A question regarding proof

[ThomM]

I had a dream about a pony last night.

Can my pony dream be objectively proven?

NO - it cannot be proven objectively

However- once you realize that dream, a so called out of body experience, or even a near death experience - it not an indication of reality - the matter is moot.

[Fred]

I had a dream about a pony last night.

Can my pony dream be objectively proven?

No.

Excellent. Since nobody has produced anything to challenge it and we all agree, let's posit it as a given for our argument: There is no objective evidence for a dream pony.

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You guys are being real idiots if you want my input. Fred is clearly following a logical trajectory and you seem to have checked out.

Heh. Glad I'm not the only one who has noticed.

I totally agree with his summation above. Can somebody just please stand up for their position? I don't hold much respect for it as it is... this is confiming my worst fears: you haven't thought about it at all, and couldn't possibly defend it.

Heh. Glad I'm not the only one who has noticed, the sequel.

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Then you tell us his point, please, since you get it. I don't know what I am supposed to be thinking about, or defending.

[/quote]

No, you don't. But that hasn't stopped you from trashing it before you even could pick it up. Stand off to the side and take your little potshots about my speshalness if it makes you happy because I don't see a reason to include you in the conversation any longer.

[The Grand Nudger]

Excellent. Since nobody has produced anything to challenge it and we all agree, let's posit it as a given for our argument: There is no objective evidence for a dream pony.

There is no evidence for YOUR dream pony, because you have proposed a situation in which there can be none. There is no reason, if this dream pony existed, that there could be no evidence, and again we do have evidence for the existence of dreams. These are important distinctions which you fail to acknowledge because they leave you with no point to make. You seem to believe you've stumbled upon some mind shattering pearls of wisdom but you haven't. Materialism, objective evidence, and the burden of proof remain intact.

[Fred]

Just plug an EEG machine to your head before you go to bed and you can prove you had dreams, even those that you yourself don't remember. Watching REM is also a good way to prove. As to what those dreams were about, we can't, at least not with the current technical capacity. So what's the point Fred?

Your EEG or an fMRI or any of the most sophisticated gear we have can track the brain activity, but it cannot disclose the content of the interior experience apprehended by the subject.

My point is that when it comes to evidence, the idea that only objective evidence is real or valid is not accurate, nor the whole story, and except as an ideal or a club to wield, in practice, nobody really believes it is.

The idea that evidence = objective evidence alone is wrong.

[The Grand Nudger]

our EEG or an fMRI or any of the most sophisticated gear we have can track the brain activity, but it cannot disclose the content of the interior experience apprehended by the subject.

My point is that when it comes to evidence, the idea that only objective evidence is real or valid is not accurate, nor the whole story, and except as an ideal or a club to wield, in practice, nobody really believes it is.

The idea that evidence = objective evidence alone is wrong.

What, a thin appeal to ignorance? And if we map this process completely and develop a machine to "read dreams", what happens then to your god-of-the-gaps? Something tells me you'll just move along, as others have done every time we remove the lightning from the hand of Zues.

Was this all you wanted to say? You should have started out with that instead, because now I feel cheated. No one has ever claimed that subjective evidence couldn't be part of the overall package, this entire thread has been a straw man from go. Subjective evidence ALONE is insufficient to declare knowledge, especially if such evidence contradicts objective evidence. In practice, all science is performed with objective evidence as priority. Leave it to a magical thinker to tell us what we believe.

What a waste of time.

[Anomalocaris]

I had a dream about a pony last night.

Can my pony dream be objectively proven?

In principle, yes, whether you had a dream about a pony last night can be proven or disproven. Your dream is an artifact of your nerological activity. Your perception of a pony is also an artifact of your neurological activity. With sufficiently detailed understanding of your physical brain structure, one could in principle prove whether you undertook such neurological activity as required by dreaming last night, and whether such neurological activity as required by perception of a pony occurred in conjunction with your dreams.

But in practice not yet. We don't yet have the ability to define your brain structure to such detail, nor have enough understanding of exactly how the state of your brain structure relate to your neurological activity.

But that doesn't change the fact that in principle, whether you've dreamed a pony is not solely up to your bullshit.


Since I can't prove yet whether you dreamed about a pony last night, I won't proceed too far down any path that requires firm commitment to the proposition that you either did, or did not, dream of your pony last night.

And no, whether it is proven that you dreamed a pony, we can prove a dreamt pony lack all attributes of physical existence.


BTW, dreaming of pony? Are you gay or something?

[Fred]

Excellent. Since nobody has produced anything to challenge it and we all agree, let's posit it as a given for our argument: There is no objective evidence for a dream pony.

There is no evidence for YOUR dream pony, because you have proposed a situation in which there can be none.

Mine, yours, everyone's, you are correct because there can be none.

So the first point stands. There is no objective evidence for a dream pony.

Ok, so now that that's settled, onward.

There is no reason, if this dream pony existed, that there could be no evidence, and again we do have evidence for the existence of dreams.

We have no objective evidence, as has been established. But we do have evidence, certainly. But in no way, shape, or form is that evidence solely objective and cannot be.

These are important distinctions which you fail to acknowledge because they leave you with no point to make.

Rhythm, your predictions and assumptions as to what I believe or where I am going have proven to wildly inaccurate so far. I'm not failing to acknowledge the distinctions. I just haven't gotten there because I've been delayed by all the assumptions and the ad hominen stuff, much of it from you.

Since I'm more interested in actually discussing the thesis of your evidence claim being broken, I'm going to beg off on the game ball stuff and focus on that. Ya wanna discuss without the stupid assumptions, fine. Ya don't, go join Aleia over on the sidelines and the two of you can call me names.

[The Grand Nudger]

Mine, yours, everyone's, you are correct because there can be none.

A claim to totality of knowledge, and an absurd one at that. There's a bit of irony here, given the context of your assertions, that I'm the one championing the fallibility of human knowledge.

We have no objective evidence, as has been established. But we do have evidence, certainly. But in no way, shape, or form is that evidence solely objective and cannot be.

More of the same, the above applies.

The rest of your post is posturing, and so it doesn't require a response.

[fr0d0]

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[The Grand Nudger]

If you wish for something really hard Frodo, it may come true, at least for you. Freds gone the Teapot route in each of his threads. If I were going to do such a thing I would've picked something other than dreams. Something we truly knew nothing about. Like you do, with God.