Intro to Metaphysics

* Metaphysics for beginners
** Examples:
*** Object permanence [and REALITY]
*** Space and time?
*** Cause and Effect
*** Flat earth
*** Heliocentrism etc.
****if it would look the same whether the earth was spinning or if the sun was traveling around it once every day [or some mix of the two], how can you confirm which is true? [comparing view from mars can dispel the mere appearance of heliocentrism. gravity makes sense of heliocentric orbits, inertia makes sense of nay/night spinning. light speed limit rules out universe traveling around earth]
*** One of the times I was mistaken for a ghost
*** Fibers growing from my skin!?
*** Snow ball burning instead of melting!?
*** Ufos
**** the recent videos in the news are explained here (the first link is a general writeup, the rest are videos):
*****UFOs Are Not That Remarkable
*****Explained: New Navy UFO Videos
*****Gimbal UFO: Why Does the Glare Rotate When the Horizon Does Not?
*****Explained: The Gimbal UFO's Glow/Aura is Just Image Sharpening
*****Explained: "Go Fast" UFO Video - Not Low and Not Fast - Like a Balloon!
*****"Pyramid UFO" - NEW FOOTAGE. It's Just Bokeh, not a Pyramid
*****Is the Nimitz UFO Video Just a Plane?
*****Nimitz FLIR1 "Tic-Tac" UFO Video - No Sudden Moves!
***Ancient aliens
*** “Conspiracy theories”
*** Anti-physicalism, metaphysical idealism
** The point of all this, the general motives and uses of metaphysics, interpretation, models
*** Metaphysics [“of the gaps”][“what’s over the horizon?”][“what is there when i’m not looking?”][“what exists that i can’t see?”/”god is invisible but so is the wind!”]
*** More relevant stuff?  Sociology?  Propaganda...spin, marketing…”narratives”
**** State religions etc.
*** Epistemology, bayes, models, map vs territory…
**** “Outsider test of faith”, since ANY theory can fit the evidence, you have to compare.  Use bayes.  Etc.
**** Correlation, causation, and coincidence
**** Theoretical modeling
*** What about the future?  Prophecy, hope, etc...
** Art
***Minority Report!
*** Surrealism, david lynch?
*** The X-Files
***Magic tricks
***the common children's story cliche where the kids discover something magic, but the adults don't believe them, and the kids try to prove it, but there's some coincidence that makes the adults not see the proof. This also happens sometimes in the X-Files, with a particularly egregious example happening at the end of the 1998 X-Files movie, where Mulder sees a massive and obvious flying saucer, while Scully lies unconscious (and then she wakes up when it's gone).
***tying metaphysical beliefs in with hope, so that any threat to the belief [skepticism, doubt, disproof] is perceived to be a threat to some kind of important hope ["i want to believe", from x-files, concluding the episode "Conduit"]. And then, in stories, toying with this dramatically, so that people are yanked back and forth between disbelief [even acceptance] and belief.