(November 22, 2011 at 4:11 am)Shell B Wrote:

(November 22, 2011 at 1:06 am)Willpower Wrote: Enough with the ad-hominem attacks. If you are so wise, can you explain it?

No, that's enough with the misused phrases. It was an insult, not an ad hom.

Wikipedia - Ad Hominem: Latin for "to the man" or "to the person," short for argumentum ad hominem--is an attempt to negate the truth of a claim by pointing out a negative characteristic or belief of the person supporting it.

I had stated that "it is inexplicable how they could come back with such vivid accounts."
In response, he said that my reasoning lead me to that [faulty] conclusion of inexplicability only because I am not amongst the "truly enlightened" and because I have allowed myself to acquire a "god dulled brain." In doing so, he attacked me--my person, not that whole post's argument or any of the support/evidence which had led me to that conclusion. He did not address the argument that I had presented at all. I retorted that, if he is so wise ("truly enlightened" and not "god dulled"), then he should try to explicate.

In his attack, though, he did not address any of the support/evidence that I had provided at all. He attempted to negate my whole argument quite simply on the basis of those asserted personal character flaws.

Thus, I accurately described it as an ad-hominen attack. I did not err.


It's an insult, too, for the record.


Don't be so eager to try to correct me over little things....

I'm not eager and it is not a little thing. You incorrectly used the term. He was not using the insult to refute your claims. He was insulting you, on top of refuting your claim.

"You're wrong because you are an idiot" is an ad hom. "You're wrong because of A, B and C, you idiot." is not an ad hom.

He was saying that I did not understand the explanations because I have a "god dulled brain," but did not indicate where my explanations had gone wrong. All i have there is the attack on my character, but he did not present any reasoning for his assertion. He said that it had all been previously explained, but I had already responded, in detail, to those explanations. In the end, he was saying the reasoning behind my argument was wrong on a basis of my assertedly incapable mind which led me there, but yet he failed to indicate where exactly my reasoning erred. In that aspect, he is dismissing my argument on a basis of my asserted character flaws (god-induced ignorance which prevents me from sufficient comprehension), yet he failed to articulate how exactly my comprehensive responses were indeed insufficient.
That's an ad-hominem attack.

He did not address, at all, how exactly my comprehensive responses were indeed insufficient and lacking. He says I'm wrong because I'm to dumb to comprehend, despite the reasoning that I presented. His response effectively ignored all the reasoning that I had already presented. I didn't want my whole posts's reasoning and argument to be so easily ignored. So I asked him to explain.



If you are still unsure about ad hominem attacks, check:
http://atheism.about.com/library/FAQs/sk...busive.htm

Ad hominem attacks are casually called "Insults" and "Personal Attacks" as well.

And it really isn't that big of a deal...

He was saying you are wrong because he believed it you had already been refuted well enough in this thread. He added that you didn't get it because you were addled or something of the sort. Really, you're not the first person to be refuted in here and then jump on the "they're making fun of me" bandwagon to detract attention from the matter at hand. At any rate, there are plenty of points you did not respond to.

Quote:If you are unsure about it, check:
http://atheism.about.com/library/FAQs/sk...busive.htm

Ad hominem attacks are casually called "Insults" and "Personal Attacks" as well.

Of, for fuck's sake. That is an about.com link. They are not known colloquially as insults and personal attacks. http://plover.net/~bonds/adhominem.html

He had not attempted to counter my argument at all. He had only said that I had developed poor reasoning and comprehension due my asserted personal character flaws. But what part of my comprehensive responses were wrong? He had not addressed that at all.

And after he proceeded to elaborate, I explained my response. He then had no further comment. We got past it.

I'm going to bed. It really isn't interesting for me to discuss something as little as a short-phrase that me and the other dude already got past. I don't know why you are seeking to waste all this energy on it. I don't care, he doesn't care, let's move on.

He hasn't even been back to say whether he cares or not. Read the link I posted or quit your whining.

Really, must you be so rude?

(November 22, 2011 at 1:06 am)Willpower Wrote:

(November 22, 2011 at 12:52 am)IATIA Wrote:

(November 21, 2011 at 5:46 pm)Willpower Wrote: ...it is inexplicable how they could come back with such vivid accounts.

Perhaps "inexplicable" for a 'god dulled' brain, but for the truly enlightened, there have been several explanations within this thread to account for this 'experience'. Forget god and let some science seep into that brain of yours and you will see how simple it all this is.

Enough with the ad-hominem attacks. If you are so wise, can you explain it?

---

(November 21, 2011 at 9:05 pm)Epimethean Wrote: So, to restate your premises:

"I believe that near death experiences occur."

"I believe that near death experiences somehow come at brain death, but that people 'get better' because of god."

"I believe that near death experiences are evidence of god."

Now, the rational responses.

Thinking, rational people tend to see near death experiences as being tricks of the mind played during trauma."

Thinking, rational people tend to see that near death experiences cannot come post-mortem, which occurs with brain death.

Thinking, rational people tend to see near death experiences in conjunction with god inasmuch as they are delusions played by the brain on individuals.

In response to your assertions, read my response to Shell B. in Post #32 and my response to. I discussed the faults with that sort of conjecture.

Not in any convincing way did you do so. Your contention remains scientifically absurd and, so, simply more religious mumbo-jumbo. 50% of patients listed "Awareness of being dead?" WTF? They weren't dead, or they would have had no such awareness. Dreams can be convincing, too, but they are not reality. This is silliness, and a great many people here have been trying to show you that the religious bias you are applying to this is contaminating any possible scientific credibility you could earn by admitting that this sort of event is not true death and unlikely to have any connection to any god or gods whatsoever.

(November 22, 2011 at 5:44 am)Willpower Wrote: Really, must you be so rude?

If you insist on being a cotton-headed ninnymuggins, yes.

Another NDE/Afterlife thread. Fine, few questions.

-Where does the notion of an afterlife come from?
-Do we have any evidence that there is an afterlife?
-Is there a simpler, better demonstrated explanation for any of the evidence presented?
-Are we sure that we're not proposing something that does fall under the remit of scientific inquiry that has been ruled out due to incompatibility with the majority of what we call "natural law"?
-How did this afterlife come to be, and what evidence do you have to support whatever explanation you offer?
-If this evidence is compelling, have the major religions reworked their visions of heaven to more accurately match the descriptions? (tunnels of light is a bit different than St. Peter and his gate, for example)
-Where does the notion of a soul come from? What does this soul do?
-Do we have any evidence that there is such a thing as a soul?
-Is there a simpler, better demonstrated explanation for any of the evidence presented?
-Are we sure that we're not proposing something that does fall under the remit of scientific inquiry that has been ruled out due to incompatibility with the majority of what we call "natural law"?
-What gets a soul, and what doesn't, and what parameters are used or defined in order to make this distinction?
-What keeps your soul, memories, etc "intact" after bodily death?
-How does one experience the afterlife without their sensory equipment?
-If we assume spirit eyes and ears then why do we have physical eyes and ears(or spirit memories)? Which of these systems is redundant, and which is actually responsible for our sensory experience(and our memories of that experience and ourselves)?
-Where's the "hook"? What attaches our souls to our bodies to be released, what keeps them from accidentally disengaging?
-Have we ever demonstrated a single disembodied consciousness, anywhere, at any time?

I suppose if I spent more than 5 minutes on this I could drown the original question and claim under a sea of questions and counter-claims. Point is, I think that oftentimes people assume an afterlife as though it were a simple idea, it is not. I also feel that people make claims about the afterlife and souls that are quantifiable, and have somehow managed to elude detection despite repeated attempts at observation by means as broad as the gulf between magic and science. Why is it, that even after trying absolutely everything we could conceive of, we can't even caught the slightest of glimpses? Why not Bifrost to Valhalla? What makes one vision of the afterlife and souls more genuine than the next?

This is my favorite question, it deserves space of its own. What "laws of the supernatural" are at work here that maintain this system, allowing it to interact with our own world with it's natural laws without having profound, inexplicable, and observable effects on one or the other world? What laws could we imagine that would be compatible both with those that we know, and those that would not rule out what we're attempting to hypothesize? This is the "making predictions" portion of earnest inquiry. Let's see if we can get a canary in the mine, eh? It's very easy to be completely wrong about any given thing, little more difficult to be even remotely correct.

In my opinion, the notion that we have "souls" that live on into eternity in some sort of "after-life" is bare anthropomorphism, and wishful thinking. It is intended to be an answer for the question "what happens when/after we die?". In this regard it fails utterly. It explains nothing, has not been demonstrated, and is entirely dependent upon the personal religious preferences of whoever is arguing for improbable, and perhaps even impossible. If this notion were even remotely correct there would be something, somewhere, that was utterly compelling in the hypothetical at least. If the total sum of evidence for such an immensely powerful and pervasive force is "seeing things" while under the stress of dying (stress which we understand very well and can demonstrate repeatedly), then I'm sorry, but this claim isn't worth the time it would take to completely and utterly debunk. As a narrative, it's creative and engaging. As literal truth, well anyone who suggests that I take this particular portion of myth to be factually accurate can stuff this garbage up their ass. You're asking me to be both incredulous and willfully ignorant, I refuse.