Immediately, I was reminded of a passage from a book I read recently, The Full Facts book of Cold Reading:
An open mind is appropriate in situations where we have no good evidence on way or the other... However, it is inappropriate to retain an open mind in cases where there is already plentiful evidence backing one view as against another.Technorati tags: open mindedness, silliness
Imagine you are in a plane flying at 20,000 feet. The captainof the plane starts thinking along these lines, "Gee, everything in the history of aeronautical science, and every experience of every airline pilot in history, suggests that to keep this thing in the air I need to keep the engines running. But hey, I'm going to keep an open mind. I'm going to cut all the engines, and dump our remaining fuel. Who knows, maybe the plane will still fly." Do you really want the captain to keep an open mind about this?
Or imagine you're dining with friends at a favourite restaurant, and you have ordered tomato soup. Do you really want the chef to be thinking, "Well now, everything we know about human nutrition, and every ounce of gastronomical training I have, suggests that I should not add a large dose of cyanide to this soup./ But hey, I'm going to keep an open mind. Maybe it will taste better, and everyone will love it.
4 comments:
In both of the examples, there is serious potential danger and a small potential benefit in being open minded. That really doesn't seem fair.
Allow me to play devil's advocate here. Consider the scenario of a man who questions the established wisdom that disease is caused by demon possession. His failure to pray and seek exorcism the demons might lead to a devastating proliferation of demonic influence. On the other hand, if he finds out that disease isn't caused by demons, what is the benefit? Knowing that it's not demon possession is nothing close to a cure or treatment.
Hmm, I recognize that "established wisdom" isn't exactly the same as what "plentiful evidence" means in the scientific sense. Might there may be unknown flaws in the interpretation of the evidence, rendering it something much closer to mere "established wisdom."
Nokot (same as first poster)
I am the person to whom you are replying, (the other anonymous posters aren't) and I think that your reply was terribly lacking. The question of God is nowhere near as simple as the questions of an engine or cyanide. If you really think you've answered my objections, then it is *my* opinion that there is something dreadfully awry with your thought process. I could try and explain this, but your mind is closed to the idea of God's existance. I'd just be wasting my time. (After all, you do compare religion to eating cyanide)
The question of God is nowhere near as simple as the questions of an engine or cyanide. If you really think you've answered my objections, then it is *my* opinion that there is something dreadfully awry with your thought process.
So, what's so complicated about it?
Most of the time when I hear complaints about skeptics looking at things too simply, they seldom offer any reason why looking at things in simple terms is wrong. Mostly it comes from alties like homeopaths trying to make it look like they're sophisticated and nuanced when the situation is utterly simple, even taking alleged nuances into account.
I could try and explain this, but your mind is closed to the idea of God's existance. I'd just be wasting my time. (After all, you do compare religion to eating cyanide)
"Crimestop" is a term from George Orwell meaning deliberate stupidity to avoid grasping a concept that would be heretical. One form is the failure to grasp analogies.
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