--- Ronn!Blankenship <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > At 01:23 PM 7/4/03 -0400, David Hobby wrote: > >iaamoac wrote: > > > > > > --- In [EMAIL PROTECTED], David Hobby <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > If you want a serious discussion of religion, we should > > > > probably all agree to adopt an agnostic viewpoint for the duration. > > > > > > But what kind of discussion is it where one adopts a viewpoint that > > > one does not seriously believe? Why should those who disagree with > > > agnostics be forced to adopt their viewpoint? > > > > "Agnostic" means "not knowing", right? I don't really > >see that there is much to DISAGREE with there. You might personally > >KNOW, but should be open to the possibility that others don't. > > > > I'm not sure what you are getting at in the last paragraph. Let's change > the topic under discussion from religion to astronomy (or math, or physics, > > or some other subject at which you may be considered an expert). When I go > > into the classroom, it is assumed that I know something about the topic, > and that it is not just a possibility but a certainty that the students in > the class do not know as much about it as I do. So what I do is to share > as much of my knowledge of the topic with them as is possible. However, it > > seems as if the above is saying that instead of sharing my knowledge with > others, if they do not already know what I know, I should pretend that I > don't know either? Is that the correct interpretation, or am I misreading > what the above says? > > > > >If you aren't > > > ...open to the possibility that others don't know (?) ... > > > >, there really isn't much to say, is there? > > > > But since I am open to the possibility that others don't know as much as I > do about certain topics, I am willing to share what I do know in order to > help others learn more about those topics. Do we agree, or am I missing > the point you were trying to make? > > >
Ronn, I think you are missing the point. You are getting cought up in alternate interpritations of the words being used. You have gone off down a metiforical path which has little to do with the original conversation. I could easily repond with "Take yourself out of the position of teacher and treat the others in the disagreement as if they were equals."
I admit that I might have phrased that better by not using myself as the teacher in the example: that was simply the first example I thought of.
but then I would taking that path with you and that would be counter productive.
I don't mean to be difficult here, but the statement
"You might personally KNOW, but should be open to the possibility that others don't"
seems to suggest, or at least allow for, the possibility that someone participating in the discussion may "KNOW" some information which the others in the discussion do not. If such a person is a participant, shouldn't that person contribute to the discussion to the best of his/her knowledge and ability? Perhaps my example about teaching was not the best one I could have used: I was simply trying to say that there are situations where it is clear that one person in a group has knowledge which the others do not have but are interested in obtaining, so it seems reasonable for that person to share his/her knowledge with the others. If the classroom setting seems too structured, the same thing (ideally) happens in a department seminar, a business meeting, or a simple bull session where all the participants are (more or less) equal: a person who has particular information shares it with the others so they may have it.
Let em see if I can help.
The Idea here is that two equaly intelegant people
I think this, or the examples I gave above, has little to do with the intelligence of the participants -- everyone in each of the situations is presumably of comparable intelligence -- but one of knowledge which one or more people may have acquired through study and experiences which others in the group may not have had.
have a disagreement on of somthing or other we wil call (X). Person (A) believes that (X) is True, but person (B) does not. If they are going to have an enlightened disagreement where each is open to the posability that they migt be wrong they should each start from a position that the -truth value- of A is unknown, and then describe to the other how a postition of truth or falsification is reached.
However, the statement I referred to above seems to allow for the possibility that some person (A) may "KNOW" that (X) is true, which would seem to be a stronger statement that "(A) believes that (X) is true." Assuming, then, that such a person exists, how should s/he participate in the discussion?
Persons of faith tend not to want to engage in this type of discussion about their faith. Even though they are willing to have (and often require) this type of discussion on every other topic.
Is "faith" here the same thing as "knowledge"?
IOW, I think what I am asking here boils down to whether all participants in the discussion agree from the outset that discovering the truth value of (X) is at least possible (and so conceivably is already known by someone somewhere), or if it is to be assumed a priori that the truth value of (X) is in fact unknowable?
--Ronn! :)
I always knew that I would see the first man on the Moon.
I never dreamed that I would see the last.
--Dr. Jerry Pournelle
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