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Has this ever convinced someone who doubted?

Some facts here are more than obvious. I didn't know math was the universal language though, but makes sense!

Also 1800 posts

Dear fucking climate change deniers,

Aero wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 20, 2020 8:01 pm

Has this ever convinced someone who doubted?

Spoiler: show

Depends on what you mean with doubted and convincing them stopping to deny something.

Looking at you Holocaust deniers.

Some of the Americans/Westerners do deny science. It is funny seeing them on r/facepalm, r/murderbywords and r/quityourbs for their anti-science beliefs. Of course, they are hindering the scientific development of mankind.

You can argue with smart people. But you will never win against dumb people. "Never argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience."

hbomberguy sheds some good light on why images like that dont work in his video on climate change deniers. LastWeekTonight's most recent piece on covid conspiracies (and conspiracies in general) is also worth watching for further insight on what leads people to take their stances on denialism on certain topics. Having watched these I wonder if anyone knows resources that use the knowledge presented in this material to suggest a more effective approach of communication with people who spend their lives researching a false worldview, while you yourself are merely tangentially familiar with the topic as it seems like a non-issue to you? A common problem I find is that, since those people have a whole repository of sketchy sources you always have to spend hours doing impromptu research to show why each source is wrong, before the goalpost is moved to the next conspiracy. It always feels like a lightning round of "no actually" where unsatisfying responses are either ignored or misinterpreted to fit the worldview in some capacity. There has to be a more efficient approach.

cato wrote:It is funny seeing them on r/facepalm, r/murderbywords and r/quickyourbs for their anti-science beliefs.

it is funny (or actually, incredibly frustrating and disturbing) to see two of them on this forum as well!

and I guess the most efficient approach is ignoring them even if it feels difficult

Ignoring would be a way, but just look how many people keep giving Hildemann attention.
He sees and hears that and no one is even stopping him smh.

Enjl wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 21, 2020 4:25 am

hbomberguy sheds some good light on why images like that dont work in his video on climate change deniers. LastWeekTonight's most recent piece on covid conspiracies (and conspiracies in general) is also worth watching for further insight on what leads people to take their stances on denialism on certain topics. Having watched these I wonder if anyone knows resources that use the knowledge presented in this material to suggest a more effective approach of communication with people who spend their lives researching a false worldview, while you yourself are merely tangentially familiar with the topic as it seems like a non-issue to you? A common problem I find is that, since those people have a whole repository of sketchy sources you always have to spend hours doing impromptu research to show why each source is wrong, before the goalpost is moved to the next conspiracy. It always feels like a lightning round of "no actually" where unsatisfying responses are either ignored or misinterpreted to fit the worldview in some capacity. There has to be a more efficient approach.

I watched that John Oliver piece (which was really bad due to its opening followed by ranting) after I posted this coincidentally, and I've seen the hbomberguy video. I think the way to go about an effective approach is to first do no harm, and then see where you can even go. I have never heard of someone who believes in a conspiracy and is scolded, or overwhelmed with facts and then changes their mind. The backfire effect just makes the commitments more rigid. Like when it comes to flat earth stuff everyone likes to flex their middle school science knowledge, but that doesn't convince anyone. I think the best approach is a pragmatic one to just understand that science and every method of obtaining knowledge has its limits, institutions have lost a lot of public trust, and just see where more understanding can be brought out instead of insulting people's intelligence and being flippant. Being mindful of the backfire effect, and other biases does help and I have gotten good results by doing so. It should also be considered whether conspiracies/denial/pseudoscience are something to be stamped out, or discussed, or fostered into something that can grow knowledge by studying why people believe what they do. Some people are paid to be wrong, others will explicitly say they will work backwards from their conclusions, and others are just trying to take advantage of people so not everything is worth a debate. That being said, people should be allowed to believe whatever they want and people should be allowed to hear each others beliefs no matter the consequence of the belief in my opinion. And really for the social consequences and the loss in trust in institutions, it may have to do with how technocratic governments are and when they get the science wrong it's disastrous. The whole mask debate in the United States came from the mixed signals, and the politicization of the coronavirus. Perhaps if the government did not take a scientific position there wouldn't be this culture war happening. The utility of masks is mixed based on scientific study but there's correlation with masks and flattening case curves. In Japan they did everything "wrong" except pretty much everyone wears a mask. They also have much lower cases, their economy is not on the brink, there's no culture war (afaik) about the virus and masks, and the same can't be said for elsewhere. I happen to be reading a book about the philosophy of science, and the author argues for separation of science and state similar to separation of church and state with an "anything goes" epistemological anarchism approach to science and I do find that to be impactful in situations like this. But I'm rambling now, but the point to get across is first do no harm and try to reach understanding.

EDIT:
Here's a biases poster I like to share. It's good for understanding how one finds themselves believing something that isn't necessarily accurate or talking to someone with a potentially biased belief.

Cedur you are stuck in the paradigm of science without spirituality. If you were able to combine science with spirituality (which is not the same as religion) you would have a much broader level of understanding of reality.

Religion is an institutional doctrine created to dominate the minds of the masses, and spirituality is a fundamental reality of life. Spirituality is based on the metaphysical laws of nature that remain hidden from the naked eye.

All the great geniuses, such as Leonardo Da Vinci, Albert Einstein, Nikola Tesla, and some more, have always mixed science with spirituality because spirituality is the feminine side of science (science is the masculine side of spirituality). Science and spirituality are an inseparable pairing: two sides of the same coin.

Science is dedicated to defining the visible and measurable side of existence. And spirituality is dedicated to defining the invisible and quantum side of existence.

It is not consistent to deny one and validate the other. One doesn't exist without the other. Both science and spirituality must be validated and combined if you want to see reality with extreme clarity.

Our brain has two cerebral hemispheres: the left and the right.

The left cerebral hemisphere is dedicated to defining and ordering reality. The left cerebral hemisphere is concrete, logical, and rational. It is the hemisphere correlated to science.

The right cerebral hemisphere is dedicated to conceptualizing and understanding reality. The right cerebral hemisphere is abstract, intuitive, and emotional. It is the hemisphere correlated to spirituality.

When both cerebral hemispheres work in a balanced way, discernment appears. If one cerebral hemisphere is more potent than the other, an imbalance occurs and confusion appears.

Discernment is the balanced combination of reason and intuition.

That is why, Cedur, I explain to you that you have great confusion when you address me because you believe that I deny science and that I speak from a religious doctrine. I do not deny science and I don't belong to any religion. I value science and I also value spirituality. Both work together and if they go separately, there are imbalances in the perception of reality.

If our brain has two opposite sides that combine and complement each other. Why then should we separate science from spirituality or spirituality from science, if both are two sides of the same coin?

It makes no sense to me (after checking that they are both linked) to separate them by denying one and validating the other.

I hope that now you can better understand my position and stop cursing what you do not know with the amount of prejudice you have shown.

Science without spirituality is sterile and spirituality without science is blind. If you review the great geniuses of humanity you will realize that all of them already knew this truth.

And if you want to understand more about my point of view then do research of a documentary movie called "Thrive". My line of thought is similar to the line of thought of the documentary.

No, you are stuck in the paradigm of fundamentalism. What you try to sell off as your spirituality is bigotry, as you've proven several times by trying to promote complete humbug. Regarding spirituality, I also don't need to believe in higher forces or afterlife to define my happiness. I don't need to make up an act in public other than you. I also know that science without ethics is bad, but it's an entirely different thing than "spirituality".

I get what you write in this post but it's competely contradictory all the way. If you say "I don't belong to ANY religion" (which is hard to buy, as you sound like a classic American protestant), why do you throw around religious phrases like hell? Your spirituality were all okay for me if you weren't so sanctimonious on this forum and if you have the nerves to claim that 9/11 wasn't real then you permanently lose my respect tbqf.

Oh and I know the saying, "you should treat religion like your genitals. It's nice to have it but don't bare it in public".

Here, the only bigot is you. You position yourself in a defensive posture, closed to dialogue. You have negative prejudices towards my way of thinking. It seems contradictory to you that I expose that science and spirituality are united. It bothers you that I have a universal fraternal attitude. You make rude comments. You lack humility. If you had a broader and more impartial mind, it would be much easier for you to be able to dialogue with me without understanding problems.

I am not stuck in fundamentalism because I am completely flexible in my thinking. I am on all sides at the same time. So I cannot be stuck in fundamentalism as you say because I am open to everything. I do not belong to any religion because I believe that I do not need intermediaries to connect with God. According to my way of thinking: I am God and everything else too. For me, God, is the life force that is in the universe: a universal consciousness that is within me and everywhere.

I did not say that 9/11 was not real. I said 9/11 was a military strategy called a "false flag operation." The North American government was involved in this false flag operation. I said that the North American government killed, as a sacrifice, its own people to have an excuse to go to war with the Middle East. I said that the American government crashed two planes into the New York twin towers. I said that the North American government prepared the attack in advance and that it agreed with a terrorist organization called Al Qaeda so that this organization claimed responsibility for the attack. It later emerged that the two twin towers were shot down with explosives and not the effect of aircraft fire.

For me "9/11 is not real" obviously summarizes all kind of weird conspiracy theories, and you have the nerves to put yourself over VERIFIED FACTS (and heck, common sense also), so there's that. You have even been warned by staff for that.

What verified facts are we talking about? Do you think what I am explaining are theories? If you have not yet realized the world you live in, I can understand that for you they are theories.

If you had lived my life, you would have realized that they are not theories, but the reality that they hide from us.

I have related to people in the secret government for reasons that I will not explain here. They have a satanic mentality and have bad intentions with all of us. If for you, a reality that many of us have lived through, is a simple conspiracy theory, then you are being very unfair and intolerant of all of us who have had to live experiences that no one would want to live.

Yes, I have been warned because I went off topic in the Coronavirus thread. In fact, almost all of us are off topic in these threads but I am not going to discuss this here and now.

Have a good day brother. I wish you the best.

idruinn wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 21, 2020 1:08 pm

It seems contradictory to you that I expose that science and spirituality are united

Not what's going on. It sounds ridiculous because you don't provide any evidence. The game of "you're defensive because you're entrenched in your worldview" is unproductive and can be played day in day out. Just like you accused Cedur of being bigoted for taking their stance, they can say the same about you and your stance.
When providing evidence, please make sure that it's from a trusted source, preferrably a primary source of good reputation. It'll make it more likely for people to take your odd assertions seriously.

idruinn wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 21, 2020 1:08 pm

I did not say that 9/11 was not real. I said 9/11 was a military strategy called a "false flag operation." The North American government was involved in this false flag operation.

Disclaimer: I'm not an American, so I'm not particularly biased on whatever ideologies or belief systems exist in your country. Try to see this as an assertion from a third party. I also don't spend my entire days researching conspiracy theories. Their debunk videos just occasionally reach my youtube recommendations.
Whenever there's some form of topic that people have to cover up (for example, a birthday party) you are probably familiar with how difficult it can be to keep quiet until the set deadline. In cases like common conspiracy theories (strangely frequently propagated out of the US, it seems) where there is no deadline, it less becomes a question of IF the ruse is ever exposed but rather WHEN. As it turns out, that human error can be estimated.
http://conspiracycalculator.com/
Take a peek at this page and its sources. Of course the numbers are never quite exact, but it serves in giving a rough estimate for how long a cover-up would last.
I don't know how many people are employed by the US government, but taking into account how employment figures change over the past 20 years and how for such a false flag operation at least a good number of the military would've been in on it, I think 50k isn't too unreasonable of an estimate (did a quick search trying to find a lead on the numbers and all I could find was 1.4 million with access to a potentially even more secret categorization of classified information. Since this is just for illustrative purposes I think less than 5% of that figure should be good). With 50k people, the calculator says it would've taken no longer than 17 years for such a conspiracy to come to light... that's 2018, and we're past that, and I don't think the majority of humanity has since figured out "the hidden truth", making it incredibly unlikely to be actually "the truth". Even more so if the actual number of people in on it is higher, which, with the rapidly shifting people in governmental positions, is pretty likely.
I recommend you give this tool a shot with some other things you think people have all wrong. Of course, take the exact numbers with a grain of salt, but be wary that this is a good guideline and if it spits out 2 years it's more likely to be 2 than 20. You can read the original paper in the first source on the page if you want to get more into it.

Enough is enough. You claim to possess the ultimate truth and put yourself on a pedestal, yet the complete opposite is true. Your believes about 9/11, your previous posts about Corona, and your impertience of calling me wrong prove that you're doing nothing but sectarianism.

Even without referring to "official sources" to prove that 9/11 was executed by al-Quaida alone, there's enough common sense to show that there can't be a governmental conspiracy like this. It would involve lots of confidants who all had to stick together and not expose it. It wouldn't be possible to keep it secret. If it were real, just the medial interest and arising of the respective theory would have caused someone involved to confess. Exploding two towers with 3000 deaths isn't the same as the potential Cuba Crisis stuff or Nazi-Germany's staged "being attacked by Poland". It's a different kind of brutality that noone would have taken the risk for. Only someone as maniac as Hitler perhaps, but US presidents are NOWHERE LIKE THIS. If this were the truth about 9/11, we would know. Your claims about "US cooperated with al-Quaida" is even bigger bullshit. In that case, why would the US have done everything to kill Bin Laden, and why wouldn't al-Quaida reveal the cooperation themselves as soon as the persecution started?

In short, all thousand people involved in such a hypothetical theory would have to fear death penalty as soon as someone started spilling the beans. Every person supporting the official truth would have to be bribed. Isn't that complete nonsense to believe?

I think you're a disgruntled person yourself struggling to find a true firmness in life, hence you're trying to make it up and escape to some alt-reality. Very common thing.

It is okay. You are right Enjl. If I borrow the scheme that Aero has shown at the beginning of the thread, we can see that there is a section that says "Maths are the language of the universe". And yes, maths are the language of the universe because everything in the universe is geometry.

Do you know something about sacred geometry? Ancient cultures encoded this geometry that they discovered as the basis of the universe itself. Ancient cultures understood that God was everywhere because God is in numbers and numbers are everywhere. They also understood that God is in nature because nature (we are nature) is made up of numbers. They decoded many geometric patterns that are reproduced throughout the universe. They even decoded God's geometric pattern called the "Flower of Life".

Why did they call this last pattern the Flower of Life? The Flower of life is a set of 19 circles that are born from a much simpler pattern that is formed by 7 circles and they called this way because it represents the cycle of creation.

Ancient cultures understood the spiritual and scientific side of numbers. They understood that maths are a universal language that regulate physical laws and also metaphysical laws.

All this information is difficult to find online because as it is currently considered a pseudoscience. But if you search well you can find accurate and rigorous information about this.
I will look at the page you have shown me about the conspiracy calculator. Thanks for your kindness brother.

Added in 34 minutes 42 seconds:
Come on Cedur... I was 14 when it happened. Now I am 33. Do you think I have gathered all the information to show it to all? Do you think I have to be an encyclopedia with all the data completely ordered and ready to directly offer them? Honestly, I do not care if you think all of this about me and what I say. I do not have the absolute truth. I only share information. I already said it in the Coronavirus thread.

idruinn wrote:

Actually this response to the image is part of why I find the original to be a problem. It says "maths are the language of the universe" and "we are all made of stardust" but that's scientism garbage. Math can be used to describe the natural world, but by no means is it an essential language of the universe. Math is how humans describe the relationships found in nature and they're called scientific laws. The laws we come up with do not cause anything. Now what you're describing is numerology, which has to do with the attribution of meaning to numbers. The problem with numerology is that it is inconsistent and you can assign any different meaning you want, and make numbers say whatever you want which leads to contradictions and no explanatory nor predictive power. You can get whatever you want out of the "Flower of Life" but you're not going to solve any new problems. You can craft something together that is built of ad hoc meanings, but you can't get anything new.

If you look at gematria or other numerological systems, none of them are consistent with each other so they can't build a body of knowledge. Also since they cannot build up new knowledge, and seem to describe anything and everything then perhaps it could be assumed they describe nothing. If you can't find something that isn't described by your system, then that should be a red flag.