Personal Experience: Logically Circular?

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   Dgerrimeaposted 14 years ago

   I am interested in people's response to the following question;
   If you have ever encountered someone who held any kind of supernatural belief, be it religious or any other, who justified their belief by citing some kind of 'personal experience', or if you yourself hold any such beliefs which you justify by citing personal experience, is it fair to say that their/your justification is circular because you are using the vividness of an experience to valid the experience itself as "true".
   
   
   Clarification: I am not talking about people who fallaciously credit their experience to a specific agency, eg. I felt a presence, therefore that presence was god. I'm more talking about people who would say for example they saw an angel, or they heard god talking to them, or something like that.
   
   Discuss!

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   1. 58

      Jeramiposted 14 years agoin reply to this

          With out a doubt in my mind.  comes in dream state prepairing me for calamaties in my life. Advanced warnings of every family menbers death that has occured. Advanced warnings as to mistakes that I was about to make in life. Did some of them any way.    "You are not the boss of me"  mentality has played havock in my life. I knew beter but I did it any way.
         Any one out there know what I'm talking about???

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2. 59

   DogSiDaedposted 14 years ago

   Remove the question mark from your question and you have my answer

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3. 60

   tantrumposted 14 years ago

   What's circular about seeing an angel or talking to some God  ?

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      DogSiDaedposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      I think what the OP means is that if someone experiences an event that makes them believe in the event because of how the event seemed, that would make it circular logic.
      
      Although after reading the question again I'm not sure that's circular...

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         tantrumposted 14 years agoin reply to this

         It's very obtuse.
         

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            DogSiDaedposted 14 years agoin reply to this

            True But this forum loves obtuse questions

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   2. 61

      Dgerrimeaposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      Well I'm wondering if you would consider it circular if someone used the following justification:
      
      A - I believe in X because I had a personal experience of X
      
      B - How do you know you really experienced X
      
      A - Because X verified itself to me during the experience
      
      OR
      
      A - Because it just really really really seemed like X

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         tantrumposted 14 years agoin reply to this

         It looks square to me!

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            Dgerrimeaposted 14 years agoin reply to this

            Is that square as in valid?

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               tantrumposted 14 years agoin reply to this

               I don't know what you mean. But I would never validate that belief.

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            DogSiDaedposted 14 years agoin reply to this

            I understand better now I wouldn't call that circular logic. I'd say that they haven't used proper reasoning to believe in the incident perhaps, but I wouldn't call the logic circular. It's like someone kicking you in the nuts. You go up to someone and say OW I was kicked in the nuts, that hurts! And they say 'How do you know it hurts' and you say 'Because it felt painful!'
            
            It's similar(ish) to that Although seeing can be fooled much more than a physical contact

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               tantrumposted 14 years agoin reply to this

               that's pure logic !
               

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               Cagsilposted 14 years agoin reply to this

               

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                  Jeramiposted 14 years agoin reply to this

                     No I didn't understand..   can ya tell me about X  again??

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                     Cagsilposted 14 years agoin reply to this

                     I didn't explain it to you in the first place. Maybe you should try the person who posted the thread. I was just laughing at something someone else said.

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                  2. 59

                     DogSiDaedposted 14 years agoin reply to this

                     Ok, the whole point of X was to say that by experiencing something you cannot verify the thing you experienced as true BECAUSE you experienced it right? Now, what I said, in a slightly strange roundabout way was that you can know something happens from an experience, but the problem comes when the senses are fooled into making a mistake. By this reasoning, the logic isn't circular, but can be unfounded.
                     Is that better?

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   tantrumposted 14 years ago

   
   i'm becoming an expert!

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   1. 59

      DogSiDaedposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdNH1i2SNR4
      
      Horribly low quality though

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         tantrumposted 14 years agoin reply to this

         Am I vague ?

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            DogSiDaedposted 14 years agoin reply to this

            Noo, but the questions are
            
            Edit: I quoted the wrong part of the thread >.< Sorry for the misunderstanding there!

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   tantrumposted 14 years ago

   Oh! I was just going to report you !
   
   

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      DogSiDaedposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      Woo dodged a bullet there! Another three days out of the forum and I duno what I'd do!

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         tantrumposted 14 years agoin reply to this

         
         
         The same things you used to do, before coming in here.

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   tantrumposted 14 years ago

   
   
   I think it's kind of better.....

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7. 58

   Jeramiposted 14 years ago

   I was just messin with ya .  Ya don't have to be a 8th grade graduate to understand that circular means that it goes in circles.  If ya caint catch it this time around just wait righ there and it will "circle" back around and we can catch it on to ta next go round; maybe??

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   1. 59

      DogSiDaedposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      Ahh ok then Apologies for discrediting your knowledge by failing to notice the satire.
      
      Although just to re-emphasize I don't believe this logic is circular

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         Jeramiposted 14 years agoin reply to this

            discrediting accepted...   Thanks.

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   Minnalousheposted 14 years ago

   In the end, all any of us have is our own experience of this crazy ride. If you outsource the quality of your truth to the experience of authorities, then it's on your own head. What we know now about "reality" will seem like monkeys to those in the 30th century. Like someone once said, our wildest fictions are probably closer to the truth than our most "objective" truths. But I paraphrase. But the point is, reality is stranger than you can imagine, and your only experience of whatever there IS is through your own lens. Not your "sources."

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      The Paulposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      That's absolutely true.
      
      There's a mistake in placing emphasis on a single personal experience that contradicts the rest of what you know, but if a burning angel keeps appears to you and telling you stuff, that is a good reason to believe in it.
      
      I mean, you're could be insane, but if you can't trust your own senses what are you gonna do about it?

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   WriteAngledposted 14 years ago

   We have to rely on experience to verify that we actually exist.

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