Secret Chiefs and attainment
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@Los said
""I have a pain in my leg" is a factual claim, not a values statement.Here's an example of a values claim: "It sucks that I have a pain in my leg.""
No. You are wrong again.
They are both qualitative measurements. This is where your admitted lack of education in science is betraying your reason.
I'm not going to move much beyond this to look at the rest of your subjective beliefs and opinions, all of which are based on your OBSERVATIONS. We need to first establish use of scientifically accepted terms for measurement.
The terms you prefer to use are about as illusory and imaginative as Goblins in "real" science.
I lifted the following from a quick Google search -- it is very oversimplified. Since your scientific research background is admittedly limited (which I appreciate your honesty) it should be easy to follow for you:
"Quantitative measurements are those which involve the collection of numbers. It is the opposite of qualitative data which are observations."
Your pain examples are both qualitative. And then you move on to more confused statements, which I can't believe you even wrote down...
@Los said
"Similarly, "There are Secret Chiefs" is an unsubstantiated factual claim. "My friend pretends to talk to Secret Chiefs" or "My friend pretends that his daydreams are communications from the Secret Chiefs" are substantiated factual claims."
Which brings us to the next step in Los' science lesson plan...
Unsubstantiated and substantiated: quantitative measurement and how it works.
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Well, Los' concern is only what may or may not be said to be concretely real. Under those demands, for the Secret Chiefs to be real, they would have to be actual living humans. For their powers to be real, they would have to submit them to the "show and tell" of hard science for verification.
And you know, if there are Secret Chiefs who are actual living people, I just don't seem them as willing to perform tricks for those who have no interest in them except to confirm their existence or not. It doesn't really line up with the idea of someone who actually has such powers living according to the necessities of their Will. It assumes they'd feel the need for otherwise unconcerned people to believe in them for some reason, and I can think of no reason except to affirm their own egos in some way, which would beg the question of the level of their development to that of Secret Chief.
But even if you loosen the demands on what may be said to be "real" to include phenomena, as in "the phenomena of experiencing the Secret Chiefs is real," then there is no reason that completely healthy, sane, rational people should not be interested in investigating such phenomena, especially if such phenomena have in the past been reported to provide beneficial and intelligent instruction and guidance in accordance with one's own True Will.
In short, I find no adequate reason to discontinue the working hypothesis, as I am content with either extreme of manifestation and have primarily found the writings and instructions of those who report their influence to be among the most beneficial and intelligent things ever written.
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@Legis said
"And you know, if there are Secret Chiefs who are actual living people, I just don't seem them as willing to perform tricks for those who have no interest in them except to confirm their existence or not."
If they're "real" but they don't affect the world in any detectable ways, then they're indistinguishable from being not real, and no one therefore has any good reason to think that they're real.
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@Los said
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@Legis said
"And you know, if there are Secret Chiefs who are actual living people, I just don't seem them as willing to perform tricks for those who have no interest in them except to confirm their existence or not."If they're "real" but they don't affect the world in any detectable ways, then they're indistinguishable from being not real, and no one therefore has any good reason to think that they're real."
You're default tautology. You define "real" as measurable. So, only the measurable is measurable.
It's amazing how many stars suddenly became real when we launched the hubble telescope.
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@Takamba said
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@Los said
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@Takamba said
""[T]here are no facts, only interpretations." - Friedrich Nietzche."And is that a fact or an interpretation?"
It's a quote."
I don't really have to spell this out, do I?
If the statement "There are no facts, only interpretations" is a fact, then the statement is demonstrated to be false (since there would actually be a fact, in contradiction to the statement).
If the statement "There are no facts, only interpretations" is an interpretation, then it's just somebody's arbitrary way of looking at things: it's not a fact, and nobody has any reason to think it's correct.
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@Avshalom Binyamin said
"You're default tautology. You define "real" as measurable. So, only the measurable is measurable."
I said detectable. Real things manifest in detectable ways. If something is "real" but doesn't manifest in any detectable ways, then it's functionally equivalent to being not real and nobody has any reason to think that it exists.
Name something real that doesn't manifest in any detectable way.
"It's amazing how many stars suddenly became real when we launched the hubble telescope."
They didn't "become real" -- we became aware of them (and thus had reason to accept that they existed) because we were able to detect them.
They were always real -- always capable of being detected -- but we didn't know that they were real until we actually did detect them.
In the case of these Secret Buddies of yours, no one's ever detected them, and therefore nobody has any reason to think that they're real. If ever humanity does detect them, then we'll have reason to accept that they exist.
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You want me to name something detectable that's not detectable?
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@Avshalom Binyamin said
"You want me to name something detectable that's not detectable?"
No, I want you to name something that you consider real that is not detectable in any way.
The reason for my question is that you seem to disagree with the idea that "real" means "manifesting in some detectable way." So, in order to get a grasp on what you think "real" means, I'm asking you to point to something undetectable that you consider real.
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Everything we haven't discovered yet.
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@Avshalom Binyamin said
"Everything we haven't discovered yet."
Things we haven't discovered yet -- with the implication that we could possibly discover them -- are detectable (otherwise, we wouldn't have the possibility of discovering them).
I asked you to name something you consider real that's not detectable (i.e. not capable of being detected, at all, ever).
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So you accept the existence of things we have no evidence of?
I also accept the existence of all the unknown things we will never be able to detect.
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@Avshalom Binyamin said
"I also accept the existence of all the unknown things we will never be able to detect."
There's a difference between something that's detectable that we never actually do detect and something that's undetectable.
What you're saying here is that you think there are (detectable) things that we will never actually detect, which means that, as far as I can tell, you're identifying "real" with "detectable."
I mean, you do agree that until something is detected people are not justified in accepting that that specific something exists, right? An example to make that question clearer: radio waves existed long before people were capable of detecting them, but they still existed (that is to say, they were, in theory, detectable...people just didn't yet have the necessary tools to detect them). Do you agree that, before anyone had detected radio waves, that no one had any good reason to accept that they existed?
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I asked you a simple question first.
Do you accept the existence of things we have no evidence of?
Or have we already discovered everything?
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@Avshalom Binyamin said
"I asked you a simple question first.
Do you accept the existence of things we have no evidence of?
Or have we already discovered everything?"
I accept that there are things that we haven't yet discovered, and I accept that claim on the basis of evidence: the entire history of the human search for knowledge has continually revealed new things to learn, and, inductively, we are more than justified in concluding on the back of that massive amount of evidence that there will (functionally) always be more to learn.
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@Los said
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In the case of these Secret Buddies of yours, no one's ever detected them, and therefore nobody has any reason to think that they're real. If ever humanity does detect them, then we'll have reason to accept that they exist."
To put a slight fly in your ointment:
Crowley detected them, in fact his whole philosophy, of which you claim to be a follower, is based on just such a claim.
In fact various people have claimed to detect them, whether you accept those claims or not though is down to you.
It could possibly be that these people have simply detected something that you yourself don't have the capacity to detect, by dint of not having developed the faculty's necessary?Not so long ago I was pretty much a nihilist/skeptic, I simply thought that all these 'goblins' and whatnot were patently absurd, stands to reason doesn't it? Anyone can tell you that there are no goblins!
Even though I had had Out-of-body-experiences and seen "Ghosts", I had written them off as hallucinations.
Two things made me not so sure, one was my first experience of Kundalini rising, it was actually happening, and that in itself was a revelation. The second was the Vision of Adonai, I had no idea that it was both as literal and as unexpectedly commonplace as it was.
Now you will probably write these off as my own fantasies or delusions. It doesn't matter really what you think because those experiences have left an indelible mark on my life. I'm not saying that these things confirm to me the existence of secret chiefs, but they do confirm to me that there is more going on in the Universe than my senses detect in the normal course of things.
Anyway, that's my two-pence. Back to Work.
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@Los said
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I don't really have to spell this out, do I?If the statement "There are no facts, only interpretations" is a fact, then the statement is demonstrated to be false (since there would actually be a fact, in contradiction to the statement).
If the statement "There are no facts, only interpretations" is an interpretation, then it's just somebody's arbitrary way of looking at things: it's not a fact, and nobody has any reason to think it's correct."
Do I have to spell it out for you? Your God Nietzche (whom you oft quote) said this. Ergo, he meant it exactly as you interpret it. Ergo, it applies to all your beliefs rooted in Nietzche. Ergo, no more hold water do you.
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How do you define a goblin?
Seems funny, to me, that there should be a definition for something which does not exist.
Yet, at the very heart of a matter, without a definition one can make no argument.
The statement "Goblins do not exist" is a logical fallacy.
A more accurate statement:
"I have no experience with what I define as a goblin."
It is about taking responsibility for your belief system. -
@Archaeus said
"Crowley detected them, in fact his whole philosophy, of which you claim to be a follower, is based on just such a claim.
"This is their detectable effect on the world. Some report an experience of the phenomena of Secret Chiefs and then write things that captivate the mind to the point of our coming here almost everyday to discuss them.
As I said, because of the quality of information presented by those who claim to have an experience of this phenomena, I see no reason why the phenomena should not be investigated by any rational, interested person. Attempts to discredit a working hypothesis by accusations of "acceptance without proof" misunderstand, either willingly or ignorantly, the process of investigating a hypothesis, where an idea must be regarded as potentially true for any* legitimate *investigation and discovery to occur.
As to the possible results of investigating the phenomena of the experience of Secret Chiefs: If they are real, even in Los' strictly defined sense of the word "real," but have by definition simply hidden themselves from the masses, then I see no reason to think that they could not demonstrate their reality beyond the strictest doubt to those who by their work make themselves ready and worthy of an experience of their phenomena.
But the expectation that they would demonstrate their reality to any and all merely curious persons contradicts their primary description, which is "Secret," and thus contradicts the hypothesis itself.
Perhaps, in the end, it is simply offensive to the minds of some that proof should be given to some who are considered worthy by the purpose and quality of their work while others are left in the dark. Yet anyone who has ever wished the attention of a person in high demand faces the same restriction, as many, many others also desire the same attention. In the end, such people usually restrict their attention to those individuals whose purposes and qualities attract their own.