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Some Thoughts about Critical Thinking

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dream_weaver

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Your words are thoughtful.

 

I have read every kind of discourse in these forums, from insipid, dogmatic, evasive, rationalistic, parroting, to thoughtful, heartfelt, brilliant, awe-inspiring, lucid, enlightening... we get people in here from all walks of life, every level of education, every leaning in politics, philosophy, religion, we have some incredibly intelligent people and a few crackpots posting here...

 

I think an open forum will get all of the above and it can be a good thing... certainly it is good sometimes.

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Reading that, I'm reminded of a point Ridpath had made in Religion vs. Man - speaking of tolerance. "Unbounded tolerance is not a virtue." It had to do with the eastern mystics, and the notion of "no-mind" - kind of a self-imposed, frontal lobotomy - in contrast with the western mystics, who picked up their swords and went out on their crusades. To which he added: "At least they had a purpose."

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Reading that, I'm reminded of a point Ridpath had made in Religion vs. Man - speaking of tolerance. "Unbounded tolerance is not a virtue." It had to do with the eastern mystics, and the notion of "no-mind" - kind of a self-imposed, frontal lobotomy - in contrast with the western mystics, who picked up their swords and went out on their crusades. To which he added: "At least they had a purpose."

Well um ok, but who would you rather have for a neighbor?

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Understood, tadmjones. That does leave the fuller context of the overall message of Ridpath's presentation aside. If you consider where the west matured to during the 1700-1900 vs. the east during the same period, I rather enjoy the land of eternal spring made possible by discovery of HVAC.

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Dream-weaver:

This forum is very meaningful to me. It is, as you said, the place were ideas and critical thinking can be challenged. Our culture is dominated by advertizing media, infotainment distractions, fashions, fads, and celebrity role-models who promote altruism, while securing their fortunes in foreign bank accounts. This very well could be the market place of a popular culture trend that could redeem Western Civilization. I can only hope that rational people everywhere develop the principles of Objectivism into their normal practices, bestow them on their children, and begin a process of restoring reason in a world that seems, at times, quite opposed to reason.

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If I were to reword part of that to: It is, as you said, the place where ideas can be challenged by critical thinking,

 

Many folks express the sense that there is something essentially wrong in the world. The news media, politics/government, education along with your 'shortlist' seek in some way to fill, or address that gap, seeking to fill, if you will, the void created by viewing reason and logic thru a false alternative as being either wrong or useless - tying into another point Piekoff puts forth  in his Introduction to Logic.

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Understood, tadmjones. That does leave the fuller context of the overall message of Ridpath's presentation aside. If you consider where the west matured to during the 1700-1900 vs. the east during the same period, I rather enjoy the land of eternal spring made possible by discovery of HVAC.

Huge fan of HVAC, here too, but still might have to give a hat tip to eastern modalities and their influence on the crude western mindset, we did have to get comfortable with the idea of not being able to make cold in order to make it :)

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Would you attribute HVAC to the eastern modalities, as you put it, or more to Thomas Aquinas' attempt to integrate his discovery of Aristotle's works with the dogmas of the church?

Edited by dream_weaver
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Dream-weaver:

This forum is very meaningful to me. It is, as you said, the place were ideas and critical thinking can be challenged. Our culture is dominated by advertizing media, infotainment distractions, fashions, fads, and celebrity role-models who promote altruism, while securing their fortunes in foreign bank accounts. This very well could be the market place of a popular culture trend that could redeem Western Civilization. I can only hope that rational people everywhere develop the principles of Objectivism into their normal practices, bestow them on their children, and begin a process of restoring reason in a world that seems, at times, quite opposed to reason.

 

I agree with almost all of what you said except for ... "restoring reason in a world..."

 

In some sense it may partly be true .. politically and economically compare now to the founding of America, but in the entire scope of mysticism, ethics, etc. this is not so much about "restoring" it as popularizing its recent profound consistent discovery and application... Rand's work.

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