Aproach on reincarnation (spam only on topic, no flaming plz)

[Magrus]

Can you explain how is this equal to Infinite Nature's "thinking of something not concieved by any human worldview"?

It's simply my viewpoint, regardless of how it fits. You've missed my point. I'm not saying I accept everything handed to me as that it has to exist because someone has thought of it. I'm just allowing myself to fit it into my mind that it is a possibility and not throwing it out as wrong. I believe outright disregarding of something based on lack of proof is just as foolish as complete faith in something without any. I have my beliefs, but I'm still open to others, and I'm not blind in them.

Just because something has not been scientificially demonstrated to exist, does not mean it exists either

Exactly my point, it's not been proven either way, so why vote on it either way until you have a reason to?

Now @Margus I wont assume your any specific type of religious beleiver, but lets for example you beleived in Hinduism. They beleive in reincarnation and from what I've heard and read are a fairly laid back bunch of dudes (Was watching Bill Bailey lol) Now what if science, at some point, managed to prove beyond any reasonable doubt that it did not, could not and would never exist? Would you listen to the arguements, read the papers published, digest all the facts and finally come to the conclusion that after studying it yourself with your open mind that the scientists were right? Or would you staunchly refuse to listen to anything you were told and carry on beleiving exactly what you wanted to? Replace Hinduism and reincarnation with any other religion and belief. What would you do? For that matter what would the rest of the religious population of the world do?

Yes, why wouldn't I? People seem to be just disregarding the basis of what I've said. I just don't see any point in not allowing myself to see things pointed out to me as possibilities as just that. If someone could irrefutibly prove that my beliefs were wrong, I would believe them. To do otherwise is to live in denial, just as IMO, to believe that anything outside of what you believe cannot exist because it's outside your view of things. I believe in my own religion, I can accept that others might be right too.

As far as humans only being able to view the world with the senses they've been given, I seem to recall being told in school that humans haven't been able to use the full potential of their brains, only a small portion of that and a very slight variation happens to occur from person to person. If true, then who's to say what our worldview and senses would be if that full potential were realized?

I don't think it's at all pointless to think of things that haven't been proven right or wrong at times. Why not contemplate such things when you've nothing else to do? At least your using your brain rather than staring at your TV or something. Just because I allow myself to think of these things doesn't mean I wander about the neighborhood preaching them as supreme truths.

About proving the Pope wrong, I do believe he HAS been proven wrong and he's hidden the evidence on that personally. Not about the subject you mentioned but still on other things. Why? Because he leads the faith's of billions of people and it would shatter their views if it was let out.

[Macleod1701]

@ Margus, your getting me wrong mate, I wasn't demeaning you or saying you were wrong I was just wanting to know your opinion.

Anyway I agree with you in some part. I'm not at all religious and am off the fondest hope that when I die, thats it, I just cease, no reincarnation or heaven or anything. I'll live on in the memories of my friends and family and that will do for me. I'm a very scientific guy, I study it and for the most part like to have proof of something before I beleive it. The exception being the supernatural, ghosts, spirits and whatnot. Now I know that the 'evidence' of this phenomenom is sketchy at best but I still beleive in it, and am indeed fascinated behind the theories and sciences dedicated to studying and proving that their real, (so much so I thought of doing a second degree in paranormal psychology or the study of it as if aerospace engineering wasn't enough) but I suppose it's just me wanting to prove something that I beleive in.

[Luis Antonio]

[QUOTE=Moonbiter] I truly beleive that if I kick the bucket with some seriously unfulfilled task in life, I won't stand still untill it's been completed. Then you have to figure out for yourself if you want another go at it or if you want oblivion. Who wants to live forever?[/QUOTE]

Now I'm gonna tell my own family experience. My uncle Helio, when young, looked a lot like his grand-grandfather. When this grand grandfather died, my uncle was still a kid, and he couldnt sleep, victim of allucinations, and used to wake up all sweaty and saying that a man with glasses just like those his grand grandfather used kept telling him about a promess made to the church. Then they went to talk with the wife of this grand grandfather, who told my grandfather about a promess the dead man had made months before dying, something about donating two sacks of rice and five chickens to the poor or to the church, I'm not really certain about that. My grandfather dressed my uncle with the grand grandfather clothes, took him to the church, and after the sunday cult he donated the rice and the chicken. After two or three days, my uncle woke up laughing, all happy, telling that the man who talked to him before was now happy, and he never had those dreams again.
My opinion? Weird, but it is a family "fact".
And no one wants to live forever, not in the same body, I suppose, thats why the reincarnation is a strong belief.

I would like to believe. The society compells me to believe in life after death, and in energy, and in many many things, but I still cant process this kind of information. Maybe because I'm 23, maybe because I'm a bit skeptical about things, or maybe because I always felt a lack of hope in heaven, hell or in counciousness after the end of flesh life.

[Macleod1701]

Hell Luis I'm only 23 mate and I don't take anything at face value. Far too cynical sometimes. There are loads of papers and things you can read up on that sort of thing if your interested in finding out more.

[C Elegans]

It's simply my viewpoint, regardless of how it fits. You've missed my point.

I certainly don't get your point since you do not reply to my questions but instead keep repeating that you are "open minded".

For your convenience I will again copy and paste this part of the discussion, the part that concerned the human worldview.

Exactly my point, it's not been proven either way, so why vote on it either way until you have a reason to?

As I wrote in my reply to you in my last post:
What we believe affect our views on the world, ourselves, and other people. It also affects our actions. Beliefs have consequences...

If you do not understand what I mean, I can give some schematic examples of consequences that some beliefs may have:

Believing in the traditional monotheistic religions: You believe humans do not have the ultimate responsible for events. A transcendental good (god) and in christianity also a transcendental evil (the devil) polarises the world into good and evil, and man is not entirely responsible for his own actions. Humans should serve the god, the god and his rules are more important than human life.

Believing in traditional or common new-age reincarnation: You believe the world has some fairness, that everything happens according to a Karma. If a child is born in Sudan with HIV and starves to death, that is his karma because he did something bad in his previous lives. If a person gets tortured, raped, murdered or get a horrible disease it is also karma - ie it implies it is the persons own fault since it is a response on what the person has done in previous lives and therefore must pay for or learn something about.

Believing in unicorns: Have no specific moral or judgemental consequences as far as I can see, so I would prefer this before any of the above

When you choose to believe rather than ignore an ideology or a phenomena, you must ask yourself what consequences this line of thoughts/opinions has. If you choose to believe in unicorns based on current data, you must also acknowledge that you have to respect that other people believe in Santa claus or goblins. If you choose to believe in spiritual phenomena, you must ask yourself: what effects do this belief have on human nature, life, behaviour and on human value? Note for instance that several of the world religions has cultural racisitic, exclusive messages that includes discrimination and has the effect of ranking people and maintain social stratification and segragation.

First of all, the idea that humans only use a small portion of the brain in totally incorrect, and if you were taught that in school you should actually complain to your school for teaching something that was not even regarded as correct 100 years ago. This erranous idea comes from popular misunderstanding about plasticity and "reserve" areas with cortical copies of the motor areas etc.

Secondly, even if it was correct - unused parts of our brain would just be unused, they would of course not be less human.

You repeat in your posts that you are "open" and "open minded" and you seem to view this as a highly positive trait in yourself. Personally I don't view "open mindedness" is something clearly positive, it needs to be coupled with critical thinking and evaluation of the consequences and effects of one own's belief systems, otherwise the open mind will be vulnerable to manipulation and propaganda. Also, I have notices that many people use the term "open minded" as a plattitude, a mantra to fall back on instead of presenting valid arguments.

In your posts, you have used historical development and some examples to demonstrate the virtues of "open mindedness" and the vices of the scientific method. I have argued that your historical account is incorrect, and that your examples are invalid since they examplify how the scientific method turned out to be the more reliable method for gaining useful knowledge rather than religion, ideology and individual subjective experience. You have not responded to any of my arguments. Instead, you continue to emphasise on you are "not blind" and on your open mindedness, whereas you describe other types of views as "foolish" and "close minded and dull". You realise that these are not arguments, only statements of your personal opinion? Personally, I would prefer if we continued this discussion with arguments rather than just statments of adjectives. For instance, I would be interested in knowing how you yourself make the distinction between being open minded and being gullible - what criteria do you use, what variables are fundamental when you evaluate ideas and phenomena that are presented to you?

(PS, An argument is a statement, set of statements or line of reasoning that aims to demonstrate a conclusion, either by logical principles or by presenting evidence.

If I say: "The moon is made of green cheese"
And you say: "No, it is not"
I say: "Yes it is because I say so" is not a valid argument
You say: "No it isn't because....(presenting a line of evidence including many objective measurements, material collections, report from moon landing etc)" is a valid argument)

[Luis Antonio]

[QUOTE=C Elegans]
... "open" and "open minded" and you seem to view this as a highly positive trait in yourself...

(PS, An argument is a statement, set of statements or line of reasoning that aims to demonstrate a conclusion, either by logical principles or by presenting evidence.

If I say: "The moon is made of green cheese"
And you say: "No, it is not"
I say: "Yes it is because I say so" is not a valid argument
You say: "No it isn't because....(presenting a line of evidence including many objective measurements, material collections, report from moon landing etc)" is a valid argument)[/QUOTE]

But CE, how can you argument over something the science can not cathergorize, or create an easy reference guide? you cant measure faith, you cant measure spirit, you cant measure nor conclude anything on ressurrecion or afterlife - you can only say something that looks like your first statement "The moon is mad of green cheese". I mean, you cant make people swallow your unbelief with a tea, and I cant also make you swallow any of the other posted ideas. It may not yet be argumented, only exposed and discussed - of course some theories look better than the others but thats only personall preference.

And regarding open minds, I guess what he means in this thread is to have an open mind to accept what other people think and to express what you feel regardless of how much offensive the previous posts have been to your belefs.

[C Elegans]

[QUOTE=Luis Antonio]But CE, how can you argument over something the science can not cathergorize, or create an easy reference guide? you cant measure faith, you cant measure spirit, you cant measure nor conclude anything on ressurrecion or afterlife - you can only say something that looks like your first statement "The moon is mad of green cheese". [/QUOTE]

Of course you can present arguments for religious faith and spiritual beliefs, you can explain and demonstrate why you believe in them. It will obviously not be scientific evidence, but scientific evidence is just one type of arguments. Logics is another, various philosophies could present yet others. Valid arguments must not be scientific in nature. (You should hear my professor's arguments for believing in a god - it's a personal choice of his, and he has excellent arguments for this choice, none of them the slightest scientific, but valid - I just disagree with him on this.)

There is a lot more than can be said than just "I believe this because I believe it's good to believe this" (ie the moon is made of green cheese because I say so).

[InfiniteNature]

"When laymen describe what they think science is, and what the limitations, drawbacks and advantages of science is, they often describe a simplified version of some aspects of positivism, not science. Both of you appears to do the same mistake here. If you choose to gain your knowledge by other methods than science, fine, that is your personal choice, but if you want to discuss what science is and not, it is good to have some familiarity with the topic.

Since this thread is about reincarnation and not about theory of science I will not elaborate this too long, but some essential points:

1. It is a misunderstanding to believe that science only deals with laws. Some scientific disciplines does, other do not. In biology for instance, there are no laws. The demand for replications of results is A) only demanded in the experimental sciences and 2) only one way to collect objective data."


As to laws perhaps I was misunderstood, science does assume to laws that the laws that exist today existed then. In biology to use your example or geology, there is the assumption that evolution occurred through a set path, or geology that quite ordinary process of erosion or other weather factors caused. I know then comes quick change, quick evolutionary jumps, but the overall assumption is still laws will stay the same once discovered, and have held true throughout time. That quite ordinary events caused mutations over time, who is to say unordinary events didn't.

In the end the idea is that laws do not change, but really who is to say they don't, and how would you objectively prove they don't.




"""""3.. It is also a misunderstanding to believe science does not deal with the unexplained. On the contrary, the whole point with science is to understand and explain what is currently unexplained. The difference is that science does not seek mystic explanations. The reason why physics does not deal a lot with time travel is not that physicists find it one of those "irritating things we just ignore because we can't explain away them". It's just that most scientists are not so interested in time travelling and trying to realise sci-fi novel stuff, they are more interested in how the universe came to be, how it will develop, how the particles our universe is made of behave, and how it all works. I suggest you do some reading on what physicists actually work with. There are some labs (I know of 2) who work with photon mechanics in a way that may apply to possibilities of time travelling, but it's hardly viewed an an important scientific question. """"""

Ah but isn't some of the prime foundations of current physics that QM assumption that observation collapses the wave form, what is it in consciousness that does this?, what happened before that, before consciousness existed to define it?

Or why do you not see quantum effects on the large scale, what happens between the fuzzy quantum world and the non fuzzy relativistic larger world to make it so?

True most sciencists are concerned with the bigger questions, like for example unifying Einstein's theory of relativity with QM, but at the same time proposing things like inflation for example. But it is viewed as a important question, unfortunately things like time travel can not yet be proved using the energies we are currently harnessing, at least I think based on what I know, because it would probably involve things like shifting a quantum state to tachyons, or enough energy to open up a wormhole at Planck scale; still I might be wrong.

It is a important question because it leaves a glaring hole in consistency, events happening before the causes, is it possible to have a scientific method in such a case?

I like time travel, but it still ties into some of the larger questions, its there in our current theories, because of a lack of perfect understanding, because of the bigger questions, because of a inability to unify relativity and quantum mechanics, or a incomplete understanding of time. It ties in also to the questions of whether time had a beginning, or a end, those cosmic questions.

If you could could you perhaps send me the information on the photon labs, the closest I know is about the work they are doing on teleportation using photons.




""""4. Science is a specific method for gaining knowledge. You may not like it, but many other people find it the most reliable method for increasing knowledge. The scientific method is full of limitations. Splitting our world in many different disciplines is one of those. It is however a misunderstanding to believe different scientific fields are based on unverifiable assumptions. On the contrary, in science the assumptions change all the time as knowledge increase. There is no dogma. """

I never said I didn't like it, I just rather like arguing the devils advocate, and coming up with inconsistencies in my thinking that way. Wasn't a misunderstanding, just saying that because of overall specialization, the information or knowledge you could gain from the combination of those fields is not created, and that it is possible that assumptions in one field might be invalidated when compared with other fields.

Chaos theory probably being the most prominent example, especially as relates to a temporal predictable path in history, or to prediction of a specific field such as for example fluid dynamics.

Dogma, we are talking about science here right?, wasn't Newton's law the established Dogma for a long time before relativity? Or the entire concept of gradual change as opposed to catastrophic change, wasn't that the prime dogma hindering the whole Alvarez idea of a great impactor causing the extinction of the dinosaurs.

Then there's the dogma of the big bang theory, there is quite a lot of information to support it still, but things like the shape of universe and now this new dark energy seems to be relieving inconsistencies in that idea.

""""Of cause every human being is a collections of neurotransmitters and genes, that is necessary to be alive as a biological being. A worm is also a collection of neurotransmitters, genes and other material, plus behaviour and lots of other things. You pose the question as if there was a contradiction between the neurogenetic events and something else? I don't think who you are as an individual person is a scientific question at all, it's a personal question. If you want to understand yourself at a scientific level, there is plenty of neuroscience, genetics, evolutionary biology, biochemistry, psychology, sociology, antropology and history to read."""""


We might might not, it depends on what consciousness is, something I am sure the research is still out on. I especially find interesting the possibilities in chaos theory and QM as applied to it.



""""Why not the jumps? Why assume that unlinear temporal development is less explainable than temporally linear? And why view it as sudden jumps at all, developmental steps in Western history are not so sudden if you study the mechanism behind the events, as history often does. You seems to try to make a mystery of things which are very natural?

Your account above of the development of human life is not very correct. I do recommend you to do some reading on hominoid evolution, antropology and worldwide history, and you will see that development is not so simplistic as you describe above. What you perceive as "nothing happened" is a lot more, which you will notice once you start studying the topic. Also, what on earth do you mean by "more intelligence than we really need"? """"



So I glossed over the details, I was lazy. Mystery, isn't it a mystery why events occur at certain times and not others, isn't that a interesting question especially considering chaos theory, and how events in large systems occur chaotically, or what effect outside events have on history, or why certain events happened, which then sparked a chain of events leading to something entirely different.

That if one took the entire thing over, it would run completely differently, or would it? Because according to the current thinking it would not run temporally linearly, but alinearly.

'"""
Also, what on earth do you mean by "more intelligence than we really need"? """"
""""

More intelligence then we really need because strictly speaking we don't really need the brain power we do have, not to survive in the world we had anyway, many other species survived quite ably on a similar ecological niche. Other generalist species survive quite well without all that brainpower.


As to question I ask can we think outside our worldview, hmmm on further thought it is possible but not by choice, but by chaos, and chaotic events in the environment.

[C Elegans]

@Infinite Nature: There seems to be some semantic confusion going on, you seem to use different definitions of terms than the standard ones.

As to laws perhaps I was misunderstood, science does assume to laws that the laws that exist today existed then. In biology to use your example or geology, there is the assumption that evolution occurred through a set path, or geology that quite ordinary process of erosion or other weather factors caused. I know then comes quick change, quick evolutionary jumps, but the overall assumption is still laws will stay the same once discovered, and have held true throughout time. That quite ordinary events caused mutations over time, who is to say unordinary events didn't.

In the end the idea is that laws do not change, but really who is to say they don't, and how would you objectively prove they don't.

What you describe here is not called a law in science. It is called a theory. In physics and maths, you can talk about laws, but not in other disciplines. The process of evolution cannot be described by laws, nothing in biology can be described by laws. Laws state how something behaves under stated circumstances. In biology, nothing is ever the same, so laws are not very interesting. In all other science than physics, we talk about models, hypothesis and theories.

Ah but isn't some of the prime foundations of current physics that QM assumption that observation collapses the wave form, what is it in consciousness that does this?, what happened before that, before consciousness existed to define it?

Or why do you not see quantum effects on the large scale, what happens between the fuzzy quantum world and the non fuzzy relativistic larger world to make it so?

Quantum mechanics has no connection to consciousness other than in the romantic fanatasies of some people. Most of these people are laymen, some are researchers (like Penrose) but regardless of who believes in this or not, it is a fact that 80 years of Quantum physics and 150 years of consciousness research, has not demonstrated any connections.

True most sciencists are concerned with the bigger questions, like for example unifying Einstein's theory of relativity with QM, but at the same time proposing things like inflation for example. But it is viewed as a important question, unfortunately things like time travel can not yet be proved using the energies we are currently harnessing, at least I think based on what I know, because it would probably involve things like shifting a quantum state to tachyons, or enough energy to open up a wormhole at Planck scale; still I might be wrong.

It is a important question because it leaves a glaring hole in consistency, events happening before the causes, is it possible to have a scientific method in such a case?

Not being able to find evidence for time travelling is the smallest problem is physics right now. The standard model, the Grand Unification theory and the main foci of research. The idea of time travelling was a by-product from a by-product of Einstein's equations. We are not even sure yet if black holes exist. The existence of wormholes is a fantasy, a total speculation. The idea they could be used by humans for time travelling in science fiction. You have to realise that after theorists like mathematicians and theoretical physicists have predicted something in their models, there is a large gap until you can test these predictions empiricially. Because a derivate or a by-product of one of an equation makes time travelling possible in theory, does not mean scientists are rushing to study this. First, you must set up methodology to study something, and this, we are far from.

If you could could you perhaps send me the information on the photon labs, the closest I know is about the work they are doing on teleportation using photons.

I try to find their names, I last read about it in Physics Letters last summer I think.

Dogma, we are talking about science here right?, wasn't Newton's law the established Dogma for a long time before relativity? Or the entire concept of gradual change as opposed to catastrophic change, wasn't that the prime dogma hindering the whole Alvarez idea of a great impactor causing the extinction of the dinosaurs.

Then there's the dogma of the big bang theory, there is quite a lot of information to support it still, but things like the shape of universe and now this new dark energy seems to be relieving inconsistencies in that idea.

No, there cannot be any dogma in science by definition, except mathematical axioms, but mathematics is a metascience anyway. Dogma means unchangable statement that is taken as true. Newton's laws are not dogma, they are laws. If new experiments falsify them, they go. In religion, you can have dogma, like "Jesus was the son of god" or "There is only one god and Muhammed is his prophet". Science is self-revising. The reason why science does not happily replace any older idea with new, cuddly ideas that are more popular among people, is that scientific theories must be testable, have explanatory power and make predictions.

Using scientific terms, the big bang theory is not a theory, it is a model, a set of hypothesis that remains to be tested.

We might might not, it depends on what consciousness is, something I am sure the research is still out on. I especially find interesting the possibilities in chaos theory and QM as applied to it.

First, how do you mean the nature of consciousness will change that human beings are a collection of neurotransmitters and genes? Did genetics change than humans are collections on bones and muscle tissue? Did medicine change that humans are a collection of hair and skin? Learning more about one aspect does not mean the other aspects go away. Humans still have skin, and bones, regardless of increased knowledge in genetics and neuroscience.

Second, why do you find it interesting to apply chaos theory and quantum mechanics to consciousness? How? What is your rationale and what is your hypothesis, so to speak?

So I glossed over the details, I was lazy. Mystery, isn't it a mystery why events occur at certain times and not others, isn't that a interesting question especially considering chaos theory, and how events in large systems occur chaotically, or what effect outside events have on history, or why certain events happened, which then sparked a chain of events leading to something entirely different.

You not only glossed over details, you actually gave a totally erranous summary of human evolution and history.

No, I don't think it's not a mystery why event occur at a certain time and not others, especially not considering chaos theory. And btw, chaos theory is not "chaotic", it's called chaotic just because it is non linear and complex. It is however not known whether chaos history can be generalised to anything else than climate systems.

More intelligence then we really need because strictly speaking we don't really need the brain power we do have, not to survive in the world we had anyway, many other species survived quite ably on a similar ecological niche. Other generalist species survive quite well without all that brainpower.

How do you know we didn't need this intelligence at some point, although we don't need it for survival right now? The extremly low variance in the human genome suggests that we have all evolved form a very small population that survived something that killed off most of the population.

One current hypothesis about hominoid evolution is that this intelligence was needed and selected for when Heidelbergensis faced the drought in Africa. If this hypothesis is correct, we would have died out 100 000 years ago or so.

As to question I ask can we think outside our worldview, hmmm on further thought it is possible but not by choice, but by chaos, and chaotic events in the environment.

So can you explain how we may be able to leave human worldview by chaotic events? Do you think we become another species, or godly, by chaotic events? Unless you are religious, I really cannot understand your and Magrus claims that human can leave the human perception.

[Magrus]

[QUOTE=C Elegans]So can you explain how we may be able to leave human worldview by chaotic events? Do you think we become another species, or godly, by chaotic events? Unless you are religious, I really cannot understand your and Magrus claims that human can leave the human perception.[/QUOTE]

I completely forgot about this thread and to respond to what you left earlier. To make this brief, that quote about leaving the human perception simply triggered in my mind the thought that too many people deny that which they don't fully believe in. Thats all. Not that you gain some supernatural wisdom or intelligence or anything. Just that far too many refuse to accept those beliefs and ideas out there as a possibility and outright deny it as false. I find it to be a closed-minded way of viewing things.

Believing in things as a possibility with nothing but faith and the thought of "ok, this might be true, but who knows really" doesn't really give you anything, or see to it your life is bettered in any significant way. It does leave you with more to think of, but my comment of it opening your mind, you've taken literally, rather than as just a simple saying. I find it be more gratifying to at least allow in my own mind the thought that, hey, I could be wrong, and that guy across the room could be right. The guy I saw on the street an hour ago could be too, or maybe we've all got a right answer on some topic, and no one's wrong. Why shout down someone else in how they can't be right because it's not what you think without any proof either way you know? It doesn't get you anything but an argument and a headache.

[C Elegans]

To make this brief, that quote about leaving the human perception simply triggered in my mind the thought that too many people deny that which they don't fully believe in. Thats all. Not that you gain some supernatural wisdom or intelligence or anything.

Ok, I see. If I understand you correctly, it was more of an association rather than a comment on IN:s actual statement. Leaving your own, subjective worldview is one thing, that can be done by any human being during specific circumstances ranging from eduction, travelling, crisis and drug use. Leaving human perception is entirely another thing.

Believing in things as a possibility with nothing but faith and the thought of "ok, this might be true, but who knows really" doesn't really give you anything, or see to it your life is bettered in any significant way. It does leave you with more to think of, but my comment of it opening your mind, you've taken literally, rather than as just a simple saying. I find it be more gratifying to at least allow in my own mind the thought that, hey, I could be wrong, and that guy across the room could be right.

Yes, I take the word "belief" as in not only acknowledging the possibility of something, but really believe it is so. Believing in god usually means that you think a god exist, not only that you don't exlude the possibility.

From a scientific viewpoint as I have, you can't really exclude the possibility of anything since, as we have discussed previously, you cannot prove that something does not exist. However, the possibility that something exists in far from believing that it actually does. It is possible that god, Santa, unicorns and reincarnation exists. However, since there is no evidence showing the actually do so, it's unnecessary to form a belief in the sense I mean, ie really believe they exist. Unfounded belief has no value, IMO.

What you describe is not what I would call believing in something. Personally, I think the "anything is possible" view is somewhat meaningless, since it does not take us any further. There can be no development in knowledge if everything is just equally possible forever. Maybe the old shamans of Northern Sweden was right and modern medicine is wrong, so why continue treating infections with antibiotics, maybe we should start dancing in a circle again? It's possible. Maybe HIV is a holy scourge from god to punish the Africans for being bad people, so why should we spend resources on researching a cure?
Do you see what I mean? What we believe affect our actions. Thus, we must choose what foundation to derive our acts from, and here I by far prefer what can be objectively measured compared to images (such as gods or mystic beliefs) that we have no evidence for. Sure everything is possible, but as long as we lack evidence, it does not matter to me.