Advocatus Atheist

If the meme means to say a pencil is meant for writing so that the end result is a bunch of written words... and... that a gun is meant for shooting things so that the end result is that those things will be dead. Then yes, it's correct logic. If not, then not.

I often tell my ultra conservative friends that it would do them good to take some time off, learn a foreign language, and move to a foreign country and live there for 3 years. Of course, in my recommendation of this I am proposing they broaden their worldview. Not in a condescending you don't know anything way, but in a way that has a proved track record of results for opening a person's mind and really helping them see the world, and themselves, in a new light. This suggestion of course brings with it the obvious side effects of growing more liberal. This automatically happens when you take yourself out of the center of your world and have to learn to communicate with others, learn patience in listening to them, and learn to accept that the way you do things and have done things is likely 99% inadequate if not completely wrong. The inability to express yourself clearly forces you to think long in hard about what you say before you say it. What's more, it ...

Changing your mind about something you believe deeply and truly isn't easy. In fact, it's downright hard to do. Changing your views on something you hold to be an absolute truth, something you feel in your deepest self to be self-evident, something so undeniably and incontrovertibly true there's no contesting it... but then having the fortitude to examine it closely and re-think what you think you know, and consider all the objections as fairly as possible, realizing you do hold biases, and then strive for the best possible objectivity and finally, upon finding ample evidence / reasons to doubt yourself, consider other options / possibilities is not easy. Not by a long shot.  What it is, is downright hard. Critical thinking, learning to be skeptical and doubt within reason, setting bias aside, striving for objectivity, all in the pursuit of the truth are skills one must develop them over time. And not everybody posses these skills. Just like not everyone ca...