I am not certain about anything.That is why I do not feel it is appropriate for me to mercilessly ridicule people.
You should not be certain about something for which you have not got conclusive evidence either. If you are then you are making the kind of assumptions which you seem to feel are worthy of ridicule.
(You should not be certain about something for which you have not got conclusive evidence either. If you are then you are making the kind of assumptions which you seem to feel are worthy of ridicule.
LordManley twitter.com/LordManley,
Fri 25 Jan 2008, 0:14,
archived)
Aha, so you agree that "assumptions which I seem to feel are worthy of ridicule"are at least a class of assumptions, assumptions of a kind that you can identify (without having to ask me what I think). You know what type of assumptions I'm talking about, then. You just don't want to call these assumptions "ridiculous"
Fair enough, I'm not fussy about terminology. If I'm no longer allowed to ridicule people, I will have to make do with accusing them of holding "assumptions of the kind which I previously thought were worthy of ridicule" instead. Comes to the same thing.
...by which I mean that you agree with me really, and find certain ideas that you encounter ridiculous, and just don't want to appear harsh by saying so, or something.
(,
Fri 25 Jan 2008, 0:38,
archived)
Fair enough, I'm not fussy about terminology. If I'm no longer allowed to ridicule people, I will have to make do with accusing them of holding "assumptions of the kind which I previously thought were worthy of ridicule" instead. Comes to the same thing.
...by which I mean that you agree with me really, and find certain ideas that you encounter ridiculous, and just don't want to appear harsh by saying so, or something.
No, you are wrong.There are ideas I consider ridiculous, but the major point here is that I do not ridicule them, not because I do not wish to be harsh, but because I accept that my opinion of these ideas is subjective.
I do not ridicule them because I do not know that they are wrong, I am merely bound by my own prejudices.
It is unlikely to encourage you to agree with me, and I genuinely do not believe that it affects this argument, but you might be interested to learn that I have attended a CofE church this very evening.
(I do not ridicule them because I do not know that they are wrong, I am merely bound by my own prejudices.
It is unlikely to encourage you to agree with me, and I genuinely do not believe that it affects this argument, but you might be interested to learn that I have attended a CofE church this very evening.
LordManley twitter.com/LordManley,
Fri 25 Jan 2008, 0:45,
archived)
Also, it is time for bed.I have enjoyed argueing with you.
Feel free to Gaz me.
(Feel free to Gaz me.
LordManley twitter.com/LordManley,
Fri 25 Jan 2008, 1:04,
archived)
OK, I'm losing coherence due to tiredness too.Night chap.
...it's about time we had an argument about this really, though, been brewing for a while.
(,
Fri 25 Jan 2008, 1:07,
archived)
...it's about time we had an argument about this really, though, been brewing for a while.
Dawkins expresses fondness for the C of E. (More so than I do.)I'm not sure what we mean by "ridicule", I
think the problem might be that we have
different ideas of what it means. I just mean
telling people "you're wrong" when I think
they're extremely unlikely to be right and have
weak arguments. I could point out that I'm
replying to a post which begins "no, you are
wrong". Oh, and continuing with "your arguments
are extremely weak" and perhaps comparing them
to other weak arguments, e.g. "you might as
well say you believe in fairies," is also part
of ridicule. There's nothing dogmatic in this,
you understand. I don't see why you shouldn't
say that sort of thing too.
Hmm,You can be wrong about something without it being subjective.
As a hypothetical example:
I believe that there are kittens in the woodpile. You believe that they are crabs.
I should not say 'You are wrong, they are kitten', but, if you say that I don't believe that there are kittens, then I am perfectly entitled to say 'you are wrong - I do believe that there are kittens'.
(As a hypothetical example:
I believe that there are kittens in the woodpile. You believe that they are crabs.
I should not say 'You are wrong, they are kitten', but, if you say that I don't believe that there are kittens, then I am perfectly entitled to say 'you are wrong - I do believe that there are kittens'.
LordManley twitter.com/LordManley,
Fri 25 Jan 2008, 9:15,
archived)
Even that isn't strictly true,it's possible to be mistaken about one's own
experiences. Every opinion is subject to
fallibility, even my own opinions about what I
myself think (and actually I quite often misjudge
my own mental processes when I try to describe
them, e.g. try describing retrospectively how you
arrived at a preference, and see how watertight
your description is - probably not very).