How open minded are we?

[isidro]

Oh my dearest Feignfeign, I'm so sorry. You are right in that Christians have a history of enforcing their ideas at the end of a sword - the Crusades, the Inquisitions etc, and my heart grieves that people have denied exactly the virtues they profess to believe and treated you in such a horrible manner.

Do me a massive favor, will ya, and blame the people, not the doctrine. I am technically Christian but read the Tao Te Ching, the Popul Vuh, and wear a star of David. I am actually Mormon, and we are a very different kind of Christian, one of the key facets of which is that we don't (in doctrine, hopefully in society) condemn you to hell for thinking for yourself. You actually are not allowed to join unless you independently have a testimony of the doctrine, and not looked down on if you don't join.

I really do appreciate your trying to keep an open mind and I hope you find a philosophy that suits you and is true to your personal belief system.

[JBI]

Oh my dearest Feignfeign, I'm so sorry. You are right in that Christians have a history of enforcing their ideas at the end of a sword - the Crusades, the Inquisitions etc, and my heart grieves that people have denied exactly the virtues they profess to believe and treated you in such a horrible manner.

Do me a massive favor, will ya, and blame the people, not the doctrine. I am technically Christian but read the Tao Te Ching, the Popul Vuh, and wear a star of David. I am actually Mormon, and we are a very different kind of Christian, one of the key facets of which is that we don't (in doctrine, hopefully in society) condemn you to hell for thinking for yourself. You actually are not allowed to join unless you independently have a testimony of the doctrine, and not looked down on if you don't join.

I really do appreciate your trying to keep an open mind and I hope you find a philosophy that suits you and is true to your personal belief system.

Why reach back so far into the past - in the present there are Christians everywhere in the world trying to convert people by offering them the basic necessities for life that should, according to "Christian morality" be offered freely to everyone. But I think it gets better - one is offered salvation and sainthood from such practices. That annoying guy on TV who advertises for Christian Youth whatever is made into a hero for running such a "righteous organization."

[isidro]

Hey, JBI - Mormons give for free without expecting any kind of conversion. You are making me terribly proud of myself by that comment.

Although, we have to admit that Christians, while extremely prevalent in our own hemisphere, are not the only ones in the world guilty of this kind of thing and not the worst either. I understand entirely the frustration it excites but people of all backgrounds, religious or not can be and often are hypocritical. If we condemn the Christians we have to condemn several other groups as well, no?

And I just have to make the point that although they can be terribly annoying, I agree, an annoying manner does not necessarily mean that the doctrine they tote, whether they live by it or not, is wrong. Someone can be built upon a true and solid foundation and be a terribly annoying person. Again, we need to separate the people and the fundamental philosophy. The doctrine may be right and the person imperfect in obedience. No?

[Jozanny]

I am less open minded as I age because I am right most of the time, and have the confidence and discrimination of my intelligence. I do not like American Evangelican Christianity, as a brand, but I am not too fond of Islamic honor killers either, and liberal Judaism, though it is more tolerant of multi-culturalism as a general rule, it too has its old guard agenda. On the other hand, if I have learned anything in the time I have been posting here, it is that I increasingly find atheistic advocacy distasteful.

So I can dispense with ideologies of any make and model. I don't mind posting about things: films, books, literary periods, writing, the utter failure of disability activism to make itself analogous to the civil rights movement of the King era--so on, so forth--but as some regulars may have noticed, I bump heads less and less with these abstract topic debates.

If you impress me enough, however, I may try to tap you for an article, which may or may not make me as annoying as a more hardened Jimmy Stewart in the near great newspaper film "Dial Northlight 777".

[Annamariah]

Hahaha! Kudos for that! Four stars for you my friend.

Thank you

I guess my open-mindedness depends on the definition. Does open-mindedness mean that one has to be ready to adopt new views very easily or does it simply mean that they can understand those other views without believing in them themselves?

I have clear opinions about many things and don't change my mind easily, unless I have a good reason for it. In that sense I guess I'm a rather close-minded person. But I can respect other people's views too, and like a good conversation about things we might not agree on. So what does that make me?

[Gladys]

Does open-mindedness mean that one has to be ready to adopt new views very easily or does it simply mean that they can understand those other views without believing in them themselves?

Can one really understand the views of others without believing in them?

An open-minded person is more like a rudderless ship drifting with the prevailing wind.

[JBI]

Thank you

I guess my open-mindedness depends on the definition. Does open-mindedness mean that one has to be ready to adopt new views very easily or does it simply mean that they can understand those other views without believing in them themselves?

I have clear opinions about many things and don't change my mind easily, unless I have a good reason for it. In that sense I guess I'm a rather close-minded person. But I can respect other people's views too, and like a good conversation about things we might not agree on. So what does that make me?

It's all logic - in order to have no opinions, one must break with all categories - as soon as anybody acts subjectively, they limit themselves. To really understand stuff, one must limit the range of their understanding to within the frame of a discipline. In that sense, scientific knowledge allows people to understand the specifics, but ultimately reduces the range of belief available to the person.

My taste in literature, ultimately, if I value texts, is limited - in order to have the "most open minded" notions, I must forgo all judgment, and categorization.

Categorizing allows us to understand the particulars, but ultimately, by understanding things, we limit their range of possibilities within one frame - so if we decide to say that one religion is true, then ultimately, we have created a mindset that rejects thought that is incompatible as false - if we side with Catholicism, then we imply that Judaism is false by necessity. If we are atheist, than ultimately, we see all religions as false, in the sense that we cannot believe "god did this, and god did that".

If we believe democracy is good, then ultimately, we are limiting our perception on authoritarianism. If we say communism is good, then we limit our open mindedness toward capitalism.

When it comes down to it, it's better to just hear a lot of sides, and make one's mind up, in pursuit of understanding particulars. "open-mindedness" as a theory is simply nihilistic - it's an infinite aporia.

But culturally, we come from Aristotelian thought which dictates that we assign categories to understand things - we close our possibilities for the sake of deepening our understanding on things.

[Annamariah]

Can one really understand the views of others without believing in them?

I guess that depends of the definition of "understanding" But I think I can understand why someone has different opionions and beliefs than I do (I mean I can often see the reasoning behind their thoughts) even if I don't share that opinion or belief. Not always, of course, but often.

[isidro]

Okay, here's another related question then.

Does being openminded and being true to onesself necessarily contradict?

[Gladys]

...(I mean I can often see the reasoning behind their thoughts)...

To quote the Apostle Paul, 'For now we see through a glass, darkly...'

[isidro]

Well put, Gladys.

[The Atheist]

Seems to me there's a bit of confusion between "open-minded" and gullible.

To me, having an open mind is weighing up the evidence without any pre-conceived ideas, which is what I try to do with everything.

Carl Sagan once said "We must keep our minds open, but not so far open our brains fall out."

Many people seem to think "open-minded" means not looking for the evidence but merely accepting a position on the advice of others. Which is just silly.

Open minded is in the eye of the beholder. There are things to be open minded about and things not to be open minded. I would hope that no one is open minded about slavery or racism or pedophilia.

As above, I think one can be open-minded about those subjects, but quickly come to the conclusion that they're wrong. It doesn't make you closed-minded, just sensible.

[prendrelemick]

An open-minded person is more like a rudderless ship drifting with the prevailing wind.

I am beginning to think there is truth in this. I would like to think I am open minded, but suspect I am indecisive and scared of commitment.

[Scheherazade]

Can one really understand the views of others without believing in them?

Why not? There is always the possibility that one has stopped believing in them because they have come to understand them only too well.

Seems to me there's a bit of confusion between "open-minded" and gullible.

Oh, OK. Then, I am mostly gullible.

To me, having an open mind is weighing up the evidence without any pre-conceived ideas, which is what I try to do with everything.

Agreed. However, it is "easy said than done" at times, I find. One's feelings might cloud the picture.

However, that might be because I am only a woman with a lil' brain in me lil' 'ead.

[papayahed]

To me, having an open mind is weighing up the evidence without any pre-conceived ideas, which is what I try to do with everything.

How do you not have preconcieved ideas? None of us live in a vacuum.

I think the confusion comes in when we don't recognize the difference between an opinion and open-mindedness. I have opinions about a lot of things on a very superficial level I don't like fish. To be open minded do I have to try every single type of fish out there before I can make that statement? If that's the case how can I have an opinion about anything?