Theitards colossal failure in basic reason, leads me to the question, how do you fix stupid? God is, therefore what god says is...without thought. Everyone uses reason to get through daily life...why does religion escape scrutiny, and how do we fix that? I have proceeded along the line of thinking, that knowledge and education can enlighten everyone, and for the most part, have been very successful in doing so, except with the religious...WTF! Look at Jo for example, Holy shit.
So, tell me, how do you fix stupid?
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQv7Tr8HbGE
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Thanks
How do you fix stupid?
Depends on which form.
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Quetiapine oughta fix that stupid. 300 mg before bed and no more religious hallucinations. Won’t get you out of bed in the morning though. HA HA!
No. But seriously. Check out “Wild Wild West” on Netflix. It’s a documentary about Sri Rajneesh - a cult figure back in the eighties.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rajneesh_movement
So get this. Sri and his many followers buy a plot of land in Oregon. The near by city dwellers don’t like it.
In order to win a vote that would give them the right to practice their religion in Oregon - they go all across America picking up homeless people from the streets. Bussing them in to the ashram.
So. These cult people are allowed to have two beers a night. His secretary, Anand Sheela starts adding Haldol to the beer!
Anyway. Can’t remember where I was going with that. Great documentary. I’m gunna read the wiki entry right now.
@Rat spit: documentary about Sri Rajneesh
Yeah. I saw that one. Those people rolled into town in a motorcade of Rolls Royces and just started building stuff. They built their own airfield and flew in Rajneesh's private jet. Watching that doco, I realized that religion can be summed up in a line from that Dire Straits song: "money for nothing and your chicks for free".
@Algebe
Crazy stuff, eh? All the assault rifles? They initiated their own police detachment? I was like, why didn’t I hear about this before? Some crazy ass shit.
But yeah - learjets coming out of nowhere. “Money for nothing” is right. It’s not that easy though. I’ve been pushing my cult on Craigslist for a while now. Not a lot of response. Can’t quite quit my nine to five just yet ;)
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Lack of reason isn't the only cause for people being attracted to religion.
We can fix stupid by first fixing fear, despair, poverty, greed, intolerance and ignorance.
After that stupid should be a push over...but then...we will never be completely rid of religions, unless we also fix intellectual laziness and un-intelligent wish-fulfilment as well. It certainly looks like a lot of work.
In the meantime we just have to keep on being atheists until everyone else comes to their bloody senses and the word and its antonym fall out of use.
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The human brain is a very paradoxical object. It can be one of the most powerful computing tool known of the planet, yet it is so riddled by cognitive errors that we may waste (including myself) most of it's potential during our life.
Neuroscience and intellectual training seems to be our best bets.
“If intellect is welcome anywhere in the other world, it is in hell, not heaven.”
Mark Twain
How do you fix stupid?
It's fairly simple.... Don't push stupid to children. Teach children facts not fiction. Bob's your uncle and Fanny's your aunt.
Re: How do you fix stupid?
Well, a ball peen hammer and/or duct tape has proven to be an effective method from time to time... *shrugging shoulders*...
I have debated religious people, creationists, believers in homeopathy and other silly alternative medicine, historical revisionists, 9/11 conspiracy nutters, flat earthers, and science deniers (and some of them even subscribe to all of the above). I have found or seen no way to actually fix their stupid. The best one can do, in my opinion, is to instead target other readers with the debate (under the disguise of a debate with the stupid), to give them the facts (or at least a more nuanced view) so they do not fall into the stupid trap, or, hopefully, start thinking their way out of it.
https://xkcd.com/386/
Edit: fixed flawed sentence.
My view on this is simple. Subject the bullshit emanating from stupid people to every last round of ordnance in the discoursive arsenal. Be merciless in this matter. Don't stop until the bullshit has been turned into a radioactive crater full of lava.
Eventually, some will wake up and smell the coffee. The ones that don't, you relegate to the playpen.
Though on a tangential diversion, ignorance eventually yields to sufficient education. What is far harder to combat is doctrinally motivated duplicity. That requires you to be even more merciless whenever you encounter it.
I like this, and try somewhat to follow a like model...not ruthlessly, but structurally. Maybe a little more cutting educational recourse should be applied.
Thanks Cal.
@Calilasseia: "Bullshit?" "Stupid People." "Really?" I think we are corrupting you. You keep talking like that and your mother is not going to let you play with us any more. "Eventually someone will wake up and smell the coffee." (You are beginning to use common idioms?) At least you finished the post on a high note. I suspect we are a negative influence on your literary talent, unless of course you are attempting to sound more like the common man. :-) In which case, this is probably great practice for you.
@Cog Re: To Cali - "I think we are corrupting you. You keep talking like that and your mother is not going to let you play with us any more."
Hell, Cog, even when Cali is "slumming" he still beats the bajeebies out of most of us in the literary arena... *chuckle*...
Well the tone of my last post was heavily influenced by dealing with a spectacularly odious example of doctrinally motivated duplicity on the AR Facebook page, which was almost certainly amplified to a less than delightful extent, by dealing the previous night with yet another pyroclastic outburst of gastro-intestinal vulcanism arising from my diabetes medication. In my case, Metformin has proven to be a double edged sword with a vengeance - it keeps my blood sugar levels within safe limits, but leaves me wondering some nights if I'm going to be found dead in my bed having choked on my own vomit. Experiencing this does not predispose one to being merciful toward egregious mendacity.
Not that I was predisposed to be merciful toward this to begin with, of course, having seen enough of said malfeasance over the past decade, to be filled with the desire to break out ordnance of a sort other than the merely discoursive. To a certain extent I've become accustomed to, for example, creationist mischief, and usually it takes a special brand thereof to motivate firing up the flaming pitchfork, but my encounters with snide trolling for its own sake are of much more recent vintage, and as a corollary, the "Launch on warning" modus operandi puts in a more frequent appearance when this brand of pestilence raises its head above the parapet. Blowhards who simply post inflammatory and provocative lies about atheism on the AR Facebook page, for no other reason than to engage in narcissistic stroking of their Internet phalluses, I treat with carborane superacid levels of scorn and derision.
@ Calli
Thank you for that...I laughed me tartan socks off. I needed a start like that to my Monday Morning...*still giggling*. Although your diabetic travails are not subject for amusement the whole piece convulsed my warped sense of humour...
@ Cog
That'll larn ye to fling poo before 9am....
@Calilasseia: WICKED! And all is right in the world once again!
Well, shit, Cal. Depending on your severity of insulin resistance, you might want to try the saliva of a Gila Monster. Look it up...exendin4 doesn't have the side effects of metformin.
Somewhere I have what amounts to an after dinner speech I wrote following a tonsillectomy. You may find that amusing too. I'll have to dig up the requisite file ...
@Cali, Cog, and Old Man
Ahhhhh... that whole exchange was incredibly delightful. Put a warm fuzzy feeling in my heart, and a huge smile on my face.... Thank you all for that.... *contented sigh*...
doG, after thinking about your question for awhile, I have come to the following conclusion. Your question reflects a thought I have had for years. If we (atheists) can see through the smoke and mirrors, why do so many still fall into the trap? I believe the answer has multiple layers. There are people who believe 100% what the Bible says, and what is preached to them in church. They probably look at any evidence (facts) as the work of the devil, to undermine god’s plan. They are also the ones who preach to their children and grandchildren. Then there are the folks who pretend. They go to church because they enjoy seeing people there, it gives them a social life. Let’s not forget, lots of relationships, and fucking around, stems from church. They nit pick what they think is important (if they believe any of it at all) and go along with the rest. In my opinion, I despise these people the most! They are the epitome of hypocrisy! After these two groups, we get into the folks who believe, but may not like church, folks unsure of what they believe, and end up at us atheists. I do believe the numbers of people who swallow religion whole is shrinking. Information is at everyone’s fingertips now. Hopefully the believers who are ignorant of information that has been purposely kept from them, can educate themselves in these matters. The people who refuse to believe facts easily proven to them are the stupid ones. They prefer the power and protection of superstition over knowledge. Hopefully, in time, education will trump superstitious stories and broken promises.
Yup...I think we might all agree with you. I want to resolve this failure in reason. So, why, is important. I need to figure out the mechanics of the process, to break the chain.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkFtwOIr4NA
If I only had a brain!
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