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That is what I am coming to see on this forum. I strongly believe that if people would actually go out and do their own research and experimentation that their opinions would be different. However, if you go into it completely set on what you are going to find, that is what you will find in most cases.
While it is a bit unfeasible to expect everyone to go out and check Einstein's or Hawkings' work, your point that everything is open to question is a valid one.
What your argument looks like is the old accusation that god - denying science - worshipping atheists simply parrot what's in their science books without question, whereas a rational person would question it.
The fact is that this argument applies so much more to religious faith and god - claims since the questioning throws up so many objections which are sidelined by appeals to faith, lack of human knowledge and magic.
Science at least has a built in skepticism whereby everything is questioned and questioned again. Which is why there are occasional shocks and reappraisals - which is proved by theists being able to claim that science is always changing its mind or getting things wrong. But it also means that science applies everywhere. There are no rival sciences as there are religions.
While the corpus of data is as reliable as anything can be expected to be, (so it is reasonable to quote it without all of us having to go and re-do the work ourselves), it is the believers in the god - claims and alternative history cults who are fiercely skeptical of science (which is what your OP was all about) while being incredibly and eagerly uncritical of their own unsubstantiated god - claims and the like.
To study something and to disprove it, you must exhaust all possible studies and tests.
This is false. Convincing evidence to the contrary is sufficient. I don't have to exhaustively search the entire known universe to show that "all flowers are blue" is false - I just need to go out in my yard and find a red flower.
Now if only supernatural magic were as plainly stated as "all flowers are blue". Instead lots of it is stated so it's impossible to study - and then people wonder why it gets dismissed without exhaustive studies to the contrary....
That is what I am coming to see on this forum. I strongly believe that if people would actually go out and do their own research and experimentation that their opinions would be different.
So do I. So when are you going to get around to doing a randomized double-blind study of your beliefs? If you haven't done so, you're just being a hypocrite to complain that no one else has either. So get to it, and let us know when we can see your published results.
..... Most educated people are not skeptical, most educated people believe what they read. Intelligent people, do their own testing and form their own opinions based on their own discoveries.
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Originally Posted by raison_d'etre
..... I strongly believe that if people would actually go out and do their own research and experimentation that their opinions would be different. .....
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Originally Posted by raison_d'etre
I don't know many atheists or skeptics that actually do their own studies and experiments. So, I would say no. Same goes for most Christians.
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Originally Posted by raison_d'etre
I don't know many that do their own studies. I know plenty that say question everything, but when the read say a skeptic magazine, article or book they don't question anything. They buy into what they read and don't do what they tell others to do.
I am well versed in these types of tactics. Skeptics and atheists alike try to discredit the author or posts and books. They do this because they can't do it to their work. You are now trying to discredit my with these tactics. Nice try. Keep trying.. what's next? Pointing out my grammatical errors...
Let's see ... first you said educated people believe what they read, then you said intelligent people do their own testing, then you said "if people would do their own research," then you said you don't know many skeptics or atheists who do their own studies," then you said they question everything except what they read, then you said they discredit the author but not their work.
Yep, their is plenty there to make us wonder what you are really trying to say. What ARE you trying to say?
I had problems with them too when I read them for a time. I remember they had an article that really seemed to disapprove of the main ideas on the Big Bang theory in favor of notions that struck me as more fringe. It's like they were so uncomfortable with the notion of a "creation moment", even though this doesn't necessarily mean God, they wanted to invent something to dismiss it. I found this a tad suspect. I can't seem to find that article though, I admit that. It seems like they also criticized SETI in a way that struck me as a bit unfair.
Then they nearly put a fatwa against Robert J. Sawyer because he had Intelligent Design, in a science fiction novel he wrote, as valid. He didn't believe it, he told them that, he just wanted to do a novel/alternative-Universe to explore the idea. And they seemed to do other "don't even explore this in fiction" kind of things that I found a tad repressive.
Isaac Asimov had the literal existence of God or devils in a few stories. Writers are going to imagine scenarios they don't believe in sometimes. When I used to write I had characters who engaged in behavior I didn't believe in and I did a poem based on the Swedenborgian view of the afterlife. It doesn't mean anything about what I believe. At most it means I was curious about how those beliefs worked.
That being said SI has some good stuff too. They're kind of uneven.
Could it be that Skeptic Magazine has its own slant on things?
Could it be that Skeptic Magazine has its own slant on things?
Ah. Sorry. Point taken. The SI appears to gave gone off half - cocked. If so they should rectify matters. The book was just so good that it evidently took in the reviewer. Ok. hold the hands up. It is understandable that there are cries of glee by theists looking for anything to embarrass the Skeptics. It is a bit less creditable for theists to seize on it as a way of trying to discredit skepticism as you do here by arguing "slant" (read 'so very biased that we don't need to listen to them, do we?')
Last edited by TRANSPONDER; 09-27-2011 at 09:41 AM..
And also...when you think about it....no matter what denomination we are or aren't....isn't EVERYONE "guilty" of scepticism in one way or another.
It's ok yo be skeptical of things, but when you are skeptical and you do nothing to change that, then you are what I call a skeptic. When I say do nothing, this includes simply reading other peoples studies. If you can't possibly test it for yourself, then reading about it and forming an opinion about it is ok.
Most "Skeptics" don't do any experiments themselves. They read what others have done and take their word for it.
Anway, to answer your question, I doubt many serious scientists get "Skeptic" magazine. There are plenty of REAL scientific journals out there that don't waste paper debunking everything and anything, but focus on the real results of real research...
I didn't say that it was unique to this magazine. Many magazines have biased garbage. But, the topic right now is skeptic magazines. I have read other ones and they do some good work.
Didn't say that it was a bad thing. It only becomes bad when you are skeptic about something and do nothing to make your opinion a little more solid. It also becomes bad when you rely on what other people write and their studies. I never tell someone to take my word for anything I do. If you don't believe me, take a class in reiki or one of the other things I do. Just be careful, there are plenty of snake-oil types out there offering their unique technique for alternative spirituality stuff. Find the real thing, do your research, ask the person offering the course questions.
I don't support doing anything blindly, except eating food. But, that is a topic for another time...
It's ok yo be skeptical of things, but when you are skeptical and you do nothing to change that, then you are what I call a skeptic. When I say do nothing, this includes simply reading other peoples studies. If you can't possibly test it for yourself, then reading about it and forming an opinion about it is ok.
Most "Skeptics" don't do any experiments themselves. They read what others have done and take their word for it.
I'm not sure what you mean by 'experiment' but if anything what I have seen here has had the atheist types going back and checking data on both sides whereas the theists tend to cut and paste from theist apologetics sites without checking them, let alone checking the sources that apologetics sites copy from.
There has been a lot of egg on a lot of theist faces over that. Though it takes a hell of a lot of egg before they even see it's there.
I may say that I have read and tested the Gospels to near destruction.
The believers (even if they bothered to look) have clearly just shrugged it off. Reading what others have done and taking their word for it is one kind of bias. Reading it and not taking the detailed and explained argument on board requires bias of another order entirely.
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