Moses was high on drugs: Israeli researcher

[Fake Boris]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
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).

Go ahead, what are those possibilities ?

Are you about to claim that the "supernatural" explanation is more likely ?

[snoopy369]

He cannot scientifically say that the supernatural explanation is incorrect with what he/we currently knows, nor can he make a scientifically sound comment about the probability of either event in relation to each other. He can merely say that one is a possibility, nothing more.

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by Mercator


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 have no problem with the statement "It is possible that Moses was high on whatever while he took down the ten commandments". That is not what was stated in the OP or in the radio show, however.

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.

And that's a big problem in my book. There's a difference between "layman's terms", ie explaining science without the jargon, and "populist rhetoric" or the science equivalent - putting a scientifically sound statement in a way that makes it popularly interesting but utterly incorrect. The latter plays on the herd mentality and conditions people to accept statements that are not true as true - making it very hard for people later to determine the validity of actually relevant statements, such as "We should utilize discarded human embryos to advance scientific progress in the field of medicine", when put up against similar populist rhetoric.

[Cort Haus]

To me it is far more plausible that the experiences of perceived encounters with 'god' were caused by hallucinogens rather than the (imv) far more unlikely scenario of an actual encounter with 'god'.

[Ecthy]

I didn't know there was any "science" (by any meaningful definition) that actually included supernatural factors, so I guess those can be ruled out from the beginning by any meaningful scientific standards. Correct me if I'm wrong.

[snoopy369]

Then I guess we should have ruled out gravity, electricity, magnetism, radio waves, etc. also...

[Ecthy]

Gravity is a concept for which a strong model exists that was the result of a long process of scientific work. Same accounts for the other 3 examples.

Most things that are considered "supernatural" are considered such because no proper models exist to explain or even describe them (contrary to gravity), let alone any meaningful scientific work.

[Ecthy]

So while we lack any scientific insight on a phenomenon / subjective observation, we should indeed rule it out to explain other phenomena. This doesn't mean to "rule them out" forever, just that they need their own proper scientific investigation before they become a part of the "natural" world (as opposed to non-scientific, "super-natural").

[Ecthy]

Look at it this way: by "supernatural" explanations we're talking about God-related stuff here. And you come up with gravity and electricity. What kind of comparison is that? Are you implying there's been an equal amount of scientific output on "God" (positive output, real models!) as on electricity and magnetism?

[unscratchedfoot]

Originally posted by Kidicious


I don't understand your objection. He doesn't think A is likely, but thinks B is, so he does a study to find evidence that B is more likely. How is that bad science?

He was comparing C to D so get your argument straight. What you are saying is like comparing pineapples to oranges.

[Mercator]

Originally posted by snoopy369
And that's a big problem in my book. There's a difference between "layman's terms", ie explaining science without the jargon, and "populist rhetoric" or the science equivalent - putting a scientifically sound statement in a way that makes it popularly interesting but utterly incorrect.

Populist rhetoric? You're basing that on a brief news article about a radio interview about a science magazine article. I certainly don't know anything about the context it was said in, anything else he might have said, the kind of radio show it is, let alone what the article really said.

Unless I were specifically listening to some scientific radio show, I'd put zero scientific value in anything I heard on the radio in the first place. The only point it has is to be interesting. And if it is sufficiently interesting, I might actually look it up in more reliable sources.

... Actually... Here's the original article:

http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/berg/tmdj/2008/00000001/00000001/art00004

[phoenixcager]

At least the original article is honest about it being speculation

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by phoenixcager
At least the original article is honest about it being speculation

It is not speculation, because it is based on factual evidence.

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by Mercator


Populist rhetoric? You're basing that on a brief news article about a radio interview about a science magazine article. I certainly don't know anything about the context it was said in, anything else he might have said, the kind of radio show it is, let alone what the article really said.

Unless I were specifically listening to some scientific radio show, I'd put zero scientific value in anything I heard on the radio in the first place. The only point it has is to be interesting. And if it is sufficiently interesting, I might actually look it up in more reliable sources.

... Actually... Here's the original article:
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/conten...00001/art00004

The point is that 95% of people will hear just this little bit, and never anything more; and that is what I am objecting to. Using incorrect terminology - not just less specific, but blatantly wrong - is the reason that popular scientific discourse has gone straight downhill and frankly IMO is partially to blame for the anti-scientific mentality. Certainly it's possible he said something other than what was related in the OP, but failing having heard it myself, I presume the OP is correct; and regardless the argument is quite pertinent as this is a common theme unfortunately in modern popular science.

Had the radio show said this:

Taken together, the botanical and anthropological data on the one hand, and the biblical descriptions as well as later Jewish hermeneutics on the other, are, I propose, suggestive of a biblical connection between mind-altering substances and supernatural experiences. Admittedly, the smoking gun is not available to us. However, so many clues present themselves which, like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, seem to cohere into an
intriguing unified whole. I leave it to the reader to pass his or her judgment.

I would have had a much more positive opinion of the speaker (This is a very slightly altered form of the conclusion of the paper). I don't disagree with that conclusion - and generally find it quite probable myself.

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by Ecthy
Gravity is a concept for which a strong model exists that was the result of a long process of scientific work. Same accounts for the other 3 examples.

Most things that are considered "supernatural" are considered such because no proper models exist to explain or even describe them (contrary to gravity), let alone any meaningful scientific work.

This is true now. However, what I am saying is, at the time just prior to their discovery, they were supernatural phenomena; and thus should not have been researched according to your earlier statement... and their effects should have been discounted in those areas that they effected but the actual thing was not clear.

And, besides, Gravity is absolutely supernatural even today in some sense; we cannot show what causes it, only that it is found to increase with more massive objects. At every point of physics, there is always some element that can be reduced to 'We don't know what causes X precisely', because we don't know the 'final answer' for the smallest possible pieces of the universe, nor what actually transmits force between them.

Also, read the early history of the radio; most scientists at the time considered the method of transmission essentially supernatural. Yet, they studied them anyway...

Regardless, you cannot simply exclude supernatural (ie, beyond the current ability to comprehend) explanations when you do good science. Until you can conclusively show that your explanation is very probably THE correct one, you must allow for the fact that you might simply not know enough to explain something; even when you are 99% confident based on experimental evidence, you always use a THEORY instead of stating thta this is the one and only way things are. Newtonian physics were pretty rock solid for a good long time prior to the 20th century...