You know, while I decry and oppose any personal attacks any skeptics have leveled against anyone in this topic (that is neither rational nor
productive in my opinion,) as a skeptic myself I have to share my feelings about something, and that is this.
It's incredibly wearying when every thread title or topic post that has the word "skeptic" in it is accompanied by an assumption that paints all
skeptics with the same rigid "disbeliever" brush. Would believers like it if a skeptic made a topic entitled, "For the believers who believe
everything anyone tells them, here's proof you're gullible?" No, because people can have strong beliefs, spiritual outlooks, and opinions without
having to be gullible, and I as a skeptic should be capable of respecting your beliefs. And I am, and I do.
Likewise, skeptics are not the stubborn, "refusing to believe," "unenlightened," "missing the ascension boat when it comes" cynics that some believers
paint us as. I'm a skeptic. I'm open minded toward such phenomena, because to be truly skeptical, I have to be. If I can't prove something isn't real,
then I have to remain open-minded toward it. However, the other side of that coin is that I also can't accept a thing as true without proof, and
without first ruling out other explanations.
This video doesn't provide that proof, and it doesn't rule out those explanations. Nothing I've ever seen (so far) does either. Therefore, I cannot
accept that the healing phenomenon discussed in this topic, or others for which I have yet to see any undeniable evidence, are definitively real. That
doesn't make me a closed minded cynic. It makes me an open-minded skeptic (because I am being both skeptical of the phenomenon, and open-minded toward
it.)
It sometimes seems like many on ATS (and elsewhere) see themselves as enlightened, spiritual beings with special knowledge of abilities we lack, and
if only those darn, stubborn, closed-minded skeptics could open themselves to the truth then they'd be liberated from the illusions they're trapped
in. (I'm not saying you feel that way, OP. But it's been suggested by others many times in many, many topics here on ATS.) It doesn't work that way
for a skeptic. You want to enlighten us? Provide us with proof, or at least compelling evidence for which other explanations don't exist
substantially. (No one would be more delighted than me to see it.)
But until then, please understand that skeptics are not the enemy and are not practicing skepticism out of some form of stubbornness, spite, or
cynicism. We are not trolling the internet to rain on everyone's parade (or beliefs.) We're here for the same reason you are: to try to discover the
truth, whatever that may be. We don't all refuse to believe. Many of us want to. Desperately even, on some level. But we can't without evidence, no
matter how much we might want to. And even if we can, believing is not the same as
knowing.
My two cents. Peace.
edit on 1/25/2012 by AceWombat04 because: Typo