. It's incomplete.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Who's criteria should I use then? And you keep saying "incomplete" meaning I am missing a criteria. Imagine a checklist of criteria for evaluating claims, what's missing from mine do you think?

You are missing criteria. His observations. You aren't even taking them seriously which is why you don't see their validity. Here's one: How can a person offer an excuse for what he did [which hurt another] when he's already excused and no one is questioning his conduct?

[Vivisectus]

Originally Posted by Peacegirl

just because you can choose how and whether to act on your desires does not mean your will is free.

If you can choose whether to act on your desires, then will is free. Amazingly you are once again unable to express your own point of view. Your point of view, if we assume for a moment that the confused muddle that you like to come here and dribble all over people justifies that name, is that we can choose according to what we desire: it is just that we cannot choose what those desires are. Your fabulous talent for self-contradiction makes me wonder if perhaps the book originally made some sense, until you got to it.

[Angakuk]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

I can't blame anyone for this tragic loss, because your will is not free.

Your magnanimity is overwhelming.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

That's very true, but just because you can choose how and whether to act on your desires does not mean your will is free. That is the conventional definition of free will, but in actuality being able to choose does not mean will is free in any sense of the term.

Actually, it means just that according to conventional usage, which you just acknowledged.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

How can a person offer an excuse for what he did [which hurt another] when he's already excused and no one is questioning his conduct?

Maybe because he is questioning his own conduct. Some people, when they feel guilty over having engaged in some thought or action, will offer excuses for that thought or action even though no one else is blaming them, holding them responsible or are even aware of the thought or action in question. Why do they offer excuses when no one is blaming then? Probably because they feel guilty and feel the need to excuse themselves to themselves. In other words, offering an excuse, even when no one expects it of them, is a movement in the direction of greater satisfaction.

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

Anyway, I don't see how you get to complain, as your knee-jerk reaction to flat-earth theory clearly proves you are a close-minded and biased jerk, and that you are just pissed off because your cozy little world-view has been challenged. It is disgusting how you are just belittling all these people and making all your little cronies jump on the anti-flat earth bandwagon. It is so unfair: flat-earth theory does not even get a chance! Why won't you wait for the empirical evidence to come in? You must have some sort of complex or something.

You just stated that science isn't carved in stone because of something that TLR said that you didn't understand, so how come you are here on your high horse claiming that round earth theory is a fact like a little ole missy miss?

I understood very well what he said; science is based on a preponderance of evidence. It's true that the observations of a round earth are more reliable than anything the flat earthers are offering, otherwise there would be a lot more people interested in what they have to say. It is also true that because science deals in theory, however strong the evidence may appear, cannot rule out the possibility that their conclusions on a given topic could be mistaken. The round earth theory doesn't have any opponents other than the flat-earthers whose evidence isn't convincing. Their belief regarding the shape of the earth does nothing to improve on what we already know. You can't compare their arguments for a flat earth with what my father is offering, which cannot be denied, if understood, because we're dealing with undeniable observations that are not easily perceived, but true nevertheless.

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

Flat-earthers have been thinking and writing (for at least 8 hours a day, between them) for over a hundred years, perceiving relations left right and centre and observing things in a very astute fashion.

No they haven't. They have not proved that the earth is shaped like a disc.

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

And you think you know it all SOOOO well and just pretend you are all superior to them. Disgusting.

But thats OK because in the end we will win, only it won't be until we are all dead, but when we are, boy will you be sorry and we will be all smug and sanctimonious.

This is a game to you. You are out to make it appear that Lessans is nothing but a crackpot. That's far from the truth Vivisectus, and it's sad that you are comparing Lessans to a flat earther. This makes you guilty of the taboo reaction; a perfect example of the pot calling the kettle black. As Richard Milton stated:

p. 8 Often those who cry taboo do so from the best of motives:
a desire to ensure that our hard-won scientific enlightenment is not
corrupted by the credulous acceptance of crank ideas and that the
community does not slide back into what Sir Karl Popper graphically
called the ‘tyranny of opinion.’ Yet in setting out to guard the
frontiers of knowledge, some scientific purists are adopting a brand of
skepticism that is indistinguishable from the tyranny they seek to
resist. These modern skeptics are sometimes the most unreflecting of
individuals yet their devotion to the cause of science impels them to
appoint themselves guardians of spirit of truth. And this raises the
important question of just how we can tell a real crank from a real
innovator — a Faraday from a false prophet. Merely to dismiss a
carefully prepared body of evidence — however barmy it may appear
— is to make the same mistake as the crank.

[The Lone Ranger]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

I understood very well what he said ...

No. You didn't. At all.

[davidm]

Encyclopedia of American Loons

Entry: Peacegirl

Peacegirl is a tragically deranged Internet troll and malignant mushwit who has spent the last ten years of her sad-sack life chained to a computer, promoting the whakco writings of her brain-damaged father on Internet message boards.

Her father would be included among the American loons, except that he is dead, so peacegirl stands in for him.

Her father, Seymour Lessans, was a seventh-grade dropout, pool hustler and aluminum-siding salesman who devoted his life to reading the writings of Will Durant and the dictionary, which he purportedly read at least seven times over, with little to show for it, evidently. He may also have read the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire or some other shit like that. After thirty years of "research" and "astute observations," Lessans wrote a book, in which he bloviated that if the sun were turned on at noon, people on earth would see it immediately, but not see the people standing next to them for about eight minutes while waiting for the photons to arrive. This was his so-called "second discovery."

In addition to being empirically false, and known to be false for hundreds of years, this claim is conceptually incoherent and so face-palmingly, gob-smackingly dumb that it beggars belief that anyone could claim it. It's as dumb as asserting that a triangle has four sides. It can be proven wrong in about three seconds, but the loon peacegirl sticks to it because her dimwit Daddy wrote it. "Lessans' book is my bible," she stated in a message board post.

Peacegirl also pushes Lessans' "first discovery," which is that "we are compelled of our own free will" to do stuff, never once noticing the idiotic contradiction in the claim. Lessans wrote that he called Will Durant on the phone to hector him on this point, but Durant hung up on him. Later Lessans sued President Carter for not giving him an audience to discuss his "discoveries." Much of his 600-page book is devoted to whining about how his intellectual betters refused to take him seriously. However, the book does contain amusing bits about having sex on the dinner table, translucent sex robes and the vital importance of perfectly prepared spaghetti and meatballs by wives (genitals, according to Lessans) who make a proper study of cooking and don't expect their husbands to share the same beds with them.

The loon peacegirl understandably doesn't like to talk about the loon Lessans' "third discovery," which is that all Jews who were killed by Hitler should not be mad at him, because all those Jews are still alive even though they are dead.

Diagnosis: Harmless but extremely ignorant and arrogant fuck head. A know-nothing, graceless little freak who lies like a rug and repeatedly insults her intellectual and moral betters. Harmless, though, because she and her dim-bulb daddy have not found a single convert to their idiocy. Peacegirl is so loony that she cannot even find a support group of like-minded loons, which makes her, thankfully, an incompetent loon. It also gives some fleeting hope that the American public isn't as dumb as it actually seems to be. Some things, it would seem, are too dumb for anyone (other than peacegirl) to accept, too dumb to accept even for the useless dumb asses who constitute the majority of the populace of the U.S.

In her never-ending and wholly futile Internet tour, it is recommended that she next take her nonsense to the ludicrously misnamed "Talk Rational" message board. Apart from the life sciences forum, it is a sewer infested by vicious know-nothing morons and administered by half-witted jackasses, a place where even the moderators are trolls. No, she won't get a more positive reception there -- in fact she will be called a child molester and receive death threats, and her home address, phone number and other personal info will be relentlessly hunted down and posted, in keeping with the high intellectual and ethical content that the mouth-breathing grotequeries who run the forum like to cultivate. But that will be amusing for lurkers.

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

If you can choose whether to act on your desires, then will is free.

Absolutely not. That's what is being debated. I cannot believe after all this time, and after my clear explanation as to why will is not free, you resort to saying we are free because we can choose.

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

Amazingly you are once again unable to express your own point of view. Your point of view, if we assume for a moment that the confused muddle that you like to come here and dribble all over people justifies that name, is that we can choose according to what we desire: it is just that we cannot choose what those desires are. Your fabulous talent for self-contradiction makes me wonder if perhaps the book originally made some sense, until you got to it.

If I'm hungry, I'm not choosing my desire to want to eat something. If I'm bored, I'm not choosing my desire to want to do something that will be stimulating. If I'm missing my kids, I'm not choosing my desire to want to go visit them? How can we choose what we desire? It is true that we don't have to act on a desire if it's something we don't want to feel. I have a desire for ice cream. I have no control over that (that desire is in my brain right now; chocolate mint chip from Baskin Robbins, yummy), but I don't have to act on that desire and go buy it. In terms of this discovery, how does anything you just said disprove what Lessans has demonstrated?

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by The Lone Ranger

No. You didn't. At all.

Explain it then. I thought a scientific theory meant that, based on the preponderance of evidence, it is regarded as fact for all intents and purposes.

[The Lone Ranger]

NO!


Good gravy. In all this time, have you learned nothing at all? It's not as if I and others haven't explained to you -- repeatedly and in detail -- what a scientific theory actually is.

[LadyShea]

Remember, by proving that determinism, as the
opposite of free will, is true, we also establish undeniable proof that
free will is false.”

False dichotomy

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by The Lone Ranger

NO!


Good gravy. In all this time, have you learned nothing at all? It's not as if I and others haven't explained to you -- repeatedly and in detail -- what a scientific theory actually is.

What? You've never tried to stuff jello into a cannon ball (solid shot)?

[LadyShea]

To repeat: He didn't say that the eyes have no afferent receptor neurons. He said that there were no similar afferent nerve endings that make direct contact from the outside world to the inside world as is the case with sound, taste, and hearing and smell.

Light, from the outside world, makes direct contact with the afferent sensory neurons. So he was still wrong

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Light, from the outside world, makes direct contact with the afferent sensory neurons. So he was still wrong

And it has been demonstrated that the contact results in signals to the brain. Is Peacegirl suggesting that those signals are just meaningless static?

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

Then you concede my point, and your objection is refuted: there is ample benefit to believing in a flat earth.

Not for me. Maybe for these flat-earthers. They can continue to believe what they want to believe, but you can't compare this to my father's discovery which, if confirmed valid, has major implications for our world.

Originally Posted by Peacegirl

I'm not asking you to wait for empirical evidence to materialize.

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

Au contraire - the plaintive call of "Why can’t you wait for the empirical evidence?" used to resound from this board like the eery call of Gavia Immer. You have told me and others exactly that on many occasions. Are you that forgetful or are you just telling a convenient lie?

That's the only thing I can resort to with this group. It does not mean his observations are unclear and need further proof, if you can follow his reasoning. This is not just an assertion.

You can continue to believe that the eyes are a sense organ and man's will is free, if you want to. But he has offered more than an assertion, which is what you're all making it out to be.

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

I am not talking about that at all: I am talking about the shameful way in which you are dismissing the flat-earth theory out of hand, joining in with your cronies to attack an idea just because it upsets your cosy little world-view. The flat-earth theory has a lot of evidence in favour of it, as you would see if you actually bothered to study it. Tell me, what are the two different models proposed by flat-earth theory scholars? I bet you cannot even tell me, and here you are shooting of your mouth and discrediting these brilliant scholars, ruining it for everyone.

I'm not sure; I never delved into it. I'm not ruining it for anyone. If they believe this, then they need to show me the money. If I'm not convinced, I will not go along with it. It's obvious that we lean toward what we believe makes the most sense.

Originally Posted by Peacegirl

I appreciate how you have tried to compare me to a flat earther, but you can't compare the two. Lessans does have proof that man's will is not free, they have no substantial proof that the earth is flat. If taxpayers want to use their money in that direction, that's their business, but it's not their business to use my tax money in this direction if I don't want it used this way. Lessans is not asking for funding.

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

And here we go again – a “flat-earther” is automatically something that you would be ashamed to be compared to, and you assume that they do not have proof to back up their ideas without even studying the evidence that they offer. Unlike some people I could mention, they have at least made an attempt to make a case for their idea. But without even having studied the proof that they offer, you have dismissed this idea out of hand, poisoning the minds of all the other posters with your queen-bee attitude. I am disgusted by the way you never even give this idea a chance, and all that before the empirical evidence is even in!

It's true because in this case I took for granted that science had it right. I don't go around arguing with established theories just for the fun of it. I happened to be Lessans' daughter, but that's not why I'm espousing these principles. I see the validity of these principles for myself. I'm not just a puppet on a string.

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

What makes this particularly unfair is that they offer a lot more evidence than you offer for your positions on conscience and the nature of sight. This just proves how biased you are, and that your rejection is just an emotional reaction to the challenge to your world-view.

Not really. I don't have to understand their ideas on conscience or the nature of sight to know that my father's observations on these issues were spot on. And I don't need to know all of the theories on freedom of the will, determinism and compatibilism to know that his understanding of determinism is spot on, and therefore the most useful.

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

This is hypocritical in the extreme, since:

1: You have not read the book(s), so your opinion on any part of the book(s) that have been explained to you is automatically invalid.

You're right. I haven't read the books so I don't have the right to argue the points they have made.

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

2: You yourself advocate that in such cases as these, where someone has acutely observed some relations, it is vital that we believe him completely and assume he is correct while we wait for empirical evidence to materialize.

I never said you have to believe him completely if you don't see the relations for yourself. I said you'll have to wait, that's all.

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

3: It would be great if the earth was flat, for we would get a lot of spare money to do good with, and we would have a perfect argument to make people more environmentally conscious, not to mention the further beneficial scientific discoveries that could follow should all scientists embrace the correct (flat) theory.

I don't understand how the earth being flat would make us more environmentally conscious, or would give us spare money. If it was true, then we probably would find other discoveries based on this knowledge, but so far it seems that we were able to get to the moon after learning that the earth was round, so I'm not sure how they overcome this.

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

4: Something else could be going on – science does not deal in certainties, and since there are no certainties in science, this particular idea must be plausible!

Nope, this particular idea doesn't necessarily get equal treatment just because science doesn't deal in certainties. It depends on what they bring to the table. If it refutes what we know mathematically to be true (Nasa deals in mathematics), then it won't stand up to scrutiny and it will rightfully belong in the woo category.

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Light, from the outside world, makes direct contact with the afferent sensory neurons. So he was still wrong

Light makes contact but not without the object in view LadyShea. He said light causes certain reactions, which it does. It is a necessary condition of sight (without light we cannot see anything) but there is no direct contact between the nerve ending and the brain that would allow the visual stimuli (the image) to be decoded. Nothing I say will make a difference. You'll have to wait for further empirical evidence if you care to. If not, stick with your beliefs. This isn't nearly as important as his other discovery, which I don't want to go on the back burner.

[LadyShea]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

Light makes contact but not without the object in view LadyShea. He said light causes certain reactions, which it does. It is a necessary condition of sight (without light we cannot see anything) but there is no direct contact between the nerve ending and the brain that would allow the visual stimuli (the image) to be decoded.

What does that have to do with what Lessans claimed?

He said "If a lion roared in that room a newborn baby would hear the sound
and react because this impinges on the eardrum and is then
transmitted to the brain. The same holds true for anything that
makes direct contact with an afferent nerve ending, but this is far
from the case with the eyes because there is no similar afferent nerve
ending in this organ."

What he said was demonstrably incorrect since light makes direct contact with afferent neurons in the eyes.

And what on Earth do you mean there is no direct contact between the nerve ending and the brain?? Are you seriously making a claim about neural anatomy...which you know nothing about?

[LadyShea]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

No one is denying that light must be at the film but to say that the image created is subject to light travel time delay long after the object or event is no longer present, remains a theory.

These Hubble images are not theoretical, they are not imaginary, they exist. These are facts HubbleSite - Hubble Deep Field

Originally Posted by peacegirl

This is just as much a scientific discovery as any other scientific discovery made in the history of our world. You don't like it because he didn't use the method that you believe is necessary for proof. Sorry to say that it's not the only tool in the toolbox that can be used to determine the accuracy of the observations made.

No, it is the method necessary for what he did to be called science.