Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.


Thursday, October 15, 2015

Experience Has No Explanatory Power

This post reproduces the first post I made on the Temple of Thelema forums a few years ago. Some readers may recall that I appeared on those forums with the intent of offering a perspective that differs from the supernaturalism typically pedalled there. Of chief importance to this new perspective is the simple fact that bare experience -- all by itself -- explains nothing because the process of explaining is a rational one.

It is rational thinking about experience that has explanatory power.

After a period of my participation in the forums there, the moderator made the decision to institute a new policy: that any post would be deleted unless it starts from the assumption "that we are spiritual beings." Since I do not begin from this assumption, I am functionally banned from participation at the Temple of Thelema forums [Importantly, it should be noted that I also do not begin from the assumption that "we are not spiritual beings"...I make no assumptions at all about this point]. This is a decision that is entirely within the scope of the moderator and website owner, and it is not a decision that I consider unfair at all. Every person with a website is entitled to have whatever kind of website he or she likes.

For some reason, the moderator also decided to delete the thread I started upon my arrival there (the thread that opens with the post I will reproduce below). So much for my making a dissenting point of view available on the forums, eh? As luck would have it, Google retained a cache of the thread for some weeks, and I was able to recover nearly all of the thread and save it for my records.

Over the next several months, I may -- as time and inclination see fit -- examine different parts of the conversation on that thread to explore the kinds of faulty thinking that underlie supernaturalism.

Read on for my initial post.