I have seen doctors who have done this themselves. A person is diagnosed with a fatal disease or cancer or is HIV positive and then it 'goes into remission' or disappears, and so what do you think the doctor says? He says that he (or someone else as the case might be) simply must have made a mistake in the first diagnosis and that she never had cancer or aids or whatever to begin with.

In cases like this, they will assume that the first diagnosis was a mistake or wrong before they will assume a miracle healing or self healing took place. This is because the CHOOSE what they will believe.

In some cases I'm sure you are correct.

You believe what is "real" don't you? You decided to believe what is "real" didn't you?

How do you know it is real? How can you be sure what you believe is real... is real?

Frankly, guys, I don't comprehend How can you devote so much time to the subject which (as both, Abra and Creative, correctly noted) has no evidence, while there's really an evident "CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER" upon most of the Humanity?

Though the 2012 date may have been slightly exaggerated, nevertheless the general alarm may not be far from the reality –- that period, according to the NASA’s Near-Earth Object Program Office, would be the 1st opportunity of estimating the trajectory of the massive Apophis asteroid, when it makes another close approach, within about 14 million kilometers of Earth! This particular asteroid, around three football fields in size, was first spotted heading towards Earth 5 years ago. It was suggested then there was a 2.7% chance it would strike our planet in 2029. It may almost gaze the Earth, missing by only 30,000 kilometres, less than the distance between Earth and the moon.

*** However, there’s a very small chance it will pass through a 600 meter-wide “gravitational keyhole” as it swings by. That would alter its course and cause it to slingshot back and hit the Earth in 2036. *** * *

New NASA calculations released in October rate the chance of impact during the second pass at 1 in 250,000 – quite a slim chance(?) ***However, as Dr. William Ailor, of California Aerospace Corp. said, “That’s a pretty high probability if you’re betting the planet.” (He also chaired the biannual Planetary Defense Conference of the world’s leading asteroid experts)...
--> While the head of Russia’s space agency, Anatoly Perminov, has called for a massive planetary effort – inviting NASA, the European Space Agency and the Chinese space agency to join in -- to deflect a massive asteroid as it skips by Earth by Earth in 2029:
“We should pay several hundred million dollars and build a system that would allow us to prevent a collision, rather than sit and wait for it to happen and kill hundreds of thousands of people: a spacecraft must be built designed to nudge the Apophis asteroid away from Earth.”

P.S. Ailor points out that the 1908 asteroid that exploded over Tunguska in Siberia was only 30 meters across. It devastated more than 2,000 square kilometers of forest. APOPHIS is 270 meters in diameter!!! * * * * * * * * * *
“It won’t likely be a doomsday rock, if it will hit the Earth directly – probably not the end of life, as we know it, but a very bad day,” Ailor said. (DUH???


-- you can even Google it, or www.jpl.nasa.gov/asteroidwatch and search for Apophis. Enjoy!!!
(and stop that useless flexing of your intellectual muscles!)

I agree.



It can be, but sometimes it is helpful, especially when there are ideas exchanged which are new to one of the participants.



I've read through some of the discussions between Sky and others, and its my impression that Sky is very, very attached to this idea. I don't see any point in arguing with him about it, but I disagree with the blanket generalization that reality is decided by agreement. Agreement can be a great way of reigning in flawed perception; when i hear a soft persistent ringing sound, I do turn to others to see if their hearing organs detect the sound as well. I could just as easy carry a sound analyzer, and skip the people.

If I'm already in a position of doubting my senses to a large degree, then I might equally doubt that the 'other person' with whom I'd seek validation even exists.

In my experience, when it comes to determining the details of what is real, my own flawed senses and imperfect reason are far more reliable than seeking the opinions of others.

But it is true that, generally, people influence each others beliefs, and our beliefs influence our perceptions and thought processes - and so groups of people influence each others' perception of reality. But that doesn't mean that 'reality is determined by agreement'. Some people choose to adopt this belief, as they continue to sort out their own experience of reality, but it doesn't make it true.

Maybe, just maybe, those that believe in a existence of a materiality reality do so because it really is there, and their consistent, if imperfect, experience of it leads them to acknowledge its existence.




JB, I think this is a very important statement.

I don't know if this is related to your thought process, but hypothetically, if I had to choose between:

(a) being very mildly insane, but completely happy, healthy, productive, enthusiastic about life, good to other people and

and

(b) having a very objective and realistic perception of reality, but being depressed, apathetic, lethargic, unhealthy, unpleasant to people

I just might choose (a).




And, on the flip side, if we believe that we create every aspect of our reality when we can't, it could kill us, or those we love. Especially when people refuse some particular medical treatment (which had high odds of success) while believing they could cure their disease with their beliefs.

This is all very true. But did they change whether or not the person ever had cancer, by choosing what they believe? Really, my question was intended to help disambiguate two different ideas of 'choosing' which were intermingling in this conversation.

I lean solipsist enough to say "I don't. I can't".

But that doesn't mean that all non-provable claims are equal! I'm not saying that you are making this argument - but some people have made the argument that "since we can't prove that reality exists, we might as well acknowledge (insert fanciful notion) as equally valid as any other view of reality"...which of course is silly. And since I don't want the effort I spent learning fallacy names to go to waste, I think that would be the 'perfect solution fallacy'.


(taken from wikipedia)

Well I grew up being taught to believe the authority, to trust what I am told. Time and time again I discovered I was being fed a bunch of lies and propaganda from the Bible to the wars we have endured, to the gruesome black operations of our own government. Now, I don't believe much of anything on CNN. I look for truth from people face to face, from ordinary people on the Internet, through analyzing information looking for agendas, lies and propaganda intertwined with truth.

My conclusions about what is really going on, I'm quite sure, would freak most people out. Its a dangerous world. Don't believe what they tell you about it, is all I can advise.

I can also say that I accept what is. Whatever it is. I am sure I don't have the whole truth or the details of this complicated tangled society we live in, or the universe and how it came to be. I believe I may have a good idea of what goes on in this reality. It is like fantasy Island. Anything you want is here. The depths of depravity and horror, to the heights of love and bliss exist here by our own creation and doing. It does not do much good to worry, or fear, or complain about the state of what is. It just is, and it is what we, the humanoids who live here have manifested. (That includes any extraterrestrials.)



Its a jungle.

The question is why do you remember?

Not even a million will die? Seems like kind of a small death toll for something so many football fields large.

But we've already landed a satellite on an asteroid. Whether that one is dense or not-dense we shouldn't have that rough of a time deflecting it. Still some odds that we'd fail but you multiply the chance of that with the chance of it hitting in the first place and it gets awfully small.

You have that choice every waking moment. You'd want to do a little research to make sure you did it the right way but brain damage could effectively take you there.

Thing is though that given the choice between essentially being too retarded to take care of yourself but happy vs intelligent enough that you recognize the hardships of life it's no contest. The story of Oedipus is enough to show that we had already firmly decided as a species which we prefer ages ago.

*he ends up king of a prosperous country with a happy family but then he learns that it's all really horrible as he married his mother and had incest babies. She kills herself and he stabs his eyes out. There was this big prophecy where everyone basically knew it was going to happen too but he in ignorance everyone's attempts to avoid the situation are what made it happen. Had he known before he acted in those ways it would have been easy to prevent.

But why not just believe that there are no reptilians and all of that if reality is what you make it? If it works how you've been saying you could just choose for newscasters to be a bunch of pricks doing their best to support party views while having some general flaws in their thinking that cause a variety of problems and fail to handle others.

I'm sure it looks to you like that's the world I've chosen and if that's all it takes for things to be "real" why not choose the same yourself? Did you accidentally choose something a lot worse and there's no do overs?

Frankly, Shoku, you have a talent for underestimation!
But, as Dr. William Ailor, of California Aerospace Corp. said, “That’s a pretty high probability if you’re betting the planet.”

Well because I choose not to delude myself. Beliefs change only when you are willing to look deeper at what is really going on. Many people don't want to know the truth. Like the movie line, they "can't handle the truth."


News casters aren't really pricks, they are mostly just stupid pawns of the system. They don't really care about the news, they want to be movie stars, LOL. It is the people they work for who own the news stations who are the propaganda pushers. They actually make the rules about what can and can not be reported. Its the same with news papers. They are told what they cannot print. Cattle mutilations are just one of them. I know a small town news paper owner who refused to comply... for a while... until they threatened his business and family too. THIS IS NOT PARANOIA, so if you think it is you are deluded.

I do choose what to believe but I look for the truth of the matter. I just want to be aware somewhat of what is going on in the world around me. But I tell myself that the bad guys have been here all along, since the beginning, so there is no reason to let fear and anger get the best of me or let it ruin my life. I do create my personal reality.

The advantage to being aware of who the bad guys are and what they are doing is you know who to avoid and who not to trust with your life. It is good advice to know something about the enemy.

Its a jungle. If you are a gazelle, you live your daily life as always; and if you are alert you might not get eaten by a lion or a cheetah, but it helps to know what to look for and where in the bush they are likely to hide.

Do gazelles live in the jungle?

They live in Africa. They graze the African plains which is surrounded by jungle. But I'm sure you get my point.

You said yourself that it's not betting the planet. It would just be a "bad day."

Wait wait wait. So you're saying that truth is independent of belief?

That's pretty much the same thing. There aren't many people that roll out of bed in the morning and say to themselves that they will intentionally make the world worse today.

Ya but there are a lot of reasons you might not be allowed to put cattle mutilation in the paper. I bet if I had a column I filled with roadkill pictures some people would want to put a stop to it too.

So what exactly was s/he publishing and why was s/he told to stop?

So when you use the word reality you're talking about something that doesn't have to be the same as "what's really going on"? I think that's a big source of confusion because to the rest of us that's pretty much exactly what we mean by reality. Personally I'd use the term world view for what you seem to be talking about.



We were saying something more like "why not just not agree that lions and cheetahs can eat you? Believe their teeth are made out of squeeky toys and that their claws are balloon animals. If belief can change what's actually happening it should be that easy."

Yes of course. Beliefs change all the time.

But to a single observer who believes in something 100%, to him or her, that is the truth. (They would not believe it if they did not think it was true.) (Duh!)

Its not the same thing. A prick, in my book MIGHT roll out of bed in the morning and plan how they might make the world worse today. Bad news gets ratings. LOL



Having a column and owning your own newspaper are two different things. If you have a column your boss can tell you what you can't put in it. But if you own your own paper, NOBODY has the right to suppress your right to freedom of the press.

But maybe you are not familiar with freedom of the press? Freedom of speech? There is NO REASON or excuse for anyone (especially a covert or unknown government agency) to threaten an independent newsman who owns his own small newspaper for the purpose of preventing him from reporting the truth, which is the news. That is a violation of our (his) rights. FREEDOM OF THE PRESS!

He was a local farmer and rancher. He published a small "Ranch Land" newspaper for local farmers and ranchers. Local farmers and ranchers were loosing cows left and right all over the place. He was reporting these incidents in his paper long after the big news papers, (owned by the corporations,) were ordered to cease and desist any reporting of these incidents.

Why was he told to stop?

They did not give him a reason. They simply threatened his family.

BUT I have to assume he was told to stop because someone was trying to control the flow of information (news, truth) about these incidents which were linked to silent top secret black helicopters, UF0's and other strange things.

But this was NEWS. And in America we are supposed to have FREEDOM OF THE PRESS. This is especially true if YOU OWN THE PUBLICATION.

My theory: Their job was to cover up all ALIEN ACTIVITY. This was in Falcon CO, east of Colorado Springs. Colorado Springs is a hot bed of alien activity and cattle mutilation cover-ups. It is home for Fort Carson, Peterson AFB, and other government defense agencies.

Our government made a deal with the aliens in exchange for some technology. These kinds of cover ups was part of/ is part of that deal.

So now go bury you head in the sand and laugh your a$$ off. Everyone else does. I don't give a rat's a$$. I tell it like I see it.