[VISION] [Asperger-friendly] The underpinnings of a visionary conversation

[John Harvey]

Hi, Shannon --

You're right, it's a priori denial, case closed. But without the capacity to see, being accused of being blind doesn't open your eyes to new ideas.

Mention of Skeptics' challenges due to Asperger's comes from the Skeptics themselves, many of whom make no secret of it. I think that it's good cause to rethink what's been going on in the discussions in which the brotherhood seems to be deliberately ignoring everything that could change its viewpoint. It may, as it now appears, be the case that the subtleties of rigorous science, which demands the ability to think laterally and sustain uncertainty, are genuinely beyond the abilities of the majority of them to grasp.

In that case, helping them to understand those subtleties via concrete examples may be the only way to overcome what may after all be a genuine indignation about concepts that to them are simply beyond comprehension and that therefore would understandably sound like hocus-pocus.

Cheers --

John
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"The most successful tyranny is not the one that uses force to assure uniformity but the one that removes the awareness of other possibilities, that makes it seem inconceivable that other ways are viable, that removes the sense that there is an outside."

-- Allan Bloom, Closing of the American Mind, p. 249.

[John Harvey]

Sounds like a great book for insight without pain.

The lines are drawn, I guess, but maybe a new conversation based on explicit assumptions will be able to tread fresh paths.

Cheers!

John
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"The most successful tyranny is not the one that uses force to assure uniformity but the one that removes the awareness of other possibilities, that makes it seem inconceivable that other ways are viable, that removes the sense that there is an outside."

-- Allan Bloom, Closing of the American Mind, p. 249.