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RE: is it possible for me to one day be a skeptic?
February 21, 2014 at 8:26 am
(February 20, 2014 at 9:33 pm)leodeo Wrote: ... i guess nowadays im more skeptical of christin logic, and dont really believe in psychic/astronomy stuff as much, but when i see like a fortune cookie or horoscope that matches up perfectly, it still does make me wonder....
No, it doesn't mean you are stupid, but it's not easy to see through this. Evolution has hard-wired us for confirmation bias, so that we notice the hits and ignore the misses.
I never believed in astrology, but one time almost 50 years ago, I was really shaken for a day or two. I read my horoscope for amusement only, and it told me that I would get an important letter. Damned if I didn't. I had been waiting months to hear from my thesis supervisor and he finally wrote back to tell me that he really liked my outline.
If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people — House
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RE: is it possible for me to one day be a skeptic?
February 21, 2014 at 12:25 pm
(This post was last modified: February 21, 2014 at 12:52 pm by Simon Moon.)
(February 20, 2014 at 9:33 pm)leodeo Wrote: im not very skeptical like most atheists, im not any religion but i believe in a god and after life and stuff, though still looking for answers to kinda draw up what exactly i believe,
though im very much more skeptical than i used to be ie: people would tell me when i was a kid how things have a way of working out, and everythings gonna okay and stuff, and god has a plan for us all, and dreams do come true - so a lot of hard years later i definitely saw thats not always teh case!
i guess nowadays im more skeptical of christin logic, and dont really believe in psychic/astronomy stuff as much, but when i see like a fortune cookie or horoscope that matches up perfectly, it still does make me wonder.
but also another person told me that you cant really change your core beliefs and personality, and you can try but in the end the inner you will keep leaking out....so idk, but im more able to see nowadays what i want/like rather than having people tell me what i should want/like.
The first thing you have to do, is to truly care whether you want your beliefs to be true, or at least likely to be true.
If you don't care, and you just want to believe things because they make you feel good, or they sound cool, then, no, you will never be a skeptic.
But what is the best method to assure that your beliefs are based on true things, and to eliminate false beliefs? Base them on demonstrable evidence, reasoned argument and valid/sound logic. And to have the mental toughness to reject claims unless they meet that criteria, no matter how pleasant the belief is.
I would highly recommend the book, "The Demon Haunted World" by Carl Sagan. It is a how to guide on how to approach extraordinary claims.
You'd believe if you just opened your heart" is a terrible argument for religion. It's basically saying, "If you bias yourself enough, you can convince yourself that this is true." If religion were true, people wouldn't need faith to believe it -- it would be supported by good evidence.
