pgrmdave Posted December 2, 2006 Report Share Posted December 2, 2006 The truth helps, but not very much. It's why scapegoats work - we (being humans) would rather see an easy lie than a difficult truth. We'll elect politicians who provide bread and circuses rather than those who would make difficult decisions and try to actually make things better. This is not a good thing, this is not a desirable thing, it merely is the thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sebbysteiny Posted December 2, 2006 Author Report Share Posted December 2, 2006 The merits of an argument matter very little in persuading people. The truth helps, but not very much. It's why scapegoats work You see, this is the nub of why I cannot accept any of the above statements. If it were true, and the merits of the case is all but irrelivent when it comes to making decisions through the consious mind, then every single one of us has not ever looked at the merits of the case. All our opinions are complete tosh based on fancy ties and no substance. Any pretence to to reason must be a complete illusion. Yet I find this completely false. Many of us do require a logical argument and we respond to it much better than, say, a blatant logical facacy. Accademics spend days peacing together ideas and when we read them and agree with some of them, we do so because we all believe it makes sense. Right? Does anybody here actually read something and accept it without also saying that it makes sense to them? And has anybody read something and dismissed it because they found what they perceive to be a fatal flaw? I think the problem is not that people do not look at the merits of the case, but that people often do in too much detail. And when they find what they perceive to be a flaw, or an assumption they cannot accept for probably legitimate reasons, they, and this is the important bit, close their mind to the entire argument. That latter stage is illogical. Somebody might say something which is 90% correct even from your view yet we dismiss that 90% because of the 10% that is not. Blatantly logicaly absurd but that is the way I think it is. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
InfiniteNow Posted December 16, 2006 Report Share Posted December 16, 2006 Yep, not a lot of art here either. Ou est le bœuf?Donde estás el carne? "Beauty is the purgation of superfluities. "-- Michelangelo Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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