Intelligently Designed but Is it Divine?

Originally posted by mytym
I don't think a court of law is the ideal yardstick to determine fact from fiction. You're entitled to your own opinion, but so is everyone else.

Would you honestly listen to someone claming they were possesed when they killed thier family? Let's not lock people like that up but instead perform ancient pagan rituals for dispelling bad spirits that make people do bad things or make people sick?

To answer that honestly I would have to know the circumstances. An answer given without them could be completely opposed to an answer with that knowledge.

Originally posted by mytym
To answer that honestly I would have to know the circumstances. An answer given without them could be completely opposed to an answer with that knowledge.

Hypothetically, under what terms would you believe/accept someone claiming to have been possesed when they murdered their family?

This should make answering easier.

Proton,
I wasn't specifically refering to demonic possession but you do bring up a good point regarding getting POed.I have thought of this probability.

Many things wouldn't hold up in a court of law. It doesn't mean it's not worth considering outside a court of law as a possibility.

[edit on 24-3-2006 by point]

Originally posted by point
Proton,
I wasn't specifically refering to demonic possession but you do bring up a good point regarding getting POed.I have thought of this probability.

Many things wouldn't hold up in a court of law. It doesn't mean it's not worth considering outside a court of law as a possibility.

[edit on 24-3-2006 by point]

Well, in the case of anger, being POed. It's mainly a chemical imbalance. Some source's have linked this imbalance to heart disease, which explains why people who are more stressed or angry then usual tend to have a higher risk for heart disease.

researchnews.osu.edu...
Researchers at Ohio State University found that men and women with higher levels of hostility also showed higher levels of homocysteine -- a blood chemical strongly associated with coronary heart disease (CHD).

Men who reported that they consistently held in angry feelings also showed higher levels of homocysteine.

Prot0n:
The events that transpired at Amityville spring to mind. Of course there is a difference between experiencing it and hearing about it. Whether I accept it as justifiable doesn't indicate the thought processes of the person themselves. Only they can truly expect to know this.

[edit on 24/3/06 by mytym]

[edit on 24/3/06 by mytym]

Proton,
The chemical imbalance can be a result of and one of many symptoms of temporary partial possession resulting in anger.
Just a thought.

[edit on 24-3-2006 by point]

Originally posted by mytym
Prot0n:
The events that transpired at Amityville spring to mind. Of course there is a difference between experiencing it and hearing about it. Whether I accept it as justifiable doesn't indicate the thought processes of the person themselves. Only they can truly expect to know this.

Amityville was a hoax. No one really know's about the hoax part due to the media and everyone's love for a good horror story. You should do some research on it. Defeo's lawyer admitted that he and Lutz came up with the 'haunting' story. Also, a researcher by the name of Stephen Kaplan had done an investigation shortly after the claim, but by that time the Amytiville horror was so popularized no one listened to him. Talk about blind sided ignorance huh?

But this wasn't really the point of my questioning. I was mainly interested in what you yourself would considered admissable for a posession murdure case.

Originally posted by point
Proton,
The chemical imbalance can be a result of and one of many symptoms of temporary partial possession resulting in anger.
Just a thought.

[edit on 24-3-2006 by point]

And how can we test the validity of such a possibility?

Whether it was a hoax or not, I think this would be an acceptable reason if it were true. You said hypothetically, didn't you? I did see why I need to convince a court of law as I already alluded to my lack of faith in the justice system.

[edit on 24/3/06 by mytym]

Originally posted by Prot0n

Originally posted by point
Proton,
The chemical imbalance can be a result of and one of many symptoms of temporary partial possession resulting in anger.
Just a thought.

[edit on 24-3-2006 by point]

And how can we test the validity of such a possibility?

Not sure. If you come up with anything, let me know.

Originally posted by mytym
Whether it was a hoax or not, I think this would be an acceptable reason if it were true. You said hypothetically, didn't you? I did see why I need to convince a court of law as I already alluded to my lack of faith in the justice system.

[edit on 24/3/06 by mytym]

I'm not asking about a court of law though. I'm asking about you personally. Granted you did say the Amytiville case, I don't feel this adequately define's your stance on what would be an admissable posession claim in your eyes.

Such as, would you personally believe, say a friend or someone you've met before if they came up to you and outlined a similar case to the amytiville horror hoax?

Why do you have a lack of faith in the justice system anyways? I understand it's not perfect and does need some fixing here and there, but not all justice system's are perfect either.

Originally posted by point
Not sure. If you come up with anything, let me know.

I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to come up with a way to test for 'real' posession as I hold my belief in 'reality'. I haven't seen any convincing case for posession's as of yet, and with the chemical nature of anger and other emotional response's it seem's less likely to me that a posession is something real. I mean, people can lose their memory for no appearent reason durring a traumatic experience, this could be something similar going on with a 'posession'.

Originally posted by Prot0n

Originally posted by point
Not sure. If you come up with anything, let me know.

I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to come up with a way to test for 'real' posession as I hold my belief in 'reality'. I haven't seen any convincing case for posession's as of yet, and with the chemical nature of anger and other emotional response's it seem's less likely to me that a posession is something real. I mean, people can lose their memory for no appearent reason durring a traumatic experience, this could be something similar going on with a 'posession'.

What causes the chemical changes that appear to correlate with the expression of various emotions?
Ever heard of someone say, "I don't know what came over me" or "I wasn't thinking straight"or "I wasn't myself at the time".
It appears that something from within or without is acting on the brain and/or body to facillitate a change in mood.

Originally posted by point
What causes the chemical changes that appear to correlate with the expression of various emotions?
Ever heard of someone say, "I don't know what came over me" or "I wasn't thinking straight"or "I wasn't myself at the time".
It appears that something from within or without is acting on the brain and/or body to facillitate a change in mood.

This is generally true, people do say these thing's but usually metaphorically imo. Someone can say or do something that will trigger a deep emotional response that can have a rather lasting effect on the individual and the person who might've caused it. Other outside variable's could be enviromental stimuli. There are way to many variable's that could lead to so many different mixed emotional response's. Another aspect is genetics and in some extreme cases is the leading reason. As we develop in the womb, we're still susceptible to the hormonal discharge's of the mother, various emotional stage's through out the pregnancy and even auditorial stimuli, such as arguments, all these different variable's help shape our personality as we develop.

Prot0n:
I'm very open minded, some may say gullable (sp). Presented in the way the Amityville case was, and assuming the source was someone I trusted, then yes, I would most probably believe them.

I think we are getting a little off topic now, but to answer your question, my lack of faith in the justice system stems from the apparent widespread corruption that plagues the system the world over. I specifically have an issue with the preoccupation with technicalities rather than truth.

Getting back on topic, it seems quite probable to me that an intelligent designer of THIS universe is a human just like you and me. If that is the case divinity is surely out of the question. I believe I have read somewhere that our science may be nearing the point where we can create our own controlled universe, thus we would be the intelligent designer.

[edit on 24/3/06 by mytym]

Originally posted by point
What causes the chemical changes that appear to correlate with the expression of various emotions?
Ever heard of someone say, "I don't know what came over me" or "I wasn't thinking straight"or "I wasn't myself at the time".
It appears that something from within or without is acting on the brain and/or body to facillitate a change in mood.

Emotions are an adaptive biological response to the environment. You see a bear, you feel fear. Emotions can be expressed rapidly, automatically, and unconsciously. They are the primary response to stimuli, cognitive appraisal follows the emotional response.

So what causes the chemical changes? Stimuli in the environment - usually associated with reward or punishment.

And a quick point - emotions are chemical/physiological changes, not merely correlated with them.


[edit on 24-3-2006 by melatonin]

Getting back on topic, it seems quite probable to me that an intelligent designer of THIS universe is a human just like you and me. If that is the case divinity is surely out of the question. I believe I have read somewhere that our science may be nearing the point where we can create our own controlled universe, thus we would be the intelligent designer.

That's interesting, first time I've heard the designer being labeled as human. Also first time I've hear anyone claim that we're close to being able to create a universe. Where did you read this claim? You have any links?

Sorry, my memory is pretty sketchy. It may have been on a documentary I saw on TV. It was definitely this year that I came across it though. The theory was that the created universe would be unlimited by spacial dimensions within it, but outside of it, could be contained in a bubble the size of a balloon. I haven't heard it mentioned any where else either so maybe it was just pie in the sky stuff. Interesting though, none the less.

Originally posted by mytym
Sorry, my memory is pretty sketchy. It may have been on a documentary I saw on TV. It was definitely this year that I came across it though. The theory was that the created universe would be unlimited by spacial dimensions within it, but outside of it, could be contained in a bubble the size of a balloon. I haven't heard it mentioned any where else either so maybe it was just pie in the sky stuff. Interesting though, none the less.

I'm not sure I've ever heard of something like that before ... Especially not something we'd be capable of doing any time soon, we can hardly get off our own planet or produce enough energy and food for all it's people. I don't think we'd be getting in the baby universe construction biz anytime soon lol.

I do remember hearing/seeing something on how the observable universe could be compressed into something roughly the size of a basketball, but this is due to the fact that atomic structure's are mostly empty space. The mass of something that highly compressed is probably going to be rather enormous. Just think about it, a teaspoon of matter from a neutron star weighs many of tons, and all it's made up of is compressed neutrons! Science can be pretty amazing.