Comments by "Tim Trewyn" (@timtrewyn453) on "Academy of Ideas" channel.

  1. To everyone else a religious experience is ultimately personal, anecdotal, subjective, and unfalsifiable but certainly open to skepticism. Collecting a poll of those who have had a religious experience is unlikely to satisfy the scientific mind that has not had such an experience. Or perhaps a scientific mind finds another explanation for their religious experience, something biochemical or otherwise material. I have some empathy for such an atheist. I have had more than one unsolicited religious experience. I still see them as rare in my life, yet they seem to connect to a more subtle and continuous influence on my conscience. I think I have a conscience quite apart from the divine, but subject to its influence. I cannot dismiss God. So there. I am a data point, but just a point. The danger of religion is that it is often invented by an elite to serve its uber minority interests. Few things suit those elites more than a compliant and productive populace, and religion can deliver, if imperfectly. North Korea seems to have reached a new height in this form of society, from the elite's perspective. The dear leader is usually smiling or clearly in command of the situation. What is interesting is how the historical religions still seem to make their way into that society here and there.
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