rationalskepticism.org

Calilasseia wrote:

my_wan wrote:Ever notice how extremely common it is for religiously oriented people to call that a personal attack? So common I think it's why they get in trouble so easy here. Could it also have something to do with the way the claims of Matt are considered good arguments? I have my blind spots to, but just wondering if there's a common thread in this....

This is a frequently observed part of the supernaturalist aetiology, which points to another important difference betweeen supernaturalists and the critical thinkers here. Namely, that the critical thinkers regard ideas as disposable entities. If appropriate critically robust evidence is presented, that informs us that a particular ideas is a bad idea, then the critical thinkers toss that idea into the bin, and look for a better replacement. A process that mirrors the way science works, namely, test one's postulates against reality, and if reality says that the postulates in question are plain, flat wrong, then the postulates are tossed into the bin, and a new set brought into the arena for testing. Amongst the bad ideas that science has discarded via this process include the alchemical view of the elements, phlogiston, vitalism etc. Indeed, one can visualise the scientific process of discarding bad ideas, and keeping the ones that survive test to destruction, as being akin to a Darwinian selection process, but I digress [...]