I've always found it to be an interesting philosophical question about whether or not the brain is ultimately all we have or if there is a soul living inside our body that is capable of "seeing with its own eyes" after death as Lion IRC suggests in this thread.
Well I don't really want to derail the thread into a debate about discarnate consciousness but if we think of death as a 'singularity' that can't exactly be duolicated in the science lab, there's no reason to presume against the afterlife.
...We've all seen movies like Ghost where a dead person can see what's going on in the world and can figure out ways to interact with it. The thing is that's fiction. There is no evidence - anywhere - that a non-physical entity can be intelligent and can use that intelligence to interact with the physical world. None. Whatsoever.
How can't you so emphatically reject events which you weren't even there to experience?
...Okay, maybe that's too strong a statement. There is anecdotal evidence, sure. Lots. But there is lots of anecdotal evidence that Leprechauns, Fairies, Vampires, etc., exist. There is lots of anecdotal evidence that people all the time are being abducted by aliens and having all manner of experiments conducted upon themselves.
What you dismiss as anecdotal evidence is what I call raw data.
If you were to say that some/many of them are honestly mistaken, deluded or lying I could agree with you.
Yes, they are extraordinary claims. But an even
more extraordinary claim is that every single one of those anecdotes - all of them throughout all of human history - are ALL deliberate lies or hallucinations.
Surely you can expect me to believe
that!
... It is irrational to believe that an infinitely intelligent mind that never had to learn anything to become that way, that requires no energy to operate, that was never created and cannot ever be destroyed, that without using any form of depletable energy can move planets as easily as pebbles and knows the position of every particle in the universe and its trajectory at every instant in time.
Why is it irrational to think that? I don't think it irrational to suspect that there are Higher life forms in the universe/multiverse/megaverse.
In fact I would argue that it's irrational to think humans (human conscious existence) represents the upper limit of reality.
It's rather arrogant if you ask me.
...Yet people believe such a person exists. They believe it not because they have actually seen or been able to verify this person's existence, but only because of anecdotal evidence.
That is simply not true - assuming you are making a universal claim about every theist.
I think you are having difficulty believing that others HAVE had verifidical experiences, the best explanation for which is something you would refer to a 'supernatural'. And I think that's because you yourself haven't had such an experience.
...The same evidence that brought us every scam that has ever been foisted by one human being on another throughout the course of human history.
No, no, no.
It's not 'the same evidence'.
People fall for scams because they want them to be true.
And yet many people have
reluctantly come to accept theism. Many have had to
unwillingly defend unpopular truths. It would have been much more comfortable and convenient in many/most cases for people to keep these anecdotes to themselves.
(The same can be said of atheists who pretend not to be atheists because they fear persecution.)
Some people lie, yes. But please don't lump all anecdotes into the same category.
...We know that our ability to see is an effect of physical nerves in our eyes which are sensitive to a narrow band of wave emissions; that they react to these emissions by producing electrical impulses which are carried through more physical nerves to our physical brains which process these impulses and interpret them in a manner that gives us a very detailed image of the world around us.
It's not our eye which "sees" any more than a telescope "sees" or a set of headphones "hears".
Look how heavily-laden your post is with jargon that oversimplifies "these processes".
Our brain is a lump of meat. Meat doesn't 'interpret' or 'process'.
...As a rational person I have to wonder, what is the evidence that a soul living inside my body has the same ability to "see" even after my eyes, optic nerve and physical brain have been destroyed? It would make sense that if this soul can see without the benefit of eyes or brain activity then it should be able to see even if the eyes or optic nerves were damaged.
Do you dream with your eyes open or closed?
...But sadly for many people who were blinded by some happenstance, sight is only a memory, not anything they can ever hope to recover. At least not as long as they are encumbered by this physical body.
Even blind people use 'visual' vocabulary to describe their dreams.
...If the soul can see stuff without the need for these physical apparatuses, what does that say about a creator-god who would unnecessarily encumber us with such easily damaged and completely unnecessary components?
I don't think blind people wish they were dead.
