Past, Present and Future

[kandrathe]

Now don't get me wrong, I'm all for science backing up and validating psychic claims 100%, but I'm just pointing out the obvious here: we don't know everything, and quite a bit of our own bodies is still a big mystery, even in our day and age.

And... I'm just going back to Aristotle and Plato -- the fundamentals of metaphysics, in that there is actuality and potentiality. We have that which we know and can prove, and that which we don't know or cannot prove. I feel Jester places inordinate trust in the actuality, and no trust in the potentiality. Regardless of the fact that in the history of actuality, humanity has a pretty dismal record of failure. However, each failed theory is replaced with an even more elegant and complicated one that is supposed to now be the correct answer, even when it fails to adequately describe reality. I'm not as pessimistic as old Blaise Pascal when it comes to the failure of Reason, but I hold no more faith in Reason to explain the nature of reality than I would in science to explain Cosmology. Reason is a useful tool for ordering an irrational universe, just as Time is a useful idea for explaining how we experience it. To discuss possibilities one must move beyond what we perceive as realities, and make reasonable guesses into the realms of the unknowable. Rationalists might see this as senseless, as all unprovable theories may be correct (unicorns, elves, Spaghetti monsters, or Norse Gods). But, this is just monochromatic thinking. Discussing best guesses, may lead us to better theories, which may lead us to provable actualities. Which is a good thing for those who trust their senses. Me? I'm not sure our senses are very good at giving us an understanding of reality, meaning that our senses are very, very limited. Those among us who have made the greatest breakthroughs in furthering our understanding of reality have done so by pursuing theoretical mathematics, rather than physical experimentation. Experimentation has only partially verified what our mathematics has revealed.

When I'm talking about unexplained phenomena, it is not in the realm of some 1970's era ESP experiments where victims were forced to predict complicated symbols on decks of cards. I'm talking about shared phenomena, 1) The mind-body connection (placebo effect) where the body heals itself as if the cure were effective, 2) wide spread belief in intuition (what you describe), 3) similarity of near death experiences, 4) Deja-vu or glimpses of the future, and 5) shared experiences of spirits. I would grant that a majority of the history of paranormal experience is filled with cranks and hoaxes, but there are certain cases that defy a purely rational dismissal. I've seen magician David Blaine do amazing things, but I know they are slight of hand and explainable. But, there are some things people have experienced without an obvious charlatan behind them. I'm open to the possibility of the existence of an unknown charlatan as well. I just don't know for certain, and so I'm ready for a rational explanation (if one exists).

The nature of this thread is dealing with metaphysical potentiality, since we cannot conceive of an actuality where time travel is possible (or we'd be doing it). According to Aristotle, and Plato, for every effect there is a cause (reason).

Regardless of the hard materialist views of some here at the Lounge, I'm open minded enough to consider other voices on the nature of reality and consciousness such as David Chalmers of the Australian National University. I like to think outside the box, and I detest being bound by "what is known" (actuality). The problem of our age is that too often our higher education consists of being told what to think, rather than being taught how to think.