Personal experience

[Captain Scarlet]

I haven't discounted anything you've said directly so far and due to the subjectiveness of experience I'm willing to grant great leway. But, how exactly do you have an experience of not having an experience? If we're not rationalizing beliefs, then I'll assume here that experience preceeds analysis. If you never experienced anything and conclude that the default position is "no God exists" because no explination has arrisen; that's one thing and perfectly fine. If you're saying you've actually experienced something that disproves God, that's something entirely different. If you've had any experience with god at all doesn't that lend more credibility towards the existence of God then? Wouldn't the rest then be rationalization to deny that evidence. Those are supposition to your thought process, but I'm just answering your questions and trying to figure out where your questions are going.

So my experience was in church pre athiesm of there being nothing there an emptiness or void if you will. All subsequent experiences, for example of joy or comfort, in my life have arisen at times when I was in contact with other humans and as a result of those relationships. I have put all these experiences down to my own personal emotion. But if you claim as evidence that people experience a presence or apprehend god in some other way, then you have to allow my non apprehension and a Muslims apprehension of Allah and Mohammed and a Hindus apprehension of ginesh and a buddhists apprehension of the Buddha ( though not a god). So as evidence it leads you nowhere.

[tackattack]

I don't think you can experience a nothingness, an motional void or emotional sadness maybe, but I don't think you can experience nothing, nothing is default. I do allow other aprehensions of God because I believe religion is just a way to form a definition of a concept of something extraneous generally reffered to as a God or Gods. It doesn't lead to nothing it leads you to God. I find that a funny phrase "something leading to nothing", in a causally constrcted universe how can something lead to nothing? It would just lead to a different something (and so on and so forth), only a nothing can propigate a nothing. Anyways, back on point. You then attempt to identify the cause of the experience and (hopefully) through reason you can choose the religion that supplies the closest concept of God to your experience personally with God. Typically though it's through indoctrination and upbringing that a religion is chosen.

[Edwardo Piet]

Personal experience is not evidence for God or for anything else that requires a much higher standard of evidence than mere anecdote.

[Captain Scarlet]

I don't think you can experience a nothingness, an motional void or emotional sadness maybe, but I don't think you can experience nothing, nothing is default. I do allow other aprehensions of God because I believe religion is just a way to form a definition of a concept of something extraneous generally reffered to as a God or Gods. It doesn't lead to nothing it leads you to God. I find that a funny phrase "something leading to nothing", in a causally constrcted universe how can something lead to nothing? It would just lead to a different something (and so on and so forth), only a nothing can propigate a nothing. Anyways, back on point. You then attempt to identify the cause of the experience and (hopefully) through reason you can choose the religion that supplies the closest concept of God to your experience personally with God. Typically though it's through indoctrination and upbringing that a religion is chosen.

So your experiences are valid and mine aren't? Of course you can experience nothing as you can experience someting. The default is infact to experience something because of all external stimulii. It seems to me you don't want to acknowledge my experience because it negates your argument. Of course you could admit that all personal experiences are invalid, to which I am happy to agree with you.

[Eilonnwy]

While I can agree that personal experiences don't amount to evidence because there is no evidence to back it up (pics or it didn't happen)... I can't agree with the second part of your statement. I think you've worded it wrong/weird. If you want to create a fountain of coke, for example, and take some mentos and put it in the coke, and create of fountain of coke, that is something that happened because you want it to.

No, I mean something happened as a direct result of wanting, to therefore imply psychic powers or divine intervention. Not indirectly, such as wanting a fountain and then making one.

[Eilonnwy]

I'm going to have to strongly and respectfully disagree with you both on this. Personal experience is evidence. You use your human senses (sight, sound, smell, taste, 5 types of nerve endings for touch, balance, orientation, diretcion, kinesthetic, and several other internal senses which are up for debate but are more than likely true) to experience all the things you see as evidence, it's a necessary precursor for anything deemed as evidence and at it's very basest is a personal experience and subjective in nature. It's not "something happened because I wanted it to it's "something happened to me" and some people can leave it at that and it forms their subjective view of reality. I'm not stating what's real for me is real for you, just trying to get some people to accept the posibility is more than likely that something outside the , IMO closed minded, view of a materialist world observed only by the five senses. It's productiveness is debatable and certain few aspects are unproven but that's sounding like a whole other thread.

I would never deny that if someone said something happened to them that it did not happen to them. However, I would not make the leap from "Something happened" to "Something happened as a direct result of my praying and God did it". You're making a logical leap with really no sound reasoning to back it up. Also, how many times do you pray for something and nothing happens? Confirmation bias is the tendency to remember this hits and forget the misses. For every 12 times you pray, 1 time something happens that you feel fits the requirements of what you prayed for. You remember that 1 time and forget the 11 times nothing happened. You build up these hits and constantly ignore the misses. This isn't evidence, it's just anecdotal, and anecdotal proves nothing.

It's not close minded to not accept the claim of supernatural intervention. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. I've not going to believe something supernatural happened solely on one person's say so of a strange event.

I will turn to this youtube video that I have posted many times before, but never tire of listening to, but it nails it in terms of what is truly close minded and open minded about supernatural claims.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T69TOuqaqXI

[annatar]

Perhaps He did. In my toughest times in life its stopped me from doing anything that would harm myself.
Why did God answer my prayer from everyone elses?
Why didnt God anwer my friends prayer, which was to be healed and not die from cancer and answered mine?
I dunno.
Like I said, I have been there 12 years in a row and never seen dolphins there. Perhaps it was coincidence, perhaps it was not.
However that is of course subjective evidence and I would never use it to try and convince someone there is a God.

You stopped yourself from doing any harm to yourself not a superior being.You saw something which is irrelevant to your troubles and hold on to it. point is, your troubles doesn't needed some supernatural help and you fixed them yourself. But your friend needed a supernatural help and he didn't get any. in conclusion neither of you got any supernatural help from some superior being...

So you saw some dolphins in the sea and took it as revelation? and of course everybody knows that there are no dolphins in the sea. if you had asked for a mermaid and seen one that would be something.. but you saw dolphins! and in the sea! not in a shopping mall or starbucks.

Exactly my point. Your scared of spiders? what? How could you be? You are so much bigger than them. Our experiences shape what we believe, think about it.

fear of spiders is an irrational fear.And people who afraid of spiders knows that its irrational and with little therapy one can overcome this fear. Do you admit that your revelation was also irrational? If so, then you have no proof about god's existance depending on your experiences. which leads us to begining of this argument, can you or can you not use your personal experiences as an evidence to god's exsistance? You tell me the answer...

[Minimalist]

Personal experience is evidence.

That's a load of shit, tack. How do we know that you aren't merely delusional?

This fellow had a "personal experience" too.

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/02/12/D...234475937/

During the interview, Hagerman said that God had told him to kill his son, Joshua, to keep him from the anti-Christ.

Should this "personal experience" be admitted as exculpatory evidence at his trial? Should he even have a trial because people like you will say "well...if GOD told him to do it it must be right."

(Of course, then it all quickly dissolves into a No True Scotsman argument because you will doubtlessly claim that your 'god' would never order anyone to kill his kid...in spite of all the biblical testimony to the contrary.)

[chasm]

While I can agree that personal experiences don't amount to evidence because there is no evidence to back it up (pics or it didn't happen)... I can't agree with the second part of your statement. I think you've worded it wrong/weird. If you want to create a fountain of coke, for example, and take some mentos and put it in the coke, and create of fountain of coke, that is something that happened because you want it to.

No, I mean something happened as a direct result of wanting, to therefore imply psychic powers or divine intervention. Not indirectly, such as wanting a fountain and then making one.

Then, humph.

---

If you can accept that dolphins have echolocation and some fish can sense electromagnetic fields even though we don't have those senses, is it really that far of a stretch to think that people can see auras.

Yes, it is a stretch. In fact, it has been proven that dolphins and some fish DO have those senses, while it has not been proven that some people can see auras. Would you believe me if I said I was physic, like Godhead said he was?

Question: Why does humans not having a sense that other mammals/fish have make it hard to believe in? They are a DIFFERENT SPECIES, of course they are going to be DIFFERENT from humans.

Another thing I'd like to add is the fact that you don't think it's weird that dolphins and fish have gills and humans don't, or that bears and cats have fur and humans don't, or that birds can fly and humans can't.

[Captain Scarlet]

Humans seeing auras, ghosts, aliens, crystal healing, tarot cards, astrology come on let's be serious tackattack. Allsomeone has to do is to submit to an experiment and prove which they have singly failed to do. Wonder why? Spoon bending anyone?