Stay strong in your beliefs! Don't let the agenda spreaders win!

a reply to: and14263

Stay strong in your beliefs! Don't let the agenda spreaders win! Did you happen to see this on TV. Is that a new reality show.



Just kidding. I mostly agree with what you say. But we have to realize what we believe and identify with might be an agenda also. We have to be careful and not fall into the same trap we accuse others of doing. By surrounding ourselves in a bubble reality where everything we believe is confirmed and shot back at us. With all alternate view points shut out.

This is now in the rant forum.... It's not a rant, it's probably more like 'Deconstructing Disinfo'. Who am I to argue with tptb.

a reply to: paradoxious

A username driven post loaded with a logical fallacy? Very clever.



EDIT: No sarcasm intended BTW.

originally posted by: Dark Ghost
a reply to: Woodcarver

Can we, however, really prove our beliefs? How many of your own personal beliefs do you need to verify personally before you accept them as truths?

Your not a fan of science are you. I know, it goes over a lot of peoples heads. This may sound funny, but it is the best way to find out if your beliefs are true or not. Some people actually care if their ideas are true or not and they test them. They don't just adopt neat sounding ideas without any understanding of the world around them. The validity of "things" can be tested. Purposely using a broad brush, just like in your blanket acceptance of "beliefs" in the OP.


What do i believe that hasn't been proven to be true? Again, You would have to take on these ideas one by one and rate the validty of each based on what we can know about the "idea"

You would have to take each and every belief, and judge it by itself as to how valid it is. We can't just give blanket acceptance for every belief. Im sure you can think of some beliefs that are wrong right? Flat earth, ghosts, magic, things that we know aren't true.

a reply to: Woodcarver

What makes you think I am not a fan of science? I am a big fan! I am just aware that there are people out there who neglect their critical thinking skills by placing too much faith in scientific research just because that is the source of the information they are fed.

For example, If I asked you at what distance does the Earth orbit the Sun, you would probably state "at approximately 150 million kilometres" and attribute this to science. I would be as bold to say that you would accept this as factual, even though you have not personally verified the distance through a scientific experiment of your own.

Another example: if I asked you in what region of the brain is Wernicke's area located, you would probably state "inside the cerebral cortex" and attribute this to science. Again, I ask this: have you personally verified this through an experiment of your own, or do you just take it as factual because the source is scientific research?

Do you understand the point I am making?

a reply to: Dark Ghost

My answer would be, "I don't know, i have no reason to know. lets look it up." If there were any reason to doubt the science of measuring such things, then i would question it. The fact is that our methods of measurement are pretty spot on. And there are many ways to measure this distance so i can be sure that these standards can and have been cross checked. So no i would not doubt that "science" has these things correct. I have a very reasonable expectation that our estimated distance from the sun is accurate. So it is not a matter of faith that i believe the accepted standards of science. I know that these standards are based on multiple different methods of measurement. Plus, the competition among scientists would insure that if one of these standards were proven to be inaccurate, it would make the front page and possibly earn a nobel or some other accolade.

Some of my knowledge is based on my own experiments of how such things are measured. (Yes, i am a real scientist) i mean, if it was really important to know, i WOULD do the experiment myself. It is not that difficult. That can't be said about most people's odd beliefs. The thing about scientific data, is that i can actually check myself whether the data is true or not. That is how one should come to the decision of how accurate a belief is. Whether or not it can be tested,

(the non existance of something cannot be tested, but if there is no positive evidence for it's existance then there is no reasonble means for me to conclude that it exists. therefor atheism is not a faith based position. It is a reasonable one.)

and how well it holds up in these tests.


If i needed to know the anatomy of a brain, i could look in a science book that is commonly accepted by accomplished neurologists. If that weren't good enough i could go to school and work on cadavers. This can't be said about telepathy, ghosts, or gods. Because they don't hold up under even the lightest of scrutiny.


Scientific theories are judged on their predictive abilities. If you can predict the outcome of an experiment, using a specific theory, and your predictions are 100% accurate, then you have a good theory.

There are not many theories that are 100% accurate in their predictive ability, because you can always take an experiment to an extreme that will cause your theory to not be accurate. So you change your theory to include the new observations. In it's simplest definition, a theory is a list of observations you have made. They do not come from your imagination. You cannot come to any theory in your mind or without significant and repeated physical testing. After these tests, whatever you observed is the base of your theory. If your theory does not match what is to be expected, or if it only has 50%-60% predictive ability, then you need to do more work. Or become a preacher, they have low standards for quality.

SCIENCE.

a reply to: Woodcarver

So if we are going to talk about how valid people's beliefs are we should subject them to proper scientific scrutiny. We should be talking about and considering how to subject these beliefs to scientific scrutiny. If you wanted to prove your beliefs are true, (and i would hope you care whether your beliefs are true or not) you would only ever be able to do that with the proper use of scientific methods. Which is rather ironic for folks who don't trust science.