Is Uncompromising Rude Reality Too Much?

[CJK]

Could the comfort of living in a subjective reality be the pull factor for any faith?

[QED]

People experience the miraculous.

No, people experience things they cannot explain. Humans, being a curious species, create explanations that appeal to their sense of awe, hence inventing miracles. It's not the event, but the ad hoc explanation that makes the miracle.

There was a time when it was a "miracle" every time there was an eclipse of the sun. Today, we know better.

Well said Cephus. People also generally overestimate their connection with "reality" by a considerable factor. The actual situation is very different: huge short-cuts are taken between our sensory and perception systems. This is the reason why we can digitally compress audio and video by factors of 10 to 100 without losing appreciable fidelity. But this also gives us a tendency to read significance into insignificant stimuli.

It is very likely though that many people today are wholly unaware of this loose connection between reality and their perception of reality. I've just enjoyed reading a book by Richard Robinson called "Why the toast always lands butter side down" subtitled "The science of Murphy's law". This uncontroversial book is full of fascinating implications arising from the way we perceive the world and I think it does a good job of illuminating the shortfalls between what we think is going on and what is actually going on in the world around us.

One conclusion that can be drawn from this is that people in the ancient world would have been very much more under the impression that they had a "direct connection" to the world through their senses such that anything they felt they had experienced must have happened in reality. This would certainly explain why reports of miraculous events have tailed-off through the ages.

[harvey1]

It is very likely though that many people today are wholly unaware of this loose connection between reality and their perception of reality

This is how I translate that statement, "It is very likely though that most people today are idiots, and their perception of reality should be like us smart metaphysical naturalists who don't believe anything that doesn't match up with our metaphysical natural position."

QED, it's your metaphysical naturalism which is wrong. Not the people having their experiences of the miraculous.

One conclusion that can be drawn from this is that people in the ancient world would have been very much more under the impression that they had a "direct connection" to the world through their senses such that anything they felt they had experienced must have happened in reality. This would certainly explain why reports of miraculous events have tailed-off through the ages.

The causative factors that people used to explain nature were metaphysical-based then, and they are metaphysical-based now. It's just that today some people think that their concepts have eliminated metaphysical terms when they really haven't. A natural cause is still very much a metaphysical event, and just because some wish it not to be so, does not make it so.

[QED]

Hello Harvey. I trust all is well with you

It is very likely though that many people today are wholly unaware of this loose connection between reality and their perception of reality

This is how I translate that statement, "It is very likely though that most people today are idiots, and their perception of reality should be like us smart metaphysical naturalists who don't believe anything that doesn't match up with our metaphysical natural position."

Why do you feel the need to "translate" what I wrote I wonder? I thought I wrote it in fairly plain English and I meant exactly what I said -- not what you said. And I also gave my reasons for saying it as well, so how do you address those? If we can throw away 10 to 100 times the data coming in through our senses and still perceive things clearly then it follows that under certain conditions one tenth to one hundredth of a signal is all we need to extract from the noise of the world in order to trigger the clear perception of an event which never actually occurred. This is how our minds are known to work now. This was not always understood, and I would guess it has only been known about in any quantitative way since the middle of the last century.

QED, it's your metaphysical naturalism which is wrong. Not the people having their experiences of the miraculous.

Maybe at some higher level of abstraction, yes -- my metaphysical naturalism may indeed be wrong -- but when it comes to the vagaries of human perception I think you really ought to recant a little here and admit that it has been established beyond all doubt that humans do indeed use such shortcuts that render them prone to being deceived in their perceptions. This is very easy to prove in any number of different ways, and hence I can easily stand by my claim that much (if not all) of what seems odd or contrary to physics has a probable explanation that lies within the indirect link that transfers reality from our sensors to our conscious minds.

The causative factors that people used to explain nature were metaphysical-based then, and they are metaphysical-based now. It's just that today some people think that their concepts have eliminated metaphysical terms when they really haven't. A natural cause is still very much a metaphysical event, and just because some wish it not to be so, does not make it so.

Irrespective of whether your viewpoint here is valid or not, the fact remains that evolution has led to a whole set of processing shortcuts which render our perception prone to error. It's pointless for you to protest that the whole world operates on a different metaphysics -- we would still get the same cock-eyed view of it regardless.

[Cephus]

It is very likely though that many people today are wholly unaware of this loose connection between reality and their perception of reality. I've just enjoyed reading a book by Richard Robinson called "Why the toast always lands butter side down" subtitled "The science of Murphy's law". This uncontroversial book is full of fascinating implications arising from the way we perceive the world and I think it does a good job of illuminating the shortfalls between what we think is going on and what is actually going on in the world around us.

Humans seek out patterns in the world around them and tend to ignore the disordered. When they find those "patterns" (whether they really exist or not), some people claim that it proves the existence of something greater, because these "patterns" could not exist otherwise. In the end, it's all a bunch of wishful thinking and poor perceptions, not that some around here would ever admit such things, their entire theology depends on it.

[QED]

I watched a very powerful demonstration of the problems with human perception on TV the other evening. It was a program about the UFO sightings around Phoenix Arizona in 1997. Many people captured a strange formation of orange lights on video and all manner of reports came flooding in to the Police and media. People became swept-up with the idea that the lights represented the outline of some vast extraterrestrial spaceship and to begin with it really did seem to be a mystery. But then the video was processed and overlaid with an image of a distant mountain range which clearly showed the bright dots going out one-by-one as they went behind the peaks. Not only did this put the lights in a totally different position when compared to the eye-witness reports, but it also provided the explanation for the source of the lights -- A-10's were dropping flares in an exercise on the other side of the range.

Now I'm not such a skeptic as to dismiss this sort of thing out of hand, indeed, the producers kept the explanation a secret until quite near the end of the program and I have to confess that I found myself looking at the video and eye-witness accounts with a great deal of fascination. If I had experienced what those people did at first hand I might easily have been swept-up with the hysteria as well. This tells me how fallible our perception can be, and if it's possible to allow our preconceived notions to influence our thoughts to this degree in this day and age, I can easily see how much more things might have gotten out of hand in the pre-scientific age.

I certainly don't think the answer to UFO sightings is that our metaphysical assumptions are out of kilter with reality and I think this has an important lesson for us when we consider all other reports of metaphysical events.

[harvey1]

I also gave my reasons for saying it as well, so how do you address those? If we can throw away 10 to 100 times the data coming in through our senses and still perceive things clearly then it follows that under certain conditions one tenth to one hundredth of a signal is all we need to extract from the noise of the world in order to trigger the clear perception of an event which never actually occurred. This is how our minds are known to work now. This was not always understood, and I would guess it has only been known about in any quantitative way since the middle of the last century.

The ultimate test for any perceptual system is whether that entity survives and prospers given the adequacy or inadequancy of their perceptions compared to the reality of the situation. Our survival depended on detecting that there were leopards in the nearby trees, and so I don't think that you can take exceptions of perceptual fallibilities and make that into a rule that non-metaphysical naturalists are bumbling fools.

I think you really ought to recant a little here and admit that it has been established beyond all doubt that humans do indeed use such shortcuts that render them prone to being deceived in their perceptions.

Sure, but that fact is also the result of human perception. So, in order for any fact to have any meaning at all, we need to depend on the reliability of human perceptions to some considerable degree.

This is very easy to prove in any number of different ways, and hence I can easily stand by my claim that much (if not all) of what seems odd or contrary to physics has a probable explanation that lies within the indirect link that transfers reality from our sensors to our conscious minds.

But, why do you assume this? From my perspective the majority of metaphysical naturalist won't believe in any kind of divine influence because they simply don't like those kind of beliefs. I see it as almost entirely as a psychological rejection.

evolution has led to a whole set of processing shortcuts which render our perception prone to error. It's pointless for you to protest that the whole world operates on a different metaphysics -- we would still get the same cock-eyed view of it regardless.

Metaphysics is how we interpret the data before us. If we all lived 40,000 years ago, we'd have an entirely different metaphysics that we would use to interpret the findings of science (i.e., if current scientific knowledge were reported to us by a time travelling scientist with a desire to see how early humans reacted to such findings). Similarly, even different communities react to scientific findings differently (even within scientific communities the reactions can vary depending on the discipline). However, as far as evolution producing short-cuts, my response above especially applies. If evolution wasn't pretty good at producing accuracy in our perceptions, the last human ancestor would have been eaten by lions many eons ago.

[Curious]

Well said Cephus. People also generally overestimate their connection with "reality" by a considerable factor. The actual situation is very different: huge short-cuts are taken between our sensory and perception systems. This is the reason why we can digitally compress audio and video by factors of 10 to 100 without losing appreciable fidelity. But this also gives us a tendency to read significance into insignificant stimuli...

...It is very likely though that many people today are wholly unaware of this loose connection between reality and their perception of reality.

And yet there are those that accept this "reality" with absolute certitued. Given the nature of your statements here QED, I find it odd that you remain so adamant in your atheism.

[QED]

The ultimate test for any perceptual system is whether that entity survives and prospers given the adequacy or inadequancy of their perceptions compared to the reality of the situation. Our survival depended on detecting that there were leopards in the nearby trees, and so I don't think that you can take exceptions of perceptual fallibilities and make that into a rule that non-metaphysical naturalists are bumbling fools.

Bumbling fools? Idiots? These are your words Harvey. Maybe you're reacting to the provocative title of this topic. I don't know. But as far as I'm concerned we might all be described by these terms. Richard Robinson refers to the "naive scientist" that is inside each and every one of us. This naive scientist is constantly assessing the data coming in from the external world and trying to make sense of it. This is the area that I'm trying to draw attention to.

I think your comments about evolution necessarily providing us with an efficient perception system need to be augmented: Sufficiency is what counts and a fine balance will always be struck between providing more or less accuracy than is necessary to achieve sufficiency. This cost/benefit ratio is what accounts for the compression ratios we see, with the cost of uncompressed data processing being unsustainable. But you understand my point -- without a linear, direct, response there will be such things as optical and auditory illusions. But this is not how people think of themselves. Who sits in front of a pair of stereo speakers and laughs at themselves for being tricked into thinking that sounds are originating across the entire width of the sound-stage?

There are an infinite number of correlations and perceptions experienced on the basis of a partial data set and while evolution has seen to it that we don't mistake a puma for a pussy cat, we mustn't come away with the notion that we are in perfect tune with all the events going on around us.

Sure, but that fact is also the result of human perception. So, in order for any fact to have any meaning at all, we need to depend on the reliability of human perceptions to some considerable degree.

I do hope you're not about to lapse into solipsism. The facts about our data processing system would seem safe with regards to the fallibilities of that same system. I say this because all the fallibilities that I speak of are easy to expose so I'm quite confident that such matters have been taken into proper account while the research was done.

This is very easy to prove in any number of different ways, and hence I can easily stand by my claim that much (if not all) of what seems odd or contrary to physics has a probable explanation that lies within the indirect link that transfers reality from our sensors to our conscious minds.

But, why do you assume this? From my perspective the majority of metaphysical naturalist won't believe in any kind of divine influence because they simply don't like those kind of beliefs. I see it as almost entirely as a psychological rejection.

It is not so much an assumption as an observation. Any observer of the industry that has sprung up around the "paranormal" has ample opportunity to watch the effects of human perception at work. People will swear that Ouija boards, Tarot cards and all manner of voodoo really do work -- but they don't -- not in any external sense. Everything that goes on (and yes, something does go on) is taking place in the perceptions of the individuals concerned; not outside in the material world. How much more evidence would you need from things like astrology and water divining (I could go on listing these sorts of thing all day). Do you believe in it all being connected to the external world? I don't see any of it being thus, therefore the vast catalogue of para-scientific (?) activities serve as a considerable testament to the human propensity to over-egg reality.

[QED]

Well said Cephus. People also generally overestimate their connection with "reality" by a considerable factor. The actual situation is very different: huge short-cuts are taken between our sensory and perception systems. This is the reason why we can digitally compress audio and video by factors of 10 to 100 without losing appreciable fidelity. But this also gives us a tendency to read significance into insignificant stimuli...

...It is very likely though that many people today are wholly unaware of this loose connection between reality and their perception of reality.

And yet there are those that accept this "reality" with absolute certitued. Given the nature of your statements here QED, I find it odd that you remain so adamant in your atheism.

This is a sort of "shell game" isn't it. I presented some information here to demonstrate the fallibility of the human mind which allows it to be mistaken in its perception of the external world. This is a novel concept for some, as they imagine that they are coupled 1:1 with the world seeing and hearing it as clearly as they do. But as observers of this fact we are very poorly placed -- something easily exposed by any number of entertaining illusions.

I'm surprised that you find it odd that I remain so adamant in my atheism. To my way of looking at this I see the tendency to read stuff that isn't there into our perceptions in contrast to something like a Web Cam trained on a fixed spot. The camera is connected to a PC with automated inspection software which trips an alarm on any changes to the scene. For the purposes of this exercise we could set up the system in a crypt or any intensely spiritual place and leave it running for ever (in principle). You might say that my adamancy is born out of a firm conviction that the alarm will never be tripped by anything other than a natural event.

[harvey1]

It is not so much an assumption as an observation. Any observer of the industry that has sprung up around the "paranormal" has ample opportunity to watch the effects of human perception at work. People will swear that Ouija boards, Tarot cards and all manner of voodoo really do work -- but they don't -- not in any external sense. Everything that goes on (and yes, something does go on) is taking place in the perceptions of the individuals concerned; not outside in the material world. How much more evidence would you need from things like astrology and water divining (I could go on listing these sorts of thing all day). Do you believe in it all being connected to the external world? I don't see any of it being thus, therefore the vast catalogue of para-scientific (?) activities serve as a considerable testament to the human propensity to over-egg reality.

Well, you won't get agreement from me on those things. I think that synchronicity is part of our interaction with nature, and even such enterprises as astrology, playing with Ouji boards, and the like can bring about synchroncity type events, and therefore can be perceived by those people as being of supernatural influence. The issue for me isn't whether those enterprises generate synchronicity, the issue is whether we can use synchronicity as a means to predict the future, tell us what others are thinking, etc.. I think for the most part we cannot do so, at least at a level that science could demonstrate is better than chance. Synchronicity is not that kind of phenomena that allows for that kind of interpretation.

Sychronicity is based on context and thought. If you have a certain thought, and an event happens that immediately connects that event with the thought that you just had (or have been pondering), then from the perspective of science there is no way to determine this coincidence from a real coincidence or a real synchronous event. However, the synchronicity might affect your life from then out (e.g., perhaps you were thinking of the girl in high school and you immediately run into her and you get married, etc.). Science can only succeed using methodological naturalism, and therefore without a mechanism and ability to study the mechanism in an empirical way, there is no way science can advance the study of that phenomena. In the case of synchronicity, this is very difficult because there is no scientific theory that is anytime soon forthcoming. Therefore, just looking at the empirical data for synchronicity will not do since synchronous events--while significant to human lives--is not satisfactory to science since science has no objective way to assign expectation values to such kind of events in a controlled environment.

So, perhaps you can see why I waive off your metaphysical naturalism since I disagree with the assumptions on which it is based. Everytime you use those assumptions to argue your point, I think you are just begging the question. How do you know that your assumptions are right in the first place? Coming from my perspective, your assumptions make for a comfortable, but meaningless, world for you; while also causing you to miss out on the miraculous and divine experience that our world and our God make possible.