New Agers bashing "Materialism" get on my nerves.

[Odin2005]

On a current events & history message board I post on the resident New Ager & Astrologer started this thread and is driving me and several other posters crazy with his repetitive rants equating philosophical "Materialism" (Naturalism) with Economic "Materialism" (Consumerism and Corporate Capitalism). And he also spews a lot of "Quantum Theory disproves materialism" nonsense.

I can't believe perfectly intelligent people can believe such nonsense.

[intaglio]

1. any "New Ager" using the word quantum

deserves to be the victim of a Gilbert and Sullivan patter song. Definitely on the "Little List"

[dmallind]

5. I have a quantum rule

If you are using the term in a discussion about any visible system, you are dealing in science fiction guesswork, and more than likely woo-woo.

Yes I am aware quantum effects have been shown in a - barely - visible object, but neither in the manner nor with the effects that are normally posited when an "enlightened" person is speaking of quantum souls or quantum thinking yadda yadda....

[longship]

7. Plus those barely visible objects are probably Bose-Einstein condensates

And the woo-woo promoters don't even know what that means.

[daaron]

2. Oh yeah. I'm a transplant -->

from http://randi.org skeptic site. Basically it's that movie "Dinner for Schmucks" online with real schmucks (lured by Randi's promise of a million bucks) but instead of rich snobs, it's a bunch of geeks playing with their prey. The science & math forums are lively, but the politics and religion forums are way better here.

We get the QM abusers all the time over there. Usually New Agers, but not always. There's a brand of fundie who like to try to use QM or relativity (or both) to prove who-knows-what (never can get a straight answer).

I recommend the firm application of Rule #14 of the internet.

[DetlefK]

3. There is a link to homeopathy-video here on DU:

Did you know that homeopathy is connected to the vibrations of string-theory?

[daaron]

4. No I didn't know that!

How fascinating ... that someone would believe that!

Gotta love the quantum woo. Right? Right? (Kind of a strange thing.)

[AlbertCat]

6. equating philosophical "Materialism" (Naturalism) with Economic "Materialism"

Like equating Natural Selection with social natural selection or economic natural selection.

Natural Selection is the means of evolution in nature. It is indifferent to the point of seeming cruel. It is nothing you want to base a society, an economy or any other human activity upon, that's for sure.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

8. I get tired of New Agers who use physics to promote woowoo.

It started with The Tao of Physics and just degenerated.

I think they don't understand physics (they could ask hubby, he has two degrees in math and physics, he explains relativity and differential equations to me--sounds like he knows what he's talking about ) but they take broad concepts like "everything in the universe is connected" and run with it.

They are nice people but after a while they get tiresome. Unfortunately I have two degrees that require logic and scientific thinking (biology and law) and that kinda makes me skeptical.