(September 26, 2020 at 10:09 pm)John 6IX Breezy Wrote: I just know souls aren't defined in an unfalsifiable manner.

I'm not interested at all in falsifying your belief, there seems to be nothing there that's solid enough to grasp.

How do you define a soul ?

When you say that a god created a man, do you know what kind of a man they are referring to ?

Modern human beings contain DNA from many viruses that are millions of years old.

Did your god create a man and a woman with or without viral DNA ?

I doubt that he'll be any better at defining a soul than he was at describing his belief in soul sleep or annihilation as not believing in a soul.

(September 27, 2020 at 3:56 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote: I doubt that he'll be any better at defining a soul than he was at describing his belief in soul sleep or annihilation as not believing in a soul.

That’s the grand thing about religion - you don’t have to deal with pesky things like definitions or words actually meaning things. You get to redefine stuff as you go.

Boru

(September 27, 2020 at 4:49 am)BrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote:

(September 27, 2020 at 3:56 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote: I doubt that he'll be any better at defining a soul than he was at describing his belief in soul sleep or annihilation as not believing in a soul.

That’s the grand thing about religion - you don’t have to deal with pesky things like definitions or words actually meaning things. You get to redefine stuff as you go.

Boru

Slippery fuckers aren't they?

(September 27, 2020 at 5:36 am)Sal Wrote:

(September 27, 2020 at 4:49 am)BrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote: That’s the grand thing about religion - you don’t have to deal with pesky things like definitions or words actually meaning things. You get to redefine stuff as you go.

Boru

Slippery fuckers aren't they?

Like an eel covered in chip fat.

Boru

People go with the reality which they live. The experiences of their senses and the evidence that they are presented with.

In the reality that I live in the idea of a god seems silly. It contradicts a lot of the things that the evidence of my senses, logic and science has repeatedly shown to be true.

By the way recent studies in russia have shown that a few months of being bombarded with lies is enough to so entrench those lies that when presented with conflicting evidence it reinforces the lie.

This is how I think you get religion.

(September 27, 2020 at 3:56 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote: I doubt that he'll be any better at defining a soul than he was at describing his belief in soul sleep or annihilation as not believing in a soul.

I'm aware that John does not believe in souls, but his claim seems to be that if they did exist they would not be unfalsifiable.

Hence my clarification on what he believes that other people believe a soul is, that his denomination refutes exists. Frankly I've never had such a strange conversation where two people agree on something, but the waters are still muddied somehow !

So far as i can tell there are two mainstream thoughts on what a soul is, as i understand it the Greeks defined it as essentially 'all that makes a person up' it does not really delve into the spiritual.  This is i understand how many people still use it.

In religion however the soul is often referred to as a spiritual, none material form that either informs us, or in fact is us, this is i suspect what John means when he says we don't have a soul. To me you cannot falsify the soul, simply infer that we have much better idea's about what consciousness could be etc, in other words make an unprovable soul unnecessary.

My position being that should a soul exist, there is no way to prove/disprove (unfalsifiable)  

I find myself in this back to front conversation where people it seems can make any claim, that the scale of what's extraordinary is subjective, and John seems to think the responsibility is on those who doubt it to refute it rather than the person who makes the claim to prove it.

I'm trying to understand why John under these circumstances would reject a alien abduction claim out of hand.  In other words where does  does healthy scepticism kick in in the mind of John given that all claims must be disproven rather than proved ?

(September 27, 2020 at 8:50 am)possibletarian Wrote: So far as i can tell there are two mainstream thoughts on what a soul is, as i understand it the Greeks defined it as essentially 'all that makes a person up' it does not really delve into the spiritual.  This is i understand how many people still use it.

Ah, yes.

Does John believe that consciousness is the soul or does he believe that the soul is something entirely separate.

(September 27, 2020 at 4:49 am)BrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote: That’s the grand thing about religion - you don’t have to deal with pesky things like definitions or words actually meaning things. You get to redefine stuff as you go.

Boru

Given our discussion of faith, it appears the redefining stuff as you go comes from the other side of the aisle.