# People who don't think like you do **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 21, 2005, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195 "2005-02-21T16:39:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/41 "2005-02-22T00:04:29Z")
> [@Ottoerotic](#): > > My mother refuses to believe that light travels… You turn on a light and its just on, instantly, everywhere. She says that she’s waiting for the day when my own kids come home from school and tell me that “the whole light traveling thing” has been disproven. Obligatory Hitchhiker’s quote: > [@The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy](#): > > Even light, which travels so fast that it takes most races thousands of years to realize that it travels at all, takes time to journey between the stars. It takes eight minutes from the star Sol to the place where the Earth used to be, and four years more to arrive at Sol’s nearest stellar neighbour, Alpha Proxima. > > For light to reach the other side of the Galaxy, for it to reach Damogran for instance, takes rather longer: five hundred thousand years. > > The record for hitch hiking this distance is just under five years, but you don’t get to see much on the way. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Babbington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Mr.Babbington](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Babbington)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/42 "2005-02-22T00:19:28Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > Simply qualifying a statement with “the majority” or “some” does not make it any less a stereotype. What are “people like Bush”? White people? Rich people? Texans? By “people like Bush,” I meant religious conservatives who don’t talk down to the people they claim to represent. (e.g. Tom DeLay, Rick Santorum, Orrin Hatch) By “the majority,” I meant that a majority of the voters in the various constituencies voted for these individuals, since they were elected. > [@](#): > > Now, maybe my mistake was to single out the entire region. I do know that they are not Bible thumping zealots to the last man/woman/child. But my impression from dealing with people from those states is that if you do have more moderate to liberal leanings, you often feel like a minority. What’s wrong with being in the minority once in a while? Is it that you are scared of leaving the intellectual cocoon of your “highly educated” friends and acquaintances? > [@](#): > > Just because something is a stereotype does not make it untrue. It just means that every member of that group does not necessarily fall under the stereotype. Huh? > [@](#): > > If I sound elitist, it is not meant to be towards people because they are from a certain region. It is because of they have a way of thinking that I consider closeminded or backward and, right or wrong, I have come to associate that type of thinking with that region. I am sure that one of the closed-minded and backward people would call you a baby-killing Communist, or perhaps one of them Northern Liberals, which is exactly what you just did when you called them “anachronistic hicks.” Why not take the high ground and accept them and their beliefs? > [@](#): > > In any event, I think I’m more inclined to change my view of the Bible Belt than the Bible Belt is inclined to change their view on evolution. This, I probably agree with, since your view of the Bible belt isn’t rooted in faith. I should say, I’m on your side. I just thought you were being an idiot. ---
**Author:** ![zagloba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/977dab/32.png) [@zagloba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zagloba)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/43 "2005-02-22T00:31:48Z")
A friend, “K,” was helping me set up for a sale of some merchandise I’d brought back from India. Among the items are some beautiful hand painted papier mache ducks and eggs from Kashmir. K picks up an egg and says “Look! I can put an egg next to a duck and it will look as if the duck laid an egg!” I said something to the effect that since ducks lay eggs, I’d taken a photo of a duck and egg together for my website. Eyeing me dubiously, she said “Ducks – lay eggs?” K is 40 years old and has a Masters degree (in International Relations – but still)! I wonder where she thinks the eggs at the grocery come from? ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/44 "2005-02-22T01:00:28Z")
> [@zagloba](#): > > K is 40 years old and has a Masters degree (in International Relations – but still)! I wonder where she thinks the eggs at the grocery come from? Don’t they come from the same place the plastic- and styrofoam-wrapped cuts of meat come from? The Soylent Food Processing Plant, of course? Soylent Green Lite–It’s Made Of Athletic People! 20% Less Fat Than The Leading Potted Human Meat Product. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![GillianBoardman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bc79bd/32.png) [@GillianBoardman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GillianBoardman)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/45 "2005-02-22T01:35:40Z")
> [@START](#): > > Most people I know are religous in some way not neccescarily Christian or any other organized religion but they atleast believe in God so coming to the SDMB was a shocker being that I never saw so many straight up athiests and then besides this message board I have met a few people who don’t believe in anything and that is always different for me because like I said most people I encounter believe in some type of Higher Power if not God himself. I’m sorry, I happen to be religious. It’s not a mainstream religion, but never in my questing life, have I ever believed that there is nothing but the physical world. However, when describing the physical world, which is what science is, then I go with the scientific explanation. And so far, science’s best explanation for the variety of life on this planet, the one with lots of evidence to back it up, is evolution. Now, I suppose some sort of incredible find could be made, and change all that, and then I’d have to change my thinking to go with the evidence too. But how on earth does being religious = not able to accept prevailing evidence? I find that concept incredibly insulting. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/46 "2005-02-22T01:55:39Z")
> [@GillianBoardman](#): > > But how on earth does being religious = not able to accept prevailing evidence? I find that concept incredibly insulting. Well, at some point faith takes up for observational evidence; you “believe” in something, because the evidence to the contrary (or lack thereof) is not compelling. There’s a certain inherent contradiction coming from both directions (religious and athiest), in assuming the truth or falsity of a non-falsifiable proposition, humorously illustrated in Adams’ disccusion of the Babel fish: > [@Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy](#): > > "Now it is such a bizarrely improbable coincidence that anything so mindboggingly useful could have evolved purely by chance that some thinkers have chosen to see it as the final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God. > > "The argument goes something like this: `I refuse to prove that I exist,' says God, `for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing.’ > > "`But,' says Man, `The Babel fish is a dead giveaway, isn’t it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don’t. QED.’ > > "`Oh dear,' says God, `I hadn’t thought of that,’ and promptly vanished in a puff of logic. > > "`Oh, that was easy,’ says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets himself killed on the next zebra crossing. > > "Most leading theologians claim that this argument is a load of dingo’s kidneys, but that didn’t stop Oolon Colluphid making a small fortune when he used it as the central theme of his bestselling book Well That About Wraps It Up For God. I like to acknowledge that, while I don’t see any reason or evidence of a higher intellegence or creative force (and don’t “feel” it either), there’s no disproof of a God. You want to pray? Be my guest. Just don’t cajole me to, or use it as an excuse to fight a war or persecute a people. Most moderate religious people respect that and vice versa. The evangelists (in both camps) just make life uncomfortable for everyone. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![antechinus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/fbc32d/32.png) [@antechinus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/antechinus)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/47 "2005-02-22T02:09:12Z")
**Phenomenon - % of Americans that believe it is real** ESP - 48 Telepathy - 35 the Devil - 56 Possession by Devil - 42 Angels - 72 Astrology - 25 UFO’s have visited Earth - 45 Source: Gallup poll survey, 1996 I find that kinda scary. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/48 "2005-02-22T02:17:22Z")
> [@antechinus](#): > > **Phenomenon - % of Americans that believe it is real** > ESP - 48 > Telepathy - 35 > the Devil - 56 > Possession by Devil - 42 > Angels - 72 > Astrology - 25 > UFO’s have visited Earth - 45 > > Source: Gallup poll survey, 1996 > > I find that kinda scary. As a college mate of mine used to observer, “Those are the people who are going to make me rich!” If you could bottle liquid ignorance in a volatile form our gasoline crisis would be a thing of the past. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![GillianBoardman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bc79bd/32.png) [@GillianBoardman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GillianBoardman)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/49 "2005-02-22T02:38:31Z")
> [@Stranger On A Train](#): > > Well, at some point faith takes up for observational evidence; you “believe” in something, because the evidence to the contrary (or lack thereof) is not compelling. There’s a certain inherent contradiction coming from both directions (religious and athiest), in assuming the truth or falsity of a non-falsifiable proposition, humorously illustrated in Adams’ disccusion of the Babel fish: > I like to acknowledge that, while I don’t see any reason or evidence of a higher intellegence or creative force (and don’t “feel” it either), there’s no disproof of a God. You want to pray? Be my guest. Just don’t cajole me to, or use it as an excuse to fight a war or persecute a people. Most moderate religious people respect that and vice versa. The evangelists (in both camps) just make life uncomfortable for everyone. > > Stranger Did I say I was telling anybody else what to believe? No, I did not. I never have. Short of basic well accepted social rules, (Do not kill or maim your playmates, or even the people you don’t like!), I haven’t even told my three children what to believe. Even in that case, I wasn’t instructing them how to believe, but how to behave. I like to hope they believe that these rules are good things. Admittedly when my oldest (adult) daughter spouts off some some incredibly biggoted bilge I cringe and wonder why I was stupid enough to marry her father, but I don’t presume to be authorized to meddle with her beliefs. I modeled my beliefs with my actions, and hoped they’d find them good but, with this one, no such luck. Most (not all) accept that part of parenting is handing down your own core beliefs. Obviously, I didn’t feel this way, but most people would not have argued my “right” or even, to fundamentalists, my “duty” to do so. Again, I’m being insulted. I know that because at some point I allow what I feel to influence what I believe, you believe me to be more gullible, less logical (well, I probably can’t argue that one!), and more rigid and controlling than you are. I guess one out of four isn’t too bad. I do work more on the intuitive than the logical. But that doesn’t mean that I don’t recognize logic, or that I deny proof of the physical world because it doesn’t fit in with some pre-digested faith! Is it absolutely necessary for atheists to take on all the worst aspects of the “fundamentalist” religious? I realize this is a place for fighting ignorance but assuming you know all about me, because you know one little fact about me is ignorant in the extreme! ---
**Author:** ![EllisDee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellisdee/32/4531_2.png) [@EllisDee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EllisDee)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/50 "2005-02-22T02:51:44Z")
> [@Susie Derkins](#): > > I know that “welch” is valid as well, but my issue was with him telling me that I used the word incorrectly when I didn’t. He was wrong when he said that I’d misused the word, but still didn’t want to admit it. Just a minor annoyance. I swear I’m over it. 🙂 Indian giver, nigger rig, jew down the price, and welsh on a bet are all on equally un-pc footing. They are also all likely to be found in the dictionary, alongside collateral losses to the pc movement like niggardly. Just FYI. My “we’re not in Kansas anymore” moment came during a conversation with a longtime close friend. It was when Dolly the sheep first hit the news, and we were talking about cloning. At one point, in reference to human cloning, she commented that she was against it because “how does it get a soul?” I always knew she was _raised_ catholic, but I didn’t realize until that moment that she _was_ catholic. (Just the _idea_ that science could possibly interfere with an all-powerful god seems so…ignorant.) I just thought of one more. After the last election, I was out getting food with my buddies during one of our Madden nights. Waiting at the drive thru, one of them asked me “So, what did you think of the election?” I groaned and said that I was shocked and stunned. He paused, then said “Should we not discuss it?” I then realized that both of my buddies had voted for Bush. I was in a Bushie car! AAAAARARRRGGGGGHHHH!!! ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/51 "2005-02-22T04:34:49Z")
> [@GillianBoardman](#): > > Again, I’m being insulted. I know that because at some point I allow what I feel to influence what I believe, you believe me to be more gullible, less logical (well, I probably can’t argue that one!), and more rigid and controlling than you are. I don’t think you’re being insulted, but I do think you are oversensitive. If you read back though my post, you’ll find that the gist of my statement is that at some point (that is, the point at which the debate becomes a discussion of things beyond perception and measurement) the idea of proof/disproof is meaningless. God, Yawaeh, Allah, and whathaveyou, are **non-falsifiable** propositions; there is no way to absolutely disprove the existance of it (even though I’ll argue that there is no necessity for such) and thus, one camp is no more “right” than the other. No system of logic can be any more complete than the axioms/assumptions on which it is founded. Axioms are by definition beyond proof; they are “self-evident” truths that are either accepted…or not. As long as you don’t proselytize to me I won’t criticize you (and I’m using “me” and “you” in the general sense, not specifically the two of us.) Peace onto you. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Large\_Marge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/50afbb/32.png) [@Large\_Marge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Large_Marge)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/52 "2005-02-22T05:43:24Z")
> [@antechinus](#): > > **Phenomenon - % of Americans that believe it is real** > ESP - 48 > Telepathy - 35 > the Devil - 56 > Possession by Devil - 42 > Angels - 72 > Astrology - 25 > UFO’s have visited Earth - 45 > > Source: Gallup poll survey, 1996 > > I find that kinda scary. While I won’t say that I _believe they are real,_ until there is evidence to prove or disprove the above, I am open to the possibilities. ---
**Author:** ![START](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2bfe46/32.png) [@START](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/START)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 9:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/53 "2005-02-22T09:06:04Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > And how shocked are you that most of us use punctuation? Very Shocked. ---
**Author:** ![armedmonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@armedmonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/armedmonkey)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 9:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/54 "2005-02-22T09:26:52Z")
I once had a discussion with a friend of mine about the AIDS virus, and how it’s not just a “homosexual disease”. I mentioned that it had already infected a signifigant portion of women, so even straight guys like us had to be wary of it. He disagreed and said you couldn’t get it if you weren’t gay. I asked him how he thought heterosexual women get it. He said, “because they have sex with men; only men can transmit AIDS”. And this was in 199 **9**. ---
**Author:** ![Arwin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/51bf81/32.png) [@Arwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arwin)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/55 "2005-02-22T13:46:40Z")
> [@Podkayne](#): > > Electric fields. They can. not. grasp. them. There are lots of concepts that I remember struggling with the first time that I saw them. But electric fields? I remember seeing **F** =q **E** and thinking, “Oh, yeah. Okay. That’s obvious. Next!” I don’t want to come off like a smarty-pants, but seriously, I didn’t even bat an eye. But these guys? I can get them to grudgingly draw field lines by rote, and work through the math, but as soon as you probe for _any_ conceptual understanding, you get blank stares. I thought at first that I sucked at a teacher, but I begged my colleagues for help and they said, “If you figure it out how to teach them fields, _tell me_!” So, in general questions, open a thread where you answer this question. Try to give us a conceptual understanding. I would like to understand. I’ll be a good challenge because I haven’t got much physics behind my belt, just 2 years in secondary school, but I’ve allways been interested and read a lot of small articles on physics. If you can explain it to me, then the psycho-linguist in me might be able to come up with a way of making them understand. Then again, you might just end up getting a blank stare. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Susie\_Derkins](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47774/32.png) [@Susie\_Derkins](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Susie_Derkins)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/56 "2005-02-22T16:12:48Z")
> [@Ellis Dee](#): > > Indian giver, nigger rig, jew down the price, and welsh on a bet are all on equally un-pc footing. They are also all likely to be found in the dictionary, alongside collateral losses to the pc movement like niggardly. Just FYI. I’m well aware of that, thanks. It’s not a term I normally throw around, but the board on which I posted was Television Without Pity. I was discussing a specific instance on a reality show where a person _on the show_ used the word. In my post I used the terminology that he used, with quotes around it and everything. Sorry I didn’t go into more detail, but my point had nothing to do with the pc-ness of the word. ---
**Author:** ![Susie\_Derkins](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47774/32.png) [@Susie\_Derkins](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Susie_Derkins)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/57 "2005-02-22T16:16:32Z")
And that came out sounding snippier than I meant it to, sorry. Just don’t want to give off the impression that I’m bigoted against the Welsh, or anything. 🙂 Not my intent. ---
**Author:** ![EllisDee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellisdee/32/4531_2.png) [@EllisDee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EllisDee)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2005, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/58 "2005-02-22T23:35:56Z")
No worries. The clarification was unnecessary, but appreciated. ---
**Author:** ![Cyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a88e4f/32.png) [@Cyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cyn)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2005, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/59 "2005-02-23T02:02:46Z")
Many people don’t think like I do. I’m 42 years old, was raised Catholic, quit college to get married and raise kids. I was a soccer mom and PTA president. I was an abused woman. I was a divorcee and single mom. I had therapy. I was a returning student and then a RN. I have had many beliefs shattered, I have had many opinions reversed and I have met many people who are the reverse of a stereotype. Even if I don’t choose what others choose or can’t appreciate what others appreciate, I know that others have needs that I don’t. And that’s okay. But many people don’t think like I do. ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2005, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195/60 "2005-02-23T15:06:38Z")
What **Cyn** said. As a teen, I had the same mental capacities I have now, but I was, in very many ways, very ignorant. Some thinking errors just come so natural, or are so convenient to have, that they don’t correct themselves. An example: _"Honesty is good, therefore, I should be honest always, even when I hurt people with my honesty. In fact, I have to be honest_ especially _when it hurts other people, otherwise I’m a coward_". :rolleyes: Being intelligent doesn’t automatically mean having all the neccesary information. It also doesn’t mean not making intellectual mistakes -one mistake is admitted to each of us. 😉 You wouldn’t expect a somebody, no matter how musical they are, to play every new tune faultless, upon first performing it; why would we expect any different when somebody has to grasp a new or difficult intellectual concept? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-dont-think-like-you-do/291195.md?page=4)