Comments on: Believing the Unbelievable

By: James Ragsdale

James Ragsdale — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 18:41:41 +0000

Regarding sensing people behind you. Studies have shown that the brain often registers external stimuli before awareness and a decision to react enters our consciousness. For example, reflective actions (grabbing something with the hand). So, perhaps the brain hears something behind us that is below the level of what we can perceive consciously and what we first experience at the conscious level is merely an intuition that someone is behind us. Only moments later enough auditory stimuli accumulates and passes the threshold of consciousness and conscious confirmation.

Why this would develop would make sense from an evolutionary-survival perscpective.

By: garry

garry — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 01:31:51 +0000

The cost of religious supersition is too high despite its ability to provide internally consistent explanations tht are comforting. The insularity, intolerance, hatred, and violence that is the natural consequence of religious superstition and the mentality of religion working at the tribal and national level wipes out any benefit at the family and community level. Some of the most sadistic and ruthless acts commited by mankind has been on behalf of one religion to destry another rival.

By: Salvadore Pix

Salvadore Pix — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 03:25:26 +0000

I missed the last part of the show, but I heard the guest talk about how people erroneously think they can feel it when someone is watching them from behind, and that that has been disproved. I also heard the host use “what if” examples involving some mass murderer named Darmer… Did anyone think to ask this scientist: “What if the person in the experiment watching the subject from behind was a mass murderer like Darmer?” I am supposed to believe that if some creep like that was behind me contemplating wringing my neck and eating me for breakfast that I wouldn’t sense anything unusual?

By: ClioSmith

ClioSmith — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 13:05:59 +0000

Tom, you said you have relatives who are “snake handlers.” I don’t believe you.

I think your “snake handler” meme is a dead giveaway as to your real attitude about religious people who don’t conform to your crowd’s rationalist standards.

I think it’s also a reliable indicator that you are less interested in empirical accuracy than you are interested in affirming your allegiance to a specific stereotypical view that is dominant within the circles you move in.

Maybe I’m wrong, and you really do have relatives who are snake handlers. If so, I hope you’ll interview them on air, or at least interview a scholar who actually studies Appalachian snake handlers.

By: Chanan Kubitsky (Tel Aviv, Israel)

Chanan Kubitsky (Tel Aviv, Israel) — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 07:22:03 +0000

The myth that humans have no free will is one of the prevalent excuses for wrong doing. It’s not me, it’s my genes, it’s my upbringing, it’s someone else.

Morality is based on free choice. This is essential in Jewish teaching.

By: Quote of the Week « Living Better Skeptically

Quote of the Week « Living Better Skeptically — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 04:23:52 +0000

[...] You can find it here. [...]

By: On Point with SuperSense « Bruce M. Hood

On Point with SuperSense « Bruce M. Hood — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 16:30:05 +0000

[...] [...]

By: Eric

Eric — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 02:49:01 +0000

I find it interesting that belief in god is called superstition while not believing in god is not superstition. Since when has god’s existence been proven or disproven? It is just as superstitious to believe god does not exist as it is to believe god does exist. A person either has faith of a god existing or they have faith one does not.

By: Rishiyur Nikhil

Rishiyur Nikhil — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 01:41:04 +0000

What was profoundly disappointing about this discussion is the imprecision with which the hosts labeled something as superstitious. The woman who brought up the point about “abstraction” absolutely hit the nail on the head, and both Tom and Prof. Hood seemed to miss it completely. Take the example of revulsion at wearing Darmer’s raincoat, which was blanketly dismissed as superstitious. Well, it depends on how the raincoat wearer explains it. The woman caller gave an explanation about abstractions, and which had nothing to do with any belief that the coat contained any “essence” of Darmer that would rub off on her, and yet you kept going back to that interpretation of the revulsion.

By: Dan Wylie-Sears

Dan Wylie-Sears — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 00:35:51 +0000

Oh, the current caller just mentioned astrology.

There are many ways that the time of year you’re born could have effects: the light/dark time cues could alter maternal hormones, leading to in-utero effects; an infant’s first experience of seasonal conditions like cold and flu season, temperature extremes, seasonally-available foods, and seasonal allergens could have different effects at age one month than at age seven months; and being the oldest, youngest, or in the middle of your elementary-school peers could be a formative influence. There’s no realistic way to follow through all the effects from first principles. The only way to find out these effects is empirically — which is part of what astrology is.

Of course, astrology is full of hogwash too. You can filter out noise from signal if you know the signal characteristics in advance, but amplifying an unknown signal inevitably amplifies noise.

The reason we have these apparently irrational tendencies to believe is that they’re rational under circumstances of pervasive ignorance.

By: Dan Wylie-Sears

Dan Wylie-Sears — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 00:20:26 +0000

There’s absolutely no supernatural belief involved in saying that people in front of you act different when someone behind you is staring at you, or that you’ll perform better in various situations when you’ve gone through your normal routine, or that a gesture expressing some connection with a killer is repugnant to you.

By: Sam E.

Sam E. — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 22:28:37 +0000

FWIW I heard Joy Brown once say that there was a study that confirmed that people could indeed tell when there is someone looking at them.

By: Joan

Joan — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 16:50:04 +0000

I LOVE that the very last caller raised the ultimate superstition, belief in free will.

By: Glenn Broughton

Glenn Broughton — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 16:48:34 +0000

The views put forward were expressed as ‘this is reality’ but they only saw the world as physical. In reality everything is energy, as shown by science. Our computers work because silicon chips, which are quartz crystal, can be programmed with energy. Wallboard in our houses is made of gypsum which is also a form of quartz, and we are energy so when two people have an argument the memory of that angry exchange is held in the walls – thats why people get ‘feelings’ about being in certain houses or rooms. The same may occur with the mass murderer’s sweater holding an energetic blueprint of the owners thoughts. All thoughts produce emissions of energy from the brain, it goes somewhere!

By: Jay

Jay — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 16:05:05 +0000

Human evolution takes a very long time, much longer than known history. I think it is simplistic, arrogant, and narrow-minded to think that our ancestors were stupid. They clearly were not. Again, evolution is much slower than that. They were as intelligent as we are. Credit them. I am fairly convinced that the various authors of Genesis, for example, knew full well and intended to first orate, then write in metaphorical terms. I am sure there were many then, as far back as early Vedic days and earlier, as now, who were perfectly capable of understanding the mythical metaphorical nature of the belief systems of their time and place and used them, as many do now, simply as a vehicle to spiritual harmony. To claim this kind of intelligence only belongs to modern people is silly.

By: Gordon

Gordon — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 16:00:44 +0000

Very interesting discussion, but I can’t help but think that our scientific self-satisfaction permeates it. The level of practical know-how required to live a pre-industrial life in the rain forest, for example, is huge, and may dwarf the relative simplicity of the urban grid and our relatively regimented society. Pre-industrial and pre-agricultural cultural and cognitive structures were highly effective. While the scientific world-view fits very well with our intellectual picture of things, its ability to sustain us for thousands of years has yet to be proven. Given scale of our environmental problems, I believe the verdict is still in doubt.

By: Gregg Smythe

Gregg Smythe — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 15:54:56 +0000

A la the illustration of Theseus’ ship, am I being supperstious to believe that although all the cells in my 54 year old body are a lot younger than 54, I am still I?

By: Matthew McKinney

Matthew McKinney — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 15:49:54 +0000

Is the meaning of life subjective, situational or does it fall in the realm of an absolute truth? How do you see believing in the unbelievable defining the meaning of life for groups and individuals within society?

By: Bruce

Bruce — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 15:46:43 +0000

Mr. Hood is right regarding religious indoctrination. As a Catholic friend of mine once said “It is easier to create them than convert them (to Catholicism)”.

Religion is indoctrination to a set of beliefs. It differs from indoctrination to a society’s common values by adding the concept of behavior related to a greater force, creator, etc rather than the common good.

By: Stacey Dyer

Stacey Dyer — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 15:44:40 +0000

I think superstition has something greater occurring with a correlation to the love of ignorance as bliss. As children we covet our imaginations and the wondrous things we believe while the cruel world spins round. The magic that lies within each superstitious belief gives us hope that there is a chance that a result may occur just by “wishing” it to be so.