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Old 07-18-2011, 01:19 AM   #24
CoiI8XIj

Join Date
Oct 2005
Posts
388
Senior Member
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Sure. We have new and better tools.
The Buddha provided these tools 2500 years ago. And he encouraged folks to put away the defective "tools" of superstition.

Some of the old tools are irrelevant/outdated/harmful and should be discarded. Some old tools can be used along with the new ones. Some can be "retrofitted" in light of advancements in science. It's not a black or white issue. You are not really saying anything here. Clinging to superstition and retrofitting superstition "in light of advancement of science" is more akin to lying to oneself pathologically than to acting rationally.


You're missing my point. Not in the least. I am challenging your assertion.


I'm not saying that reason and superstitition are equivalent, that they are "the same sort of cesspool", Sure you are, and you continue to do so below.


....that we shouldn't investigate or come to rational conclusions, or that we shouldn't expose the errors in superstitious thinking. I agree with most of the points made in the video you posted. You are attempting to use "rational" arguments to defend the irrational and indict the rational. This is akin to the poor fellow at 2:45 in the video below:





But ultimately rationalism is also a box, even if it's a better and bigger one. No, it is not. And there you sit, cutting the branch out from under yourself.

The act of rejection amounts to setting up the walls of the box -- certain things (the scientific method, Cartesian logic) go in the box, certain other things (religion, mythology) are kept out. You are attempting to use reason to dispute the veracity of reason. Kind of silly. One rejects what is unfounded for cause, which you are completely ignoring.


One then fights to make sure they are kept out (through polemic) while reinforcing what's inside through peer selection and choice of reading material (the echo chamber effect). And this is not true, either. One keeps an open mind. What you are describing is the behavior of the superstitious, not of the rational. Again, trying to equate the two and cast reason as being the same sort of cesspool that superstition is.

So, yes, it does become a matter of reinforcing predispositions -- even if they are better predispositions. Not at all. Critical thinking and a rational approach is not a "predisposition", and humans are not "predisposed" to take such an approach -- by and large it is something that one has to learn.

At worst, it can turn into ideology, and we should always be wary of ideologies -- even, perhaps especially, "superior" ones. You betray a complete lack of understanding of critical thinking and rationality. Ideologies are the domain of superstition. Critical thinking and a rational approach to investigation are antithetical to ideologies. What you are doing here is akin to a theist claiming that science, critical thinking, or reason are matters of "faith".
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