SO do you have an explanation of what this radical emotion of love we have is ? Your just stating that it doesn't exist, when everyone in the world knows it does. That alone doesn't make it real, but how is it nonexistant? We do have hormones that play a role in love, I can only think of Oxytocin and Vasopressin at the moment, but there are others.
I take it you don't have a dog. Now close your eyes and think of someone you love. That has just become a spiritual process. I keep going round in circles with that statement. An object/person causes a response, so we use reason to conclude that the response was caused by the object/person. Thus validating this and all future reasoning. Well d'uh you know it a priori. Why should I show you that G-d is the source of my emotional experiences? The real lessons in life are learned and not taught. So you don't know the science behind it and still take a leap of faith on it? Ohhh...caps lock SO... scary... I've had my fun... This is consesus ad absurdum. Arguing a point to it's absurdity. Yes, everyone knows (well vast majority) that love exists yet there is no real scientific proof to it's existence. It's there, I can feel it, but I can't prove it. Not empirically anyway. My love is bigger, my love is stronger, there is no empirical way to prove it. It's on the back of science vs religion threads, and the absurdity of them. I do not associate with any religion, but I do believe in source/creator, or G-d. Based on these threads I have to reach the conclusion that as science can not prove the existence of G-d, (which I know to exist) G-d must not exist. I must look at science to validate my beliefs. So with that in mind I have to look at other things in my life, as science is so dominant and correct and I on order to make an educated decision on the matter I need to explore both scenarios. It is the mark of an educated mind to entertain a thought without accepting it. So enter love Love. I can not find any empirical scientific proof to the existence of love. If I were to bring the same level or proof to a G-d debate I would be shot down. So I thought I would play along and well...enjoy the absurdity of it all. Same set of rules. Hope you see the absurdity of it.
love only exists as much as you let it if you go around life not believing in such thing as love, then of course there will be no love in your life, because your not allowing it! and do you honestly want to go around life believing there is no such thing as love? that sounds awfully depressing to me [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HN7HakO6oGA]John Lennon Real Love (Acoustic) - YouTube[/ame]
BBC NEWS | Health | Love like a drug, scientists say though it's not very romantic to say that "love" is merely a chemical addiction to the various hormones released into the body, "romantic love" is a relatively new phenomenon (which goes back about a thousand years or so.) basically, i don't think you see it as i do but that's cool. besides, at heart i am more of a cynic and less of a romanticist so understand that my view of what it is (to put it bluntly, addiction) is probably not going to cut the mustard for the romatics out there. now, is it a case of one being right over the other or a case of one not wanting it to be the case over the other? besides, i think in your blurb you're misinterpreting lust for that "in love" feeling. yes, how we all perceive how it acts on our selves is entirely too subjective but at the very core of it all, the emotional sensations we feel are merely biochemical reactions. love doesn't come from any external source so that leaves the internal... and the internal is ruled by all the many, many biological systems that we have in our bodies thanks to millions of years of evolution.
I've been playing consensus ad absurdum Science and spirituality will eventually merge, they are not mutually exclusive. Both can learn from each other. Too much pollution in both scientific and religious fields though. I agree that falling in love is akin to madness and yet I enjoy the romanticism of it. I guess when someone gets close to the answer you blurp them out, easy tactic. There isn't any proper empirical data to prove love though, they are more para-sciences. Many broad generalisations and so on. They start with the assumption that love exists. No different to the spiritualist's view of G-d exists and studies on people who are momentarily dead and see a light. Where does love originate?
I don't. I have a cat. And I do not feel the same love for my cat as I do for my family. No it hasn't. The emotional response was the result of an idea. Conscious thoughts manifest through physical processes. I should have mentioned that ideas can induce emotional responses, really this is something that is self-evident as well. But we were talking about external sources being the cause of our emotions. Great. That's your opinion. But this really smells like a cop-out since you can't show me that god is the source of your emotional experiences. I don't have to know the technicalities of very little thing in life to make reasonable judgments. I see that we can observe physical phenomena occurring in the human body, and I can see emotional responses can be verified by human subjects when these physical phenomena occur. I see the relationship. And since science relies on observation and experimentation, and that their conclusions time and time again lead to accurate descriptions of reality, I have reason to believe their claims. But anyway. What you're really arguing here is that it takes the same kind of faith to believe in god as it takes to believe in love. Wrong. It would be like saying 1 has the same numerical value as 100. It doesn't. Likewise, the quantity and credibility of evidence of our observations of phenomena differ from the quantity and credibility of the evidence of your claims. We can observe physical phenomena and how it effects the conscious mind and come to accurate conclusions. Just as an example, if we take a drug and feel an effect we can say the effect is a result of the drug. We can observe the physical process that is occurring. We can come to many accurate conclusions to the relationship between the physical occurrences and what occurs in the mind. I'd like to see you provide any evidence for the relationship between god and emotions. [/QUOTE]
For some people, emotions don't really exist. For the rest of us, they are reactions to stimuli. Our reactions manifest, and the manifestations can affect the shared experience we refer to as existence. If this is meant as a lesson regarding something supernatural, the moral seems to be that it can but does not always exist. Or that it exists as a reaction to stimuli, and the true existence of the thing is in how it manifests out of us into the shared reality. God sometimes exists, and the proof is that sometimes we act out on the idea.
Oh, I can, I just choose not to show you Just answer this one question. Why should I show you that G-d is the source of my emotional experiences? I would be bringing logic to a debate that thrives on logical fallacies. I would be wasting my time. Why should I show you when you are predisposed, uncapable and unwilling to see?
This is not good logic. Love is a very vague word. I like this topic, but I don't know how to go about it with what you've given.
Maybe love is like gravity and is a force outside of this dimension [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qkq3IIxUEjQ]Love and Gravity - YouTube[/ame]
You were arguing that the principle behind believing in love and believing in god were the same. If you want to show this then show me that an emotional experience stems from god with evidence of the same credibility and reliability that science provides. I can respect worldviews not rooted in empiricism, but it will be hard to convince me of them. (Hence the word rooted, obviously we can not observe the mind but we can observe the brain and how it affects the mind.) Otherwise you could argue that a paw-print showed that Bigfoot existed, or that a horn showed that unicorns existed, etc...and those conclusions aren't reliable enough for me to believe them.
This is like the question of morality. Would morality exist without humans? Well nobody gives a shit because we wouldn't be around to know. It's pretty obvious that these abstract ideas exist as much as we make them and that's all that matters.
Can you read? I am not arguing that the principle behind believing in love and believing in G-d are the same. The same reliability that science provides? There was a time when science said that the world was flat and the sun revolved around Earth. Sure a paw-print is no evidence per se of the existence of Big Foot. But if you came across a paw-print that did not match any paw-prints you know about, and if that paw-print matched folklore descriptions of a Big Foot then maybe you could entertain the idea of the Big Foot's existence. But obviously you have decided that Big Foot doesn't exist, so no matter how many clues you find you will never be capable of putting them together.
What are you arguing then? This is what I get from this thread: (1) We can't show that love exists by observation (since it is of the intangible mind). (2) We can't show that god exists by any means of observation. (3) Therefore since you believe love exists, you can not say it is irrational to believe that god exists since we use the same reasoning to determine the existence of both love and god. I said that we do not use the same reasoning. My reason to believe that love exists is because of the evidence that is provided for the existence of love. The evidence is sufficient, reliable, and credible. Should I have restated: scientific claims backed by sufficient/reliable evidence? In today's world we have profound knowledge and technology, we can use it to come to much more precise conclusions. In ancient times we didn't exactly have the recources or understanding to come to accurate conclusions. They used evidence to hypothesize the world was flat (observing the relative flatness over great distances), but it clearly wasn't enough evidence to paint an accurate picture of the earth. The great thing about science is it doesn't work in absolutes; if evidence goes against a hypothesis then we have to restructure our understanding of phenomena. I do not assert that Bigfoot does not exist, kind of like how I don't assert god doesn't exist. I state that I will not believe in Bigfoot unless I find sufficient reason to believe so. I ground my reasoning in evidence and therefore I do not believe in Bigfoot. (Note that believing Bigfoot is different than asserting Bigfoot doesn't exist.) If we were to find some fucking monstrous paw-prints that appeared to come from no known animal, and if these paw-prints matched the size of what is depicted in folklore, I would have reason to believe that there may be a connection. But further evidence would have to be collected before I could form any stronger opinion on the matter.
It's like saying (1) I like jam on bread (true) (2) I like ham on bread (true) Thus (3) I like jam and ham on bread (false). What I am saying: (1) as there is no scientific proof for the existence of G-d then G-d must not exist. Applying the same logic to love: (2) As there is no scientific proof for love then love must not exist. Realising that love exists, despite lack of concise scientific proof of it's existence maybe when looking at G-d you could move away from science as the ultimate validator. Today we have profound knowledge and technology, compared to 1000 years ago, but that does not mean that the knowledge and technology are correct. We use evidence to hypothesize but as evidence changes, science adapts. In 10 years time, the technologies that we hold so dear today will be outdated So you make daft analogies, get caught wanting and recalibrate...mmm... Through observation and hypothesis you can reach the same validation on G-d. If you're not observant enough, lack the life experiences to hypothesise then that's your life, but because you lack these skills doesn't mean that everyone else lacks them as well.
Love is real because we feel it. its an emotion. God is not real because he is an external figure that is supposodly watching over us yet noone has seen him. Its like comparing dogs to graphite. Two completly different things. You cant say, "oh im so god right now" because god is not an emotion. He is a fairtytale.
I think people try harder to validate the non-existence of G-d through self justification rather than observing the obvious.
To my knowledge science doesn't ascribe the term 'proof' to theories of understanding phenomena. Only evidence which validates the credibility of claims. Although when the evidence becomes overwhelming it is regarded as fact. Anyway, in response to, (1) Maybe some people believe this, but I do not subscribe to this reasoning. I reason that since there is no evidence (that I find sufficient) for a god, I do not believe in god. I do not assert that god does not exist, that would require knowledge of the entire physical and any non-physical realm that could possibly exist. (2) Since there is evidence (that I find sufficient) for the existence of love, I believe it exists. Not only is it a self-evident matter, we can examine the physical reactions that are responsible for such emotions. *Note that I find sufficient evidence can only be derived empirically. Cool. The fact that I can drop a ball 100,000 times from free-fall and determine it's position in time tells me that the theory of gravity is so reliable there really isn't much to question about it's nature. Same applies for any theory with ample credibility. Still waiting for any insight as to how we can show god exists through empirical means. I'll take your description of my 'lacking capabilities' as a cop-out...