From: bcash@crchh410.BNR.CA (Brian Cash)
Subject: Re: Religion = Anything that's fun is bad.
Reply-To: bcash@crchh410.BNR.CA (Brian Cash)
Organization: Bell-Northern Research Ltd.
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 02:51:08 GMT

In article <1992Dec14.013204.5282@bmerh85.bnr.ca>,
dgraham@bmers30.bnr.ca (Douglas Graham) writes:
|>In article <1992Dec13.233601.26377@bnr.ca> bcash@crchh410.BNR.CA
(Brian Cash) writes:
|>>In article <1992Dec13.222145.3761@bmerh85.bnr.ca>,
|>>dgraham@bmers30.bnr.ca (Douglas Graham) writes:
|>>|>Please explain what you think "open-minded" means because I think that
|>>|>you and I have different definitions, and that difference often leads
|>>|>me to get a bit pissed at a lot of your articles.
|>>
|>>Sorry.  I take 'open-minded' as meaning 'willing to try new ideas;
|>>unprejudiced viewpoint'.  I'm saying that an open-mined person
|>>wouldn't think that their viewpoint is the only rational one.
|>
|>It depends on the subject.  On the subject of gods, the only
|>rational viewpoint is that there aren't any.  Willingness to
|>consider new ideas is not the same as granting that those ideas
|>have any merit.  I might consider the idea that earth is really
|>flat, and completely reject it.  That doesn't make me closed-minded.
|>Ditto for gods.

Like I said, I may have taken the term 'open-minded' too far.

|>
|>>|>For instance, in talk.religion.misc, you recently responded to Roderick
|>>|>Moten's rantings about demons and things by calling it "superstitious
|>>|>drivel" or something similar.  Were you being closed-minded?
|>>
|>>?Huh?  I think you have me confused with someone else.
|>>I went back to my saved articles and only found two
|>>that involved Rod's posts and neither had anything to
|>>do with demons.
|>
|>The exchange went as follows:
|>
|>  Roderick:
|>   However, today the devil is binding people to believe in no higher
|>   being so that it would be hard to reach them.
|>  You:
|>   Superstitious drivel. A total lack of evidence is what leads people to
|>   doubt the existence of both deities and devils.
|>
|>Here you express an unwillingness to consider the possibility that
|>the devil is binding people to believe in no higher being.  Does
|>that make you closed-minded?

Could you email me that?  I do NOT remember saying that!  Either
I was asleep at the time or someone is using my account. 

|>
|>>Besides, _I_ never claimed to be open-minded,
|>
|>Perhaps not, but you must have some idea of what you mean by the
|>term.  I get the impression that you think it means never asserting
|>that somebody else is wrong, and never making too much of a fuss
|>about what you believe.

So what is the difference between 'open-minded' and 'dogmatic'?
Or are they mutually exlusive?

|>
|>>I only questioned your claim.
|>
|>Actually, your interlocutor was Keith Ryan until I butted in.

I didn't think you wrote that!  I should have re-checked the
From:.  (not that you WOULDN'T have written that, given the
chance.)

|>
|>>(actually, I think you might be
|>>one of the few posters that are even close to being open-minded:
|>>I was mainly attacking the statement.)
|>
|>Must be Keith you're talking about here.  I'm a closed-minded
|>raving atheist fanatic.

Cool!  Add 'militant' and I'll drink a beer in your honor at New Year's!

|>--
|>Doug Graham         dgraham@bnr.ca         My opinions are my own.
                                                           
Brian /-|-\

ObCuteFace: 8^Q