Hey numerologists, astrologers and faith healers

[Goldmund]

It's April 19th, and it seems the ole Sears tower is still standing, no?

[Az]

1. Not claiming any validity to their craft

But how did the faith healers get into the prognosticators club?

[Goldmund]

2. Oh, I don't know

Probably because faith healers have a similar mental linkage between their craft and reality as the fore-mentioned prognosticators.

[Az]

3. You have a lot better chance

of dismantling a person's beliefs if you do not wear your disdain on your cuff. :evilgrin:

[Goldmund]

4. But who says...

...I'm after dismantling a person's beliefs?

After all, if those beliefs aren't dismantled by consistent and repeated clashes with reality (Sears tower is just the latest example), why do you think that those beliefs could be dismantled with a little debate?

[Az]

5. The trick is

Figuring out what basis the proponents belief is built upon. Not your own. You have already satisfied yourself as to the invalidity of the claims. Using the same criteria by which you were satisfied will not work on those that have different criteria.

[Goldmund]

6. By the same token...

...why aren't you out there converting Freepers to our cause?

[Az]

7. Don't mistake my comments

I find faith healers to be the most reprehensible of the paranormal milleau. The selling of false hope when real action is needed is by far more damning than selling someone false insight into the future. But I merely question the tactics. As with freepers one has to determine how a person comes to be where they are and address those issues. Assailing a freeper as a close minded idiot that is blind to the con job the Bushies are throwing their way is not going to convince them. It is a waste of effort to use that tact and only ellevates one's own sense of stess at the inability to persuade some to what should be obvious. But obvious is never as simple as we would like to believe. Some people cannot help but see the emperor as wearing fine clothe. While we are forced to see every wart and blemish on his unclothed body.

[Goldmund]

8. I dig.

I agree with you, actually. But while the Bushies' con-job is obvious to us -- as obvious as the nakedness of the emperor -- it takes takes a little analysis to see it, not simply empirical perception. That's why there are still shitloads of people in the US who have no interest in politics and who couldn't name who the vice-pResident is.

On the other hand, it is empirically indisputable that the world didn't end in 1999, that the Sears tower is still standing, and that God didn't come in on Channel 53 on August 6th to lead us to Heaven. This doesn't depend on your ideology, your intelligence, your perceptive or analytical powers, or the level of your gullibility. If people can still hold their beliefs against the evidence that enters through their own senses, there is no analysis -- no matter how clear-cut or logically sound -- that could possibly change their minds. In order for that to happen, me thinks an internal mental shift within them is required. If these people don't trust their own five senses, they sure aren't going to trust mine or yours analytical reasoning.