Do you believe in ghosts?

[Arjan Dirkse]

True, but so far all empirically attested lifeforms have a material "base", the body...

Well, gee whiz! Has it occured to you that maybe that has to do because the starting hypothesis behind the experiment is to prove that "all empirically attested lifeforms have a material "base""? And, really, given sciences materialist bent, an experiment that tried to prove that some "attested lifeforms" do not "have a material "base" would be impossible within the confines of a (materialist) scientific paradigm.

I think most scientists would actually love to have their assumptions challenged in that regard. Finding an immaterial lifeform? A genuine ghost case, that could be investigated, tested, and repeated, would be a sensation.

[gregkavarnos]

Yes, but first you would have to design a material device that can detect and record the immaterial!

[Indrajala]

True, but it's all anecdotal. I don't know of any cases that were investigated and where it was concluded that they were indeed genuine ghosts.

I'm not saying those people are lying, or insane. Ghosts and other immaterial lifeforms are a cultural fact of life for many people, and suggestion is a powerful force. Also sleep paralysis explains a lot of ghost stories.

You can believe that all you like, it doesn't negate the evidence to the contrary. You can call it a "cultural fact", but that's just your own cultural assumption and bias that such things don't really exist.

Centuries of human experience and continual ongoing incidents of ghost encounters probably indicates something, but the mainstream contemporary worldview denies this is possible and hence it can't exist.

[Arjan Dirkse]

Centuries of human experience and continual ongoing incidents of ghost encounters probably indicates something, but the mainstream contemporary worldview denies this is possible and hence it can't exist.

That might be true. But I am certainly open to evidence to the contrary.

[Indrajala]

I think most scientists would actually love to have their assumptions challenged in that regard. Finding an immaterial lifeform? A genuine ghost case, that could be investigated, tested, and repeated, would be a sensation.

To investigate the existence of devas and so on you'd need yogic development on a level most people are not immediately capable of attaining. Even then it'd still be personal and subjective, not something you could reproduce under laboratory conditions. It wouldn't be scientific, but that doesn't negate that means of knowing something.

So we have a common pan-cultural phenomena that has existed seemingly for all human time as we know it.

[Indrajala]

That might be true. But I am certainly open to evidence to the contrary.

There is more to human experience than materiality which can be investigated scientifically.

Perception of logic, numbers, various qualia, feelings, language, etc... are not material yet possess causal efficacy in very tangible ways.

Nevertheless despite this being blatantly obvious to any sane human, materialists arbitrarily reject the existence of such phenomena, calling them epiphenomena of neural activity, or simply unimportant. Some materialist philosophers go so far as to suggest qualia are just "the brain tricking us into thinking that...". We're really just philosophical zombies but haven't realized it yet.

So when it comes to experiencing things like immaterial beings and so on, there are plenty of people who experience such things and historically many cultures accepted this and even incorporated such experiences into life without having any existential issues.

[Arjan Dirkse]

Nevertheless despite this being blatantly obvious to any sane human, materialists arbitrarily reject the existence of such phenomena, calling them epiphenomena of neural activity, or simply unimportant. Some materialist philosophers go so far as to suggest qualia are just "the brain tricking us into thinking that...". We're really just philosophical zombies but haven't realized it yet.

It's not really nice to accuse people who have a different point of view of not being sane.

Like I said, I don't think people who believe in immaterial lifeforms are insane.

[Indrajala]

Nevertheless despite this being blatantly obvious to any sane human, materialists arbitrarily reject the existence of such phenomena, calling them epiphenomena of neural activity, or simply unimportant. Some materialist philosophers go so far as to suggest qualia are just "the brain tricking us into thinking that...". We're really just philosophical zombies but haven't realized it yet.

It's not really nice to accuse people who have a different point of view of not being sane.

Like I said, I don't think people who believe in immaterial lifeforms are insane.

I didn't say any such thing. I'm saying sane people can and do experience immaterial phenomena and this should be obvious to them, though they may choose to deny them.

Materialism is a belief system.

[Arjan Dirkse]

Materialism is a belief system.

That I agree with.

edit: I don't mean I agree with materialism, I mean I agree that materialism is a belief. Though I also believe that most scientists are not guilty of having such a bias; good scientists are open to having their worldviews challenged.