the slippery "F" word - my solution

[Amethyst]

not half but about 90% of the US. As for calling it brainwashing - I wouldn't quite agree, since when we talk about brainwashing this implies a party who is "sane" feeding the other one false information on purpose, and, while I'm sure there are secretly-atheistic priests most of the time I think the parents/priests/community probably believe it themselves. But if you want to include those people as well then what about just a few hundred years ago when basically everyone was a theist and there were no alternatives in society? what about tribes with no contact with the outside world- are their views about the world brainwashing, or or perhaps more simply they don't know any better? And perhaps we have some facts about the nature of the universe wrong that might be corrected in the next decades or hundreds of years - that would then also have to be included.

I think it's better to use the Meme and idea-organism analogies to describe what is happening.

I disagree, as one who was formerly brainwashed in the Lutheran church. I also was forced to go to a religious school til 6th grade, when I begged my parents to let me go to the public school because I was being bullied, and my idiotic religious teachers did nothing when I told them what was going on.

Brainwashing = the repeating of ideas on a day in, day out basis, which does happen when one is forced to endure it daily at school.

Here's my example. Say there is an island with no contact of the outside world. The island teaches every child from birth onward that the sky is purple. Now, the sky happens to be really blue.

Let's say that a shipwreck survivor arrives on the island, and hears the villagers talking about the purple sky. (For the purposes of this story, let's assume they just happen to speak the same basic language, and they have concepts of both blue and purple.) He tries to correct them and tell them it is really blue, but is laughed at.

A couple of weeks later, the survivor finds 2 flowers. One is blue, one is purple. He shows them to the villagers. The villagers, being brainwashed, argue that the purple flower is the color of the sky even though the blue flower matches the sky perfectly.

Let's also add, that the villagers dare not go against what their teachings say because they believe if they admit the sky is another color other than purple, they will be struck by lightning and killed instantly.

This is what arguing with Christians is like, and it's why I try not to do it anymore because it tends to give me headaches.

[theVOID]

Here's my example. Say there is an island with no contact of the outside world. The island teaches every child from birth onward that the sky is purple. Now, the sky happens to be really blue.

False analogy, in this case they are simply using a different label to describe the same thing, neither of them is wrong because the world 'blue' does not have any more inherent value in describing the colour of the sky than the word 'purple' does, it's only a label than points to a concept.

As long as the concept is agreed upon, ie the wavelength of light captured by the eyes interpreted by the brain, what they name the concept is only a linguistic obstacle for communication and not an instance of them being right or wrong.

[Anomalocaris]

If there are two different wave lengths of light that would be perceived by people with normal color receptors in the eye and no special indoctrination in conceptualizing color to be of two different colors, could indoctrination from birth cause a person with normal eyes to no longer be able to perceive difference at all between these two colors? Not just think the difference between these two colors makes no difference, but really unable to perceive any difference despite differing input for them from the retina?

If this is the case, then obstacle would be more than linguistic. A tool to plot the wave length can still remove the obstacle, but that analogue of wavelength plotter is not always available, and it's efficacy can be thwarted in principle by exactly same type of indoctrination.

[theVOID]

I highly doubt it, should a normally functioning brain and retina be able to discern a difference between the wavelengths indoctrination should not be able to change that.

[solja247]

One of the most time-consuming and frustrating things a theist can do is say something like "you have faith that the sun will rise up tomorrow - thus even you have faith, so how can you be critical of my faith in god" - while it's possible to go into dictionary definitions of the multiple way the word can be used or go the route that one has no faith at all in anything in the believe without evidence meaning of the word, what I have found is that it is best de-obfuscated by dissecting the F word into something a computer might understand:

Indeed, it does require some level of 'faith'. We all have 'faith' in people and in science.

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This is what arguing with Christians is like, and it's why I try not to do it anymore because it tends to give me headaches.

Not always.

If there are two different wave lengths of light that would be perceived by people with normal color receptors in the eye and no special indoctrination in conceptualizing color to be of two different colors, could indoctrination from birth cause a person with normal eyes to no longer be able to perceive difference at all between these two colors? Not just think the difference between these two colors makes no difference, but really unable to perceive any difference despite differing input for them from the retina?

The sky is not blue, we percieve the sky being blue because that is the highest wave frequency we can see. Other animals see it as being red or ultraviolent.

[LastPoet]

The sky is not blue, we percieve the sky being blue because that is the highest wave frequency we can see. Other animals see it as being red or ultraviolent.

Solja, the sky is 'blue', 'blue' is the name we humans have come up with to designate that color, that corresponds to that wavelenght. And other animals do not see it 'red' or 'ultraviolet', they can or can't see the wavelenght and can or cannot perceive differences between them (depends on the animal). But I doubt they conceptualize it in words.

ultraviolent

Hehe, atheist joke: that's what theists see in the sky, its the home of their ultraviolent sky daddy that, if you don't worship him, you're fried.

[Amethyst]

Here's my example. Say there is an island with no contact of the outside world. The island teaches every child from birth onward that the sky is purple. Now, the sky happens to be really blue.

False analogy, in this case they are simply using a different label to describe the same thing, neither of them is wrong because the world 'blue' does not have any more inherent value in describing the colour of the sky than the word 'purple' does, it's only a label than points to a concept.

As long as the concept is agreed upon, ie the wavelength of light captured by the eyes interpreted by the brain, what they name the concept is only a linguistic obstacle for communication and not an instance of them being right or wrong.

Not really, because one believes the sky is one thing, despite proof being offered it is something else, and the other believes it is another. This is like what Christians do when you debate with them and offer them logical evidence that they are wrong.

I'm not talking about interpretation of wavelength of light. I'm talking about being stubborn and saying something is one thing, when one has been offered logic that it cannot be that thing, such as what I like to call Biblegod.

If one was offered evidence that their dad was really dressing up as Santa, but still continued to believe in Santa literally, it's what Christians do.

As a child going to a Christian school, I was told from kindergarten and up, that a sky daddy existed. I believed such for years. Until I stopped being indoctrinated on a regular basis, I did not question the existence of the sky daddy. This is what happens with a lot of people.

[solja247]

If one was offered evidence that their dad was really dressing up as Santa, but still continued to believe in Santa literally, it's what Christians do.

Some do, not all. Like some atheists are irrational, but some are not.

As a child going to a Christian school, I was told from kindergarten and up, that a sky daddy existed. I believed such for years. Until I stopped being indoctrinated on a regular basis, I did not question the existence of the sky daddy. This is what happens with a lot of people.

What reason do you have not to believe in God?

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Solja, the sky is 'blue', 'blue' is the name we humans have come up with to designate that color, that corresponds to that wavelenght. And other animals do not see it 'red' or 'ultraviolet', they can or can't see the wavelenght and can or cannot perceive differences between them (depends on the animal). But I doubt they conceptualize it in words.

If an animal was not able to see blue does that mean they see no atmosphere? or a different color?

[downbeatplumb]

What reason do you have not to believe in God?

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Personnally non-belief in god is my default position.

There is no evidence to that I have encountered to make me change that position.

So I dont believe.

Why dont you believe in unicorns?(I assume you dont)

I would guess that it is because in all likelyhood they dont exist and so there is no REAL evidence that they ever did. (I have seen what was said in the middle ages to be a unicorn horn but turned out to be a Narwhal tooth)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narwhal

I bet your default position is that there is a god and that you require evidence to knock you out of that belief.

I prefer evidence for the things I believe in.

[Amethyst]

[quote='solja247' pid='100908' dateline='1287824864']

As a child going to a Christian school, I was told from kindergarten and up, that a sky daddy existed. I believed such for years. Until I stopped being indoctrinated on a regular basis, I did not question the existence of the sky daddy. This is what happens with a lot of people.

What reason do you have not to believe in God?

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Hell doctrine. Period.