Again, same question: Why are we conflating "beliefs" with "understandings and answers?"
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What make you think your answers are more correct than others?
- Thread starter Spirit of Light
- Start date
Again, same question: Why are we conflating "beliefs" with "understandings and answers?"
Martin
Spam, wonderful spam (bloody vikings!)
Because they often are conflated, or muddled up.
My understanding of basic science is good enough to know if a certain claim is going against well established evidence based understanding of reality (for example there is no scientific basis of a global flood or an original human pair or a 6 day creation etc.) In this I have very little doubt. Science can change of course, but its very very very unlikely that these basic facts will be changing. These are a bit like the scientific fact that earth is the 3rd planet from the sun. Unlikely to change.
I have had spiritual/mystical experiences that inclines me to a certain understanding of the nature of the "divine" that makes me skeptical of certain conceptions of God (eg. a God who micromanages human affairs by sending down laws, gets offended if a wrong divinity is worshipped, sends people to hell or heaven based on belief etc.) as anything other than human projection of themselves onto this divinity. I could be completely deluded here of course, but I would need convincing through evidence and reasons.
TagliatelliMonster
Veteran Member
This is formulated in a bit to generalized fashion for my taste. As if my answer about anything is by default "more correct" then others. This of course is not the case.
In general, I would say that that which determines which answer is more correct then another, is how well it matches the facts of reality. In other words: evidence determines this.
TagliatelliMonster
Veteran Member
And considering how they all make the same kind of claims using the same type of "evidence", more then likely they are all wrong.
I don't, which makes the question moot, due to the false assumption in it. What makes you think that all other people think their view is more correct? Quite the generalisation.
As Salix said, beliefs are different, due to the wide range of experiences on this planet.
Spirit of Light
Be who ever you want
The question was meant for those who dont "accept " other answers than what they them selves believe to be true.
Its not a competition to find who has the right answer.
I certainly do not hold the truth
Actions are measured by their fruit.
We defied God (bible commandments), which made the world a mess.
"Thou shalt not kill" (TEN COMMANDMENTS). Terrorism (a worry of mankind) prompted war, which openly defied God. God wanted to handle terrorists because He knew we'd attack the wrong enemy.
But wasn't the enemy in the Middle East somewhere? Wasn't Iraq in the MIddle East somewhere? Well, al Qaeda terrorists also were trained in Arizona to fly planes. Does that mean that the United States was/is supposed to attack Arizona and torture citizens in Arizona (because they are very close to where the terrorists trained?)? When defying God by making a war, it would help to fight the right people.
The United States lost the war in Iraq, after killing 1,000,000 innocent Iraqis (who were not involved in terrorism), and after creating torture camps. Though the United States was able to defeat Iraq (which had already been defeated in 1991, and its weapons taken away, and it was inspected for Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)), the US lost thousands of troops, maimed many more veterans, and still didn't achieve victory (but did achieve resentment which would last for thousands of years). Iraqis still resent Alexander the Great. Their grudges last for millenia.
Revelation (a chapter of the bible that predicts future events) said that we would face God's wrath if we attacked Babylon. The Religious Right now tries to redefine the name "Babylon" and say that it isn't the city that has been there for hundreds of years. While it is true that there was an earlier Babylon, the current Babylon in Iraq was the one mentioned in Revelation. That would make the United States the Whore of Babylon (as defined by Revelation 17:18), and it would make W. Bush the beast (Satanic demon from the bottomless pit of hell), and it would make Bush Sr. the dragon (Satanic demon from the bottomless pit of hell, and father of the beast).
Everything that occurred in the world today happened the way Revelation said it would. Revelation said that the one that was and is no more is again. That refers to the administration of the Bush family. When Bush Sr. was no longer president, and Bill Clinton was president, that was "the one that was and is no more." When W. Bush was elected, the Bush family administration was again. So the details of the bible prophecy were fulfilled.
Revelation warned us about the richest nation in the world, and the most powerful nation in the world attacking Babylon...that could only be the United States. The bible described the Whore of Babylon as being a sinful nation (sex scandals like the scandal of George Bush Sr. and Jennifer Fitzgerald), and the bible warned us of fancy jewels, and specifically mentioned pearls (like the simple pearl necklace that Barbara Bush mentioned repeatedly). Revelation wrote of flaming missiles in the sky...you didn't see that hundreds of years ago...only in modern times did such warfare exist.
Satan rules by fear, lies, and greed. Satan often pretends to be God..."fightin' evil" like W. Bush. In recent times, we've seen the homeless ignored (so now we have a huge homeless problem, and disease attacks them). We've seen plagues (predicted in Revelation 15) for defying God and warring with Iraq.
People have defied God in the past. Much of the entire world was corrupt so flooded by God (Noah's flood). Sodom was corrupt so destroyed. But after defying God, the world continued to exist. This time, however, the world will be destroyed (these are the end times), because mankind's intentional transgressions against God, having been warned repeatedly by God, are so great that all will be destroyed, and prayer won't help. Iraq was a very special place for God. It was the location of the Tower of Babel, and the location of Eden (between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers). God never destroyed the whole world before, but mankind never hurt God as much as they did in recent times.
The environment is polluted, and Global Warming is also destroying the world. Greed prompted oil drilling (instead of solar power). Offshore spills, pollution, and Global Warming followed.
Following the wrong leader is a package deal. You not only have one problem (plagues), you have many problems, all created by the same leader (pollution, Global Warming, wars, torture camps, etc). God warned us.
W. Bush and Cheney sent Wilson to tell lies about Niger in order to start yet another war, so the US could take Uranium yellow cake and the land of Niger. Wilson refused to lie on their behalf, so they outed his CIA wife, Valery Plame, resulting in the death of CIA agents who associated with her.
Follow the blood trail, the greed trail, and the lies (lied us into war with Babylon, then lied about torture camps by redefining the word "torture)." At the end of the trail, you will find Satan.
Judge not lest ye be judged (Jesus). Yet, if we don't judge Satan, we are doomed to follow Him.
Martin
Spam, wonderful spam (bloody vikings!)
I think it's more nuanced than that. People do of course have different experiences, but there is an inherent subjectivity about "spiritual" experiences. Such experiences are often interpreted or explained according to pre-existing beliefs, views and assumptions.
Added to that, many religious practices are designed with a particular goal in mind, or at least intended to point the seeker in a particular direction.
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Depends on the subject area. For a lot of things - most things, in fact - I acknowledge that there are people who are more correct than me.
If you're talking about religious and theological subjects... the thing that makes me believe that my understanding is more correct than theists' understanding is that I've talked to many theists about the support for their beliefs and found that support to be lacking at best and often completely absent.
A Vestigial Mote
Well-Known Member
I simply don't have the types of answers I assume you are referring to here. I don't have them. That doesn't mean, however, that my not having them isn't for good reasons. There are very good reasons I don't go around pretending I have those sorts of answers... because I understand what it would actually take to truly have those answers. This is something lacking quite a bit in probably every person who has ever held onto a religious notion as if it were somehow "the truth." I have thus far always been extremely certain that religious people I come in contact with who profess to have "the answer" don't have what it takes to truly hail the articles that they ultimately present to me as the "truth"... even as I have no substitute article of belief of my own to offer them. This is not somehow a problem, or some conflict or contradiction I am holding onto. Not in the least. I don't have the answers... and I know I don't for very specific reasons. Reasons that have an extremely wide scope of applicability to all of the rest of humanity as far as I can tell. Which is why I feel confident in telling others that they don't really have the answers either... which necessarily means that they are only pretending. And not only that... but because of the availability of good evidence (that is... ZERO availability) for these kinds of "answers", it also necessarily means that even if one of these people is correct about anything in their religious tenets of a specifically metaphysical/supernatural/spiritual nature, they are correct by accident.
I believe the only One Who possesses perfect knowledge is God and that He conveys this to us in each age through His Messengers.
I think what matters more than being right or wrong is that we love each other. The world is tired of arguments and endless disputes but never gets tired of love.
RestlessSoul
Well-Known Member
Let me begin by defining correct. To call an idea correct, I require empirical evidence that that idea accurately describes a portion of reality. Ideas that are not derived from experience and confirmed to anticipate future experience cannot be called correct. They are not useful answers, and they are not knowledge. If a person tells you he lives five blocks north and three blocks east of the pier, that can only be knowledge, or correct, if it can be confirmed to be correct empirically.
So, given that, any answer that derives from sound reasoning and which can be demonstrated to be correct empirically can be called that, and nothing else. When that's how I've derived my conclusion, and it disagree with another's who uses a different method and comes up with claims that are not tied to observation and cannot be demonstrated to be correct, the latter is deemed either incorrect if it can be disconfirmed empirically, or "not even wrong" (not a scientific proposition) if it cannot. Facts are ideas that pass these tests, and knowledge the collection of such ideas held. And if somebody makes a claim contradicting a conclusion arrived at through sound reasoning, I deem it incorrect, and that derived empirically which contradicts it and can actually predict outcomes (more) correct.
If one develops these skills and accumulates beliefs accordingly, eschewing all ideas not able to pass the empirical test, he will have a more accurate and reliable map of how things work. A literal map is, as you know, a diagram in which elements of the diagram stand for roads and other features of the terrain from which it was derived. If one doesn't use empirical methods such as aerial photography as Google maps did to construct its maps, the map won't correspond properly to the terrain mapped. It might show roads that don't exist, or omit ones that do, or show connections between them that aren't out there. You can see the problem with that. No other method contributes to an accurate map than observing reality and correctly mapping it. No map made by other means can be called correct. If one map gets us there and another doesn't, the latter is incorrect, and the former (more) correct.
If somebody tells me that prayer can result is an alteration of reality apart from a placebo effect on the believer but cannot demonstrate this effect, and another shows me empirical evidence that prayer does not effect material outcomes, then I consider the latter a (more) correct understanding.
I recommend this method exclusively for personal mapmaking. There is no prayer-works road on my personal map, and so I don't pray. Others pray, but if it doesn't make what is prayed for any more likely to occur, they've got the prayer-works road on their map, and they go down it to nowhere.
I've already shared with you that I consider the spiritual road that many tell us that they are on such a path simply because none has ever told me what truth (actual road) they have discovered, or shown me why I should consider it truth as well (add it to my map), so I don't. I don't consider those answers or knowledge or correct. I understand that others might, but they aren't going to convince me of that without demonstrating that knowledge and how they use it to their benefit.
Whatever it is that one is seeking going down this spiritual path, what is the hope of arriving there if the destination doesn't exist, or one takes a path that can't get him to it if it does, that is, if one's map is incorrect and suggests a path that doesn't get to the desired destination? On what basis does one call such beliefs correct, knowledge, or answers if not empirically?
I had false beliefs acquired by faith when I was a Christian. They were roads and destinations on my map with no correlate on the actual landscape, and so naturally, I wandered a philosophical desert for what seemed like forty years searching for what was not to be found. This is the cost of holding wrong beliefs, and avoiding this is the incentive to maintain an accurate map, that is, allow no false beliefs to appear on it. I rewrote my map by excluding the faith-based roads, and have been reaching desired destinations since.
One can resolve the issues that still trouble many on a perpetual but fruitless path, people looking for meaning where there is none, people looking for answers that simply aren't available. By understanding this, he can directed his attention elsewhere (travel roads that actually do produce results as determined empirically).
So, in summary, I judge the correctness of an idea by its fruits. Only ideas that can be applied to produce desired outcomes are deemed correct, and only ideas derived empirically can do this.
Nimos
Well-Known Member
It is represented in 2d for practical reasons, depending on which method you use to unwrap a sphere you will get different distortions, which is why certain countries might appear smaller or larger than they actually are. But in books its obviously more useful to show Earth in 2d compared to 3d.
Spirit of Light
Be who ever you want
Dang it....i need to buy a sherical screen to use Google maps when I planing my next trip abroud
I believe if we do our part, God will do his part to guide.
This is a Du'a after Ziyarat Auli-Yaseen, and it talks about the different types of light:
اَللَّهُمَّ إِنِّي أَسْأَلُكَ أَنْ تُصَلِّيَ عَلَىٰ مُحَمَّدٍ
allahumma inni as'aluka an tusalliya `ala muhammadin
O Allah, I beseech You to send blessings upon Muhammad
نَبِيِّ رَحْمَتِكَ وَكَلِمَةِ نُورِكَ
nabiyyi rahmatika wa kalimati nurika
the Prophet of Your mercy and the Word of Your Light,
وَأَنْ تَمْلَأَ قَلْبِي نُورَ ٱلْيَقِينِ
wa an tamla'a qalbi nura alyaqini
and to fill in my heart with the illumination of certitude,
وَصَدْرِي نوُرَ ٱلإِيـمَانِ
wa sadri nura al-imani
my chest with the illumination of faith,
وَفِكْرِي نُورَ ٱلنِّيَّاتِ
wa fikri nura alnniyyati
my intellect with the illumination of honest intentions,
وَعَزْمِي نُورَ ٱلْعِلْمِ
wa `azmi nura al`ilmi
my determination with the illumination of knowledge,
وَقُوَّتِي نُورَ ٱلْعَمَلِ
wa quwwati nura al`amali
my strength with the illumination of work,
وَلِسَانِي نُورَ ٱلصِّدْقِ
wa lisani nura alssidqi
my tongue with the illumination of honesty,
وَدِينِي نُورَ ٱلْبَصَائِرِ مِنْ عِنْدِكَ
wa dini nura albasa'iri min `indika
my religion with the illumination of insights from You,
وَبَصَرِي نُورَ ٱلضِّيَاءِ
wa basari nura alddiya'i
my sight with the illumination of brightness,
وَسَمْعِي نُورَ ٱلْحِكْمَةِ
wa sam`i nura alhikmati
my hearing with the illumination of wisdom,
وَمَوَدَّتِي نُورَ ٱلْمُوَالاَةِ لِمُحَمَّدٍ وَآلِهِ
wa mawaddati nura almuwalati limuhammadin wa alihi
and my faculty of love with the illumination of sincere loyalty to Muhammad and his Household,
عَلَيْهِمُ ٱلسَّلاَمُ
`alayhim alssalamu
peace be upon them,
حَتَّىٰ أَلْقَاكَ وَقَدْ وَفَيْتُ بِعَهْدِكَ وَمِيثَاقِكَ
hatta alqaka wa qad wafaytu bi`ahdika wa mithaqika
so that I, when I meet You, will have fulfilled the pledge and covenant that I made with You
فَتُغَشِّيَنِي رَحْمَتَكَ
fatughashshiyani rahmataka
and then Your mercy will encompass me.
يَا وَلِيُّ يَا حَمِيدُ
ya waliyyu ya hamidu
O Protector! O Worthy of all praise!
اَللَّهُمَّ صَلِّ عَلَىٰ مُحَمَّدٍ
allahumma salli `ala muhammadin
O Allah, bless Muhammad (al-Mahdi)
حُجَّتِكَ فِي أَرْضِكَ
hujjatika fi ardika
Your proof in Your land,
....
(The Du'a continues)