Ok, I'm back. I followed the links. All the information is stuff that I am familiar with. I have a degree in psychology. Naturally when I was a Christian I turned to psychology to explain my phenomena, everything not covered sufficiently by psychology or glossed over by denial/selection bias I used to attribute to God.
I have learned about quantum mechanics possible explanations for precognition. For some phenomena they sound more plausible than the psychological theory I am used to but only because I suck at math. A situation which prevents me from going through the stuff for myself to determine it's validity.
I am going to research the personal construct theory of psychology in greater detail
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_constructs_ and the repertory grid.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repertory_Grid
It might help explain better how people can take information/phenomena and interpret it such different ways. It might not explain fully why people experience present phenomena differently (I believe there is an element of biology in here). I think it's safe to say that Nature and nurture work together to influence our present experiences. For example if you are someone who experiences more euphoria from the experience of eating food, or taking drugs, or religious services because of some genetic factor you would automatically have a tendency to consciously and subconsciously seek out these things. I could list the things that cause people to consciously and subconsciously seek out the things which give them pleasure but that would take too long to explain.
Suffice it to say that humans are predictive people. We want something so we do things in order to get them. If we know that a certain set of behaviors gives us what we want then we do those behaviors. For example if I wanted a person to like me and to feel comfortable with me I might tell a joke. In the past jokes were a good method for reaching the desired goal so naturally I decide to tell a joke in this new situation. If the joke produces an unexpected response say a negative response from the recipient then I must learn why this is so so that I avoid the mistake in the future. After all the goal is the same, the method to reach the goal must be adjusted to the situation.
Religion is a way to make sense of the world and it's phenomena. It does so in a predictive sense. In a larger view predictability can give a sense of comfort because it gives you a sense of control. If nothing else predictability can eliminate unpleasant surprise. Say for example someone you know suddenly dies in a car wreck. You could explain the death as Gods punishment on that individual for being a sinner. All you have to do to avoid the same fate as he is to not be a sinner. You are assured safety....sort of.
What if the person was a very righteous person? Well you could believe that the death was God calling that person home early. In this case the temporary suffering the individual suffered in the car wreck pales in comparison to the wonderful place they are in now. What does this mean for you? Well if this event were to happen to you you can be assured that soon you will be very happy.
Another way to explain the event and predict the future would be to explain the event as "God's plan". In this case "God's plan" happens to everyone. we are all under the same jurisdiction. By the common definition used in CF churches God is all knowing and he has wisdom that is better than ours. In a paraphrase of a bible verse "at first we see poorly as in the reflection of a (first century) mirror. then (after we get to heaven) will will see clearly". Very Platonistic if you ask me. Suffice it to say that, like a child to their father, we must understand that this greater wisdom and knowledge resides in God not us. According to the doctrine we are too pathetic in our mortal/physical minds to understand it so we must believe by faith that it exists. Therefore when someone suddenly dies in a car crash we can explain it to be "part of God's plan" though we don't and probably won't ever have a fucking clue what the fuck is going on. But by faith......blah blah blah. I'm sure you've heard this before.
To conclude my babbling, in the absence of any organized system, Christianity provided me a construct within which to interpret the world and it's phenomena. Christianity has since not withstood scholarly evaluation especially with regards to it's foundational doctrine (namely that of the Bible being the very words of God and infallible). Christianity has been proven by many scholars in a reproducible and peer reviewed manner not to be what it claims it is therefore a new construct, a new way to interpret phenomena is now necessary. Some of the more spiritual phenomena can be explained via the psychological knowledge available today. If the rest can be explained through quantum mechanics that would be great, but this possibility seems more like a fantasy to me than anything else. All else will have to fall to the unknown, but might possibly get explained via science in the future. The latter bit is a bit unnerving but so also is the concept of randomness. The best that I can do about my 30 year stint in CF is to make peace with it and move on. or perhaps write a book about it, make lots of money, and thumb my nose at all the Christian churches out there and say "heh,heh heh you aren't getting any of it ." That latter bit is a bit of a fantasy but at least it's a funny one.
