That made me laugh loudly, but then the evil spirit of the dark sprite PeW entered my head and started tempting me with logic and evidence and I’m left wondering if it makes sense. Are many people attempting to claim supernatural events with photo-shopped snaps as proof?
Oh, do me a favour. Mak, and Bigstick have their moderator thing on and I’m lurking in their Spam, I’m sure.
I don’t want them to think I don’t read or comment.
I’ll let them know… but you’ve been caught in spam here, too. Have you been typing in the nude again? You know that messes up with posting comments. The purity drive kicks in đŸ˜‰
Unlike you Brazillians who can sit in the rainforest starkers all day long us folk up on the Highveld of SA are freezing our nadgers off. It is getting to that time of year where it get so bloody cold that like our female counterparts, we mere men have to sit for every visit to the loo.
Cheers! Aliens aren’t supernatural, and given the number of stars its absurd to think the Universe isn’t teaming with life. In fact, Stardust brought back complex Amino acids captured in space so its almost a given there is life elsewhere. Have we been visited, i have no idea, but (intelligent) extraterrestrial life doesn’t break the laws of physics.
“Mr JZ, Sir?”
“Yes, little Virginia?”
“Sir … if there’s intelligent life all over the universe, how come none of it has ever tried to contact us … … oh!”
Re. Stardust, got to meet Don Brownlee once. It was his baby. He’s still of the mind that complex life (including intelligent ETs) is rare, simple life common.
You lucky, lucky bastard! If you ever see him again, shake his hand for me.
Yeah, i’d agree with the statement as by our own experience life has been on earth for 3.8 billion years, but intelligence (insert long definition here) only 200,000. The variable we don’t yet know (if we can ever know) is how successful is intelligent life and can it avoid destroying itself. Presently, our “intelligent” species is proving quite stupid.
I won’t even entertain answering such a ludicrous question, rather ask you this: why haven’t any of my dead pets come back to life? (I would like them to)
Ostensibly because there is no repeatable mechanism whereby dead pets can be reanimated. Unless, of course, they expired in a very particular way.
But seriously, if you’re so convinced that supernatural events break the laws of physics….surely you can come up with one physical law we would have to alter, right?
People were faking photos before photoshop, and people were probably quicker to believe them, since they didn’t know how easy it was to do it. Now with photoshop, you can’t use photo evidence for anything, cuz everyone’s too skeptical.
Oh, don’t be a stick in the mud, Logan. Yes, the Cottingley Fairies were faked, and even the Shroud of Turin is a medieval forgery using photographic tech, but that doesn’t get a giggle.
Sorry it’s still early here and I haven’t had my coffee. Besides if I really wanted to be a stickler, I’d say ur scale is a little off, since the time between the invention of the camera and photoshop was roughly what 100 years? and it looks like you’ve got two more increments of that measure after photoshop đŸ™‚
Plus I’d wanna know what that big dip is around 1500
I have studied Biology all my life. We do not know everything about what you would call “natural”. Supernatural is what you can’t explain. Observe and Record.
Observe and record, absolutely, but we do know the parameters of what is possible. Aliens are possible (probable even), but something like resurrection is not.
Supernatural is presented as an explanation to any matter, that we really can not explain. It is a made up fictional explanation. That is the root of all supernatural.
As our understanding about the reality grows, things previously explained as supernatural turn out to be natural, or fiction, or a combination of these two. But never has anything previously thought to be perfectly natural, turned out to be infact supernatural. Funny, how that only works one way…
Perhaps, there is a source for a meme in the traffic on that one way street. What do you say John?
That will take some research but it’d make a brilliant meme. You really shouldn’t be encouraging me, though, to do more memes. They encourage laziness in writing đŸ˜¦
When the news of the earliest airships were being circulated people saw them in the sky in different places. They heard voices of the captain giving instructions to the crew, sounds of an anchor being lowered from the air etc.
Around the time of the World Wars, in the close encounters, the aliens were from Mars, Venus, or other planets within our system. ( or sometimes from under the oceans ie Atlantis)
When science proved that life the other planets of our solar system is unlikely , then they started coming from other galaxies.
So yes UFO sightings are also evolving.
Precisely! The design of the ships has changed somewhat predictably, too. Everyone seems certain what was once shiny metallic saucers are now giant black triangles.
Oh, Fauns, Imps, Chimaera’s, Nymphs, Elves, Rocs, Griffins, Kelpies, Brownies, sprites, Harpies, Valkyries, Mermen, Pixies, Wraiths, Goblins, Jotuns, Basilisks, Changelings, Djinns and all other enchanted creatures are real… It’s just all those religious one’s that are bogus đŸ˜‰
All religious faiths have included historical accounts of supernatural events or beings. In very early history these were passed down as an oral tradition with no expectation of contemporaneous verification.
The description of human actions is a much harder task to verify. All of us have observed the discrepancies which arise when several people relate events that we have personally observed. With eye witness accounts in the past there are even greater problems since there is usually no account of how soon and by whom the written record was created. For events of a religious or supernatural nature there is also the question of whether the event described is meant to be taken literally or as a parable or lesson.
To illustrate the difficulty in validating such writings the following example is offered. Since it involves a well-known person, only references to the abilities and events are noted. It is assumed that the reader can remember or easily refer to the underlying material, if necessary.
Proof of the Existence of Santa Claus
Santa Claus is the only supernatural being whose existence has been verified in modern times. This is a short summary of the available evidence.
Saint Nicholas was a real person who was probably born around the year 280 in Turkey. He thus has a long appearance in European history.
His current manifestation has been fully documented in the seminal document “Twas the Night Before Christmas”. This is an eye witness account which appeared in 1822 in a Troy, NY newspaper.
Subsequent skepticism has been fully debunked by a prominent impartial reporter in Francis P. Church’s editorial, “Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus”. This appeared in the New York Sun in 1897.
Most children are told of Santa Claus and his supernatural powers by their parents at a very young age. Something this important would not be taught to impressionable children, by the most important influences in their life, if it wasn’t true.
Santa Claus must be supernatural since he is able to deliver toys to millions of people simultaneously. Even in those cases where parents claim to have delivered the gifts, it is obvious that they are just acting as Santa Claus’s agent. He has determined what they will purchase and deliver. This leads them to believe they are making the gift, but they are deluded.
I, and many others, have personally seen Santa Claus on many occasions in shopping malls and other locations. Only a supernatural being could appear in so many locations during the Christmas season. Those who claim they are Santa’s “helpers” are just trying to mislead us.
Imploring Santa Claus for special consideration is considered a necessary act if appropriate gifts are to be received.
Ethical rules are attributed to Santa Claus:
“He knows if you’ve been bad or good,
So be good for goodness sake!”
Rewards are thus based upon ethical behavior.
Images and works of art depicting Santa Claus appear frequently. If he were not a true supernatural being society would not expend so much time and effort on this personage.
We see that Santa Claus meets all the criteria commonly applied to written, historical accounts for supernatural beings. The underlying issues of the reliability of the eye witnesses is crux of the issue. Much ink is spilled in discussions of the validity of the eye witness accounts, but there is almost no way to validate the reliability of the persons reporting the events. The best that can be done is an appeal to likelihood that the person would have a reason to misreport events. Unfortunately, in most cases the reporter has a great deal to gain from being believed and thus the impartiality can never be relied on.
The tests used above are summarized in the table below. As can be seen Santa Claus meets all the criteria and thus cannot be distinguished from more popular supernatural personages. Try applying the tests given for your choice of supernatural personage.
The conclusion that must be reached is that historical eye witness accounts of supernatural people or events do not meet the standard for scientific validation. They do not conform to generally expected behaviors in the observed world, they are not independently verifiable, and they are not reproducible.
thesuperstitiousnakedape.wordpress.com 
In other words: all claims of the super-natural are frauds.
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Oh heavens no…. Just 100% of them đŸ˜‰
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đŸ˜†
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đŸ™‚
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brilliant
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Not an original… i just took the idea and made it more colourful.
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I still like it all the same! and it is still brilliant
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hahaha, this actually made me laugh out loud. Bloody brilliant!
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Cheers mate. Because of you my mind is elsewhere now, busily tapping away, ignoring posting… so this was a bit of easy meat to throw out.
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Me? What have I done now? Oh.. Are you putting together your little project now? đŸ™‚
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Teasing it, yup!
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Awesome! Looking forward to it đŸ™‚
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That made me laugh loudly, but then the evil spirit of the dark sprite PeW entered my head and started tempting me with logic and evidence and I’m left wondering if it makes sense. Are many people attempting to claim supernatural events with photo-shopped snaps as proof?
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Violet, sit down, assume the lotus position, meditate, and rebuild that anti-PeW barrier. It’s hard, i know, but think about the children…
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I’ve risen to Dark Sprite level! YES! Just a few more experience points, and I’ll make it to Black Mage!
Perhaps he is referring to this business. In any case, it’s a very good graphic. I like it.
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A perfect Google-God companion.
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Ha, true! I’ll submit it to the Church of Google to be included in the Holy Pictures
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Isn’t iconoclasm a sin? Or maybe pictures don’t count in this instance?
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Oh, do me a favour. Mak, and Bigstick have their moderator thing on and I’m lurking in their Spam, I’m sure.
I don’t want them to think I don’t read or comment.
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I’ll let them know… but you’ve been caught in spam here, too. Have you been typing in the nude again? You know that messes up with posting comments. The purity drive kicks in đŸ˜‰
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Unlike you Brazillians who can sit in the rainforest starkers all day long us folk up on the Highveld of SA are freezing our nadgers off. It is getting to that time of year where it get so bloody cold that like our female counterparts, we mere men have to sit for every visit to the loo.
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Blah, blah, blah… Now excuse me while i go and blow dart a monkey for lunch.
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So glad you added the ‘dart’.
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Hahahaa…. Now you’re talking about dessert.
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They blow monkeys in the desert? Yuk, can’t trust those bloody Arabs, eh?
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In all fairness, with the hijab on its terribly difficult to know what you’re dancing with.
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So where do you stand on aliens, UFO’s or any other type of extraterrestrial beings then? Do they count as supernatural?
Loved this, by the way!
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Cheers! Aliens aren’t supernatural, and given the number of stars its absurd to think the Universe isn’t teaming with life. In fact, Stardust brought back complex Amino acids captured in space so its almost a given there is life elsewhere. Have we been visited, i have no idea, but (intelligent) extraterrestrial life doesn’t break the laws of physics.
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I thought this would be your position. What is Stardust?
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A kickass space probe. Here, i wrote a really short post on it:
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“Mr JZ, Sir?”
“Yes, little Virginia?”
“Sir … if there’s intelligent life all over the universe, how come none of it has ever tried to contact us … … oh!”
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That’s easy to answer: It’s intelligent!
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You should have seen the look on her face …
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Did she get it? That’s a pretty big thought (smack in the face) for a kid.
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She’s a bit dim sometimes, but sweet with it …
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Re. Stardust, got to meet Don Brownlee once. It was his baby. He’s still of the mind that complex life (including intelligent ETs) is rare, simple life common.
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You lucky, lucky bastard! If you ever see him again, shake his hand for me.
Yeah, i’d agree with the statement as by our own experience life has been on earth for 3.8 billion years, but intelligence (insert long definition here) only 200,000. The variable we don’t yet know (if we can ever know) is how successful is intelligent life and can it avoid destroying itself. Presently, our “intelligent” species is proving quite stupid.
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Right, here we go.
UFO claims should be treated exactly the same as supernatural claims. But John’s a priori bias against the supernatural produces a double standard.
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Crap. Aliens don’t break the physical natural laws anymore than human life does. Fail, PeW.
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Which physical natural laws would have to be changed if it turned out the resurrection had actually happened?
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I won’t even entertain answering such a ludicrous question, rather ask you this: why haven’t any of my dead pets come back to life? (I would like them to)
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Ostensibly because there is no repeatable mechanism whereby dead pets can be reanimated. Unless, of course, they expired in a very particular way.
But seriously, if you’re so convinced that supernatural events break the laws of physics….surely you can come up with one physical law we would have to alter, right?
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Sweet!
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Doughnuty
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I just notice that the arrow below “Photoshop Invented” is backward. Just sayin’. (Editors can’t turn it off; it’s a curse actually.)
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True, i’ll fix it. I should really run everything passed your eagle eye before posting. You accept bitcoins as payment? đŸ˜‰
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Jeez, you’re so cynical.
đŸ˜‰
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I try đŸ™‚
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Right On!
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This chart, of course, excludes Hot Dog Man and his miraculous deeds
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People were faking photos before photoshop, and people were probably quicker to believe them, since they didn’t know how easy it was to do it. Now with photoshop, you can’t use photo evidence for anything, cuz everyone’s too skeptical.
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Oh, don’t be a stick in the mud, Logan. Yes, the Cottingley Fairies were faked, and even the Shroud of Turin is a medieval forgery using photographic tech, but that doesn’t get a giggle.
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Sorry it’s still early here and I haven’t had my coffee. Besides if I really wanted to be a stickler, I’d say ur scale is a little off, since the time between the invention of the camera and photoshop was roughly what 100 years? and it looks like you’ve got two more increments of that measure after photoshop đŸ™‚
Plus I’d wanna know what that big dip is around 1500
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That’s easy to explain…. there was a lag resulting from the shock of Copernicus’s revelation. PLUS the first flush toilets appeared.
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haha well played
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Did you photoshop that, or is it reliable research?
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Haha… well played!
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đŸ™‚
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I have studied Biology all my life. We do not know everything about what you would call “natural”. Supernatural is what you can’t explain. Observe and Record.
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Observe and record, absolutely, but we do know the parameters of what is possible. Aliens are possible (probable even), but something like resurrection is not.
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I wasn’t there. If you say so.
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As a biologist you think it was possible?
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Who was there? Nobody.
Supernatural is presented as an explanation to any matter, that we really can not explain. It is a made up fictional explanation. That is the root of all supernatural.
As our understanding about the reality grows, things previously explained as supernatural turn out to be natural, or fiction, or a combination of these two. But never has anything previously thought to be perfectly natural, turned out to be infact supernatural. Funny, how that only works one way…
Perhaps, there is a source for a meme in the traffic on that one way street. What do you say John?
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That will take some research but it’d make a brilliant meme. You really shouldn’t be encouraging me, though, to do more memes. They encourage laziness in writing đŸ˜¦
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HAHA! I am so stealing this!
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Go for it… I stole it from someone else anyway đŸ™‚
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Wicked. Love it!
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Took me ages to do the calculations and plot the graph, but i think i got it all down đŸ˜‰
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Absolutely John. Very thoughtful.
Sums up every effort of yours!
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Hehe! I bow to your awesomeness Mr.Zande, my hat is back in doff-mode đŸ™‚
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Put it back on, this one i stole and just re-packaged it in a better graphic. Lazy.
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I don’t care, it floated my boat, but then it doesn’t take much to amuse me. The simple things…:)
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Actually it made me laugh out loud particularly with regard to our conversation yesterday about moving glasses. You deserve a good doff! đŸ˜€
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Figured you’d hit me with that đŸ™‚
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How could I resist?
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I think UFO sightings might follow a similar pattern đŸ˜‰
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I think you might be right đŸ™‚
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When the news of the earliest airships were being circulated people saw them in the sky in different places. They heard voices of the captain giving instructions to the crew, sounds of an anchor being lowered from the air etc.
Around the time of the World Wars, in the close encounters, the aliens were from Mars, Venus, or other planets within our system. ( or sometimes from under the oceans ie Atlantis)
When science proved that life the other planets of our solar system is unlikely , then they started coming from other galaxies.
So yes UFO sightings are also evolving.
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Precisely! The design of the ships has changed somewhat predictably, too. Everyone seems certain what was once shiny metallic saucers are now giant black triangles.
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Especially Photoshop is a handy tool for supernatural phenomena…
…but it worked well with cave paintings too đŸ™‚
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Paleolithic Photoshop? You mean Lascaux and Altamira are fakes? Nooooooo! đŸ˜¦
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This might well be the case…
…I wasn’t there when it was painted đŸ™‚
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While I basically agree, I love to make PS magic and halfway believe in it:)
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Oh, Fauns, Imps, Chimaera’s, Nymphs, Elves, Rocs, Griffins, Kelpies, Brownies, sprites, Harpies, Valkyries, Mermen, Pixies, Wraiths, Goblins, Jotuns, Basilisks, Changelings, Djinns and all other enchanted creatures are real… It’s just all those religious one’s that are bogus đŸ˜‰
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I am trying to copy this but am having problems on iPhone and for some reason cannot find it on laptop?
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Ah, technology! What are you trying to do?
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I can view the graph here on my iPhone but would like to share it on Facebook having problems.
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Ahh. Might have to wait until the ghosts in the machine grow bored and seek out another unsuspecting victim to haunt đŸ˜‰
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Yes and when the beer wears off
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đŸ™‚
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All religious faiths have included historical accounts of supernatural events or beings. In very early history these were passed down as an oral tradition with no expectation of contemporaneous verification.
The description of human actions is a much harder task to verify. All of us have observed the discrepancies which arise when several people relate events that we have personally observed. With eye witness accounts in the past there are even greater problems since there is usually no account of how soon and by whom the written record was created. For events of a religious or supernatural nature there is also the question of whether the event described is meant to be taken literally or as a parable or lesson.
To illustrate the difficulty in validating such writings the following example is offered. Since it involves a well-known person, only references to the abilities and events are noted. It is assumed that the reader can remember or easily refer to the underlying material, if necessary.
Proof of the Existence of Santa Claus
Santa Claus is the only supernatural being whose existence has been verified in modern times. This is a short summary of the available evidence.
Saint Nicholas was a real person who was probably born around the year 280 in Turkey. He thus has a long appearance in European history.
His current manifestation has been fully documented in the seminal document “Twas the Night Before Christmas”. This is an eye witness account which appeared in 1822 in a Troy, NY newspaper.
Subsequent skepticism has been fully debunked by a prominent impartial reporter in Francis P. Church’s editorial, “Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus”. This appeared in the New York Sun in 1897.
Most children are told of Santa Claus and his supernatural powers by their parents at a very young age. Something this important would not be taught to impressionable children, by the most important influences in their life, if it wasn’t true.
Santa Claus must be supernatural since he is able to deliver toys to millions of people simultaneously. Even in those cases where parents claim to have delivered the gifts, it is obvious that they are just acting as Santa Claus’s agent. He has determined what they will purchase and deliver. This leads them to believe they are making the gift, but they are deluded.
I, and many others, have personally seen Santa Claus on many occasions in shopping malls and other locations. Only a supernatural being could appear in so many locations during the Christmas season. Those who claim they are Santa’s “helpers” are just trying to mislead us.
Imploring Santa Claus for special consideration is considered a necessary act if appropriate gifts are to be received.
Ethical rules are attributed to Santa Claus:
“He knows if you’ve been bad or good,
So be good for goodness sake!”
Rewards are thus based upon ethical behavior.
Images and works of art depicting Santa Claus appear frequently. If he were not a true supernatural being society would not expend so much time and effort on this personage.
We see that Santa Claus meets all the criteria commonly applied to written, historical accounts for supernatural beings. The underlying issues of the reliability of the eye witnesses is crux of the issue. Much ink is spilled in discussions of the validity of the eye witness accounts, but there is almost no way to validate the reliability of the persons reporting the events. The best that can be done is an appeal to likelihood that the person would have a reason to misreport events. Unfortunately, in most cases the reporter has a great deal to gain from being believed and thus the impartiality can never be relied on.
The tests used above are summarized in the table below. As can be seen Santa Claus meets all the criteria and thus cannot be distinguished from more popular supernatural personages. Try applying the tests given for your choice of supernatural personage.
The conclusion that must be reached is that historical eye witness accounts of supernatural people or events do not meet the standard for scientific validation. They do not conform to generally expected behaviors in the observed world, they are not independently verifiable, and they are not reproducible.
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Brilliant mate, made me chuckle.
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The simplest messages are often the best
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Really cool site. Love your chart. Keep up the good work.
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Thanks, John… Took months to plot all the data points đŸ™‚
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