It's not a strawman; what it is is a refutation of a point I didn't even make.
I am not saying we should all be investigating things that have no evidence; what I object to is when someone presents some supposed evidence and Kyu rejects it without even analyzing it. I happen to agree with him that the video itself is "bollocks", but what I think myself and Darwinian were commenting on was his attitude that anything that is related to reincarnation is automatically "bollocks". Such an attitude is both anti-scientific and close-minded. The correct position to take on these claims is one of neutrality. Once a video like the above one has been debunked (which I think you can do pretty easily) then perhaps we can move it to the realm of "bollocks", but not before, and certainly not globally on any evidence presented.
If you are presented with evidence that goes against what you personally believe, or what science has deemed impossible, you can do a few things:
1) Ignore it (which is a perfectly reasonable position to take, but you cannot expect to then keep going around saying "there is no evidence" seeing as you were presented with some and ignored it). Most creationists seem to choose this one.
2) Look at it from a neutral perspective and make a decision (which is what skepticism / science is all about).
3) Keep hold of your preconceptions about the subject, and reject the evidence on the basis of these preconceptions.
Now of course, I could be wrong about Kyu's attitude; he could be just making a light-hearted remark, but if it is a serious position then I object to it. Everything should be open to criticism and evaluation, and when new evidence arises, we should investigate it, not just assume the fallacy that because claim X has had no supporting evidence so far, new evidence Y must be invalid.
I am not saying we should all be investigating things that have no evidence; what I object to is when someone presents some supposed evidence and Kyu rejects it without even analyzing it. I happen to agree with him that the video itself is "bollocks", but what I think myself and Darwinian were commenting on was his attitude that anything that is related to reincarnation is automatically "bollocks". Such an attitude is both anti-scientific and close-minded. The correct position to take on these claims is one of neutrality. Once a video like the above one has been debunked (which I think you can do pretty easily) then perhaps we can move it to the realm of "bollocks", but not before, and certainly not globally on any evidence presented.
If you are presented with evidence that goes against what you personally believe, or what science has deemed impossible, you can do a few things:
1) Ignore it (which is a perfectly reasonable position to take, but you cannot expect to then keep going around saying "there is no evidence" seeing as you were presented with some and ignored it). Most creationists seem to choose this one.
2) Look at it from a neutral perspective and make a decision (which is what skepticism / science is all about).
3) Keep hold of your preconceptions about the subject, and reject the evidence on the basis of these preconceptions.
Now of course, I could be wrong about Kyu's attitude; he could be just making a light-hearted remark, but if it is a serious position then I object to it. Everything should be open to criticism and evaluation, and when new evidence arises, we should investigate it, not just assume the fallacy that because claim X has had no supporting evidence so far, new evidence Y must be invalid.
