_LiveFree_

What the hell? Are you serious with this junk? Everyone has their moments. I never said they didn't. What I said was that from the very beginning she demonstrated the capacity to move to rationality when confronted with reason. Of course I knew from the start that sometimes she'll be irrational. Just as she knew sometimes I would be too. We weren't looking for perfection. We were looking for capacity to reason. I have to keep reiterating this point with you. Why? With anyone who is acting irrationally, you approach with reason, patience, and calmness. Then you see what you get in return. In my girlfriends case, I get reason, patience, and calmness back. In other cases, like with you, I get defensiveness, contradictions, lack of comprehension, and shifting definitions. This results in my patience running thin, meaning I'm experiencing frustration. And my judgment informs me that, because you are unwilling to acknowledge that my answer to your initial question to me in this thread was "Honesty", you're likely going to defend your position no matter what; irrationally. Which makes this a waste of my time. I'd love, LOVE, for you to prove me wrong. If I'm wrong, then I've made a serious error and will now have an opportunity to grow. If I'm right, then A: I leave this convo behind saving me time and energy, or B: continue on wasting my life with you. It comes down to judgement, and I trust mine because I've spent the time and energy earning it. (iPhone post. Sorry for grammar if it's bad)

How the hell are you not getting this? I didn't dismiss her after five minutes because she was rational and capable of challenging her beliefs. I knew very quickly that she was very capable of being rational. That judgement comes waaaaaaaaaaaayy before an intimate relationship. What you just said here was that you need an intimate relationship with someone before you know if they are irrational or not. Do you see that that is what you said?

Let me rephrase. Why do you take issue with people using their own judgement in order to maximize the efficient use of their time? And you have this idea that judging someone to be irrational is the same as finding out they hold an irrational belief. A person can be rational and hold an irrational belief through error. When you use reason to expose the error, then you find out if they are capable of being reasonable/rational as they will at the very least begin to consider the alternative you put forth. Some beliefs, like the belief in a god, are so deeply seeded that it would take an inordinate amount of time to expose the error. There is no problem in "knowing" people who hold irrational beliefs. Just don't intertwine your life with them. There are degrees on which you should interact with people. You make love and share your most deepest secrets with your life partner, not your barber. You can hang out and play ping-pong with a friend who goes to church, but you wouldn't want to marry into his family. And you never ever ever want to hang around people because you believe --maybe irrationally!-- that they want to change. This is called "using your judgement". No one else except your closest family is your responsibility. You owe no one anything. The other part of using your judgement is knowing when a member of your closest family holds a fundamental belief that you know is an error. You talk to them, try to get them to see reason, but they constantly and consistently respond to you with irrationalities. "Using your judgement", in this instance, is knowing when you are losing your life to this person's dysfunction, have been victimized by this person because of their beliefs, and can honestly state that the likelyhood of them ever changing is near zero. The cost of staying with this person is not just yourself but all of the other people who would lose out on you because you are sacrificing yourself to this one completely irrational person. If your response to the question "Do you trust your own judgement?" is "What does that mean?" I would strongly suggest you look into that like yesterday. The correct answer to this question is an honest "F--ckin' A right I do!" Trust is always earned through consistent action that does not undermine the well being of an individual. My girlfriend trusts me because over the course of 3 years I have consistently behaved in the following manner toward her: no shouting, no name-calling, no cursing, no violence, no mind-games, no manipulation, always answer her questions honestly, acknowledge when I screw up then apologize and right the wrong, being considerate towards her needs, always asking how she is doing/does she need anything/tell me about your day, listening intently, being patient and honest and direct and calm when she is acting irrationally, being angry without being hurtful when she has wronged me. And on and on and on. She knows damn well that at my deepest level I have her health and happiness set as a priority. The actions show this and over time have allowed her a foundation to build a mountain of trust on. If you don't trust your own judgement, then you haven't been acting in your own best interest. In some way, you are betraying yourself so that someone else in your life can mistreat you. And this is at the very core of what Freedomain Radio is all about. You should think very hard about what you're doing here.

Before you give them a solution you have to help them understand the problem. Most people see the problem in their own personal circumstances. So when speaking with them, start with their circumstances. Forget talking big picture, just get them to shift a bit on the small stuff. Can you give an example of a conversation you've had? Maybe we can critique it a bit.

So your issue is with using judgement incorrectly? Do you not trust your own judgement?

Do you understand that "preference" is how mankind survives? I bet you have a preference for not eating human waste. Should we be rid of that preference? Or a preference for a moderate outside temperature, other humans as mating partners instead of goats, English instead of random scribblings or sounds, logic instead of illogic, people who do violence towards us vs. people who are peaceful with us. Isn't it odd to you that in order to be more godly or whatever we have to erase ourselves? Isn't it odd to you that in order to be more patriotic we have to erase ourselves? Isn't it odd to you that in order to honor thy mother and father when they haven't earned it we have to erase ourselves? This is anti-philosophy.

Completely disingenuous as another method has been put forth which you refuse to respond to. Extremely telling.

On the one hand I really appreciate this. By keeping this answer to one word, it tells me you're serious about this topic. On the other, why would you go and post in the other thread? I'm going to ignore those posts because to do otherwise would be to backtrack. If you want to make those statements here that you made there that is fine, but this two threaded back and forth is silly. What it shows is that there is some quiet desperation on your part, which, coupled with the above answer, I fully understand. You mention in the other thread a friend, your brother, and your mother. So that you know I'm not trolling you, I'll tell you right now that I will not ask for any further details related to this. That is another talk altogether and would completely muddy this conversation if we tried to go that route. In the other thread, I was the first to answer you. I was literally post #2. How long before you replied to me? It took 31 posts. Why? Because it wasn't the answer you were looking for. You thanked Tyler for posting the video "The Death of Reason: Why People Listen to Reason and Evidence". Did you watch the video before thanking him? Because the answer Stef gives is a 30 minute in-depth version of the answer I gave. You could have asked me a question about my reply. When you finally responded to me, it was mockingly... ....and then there was this... And yet here you are, still, trying desperately to use intellect in place of courage. Philosophy is like nutrition, you can have all the best nutritional information in the world, but it won't matter if you don't put down the doughnut and eat something green. You can have all the best philosophy in the world, but if you don't have the courage to tell the truth to yourself and the people closest to you, you have nothing. In fact, it's worse than nothing, because now you'll likely go around telling everyone about this great philosophy and yet you'll be completely miserable because you haven't applied it to yourself. The motto of Freedomain Radio is "The philosophy of PERSONAL and political freedom." Stefan was precise when putting the "personal" before "political". You're trying to change others when you haven't even changed yourself. They see that. They know that. And it is why all of your efforts have been in vain. Changed yourself how? I'm going to quote a chapter from Real-Time Relationships: The Logic of Love by Stefan Molyneux: And two very teachable call-in conversations: You're looking for quick solutions to a problem of which you are denying the depths of. In other words, by being so forthright, by being precise and terse, by challenging your assumptions (which btw, how do you come to a philosophy forum with questions and then deny out of hand the answers when you don't get what you want?), I'm trying to shake you loose out of the tree. When you've confronted the irrationality in yourself, then you will have the courage to confront irrationality in those closest to you. Once through that, taking on the world's irrationality becomes an easy joy. You see me as trying to throw obstacles to trip you up. Stop. Observe. Think. Those obstacles are your real path. I'm showing you EXACTLY what you are looking for. But it means letting go of the illusions you've been holding onto, specifically about yourself and in your personal relationships. "People" are the "world". How are you supposed to change them when you can't even adjust yourself to align with what you preach?

nope you still don't get it. I'll go through the effort of restating my argument for you, but only if you answer the following question with a yes or no. Is there someone important to you, like a close friend, significant other or family member, who's mind you have tried to change but have failed?

Like I've been saying. We're talking about the same thing and I've already answered the question. If Tyler wants to change the mind of Robert on the concept of wealth redistribution, but Robert doesn't listen to reason on the topic, Robert likely has an emotional hangup somewhere. At great expense to himself, Tyler can go through the very intensive work in order to help Robert unravel the trauma related to his emotional block in order to change Robert's mind on wealth redistribution. However, is the expense to Tyler worth it? It is my position that due to the personal heavy burden on Tyler, other people in Tyler's life losing time with him, and the very low probability of success with Robert, it is not worth it. Especially when you consider there are others out there who are ready to have these conversations, who are ready to use reason and evidence not just on social issues, but on their own pasts. The original question of the thread is illogical. At the heart of this question is "How do I better change the world?" And the answer to that is my original short and sweet answer, you change yourself. Just as Robert is tasked to do.

Right, but not once was I ever arguing about the very tiny small group. I was always talking about the group that can be manipulated. Does that make my position clearer?

Well, negative could mean anything you, in particular, dislike. I think in the context of this discussion we're talking about things like socialism, statism, violence, MSM and gov propaganda, etc. It's possible to take a more personal view and say negative influence is anything that gets you to act against yourself or your own well being and joy. This would include the previous examples, but also include things like peer pressure, chemical dependencies, abusive friendships or familial relationships. People engage these types of things in their lives because they believe by doing so it will bring more happiness than if they told the truth (maybe in the short run that is true, like a hit from a heroine needle). When this goes on long enough, they begin to believe the lie. Then someone like you, me or plato85 come along to change their mind and find someone who doesn't speak the language of reason.

There are very very very few people in the world (like an incredibly tiny completely insignificant amount) who cannot be influenced by any means as you describe (why waste time worrying about them at all?). Everyone is influenced by something. Human beings have evolved to be highly adaptable, which means highly susceptible to influence. What you are really talking about here is overcoming negative influence. Is that correct?

Fair enough, we agree. I still don't see the difference between "people who don't listen" and "...mind that can't be changed". If there is a distinction, I can understand that creating a issue. I am very interested, though, in understanding why you thought I was equivocating.

You're stating nonsense. IRRATIONAL people BY DEFINITION cannot see reason. Who's trolling whom? Also, you have still not responded to my argument. It's also interesting that you'd say I'm the one who's trolling when I've been signed up here for 4 years (been listening longer than that), yet you have a sign up date that is less than a month old. I don't think this is the path you want to go down.

It isn't spin if I've made a compelling argument which you continue to ignore. Go find the argument, restate it and then tell me where I went wrong. Otherwise you're now projecting onto me.

So we disagree on that. I was very clear. He was trying to muddy the water. Care to elaborate on why you think I was avoiding?

Oh man. You are exactly what you're asking about. Your mind is switched off to the reality of it all. And you are projecting onto the world that which you are experiencing within. You don't save people. They save themselves. You are looking for someone else to say the right words to you. Save your time, they won't come. You're ready to wake up or you are not.

People are born switched on. Switching off a human takes years of psychological abuse. That's why peaceful parenting gives rise to those who will not submit to tyranny. No need to "be enlightened" whatever that means, just not violent. You're asking a question in very large terms. You need to be asking this on a personal level. In the end, it's all person to person.

You've made a serious oversight. Can you tell me what it is?

Why is it hard to accept that some people are just lost and unrecoverable?

Omg. This isn't complicated. You TELL THE TRUTH. No matter how uncomfortable or unpopular. The answer to all this is courage, not some philosophical word play or psychological mind game.

This is what I was responding to. What this not the question you wanted answered?

I'm sorry. Please restate the question. Maybe I've missed something.

Plato, are you interested in converting to a religion?