From: Narciso Rivas


My philosophy for responsable thinking is

Most information in life( science- Medical science, etc) comes from humans in the past and in the present.   Our conclusions, beliefs, opinions depend mainly on information, evidence, data( Human beings)

We have to choose wise to which humans beings we learn from on each subject.  Its wise to choose to gain information on a subject were that  specific human being is a expert in.

Example if I have doutbs about the functioning of my heart, I would seek a Cardiolgist for the information or study a textbook about Cardiology. Then I would identify the facts and opinions and make my own conclusion.

Mr. Korn give me your opinion on this Format.

I would like you to give me more ideas or tips about responsible thinking.
 
Thank you Mr. Korn

Narciso,  

I like your approach to responsible thinking, particularly the last line “Then I would identify the facts and opinions and make my own conclusion.”  It’s common for experts to have opinions that are wrong, but they are usually accurate about facts that other people can check since their reputation would suffer otherwise.  If you have good facts you can form your own opinion and recognize when you don’t have enough information. 

Obviously I have put most of my thoughts about responsible thinking on the truthpizza.org website, but the topic that may not have enough discussion is polarization.  I see many intelligent and well informed people who become so emotionally involved in an issue that they see themselves as crusaders for a good cause and have contempt for anyone who disagrees with them.  They often accept poor arguments they like and reject valid points when they seem helpful to their opposition.  If we care about the truth we have to be careful to evaluate each issue impartially and not just believe anything that that helps to support “our side.”  

Bob

Thank Mr Korn

I have some questions

Where do misconceptions about gender sterotypes originated from?

Statements like a Man is not supposed to cry or Man need more than one women to be a real man or else he is gay.

Women cannot have leadership roles.

The ideal women or man has to have blue eyes and blonde hair.( This concept is believed in certain parts of latin america were I was raised)

The beauty is depicted in a certain way in the media( women big breast size and buttocks) ( In men it is his six pack)

Do all these cultural norms and rules come from Human ideas thought out time or do they have any scientific bases?

I ask you because I was raised with parents who believed almost 90 percent of what the media or their culture told them?

I curently go to school and also find students and even teachers and pastors or spiritual leaders who hold to these beliefs.

And it seems that if you dont hold to their beliefs than your weird, outcast.

I dont want to make the same mistake that my parents and family members did.

I just started responsible thinking and it feels weird because you start noticing that even the most college educated people hold to irrational beliefs.

I feel weird in my mind also because it just feels like that I dont fit in with the ideal of the rest of my friends.

For example I think Getting to know a women well is one of my ideal. being good freinds and having a stable relatioship and then moving on to sex but my friends think you have to have sex first or else you're not macho man. My friends think man are superior to women.

I think men and women are equal.

No one has to agree with what i Say but how do I come to my conclusions without being influnce by peers. I am only 19 years old but want to be a responsible thinker.

I think at the end my self esteem(my opionions and beliefs are the most important(self interest) What is best for me is the best.

How to be a responsible thinker when the people around me believe other wise(parents)

Is 90 beliefs and only 10 percents facts in this world?

Is 90 percent of our lives moved by beliefs?

My short life remains me of the aztecs( when your brain believes something it seems so true)

Narciso,

You ask a lot of good questions. I’m not sure if I have good answers.
 
It’s hard to tell where gender stereotypes come from since most of them started a long time ago. Some things probably do have a biological origin. Some think men (on the average) like having a variety of sex partners more than women since such men historically had more children than the one or so a year a woman can have, so we’re more likely to be descended from such men. Even if this is true, it doesn’t mean it’s something we should encourage. Women may be more mentally wired to spend time taking care of children which might make them less likely to pursue jobs with leadership positions. Now that families are usually smaller this doesn’t make much difference but people may have come to expect it. I heard of a study that tried to find what female features most men find attractive and the only thing that turned up consistently over many cultures was that men tended to like a small waist to hip ratio.

People tend to like features they associate with success, so if the richest and most famous people at the present moment in history are light-skinned Europeans that probably makes them seem more desirable. Celebrities and fashion designers and other people in the media can convince people that a certain look is what they should like.
 
Other things may be based on the whims of kings and religious leaders from the distant past that convinced the rest of the people that there was a certain way people should look or behave, like that women shouldn’t have power.

Really, though, it doesn’t matter much where the traditions came from, since these things almost never establish a good reason we should try to make people conform to particular stereotypes.

It is frustrating that so many people believe things just because that is the way they were brought up or because they want to fit into a social group. Most of the time there’s not much we can do about it, but if we try to avoid being taken in ourselves at least we don’t make the situation worse by trying to make other people conform to the stereotypes.
 
There are probably a lot more facts than arbitrary beliefs in the world (water is H2O, New York is a city), but since some of the arbitrary beliefs involve how we deal with people you’re right that they have a big effect on what we do. People put in a lot of effort trying to be cool or get rich so they can impress people even though that might not be what will really make them happy. Just being aware that the world is full of faulty ideas can be a big help for keeping other people’s false beliefs from controlling your life. You’ve done well in having good values in spite of the influences around you.

Bob

Thank Mr korn for your advice

It just seems that a rare few are responsible thinkers like you and one of my freinds the rest that I know belief in Popular culture
Thanks( It seems that most people believe in the volcano God)

Happy Holidays to you and your Family

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