Thoughts on Buddhism

[Abracadabra]

Jesus fucking christ......Yes, it is an established fact that magic does not exist. In no instance, ever, have we investigated cases of "magic" and found any there. There is no known mechanism by which magic would or could operate, and there are physical laws, (well demonstrated) that rule magic out as a potential operator in this universe. If that's not enough to establish fact and hold it, I don't know what is. We've looked hard, and found nothing but constraints and evidence to the contrary. Magic does not exist.

If that's your understanding of what science has to say then I can only suggest that you have a grossly over-simplified and naive view of science. There is no way that current understandings of science can rule out "magic" in general. Unless of course you are thinking that "magic" means to somehow supernaturally overcome the laws of physics. That is NOT what magic means.

I think your objections here probably stem from your limitations on the term "magic' maybe more than anything else.

(your best argument for karma and reincarnation is "maybe magic does exist"? Well, that's not very convincing, how about some evidence?)

I'm personally not arguing for a concept of karma that carries beyond this life. Nor am I arguing for reincarnation. Either of these concepts may or may not be true.

But what I will absolutely stand behind is the fact that current scientific knowledge does not, and cannot, rule out either of these concepts as being impossible. Science simply does not have a good enough understanding of the true nature of reality to do that.

That level of scientific understanding simply does not exist. And that is a fact. So for you to proclaim that science has ruled-out "magic" is nonsense. Unless, of course, you are using the term "magic" to specifically mean to violate already known and well-established laws of physics. However by defining magic in that way, you have automatically made magic impossible by your very definition of it. So that would be a bit of a semantic cheat.

Or to perhaps state that better, the "magic" that you're referring to and the "magick" that I'm referring to would necessarily be two different concepts altogether and thus we aren't even speaking to the same concept.

My concept of "magick" appeals to mechanisms which may exist and simply not yet be known to science. In fact, I hold that some of these mechanism may not even be within the scope of what out current scientific method of investigation is even capable of discovering.

We already know that there do indeed exist things in nature that cannot be explained by science. Quantum Entanglement is certainly a prime example, but there are many others as well.

In fact, according to the most successful theory of science ever (i.e. Quantum Mechanics itself), not only can we not know the mechanism of Quantum Entanglement (or other mysterious of the quantum world), but the theory actually predicts through the uncertainty principle and through the principle of complementarity that we can't never discover the cause of these phenomena.

So how ironic is that?

The very best theory that science currently has clearly states that these things can never be known, yet look at what the scientists are doing. They are hoping with pure faith-based desire that the predictions of Quantum Mechanics will actually turn out to be WRONG.

For science to move forward in this area, it basically must first be WRONG.

At that is a pure faith-based dream. No different from religious faiths.

"MAGIC being defined as the great unknown, inexplicable force that drives growth and evolution is, I believe, an acceptable word to describe mystery, why not? Although when using the word "magic" it can easily be construed and associated with the illusions performed on T.V. and theatres by magicians which is obviously not what Abra is referring to. Ask yourself, what makes grass grow? What makes the sun shine? What makes humans and animals breathe in oxygen and expel carbon dioxide while conversely making plantlife "breathe" in CO2 and "expel" O2? And then ask yourself Why?"

Photosynthesis, nuclear fusion, biology (your welcome for clearing that up for you). How about you invoke something mysterious whilst trying to redefine magic as mystery?

You're missing the point here entirely.

Photosynthesis, nuclear fusion, biology, etc, are all nothing more than observations of what's actually happening. They are merely explanations of what the universe does. They aren't explanations of why it is the way it is.

What Bgood is stating above is basically the very same thing that Stephen Hawking brings up when he asks: "What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe?"

The observational mathematical explanations of science are nothing more than a report of what the universe does. But when it comes to actually explaining why it does any of these things it has no clue.

I once had a wonderful physics professor who truly understand physics. On the very first day of the course he said the following:

Physics is basically a study of how things behave. If you ask, "How will a ball move" physics will tell you. It will tell you how it will move, how it will collide, bounce, and so on. It will tell you in quantitative terms (i.e. through mathematics) what the ball does.

However, if you are interested in understanding why the ball is what it is and why it does the things it does, and from when it came, then physics is the wrong thing to be studying. The answers to those questions are better pursued in the philosophy department down the hall.

All science does is quantitative describe how the universe behaves. To believe that it can go beyond that is unrealistic. It simply isn't even designed in the scientific method to go beyond that. The scientific method itself is based solely on observations, and quantitative analysis of those observations.

That's all that science does. Period. If it can't measure it and put a number on it, then it can't say anything about it. (i.e such as in the case of quantum entanglements etc.) When it gets to that level the universe becomes 'out of reach' of the scientific method.

Most ironically is that the scientific method has indeed been able to predict and demonstrate that there do indeed exists phenomena and behaviors of this universe that are indeed beyond the reach of the scientific method.

Science itself is telling us that this universe goes beyond what science itself is capable of explaining. Quantum Theory (the most successful theory of science to date) demands and predicts that some things will forever be beyond the reach of science.

Yet just look at these silly secular atheists keeping the FAITH that maybe science is wrong and it can go beyond what its best theory predicts that it can't go beyond.

How silly is that?

Secular atheists have a deep-seated FAITH that science is actually WRONG.