In defense of skeptical thinking

by **slimmouse** » Sat May 27, 2006 6:07 pm

The 50 plus pages I refer to, concern the ritual assassination of Princess Diana. If you want a free look at where Icke is coming from, then try this free google video; <a href="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-758681198696417932&q=robots+rebellion">video.google.com/videopla...+rebellion</a> This was recorded in 1994. Look for the flaws if you can and come back to me. Try telling me it is any less pertinent today than it was then ! Enjoy <img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/wink.gif ALT=";)">

by **TroubleFunk** » Sat May 27, 2006 7:58 pm

The only problem I've had with Icke - and I've read and was much enlightened by and actually ENJOYED his work - comes at the end of his books where he attempts to wrap things up and give advice. The advice seems so laughable in the face of what he's described that I feel like he just runs out of steam. The advice comes down to "be good to each other", which is NEVER bad advice..but it's as if what he's describing can't really be fought and that's the best he can do. That may well be the case, mind you. His 9/11 book (I forget the title, it's buried among the 1000 other books out in my garage) is the best example of this. Just my opinion.

by **rothbardian** » Sun May 28, 2006 1:59 am

Just to comment on some of the statements in the email message (found in the first post of this thread)-- "Reasonable people don't believe things just because they are possibly true." In a 'real world' scenario that isn't true...not even close. If I'm walking in a dark alley and I see three huge, menacing guys quickly headed my direction, I do not wait for scientific evidence and DNA lab analysis to form a working conclusion. The above statement is false. In a vast array of real world scenarios it is necessary and wise to act as though certain things are true even thought they are only possibly true. "One does not become irrational or an inquisitor by criticizing and challenging claims that are near zero in probability." There is a strange, unfounded and impractical presumption in this statement. Who makes the determination as to what has a "near zero" probability? For example, who determines there is near zero probability that Bush and Cheney are the direct perpetrators of 9/11? Fox News and the NY Times..or PropagandaMatrix and Rigorous Intuition? In fact, the above statement is so blatantly unrealistic that it clearly rises to the level of intellectual dishonesty. "Skeptics are....not considered mainstream entertainment and they do not get nearly the hearing that....UFO stories get." Really? So Jeff with his open theories and reports about UFOs, about Area 51 hijinks (etc.) and "9/11 Was An Inside Job"...has been appearing nightly on the national network news programs...and the skeptics of these things are relegated to the backwaters of the Internet? Really?? I need to get my Tivo fixed. It hasn't been picking up those programs. "...the vast majority of people are not sympathetic to skeptics but with those we criticize." That statement is false. The skeptics who dutifully scoff at, for example, this astonishing and sinister 9/11 conspiracy, still have agreement and support from the vast majority.

by **robertdreed** » Sun May 28, 2006 5:29 am

No they don't.

by **robertdreed** » Sun May 28, 2006 5:39 am

rothbardian, you have a bad habit of drawing "instructive examples" exclusively from the precincts of your imagination. I mean, really..."If I'm walking in a dark alley and I see three huge, menacing guys quickly headed my direction..." ( What the f%&* you doing in a dark alley in the first place, greenhorn? ) You obviously need to both get out more, and to book it some more. Steep yourself in learning and experience to the point where you're no longer pixilated by knowledge, but sobered by it instead. "George Lewis told the Englishman, the Italian, and the Jew you can't open your mind to all conceivable points of view..." Anyone who thinks they can, hasn't tried hard enough. Who has the time? Oh yeah, that's a Bob Dylan quote. He has quite a few of them. Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=robertdreed>robertdreed</A> at: 5/28/06 3:47 am

by **4911** » Sun May 28, 2006 5:51 am

"easonable people trust impersonal testing such as control group, double-blind studies, and have learned from experience the dangers of wishful thinking, communal reinforcement, confirmation bias, cold reading, and subjective validation." what is cold reading? -------------edit---------------- ah nevermind, googled it. gotcha. Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=4911>4911</A> at: 5/28/06 3:56 am

by **professorpan** » Tue May 30, 2006 1:04 am

<blockquote>Quote:<hr>Professor Pan, several times when I have linked a specific movie to a psycho-political event which I deduced it was meant to relate to, you have merely posted "that's nuts." I think the examples I gave you objected to were 'Chicken Little,' 'Nacho Libre,' and something else.<hr></blockquote> When you suggested that "Nacho Libre" was somehow a PSYOP tied to Mexican politics, I called that nuts. I stand by my judgment. It's nuts. <a href="http://www.nacholibre.com/">www.nacholibre.com/</a>

by **bvonahsen** » Tue May 30, 2006 3:52 pm

Well, I think the larger point is that I, and apparently others too, don't feel like you listen. We tend to feel that you just reflexively say "That's nuts" to anything you don't agree with or that is counter to your worldview. If nothing else, labeling what someone says as "nuts" is dissmisive and rude and you are not likely to get your point across that way. A little diplomacy might help. I understand that you may feel differently. That you may feel like you are open to possibilities, just not in the extreme. All I'm saying is that I'm not getting that on this end of the wire. Skepticism is nice and all but the reason I come here is to confront my own hardened model of the universe, to exercise my credulity, to challenge my beliefs. I'm fairly well educated and well read. Especially in the philosophy and history of math and science and I guess I kind of enjoy having my reality cracked open a bit. I think it's good for you. That doesn't mean I buy into everything I read here or even discuss. I try ideas out, see if they fit and I tend to put things into catagories and make distinctions. Like....knowing vs believing or feeling vs thoughts. Are there UFOs, abductions, remote viewers, psychic abilities, secret plans to rule the world? Hell, I don't know and I'm not absolutely sure they aren't impossible. But I want to talk about these.... I guess they are stories... I want to talk about them without getting dismissed as "nuts" everytime I turn around. kay?

by **professorpan** » Tue May 30, 2006 4:11 pm

<blockquote>Quote:<hr>Well, I think the larger point is that I, and apparently others too, don't feel like you listen. We tend to feel that you just reflexively say "That's nuts" to anything you don't agree with or that is counter to your worldview. If nothing else, labeling what someone says as "nuts" is dissmisive and rude and you are not likely to get your point across that way. A little diplomacy might help.<hr></blockquote> At the risk of being undiplomatic, that's a crock of shit. I do listen, and that should be apparent to anyone who has read my posts. I try very hard to ask polite, relevant questions and not to just let loose with opinion or pure speculation (even in the face of opinions and speculation). But in the case of Nacho Libre as psyop, I think that pushes the boundary of reason to the point where it's okay to say that it's "nuts." If someone seriously started pushing the flat-Earth hypothesis, I'd call that nuts, too. Assertions that are not backed up with a trace of evidence and have near zero probability of being true don't require a skeptic to offer persuasive evidence against them. From the original post: <blockquote>Quote:<hr>There is little virtue in being so uncritical as to consider every idea the equal of every other idea... Reasonable people don't believe things just because they are possibly true. Reasonable people distinguish probable from improbable ideas and notions... One does not become irrational or an inquisitor by criticizing and challenging claims that are near zero in probability. <hr></blockquote>

by **bvonahsen** » Tue May 30, 2006 5:46 pm

So... reasonable people do call people they disagree with "nuts" and ideas they don't like "a crock of shit", is that right? Hows that cool emotionless rationalistic skepticism working out for ya?

by **professorpan** » Tue May 30, 2006 6:04 pm

Please read my post again. I never said any person is nuts, just that a theory is nuts. And yes, people claiming I don't listen is what I term a crock of shit. I do listen, even when I disagree. And I try to respond clearly and logically. But because some people continue to confuse an attack on an idea as an attack on their worth as a human being, I get labeled rude and dismissive. Fuck that.

by **bvonahsen** » Tue May 30, 2006 6:17 pm

Ok, I understand... it's my fault and theirs for misunderstanding. So go ahead, keep doing what you're doing over and over. You're bound to get different results sooner or later.

by **snowlion2** » Tue May 30, 2006 6:44 pm

My somewhere-to-the-right-of-Ghengis Kahn father was visiting for a while yesterday, and went off on one of his typical anti-immigrant rants ("they're in our country, they need to play by our rules") and I suggested that maybe he better hope that at some time in the future the American people didn't elect a Muslim as President who thought his fundamentalist Christianity was an unacceptable belief system. The point of the vignette, if there is one, is that I truly do believe that much of his belief system, at least politically and socially, is seriously flawed. It is, in my opinion, nuts, and I've said so. I hear him, he hears me, and we move on. We don't attempt to resolve it, because it's mostly unresolvable. And for that matter, I suspect, based on past comments, that If I were to post some of my religious beliefs, that the good Professor might well suggest that those were "nuts" as well. But you know what? I wouldn't feel at all attacked, because my beliefs are mine, and their validity doesn't at all depend on someone agreeing with them. And if I did make an attempt at apologetics, I'm sure PP would respond in a logical (though perhaps terse) manner. Then we can choose to continue that discussion...or not. Either way, my personal worth as a human isn't so tied up in any particular belief that an attack on them (or even persuasive evidence that my beliefs aren't true) is equivilant to dismissing my humanity. They're only thoughts, for God's sake. Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=snowlion2>snowlion2</A> at: 5/30/06 4:46 pm

by **rothbardian** » Tue May 30, 2006 7:37 pm

snowlion2-- When you say "feel attacked" -that's a bit of 'straw man'. It's just about insisting on common civility. People who insist on common courtesy and civility do not have a 'complex'. You seem to be suggesting that 'maturity' is at stake, in a manner of speaking. Why not express concern about maturity (as you define it) on both sides then? It's a double standard, IMO.

by **Hugh Manatee Wins** » Tue May 30, 2006 8:30 pm

(in my best Ronald Reagan imitation) "There you go again!" lol. <blockquote>Quote:<hr> But in the case of Nacho Libre as psyop, I think that pushes the boundary of reason to the point where it's okay to say that it's "nuts."<hr></blockquote> I gave you an extremely long RATIONAL justification for my assertion which you haven't touched. Perhaps the topic isn't compelling enough for you to expand on beyond your thumbs down but it is the most compelling topic to me and I really have spent the last few years reading 8 to 18 hours a day on it which is why I gave you that historical list justifying my statement. You have read up on *the Revolution in Military Affairs (mass mind control through media)? *Operation Mockingbird? *COINTELPRO? *Keyword hijacking and alternative narratives? *Social engineering of society through children? *Peventing the 1960s from returning? *The danger to the White House and Pentagon of having Mexican immigrants and young Americans in the streets by the hundreds of thousands over that horrible immigration bill recently? *Covering up the US's criminal partners in Mexico? *The iconic Che Guevera on young American's t-shirts and dorm room walls representing the romantic ideals of revolution and change? (A recent interview with notorious CIA legend Howard Hunt he was asked about the capture and killing of Che Guevera and he said that they wanted to erase Che from history. Hunt huffed irritably that even his own son reveres that damn Che. Oh well. *Simply that a movie title of 'Nacho Libre' uncharacteristically does nothing to sell it to the 14 to 25 year-old target audience and the plot is TOTALLY uncharacteristic for a Jack Black movie? Now there is a Mexican popular resistance leader named NACHO being persecuted by the Mexican government (a division of USA, Inc.) and his spokeswomen-for-the-movement DAUGHTER named 'AMERICA' is carrying that flag. All while US media is demonizing Hugo Chavez who makes the Mexican government look like Nazis by comparison and desperately trying to stop recruiting from totally tanking. If you don't agree that movies for youth aren't mind viruses to innoculate them against the truth about their so-called government, well... To quote you ProfPan- "At the risk of being undiplomatic"...I'd say that anyone who was rational and did a little reading would have to be nuts to say that I was wrong! Ok, keeping it simple: Professor Pan, do you 'believe' in Operation Mockingbird? Why or why not? Wait until the tone to pick up your pencil.....go. lol.

In defense of skeptical thinking

Yesferatu.

The ONLY problem...

real world vs. the laboratory

Re: real world vs. the laboratory

Re: real world vs. the laboratory

dear professor

Re: In defense of skeptical thinking

Re: In defense of skeptical thinking

Re: In defense of skeptical thinking

Re: In defense of skeptical thinking

Re: In defense of skeptical thinking

Re: In defense of skeptical thinking

Re: In defense of skeptical thinking

it's not about "feelings"

Re: PPan-"At the risk of being undiplomatic..."

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