I think B0ycey has it right, that just choosing topics to discuss, with not commitment towards reading bad prose attached, might better facilitate discussion.
I am in more-or-less agreement with his commentaries, too. I think part of it is ego, and part of it is plain confirmation bias. But, to add to it, I think that some amount - and perhaps a significant amount - is probably quite rational. Given that the quality of any information source is uncertain to a degree, individuals must make decisions about weighting information on a basis qualities or characteristics that are distinct from its truth-value. If we believe that our prior opinions are correct - and we mostly do I presume - then the most efficient rule would be to simply weight the salience of information inputs on the basis of its relationship with your priors.
Though, I do disagree with this point.
B0ycey wrote:owever, what I have learnt about opinion is that it can never be right or wrong. An opinion is just that. An opinion. So in reality, nobody is actually proficient in the art of reasoning, because what is reasoning for one person is bias propaganda to someone else.
Even if the method through which one comes to an opinion is faulty, that does not lead to the opinion itself being incapable of holding some truth-value. So long as we are willing to accept that there is a 'correct' and 'incorrect' we must, necessarily, accept that some opinions are 'correct' and some opinions are 'incorrect'.
mikema63 wrote:*shrug* I study biology, take what I say with a grain of salt.
I study economics so I'm far from an authority either.
mikema63 wrote:Just a guess but since the concept of 1 isn't really subject to time or space I don't see why it couldn't be true outside it.
I'm less inclined to disagree with the idea that 1 exists outside of time and space (hereafter: the universe)
*, than that it is necessarily the case that 1 = 1. I see no reason to presume that the Law of Identity - i.e. that A is A or 1 = 1 - binds as it does in our universe. In fact, I don't think we can reasonably ascribe any laws or constraints otherwise to that outside this universe, which is one of the main reasons I see reasoning about the creation of the universe - which implies a time before - as entirely futile - we can't reason about it, literally.
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* In fact, the
Principal of Explosion, if you accept it, would necessitate it does.
That the King is insane is now old news.