Theidiot wrote:If we hold something as true, we have to make assumptions about those who don't hold this view. You don't believe there is a God, and i do believe there is a God. We both can't be right. One of us is operating on 'mistaken beliefs'. My point is in relationship to why others are mistaken.

I would ammend that to say at least one of the two is operating on mistaken beliefs. There really isn't a 100% correct world view, or at least, I don't think the human brain has evolved the capability to comprehend a 100% correct one. But when two people have conflicting views, it should be the job of the two to share what evidence each person has to support each view, and then each person should ammend the view when robust evidence is presented.

Religion and preconceived narratives, unfortunately don't support this as in order for the religion to survive it must convince it's members that it has a 100% accurate preconceived narrative, so it teaches that those who disagree are "immoral" in order to retain it's members. (You'll also notice that religion never actually presents any evidence. Rather it just deflects the issue, or points to a book and makes unfounded claims of it's perfection).

This is not the way to get a more accurate understanding of reality. If you will not accept critically robust evidence as it is presented to you, or change your preconceived narrative when it becomes apparant that ammendments are needed, you are stuck in a rut with the assumption that you already had a 100% accurate view of reality. Just like in the case of minesweeper, there's technically a very small possibility that you have correctly "flagged" each issue, but the chance is SO small, that it would be folly to assume that you are the lucky one.

num1cubfn wrote:
I think the problem lies in that actual reality is not impacted at all by a person's view of reality. While the later point of two people having differing evidence comming to different conclusions may be absolutely true, the core PROBLEM comes about when one or both of those people refuses to CHANGE his or her worldview in light of new evidence. If one sticks with his or her preconceived narrative, the two people will always have conflicting views. If, on the other hand, both are open to the idea that new evidence should allow for a new world view, then the two can SHARE the evidence with each other, and both can make the appropriate ammendments required to their world views.

If everyone were open to changing their world view as the evidence dictated, we would be able to share evidence with each other and help each other come to a closer to true understanding of reality. Unfortunately, the preconceived narrative prevents this. It prevents people from building and ammending knowledge pools together, in preference for the original, unchangeable, preconception.

Which is precisely why I support Carl Sagan above and beyond any of the 'new atheists'. Some members seem to think that we are all mini-Dawkins, and never bother to enquire about our actual positions, but just go off on rants under that assumption. Sagan strongly promoted reason based thinking, and the teaching of scientific styles of analysis and evidence assessment to children in order to better equip them to follow the facts rather than to rely on the handed down wisdom of their ancestors, who incidentally were entirely ignorant of the very advances and knowledge that need to be assessed. It's about breaking free of the narrative so it has no power to steer our thinking, not about demolishing it: it is, after all, our history and heritage.

Spearthrower wrote:

num1cubfn wrote:
I think the problem lies in that actual reality is not impacted at all by a person's view of reality. While the later point of two people having differing evidence comming to different conclusions may be absolutely true, the core PROBLEM comes about when one or both of those people refuses to CHANGE his or her worldview in light of new evidence. If one sticks with his or her preconceived narrative, the two people will always have conflicting views. If, on the other hand, both are open to the idea that new evidence should allow for a new world view, then the two can SHARE the evidence with each other, and both can make the appropriate ammendments required to their world views.

If everyone were open to changing their world view as the evidence dictated, we would be able to share evidence with each other and help each other come to a closer to true understanding of reality. Unfortunately, the preconceived narrative prevents this. It prevents people from building and ammending knowledge pools together, in preference for the original, unchangeable, preconception.

Which is precisely why I support Carl Sagan above and beyond any of the 'new atheists'. Some members seem to think that we are all mini-Dawkins, and never bother to enquire about our actual positions, but just go off on rants under that assumption. Sagan strongly promoted reason based thinking, and the teaching of scientific styles of analysis and evidence assessment to children in order to better equip them to follow the facts rather than to rely on the handed down wisdom of their ancestors, who incidentally were entirely ignorant of the very advances and knowledge that need to be assessed. It's about breaking free of the narrative so it has no power to steer our thinking, not about demolishing it: it is, after all, our history and heritage.

I already have my 5 and 3 year old watching little clips of "Cosmos". Sagan was such a great man. So intellegent and he cared SO much about the human race. While no man is perfect, I can't help but be overwhelmed by how awesome he was

I couldn't agree with your point more. Though, I do think that Dawkins does a wonderful job of providing evidence to support the claims he makes, and I will point out that Dawkins does not rank himself at a "7" on his scale of atheism because he, like Sagan recognizes that the nature of the idea of "god" makes it impossible to disprove.

But I agree, I love Sagan, and I wish The Demon-Haunted World was required reading in High Schools accross the country.

num1cubfn wrote:

I already have my 5 and 3 year old watching little clips of "Cosmos". Sagan was such a great man. So intellegent and he cared SO much about the human race. While no man is perfect, I can't help but be overwhelmed by how awesome he was

I couldn't agree with your point more. Though, I do think that Dawkins does a wonderful job of providing evidence to support the claims he makes, and I will point out that Dawkins does not rank himself at a "7" on his scale of atheism because he, like Sagan recognizes that the nature of the idea of "god" makes it impossible to disprove.

But I agree, I love Sagan, and I wish The Demon-Haunted World was required reading in High Schools accross the country.

I am certainly not saying that Dawkins is wrong, or that I personally have any problems with his method of delivery, but it certainly provokes hostility. Again, even that's not wrong as it is another angle that might shake some people out of their slumber. However, there's truth to the maxim of getting more flies with honey, and extolling the capacity for humans to reach beyond their narratives and to perceive the universe as an incredibly grand place and our place in it as a continual wonder, regardless of partisan belief positions, is more penetrating and is a better role model. Sagan walked the walk, if you know what I mean?

I only recently read the Demon-Haunted world, and while I have arrived independently at the same conclusions, I agree that it is something that needs more promotion. In fact, if anything, it is the Pale Blue Dot that I have seen provoke incredible responses in people. I have a couple of extremely dogmatic friends who were thoroughly awed by it. Never have I seen them speechless, and so emotionally challenged.

Spearthrower wrote:

num1cubfn wrote:

I already have my 5 and 3 year old watching little clips of "Cosmos". Sagan was such a great man. So intellegent and he cared SO much about the human race. While no man is perfect, I can't help but be overwhelmed by how awesome he was

I couldn't agree with your point more. Though, I do think that Dawkins does a wonderful job of providing evidence to support the claims he makes, and I will point out that Dawkins does not rank himself at a "7" on his scale of atheism because he, like Sagan recognizes that the nature of the idea of "god" makes it impossible to disprove.

But I agree, I love Sagan, and I wish The Demon-Haunted World was required reading in High Schools accross the country.

I am certainly not saying that Dawkins is wrong, or that I personally have any problems with his method of delivery, but it certainly provokes hostility. Again, even that's not wrong as it is another angle that might shake some people out of their slumber. However, there's truth to the maxim of getting more flies with honey, and extolling the capacity for humans to reach beyond their narratives and to perceive the universe as an incredibly grand place and our place in it as a continual wonder, regardless of partisan belief positions, is more penetrating and is a better role model. Sagan walked the walk, if you know what I mean?

I only recently read the Demon-Haunted world, and while I have arrived independently at the same conclusions, I agree that it is something that needs more promotion. In fact, if anything, it is the Pale Blue Dot that I have seen provoke incredible responses in people. I have a couple of extremely dogmatic friends who were thoroughly awed by it. Never have I seen them speechless, and so emotionally challenged.

Haha. You know I thought Pale Blue Dot was a little less interesting than DHW, but maybe I'll have to read it again. Although, now that I think about it, it was cool how in depth he went in describing planets and moons of the solar system. I guess, when I read it, I kept having this nagging feeling of "I wonder how this view of the planet/moon has changed in the 10+ years since this was written", so I couldn't enjoy it as thoroughly.

I didn't consider your point about Dawkins until you said it, but you might be right. Underneath the way he goes about it, I think, is he blames believers a little bit for being so gullible/irrational etc. That's my reading between the lines, so I could be wrong. There certainly isn't a superiority/inferiority thing going on though between believers and non-believers, as we're all capable of delusion, so even if he's only perceived as forwarding that view point, I could see how people would respond negatively. His base point though about the unlikelyhood of a god existing, or the evils that religion can produce, etc are still spot on, it's just unfortunate that people might put a label of "angry" on him that allows them to avoid listening to what he has to say.

I like this game. I am going to teach it to my daughter and friends at her school. It is illustrative of the value of the scientific process. The fact that religion is only one of the guess the flags methods is, to me, not so important.

tytalus wrote:"It's interesting to consider this argument -- that theism was arrived at through rational examination of evidence, but that concepts like good and evil can't be spoken about rationally."

Of course good and evil can be spoke of rationally, the same way I can speak rationally about how great the last film I saw was, or how beautiful my wife is, or how wonderful my kids are.
I said at least this much, I don't why you assume otherwise.

And to have put 'rational' in quotes in the first place. Well, either it was or it wasn't. There's a point of dissonance, possibly.

I often put terms like 'rational', and 'critical' in quotes because I find when they are used as qualifiers for 'thinking', that they serve as tautologies. I don't see a difference between the meaning of thinking, and critically thinking, or rationally thinking, but perhaps a poster has some specific meaning in mind that I am unaware, so I place the terms in quotes in case we're using the terms in different ways.

Evidence is also a term I often put it quotes, because I don't see a distinction between the pieces of our perceived reality in which we infer a truth claim from, that i refer to as 'evidence', and the way the term is used in professional discourse, but once again a particular poster might have his own special meaning he affords the term that I'm not aware of. I put the term in quotes to guard against a possibility that we're both using the term in two different ways, there by resulting in problem of language--a translation error so-to-say.

I put the terms in quotes just in case a problem arises were we need to define what exactly we mean by it.

num1cubfn wrote:But when two people have conflicting views, it should be the job of the two to share what evidence each person has to support each view, and then each person should ammend the view when robust evidence is presented.

Well, a number of things have to be in place for this assumption of yours to work. I don't expect a physicist to devote his time to convincing me of many of his views. but I'm sure he does engage in such discourses with his peers.

Religion and preconceived narratives, unfortunately don't support this as in order for the religion to survive it must convince it's members that it has a 100% accurate preconceived narrative.

Is this view of yours on the survival of religion based on a rational examination of the evidence, or on a preconceived narrative of yours? Do you have a view on how religion flourishes and survives that based on a rational examination of the evidence?

Religion doesn't survive by convincing it's members of 100% accurate preconceived narrative, if that was the case than religious individuals would be perfect meme receptors, but they're in fact horrendous meme receptors. Religion doesn't survive any differently than any other worldview survives, or a particular culture flourishes.

The great religions encompass a great deal of dialogue, particular individuals may seek to formulate a rigidity, but it constantly breaks. A religion flourishes by how well it's symbols, narratives, and meaning can find relationship to a context of a particular people occupying a particular place in time. When it doesn't have relatable context, religion becomes a taboo, a relic that gets discarded. It's flourishing is dependent on the encompassing power of it's aesthetic.

This is not the way to get a more accurate understanding of reality. If you will not accept critically robust evidence as it is presented to you, or change your preconceived narrative when it becomes apparant that ammendments are needed, you are stuck in a rut with the assumption that you already had a 100% accurate view of reality.

I think I have an idea of what you're basing these assumptions on. It's an erroneous analysis, that seeks to treat religious beliefs, as different than the nature of any other strongly held beliefs.

A believer may claim that his strongly held beliefs are 100% accurate, and atheist may claim his strongly held beliefs are only 99.99999% accurate, but the difference here is only in language, not in meaning.

I'm an individuals who is constantly engaging in a dialogues with individuals very much unlike me. I talk with evangelicals fundies all the time. My friend and family are all of this stripe. And we talk of evolution, the history of the bible, comparative mythology, morality, and etc.. And there's as much delusions operating among their strongly held beliefs as that of atheist and their strongly held beliefs.

At the same time I don't face many of the obstacles individuals here face, because I affectionally understand these individuals, of why they believe the things they do, even the erroneous beliefs they cling to quite strongly. I'm attracted to the same things they are, but I'm not dependent on false understandings to preserve this attraction. It's far easier for me to provide these individuals with perspective, to correct their false understandings, than it is for an atheist who has very littler understanding not just of their particular beliefs, but the nature of the individual holding them.

Sure they operate under delusions, but that's human nature. It is those who pin the badge of rationalist on their collars who believe they have transcended this basic feature of human life. It's easy to spot individuals who hold delusions you don't share. It's a far more difficult, if not an impossible task to recognize your own.

Take a look at this forum, spot atheist who hold strong beliefs, that you don't share, and you'll notice how difficult it is dissuade these individuals otherwise, even if the evidence is stacked against them.

Richard Dawkins will cling to his belief in the harmful nature of religion as tightly as a creationist will cling to his belief in a few thousand year old earth. It does not matter how much evidence, studies, and research stands in opposition to his views. He has a made a career out of that particular belief, as well as small fortune, and reputation, and sure is not eager to give this up.

Sam Harris will not admit that Objective Morality is a failed hypothesis regardless of how silly these beliefs are demolished even on an internet forum such as this. And he's sure not going to admit this before his book goes on sale.

Tim O'neill tries his hardest to convince atheist here, who strongly believe Ratzinger should be tried in court and hopefully arrested, how far their views are removed from the actual facts, to no avail.

I could continually mention common examples on this forum, but I find there to be no point, because everyone here should be familiar with them.

In all my time in atheist forums, in theist forums, of the vast variety of individuals that I've met along the way, I find that only a rare few individuals have a sense of clarity that is not prone to delusions, and atheist surely don't posses a greater percentage of these individuals than the religious.

The only quality I find to be common among these individuals, that I'm inclined to view as more of a cause than a correlation, is it sort of sadistic bent, where even destructive truths are alluring. But these are the sort of individuals that don't raise truth to be superior to delusions, because individuals who do that are setting themselves up for delusions all of their own.

Atheist here are quick to point out that religious individuals are not very critical about the worldview they hold. But how many atheist here are very critical of their own? How many individuals here have thought critically on the power of rational thinking, education, liberalism, secular humanism, enlightenment beliefs, moral consequentialism?

How many individuals here have read seminal works like Alasdair Macintyre's 'After Virtue', that highlight the incoherency of modern moral discourses? How many enlightenment devotees have seriously engaged Nietzsche's critique of the enlightenment? How many individuals buy the narratives of secular moral discourses, of humanistic, and enlightenment worldview, but have never actually reflected on if these views are based on a rational examination of the evidence?

How many individuals here buy the narrative of Sagan's Demon Haunted World, but fail to realize how naive the book is?

An excellent example of a delusion, is our atheist who believe that the nature of religious delusions is different than the ones that commonality infect their own, and even themselves.

Most of these individuals have bought a cheap narrative about delusions, but lack any learning, or any rational examination of the evidence on that nature of 'delusions, of what makes individuals prone to them, or if there is even a cure for this common human sickness, or if it's worth even curing.

Spearthrower wrote:

num1cubfn wrote:
I think the problem lies in that actual reality is not impacted at all by a person's view of reality. While the later point of two people having differing evidence comming to different conclusions may be absolutely true, the core PROBLEM comes about when one or both of those people refuses to CHANGE his or her worldview in light of new evidence. If one sticks with his or her preconceived narrative, the two people will always have conflicting views. If, on the other hand, both are open to the idea that new evidence should allow for a new world view, then the two can SHARE the evidence with each other, and both can make the appropriate ammendments required to their world views.

If everyone were open to changing their world view as the evidence dictated, we would be able to share evidence with each other and help each other come to a closer to true understanding of reality. Unfortunately, the preconceived narrative prevents this. It prevents people from building and ammending knowledge pools together, in preference for the original, unchangeable, preconception.

Which is precisely why I support Carl Sagan above and beyond any of the 'new atheists'. Some members seem to think that we are all mini-Dawkins, and never bother to enquire about our actual positions, but just go off on rants under that assumption. Sagan strongly promoted reason based thinking, and the teaching of scientific styles of analysis and evidence assessment to children in order to better equip them to follow the facts rather than to rely on the handed down wisdom of their ancestors, who incidentally were entirely ignorant of the very advances and knowledge that need to be assessed. It's about breaking free of the narrative so it has no power to steer our thinking, not about demolishing it: it is, after all, our history and heritage.

theidiot wrote:

tytalus wrote:"It's interesting to consider this argument -- that theism was arrived at through rational examination of evidence, but that concepts like good and evil can't be spoken about rationally."

Of course good and evil can be spoke of rationally, the same way I can speak rationally about how great the last film I saw was, or how beautiful my wife is, or how wonderful my kids are.
I said at least this much, I don't why you assume otherwise.

And so again we have the vague, noncommital responses, which led me to remark:

tytalus wrote:And to have put 'rational' in quotes in the first place. Well, either it was or it wasn't. There's a point of dissonance, possibly.

It's up to you to clarify your position; otherwise, it's open to my interpretation that there may be some cognitive dissonance. There's no point in claiming otherwise and then staking out a position via cloud formations.

theidiot wrote:I often put terms like 'rational', and 'critical' in quotes because I find when they are used as qualifiers for 'thinking', that they serve as tautologies. I don't see a difference between the meaning of thinking, and critically thinking, or rationally thinking, but perhaps a poster has some specific meaning in mind that I am unaware, so I place the terms in quotes in case we're using the terms in different ways.

Evidence is also a term I often put it quotes, because I don't see a distinction between the pieces of our perceived reality in which we infer a truth claim from, that i refer to as 'evidence', and the way the term is used in professional discourse, but once again a particular poster might have his own special meaning he affords the term that I'm not aware of. I put the term in quotes to guard against a possibility that we're both using the term in two different ways, there by resulting in problem of language--a translation error so-to-say.

I put the terms in quotes just in case a problem arises were we need to define what exactly we mean by it.

You can always clear up what you mean by rational, like how I tend to qualify 'evidence' by requesting credible evidence that can withstand scientific scrutiny, for example.

Anyway, hope you can get to the rest sometime.

tytalus wrote:But without seeing the argument, we'll never know. If you would argue thus and so, by all means: argue it. What do you know that would make anyone into a theist? What rational (in quotes or otherwise) examination of the evidence results in religious beliefs? Make the case.

As an aside, I am familiar with the recourse to aesthetics, although it does seem that there is some rational study and talk of how and why we find things attractive. It appears that Google Scholar turns up some results as well from the field of psychology. Interestingly enough, one of the factors cited is cultural conditioning, which returns to the point being made by the OP.

Atheist here are quick to point out that religious individuals are not very critical about the worldview they hold. But how many atheist here are very critical of their own? How many individuals here have thought critically on the power of rational thinking, education, liberalism, secular humanism, enlightenment beliefs, moral consequentialism?

I can't answer for others, but I've spent my adult life trying to understand my own thinking and improve on it. I am not burdened by many of the inculcated narratives for a number of reasons. Primarily, my training in Anthropology helped me to put myself and my culture into a framework where there were so many competing explanations that it makes asserting my own as truth to be impossible to maintain. Secondly, by researching the history of humanity, of human thought, I've seen how people play out the same drama generation after generation.

How many individuals here buy the narrative of Sagan's Demon Haunted World, but fail to realize how naive the book is?

Empty assertion without support. Promoting scepticism is, by definition, not naive. It's a call to step away from naivety. I take it you haven't read it, as Sagan mentions a number of superstitions that he thinks are worthy of scientific exploration.

Your entire post is one long judgment of 'other' - i've noticed this a lot from you. I wonder how often you put your own beliefs under the kind of scrutiny you claim others don't engage in. Lots of generalisations, but little content.

Imagine that - declining to believe a particular assertion unless some reasonably robust and objective reason can be found for doing so. How naive can you get?

theidiot wrote:Tim O'neill tries his hardest to convince some otheratheist here, who strongly believe Ratzinger should be tried in court and hopefully arrested on one very specific and particular charge, how far their views are removed from the actual facts, to no avail.

Fixed it for you.

So, according to theidiot, it's naive to avoid naivety. Only when bending over backwards in a futilte attempt to make a preconceived narrative work, could one produce such a ridiculous claim.

Spearthrower wrote:

How many individuals here buy the narrative of Sagan's Demon Haunted World, but fail to realize how naive the book is?

Empty assertion without support. Promoting scepticism is, by definition, not naive. It's a call to step away from naivety. I take it you haven't read it, as Sagan mentions a number of superstitions that he thinks are worthy of scientific exploration.

Your entire post is one long judgment of 'other' - i've noticed this a lot from you. I wonder how often you put your own beliefs under the kind of scrutiny you claim others don't engage in. Lots of generalisations, but little content.

If I remember correctly theidiot has previously spoken about the review of Demon Haunted World he wrote which become required reading at the school he was attending. So, yeah, he has read it.

Crocodile Gandhi wrote:

Spearthrower wrote:

How many individuals here buy the narrative of Sagan's Demon Haunted World, but fail to realize how naive the book is?

Empty assertion without support. Promoting scepticism is, by definition, not naive. It's a call to step away from naivety. I take it you haven't read it, as Sagan mentions a number of superstitions that he thinks are worthy of scientific exploration.

Your entire post is one long judgment of 'other' - i've noticed this a lot from you. I wonder how often you put your own beliefs under the kind of scrutiny you claim others don't engage in. Lots of generalisations, but little content.

If I remember correctly theidiot has previously spoken about the review of Demon Haunted World he wrote which become required reading at the school he was attending. So, yeah, he has read it.

So there's at least one piece of anecdotal evidence that would suggest that reading is not synonymous with understanding.

Spearthrower wrote:I am not burdened by many of the inculcated narratives for a number of reasons. Primarily, my training in Anthropology helped me to put myself and my culture into a framework where there were so many competing explanations that it makes asserting my own as truth to be impossible to maintain. Secondly, by researching the history of humanity, of human thought, I've seen how people play out the same drama generation after generation.

Well, then perhaps we are kindred spirits in our regard for the history of thought, and humanity. I'm primarily interested the in allure of particular aesthetics, from violence, to morality, and to truth. And in particular similar imagery that appears across human cultures independently of each others, and what sort of conditions lead to these attractions.

The science of Dawkins interests me less, than his poetic allure of the cosmos, that makes him weep.

Reason and Science are slaves to our aesthetic, and what I find peculiar are those individuals who raise reason and science to a form of an aesthetic as well, unaware that this is self defeating.

I take it you haven't read it, as Sagan mentions a number of superstitions that he thinks are worthy of scientific exploration.

No, I've read it. I read it while I was still an unbeliever, but unfamiliar with who this Sagan character was, or realizing how popular he is to a number of individuals. It was an assigned reading for a sophomore critical thinking course, and I remember telling my professor how shitty it was. I wrote a paper on on it as someone else pointed out, that my teacher attached to the subsequent readings of the book in her course.

Promoting scepticism is, by definition, not naive. It's a call to step away from naivety.

No, it's naive when you haven't given thought to the question of if it even can be promoted. Sagan, Dawkins and company have bought into a certain enlightenment narrative, in which peddling rationalism and scientific thinking as an aesthetic gets individuals to actually thinking rationally. They peddle it as cure for transcending the human propensity towards delusions.

What Sagan managed to do is write a book length cure for a sickness he lacks an understanding of. At no point does he take the time to reflect on what is the nature of the problem he is trying to correct. He's bought into a certain narrative, and the choirs that have already bought into the naive narrative cheer him on, but those familiar with the actual nature of the problem, find his book idiotic to say the least.

What these individuals fail to realize is that enlightenment project has been a success. It his infected the world with an aesthetic of rationalism and science. You know what the result is? Individuals who call their delusions, rational and scientific, to be a product of critical thinking and skepticism. Ahmadinejad professes his desire for the world to be run by logic, and creationist want a sticker on textbooks asking children to think critically.

What the enlighten project possessed is far more enthusiasm than insight. It created a meaningful but intellectually shallow narrative which many secularist have swallowed whole. Can you reference for me any of these popular enlightenment devotees who has any real understanding of the nature of delusions that plague the common man? If the endeavor is devoted to curing a certain ailment in thinking, is there a work you can reference which you feel understands the nature of this ailment?

Is there a difference between the nature of delusions that plague individuals who subscribe to supernatural beliefs, and that of the delusions that plague 9/11 conspiracy theorist and jesus mythers that are not supernatural beliefs? Does education lead us to transcend this nature, or is it just catalyst for a privileged condition that makes us less reliant on a number of common delusions?

I understand the nature of these delusions, most individuals don't have a clue. And I have to throw my hands up and say there's no real cure for them, and even if they could be cured it's perhaps not a good idea that we should. Christianity peddles the belief that the Truth is ultimately life giving, but this is a myth, the truth can be just as destructive as it can be creative, and it can be the source of chaos, as well as order.

I can say how dimwitted the traditions that house the thoughts of atheist like Dawkins, Harris, Russell, Sagan, and etc.. because I understand the foundations they lack to make their thesis work. Most people don't, and particularly those who fawn over such individuals.

Your entire post is one long judgment of 'other' - i've noticed this a lot from you. I wonder how often you put your own beliefs under the kind of scrutiny you claim others don't engage in.

You're right, I'm more interested in learning about alternative worldview, and how those who attach themselves to these alternatives reconcile their problems, and take into consideration critiques of it. I engage in these discourses because of my own interest rather than yours. Not out of any sense of duty to others, but for the sake of my own curiosity.

I've been on atheist forums for several years, and seek out the best literature and arguments of opponents of Christianity. I have a high regard for opponents like Nietzsche, and low regard for those like Dawkins. If you find yourself to be an individual who understands Christianity as well as the former, I'd perhaps be interested in hearing your scrutiny, but if you find your understanding to be like that of the latter, I'm more than likely going to be bored.

Some atheist may be more interested in scrutinizing my beliefs, I'm more interested in scrutinizing theirs, mainly because I find the later discussions to serve better for scrutinizing my beliefs, than the former.

num1cubfn wrote:

Crocodile Gandhi wrote:

So there's at least one piece of anecdotal evidence that would suggest that reading is not synonymous with understanding.

So to sum it up: If you think it's a great book, that implies you understand it, if you think it's garbage, that means you didn't

num1cubfn wrote:Ok. Here's a fun experiment that anyone with a windows computer (or internet access) can do! I strongly recommend you have you friends try it too!

1)Open up the game Minesweeper and set it on Expert.

2)Before clicking anything, flag 99 boxes. In your preconceived narrative, it is a FACT that these boxes contain the mines. Be proud of your preconceived narrative! You've come to it with absolutely zero supporting evidence, but for now, noone can prove that your narrative is wrong, and besides, it's a free country, so you have the right to believe whatever you want. Think of each flag as a belief. (e.g. being gay is immoral, abortion is murder, prayer works)

3)Now, start clicking all the unmarked boxes. When you die, from clicking on a bomb, (which you will do), take careful note, not only of how many boxes you marked as bombs that weren't, and how many bombs you failed to mark, but also how FEW you correctly marked.

4)Now, try playing the normal way. You may have occasional flaws in logic, or occasional situations where there's two possibilities, and you don't have enough data to determine which is the correct possibility, but you'll find that with practice, and using the evidence that is presented to you, you will clear the board of mines FAR more often than you would using the preconceive narrative method.

5)Now think about how much actual evidence your religion has, as opposed to how much of it is just preconceived narrative, taught to you by parents or priests or teachers. Which method is better for determining the truth? A book from 2000 years ago, or rational examination of evidence. Which method should be used to determine what is moral? Or how to live your life? Or how to treat your neighbors?

A well-deserved Orson indeed.