I hear a few people are declaring themselves skeptics?
What does that mean?
It means that they have just come into adolescence (physically or mentally)!
That's when the second stage of skepticism, cynicism, self identity, self esteem, disregard for authority etc. start surfacing after the initial childhood stage.
Getting into that stage is almost automatic...but getting out is not so simple. Many people unfortunately, remain in that stage for life without reaching the third stage of maturity.
It means that they have just come into adolescence (physically or mentally)!
That's when the second stage of skepticism, cynicism, self identity, self esteem, disregard for authority etc. start surfacing after the initial childhood stage.
Getting into that stage is almost automatic...but getting out is not so simple. Many people unfortunately, remain in that stage for life without reaching the third stage of maturity.
It means that they have just come into adolescence (physically or mentally)!
That's when the second stage of skepticism, cynicism, self identity, self esteem, disregard for authority etc. start surfacing after the initial childhood stage.
Getting into that stage is almost automatic...but getting out is not so simple. Many people unfortunately, remain in that stage for life without reaching the third stage of maturity.
sceptic:Surprisingly enough, the definition is the same whether you look up the British or American spelling :D
1. A person inclined to question or doubt accepted opinions.
1.1. A person who doubts the truth of Christianity and other religions; an atheist.
2. Philosophy An ancient or modern philosopher who denies the possibility of knowledge, or even rational belief, in some sphere.
To add to my earlier post......skepticism is not something undesirable or wrong. It is a necessary and vital stage in growing up. But if skepticism becomes a habit and a mind set....then it is equivalent to a person remaining an adolescent all his life......which is unfortunate!! :D
..that would make you an 'unfortunate' then?Yes but when we consider the barely funny sixth form musings of the antitheist comedians we see that Sriram has a point...............and talking of antitheist comics apparently................
Yes but when we consider the barely funny sixth form musings of the antitheist comedians we see that Sriram has a point.............
Scepticism is the tendency to question claims that can't be backed up with testable evidence.
It means that they have just come into adolescence (physically or mentally)!
That's when the second stage of skepticism, cynicism, self identity, self esteem, disregard for authority etc. start surfacing after the initial childhood stage.
Getting into that stage is almost automatic...but getting out is not so simple. Many people unfortunately, remain in that stage for life without reaching the third stage of maturity.
Your understanding is very poor. If people start to develop critical thinking skills when they reach puberty, that doesn't mean that critical thinking skills are puberty. You seem to be confusing scepticism with teenage rebellion; see Stranger's post #4 for a much more comprehensive take. In your definition, it would seem that maturity into adulthood would be a regression back into childhood naivety.
See #5 and #11.
Scepticism is the tendency to question claims that can't be backed up with testable evidence.
Not really! Skepticism is just...skepticism, a mindset and a way of looking at things. It is normally specific to certain areas that we have developed a skeptical attitude towards, based on our culture and upbringing.
There are many people who are skeptical of evolution, Big Bang, moon landing etc. Does not mean there is no evidence for these or that their skepticism is warranted.
'Evidence' is only what we are capable of and willing to see.
Scepticism is the tendency to question claims that can't be backed up with testable evidence.Not sure that it has to have anything about testable evidence involved, Len. For instance, I am sure that there is a whole lot of testable evidence backing up much of the Brexit and Bremain claims, yet people remain sceptical of both.
Yes #5 and #11 demonstrate your lack of understanding. Scepticism is not a teenage mindset, it is more a life skill and a form of mental discipline that requires a certain depth of experience and maturity not available during childhoodI can think of peole who are now adults and have been sceptical of things since they were barely out of nappies. OK, the early days of their scepticism revolved around fairly simple issues, and it developed as the grew older.
I can think of peole who are now adults and have been sceptical of things since they were barely out of nappies. OK, the early days of their scepticism revolved around fairly simple issues, and it developed as the grew older.
Scepticism is the tendency to question claims that can't be backed up with testable evidence.Since a lot of bollocks is talked by antitheists.....shouldn't that be testicle?
Not really! Skepticism is just...skepticism, a mindset and a way of looking at things. It is normally specific to certain areas that we have developed a skeptical attitude towards, based on our culture and upbringing.
I refer you to message #4. There are several senses of the word and it is used in many different ways - that's what happens in language. Leonard is quite correct in that the word is often used in that sense (see first quote in #4).
Oxford Dictionaries first definition of sceptic is: A person inclined to question or doubt accepted opinions. A generally healthy attitude, IMO.
That is a different sense of the word. In recent times, more likely to be referred to as conspiracy theorists than sceptics.
Nonsense. This would imply that evidence is, in some sense, subjective....
evidence
noun
[mass noun]
1 The available body of facts or information indicating whether a belief or proposition is true or valid: 'the study finds little evidence of overt discrimination'
1.1 Law Information drawn from personal testimony, a document, or a material object, used to establish facts in a legal investigation or admissible as testimony in a law court: 'without evidence, they can’t bring a charge'
1.2 Signs or indications of something: 'there was no obvious evidence of a break-in'http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/evidence
All tendencies can be misappropriated though. We are all tuned up for face recognition, so much so, that we sometimes see faces where there are none, in rock formations, in clouds, that doesn't mean that the ability to recognise faces is a bad thing. Likewise people doubting climate change or Moon landings etc, like to employ the term 'sceptic' to their position but really that is a misappropriation. Some people have bad childhood experiences and that leads them on to become conspiracy theorists in adulthood, and like with faces in rock formations, they end up seeing subterfuge where there is none.
Many people see plenty of evidence for a God...why can't you? Because you can't and you also will not.
Skepticism is a mindset. People can be skeptical of anything. From philosophical theories, to science, to economics, to political affairs, to their parents love, to the value of life....etc.
Its not about evidence...its about perception and attitude.
About evidence.... Evidence has always been available for gravity in terms of falling objects. Why didn't anyone see it as evidence for gravity till Newton did?! Similarly with a host of other observations.....
'Evidence' is about connecting certain observations to certain phenomena/certain concepts. If that connection is established...it becomes evidence...otherwise, it can be in front of your nose all the time and still not be perceived as evidence for anything.
Many people see plenty of evidence for a God...why can't you? Because you can't and you also will not. You might simply call them all gullible fools...and that is that! They will call you an ignorant fool and.... that is that!
Can you provide evidence of light to a born blind person?
Ironically your continued petulance about the meaning is more an adolescent trait than scepticism.Precisely and exactly what I was already thinking, SKoS.
Yes #5 and #11 demonstrate your lack of understanding. Scepticism is not a teenage mindset, it is more a life skill and a form of mental discipline that requires a certain depth of experience and maturity not available during childhood
Some people may take pride in being 'skeptics'.......but habitual skeptics are no different from habitual believers. Their very allegiance to skepticism shows their bias and lack of balance.Spot the one who doesn't know what scepticism means ::)
Spot the one who doesn't know what scepticism means ::)
Reason and logic have their limits.
Some people may take pride in being 'skeptics'.......but habitual skeptics are no different from habitual believers. Their very allegiance to skepticism shows their bias and lack of balance.
Yes, but they are the best tools for sifting out the reasonable and logical from the unreasonable and illogical.
I refer you again to the definition of scepticism that is relevant to this thread (which is about people who self-identify as sceptics):-
Skepticism is the process of applying reason and critical thinking to determine validity. It's the process of finding a supported conclusion, not the justification of a preconceived conclusion.https://skeptoid.com/skeptic.php
But you may like to think that 'applying reason' is something people do uniformly and with uniform control over their biases and pet prejudices. That is not so ... Everyone is not a sage with a perfect and dispassionate perception of the world, completely free of all emotional and cultural biases.Part of the whole point of scepticism is firstly to be aware of such biases and then to counter or override them as far as is humanly possible. This is why trained and organised scepticism such as you find in the scientific method has elements such as anonymous peer review and the like.
Reason and logic are not super powers. They are common abilitiesSadly not that common. Take any day's worth of posting here as an example.
Yes....I understand. But you may like to think that 'applying reason' is something people do uniformly and with uniform control over their biases and pet prejudices. That is not so.
Everyone is not a sage with a perfect and dispassionate perception of the world, completely free of all emotional and cultural biases.
Reason and logic are not super powers.
They are common abilities with severe limitations. Reason and logic can and do bend to serve our personal emotional requirements.
They have a cultural element.... and what may appear perfectly logical and reasonable at one point of time can appear completely illogical and unreasonable at another point of time.
It is not skepticism that we should cultivate but.... Wisdom!
Humans have reason and logic and humans also have cultural and emotional influences. Because of this, their reason and logic also get influenced. As simple as that.
There is no such thing as pure reason and logic unless one is a robot.....maybe not even then.
You are suspicious of 'wisdom' because of your God phobia. Most of you are petrified of God being forced down your throat. You are always watching your back. ::)
The clearest definition would seem to be the first of the three listed below from the Oxford Dictionary:
Surprisingly enough, the definition is the same whether you look up the British or American spelling :D
Note the British English spelling, JA. ;)
That also suggests that religious people are not less sceptical than non-religious people, since - in the same way that it is human to err - it is human to question.
Humans have reason and logic and humans also have cultural and emotional influences. Because of this, their reason and logic also get influenced. As simple as that.
There is no such thing as pure reason and logic unless one is a robot.....maybe not even then.
That is why we need scepticism. Most people don't apply logic so much as follow their desires, habits, prejudices and beliefs. Persons by and large are unfaithful witnesses to truth, that is why to get at the underlying truth we need to remove the personal, remove the subjective, in order to approach the objective. Science is the formalised application of such disciplines to empiral investigation.
SKS....you still haven't told me how you could convince a stubborn born blind man about the existence of light!!
No that difficult! Let him tie you to the wall of a room full of obstacles, and then tell him to cross the room with his stick, warning him every time he approaches an obstacle. He can then ascertain that you are correct every time.
What you and others need to understand is that Reason & Logic are one part of being human while emotional responses are another part. Neither is wrong or right by itself.
In stage 1, we apply more of the emotional part and during adolescence we apply more of the Reason & logic. This is what you call skepticism.
My point is that both reason and emotion (head and heart, left brain and right brain) need to be applied equally. This happens after maturity in some people. This is what brings a balance....which we Hindus call... Jnana (Wisdom).
Most people however, never reach this balance and remain skewed in one direction or the other all their life.
Your impression that applying logic and reason in itself makes something more accurate and 'real' is not correct. Only when it is balanced with emotion and 'feelings' does it become more 'real'.
SKS....you still haven't told me how you could convince a stubborn born blind man about the existence of light!!
IF the blind person is as skeptical as you people are....he will not believe the person. He will first ask how does he know it is because of 'light' and not because of some other phenomenon or some other method used by the other person. What the heck is 'light' anyway?!
Define it and show evidence of how it can exist everywhere and make people 'see' (whatever that is! ::)) without itself being felt or heard or sensed in any way. Rubbish!
IF the blind person is as skeptical as you people are....he will not believe the person. He will first ask how does he know it is because of 'light' and not because of some other phenomenon or some other method used by the other person. What the heck is 'light' anyway?!
Define it and show evidence of how it can exist everywhere and make people 'see' (whatever that is! ::)) without itself being felt or heard or sensed in any way. Rubbish!
SKS....you still haven't told me how you could convince a stubborn born blind man about the existence of light!!
Can you provide evidence of light to a born blind person?
Of course. Compare: do you think there is evidence for radio waves, gamma rays, electrons...?
IF the blind person is as skeptical as you people are....he will not believe the person. He will first ask how does he know it is because of 'light' and not because of some other phenomenon or some other method used by the other person. What the heck is 'light' anyway?!
Define it and show evidence of how it can exist everywhere and make people 'see' (whatever that is! ::)) without itself being felt or heard or sensed in any way. Rubbish!
My point is that both reason and emotion (head and heart, left brain and right brain) need to be applied equally. This happens after maturity in some people. This is what brings a balance....which we Hindus call... Jnana (Wisdom).
Your impression that applying logic and reason in itself makes something more accurate and 'real' is not correct. Only when it is balanced with emotion and 'feelings' does it become more 'real'.
No matter how sceptical he is. he has to admit that it is a faculty that he doesn't have. He has been shown unequivocally that it exists.
You confuse scepticism with stubborness. They are not synonyms. We cannot see dark matter; we cannot detect dark matter directly, but we do not go around claiming it does not exist.
What you need to understand is reason and logic are appropriate to some questions and emotion is applicable to others. If you try to apply emotion to a question of objective fact, then you are being foolish.
Again, if you are trying to assess if something is objectively real, then reason, logic and evidence are required - applying emotion and feelings is crass stupidity.
Trying to (for example) appreciate art, music and literature using only reason and logic is equally foolish. It's about using what is appropriate.
That is blind belief in science. Like the emperors new clothes...you claim something exits all around us that cannot be sensed at all. It could very well be proved that DM does not exist at all.
Your impression that the view taken by reason and logic is the right view that represents reality.....is not correct.
We have evidence for dark matter. Something is affecting visible matter via gravity - we have labelled it "dark matter" because we don't know exactly what it is.
Zero faith required.
Shouldn't that be? something is affecting visible matter we don't know what it is, we have called it dark matter, but there is no evidence of dark matter, it's just a label for an effect we don't understand yet.
Shouldn't that be? something is affecting visible matter we don't know what it is, we have called it dark matter, but there is no evidence of dark matter, it's just a label for an effect we don't understand yet.
The only evidence is that something is happening...... :-\
IF the blind person is as skeptical as you people are....he will not believe the person. He will first ask how does he know it is because of 'light' and not because of some other phenomenon or some other method used by the other person. What the heck is 'light' anyway?!
Define it and show evidence of how it can exist everywhere and make people 'see' (whatever that is! ::)) without itself being felt or heard or sensed in any way. Rubbish!
That is blind belief in science. Like the emperors new clothes...you claim something exits all around us that cannot be sensed at all. It could very well be proved that DM does not exist at all.
Thats a poor comparison. With the emperor's new clothes, there aren't any clothes, that is the point of fable. With dark matter, there is definitely something going on because we have indirect evidence for it, we just haven't figured it out yet. That is not a faith position, it is an honest position to say we don't know yet
No...you're not saying that 'you don't know'. You are saying that something called Dark Matter that is five times more abundant than normal matter exists all over the universe...and this DM cannot be detected because it does not interact with normal matter at all.
Similarly with Dark Energy and Parallel Universes etc.
These are now fundamental concepts based on which many larger theories of the cosmos are being built.
However, these are only conjectures and the entire model on which these assumptions are made could eventually be proved wrong.
Let me add that I have no problem with such conjectures. They become necessary as we venture into areas that are more and more distant, abstract and nebulous.
But similar conjectures are also necessary in matters dealing with the mind, biofield, death, after-life and so on. These cannot be dismissed as nonsense for want of direct evidence.
Dark matter and dark energy are evidence - whatever the explanations are, they are not going away. Parallel universes are conjectures; nobody is basing anything on their existence, they are conjecture based on possible explanations that are being explored for other reasons.
People are free to speculate as they wish but when there is neither logical basis nor evidence, it is nothing but guesswork...
Dark Matter and Dark Energy are evidence of what exactly?! LOL! ::)
Dark Matter and Dark Energy are evidence of what exactly?! LOL! ::)
At first (and second glance), I thought your comment was from floo, Sririam! Could hardly believe it was you.
The rest of the universe appears to be made of a mysterious, invisible substance called dark matter (25 percent) and a force that repels gravity known as dark energy (70 percent). Scientists have not yet observed dark matter directly.
I see SKofS has explained it better. It is still largely unknown.
No...no. :D Dark Matter and Dark Energy are not evidence for anything. They are the presumed solutions for certain observations.
Scientists found that galaxies are receding away from one another at accelerating rates. This was not possible unless something was pushing them apart... like some sort of an antigravity force. They gave this force the name of Dark energy.
Similarly, scientists calculated, based on gravitational forces in galaxy clusters, that the total mass of the universe was required to be considerably more than was observed in the known universe. Also certain structure formations etc. needed to be explained. Therefore they proposed something they called Dark Matter which is 5 times more abundant than normal matter but which cannot be sensed or detected by our instruments.
So....the 'evidence' are the above observed phenomena. DM and DE are the proposed solutions or answers for these observations. They are not evidence for anything.
In fact, there is absolutely no proof at all for either Dark Matter or Dark energy. They are conjectures that seek to explain the above observations. They could get disproved or eliminated anytime due to alternate explanations.
But when similar conjectures or hypothesis are proposed for phenomena such as NDE's or 'miracle' cures or ESP or for the nature of the mind.....they are dismissed because we cannot prove the existence of such things as after-life, biofield, common consciousness and so on. So our conjectures are invalid! LOL!!!
This is where my earlier statement that 'reason and logic' are subject to background, culture, beliefs and mindset..... and are not uniformly applied, becomes relevant.
What is a skeptic? A dyslexic sceptic.
Don't the Americans spell it with a 'k'?If they do, they shouldn't.