Andre, Shermer is such a tool. His wife & daughter, so tired of his atheistic poo-poo'ing, pranked him. Serves him right. Oh, and if the story is a hoax, he's still a tool.ppolish
November 24, 2014
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Can anybody confirm if this is true?
http://www.michaelshermer.com/2014/10/infrequencies/Andre
November 24, 2014
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Of related interest to the moral argument that Dr. Suarez referenced in the video, we now also have evidence that even moral influences arise from outside space-time, thus further soldifying Dr. Suarez's argument against Kant's objection:
,,,the following study, completely contrary to what atheists/materialists would presuppose beforehand, shows that morality is embedded on a much deeper ‘non-local’, beyond space and time, quantum level.
Quantum Consciousness – Time Flies Backwards? – Stuart Hameroff MD
Excerpt: Dean Radin and Dick Bierman have performed a number of experiments of emotional response in human subjects. The subjects view a computer screen on which appear (at randomly varying intervals) a series of images, some of which are emotionally neutral, and some of which are highly emotional (violent, sexual….). In Radin and Bierman’s early studies, skin conductance of a finger was used to measure physiological response They found that subjects responded strongly to emotional images compared to neutral images, and that the emotional response occurred between a fraction of a second to several seconds BEFORE the image appeared! Recently Professor Bierman (University of Amsterdam) repeated these experiments with subjects in an fMRI brain imager and found emotional responses in brain activity up to 4 seconds before the stimuli. Moreover he looked at raw data from other laboratories and found similar emotional responses before stimuli appeared.
http://www.quantumconsciousness.org/views/TimeFlies.html
As well, the following experiment, from Princeton, is very interesting in that it was found that ‘perturbed randomness’ precedes a worldwide ‘moral crisis’:
Scientific Evidence That Mind Effects Matter – Random Number Generators – video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KE1haKXoHMo
Mass Consciousness: Perturbed Randomness Before First Plane Struck on 911 – July 29 2012
Excerpt: The machine apparently sensed the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre four hours before they happened – but in the fevered mood of conspiracy theories of the time, the claims were swiftly knocked back by sceptics. But it also appeared to forewarn of the Asian tsunami just before the deep sea earthquake that precipitated the epic tragedy.,,
Now, even the doubters are acknowledging that here is a small box with apparently inexplicable powers. ‘It’s Earth-shattering stuff,’ says Dr Roger Nelson, emeritus researcher at Princeton University in the United States, who is heading the research project behind the ‘black box’ phenomenon.
http://www.network54.com/Forum/594658/thread/1343585136/1343657830/Mass+Consciousness-+Perturbed+Randomness++Before+First+Plane+Struck+on+911
Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research - Scientific Study of Consciousness-Related Physical Phenomena - publications
http://www.princeton.edu/~pear/publications.html
There is simply no coherent explanation that a materialist/atheist can give as to why morally troubling situations are detected prior to our becoming fully aware of them or before they even happen. The materialist/atheist simply has no beyond space and time cause to appeal to to explain why the phenomena should happen! Whereas as a Theist, especially as a Christian Theist who believes that the Lord Jesus Christ died and rose again to pay for our sins, I would fully expect that ‘objective’ morality would have such a deep, ‘spooky’, beyond space and time, effect since, of course, I hold that God, who is morally perfect, upholds the universe in its continued existence and I also hold that we have ‘transcendent souls’, created by God, in His image, that are able to sense and interact with the perfect objective morality of God.
This following study is sort of the cherry on the cake to the moral argument and shows that objective morality is even built/designed into the way our bodies respond to long term happiness and short term pleasure:
Human Cells Respond in Healthy, Unhealthy Ways to Different Kinds of Happiness - July 29, 2013
Excerpt: Human bodies recognize at the molecular level that not all happiness is created equal, responding in ways that can help or hinder physical health,,,
The sense of well-being derived from "a noble purpose" may provide cellular health benefits, whereas "simple self-gratification" may have negative effects, despite an overall perceived sense of happiness, researchers found.,,,
"Philosophers have long distinguished two basic forms of well-being: a 'hedonic' [hee-DON-ic] form representing an individual's pleasurable experiences, and a deeper 'eudaimonic,' [u-DY-moh-nick] form that results from striving toward meaning and a noble purpose beyond simple self-gratification," wrote Fredrickson and her colleagues.
It's the difference, for example, between enjoying a good meal and feeling connected to a larger community through a service project, she said. Both give us a sense of happiness, but each is experienced very differently in the body's cells.,,,
But if all happiness is created equal, and equally opposite to ill-being, then patterns of gene expression should be the same regardless of hedonic or eudaimonic well-being. Not so, found the researchers.
Eudaimonic well-being was, indeed, associated with a significant decrease in the stress-related CTRA gene expression profile. In contrast, hedonic well-being was associated with a significant increase in the CTRA profile. Their genomics-based analyses, the authors reported, reveal the hidden costs of purely hedonic well-being.,,
Fredrickson found the results initially surprising, because study participants themselves reported overall feelings of well-being. One possibility, she suggested, is that people who experience more hedonic than eudaimonic well-being consume the emotional equivalent of empty calories. "Their daily activities provide short-term happiness yet result in negative physical consequences long-term," she said.
"We can make ourselves happy through simple pleasures, but those 'empty calories' don't help us broaden our awareness or build our capacity in ways that benefit us physically," she said. "At the cellular level, our bodies appear to respond better to a different kind of well-being, one based on a sense of connectedness and purpose."
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/07/130729161952.htm
To believe that Darwinian evolution could produce such a 'morally nuanced' genetic mechanism, a mechanism which discerns between morally noble causes and morally self gratifying causes, and to favor moral causes which are above our immediate feelings of satisfaction and pleasure, is not a parsimonious belief to believe in to put it mildly. Especially since Darwinian mechanisms have yet to demonstrate the origination of a single gene/protein:
Verse and Music:
Hebrews 11:25
and chose to suffer with the people of God rather than to enjoy the short-lived pleasure of sin.
Mandisa - Overcomer (Lyric Video)
http://www.vevo.com/watch/mandisa/overcomer-lyric-video/USUV71301156
Supplemental Notes:
ABC News – The Science Behind the Healing Power of Love – video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6t1p-PwGgE4
Social isolation and its health implications January 2012
Excerpt: Studies show that social isolation and/or loneliness predict morbidity and mortality from cancer, cardiovascular disease, and a host of other diseases. In fact, the body perceives loneliness as a threat. Research from the University of California suggests that loneliness or lack of social support could triple the odds of being diagnosed with a heart condition. Redford Williams and his colleagues at Duke University directed a study in 1992 on heart patients and their relationships. They discovered that 50% of patients with heart disease who did not have a spouse or someone to confide in died within five years, while only 17% of those who did have a confidante died in the same time period.12
http://www.how-to-be-healthy.org/social-isolation-and-its-health-implications/