Being told my beliefs are wrong...

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Don't ya just hate it?

PS: I don't care what you believe in, just as long as you don't force it upon me or say it's wrong or if your beliefs are correct. Life's a mystery and it's what you make of it.

Definitely. I hate when I hear anyone basically tell someone that his or her beliefs are wrong. One belief isn't better or more valid than another. I have problems with high and mighty, self-righteous types of people. Unfortunately, I've met a lot of those sorts of people.

Last edited by Bec on 05 Nov 2005, 2:04 am, edited 1 time in total.

Could you please be more specific?

I assume he means religious and philosophical beliefs (ones that cannot be proven right or wrong).

Sean, I think 85% of the ideas that you post on this site oppose my beliefs.
If I think that my beliefs are right and that opposing view points are wrong headed,
then I think that 85% of the ideas that you post on this site are wrong headed.

That specific enough.

And heaven forbid that ANYONE post ANY possibly contravertial opinions! Especially not in the Politics, Philosophy and Religion forum! *gasp*

Wait just a minute here! How can they be wrong if they are your beliefs?

Please tell me that was sarcasm.

They can change.

As long as you don't act like you're better than anyone else if you have your beliefs, I am happy.

Yes and no. Yes, there are many things definable as right or wrong, true or false, etc.

Philosophy may have many variables and worthy points of view.

And to hear a different drummer may encourage stepping to a different beat all the while arriving at the same. correct destination.

Sort of like computer software programs, allowing many different ways to make use of athe same utility.

Different is good. Diversity can be a strength by which great things can be acheived.

I agree that there are many worthy points of view; HOWEVER, something is either true or it is false. Example: There either is or is not a god. Just because one person believes that there is a god and that works for them, and another believes that there is no god and that works for them, does NOT mean that they can both be right. The only reason people have trouble with this is it really can't be proven either way. Just ebcause we can't prove it odesn't mean that it can be true and false at the same time.

Copied/adapted from a journal entry I wrote on another site:

From philosophy class:

A proposition is the predication of some property of some subject. (i.e. S is P)

Propositions are independent of time, people and culture. ((Don't argue this. For the love of all you hold dear don't argue this. I get enough of that from the numbskulls in class. I'll explain it better in a moment.))

Any proposition is absolutely true or absolutely false.

A belief is a proposition someone says "yes" to (if someone denies a proposition they say "yes" to its negative, also a proposition).

So, any belief is absolutely true or absolutely false because beliefs are propositions.

The "Fun" Part

OK, so before I put up a picture, you probably had a belief as to what I looked like. That belief was either absolutely true or absolutely false. It wasn't "true for you" because no matter what you thought I looked like, I looked like what I really looked like. Even if everyone on WP I knew had the same mental image of me, if it was not actually how I looked, it was absolutely false. Now if I had never posted a picture there would have been no way for you to prove if I looked the way you thought I did but that didn't change the fact that your belief had a truth value, i.e., was either absolutely true, or absolutely false.

Get it?

If you do, you're smarter than everyone in the class but me.

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I hate relativism. If you say something vague, like "democracy is good," (I'm just pulling a random statement out of my ass here, this isn't expressing my views, I'm horribly apathetic) the only reason you'd have trouble imagining a truth value is that "good" is a vague word. What do you mean by "good?" Do you mean "democracy helps every single person it governs over?" If so, then that is a false statement (not bothering to quantify "helps" but I think you get the idea). If you more mean "democracy is better for families than a government which allows only one child per family" then perhaps you did make a true statement. The statement "democracy is good" cannot be both true and false at once IF everyone means the same thing by it. Usually they don't, but once you set forth a very precise stipulative definition, you have an absolutely true or absolutely false statement.

Which actually NOT to say I'm against diversity in religion or politics. If something "works" for you, I think, more power to you. What I'm saying here is that there ARE ultimate truths, and your beliefs CAN be wrong.

IMO, even if they are wrong, if they work for you/benefit you/don't harm others, that's fine.

((And also note I'm not endorsing anything in this thread as far as what I think you "should" believe. I'm just saying that yes, something is true, or it is not.))

I think the fundamentals of our conclusions are quite similar in that the end result is to encourage individuality of thought within a basis of positive principles yielding an acceptable life.

Yay!

Just making sure you weren't trying to say "everyone's right" as opposed to "everyone is entitles to their beliefs."

yes. Allthogh, it happens all the time.

It happens more than I'd like it to. I used to have a "friend" who took every opportunity to play devil's advocate and telling me I'm wrong -- all the while professing to have the same beliefs that I do. This is AFTER I told him repeatedly that I am not a fan of debates. Needless to say, we are no longer friends.