by minimus 160 Replies latest jw friends
EP, I actually thought you were trolling with that thread. Were you really sincere about that, and yet you agree with minimus' assertion in this thread?
I was sincere. I don't recall saying I agree with minimus. Obviously, some people are like that. Some are not.
Okay, just checking :-) Because of course, everyone believes that they live by facts, but different people define "facts" differently. To you or me, facts are scientifically verified. For some people, personal experience (or vision/hallucination) is fact, and overrides science when the two come into conflict. This is at the core of minimus' observation. So when you made 'acceptance of fact' a condition on your olive branch, it was clear to those like AGuest that you meant your own definition of "fact", not theirs. Hence the accusation of your peace offering being false. Thus, the offer was doomed as soon as it was made!
So when you made 'acceptance of fact' a condition on your olive branch, it was clear to those like AGuest that you meant your own definition of "fact", not theirs. Hence the accusation of your peace offering being false. Thus, the offer was doomed as soon as it was made!
This isn't the least about Aguest, nor was my other thread.
I don't have my own definition of the word "fact" and neither does anyone else. It is what it is and what some people don't like is having it called out that what they are saying doesn't meet any definition of the word and what they say has no objectively verifiable tenets, propositions or statements and is internally inconsistent when subjected to scrutiny. As I said before, extending an olive branch doesn't mean acceptance of beliefs or agreement that something is what it isn't.
OTWO, You, sir are a man of facts. In fact, I believe this to be true no matter what you say.
I don't have my own definition of the word "fact" and neither does anyone else.
Everybody has their own definition of every word, though. Whether your definition matches the one found in the dictionary or not, and whether you're right or not, isn't the point I'm making. For some people, the facts of their life outweight the facts of science. For thousands of years, there was no science; only personal experience. Man got by in the world according to that experience. So to expect everyone living today to re-define "fact" to mean something abstract like 'objectively verifiable tenets, propositions or statements that are internally inconsistent' is not reasonable in light of the fact that we're all just hairless apes trying to make sense of the world around us.
extending an olive branch doesn't mean acceptance of beliefs or agreement that something is what it isn't
Of course not. It also doesn't require others to agree with your definition of "fact". An olive branch is simply an agreement to disagree and an affirmation of mutual respect, two concepts which I have not seen you demonstrate an understanding of.
"For some people, the facts of their life outweigh the facts of science."
Science is forever involved in the search for actuality. These have helped humanity evolve beyond superstition. But I guess we can't expect everyone to go along with societal evolution, human nature being what it is.
We all have at least some irrationality in us, otherwise we wouldn't be human. But IMHO one's life is most productive if it is lived with the acceptance of unassailable facts, once learned. I used to have as my fact that a God named Jehovah operated through a group of men in Brooklyn. I don't live by that "fact" any more and I much better off for it (even though I had to pay a price in the loss of friends and parents).
Apognophos “Everybody has their own definition of every word, though. Whether your definition matches the one found in the dictionary or not, and whether you're right or not, isn't the point I'm making.”
You can make whatever subjective point you want. However it won’t make words mean what you want them to. The fact is that dictionaries are right and people who apply their own meaning to words are wrong. They may be happy in their ignorance but they remain ignorant. Facts are rather inflexible things. That is why they can be relied upon.
But IMHO one's life is most productive if it is lived with the acceptance of unassailable facts, once learned.
Yes, and hopefully we'll move beyond a few of the reasons for human conflict too if more people accept this way of thinking. Certainly not all of them.
But at the same time, one lesson I learned from being a Witness is that I should never be arrogantly confident that now I have the truth, that now I know all the facts. It was a very humbling experience to learn how ignorant I truly was, and that I had allowed others to tell me what the facts were.
1 plus 1 equals 2. That's a fact....unless you simply refuse to accept it. At that point, you're just a "dope".
If only life were that simple! But my point was about accepting the nature of a community and not requiring other people to use our definitions of words.
