A reader sent in a request that I post a reply to an old article. How old? From June 2005. I'd almost forgotten this old quack, but Cindy Lee had to remind me.
Yes, the email she sent was all set in Comic Sans.
It seems most of these posting are rather old so in reading them I am going to comment and post a more up-to-date statement.
It is easy to be critical of something you have not experienced. I have hear stories, been to several healing services at the churches and have had five or six private office visits with Dr. Nemeh.
I have also encouraged many family members and friends to come see him for office visits.
I am an energy therapist and have had many hands on experiences over the last 20 years with many modalities. When I attended the first church service the experiences was multidimensional. In the church just watching Dr. Nemeh attend and pray over each person as if they were the only persn there. The emotions of the people there were felt and their hearts so open in their faith for a healing.
We had a little five year old with us that got tired and slept then woke up with a stomach ache. When Dr. Nemeh put his hand on his back for a few moments I was anxious to ask the child what he felt. He said " he put is hand on my back and it felt warm all the way to my stomach and then my stomach ache was better." instant report out of the mouths of babes you might say.
It was amazing to see that Dr. Nemeh asked NO questions yet it automatically put his hands on the areas that the person needed. He put his hands on my chest and back yet turned and put his hand on my friends ears.
She had a problem with hearing. The next woman he put his hands on her neck area and YES she had a problem with her lymph nodes in that area. How did he know? This is by the Holy spirit. I watch the transitition of the man Dr. Nemeh how he looks and when the Holy Spirit comes through and the man Dr. Nemeh steps back. There is a visible change.For me with all the experience of other hands on energy treatments, I can say I have never NEVER felt anything like what I felt that early Palm Sunday Morning at the church in 2005. It felt like a huge moving vortex funnel hurricane going deep deep like miles within me. I had the sense of falling backwards although inches it felt like miles and miles.
There has been other healing experiences by family member and friends but I will only state my own experience right now. When you have an experience like this it is overwhelming and mind blowing for the mind and body to understand. First you are excited then you step back and think about it all and try to integrate it all in your being and senses. For a long time you put in within you in silence and think, think about it. When you finally realize this happened you cry and are filled with joy. It is a very very personnal thing to have happen in this world of confusion and chaos. Hard to share with others as it invokes so many thoughts and feelings.
Please don't be negative until you have the experience.
I have never heard of an "energy therapist" before—it all sounds like magical nonsense to me.
Be sure to visit her site! She doesn't get many visits from critical thinkers. There's a little poll there, and I guess I was the very first atheist to stop by.
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Check out this part of her site: http://www.kids-write.com/save_the_manatee
Are YOU an indigo child?
It's easy to call out the obvious nuts. Good job. It's harder to call out the flakes who hide under the umbrella of so called science. They're there. They're more dangerous than the flakes. And they're totally ignored.
I refer, of course, to so-called neuroscientists.
C'mon PZ, where's the push-back? Minds exist in the same dimensions as do gods, spirits, souls, etc., i.e. in dimensions with no measurable units.
This has been the case for over fifty years. What progress have we seen? When do we say "Enough"?
Hey, Seed told us recently that research is almost totally wrong (and you didn't object), so let's get it right. What do you say?
Why are these charlatans not being prosecuted for practicing medicine without a license?
You might want to explain that to the computer scientists and cognitive psychologists. I bet they could use a laugh.
What?
Hey, Seed told us recently that research is almost totally wrong (and you didn't object), so let's get it right. What do you say?
does this count as the first official nutter spin post on this site of that ridiculous article in Seed?
What seed article? is it available online?
What?
What I think Caledonian is trying to point out is that, in the last 50 years, we have developed precise understandings of how and why many parts of the brain work. This has gotten to the point where we can often use the same techniques it uses to replicate its behaviour. See, for example, this wikipedia page.
does this count as the first official nutter spin post on this site of that ridiculous article in Seed?
No, I thought the article was despicable. No one else seemed to.
What seed article?
This one.
Mr. G, may I recommend the book Phantoms in the brain by V.S. Ramachandran? I really didn't like the last few chapters, but I did really like the first few.
"Energy" "therapies" have been around for a while. I've got a doggerel entry on it.
Other doggerel I spotted: #23, #46, #55, #70.
Fah. This is nothing. If you want to be a *true believer* like us folks here in Fleriduh, you need to go to a dental faith healer instead of a dentist.
You haven't lived till you've seen her "angel" photo.
http://www.kids-write.com/angel_photo
'Scuse me, now I need to go clean my screen.
may I recommend the book Phantoms in the brain
Sure. May I suggest that it's nonsense?
This has gotten to the point where we can often use the same techniques it uses to replicate its behaviour.
Connectionist accounts have nothing to do with "minds". I'm quite aware of them. In fact, they weigh against the "Cartesian" accounts of language and psychology.
Sure. May I suggest that it's nonsense?
Sure, if you've read it. Have you? You can also tell me why.
Im an April Child. Were like the Scientologist Indigo Children.
:P
Truly, you have lived a sheltered life, then.
However, her website may well be suitable for a future Your Friday Dose of Woo.
Thanks wjv for finding that photo. It really brightened up my day!
The holy lens flare angels strike again. A hard day for atheists all over the globe!
Sure, if you've read it. Have you?
No. I looked at various reviews, which were unanimous in their opinions that it was a great work, wondered how any of it had to do with advancing our understanding of things and concluded that it was a waste of time. Perhaps I was too hasty.
As an advocate, though, I'm sure you can show me where I erred.
I visited Cindy Lee's site and left this comment in her guestbook:
I have looked over your site. I must say it contains more nonsense than I have seen in a long time. I hope you can some day think critically enough to see all the baloney you are dishing out. I found out about your site from http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2007/05/cindy_lee_asks_a_favor.php#m…
((groan)) PZ, where do you FIND these people?
The very first review I found (Tibbetts in the Quarterly Review of Biology) said nothing of the sort. Quit it Mr.G, you're harshing my kook-bashing buzz.
PZ probably finds them in the same places I find these people. ;-)
Regarding the flare angels...it's amazing where technical and/or scientific incompetence and credulity will lead, like creation-science.
I also think this would be a great Friday Dose of Woo.
Chuck Morrison wrote: "Why are these charlatans not being prosecuted for practicing medicine without a license?"
Well, I think they'd have to practice medicine first.
Me putting on a pilot's hat may make people think I'm a pilot and I can fly them around. But it doesn't make it so, and only really stupid people will thank me for flying them to their destination when we've never even boarded a plane.
Oh, and I don't think I'd be liable for their lost luggage.
Mr G, I recently sat through a lecture by a researcher here at Stanford who uses microelectrodes to investigate the perception of movement. He found that by stimulating part of a monkey's brain with electricity you could influence its behavior precisely (the monkey biased his reporting of the direction of movement toward the stimulated direction, sometimes to a large degree). The results are extremely robust and hold up under a variety of circumstances. This is just one of a huge number of experiments that show that there is no mind/brain duality.
So how, exactly, is the mind not part of the brain? I'd like to see a single shred of evidence for your ludicrous view, but you don't have any. Go waste your time somewhere else.
The very first review I found (Tibbetts in the Quarterly Review of Biology) said nothing of the sort.
Oh, I guess I only thought I read such reviews. I'm so silly.
Does this have anything to do with the failure of "cognitive neuroscience", aside from lending support to my position?
First: If I ever found my inner child, I'd swat his butt and send him to his room.
Second: Any model of brain functioning that does not take not take into account how neurons and glial cells work is, on the face of it, wrong.
I'd like to see a single shred of evidence for your ludicrous view, but you don't have any.
I'm just a jerk. I haven't really considered this in the depth that you have. There's tons of evidence that immaterial spirits exist. Descartes was right. So was Chomsky. We haven't wasted the last fifty years pursuing chimera. We'll eventually discover the rules of Universal Grammar. It will turn out that free will leads us to a just world. And Creativity. Let's not forget that.
Sorry. I'm sure the world will be better once cranks like me are done away with.
Oh, and about the evidence? Think about evidence that there is no god. Same deal.
Looks like a few more atheists have visited her site since. When I took it, the results were:
Yes 46% (112)
No 54% (134)
Not Sure 0% ( 0)
Mr G, do you have any evidence for your claim that neuroscientists are pursuing immaterial Cartesian minds?
Yup. Want some? Or can you manipulate the Google without my help?
I'm sure the world will be better once cranks like me are done away with.
an hypothesis worthy of testing, surely.
I suggest you get right on that so we can observe the results.
I suggest you get right on that so we can observe the results.
It would be convenient, wouldn't it? Never mind the facts Let's just do away with those who object. Then those in power can control things, no matter what the facts are.
That would be best.
I dunno about the rest of you, but I'm registering Mr. G at about .26 Timecubes. Might I suggest offering him silence and additional rope? He may find a use for it.
When you say Cartestian Mind, are you referring to Cartesian Materialism or Dualism?
Never mind the facts Let's just do away with those who object. Then those in power can control things, no matter what the facts are.
shake your fist harder, boy.
What a goofball.
That would be best.
again... only one way to find out for sure.
*taps foot*
I'm waiting.
I promise if you're wrong, and your exit has no effect whatsoever, I'll make note of it for you.
A friend of my ex-wife effectively "lost" her mother to a car accident. Before the accident she was one kind of person, a typical mom (if you will) for her daughter, but after the accident she acted as if she didn't recognize her daughter as her own. She went from being nice and generally friendly to being brash and unkind. She wound up divorcing her husband, IIRC, and starting a new life that did not include her daughter.
So, Mr. G. and all the rest of you mind-brain duality folks, would you like to offer up an explanation? It's not like this story is unique, so make it a good response, will you?
Let me guess: The mind is a separate entity from the physical brain, but it needs the brain to interface with "the material world"? Or, at the far end of woo, there's: During or because of the accident, an evil spirit (a negative energy) took over her identity? Or: Her personality change was brought about by the psychic trauma and could have been reversed by a faith healer? Pfft. I've heard all these and several permutations of them, so spare me. The fact of the matter is that all the "faith" BS fails to answer the questions that need answering. When it appears to work to any degree (or can be spun to look like it has), it's proof! When it fails to show an effect, it's some ambiguous or untestable thing that caused the failure. The kooks out there shun genuine criticism and education, preferring instead to spoon prefab pablum into the toothless, drooling mouth of ignorance, whether their own or someone else's.
Experimental, falsifiable data points to there being no separation between the mind and the meat it arises from. Prick the brain here, a person cries; prick it there, a person laughs; prick it elsewhere for memories, visions, an audience with "God". Once again, the assertions of the "faithful" prove nothing, offer nothing, lead to nothing; they merely perpetuate the "faith". I may not know everything, but I do know that there's more hope in the scientific method any day of the week, any hour of the day, than there is in a lifetime of soft- or hardcore delusions and ignorance.
We are animals, like apes, like whales, like wolves and mice or almost whatever you please. Our brains are complex structures (though not irreducibly complex) and truly astonishing. Our minds are, like the minds of other animals, products of our evolution on this lonely and glorious little planet. Which is to say that there is nothing supernatural or metaphysical about them; kept healthy and with luck they behave as you'd expect, damaged or made ill they malfunction or even disintegrate; their fate is ineluctably and incontrovertibly tied to the brain's. I'm sorry if that's an unpleasant thought for you, because I really think you're missing out on all the really cool reality-based things.
".26 Timecubes. Might I suggest offering him silence and additional rope? He may find a use for it.:"
Go for it. I'll back you down on every claim.
Sure, suggest groupthink approaches. Shun me.
Idiots.
Me putting on a pilot's hat may make people think I'm a pilot and I can fly them around. But it doesn't make it so, and only really stupid people will thank me for flying them to their destination when we've never even boarded a plane.
Caveat emptor, then? I suppose it's only fitting.
Mr. G, you need to put up with some proof of your assertions of a "unitless dimension," or shut up.
Mr. G, you need to put up with some proof of your assertions of a "unitless dimension," or shut up.
Give an example where dimensions are accounted for. Or shut up.
Mr. G, edited for clarity: "I'm just a jerk....I'm sure the world will be better once cranks like me are done away with."
Although some may hypothesize that he was being sarcastic, the merit of the statements is indisputable.
POSSESSION! The demon must be cast out.
Mr. G, you need to put up with some proof of your assertions of a "unitless dimension," or shut up.
I think he is actually trying to argue against immaterial minds but is hindered by his extremely inept use of sarcasm. See #30.
PZ: Not enough exclamation points. ;-D
I think Mr G should start over and clearly explain what argument he is making, without trying to be clever and sarcastic, since I haven't the slightest idea what he's talking about at this point.
No, no, no, Mr. '.26 Timecubes' G. Caledonian's suggesting we "give you enough rope to 'hang' yourself." All you've really done so far is whizzed on the rugs and barked your head off.
You people are idiots. (No, I don't think think that will help my case. Bu† you are.)
Well, I guess us being idiots means you don't actually have to make an argument, since we won't understand it anyway. How convenient.
I think Mr. G is an eliminative materialist ala Paul Churchland (although he could be a behaviorist I guess). I'm not sure why he's railing against neuroscience; the target should be psychology and cognitive science (maybe cognitive neuroscience). Chomsky and the originators of cognitive science argued for the "autonomy of psychology": that biology is irrelevant to understanding the mind. It's still the de facto philosophical position of cognitive science.
I think Mr G should start over and clearly explain what argument he is making, without trying to be clever and sarcastic, since I haven't the slightest idea what he's talking about at this point
Oh, sorry. Maybe something I said would enlighten you.
#53: Going back and looking over what Mr. G had to say (or, er, chose of his own free will to say), I think, at least tentatively, that poke is right. But, wow, I'm not going to be too hard on myself for lumping him in with the rest of the kooks (crank, kook, who can tell?). I agree with P-Zed (yeah, yeah; insert eye-roll) about Mr. G's need to re-state, in clear terms, what argument he's making. Who knows, it could be interesting, but the attempt at snarky cleverness fell flat and stayed flat and smothered the point.
Iff I misunderstood your position, Mr. G, you have my humble apology for including you in my earlier comment.
Now, see, that's your problem. Nothing you have said enlightens anyone, and when you're asked to explain, you come back with something equally unintelligible and unhelpful. Take a deep breath, and try to write a straightforward paragraph that explains approximately what your position is on something, or at least explain why you're so incoherently cranky.
I'm not sure why he's railing against neuroscience; the target should be psychology and cognitive science (maybe cognitive neuroscience).
Sure, but what distinguishes these fields?
It's all just the magical mind. Blah, blah, blah.
This is science?
Go for it. I'll back you down on every claim.
Sure, suggest groupthink approaches. Shun me.
Idiots.
this guy argues EXACTLY like one John Davison.
either it IS Davison, or someone who shares his particular mental affliction.
In either case, he hasn't actually presented anything coherent yet, so since we are post the "3 post rule", can't we break out the 2x4's?
after all, it's obviously what he wants.
Now, see, that's your problem. Nothing you have said enlightens anyone, and when you're asked to explain, you come back with something equally unintelligible and unhelpful. Take a deep breath, and try to write a straightforward paragraph that explains approximately what your position is on something, or at least explain why you're so incoherently cranky.
What?
First: Sorry I missed you in Ann Arbor, my schedule was packed.
As to Mr G. (does the G stand for Goldstein by any chance?)
Sounds like his (their) usual riff:
"Sorry. I'm sure the world will be better once cranks like me are done away with."
"Sure, suggest groupthink approaches. Shun me."
What neuroscientist or cognitive scientist says anything about a "magical mind"? Sounds like a straw man to me, but I'm sure I'm missing something. Perhaps you could educate me.
This woo-woo reminded me of a little girl who did some very fine work in the furtherance of science:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emily_Rosa
-jcr
Hey PZ,
You might have been 'the first atheist' to visit Cindy Lee's site and perhaps the poll, but your faithful minions have been busy, I just voted and we godless heathens are running 65% against 35% believers. I wonder how long before the poll is pulled?
PZ. Let me repeat: What? What??
You don't want to do this.
ugh, there's a direct link to "The Secret" in the upper right corner of Cindy's website.
that site is just chock full of good 'tard.
You don't want to do this.
*boot*
Mr. G, please use your mind powers to guess which finger I'm holding up. A lot of buzz words and emotional responses aren't proof of anything, except that people are easily dooped. What kind of reaction did you expect from skeptics? Show us the mooooney. Any one can make a sales pitch. But now we want to examine the product you're selling. If you won't let us, then perhaps you're selling hot air.
You know, I think it may bother Mr. G even more if we all just ignored him. (PS- This also works well on younger sisters.)
Besides, there is much more entertaining stuff on Ms Lee's website! Such as: http://www.kids-write.com/film_ "Spirit in the Wind Energy Production Guides" for the Film industry.
Did you mean something?
The difference is that neuroscience studies the nervous system, and is a branch of biology, whereas the object of study in psychology and cognitive science is more abstract. Psychology is generally the study of behaviour. Cognitive science is the study of the "mind," where the mind in question is an abstraction based on a loose analogy with the software-hardware model of computers rather than something Cartesian (although the impetus in Chomsky was explicitly Cartesian). I think the foundations of Cognitive Science are shaky but most of the results are still worthwhile; you can just look at them as measuring certain aspects of performance of the brain.
I've been wondering the same thing about you.
I have hear stories, been to several healing services at the churches and have had five or six private office visits with Dr. Nemeh.
ooh ooh, does he do seances too, Cindy?
this woo stuff cracks me up.
Shucks! Did I miss the troll party? Darn.
"Move along. Nothing more to see here." (There really wasn't, was there?)
You gotta admit, Drew and Swiftee were a lot more fun.
I think the foundations of Cognitive Science are shaky but most of the results are still worthwhile
Sure they are.
I've been wondering the same thing about you.
Yeah, I'm just some idiot who thinks that claims about immaterial crap are stupid. ;
Take a deep breath, and try to write a straightforward paragraph that explains approximately what your position is on something, or at least explain why you're so incoherently cranky.
Yup, as everyone here has suggested, I'm just an idiot.
Thanks for making me aware of that.
Can we ban him and get on with our godless lives already? The shtick wears thin.
I think he is actually trying to argue against immaterial minds but is hindered by his extremely inept use of sarcasm.
That sort of makes sense. I guess.
He really hasn't done anything worth being banned for. Just stop replying to him.
Yup, as everyone here has suggested, I'm just an idiot.
Thanks for making me aware of that.
well, as to "idiot", you haven't actually said anything for us to determine that one way or the other. however, as to "insane", you're doin just fine with that all on your own.
I predict if ignored, like Davison, he will simply start talking to himself.
"Can we ban him and get on with our godless lives already? The shtick wears thin."
I hate to call anyone a clueless idiot, but in your case, it gives me pleasure. It doesn't have anything to do with godlessness. It's about the myriad idiots who think minds are real. Such people (I assume you're one) make the world the pitiable mess that it is.
Just because you don't have a mind doesn't mean we all don't either :P
sheesh. I really should stop commenting when I'm sleepy. Seems that's the only time I do though.
I'm afraid it's true. I do ban people. I don't ban them for disagreeing with me, though: the primary reason for kicking someone out is that they are repetitive and boring, never address direct requests, and act as if it is their privilege to troll the site with vacuous babbling.
Mr G is meeting all the requirements.
I'll give him a little more time, but if he continues his evasive game I will boot him, with no regrets.
I checked the link and find the material unconvincing.
We've no reason to swat flies except for sport. Keep your muscles trained for those who aggregate the Powers of Ignorance & Wealth (&c) for "faith". Practitioners of such stagecraft, here recounted, are but dust in the wind and affect us not. Aggregators of Power and "faith" are destroying people daily, both here and elsewhere. Y' wanna be next?
I'm afraid it's true. I do ban people. I don't ban them for disagreeing with me, though: the primary reason for kicking someone out is that they are repetitive and boring, never address direct requests, and act as if it is their privilege to troll the site with vacuous babbling.
Mr G is meeting all the requirements.
How so?
Mr G is meeting all the requirements.
How so?
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/plonk.php
I see:
Insipidity
Wanking
Trolling
Slagging
as directly applicable to you, and you're just warming up, right?
Just before I'm banned, let me say that the reason is that I'd suggest that the "MIND" is bogus.
Ban me, fuckhead. We'll eventually see what it's all about.
If you'd explain yourself, maybe you wouldn't be banned. How do you define "mind", and why do you consider it bogus?
let me say that the reason is that I'd suggest that the "MIND" is bogus.
but of course, you'll never actually make an argument to support the suggestion, which comes under the "insipidity" heading.
the second line comes under slagging and the third under wanking.
still waiting for you to actually SAY something with substance, so we can determine if you fit the "stupidity" category as well. However, enough comments of no substance could be argued by themselves to qualify for that category.
Guess it's time for PZ to gather his WITS about him.
Having just scanned the comments, I note Mr. G is acting in such an obviously trollish fashion that it seems to me that this is a lucid and deliberate attempt to be banned. I'm sure PZ is aware of this.
This is tiresome.
The arguments were made many years ago.
The "scientific" consensus was presented in such prestigious journals as The New York Review of Books.
We all have minds, existing in some undefined dimensions of some undefined space. So said Chomsky. So said they all. How can any sane man disagree?
Skinner was wrong. He was a Nazi. All that behaviorist crap was an attempt to subvert our Creativity and Free Will. It's true and anyone who says otherwise should be banned.
Bye. Because I'm sure I'll be banned for this.
This is tiresome.
yup.
Ooh, let me try.
Chomsky is a Mysterian fucktard!
Hm. I doubt that such a sentiment is sufficient to get me banned, at least around these parts.
Mr. G, it isn't that you shouted, "Skinner is a Nazi" that gets you banned. It's that while you're doing it, you're peeing in the punchbowl. Go figure.
"...they also laughed at Bozo the Clown"
I'm left with a feeling like I've been listening to a colicy baby fussing in the night.
(Shakes head as if dislodging water from ear.)
Can Mr. G speak coherently, engagingly, with some measure of authority or has he been out of sorts for so long over the nature of "mind" that his has atrophied due to lack of use?
I, for one, am quite interested in his claims and his evidence for same, and I think there are exactly two chances of his supplying these; fat and slim.
Can Mr. G speak coherently, engagingly, with some measure of authority or has he been out of sorts for so long over the nature of "mind" that his has atrophied due to lack of use?
No, Mr. G. is totally incoherent. as his previous post have shown. There's no sense in anything he's said.
Just go about your business. You'll be really happy.
No, Mr. G. is totally incoherent. as his previous post have shown. There's no sense in anything he's said.
Just go about your business. You'll be really happy.
Mr. G also sounds more than a bit schizophrenic.
Come now, G. Though I can't speak for all the others here, my implication was not that you "are incoherent" but that you had not yet "been coherent in the context of these comments."
Surely you have more to offer than flogging yourself so publicly. I mean it, man. You may in fact have something compelling and provoking to offer. If you would just get about it! And leave the flinging of epithets at yourself to the experts.
Mr. G also sounds more than a bit schizophrenic.
Multiple personality disorder you mean?
schizophrenia is NOT the same thing... which usually involves paranoia, hallucinations, delusions... oh wait, maybe you're right...
I don't even think Mr. G knows what the hell he is arguing against here.. **Mind** is a word some clowns made up way back when to describe some sort of intermediary between the spirit and the flesh. This is the *equivalent* of talking about the "ghost" in a steam engine that some Japanese where convinced made them move, back when the technology was first being introduced. Its pure BS. The *Mind* as modern psychology uses the term refers to the, and I know I am going to get attacked over this, data and "software" sitting in the "hardware" of the brain. It does exist, but its not at all separate from the physical system. An article I myself posted about on the subject talked about the brains of flies, and posited that free will was the equivalent of going from:
"Minds are what brains do"- by I forgot who.
Best summary of the relationship between mind and body I have ever come across.
I can see that I'm a little late to the party, but I just wanted to say that I was going to visit her site and vote in her poll, but when the title popped up while the page was loading, I immediately hit the little x on the tab to close it. I could not even wait for the page to show up before I had to leave.
See, here's the problem with sites like ScienceBlogs. Some people become so focused on sounding intelligent that they forget about the importance of clarity. Mr. G is obviously one of those people, as are some of the commenters on this blog entry. The best part about science is the honesty and precision scientists use to describe their ideas and findings. Once a real scientific debate becomes a battle of witticisms, both arguments lose their strength, regardless of how objectively right or wrong they are.
is it just me who thinks there might be to davison and mr.G? there's the rudeness, the tendency to evade questions, never offering up anything of substance and constantly insulting people and then there's that extremely arrogant attit5ude.
Although to be fair horrible attempts at sarcasm aren't in davison's MO but as someone earlier said there seems to be a deliberate attempt to get banned.
maybe it's davison 2.0,some kind of parody or I'm just reading that oneblogaday article's comments too much. nevermind me
I propose that Mr. G is actually a tweaked version of Eliza set up to rail against the reality of minds in a sort of meta-prank by posting without one. "He" has all the features of it, nearly flowing prose that doesn't seem to mean anything.
He just doesn't want to cast his precious pearls of wisdom before us unrepentant anti-dualist swine. He has no time for "idiots," and until we prove ourselves interested and receptive listeners, he is not interested in talking to us. His first posts are fellers to see if we are inclined to accept his position before he even articulates it. His subsequent posts are an effort to back away looking like he isn't a crass coward without a defensible argument.
...feelers...
OK, look. I'm an idiot. I admit it. I haven't a tenth the science and math education that most regular commenters have, and I don't have the right to kiss the pencil tips of the Mollies. But if G can explain himself in baby language for somebody like me, he will be 99% of the way toward doing what everyone has been asking him for in the first place. Fat chance of that.
I think we can take comment #93 and call that Mr. G's views. It sounds more coherent and less sarcastic than the other stuff he's written. Besides, why would he feel attacked on Pharyngula for not believing in an immaterial mind?
The problem is that arguing against an immaterial mind is getting so tiresome. It's harder to change people's beliefs about that than it is their beliefs about religion.
A good way to "find these people" is to head over to crank dot net.
Note: I cannot accept responsibility for damage done to your sanity whilst perusing the site.
I was personally horrified to note how many cranks are operational in what I thought to be relatively crank-proof fields like Mathematics and Computer Science. (With due apologies to Biologists.) I was particularly astonished to discover the existence of "Christian Mathematics". Despite the nonsensical nature of the term it not only exists, but has its professional society which organises conferences and publishes proceedings... almost as if it were science.
To be fair, it isn't "Christian Mathematics" but "Christians in Mathematics".
Looks like Mr. G. has left the building. That's too bad. I was eager to see if he could articulate. He couldn't, but he sure had that long-faced, self-effacing, "I'm-just-an-old-lump-of-coal" schtik working, didn't he?
I came back here this morning specifically to see if he had continued posting. I had originally thought that he had some hypothesis about that old debil', duality. In my previous comments I chided him gently (I thought) and joined others in asking him to slap together a few sentences, a couple paragraphs, that would state his point(s) in the coin of the realm, plain English. He couldn't do that but he could do a lame imitation of some of the treatment he received here. That made me consider, somewhat somberly, what kind of ailment is this poor sum-bitch is suffering from.
And then to sleep.
Then, this morning, I read Matthew L. saying, "I propose that Mr. G is actually a tweaked version of Eliza . . ."
Ladies and gentlemen, consider this: Mr. G. has successfully passed the Turning Test!!
aahhh, fudge. Turing Test.
Need more coffee.
Whether or not Mr. G can pass the Turing test doesn't say all that much. I've had at least one employer who couldn't pass a Turing test even F2F in the same room.
There's no telling whether or not post #93 is any more or less sarcastic than other posts. So far, Mr. G has not stated any position coherently.
Bored now. /Willow
You gotta hand it to the G-man. He managed to gin up >100 comments without saying a damn thing. That is A+ prime trolling, yesirree!
Floyd Alvis Cooper has been dethroned.
I think I found what the problem is.
He can't read.
Mr.G(od):
Please get back onto your medication, and we'll forgive You.
I'm with #106, myself. G-man here shows just the sort of behavior you'd expect from an advanced chatterbot AI.
And I'd hesitate to say it passed the Turing Test just based on this - there's a reason the Turing Test is supposed to be conducted specially, and that's because it takes a lot of evidence to reject the null hypothesis if you aren't considering the possibility.
PZ: Alas, "energy' is a popular buzzword amongst the bogus healers ...
poke: Also note that Paul Churchland hasn't really been an eliminativist for years. A recent roving talk of his is on colour perception, after all. As for Chomsky, his motivation was Cartesian, but he is now more or less a materialist. (As was Descartes, almost - read the Passions of the Soul.)
TAW: Better is Bunge's "Brains mind." (where the ungrammatical parallel is to "intestines digest" and "hearts pump blood")
Mr. G, who is now residing in the Pharyngula Dungeon, showed up at my place. He almost seemed to have a point, but that almost-point was quickly blunted.
Well, he still has N - 2 websites to rant in, so it's a small loss really.
Keith Douglas:
"Brains mind." I like it.