Moses was high on drugs: Israeli researcher

[Jon Miller]

Originally posted by snoopy369
The OP was making what is effectively a 'real science' claim - that a particular chemical may have had a particular effect on a person's body such as to cause a certain result. You can't very reasonably claim on the one hand that he is a real scientist as opposed to the religious people ("cognitive psychology") but then claim that he doesn't have to follow scientific standards on the other hand...

Your statement works a lot better then the initial statement. That statement was that a particular chemical did have a particular effect on a particular persons body (3000+ years ago).

To give an example of how real science would make such a claim:
They would dig up the body, do chemical tests on the makeup/setudy other such things, and give a result (see 'famous author died from arsenic' or whatever that was announced a decade or so back).

Jon Miller

[Jon Miller]

Originally posted by Kidicious


"As far Moses on Mount Sinai is concerned, it was either a supernatural cosmic event, which I don't believe, or a legend, which I don't believe either, or finally, and this is very probable, an event that joined Moses and the people of Israel under the effect of narcotics," Shanon told Israeli public radio on Tuesday.

I don't know what the hell you 2 are on about. I don't think you have the basics down to understand this.

He said that it's very "probable" that Moses was under the influence of narcotics. His study evidently makes the case for that.

No, it doesn't. It makes the case that narcotics were a possibility 3000+ years ago. Nowhere is there a case made that narcotics influenced a specific person (ie Moses) 3000+ years ago.

He speculates that Moses was influenced by narcotics, by saying that he doesn't want to beleive alternate explanations and that narcotics were a possibility. His 'I don't want to beleive in alternate explanations' is atrocious science (when a claim is based upon it).

I have a hard time believing that even social science is that bad.

JM

[Aeson]

I know people who have had God talk to them while on various hallucinogens. The most likely explanation is God likes to toke up.

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by Kidicious


"As far Moses on Mount Sinai is concerned, it was either a supernatural cosmic event, which I don't believe, or a legend, which I don't believe either, or finally, and this is very probable, an event that joined Moses and the people of Israel under the effect of narcotics," Shanon told Israeli public radio on Tuesday.

I don't know what the hell you 2 are on about. I don't think you have the basics down to understand this.

He said that it's very "probable" that Moses was under the influence of narcotics. His study evidently makes the case for that.

He based 'very probable' on his unprovable assumption that the other two cases are impossible or highly improbable. If he'd like to scientifically prove that God did not speak to Moses, then I'd support him 100%; and if he'd like to prove that Moses did really exist, again, sounds good. It is highly unscientific, however, to say that of 3 explanations, yours is best 'because I don't believe the other two'. It's okay to decide to do experiments based on that premise, but not to publish a paper on that basis.

Perhaps he made less extreme claims in paper if he published this in a peer-reviewed journal, but the explicit statements in the OP would never pass peer review.

[Elok]

It seems this person wants publicity. Perhaps he has recently released a book? In any case, I look forward to his "scientific explanation" that Elijah was almost certainly just Jezebel's angry ex spreading stories around.

[Mercator]

Originally posted by snoopy369
He based 'very probable' on his unprovable assumption that the other two cases are impossible or highly improbable.

No, he based 'very probable' on the fact that the narcotics known and used at the time induced effects very similar to the descriptions of the visions in the Bible.

Originally posted by snoopy369
Perhaps he made less extreme claims in paper if he published this in a peer-reviewed journal, but the explicit statements in the OP would never pass peer review.

He didn't make any of these claims in any paper to begin with. He made them in a public radio interview about his paper.

[snoopy369]

You can't say 'very probable' about that, however, because you can't scientifically judge the probability of the other two answers. Unless you can give something beyond simply 'possible' (ie, have some specific thing that links that particular experience, or as JM said find his body or somesuch), you simply can't use 'very probable' scientifically.

Reread my second quoted portion there and you'll find that I don't necessarily disagree with your statement, but said that if he DID make such claims in a paper, that it would not pass peer review. I'm not one for believing that making extreme and unscientific claims on radio suggests a solid scientific paper, either... that sounds more like politicking or trying to get exposure/fame/etc.

[Ben Kenobi]

You said that there is no conflict.

How cognition works isn't very well understood, and there are many theories, some of which state that there is both a physical and mental component involved. Since we don't have anything which can empirically measure mental states, then it's rather difficult to do a proper scientific study.

A cognitive psychologist would prefer to have an empirical basis for everything, but right not it isn't possible, so much of the theory relies upon things like introspection.

That's what I meant by they are reluctant to use introspection, but in many cases it's the best we have.

Although some cognitive psychologist may believe that introspection is a way to understand the mind they do not rely on that for their work.

It's unreliable for a variety of reasons. However, that doesn't mean the cognitive psychologist believes that there is nothing going on inside the mind, which they are unaware of, it's a very real problem for them. Many question whether it would be possible to obtain a truly empirical measure of something so ephemeral.

Really? I didn't know that. Have you had these visions and dreams?

We don't understand normal dreams all that well, let alone these visions. As for myself, it doesn't matter. Many have and have claimed them and we don't understand well what is going on with them.

I can see how someone having halucinations might think that God just gave them a stick that happens to be in their hand at the time that they've come off the trip. Have you ever taken halucinagens? I have.

I haven't tried hallucinogens.

[SlowwHand]

Hebrews 11:1

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
No, it doesn't. It makes the case that narcotics were a possibility 3000+ years ago. Nowhere is there a case made that narcotics influenced a specific person (ie Moses) 3000+ years ago.

He speculates that Moses was influenced by narcotics, by saying that he doesn't want to beleive alternate explanations and that narcotics were a possibility. His 'I don't want to beleive in alternate explanations' is atrocious science (when a claim is based upon it).

That's utter crap. There is lots of evidence presented just in the article, and that's not even looking at the research study. You are mistaking the fact that he stated that he doesn't believe other ideas as his evidence. And you call yourself a scientist?

I have a hard time believing that even social science is that bad.

JM

Social science is what it is. If you think you can be a better social scientist why don't you instead continually making stupid Fox News type arguments. Again, you aren't qualified to judge social scientists. You don't seem to know anything about social science.

[SlowwHand]

What do you know, Mr. Smartypants?

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by snoopy369


He based 'very probable' on his unprovable assumption that the other two cases are impossible or highly improbable. If he'd like to scientifically prove that God did not speak to Moses, then I'd support him 100%; and if he'd like to prove that Moses did really exist, again, sounds good. It is highly unscientific, however, to say that of 3 explanations, yours is best 'because I don't believe the other two'. It's okay to decide to do experiments based on that premise, but not to publish a paper on that basis.

Perhaps he made less extreme claims in paper if he published this in a peer-reviewed journal, but the explicit statements in the OP would never pass peer review.

He doesn't need to prove anything. How in the world did you get that idea? Neither does he claim to prove anything. All he has to do is make a convincing argument based on scientific evidence. His peers will be the judge of whether he is successfull or not.

Seriously, you have no idea what you are talking about.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
What do you know, Mr. Smartypants?

[SlowwHand]

Says the man with the Hillary avatar.

[Mercator]

Originally posted by snoopy369
You can't say 'very probable' about that, however, because you can't scientifically judge the probability of the other two answers.

The other two answers are irrelevant.

Those other two options were probably just his premise for investigating this in the first place: Presuming that supernatural explanations are not true (since I'm an atheist), what is the probability that hallucinogens available at the time could have caused the visions described in the Bible? That is, what is the probability of getting those kinds of visions given the fact that you took those kinds of hallucinogens.

The other two options don't play any part in that equation. I highly doubt they even came up in the paper.

I'm not one for believing that making extreme and unscientific claims on radio suggests a solid scientific paper, either... that sounds more like politicking or trying to get exposure/fame/etc.

Now if he said this on some science radio program with lots of sciency people discussing his article, I could understand your concerns. But given the way he said things, and given the things I hear on the radio, I think it's rather more likely that this was just a short and snappy little chitchat with some popular radio DJ who knows nothing about science and just called the scientist because he thought it would make for an interesting item.

The scientist then goes and describes his research in two sentences, in layman's terms.