atw: Re: How to Have a Rational Discussion

  • From: "Terry Dowling" <Terrence.Dowling@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: <austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2011 11:16:44 +0800

I've recently argued with an engineer that an illogical statement should
be fixed to remove an incorrect double negative and rewritten to remove
the programmer and engineer speak to make it more easily understood by
the people who use it. His argument was that the statement was also in
engineering design document that had been approved and so must be
correct. So, all approved documents are 100% correct? No. Machine
operators are qualified programmers and engineers? No.

 

I'm pretty sure they'll be able to eventually hone in on faith and
religious belief vs atheism to be largely related to brain structure.

 

There was a good article recently on research into liberal and
conservative brains and how they discovered 'conservative' people "with
a big amygdala were more sensitive to disgust and tended to respond to
threatening situations with more aggression". 'Liberal' people had
"bigger anterior cingulate cortices ...and ... have a higher capacity to
tolerate uncertainty and conflicts". Now, is brain structure the chicken
or the egg?

 

Howard, surely your argument could just as easily be turned on the
religious? Don't you love how rationalists/religious are so blind to
their own prejudices?

 

I don't know that rationalism is always good. I think it's easy to build
a rational argument for eugenics, though few rational people agree with
it. There is a lot of compassion that comes from religious people, but
there's also plenty of intolerance. 

 

To me, there are a lot of times when compassion should override
rationalism, even in professional life. In the long run, it may prove
more rational, too.

 

I found the quote I mashed last week:

I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god
than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible
gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours. -Stephen Roberts,
database architect (b. 1967) 

 

Cheers,

Terry

 

Thank god I'm an atheist. Aleister Crowley

Atheist - a person with no invisible means of support. Aldous Huxley

[The above attributions could be wrong.]

 

 

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