₦airaland Forum

DeepSight:
I havent said that the surface is nonexistent. You are strawmmaning me, perhaps deliberately.

Gosh, seems your amnesia is acting up again. You categorically said shadow doesn't exist so how am I strawmanning you? How can shadow not exist but still be the surface? This is what you have failed to explain. You may have nothing further to say but let it be on record that you contradicted yourself by claiming that shadow doesn't exist but is also the surface on which it appears.

What an absurdity.

Dliquidmetal:
that guy is hilarious he isn't open minded enough to know people have different purposes and the fact that it wasn't in line with his own purpose he couldn't wrap his head around it(as with many religious people)
Someone's personal purpose might be hunting and its not a problem but this people are too shallow to understand.

Yeah. I don't blame him though, lack of exposure to different concepts is endemic to this our Naija space.

Steep:
From your statement,

According to you our purpose and meaning is base on what we think it is right?
It means life has no meaning except what we think it is. And since we nothing but mindless interacting atoms and molecules, it is all gibberish at the end of day.
What you have successfully said 8s life has no meaning except what we imagined it to be, which is illusion.

And why does what we imagine it to be mean that it is meaningless? How can it be meaningless if meaning is only to be found in minds? Have you ever seen meaning floating around and you can point to it and say there goes meaning? Or do you think real hard about what meaning is and then hold it in your mind? But sure if you find meaning floating around by all means catch some for me.

Jackanda1:
my post was for christians not atheist

Really? Was it your twin who posted this:

Jackanda1:
.

If you are an atheist reading this, I want you to know that the world is not just physical, there is more.

Na wa.

Grabbing my popcorn.

[img]https://c./L8nQOHAF3VYAAAAC/thriller-michael-jackson.gif[/img]

The thing about fiction is you can make up any story you like.

DeepSight:
I am not contradicting myself because I simply said that what you are seeing is the surface, and you do not deny this. The surface without light, or lesser light, simple. It remains the surface. Look, "shadow" is just a word which we use to convey the idea of that same surface from which light is blocked. The mere fact that we have a word to convey that also does not make it a separate immaterial thing. We have such words as "nothingness" do we not.

I gave you an analogy that I thought would have put this to bed. I said that to say that a shadow is a thing is like saying that a part of a cassette tape on which no sound is recorded is a separate immaterial thing. Only the tape exists. The absence of sound on it does not form a distinct immaterial thing. If we had a word for an empty cassette tape, then you would have the same problem, because you would say I am contradicting myself by calling it an empty cassette tape and also calling it that word.

In the same way, the absence of light on a surface does not form a separate immaterial thing.

Seriously, we cant move forward on this. Let us leave it where it is. Every reader can derive his own conclusions. Pushing the matter at this stage will only lead to repetition ad infinitum, ad nauseum.

You haven't answered the question. How can shadow be the surface and be nonexistent. Explain this magic of how something can be and yet not be.

I would suggest that you answer these questions yourself first. If I disagree, or have something to add, I will do so. Let that be your own assignment, seeing as I have my own assignment already - the description of spirit. Besides the first part of your tripartite question is very badly conceived.

By way of a little hint though, of course zero by itself, in a pure conceptual sense, refers to nothingness.
Does nothingness exist?
Maybe you may wish to consult the renowned iidiot, Lawrence Krauss on this subject.

As for numbers, they are representational.

Nope, you need to answer the questions since I posed them. I can always give my answer but after you have, I insist.

DeepSight:
It is the surface you are seeing, simple. I have repeated this now too often for it to serve any purpose to repeat it further. I have also explained as best I can that the absence of light on a surface cannot thereby create a separate immaterial thing. I dont believe we can help one another any further on this subject. We will have to leave it where it is and each reader can come to his own conclusions regarding the subject.

How can the shadow be the surface and the same time be non existent? You are contradicting yourself.

A code is a code and a silence can be meaningful in a code. Thats because there are established artificial rules for reading a code. This does nothing to suggest that the absence of light on a surface is an immaterial thing of its own. Suggesting that a silence in a code is a separate immaterial thing is just as bad as suggesting that a zero in a given number is a separate immaterial thing. .

Is the morse code fragment material or immaterial? Are numbers material or immaterial? Is zero material or immaterial?

Steep:
then that is no purpose at all, a purpose is the reason for which something is made.
It is safe to say your life really has no purpose or meaning just what you imagine it to be, right?

And who are you to tell me that my purpose is not to safely convey my children to and from school? By what standard do you get to pontificate that my life has no meaning or purpose because it is not the meaning and purpose you think it should have?

DeepSight:
For the umpteenth time, what you are seeing is the surface.
No surface, no shadow.

To say that a shadow is a thing is like saying that a part of a cassette tape on which no sound is recorded is a separate immaterial thing. Only the tape exists. The absence of sound on it does not form a distinct immaterial thing.

In the same way, the absence of light on a surface does not form a separate immaterial thing.

We can, and we do observe all sorts of shapes from the interplay of light. This does not been that we are observing distinct immaterial things. We are simply seeing the interplay of light on surfaces. Both the light and the surfaces are material things.

If you insist on your position, you will be saying in effect that the absence of light on a given surface creates a separate immaterial thing. I trust you should be able to see how this does not add up. You do not wind up with a separate immaterial thing simply by blocking light from a surface.

Kindly reflect closely on the words I have underlined above. Those words should explain what I am trying to convey to you.

You still haven't shown me me how I am seeing something that doesn't exist. You categorically said shadow doesn't exist. If it doesn't exist how am I seeing it? How can I see something that doesn't exist? Your answers indicate that shadow exists so unless you are withdrawing the statement that shadow doesn't exist then you answer is a not an answer to my question.

Do you know morse code? Do the silences between each blip in a code fragment have meaning or not? Are you also going claim that they don't exist or that the code fragment is a material thing?

Steep:
And what is that purpose or meaning?

I have several. One short term purpose I have is to safely convey my children to and from school. A long term purpose I have is to retire into relative comfort. I derive meaning from the things I take pleasure in and the things that I do not like.

Jackanda1:
if the problems i had were 'challenges of life', i will still be an athiest today. It was beyond the natural, physical and medical. It's unhelpful and unwise to relate it to an atheist

Yet you want us to believe there is something more. If you think it is unhelpful and unwise then why did you make that statement? Are we simply to believe because you say so?

Rachel98:
Good morning everyone. Hope we're having a wonderful week.

My Elder brother is doing well, no doubt he's the breadwinner in our family But his wife is so rude, too authoritative, she's full of pride and she looks down on people. She see everyone as her employee, she does not care if her actions or words hurts you, she's quick to slap at any slightest provocation. She's an event planner, please are event planners this rude??

She's the main reason why we barely visit our brother, despite we all live in the same city, we feel like a total stranger in our brother's house. Probably she's using "jazz" on him, I don't know But everything she does seems cool to him.

I managed to spend the weekend with them, since on friday she act like my presence irritates her. The maid prepared semo and vegetable soup, i don't eat swallow that like, so she saw me cooking noodles, she rudely said why're you not eating semo? Why are you people so selective? Then she left the kitchen. I just maintained my cool.

Yesterday she slapped her maid just because the plantain she told her to fry wasn't brown enough (maybe she wanted burnt sacrifice plantain). My elder brother calmly said honey you shouldn't have slapped her just becus of plaintain. The next she told my brother was "Defender!! go and marry her nw"

This morning, I jejely packed my belongings on my way to work, I entered my brother's car so he can drop me at the bus-stop, I just told him I won't be coming to his place anymore, once I'm done with work today I'm going home straight. And the annoying part, he would be asking me why? As if he's blind, he can't see how rude and ill-mannered his wife is.

His wife has really separated my brother from us, his own family. We don't even know what to do.

I think your brother can see all that is wrong, he has just resigned himself to carrying his cross.

DeepSight:
Jesus No! certainly not!
Look I really dont know how something so simple has become a problem for you, but a shadow is not a thing, not even an immaterial thing. You cannot simply block light from a surface and then call it a thing, declare it a separate immaterial thing. It is not. Your mind simply discerns a shape from a part of a surface in lesser light as opposed to a part of the surface bathed in greater light. At all times, what you are looking at is that same surface, simple.

I truly must attend to other things, I will be back after hours.
Cheers.

How can I see something that doesn't exist?

DeepSight:
Its only the surface you are seeing. Its just a part of the surface in lesser light. I have already said this, really gat to run now. Will be back,
Try and study the example of the sky and clouds I gave you, Its the same.

So does the shadow exist now are you withdrawing your statement that shadow doesn't exist?

DeepSight:
PS: It should occur to you that without a surface, you see no shadow.
No surface, no shadow.

So its just a part of a surface blocked from light, and you are calling that an immaterial thing.
How can a blocked part of a physical surface be an immaterial thing.

Tomorrow, if I say that LordReed said that if we block light from physical things, we see an immaterial thing, you will scream blue murder.

Anyway, let me not be tempted. Later in the day, as I said.

Yes because you use one specific thing to generalise. You seem to always want to fallaciously take a quality from one specific subset and apply it to a broader subset and then attribute the result to me.

It was you who said shadow doesn't exist, yet you can't tell how I am seeing something that doesn't exist.

DeepSight:
You see the wall. Or whatever surface is there.
That is indisputably what you see.

Later. Busy now. Will be back to describe spirit so we can carry on.

I see the surface and I also see the shadow. If the shadow doesn't exist how am I seeing it?

DeepSight:
I have not quibbled with its nature, I have not even said it does not exist, my issue is simply that it is by no means seen with any physical eye. Or do physical eyes see things without reflection of light?



I am not dodging anything and I really mean it when I say you are frightening me.
Because if we cannot get past such a tiny and simple thing, what hope is there for a discussion of the spiritual - which is even more intangible?

Which is why it is necessary to settle definitions early. Your definitions don't seem to follow what I know or you seem to conflate so many things I don't understand how you make simple things into complex conundrums.

DeepSight:
Same pattern as blocking light may cast on a wall or the ground!
How can you fail to see that it is the wall or the ground you are still looking at? ? ? ?

Just as you can fail to see it is the sky you are still looking at!
Look at the image below.

What is the unblocked part of the image, if not simply the sky?
In your illogical analogy, what we are observing here is an immaterial thing called a circle right?

Thus it is with a shadow. If my body blocks light from a wall, the wall is still what I am looking at, and it is very physical, it is not immaterial. The part of the wall I am looking at is simply in lesser light.

My question was what is a shadow made of and your response was it doesn't exist. Explain how you can see what doesn't exist.

We are on page 4 and DeepSight still hasn't produced the definitions and evidence. How much longer is this going to take? LoLz

DeepSight:
You are the one rambling good sir. In proof of the fact that one may see an immaterial thing, you brought up an example of a hallucination which you admit is not there and you also admit is not seen by the eye (you said visual cortex is stimulated).

Abi does the eye have any other method of seeing things which doesn't involve the detection of light?
Serious, LordReed, you are scaring the hell out of me.

The hallucination itself is what we are talking about not the thing that isn't there. The person is having a hallucination, is the hallucination material or immaterial?

LoLz. Is this how you are going to dodge giving your definitions and evidence? By devolving this discussion into non-issues?

DeepSight:
I shouldn't have to struggle so hard to help you with such simple precepts. A shadow is not a thing.
Take a look at this image?
Where is the shadow?

What you are looking at is simply the part of the wall which is covered from light.
It remains the wall and the floor that you are seeing - simply in lesser light.

You are not seeing any immaterial thing which is by itself a shadow.
Exactly the same as the analogy of the clouds blocking a part of the sky.

Settle down and be reasonable.
Its so awfully simple: you are frightening me.

You are frightening yourself and overthinking simple concepts. When we say a thing we not always referring to tangible objects thus we can conceive of immaterial things like justice and other concepts. How is it that a shadow is not a thing simply because it not a tangible object?

I am beginning to be convinced you have jumped the shark by reason of too much esoteric thinking to the point you are no longer satisfied with reality.

DeepSight:
Of course I do. See my example above with clouds in the sky.
If clouds block out a part of the sky and the unblocked part forms a pattern, have you seen an immaterial thing?

What pattern is formed my the unblocked part of the sky? I don't know what this means

Well you yourself have said "something that is not there."
Hence it is not a "thing.

Much less an "immaterial thing!"

I said it is a trick of the mind, and you have mentioned the visual cortex being stimulated. The visual cortex is not the eye. The eye never saw anything. You dont know it, but you are affirming what I said. How can you not see this?

Capsice?

The person is having a hallucination, the hallucination itself is immaterial even though he can perceive it as visual stimuli. Are is a hallucination now material? Even if it is only in the mind is the mind material? You seem to be rambling now.

DeepSight:
It doesn't exist. It is just the pattern of blocked light against a surface.
All that you are seeing is the refection of lesser light, period.

LMAO! How can shadow not exist when you are looking at it? Jeez, talk about absurdity.

What the heck is lesser light?

A shadow is immaterial, it is not made of material, it is a pattern produced when light is blocked. This is so elementary I wonder how you are struggling with it. Are you overthinking these things?

elated177:
All you had to do was tell me how the weather was. To you, Reed, how you were feeling it.

And I already answered, scroll back to see my answer. Meanwhile what are you going to tell sky daddy to do the weather let's record the changes.

DeepSight:
And mind you, be further warned that if you insist that hallucinations are actually "things" which are "seen" then you just might be conceding to the real existence of ghosts.

Depends on what you mean by ghost. If you mean that people hallucinations of people that are not present in real space then yeah ghosts "exist". But if you mean some independently operating being then you'll have to provide evidence for that.

DeepSight:
Same thing, different words, the light is being reflected through materials (yes, minerals!). Physical materials. Blocking some light, letting some light through to form a pattern.

And going with this same analogy, then if clouds block a part of the sky and you can see the unblocked part which forms a pattern, then hey presto, that is also an immaterial thing that you have seen? Come on! Same thing apples to a shadow, for goodness sake!

There is no "immaterial thing" you are seeing.
You cannot see an immaterial thing.

What is a shadow made of?

DeepSight:
That is not an immaterial thing, that is simply reflected light, which is material.
Unless you are suggesting that aside from the reflected light, there is something else which is immaterial inside the mirror.
Which will only grow your list of absurdities, so be warned.

The image is not the light. How can you not understand this?

You are conflating this with an optical illusion - which is material but simply interpreted perversely.
A hallucination properly so called is a trick of your mind and is not actually seen by your eyes, otherwise you will have to tell me how light carries such an image to your eyes.

My friend, please admit: the eyes do not see immaterial things.

No I am not. I said visual hallucination not optical illusion those are 2 different things. A visual hallucination is called so because it is a visual perception of something that is not there. There is a perception a thing in real objective space even though there is nothing there and it is indicated that the visual cortex is stimulated so it is not merely the mind playing tricks, there is a material component.

DeepSight:
The images which you see are physical: they are formed by combinations of minerals and other physical materials in your laptop screen. There are several minerals which are used to create such screens and their combinations are what you are looking at. If you doubt that, smash the screen. What you are seeing are material symbols, every bit as though you are looking at ink, simply a kind of electronic malleable ink which changes its patterns which of course are carried by light to your eyes.

This is the same thing with physical sound. It is sound waves in the air which are vibrating, so those vibrations are actually what causes the phenomenon of sound. This does not make the song physical, what I hear are vibrations of physical things, but even if you smash those vibrations you have not destroyed the song, have you? The song is not material, it is not even located anywhere specific in matter, it belongs to the realm of the intangible.

So lets be clear, you are not seeing anything immaterial on your computer screen. You are seeing physical and perfectly material patterns which are changing based on the electric charges passed through them and you decipher these patterns because you have been taught the language of what they represent.

And thus with reference to the bold in your post, I do not "hear an immaterial song." I hear the physical sounds which pass through physical sound waves and are interpreted within my mind as the immaterial song. The same way written patterns are transmitted by light to your ears and are interpreted in your mind as specific images with a specific meaning. It by no means suggests that your physical eye saw something immaterial nor does my physical ear hear an immaterial sound. To hear something means using your ears here. What our ears pick up are vibrations of the physical.

Capsice?

-------
And yet, you are able to play a song in your head. Does that not tell you something?
Do you use your physical ears to listen to a song you play in your head? You are able to speak to yourself silently in your mind. Does your physical ear hear such words? Anyhow this last bit is part of that which I will use in demonstrating an intangible being. So let us let it be for now.

No, the images are not formed by combination of minerals. The image you see is conveyed by light passing through a polarised substrate which selectively blocks the light. You are not seeing a material on which light is reflect off, you are seeing a combination of wavelengths of light intricately filtered to give you the perception of an image. The image itself is immaterial, it is not made of material even though the screen and light that are conveying the image to you are material.

DeepSight:
Can you distinguish between visible immaterial things and invisible immaterial things?
Be careful - and take time to ponder on the thoughts you are conveying - because you are treading into very murky waters.
I am giving you a heads up because you may afterward accuse me of attributing that which you have not said to you.



Quite agreed, however you will also agree that physical things are perceived by physical senses. Can you present to me non physical things that the physical senses can perceive?

Your image in a mirror for another example is immaterial. What you are seeing is light reflected off a surface, the image itself is not made of material. A visual hallucination is another immaterial yet visible thing.

Invisible immaterial things are more plentiful. Ideas, thoughts, concepts are all examples of immaterial things that are not visible.

Again if immaterial is not synonymous with unperceivable I don't know why you are struggling with this.

DeepSight:
Agreed, and I am in the process of doing so. Nevertheless it is a bit of a laborious process - as I have already explained to LordReed previously - I admit holding the short end of the stick because what I am trying to convey is intangible and experiential. Therefore my task is very hard indeed, and to be approached with great subtlety.



I am shortly going to describe what I mean by "spirit."
However I warn that "evidence" as used by the scientist may not be strictly what I will be providing, because it is scarcely possible to prove the spiritual with recourse to physical science alone. Physical science is limited to the physical. Thus my method will be a motley suffusion of philosophical logic and the experiential.

A method which of course has no hope of appealing to the determined materialist scientist, but which, I hope, may appeal to the man of common reason, simple sense and inward wakefulness.

My only issue is as a methodological naturalist evidence has to be conveyed to the senses so whatever evidence you present cannot be some nebulous unknowable thing.