X-Message-Number: 20161
From: "mike99" <>
Subject: The short & cryptic messages of Dormammu (was: God talk)
Date: Tue, 24 Sep 2002 15:45:31 -0600

Dear Mr. 

Your short and cryptic responses to messages in the thread about
technologically-induced "spiritual" experiences seem to indicate that you do
not appreciate exactly how damning this evidence is to the claim that these
are God-induced experiences. For example, there is the exchange below
(quoted material is inside the 2 .... lines):
......................................................................
LATORRA<<the claim is, in your analogy, that we can easily produce physical
evidence of both natural and synthetic rubies. Can you produce
incontrovertible evidence of the existence of God?>>

d:  I see.  You misread my analogy.  my claim is that the existence of
synthetic rubies has no bearing on the existence of natural rubies.  thus,
the existence of induced spiritual experiences has no bearing on the
existence of non-induced spiritual experiences.
  indeed, even the induced experiences may be authentic spiritual
experiences,
just as an authentic breeze may be noticed when a switched-off fan is
switched on.
......................................................................
NEW RESPONSE TO THE ABOVE-v
LATORRA: Once again, your analogizing misses the mark because the moving air
of a breeze does not have the emotional impact and "revelatory" effect of
the brain events which people interpret as "spiritual" experiences. No one
who felt a breeze than went out a committed mass murder because "the breeze
told me to" but numerous individuals have done precisely this because, so
they thought, "God told me to." (For examples of this, read the historically
accurate material on Old Testament massacres, Muslin massacres, Jim Jones'
People's Temple mass murder-suicide, etc.)


And then, Mr. D., there was this exchange:
......................................................................
Message #20149
From: 
Date: Mon, 23 Sep 2002 16:02:41 EDT
Subject: Re: CryoNet #20132 - #20143

In a message dated 9/23/02 2:00:53 AM,  writes:

<<Mark Plus:  I happen to find all this talk of "mystical" & "spiritual"
experiences
baffling. I have no clue what such people are mouthing off about.

d:  find out.
............

LATORRA: What do you mean by "find out"? Meditate? Pray? Take psychedelics?
Use a "brain machine" to induce mystical experiences? One could do some or
all of that. I certainly have. But these experiences prove nothing...except
that homo sapiens are capable of having such experiences. The experiences
certainly don't prove the existence of God, an afterlife, or anything else
that some people interpret them to mean. In other words, the meaning is
added to the experience by the experiencer. The experiences themselves are
just whatever they are: bliss, love, union with something greater, etc.
Heck, even many so-called spiritual masters (e.g., Adi Da) warn their
followers not to get attached to these experiences. If they don't idolize
these subjective states, then why should we?>>

d:  one may say the same of "ordinary" experiences.  and one should.
......................................................................
NEW RESPONSE TO THE ABOVE-v
LATORRA: OK, let's do that. So now do you agree that these so-called
"spiritual" experiences are not caused by God and should be treated as being
in the same causal category as getting drunk or having a pleasant dream? Or
do you still maintain that, somehow without evidence of any kind and without
logical proof, we should still accept your original claim that God-caused
spiritual experiences are real?
  And please, write more than a dozen words this time. If you continue to
pretend to be a Zen-like sage (and BTW I am a Zen Buddhist) and refuse to
engage in the level of debate this list deserves, you will have discredited
yourself and your arguments (such as they are).
  Please, don't cheapen the efforts of those who want to engage you in
debate by dismissing them without expending at least as much time and effort
to explain your position as they have spent to explain theirs. This is
simple good manners.

Regards,

Michael LaTorra




Member:
Extropy Institute: www.extropy.org
World Transhumanist Association: www.transhumanism.org
Alcor Life Extension Foundation: www.alcor.org
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