Scientific Musings
Ramblings
This is why you're wrong: logical fallacies
- - humbugfighter
Logical Fallacies
are arguments made with bad reasoning.
Reason is basically what we call, when someone thinks, understands, and makes judgments by a process of logic. Reason is how we rule out impossibilities and irrational thoughts from our fallible minds when we are trying to explain something of truth. Any argument can be made using irrational thinking which makes any argument completely useless and provides no real basis of truth unless it follows reason.
Below are some examples of logical fallacies:
Ad hominem: Claiming that something someone says is false because of unfavorable characteristics about that person. (Hitler was a vegetarian; therefore you're a Nazi if you're a vegetarian.)
Appeal to belief: The claim that since someone believes something, it must make it true. (A lot of people believe in Christianity, so it must be true.)
Appeal to authority: The claim that since someone (is an expert or says he is) makes what they are claiming true. (Deepak Chopra says that consciousness is real, since he is an expert on consciousness, this is a fact.)
Appeal to tradition: The claim that since something has always been done this way, it makes it the correct thing to do. (i.e. slavery is okay, just because people have always had slaves.)
Argument from ignorance: The claim that something is true just because it has not been proven false. (This is one example of shifting the burden of proof.)
Burden of Proof: Shifting the burden of proof in which you are asking someone to prove a negative. Anyone making an assertion must always hold the burden of proof.
Circular Reasoning: (i.e. God is real because the Bible says he is, the Bible is real because it is the word of God)
Appeal to Emotion: The claim that things that cause bad feelings must be bad/evil, things that cause good feelings must be good.
Slippery Slope: The claim that a relatively small even will lead to outlandishly huge consequences. (i.e. If gays are allowed to marry, it will destroy the institution of marriage, children, and families.)
False Dichotomy: Making a claim that A and B are true, then asserting if one is false the other has to be true. (i.e. If you're not with us, you're against us. or If you want better teachers, you have to raise taxes. If you don't raise taxes, you can't have better teachers.)
Cherry Picking: Choosing evidence that is favorable to your claim while purposely concealing or leaving out evidence that is favorable to your opponents.
False Generalization: The claim that since one member of a group acts a certain way, then all members must do the same.
Red Herring: Changing the topic while making it appear they are related to avoid discussing the actual premise. (Claim: We shouldn't be bailing out the banks. Response: Well, during economic struggle we should support the president.)
Loaded Question: A question containing an assumption, said in order to trap you into answering it in a specific way in favor of your opponent.
Straw Man: Making an argument to misrepresent a person's claim or argument. (i.e. Claim: Sunny days are good. Response: If all days were Sunny, we'd have no rain and all plant life would die.)
Quote Mining: It appeals to the "Appeal to Authority" fallacy; using an authority to prove your claim, while misrepresenting what that authority actually says.
It is important to understand how logic works and why it must be used when arguing facts. You might think that this information is only practical if you're on a debate team somewhere or just really enjoy arguing with people. The fact is; this applies also to your thought process and beliefs. To justify a belief as rational it must pass the test of logic. If it does not, then it is an irrational belief. The human brain is not perfect and makes logical fallacies if the thinker does not actively apply reason to their thought process.
We really landed on the moon!
- - humbugfighter
The
Moon Landings
Debunking
the Hoax
You've all heard or maybe
you believe that we've never landed on the moon, that it was a staged hoax in a
desperate attempt to get there before the Russians did after the Sputnik
moment. Nearly 25% of Americans believe we've never been to the moon.
What is
so compelling about this theory?
It's
typical pseudo-history, as long as you can make a documentary that looks real,
anything is believable.
This is
what you would call irrational skepticism; let's take it claim by claim.
The
flag was waving.
No. It
wasn't. The flag was attached to a L shaped pole called the Lunar Flag
Assembly. It moved when the astronauts were assembling the flag due to their
movement, similar to a pendulum, the flag was also wrinkled and many of the
ripples are actually misinterpreted wrinkles.
The
photos contain mistakes and anomalies.
Many
claim that certain cross hairs are in the wrong place or that they see
"prop" markings on rocks. It's probably a hair that got attached to
the photo, in all of the original photos there are none of these imperfections.
The cross hairs were altered due to altering the photo to increase its
appearance.
The
cameras would have been foggy due to radiation.
The
cameras were contained in a metal box that stopped the fogging of the film's
emulsion.
They
couldn't have survived the radiation.
The
astronauts were shielded by the alumminium hulls of the craft, their trajectory
through the belts was selected because of its lower levels of radiation.
They
were using harnesses to appear to be in a low gravity environment.
This
has been debunked by demonstration repeatedly; check out myth-busters. No one
has been able to recreate the same appearance using the same technology of the
day.
Moon
rocks are identical to those found in Antarctica.
The rocks from the Moon brought back by astronauts are distinctly different from those found on Earth. Those found on Earth have been oxidized from their entry into our atmosphere. Geologists have examined this and have all agreed (due to this noticeable difference) that these rocks really have come from the Moon.
The foot prints couldn't have been preserved.
There
is no wind on the moon, their foot prints on in very fine dust that feels
a little like damp sand, that's how they were able to create footprints and
them be preserved even until now.
There
were no stars.
There
were stars, just unseen due to the fact it occurred during lunar mornings, the
sun was shining too brightly for them to be seen.
The
U.S. had motive for faking the Moon landings.
The
U.S. did have motivation to go to the Moon, to compete in the space race
against the USSR, they had launched Sputnik and we feared their technology
would advance more quickly than our own. We wanted to be first, which is why we
actually did go to the Moon. There would be reason to not try to pull off a
hoax because if found out, that would mean great failure. If the motivation for
hoaxing this, and actually going are the same, then you can't automatically
assume it was a hoax. The entire facet of NASA was created from the same
motivation, and to fake the moon landings, that would require thousands of
people behind the hoax to "keep quiet", even Nixon couldn't get away
with a handful of people stealing a few files. It is absurd to think he or
anyone else would get away with this.
We had
many rovers on the Moon before we had any manned missions. We had a lot of preparation
before we went. Similarly we put a rover on Mars and are making plans on
sending a manned spacecraft once we overcome the issues of long term space
travel. We have astronauts living on the ISS for long periods of time. It seems
absurd that we didn't have the capability of sending a man on the Moon.
How do
you know it really happened?
Besides the proof of moon rocks, the countless evidence provided by third parties and other groups outside of the government that tracked Apollo missions for fun, or
this
picture of the moon taken from a telescope to prove that we really landed,
The
most compelling evidence that we for certain... landed on the moon would be...
Lasers!
Astronauts left laser reflectors on the moon in order to measure
the rate that the Moon is receding away from Earth. We know it's moving away
from us at 3.8 centimeters per year. If you're an amateur astronomer, college
student, or you work for NASA, it's easy to prove the existence of these laser
retro-reflectors.
The only thing that conspiracy theorists can't explain away, is their
existence. They will try to claim it was from unmanned missions however it took
3 manned missions to bring up all the equipment and assemble it. If you look at
the reflectors, it requires human assembly.
We landed on the moon and that is awesome.
The Bermuda Triangle: Dude, where's my plane/boat?!
- - humbugfighter
The Bermuda Triangle
You won't find it on a real map...
Cranks out there (enabled by pseudo-history documentaries and new age
books) believe that there is a specific spot in the ocean where planes and
ships go missing unusually frequently, caused by extraterrestrial entities or
other supernatural causes.
The Lost City of Atlantis
It is a mythical island that never existed, but is claimed to have a direct
cause for missing boats and planes in the Bermuda triangle, due to “leftover”
technology from the mythical civilization. The reason these people even believe
the Lost City of Atlantis is true is due to the self-purported psychic Edgar
Cayce claiming that he predicted that evidence for this mythical island would
turn up and his followers attribute this to “Bimini Road”, which geologists
consider to be of natural origin and a common feature on the planet.
Other claims that UFOs are responsible for the disappearances.
Nothing Unusual
Let’s first attack the very first claim; that these disappearances are
anomalous.
The number of reported disappearances is not statistically greater than any
other storm prone part of Earth’s many oceans. If it happens as consistently
everywhere else we can rule out that it is an anomaly or an unusual event in
the first place.
The disappearances
were directly proportional to tropical storms.
After writers began
to benefit from persuading others to believe in the supernatural anomalies,
many reported disappearances were fakes and many reports were outright
fraudulent or poorly researched.
The Bermuda triangle
is not the only “triangle”, there are other mythical areas of the Earth where
anomalous disappearances are claimed to occur, for example the “Bridge-water
Triangle in SE Massachusetts and the “Michigan Triangle”. It's not anomalous if
it happens consistently everywhere.
What really happened?
As technology has
improved on navigation instruments, the rate of reported disappearances have
significantly decreased and these numbers are directly related. That; or the
aliens want nothing to do with our weird instruments!
The fact remains,
saying aliens did it is an irrational assumption for something we already have
a scientific understanding of; methane hydrates, tropical storms, human
mistakes, rogue waves, and compass variations are all factors in what causes
any planes or ships to go missing.
The Communism and Atheism Connection Myth
- - humbugfighter
A deeper look into ideology
This humbug that somehow there is a link between
atheism and communism is more prominent than most people who reject that idea
may think; it has been the root cause for much discrimination against American
atheists. Fundamentalists like to equate Communism with atheism, Communism was
evil, and therefore atheists are evil. That type of logic doesn't work.
The altruistic morality of Christianity and
Communism
The morality of Christianity is altruistic,
meaning you must sacrifice for other people and for God. You must do so humbly
and painfully. It is moral for you to give your last piece of bread to your
neighbor than it is for you to eat it. Communism is this collective mysticism
endorsed politically, it has the same morality that you must sacrifice for the
good of the collective proletarian. There's no "individual" person
you are sacrificing for, it's this broad proletarian that they believe in, and
believe the sacrifice should be made for. If it benefited a single individual,
then it would be selfish. Christianity and Communism share this same faith
based, spiritual collective mysticism.
Why were the communists atheists?
Communism isn't inherently atheistic. You can be
a theist and still believe in Communism; in fact it may be easier for you. Just
as you can be an atheist and believe in the economic system of capitalism.
Christianity and capitalism have very little in common and their morality
doesn't mix well, but right wing Christians in America would believe otherwise,
simply because they don't understand the basis of their moral system.
Christianity demands a preferential option for the poor, it demands social
justice. It is the (Christian) collective's responsibility to help the poor
and create minimum standards of living and do so in an act of sacrificing your
own standards of living. It requires that, the morality of Christianity not
only says help the poor, but it also doesn't permit you to not be poor
yourself. If you doubt the morality of Christianity I would re-read the
passages in the Bible about what Jesus thought about rich people. (It's not
looking so good.) Atheism was a byproduct of Communism because they believed
spiritually in their leader, the only reason the church wasn't allowed is to
prevent taking away servitude to the leader and the collective society.
Does atheism motivate evil ideology?
It depends on your definition of evil, evil being
"Someone that doesn't believe in any gods." Then, yes. Atheists are
evil. If you mean evil in any rational moral sense, as in they are motivated to be communists, no. It is
difficult to be skeptical atheists and be convinced of communism because that
would require un-testable, unwavering, improvable faith in a mystical leader
and an invisible proletarian. Communism only took away the church to replace
God with their leader, which IS their God. Atheists don't have any gods.
What is the morality of Atheism?
The morality of Atheism can be different among every individual; however
the morality of why they are an atheist to begin with is simply this: Truth is
a virtue; truth is morally superior to a lie. The morality is that of objective
reason. It is the idea of basing what you accept to be true, on repeatable,
testable evidence. It is the belief that one should not make giant leaps of
assumptions about how the universe works or came to be. It is the acceptance of
the fact that humans cannot afford to be arrogant enough to do that, that human
beings have perceptional and patternicity faults in our brains that cause our
ability to reject things that we know to be fact and believe things that aren't
true. In that, the scientific method is the most effective way to rule out that
kind of human interference, to get the most accurate and factual explanation.
The answer is not about what the observer wants to be true, but rather, what is
actually the case. Atheists have morals and a sense of empathy and fairness
towards other people. It's motivated because they are human, not because a book
told them too. Arguably, the morality in Christianity outside of altruistic
behavior is mostly based on commandment, not reason or morality. If you were to
train your pet dog to sit and he listens to your command that does not make him
moral or immoral. It simply means he is doing what you've told him to do.
Similarly if your religious text tells you to do something and you do it
because of that, that act has nothing to do with morality and everything to do
with doing something, simply because you're told to. Morality is about the best
possible action in any given situation that would produce the fairest outcome
and least harm to someone else or yourself.
What is immoral about altruism?
(a reason based opinion)
Altruism,
the morality of self-sacrifice is immoral because it is suicidal. It is also
immoral because it is hypocritical, if you are forced to sacrifice yourself to
others it is immoral simply because you are a slave to an invisible and
mystical collective and if all of the individuals in that collective are also
sacrificing themselves then who is taking? If there is a taker, based on that
ideology, they too would be immoral, because they are taking that which you
sacrificed and not also sacrificing themselves. In Communism there is only one
winner and that is the proletarian leader, the loser is the entire
"collective" that the entire "collective" believes to be
serving. It is also not the same thing as charity and isn't for the same
reasons. Charity does not require self-sacrifice in order to make the dead
"moral". Only in altruism does the sacrificial element to charity have to exist for the "morality" of it to exist.
The Red
Scare (the second one)
The idea
that atheism and communism have a relationship with one another or directly
cause one another is a myth that was born during the second red scare. We were
so frightened of the communist ideology and communists were our sworn enemy.
The U.S. was afraid that the communists would influence the social lifestyle in
America as well as infiltrate the United States government or other political
factions and start a movement in America to overthrow the government. Was this
a good reason to be afraid? Yes. There were many soviet spies that infiltrated the
U.S. government and created many double agents that compromised secrets and
caused damage to our security. Communism has also influenced ideology in the
U.S. as well. There still exists today a small fraction of people who consider
themselves to be "The U.S. Communist Party" and would like to see the
American government overthrown and replaced with a leader to worship for the
good of others.
An Irrational Reaction
However, our response to that fear, creating the Christian
ideology of the family unit and social restrictions did not solve the Red
Scare, simply because Communists were not motivated by "a lack of
belief" or atheism but rather a belief in a different type of
"god". America saw fit to solve the problem by fighting it with
"Christian Values", creating this sort of broad definition of
Christianity that wasn't there before, before "Christianity" people
identified with their denomination, during this time those denominations merged
to fight a common enemy based on religion, and religious influenced and
infiltrated our government to an unsettling and unconstitutional degree. Our
dollar did not say "In God We Trust" before but because of the Red
Scare, "Christian Values" in the broad sense of social duty and
collective community also came about due to this as well. Altruism has always existed in the ideology of Christianity, however what I am talking about is the lack of separation of church and state in many areas that still exist today as a response to this fear that is unconstitutional. The issue is, we no
longer have to be afraid of Communism running rampant and taking over America,
yet our ideology that we gave birth to in a desperate attempt to fight the iron
curtain, the mysterious and what we thought to be "godless" enemy
still exists prominently in America today. That social ideology persists
without reason and is completely fear based in origin.
It's getting hot in here: The Climate Crisis
- - humbugfighter
Relief: The majority of Americans believe that global warming is real.
This is a relief, that number has gone up significantly in the past two years. Partially due to the political climate as well as the loads of information out there debunking the denier's claims.
How does global warming work?
The Earth's atmosphere acts as a blanket, it traps in heat from the sun which is necessary in order to sustain life. We couldn't live on a planet without a greenhouse effect producing atmosphere. However when heightened levels of CO2 are emitted in the atmosphere this causes the "blanket" to thicken, allowing for more heat to get trapped.
Is global warming man-made?
This is where the deniers are staunchly in disagreement with 75% of the scientific community. Most people accept climate change as a truth, but that is a loaded sentence. Because I don't think there could be a single reason to deny changing climate, it happens yearly on a regular basis, however if you ask the same people how many of them believe in global warming, the number will change. Especially if you ask if they think it was caused by man.
During the ice age, carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was at 180-210 ppm, during hot periods it was at 280-300ppm. That is natural climate change. However, after the industrial revolution it is at 390ppm. That means by just the burning of fossil fuels since the industrial revolution, we've raised the CO2 levels almost as much as the transition between a global ice age and regular hotter climates. That is a stunningly drastic change. CO2 emissions are important naturally because they regular the Earth's ice age cycles. The entire scientific community agrees that burning fossil fuels and gas causes the atmosphere to heat up.
Why the denial?
There is geopolitical gain, for starters the average Joe that denies man-made climate change is basically indoctrinated by their favorite conservative talk radio personality to doubt the evidence behind it without further examination, partially due to the paranoia and conspirator mindset that the government will add more regulations and controls due to this "false flag" scenario. It is easier to just deny the whole thing as a fraud than to risk any personal freedoms being taken away. Now, there is some rationality to this push back, radicals on the left think taking drastic precautions is necessary for the environment while others wish to use these drastic changes for their own geopolitical gain. The deniers will fall on their own merit and lack of evidence. Those claiming that global warming is a hoax use, useless facts about Al Gore (which have nothing to do with the scientific evidence.) or keep repeating the war cry "There is no evidence for it!" When in fact, there is.
See, the issue here (as noted in an earlier post) is that we are not only capable of believing things without reason or evidence, but for the same reasons we are also capable of rejecting reality and evidence for no reason than our own desire not to. Denying evidence when there is evidence is the same as making false claims based on no evidence.
How can global warming be solved without taking away my freedoms?
Well luckily we have new technologies, for instance, electric cars will be at the forefront of solving a lot of are carbon emission levels. We also have many climatologists and research scientists looking into ways to alter Earth's atmosphere, we have safe and clean nuclear power technology and many other alternatives to conveniently reduce CO2 in our atmosphere while also adding cost effective energy into the global economy. The problem is political shenannigans. Companies that make billions on the sale of fossil fuels and other dirty energy sources will do whatever they can to stay in business. To them, their goals are not about the future of the planet, but the future of their paychecks. (Every company is the same in this regard, they just seem evil because it's currently an issue.) Acting to conserve old business practices and manipulating the information to keep things unchanged in the economy is self defeating for any business professional. You must be versatile and be willing to invite new technology and trends into your business model. If you know that the burning of fossil fuels will one day be obsolete, it is smart to take pains to prepare now for additional ways to profit on the sale of cleaner fuels and energy. While a good portion of oil companies are taking pains to do so, there is a lot that aren't, they are merely spending the extra dollars to advertise their changed image on offering cleaner solutions, this doesn't solve the initial problem, it is only a band-aid. There is a way to safely solve the global climate crisis without unfair business regulations and taking away individual freedoms.
Why does it matter?
We are half way through our Sun's lifespan. Earth should be around half way through it's life span, averaging at a little over. We are on the brink of destroying the only planet we have and need for every person and species we know to exist. I would say that grave dangers are more imperative than whether or not a few companies fail or succeed. We live in a free market and we have to play by the rules and be the best in order to succeed, if a company doesn't want to play by the rules or innovate to get ahead of the marketplace then those companies will surely fail on their own merits. It is not up to us to adjust the conditions in which something fails or succeeds but to simply allow the chips to fall on their own merit, in doing so, we will give birth to renewable energy offered at highly competitive pricing which will drastically better the environment. There are no other options at this point in time, something must be done to protect our only home. The alternatives are far out of sight, the nearest star system to us is 4.2 light years away and has no known Earth-like planet in its vicinity. So far the nearest Earth-like life sustainable planets that we have discovered are more than 1,200 light years away. Even if we had a perfect Earth planet 4.2 light years away it would still take us 20,000 years to get their due to our current highest speed of space travel we've achieved, of course a giant ship containing humans in space that long would move a lot slower. The radiation levels in space is also a major setback in long term space travel. There are thousands of issues to solve and new discoveries to be made before we could say that our capabilities are that advanced. So as far as we know, we don't have any other available options than to make Earth the most habitable we can make it. It is everyone's responsibility so long as each of those individuals selfishly want themselves and their offspring to survive.
Denying man-made climate change will only damage our situation more and bring up new generations under a scientific denying umbrella at the most crucial time in humanity's history in which scientists have never been more needed to solve the every day and future issues that humanity faces.
Quantum Quackery: The Subatomic Cult
- - humbugfighter
A Quantum Cult
Quantum
Mechanics is a branch of modern physics that deals with the world on a
microscopic level. It departs from classical mechanics at the atomic and
subatomic scale and provides the mathematical explanation for wave-particle
duality and much much more. Basically, it is a lot of math and requires a few years of Calculus
and physics to understand on an intermediate level. So when people whom do not
have that sort of educational background in physics go on television to explain
to you how quantum physics works and how you can make it “work” in your own
life. It’s humbug.
“What the bleep
do we know?” is a documentary style film that came out in 2004 and with it,
brought a whole new trend among new agers alike. It explores the supposed
spiritual connection between consciousness and quantum mechanics. This is not
the only film that has tried to do this; for reference purposes here’s a list
of the other popular ones:
“The Law of
Attraction”
“The Quantum
Activist”
“A Quantum
Leap!”
(Not the amazing
sci-fi show)
“Quantum
Communication”
“Quantum
Creations”
“Quantum
Attitude”
“Quantum Mind of
God”
“What the
Bleep!? Down the Rabbit Hole”
“Quantum
Revelation”
“The Voice: The
Cosmos and the Quantum Universe.”
(Sounds more
sciencey, except it stars Krishna Das)
“Quantum
Astrology”
“Who you REALLY
Are!”
“Getting into
the Vortex!”
“Path of
Enthusiasm”
“The Secret”
“The Big Bang
Within You”
“Manifesting
Change”
Just to give you
an idea, when I say the word “Trend”, I mean TREND.
How did this
happen? Newton said it best; for every action there is an equal and
opposite reaction. Every branch of science as its opposing pseudoscience.
Quantum
mechanics is an easy target because, even scientists will tell you it is a
little weird and no one quite understands all of it yet.
First, let’s
take a look at only one of these films, “What the bleep do we know?”
The film makers
are cult members
Yes, you heard
that right.
They're not
trying to hide it from you. Remember that one weird lady in the film? You
probably didn't notice her info presented here.
Her real name is
Judith Hampton, she goes by J.Z. Knight in the public eye while claiming to be
channeled by the spirit of "Ramtha" whom has never existed. We know
Ramtha never existed because she claims he was an ancient shaman from the lost
city of Atlantis (which also probably never existed). She's also been around
long enough for even Carl Sagan to criticize her in his book "A
Demon-Haunted World".
She started a
cult called "Ramtha School of Enlightenment", it has been
self-described as a cult by her former husband and former member, as well as
several other formal members due to the fact that they have forced members to
be locked in the school grounds overnight in poor conditions that actually
contributed to someone's death.
The main ongoing
belief is that Jehovah will return to Earth in a spaceship accompanied by
"Lizard People".
Cyanide Kool-aid
anyone?
Not exactly the
type of people to get your science info from. All three directors of the film
are members of this cult. However, they have carefully crafted many books and
documentaries to sound scientific and make an attractive case for how you can
control situations and outcomes by merely using your thoughts.
Here are the
major claims made in this documentary as well as other "Quantum
Self-Help" materials.
· The universe is made from ideas,
rather than substances.
· Matter is not solid. Particles
disappear in and out of existence.
· Peptides in the brain can cause a
bodily reaction to emotion.
· Everyone has and creates their own
reality.
· You can change substances and
molecules by your thoughts.
The film
features actual physicists that have gone "solo" and decided to leave
a promising career in actual science for a fraudulent career making millions in
book and DVD sales.
However, there
were a few scientists featured in the film that were purposely misled that it
was a scientific film about quantum physics and had nothing to do with any sort
of mind body connection, a few were outraged and sued. However, it is easy to
just ask to meet the scientific adviser; if they don't have one, then leave.
David Albert did explain for 4 hours how quantum mechanics has nothing
spiritual about it, only for the clips to be edited in a misleading way to seem
as though he is a proponent of the idea.
Other
professionals include: A theology professor, anesthesiologist, chiropractor,
psychiatrist, Fred Alan Wolf who calls himself a physicist, and a
neuro-scientist.
Basically;
quantum mechanics works nothing like this film implies. The ideas in this film
does not come from quantum physics but actually from another philosophy;
Solipsism.
They have
hijacked the word "Quantum" in order to convince the layman that they
are sharing something "scientific", in reality it is a cult that is
supporting this belief.
What the bleep
is Solipsism?
It's an
epistemological position that knowledge outside one's mind is unknown and the
only thing sure to exist is one's own mind. There are many sub branches of this
philosophy but the main idea comes from Metaphysical Solipsism which states
that there is nothing in existence outside of the mind, your world is a figment
of your own imagination, essentially no one else exists, even me. Regardless of
the fact that I too feel just as strongly about existing as you do and could
easily argue that you don't exist either. While that is an interesting thought
experiment, believing it is ridiculous. Your hallucination is oddly consistent
and persistently disappointing considering you're controlling it in your head.
The solipsist
believes that one can alter their own reality precisely because they are the
only mind that exists and their mind is creating the illusion of reality.
How can you make
a documentary sharing how anyone can control their own reality, if the entire
basis of the idea relies on only one mind existing in the first place, due to
the issues it would create? For instance, there is a finite amount of money in
the world; if everyone in the world thought about wanting it, this documentary
says "You will get it, surely!", but that isn't the case. We've all
wished for money but we don't get it. It would be impossible to wish and
receive things that everyone else is also wishing and receiving.
Why is matter
finite if matter can be created in our minds?
I will let the
obvious crackpot claims lie on their own merits and you can be the judge.
You can put down
the vision board, get out in the world, start setting real goals with real
actions to back them up, and get real results.
Quantum
Mechanics is complex and interesting without having to make up crap about it.
Why your coincidences are only coincidental
- - humbugfighter
The science
of coincidence
I'm sure all of you know what I'm
talking about, we've experienced coincidences before on different scales and
heard stories about big meaningful coincidences and probably once exclaimed
"What are the odds of that?!"
Well that's
exactly what they are; odds, not oddities.
If you're out with a group of
friends and someone else has the exact same birthday as you and your first
inclination is to say "What a strange coincidence!" and begin
wondering "what it all means." The odds of someone having your same
birthday is a 1 in 365. You have a 99% chance of being in a room with someone
with your same birthday if there are 57 people and a 50% chance if there are 23
people.
Those super rare events with one in
a million odds occur more often than you think in a population of 250 million
people. Let's say a super rare coincidence happens to at least one person in a
million every day, that's 250 coincidences each day, 100,000 coincidences every
year, and would only take approximately 6.8 years to completely recycle through
all 250 million people giving each person a day to have a one in a million
coincidence.
What you're looking at here is
randomness and probability.
You have to look at every other possibility in order to properly assess the probability of the event that did occur.
However, quacks like Deepak Chopra would have you
believe otherwise, that there is no such thing as a coincidence, that whenever
you experience one it is because it bears a direct relationship with a prior
event and was "supposed" to happen. It is easy to walk around saying
that events that have already occurred were "meant" to happen and
look like you know what you're talking about. No one can prove you otherwise or
say it wasn't meant to happen because the event has already happened. This is
the new thing for psychics, it has become too difficult to predict future
events so they will state the obvious about past events and still be convincing
you they have some sort of supernatural ability. It seems that because of the
odds, determinism isn't a one way street, it has several different available
paths, but proving whether or not there is some driving force behind it, meaning,
or that it only appears to have multiple options while we're observing it alone
is going to be a difficult task. There is no such proof and until then, your
coincidence is just a coincidence.
Why do we feel as though our
coincidence isn't just a coincidence?
Cognitive failures are no stranger
to the human brain, patternicity; or seeing patterns and meaningful connections
is a purely subjective experience for the observer.
A type 1 error; believing something
is real when it is not, type 2; believing something is not real when it is. It
is the same evolutionary process in our brains that aided our distant ancestors
for survival, (it’s better to err and assume the sound is a predator in the
woods than to err by assuming it’s just the wind, even if it is just the wind)
It is the same cognition error that explains why there are conspiracy
theorists, religious people, superstitions, and pseudoscience.
For instance, a Buddhist probably would not see the Virgin
Mary in a puddle of water, the same way a conspiracy theorist more often
believes in all or most conspiracies than just one, similarly a Christian may
experience a coincidence only a few hours after praying and think it's a
"sign."
This means
that every day there are coincidences that you don’t notice and patterns that you
don’t see. While the patterns you do notice may not actually be patterns but
associations made in your brain based on your memory and beliefs.
So maybe our life’s
events are not governed by a master plan having a specific meaning, perhaps it
has as much meaning as you create in your mind. One thing we do know, the fact
that you can create meaning and patterns in your mind is governed by a force
known as natural selection.
While that explains
why we in general believe things that aren't true and deny things that are, the
causing factor in why we assume meaning in something easily explained by math
is probably because of math phobia and a general ignorance of the numbers.
( but that will
be a later post.)