Quote Originally Posted by bhouncy
Beliefs can be dangerous.

Beliefs are an idea of what reality is. Like an assumption. If I assume the road is clear and step out into traffic it is my assumption that has got me knocked down. My belief that I am safe.
Well... anything people do is ultimately based on beliefs, or assumptions. Even the most rational, logical, skeptical and science-minded is acting upon assumptions: the assumption that the reason, the logic and the science are THE right way to understand the things. But its only an assumption. Logic is only a way to relate things assumed as true, but it cant justify itself.

Logic just says "if x is true and y is true then z also must be true", but the fact x or y are true are only assumptions. And even when they are derived from other assumptions, like "if a is true and b is true then x is true", there are this assumptions a and b which were assumed to be true. This process can be repeated as much one wants, but always there will be assumptions that are not justified, but only assumed to be true. So, all the statements derived from logic are also ultimately based upon beliefs, or assumptions, and it makes them no better than any other beliefs or assumptions, logical or not.

Quote Originally Posted by bhouncy
The spiritualist church was set up by confessed fraudsters yet with all the money to be made the assumption that one can converse with the dead is kept alive.
Well... i personaly dont believe that the "spirits" are the souls of the dead ones. I believe the dead ones cant return to this physical plane we live. But, i also believe that there are a lot of other non-physical live beings that exists and sometimes are percieved by people.

Quote Originally Posted by bhouncy
Maybe since our brains are all similar in structure that we have similar hallucinations that some call 'spirits'.
Well... if you accept the possibility of colletive hallucinations, how do you distinguish the "reality" from a collective hallucination? How can one know that we are actually percieving the world as it is, instead of having the same hallucination of everybody else?