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1. Does God want you to become a cult leader and commit mass suicide?
No.
"For a God, if he truly be a God, has no wants or needs; these are miserable tales of the poets." ~Euripides
"If therefore we grant that the Gods are the leaders of the whole of things, and that their providence extends to all things, since they are good, and possess every virtue, how is it possible they should neglect the felicity of the objects of their providential care?" ~Proclus
The Gods have no wants or needs. They look after us because it is right to do so, and they are perfectly virtuous. Part of that is something akin to hoping that we also pursue the path of virtue, for if you have a duty to look after someone it is natural for the goal to be for that person to become a virtuous person. If the Gods are to want for anything, it is for us to pursue the virtues because it is right to do so (rather than because they might want us to).
Aristotle makes it clear in Nicomachean Ethics that suicide is against virtue, and thus is not something we should pursue.
2. Does God want you to murder your entire family when things get tough to spare them the pain of this life?
No, murder is against virtue, and so for the reasons above it is not something we should pursue.
3 does God want you to live a life that sucks by avoiding fun things like orgies or tattoos or pork all because the next life will make the shitty life you have all worth it?
Pursuing hedonistic pleasures can, at times, run contrary to virtue, and thus we should not pursue them.
So tattoos, depends on what of and why.
Pork, nothing wrong with it normally.
Orgies? That seems likely to run into issues in regards to virtue.
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@SkepticalOne
I mean, a drag performer is a co-author!
Yes, I know, which is why it is telling. It was co-authored by a prominent drag performer that is behind the Drag Queen Story Hour and outlines what the goals are. When you understand how grooming works, it is clear that the goals line up well with the initial steps of grooming. Do you not think that an article that says one thing cannot also show something else unintentionally?
The article does not support the 'grooming' conclusion you're drawing.
Tell me, what do you think grooming is? It isn't some quick process where you take a child, show them porn, and go "let's do that!" It is a slow process where you guide them step by step, normalizing each step along the way, until they end up doing sexual things.
Hell, many people that were groomed into being porn stars first step in the process was ordinary modeling.
Early stages of grooming can seem very innocuous, but they serve a clear purpose in priming them for each next step.
You're saying a particular group of individuals is guilty of priming kids for sexual contact while also admitting your have no evidence to support that
That is not what I said at all.
The article I linked clearly shows that part of the intention is grooming (though it does not use that word and the authors likely have some cognitive dissonance in that regard). Saying "they aren't being convicted" is not saying "there is no evidence", as anyone that has studied the porn industry could tell you. Looking at what is happening with child drag performers, the normalization of such things, etc. is also an important point that you have seemingly refused to address.
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@thett3
It’s well documented that this trend runs like wildfire through especially teen girl friend groups
And it has been well documented for decades that teen girls are most susceptible to social contagion.
Honestly, before the widespread social acceptance movement happened, most cases of gender dysphoria appeared in men. Afterwards, there is a drastic increase in teenage girls, and yet any attempt at suggesting that social contagion has any role is often met with criticism.
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@SkepticalOne
First, there was no link in the post I responded to.
Apparently the hyperlink broke at some point. Where, in parentheses, I quoted the name of the article (Drag pedagogy: The playful practice of queer imagination in early childhood) it was also supposed to be a link to it. Do hyperlinks not work on DART? If so, never realized that before. Will directly provide the link then,
If our conception of groomers were informed by who is actually being charged sex crimes against children
I do not see how that follows. Grooming often doesn't result in criminal prosecution. Have you ever actually talked to or listened to/read interviews with some porn stars? Grooming can often be a slow process that doesn't result in charges being filed.
One thing I have consistently done is attack arguments rather than people. Attacking the person is a sure sign of a weak argument, imo.
This was not meant to be an attack, but a genuine curiosity as we got along quite well when I was active on DDO. Since joining DART, however, it just seems like you have grown more dogmatic when it comes to certain political issues, and I was curious about what changed. If it came off as an attempted ad hominem, then I apologize, as that was not my intention.
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@thett3
I have an extended family member who around age 13 or so didn’t want to wear girl clothes and for a time decided she was “non-binary.”
I honestly think the whole "non-binary" thing most helps show that the ideology relies on sexist stereotyping. Ask any non-binary person what makes them non-binary and you will always get to something built upon sexist stereotyping. Even if they say something vague like they don't "feel like a boy/girl", pressing on that reveals some sort of stereotype on what they think it means to feel like a boy/girl that they don't fit.
It is why you increasingly see stories of parents with tomboy daughters constantly having people question if their daughters are trans or not.
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@SkepticalOne
Counter: Bugs Bunny in drag is inherently sexual?
I mean, yes. Have you watched those clips? Bugs always acts in a way that accentuates the sexual aspects of the female form when he is in drag (rather than just using female clothing as a disguise). The cartoony and comedic nature of the show helps to mitigate things, but that doesn't make drag less of a sexual thing.
Could it be that this has more to do with women being perceived as inherently sexual carrying over to anything/anyone presenting as feminine?
Not at all. Women are not inherently sexual, I have never pushed such thinking either (in fact, I have often pushed against such a notion).
As for grooming? A perusal of recent sex offenders isn't likely to include a drag queen as lawyer Kristen Prata Browe has shown. Link I think her most recent vids are from March, but the point stands.
This is why multiple drag queens that do reading at Drag Queen Story Hour have been found to been convicted pedophiles, that we see some stories of Drag Queens (like Anastasia Diamond) have recently been found with child porn, oh, and most importantly, the exact points I made about both child drag shows (even giving an example) where you can find them acting no different than some strippers and the article that outlines the purpose of Drag Queen Story Hour that implicitly admits that it is about grooming (an article I even linked).
I mean, come on man, you were so much better at objectively addressing points, even from people you disagreed with, and constructing sound arguments in political discussions back on DDO. What happened in the last few years?
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@Best.Korea
Well, are you saying that child shouldnt do non-nude stripping in front of grown men?
Obviously. Non-nude stripping is still inherently sexual and can easily lead to grooming, and thus children should not participate in any way.
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@RationalMadman
I think that gender dysphoria should be treated like all other dysphorias (bulimia, general body dysmorphia, muscle dysmorphia, etc.) and considered a delusion that should be treated rather than something we should affirm. I find attempts at separating sex and gender typically end up with sexist stereotyping of the kind that the feminists of the mid-late 20th century marched against.
I also think that drag is inherently sexual, and that there very much is a grooming aspect. Look at, for example, Desmond is Amazing, a child "drag star" that essentially participates in non-nude stripping (which is already still recognized as pornographic and sexual in nature) in front of grown men. He would go on stage, put on a show where he removed clothes, as grown men watched, cheered, and threw money at him. Things like Drag Queen Story Hours are not innocent either, as an article written about the purpose of these events (Drag pedagogy: The playful practice of queer imagination in early childhood) even talks about how it is meant to get children to think in queer ways, introduce them to queer culture, and even says "We’re reading books while we read each other’s looks, and we’re leaving a trail of glitter that won’t ever come out of the carpet." If we are meant to take what Desmond is Amazing is doing as part of that culture, and it seems like we are, and that Drag Queen Story Hours are meant to get young minds to accept and possible enter into that culture, then that is grooming, no question about it.
I have said a lot on the subject here in the past, I have a lot more I could say, but I think that at this point that people are mostly entrenched in their sides, so question what point there is to rehash things in any sort of depth here.
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@oromagi
Christ commanded you to never mind those silly old books
"Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven." ~Matthew 5:17–20 (NRSV)
Clearly, that isn't what Jesus said.
and focus on being more kind to the people around you.
Sure, I agree that Jesus said that to love your neighbor is very important,
""Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?" He said to him, "‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets."" ~Matthew 22:36-40 (NRSV)
But he also clearly tells believers to rebuke sinners.
"Be on your guard! If another disciple sins, you must rebuke the offender, and if there is repentance, you must forgive." ~Luke 17:3 (NRSV)
So, if you are arguing that Jesus, according to the Bible, said to ignore the Old Testament laws and to never judge/criticize others, then it really seems like you are speaking falsehoods. If you think that the historical Jesus said that, then you would need to make a case beyond mere assertation.
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@SkepticalOne
"Homosexual" was translated into the Bible for the first time in 1946 in the RSV translation. OP has it backwards: biblical demonization of homosexuality is a new phenomena rather than a tradition thousands of years old.
The word itself, sure. What exactly constitutes a "homosexual" is also moreso a social construct, but the act of sex between two men was, itself, condemned in the Bible, though the wording by which this was understood changed as conceptions around homosexuality and homosexuals changed.
I used to subscribe to the conception that it was "mistranslations" that led to such condemnation, but it just seems like such a stretch to reach that point (to the point where you basically have to violate simplicity principles). For example, though I am drawing a blank on the specifics, one of the Old Testament verses has Christians that try to defend homosexuality in the Bible interpret one of the words as actually meaning "young man" rather than just man, all in an attempt to interpret the verse to be more about calling out pederasty. The issue is that that word is used many other places to just mean "man" and that nowhere else would it mean "young man" (if I can remember the specifics, I will go over it here).
We can even see the consequence of this Biblical condemnation throughout history, how the church and Christian nations treated those that engaged in homosexual acts.
Like, I get wanting to be more open to homosexuals and homosexuality (I am, myself, bi), but I feel attempts to reinterpret history to fit that goal is misplaced (and would be quite impious if done by Christians in regards to the Bible).
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I think one of the main issues tends to be a misunderstanding of what evidence is.
Evidence can be one of two things:
1) Something that, in light of its existence, shows X to be more probably true than false (this is what most people think evidence is).
2) Something that, in light of its existence, shows X to be more probably true than if it did not exist (and this is often neglected).
Something can be evidence of the 2nd kind without it being enough to establish that the thing it is evidence for is more probably true than false, yet often you will find people saying things like "there is no evidence for X" due to the things usually pointed to as evidence not being evidence of the 1st kind.
Cumulative cases for things are cases built on many pieces of evidence of the 2nd kind in order to increase the probability of X to being "more probably true than false," and it is important to note that many conclusions we accept in science, history, etc. are cumulative cases.
A consequence of this is that you can hold that something is likely not true while agreeing that there is evidence for it (whether it is some scientific concept, historical theory, philosophical idea, etc.).
It is rare, then, for there to be a topic worth debating where one side has "no evidence" going for it, even if it doesn't have enough evidence to be "more probably true than false."
So, I do agree with you that it is "irrational to argue that there's no evidence for the afterlife," and I think that most people that do make that claim do so out of a fundamental misunderstanding on what constitutes 'evidence'.
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@YouFound_Lxam
Because I am, ultimately, and evidentialist (with some non-standard views surrounding intuition) and do not find Christianity to be a justified enough belief to hold to in comparison to my current religion.
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@RationalMadman
In college I was talking with someone from Japan who said he grew up in a house with his parents and grandparents.
Essentially, how it worked in his home, was that the kids stay with their parents (and, in his case, his grandmother as well) until they find a partner to move in with, with one child who agrees to stay with the parents (and grandmother) for the purposes of looking after them, even after finding a partner.
The parents (and grandmother) were smart enough to know to give privacy, leave the home for a few hours for meals, shopping, etc.
Then, when the kids are born, the grandparents (and great grandmother) are there to help look after and raise them (no need for baby sitters, no need for daycare, etc.). Cousins would also be dropped off to be looked after if needed.
Grandparents were smart enough to go out with the kids at times to give the parents privacy.
This system makes it easier to raise children, makes it easier to look after the elderly in the family, etc.
That doesn't mean I don't think that you should move out if you and your parents don't get along (like you said, if someone is gay with homophobic parents), but in a functioning family, I genuinely think that this system is better. One of the big advantages is that it doesn't dehumanize the elderly as much as what happens in western countries that just put the elderly in retirement homes.
It saves money, creates a stronger family bond, increases empathy for the elderly in children, etc.
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@TheUnderdog
If you are living on your own or with a partner, then you’re an adult. Otherwise, you could be 30 and if you live with your parents still, you wouldn’t be an adult with my classification.
Eh, personally, I think the American culture of adulthood=independence is messed up. It was literally only pushed because it would lead to more people needing to buy land, pay rent, etc.
I think the cultures that have multigenerational housing have it right.
Wanting to push people out of the house at 18 and put parents into housing in their old age just seems so messed up to me, despite having been raised in that culture.
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@TheUnderdog
It isn't on your list, and certainly isn't popular enough to have warranted being on your list, but I am curious on what your thoughts are on creating a new category besides just minor and adult?
I have seen arguments that once someone reaches 18 that they should be allowed certain greater freedoms and take on certain responsibilities (they pay taxes, they can drink, etc.), but that they should not be given true independence from their parents and should not be given full autonomy of actions and voting rights until 25 (after the brain has become fully developed).
Essentially, it is the idea that we should take some of the rights (like voting, elective medical decisions, etc.) and responsibilities that we typically grant at 18, specifically ones that have greater and longer lasting consequences to self and others, and wait until 25 (as at that point their brain is fully developed, they should be wiser, etc.)
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@IwantRooseveltagain
If you make a poor financial decision then you should live with the consequences of said decision.
Why so you support forcing people that were fiscally responsible being forced to pay for people's bad financial decisions?
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@zedvictor4
Sure, but the point is that the statement "Studies that did not pass peer review" is incorrect, and that this would have been easy to see (hence the conclusion that IwantRooseveltagain is either trolling or an idiot).
Maybe the peer review process for the studies I am using is poor, I do not believe it is (and the BoP would be on whoever claims the process is poor), but that wasn't the relevant issue.
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@IwantRooseveltagain
Literally all of the studies I am relying on were published in journals that use peer-review.
So, once again, are you an idiot or a troll. I think assuming idiocy isn't a nice thing to do (unless the alternative is malice, in which case apply Hanlon's Razor), and thus I am going to keep with my view that you are a troll.
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@IwantRooseveltagain
After reading your ignorant comments on affirmation treatments
Yes, my "ignorant" comment that cited multiple studies.
I think it is a safe bet to think you are just a troll.
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@IwantRooseveltagain
Serious question, why the hyperfocus on my religious convictions?
You create this thread addressing Idaho's plan to ban certain affirmation treatments for minors, but you spend so much of your responses to me focused on my religious views (which you had to look at my profile in order to even see, which means instead of focusing on the comment I made you looked beyond it to find something to address).
Are you just trolling? Do you have some sort of mental health issue that is causing you to be hyperfocused on it?
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@IwantRooseveltagain
Is it a flawed study or not? [...] What are the chances that one part of a study is seriously flawed and another part is valid?
I'm sorry, but maybe you should reread what I have said.
The paper I used is one that is calling out another paper.
Nowhere did I use the study being called out to support my arguments, I only used the paper that is calling out the flawed study and then other studies that address a different, though tangentially related, issue.
So, is the study that is being called out by the paper I sourced flawed? Yes.
Does that negatively impact any of the points I am making? No.
I seriously think you need to learn to read more carefully if you are making this mistake (though, with your insistence on using logical fallacies, I doubt that you are unintentionally making this mistake)
Did you offer a sacrifice to the Gods before reading the study? [...] What do the Gods say?
Again, relevance?
Is this just you being anti-theistic?
I also find it funny how you say, "This site always reaffirms and validates my conclusion that weirdos and idiots tend to be right wing." seemingly, in part, as a response to me being a Hellenist when the majority of Hellenists are actually on your side on this issue, but you wouldn't know that, would you?
It is hard to believe your claim on your profile of being a "Captain and helicopter pilot in the Marines" considering the level of maturity you display here.
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@Double_R
No, it is "small government dedicated to X, Y, and Z". Try not to misrepresent people all your life, it is unbecoming of you.
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@IwantRooseveltagain
You cite a source that is critical of the conclusions you were trying to advance.
Really now? Your quoted section doesn't really do that, as the part you are relying on for your "point" is about the relationship between conversion therapy (GICE) and serious mental illness, not non-affirming therapy and serious mental illness (in fact, one of the main points of the paper is them calling out the conflation of non-affirming, neutral therapies with conversion therapy). You should try actually reading the paper with an unbiased mind next time rather than misrepresent it to try and prove your point.
So far, not a single one of your comments that has responded to me has been without logical fallacies. Maybe you should actually read up on logic before continuing?
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@IwantRooseveltagain
This is what makes you a weirdoHellenism is, in practice, primarily centered around polytheistic and animistic worship. Devotees worship the Greek gods, which are the Olympians, divinities and spirits of nature (such as nymphs), underworld deities (chthonic gods) and heroes. Both physical and spiritual ancestors are greatly honored.
I know what Hellenism is. The issue, so far, is that it is a non-sequitur.
P1) I am an ordained Hellenist.
P2) Hellenism is, in practice, primarily centered around polytheistic and animistic worship. Devotees worship the Greek gods, which are the Olympians, divinities and spirits of nature (such as nymphs), underworld deities (chthonic gods) and heroes. Both physical and spiritual ancestors are greatly honored.
P3) ???
C) I am a "weirdo"
You need to fill out what P3 is (possibly even have more than just 3 premises).
Furthermore, you ignored the more substantial parts of the comment, the parts actually related to the topic at hand.
It genuinely makes me suspect that you have no response but refuse to admit your ignorance on the matter, hence the focus on my religious convictions which have no bearing on the topic at hand.
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@IwantRooseveltagain
so you are a weirdo then. Why would anyone be interested in the uninformed opinion of a weirdo?
What, precisely, makes me a "weirdo" just for being an ordained Hellenist? Why would me being a "weirdo" matter?
Also, calling me uniformed when I am the only person to cite sources on this topic so far in this entire thread. I think you are projecting.
Parents aren’t forcing their kids to get these treatments they are allowing their kids to get the treatments they seek.
Children are inherently not educated enough to make such decisions, especially when they are life altering. I already cited two sources that go over desistance rates with the difference being if the child is medicated or not, should I also go over suicidality and how studies that show affirmation helps often are flawed and there are, when possible, corrections that show that mental health gets worse in many areas?
And when I say "when possible" I am referring to the shitty state of academia. To quote from the earlier cited paper again,
"In contrast, the debate regarding this study in the scientific arena was not allowed to occur. To the best of our knowledge, all of the letters written to the Editor of JAMA Psychiatry, many by respected academics and clinicians who outlined the serious problems in the study, have been rejected."
That is the sad reality when it comes to trans issues in academia, that if you aren't on board with affirmation that you will have a harder time getting your voice heard. In fact, the paper was only written because (1) their own letters were being rejected, and (2) "In the ensuing months, as we observed Turban et al.’s unsupported claims of the harms of psychotherapy for GD taking root globally (United Nations, 2020), we felt compelled to write a more detailed critique of the study, which we present here."
Bad science that supports affirmation becomes prominent, good science that doesn't (or that do but calls out studies that go beyond the supporting evidence) don't.
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@IwantRooseveltagain
I am an ordained Hellenist Priest.Ok weirdo
So, instead of attacking the argument you look at my profile for something to criticize me, the person making the argument, for?
I mean, honestly, this is one of the clearest examples of an ad hominem fallacy that I have ever seen, I am actually impressed.
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"Yet these therapeutic interventions do not aim to convert or consolidate an identity, but instead aim to help individuals gain a deeper understanding of their discomfort with themselves, the factors that have contributed to their distress, and their motivations for seeking transition (Bonfatto & Crasnow, 2018; D’Angelo 2020a). These exploratory questions are consistent with the principle of therapeutic neutrality—a cornerstone of ethical psychotherapy (Simon, 1992). In fact, both “conversion” and “affirmation” therapy efforts carry the risk of undue influence, potentially compromising patient autonomy. In contrast, the provision of a neutral, unbiased psychotherapeutic process that allows these patients to clarify their feelings and assess the various treatment options, which range from non-invasive to highly invasive, irreversible procedures, is arguably the only way that meaningful informed consent for the latter can be obtained (Levine, 2018)."
The truth is, not all non-affirming therapy is "conversion therapy", and the overly affirmation focused therapy that currently is common practice is, in some ways, just as far from ethical psychotherapy practices as conversion therapy.
Furthermore, we know that a lot of children that aren't given medical affirmation end up desisting, potentially up to 80% of them (https://medium.com/@jesse.singal/everyone-myself-included-has-been-misreading-the-single-biggest-study-on-childhood-gender-8b6b3d82dcf3) yet when you give them puberty blockers, only 2% desist (https://www.them.us/story/transition-regret-percentage-overblown-study).
This should be worrying. Combine this with stories that more and more detransitioners (like Helena Kerschner, as an example) are coming forward where they didn't feel comfortable in their bodies (which is normal for puberty) and people pushed them to socially transitioning, followed by "love bombing" them into feeling as if this was the right choice (when it wasn't), and we have a serious issue here. It very well could be that there is less desistance because of the overly affirmation focused environment that has been built up, with such extreme positivity being pushed by the left that it almost creates a default position of "love bombing" people going through transitioning.
Furthermore, puberty blockers are not harmless, this is why we see in countries that were "ahead" of us when it came to affirmation-therapies both medically and culturally medical organizations banning the use of puberty blockers in minors for affirmation therapy (see the U.K., Sweden, etc.).
The GOP does typically hold to a limited government, but they also hold to certain jobs the government is meant to uphold, and that is to protect the lives of the citizens and the well-being of minors. This very much is inline with that.
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Probably one of the only pagans left on this website (though not really active), but ya, not a fan of Wicca. It is a clearly invented religion (rather than one that arrived through cultural evolution), its foundation was based upon lies and now universally debunked historical ideas on the history of witches, etc.
Wicca tends to be much more politically tied than reconstructionist pagan religions, and there is a long history of cultural appropriation within Wicca.
Though, if you are looking for more "helpful" advice, then I recommend looking at what reconstructionists and historians say about their religions when "borrowing" elements from them rather than what wiccans say or interpreting it yourself (unless you have enough of a foundation to feel you can do it correctly). A warning would be that wiccan spaces are also very tied in with progressive politics, and so if you don't agree with progressive political views that it would be better to just shut up about politics and politically adjacent topics all together. Having people you can get along with that share your religious views, especially when there are so few pagans, is more important than you would think (take it from someone that lost their original group of pagan friends due to political BS).
I also would give a warning about hubris, thinking that any God or Goddess thinks of you in a super special way compared to others. It is easy to interpret religious experiences to fit what you want, and it is easy, if you are actively looking for such experiences (which I tend to see Wiccans actively looking for them more often than recons) that you will see and hear things that aren't there, your mind is just validating you and you are interpreting it as divine validation.
If there is any specific topic, then I can try to answer, but the overlap between Hellenism and Wicca isn't that great, and so it would mostly be me giving advice from what I have seen from various Wiccan friends and what I had looked into on my own time.
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Diversity can be a beneficial thing, so long as it is a subculture that comes secondary to the shared, primary culture.
Societies work when the people within have something in common that unites them, this is where a shared culture comes into play (and why cultural assimilation by immigrants is necessary for a functioning society). If the people focus on and strengthening that unity it leads to people that don't let their differences create conflict, and thus we end up with the differences from secondary subcultures being ways of seeing issues from various perspectives (and thus can lead to better solutions to issues the society faces).
The problem comes in when there isn't a shared, unifying culture or when the shared, unifying culture comes secondary to people with the subculture becoming primary. This leads to division, which leads to viewing others within society as part of "in-groups" or "out-groups", leading to conflict.
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@PREZ-HILTON
Ya, can't find it either.
So, no more looking at your comment history (only post history), no more looking at your votes and debate comment history (only your debate history), no more ability to change your profile picture, no more being able to vote without having done debates (I know others probably like this change, but I don't)...
Overall, not a fan of the update. Sure, there are some visual overhauls (which I really don't care much about either way), but the other changes seem to be more negative imo.
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Already don't like it.
When it comes to your profile, you can now only see forum posts you started and debates you participated in. You used to be able to see forum comments you made and debate votes you casted. This is already a bad thing.
Then the qualification requirements, not a fan. I get that it can help, to a degree, with quality in a sort of "quantity vs quality" perspective, but not being able to create forum topics without first commenting can limit discussion potential when new members join. More importantly for me, however, is that though I rarely am on this site due to time constraints, I do occasionally read through and vote on debates. I no longer can do this because I haven't done any debates on DART, and I don't consistently have the time to do so for the foreseeable future. This makes it so that the rare chance I have to come to this website has become even more meaningless, as it is already rare to find discussions that I wish to contribute to, but now I can't even vote on a debate that I take the time to read through on the off chance I find one, when I have time, to go through.
I made sure that all my debate votes were of substantial quality (with the exception of votes made when winner was decided due to forfeit), but with that no longer being an activity I can participate in, there is now less of a reason for me to come back to this site when I have time.
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@Tejretics
Few months late, but I never got pinged that you responded, though I guess that I also don't come to debateart often either.
I’d be curious what you think the strongest arguments for polytheism are!
This really depends on if the context is 'monotheist vs polytheist' or 'atheist vs polytheist'.
If the former, then there are quite a few arguments out there.
- Diversity of Religious Experience (Greer's feline analogy from his book A World full of Gods is great) is one that many monotheists will likely struggle with without relying on special pleading.
- Edward Butler has an argument that polycentrism is more fundamental than monocentrism, and using this to argue for polytheism.
- I created an argument about the impossibility of a single, unified theory of everything suggesting that there isn't a single rational being that everything is contingent upon.
- And a friend of mine on Reddit, Willdam20, created a great argument for polytheism from mathematical platonism.
These are the four main arguments that I typically use in debates/discussions with monotheists (which makes up most of my debates/discussions on religion).
As for arguments for theism specifically:
- I actually have become convinced that Religious Experience arguments work when used for polytheism (though fail when used for monotheism). This is especially when you combine Swinburne's argument from Reid's Principle of Credulity, Dumsday's argument from Evidentially Compelling Religious Experiences (though his examples in his paper suck), and Greer's cat analogy.
- I also Pruss's 'design' argument that the low entropy of the early universe is more probably under theism than naturalism is quite good (much better than the fine-tuning argument).
- I also am convinced on the New Kalam, the argument for God(s) via causal finitism. I was actually convinced of causal finitism before being convinced that it worked as an argument for God(s).
- While less an argument for theism, I have found that polytheism is able to actually avoid numerous arguments used to prove philosophical atheism (the POE fails, Divine Hiddenness doesn't work that well, etc.)
I don't think any single argument works, it is moreso that they balance the scales in a certain way that ultimately ends up with polytheism on top (imo). If you take a pluralistic attitude towards polytheism, and adopt some more platonic ideas, it seems as if things fall into place. I do have to say, however, that abandoning materialism was also probably a big factor in this. I just felt as though a combination of qualia, when it comes to mind and body, the ontology of holes, and the indispensability argument for mathematical platonism made it harder and harder to reject immaterial things as nonexistent.
I’d say something closer to libertarian free will.
Same, actually. Rare to find other people that hold to free will views that are more libertarian than compatibilist.
Thought experiments. My favorite one, adapted from Derek Parfit, is: if I drop a glass bottle in a woods, that would be irresponsible regardless of whether a child that injures themselves on it gets the injury tomorrow, 100 years, or 500 years from now.
I think that the issue with this thought experiment is that the act that makes it irresponsible is a future occurrence, thus the future is already in mind when judging the act and so the status of if the person is a future person or not isn't as relevant.
My favorite thought experiment is 'the execution game'.
You are in a position where your only choice is to push a button. An executioner is scheduled to kill an innocent person in 10 minutes, but you can stop it by pressing the button in front of you. If you push that button, however, then a random innocent person will die in 3 years instead. Do you push the button? Most people seem to have an intuition of pushing the button being the better choice, though this should be an impossible one if both people have equal moral value.
I think that giving moral value to future people, but not equal moral value to current people, is more intuitive and also seems to better fit how we understand group dynamics.
It is similar to the idea that you can feed the starving person in front of you or let them starve to feed a starving person on the other side of the world instead. Proximity does matter to some extent. You have a greater moral duty to your neighbor than to someone on the other side of the world, and I think this principle can be applied temporally as well.
According to B theories of time, people in the future do exist right now, because time is just an extension of space -- which is likely true if you take special relativity seriously.
I actually have adopted the A-Theory of Time, though that is also a long discussion and not one I am as ready to discuss without preparation.
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@Sidewalker
No they can't, organizational structures can be Monocentric or Polycentric, but they aren't manifolds, and furthermore, your argument is not valid when applied to organizational structure.
True, I accidentally included the word Manifold in a place it did not belong there, I will concede that. I should have said they have similarities to polycentric and monocentric structures in other fields. However, I do think that it ultimately still works when it comes to organizational structures.
You can derive a monocentric organizational structure from a polycentric one (in the same way you can with manifolds), but not the reverse.
It's is certainly easier to understand concepts spatially or temporally, but spatial and temporal concepts cannot be understood to apply to Theology.
Concepts that are contingent upon the spatial or temporal cannot be applied to God(s), sure. But you can look at spatial and temporal things to understand concepts that go beyond the spatial and temporal. Furthermore, you earlier said "Polycentric Manifolds exist as mathematical objects". We could take a Platonic view of mathematics, which we can use the Indispensability Argument for, would mean that even if polycentrism is only foundational in mathematics (like with manifolds) that it is not inherently spatial or temporal, as the Forms are not spatial or temporal.
a common example is Christianity of course, the concept of the Trinity manifests as both Monotheistic and Polytheistic, Hinduism's thousand Gods are all manifestations of the singular transcendent reality of Brahman.
Which still have a monocentric foundation to them, not a polycentric one. They assume a polycentric foundation can be applied to a monocentric one (ex. Trinity onto a single God, as otherwise you get the heresy of tritheism), thus still have a "monocentric foundation".
Could you also expand on what, precisely, you mean when you say "Theologically speaking, there is no excluded middle"?
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@Athias
The best approximation of this reasoning to monotheism and polytheism would incorporate an infinite regression argument which encapsulates neither.
How so? Can you outline where the infinite regress comes into play when applying the logic to theism?
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@thett3
Far from an empty gesture it helped to shift policy by winning votes
Exactly. In fact, this action only makes me want DeSantis to run for president even more. He knows how to influence public sentiment and seems to have a good enough head on his shoulders. Sure, I don't agree with him completely, and so I hope his VP pick will be able to pick up the slack (John Kennedy would be amazing), but he is certainly no fool.
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The "seem" gets dropped once you establish Polycentric Manifolds exist in reality. What is ontologically prior/fundamental must be something that exists, and so if something (Y) seems like it can be derived from X but X does not exist, then it does nothing to indicate how fundamental said thing (Y) is.
To expand on this point, 'God', as classically understood, seems fundamental to the universe.
The universe can be derived from God, but God cannot be derived from the universe.
However, this does not make God actually fundamental to the universe, as one would first need to show God exists. If God does not exist, then God cannot be actually fundamental (as there is no God).
Thus the breakdown. First, you show the relation between two things to see which seems more fundamental than the other, then you show existence to show it is, in fact, fundamental.
So, P1, P2, & C1 merely shows that "if Polycentric Manifolds exist, they are fundamental".
It is due to P3 that we can actually show C2 & C3 as true.
This means that a way to attack the argument, without the frustration that would come with trying to show that Monocentric Manifolds could be fundamental, is to try and argue that Polycentric Manifolds do not actually exist. Of course, it seems plainly obvious that they do, but it would be either show that or somehow show a way for Polycentric Manifolds to be able to be derived from Monocentric ones (or show that some third thing is, in fact, Fundamental to both).
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@Athias
The "seem" gets dropped once you establish Polycentric Manifolds exist in reality. What is ontologically prior/fundamental must be something that exists, and so if something (Y) seems like it can be derived from X but X does not exist, then it does nothing to indicate how fundamental said thing (Y) is.
The entire argument can be formulated without using the word 'seems' and it would work just as well, it just would cause extra explanations in order to be well understood by the layman.
Furthermore, Monocentric Manifolds and Polycentric Manifolds do not exist purely as spatial things, they can exist within organization structures (as an example). It is just easier for people to understand concepts when it is related to them in a more common manner, which tends to be spatial or temporal. That does not mean said concepts are limited to the spatial or temporal, just that it is easier to understand them in said terms.
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@Greyparrot
Exactly. Increase border security, deport illegal immigrants. That is the policy. The policy isn't "Let them come, but you Northern states need to take them." Sure, DeSantis did send them to a Northern state, but not because that is the desired policy. It is because states do not have deportation rights, he needed to do something about the large number, and he needs to make a statement that will sway the country in order to influence the upcoming election for the purpose of increasing border security.
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@Shila
So Christianity is false because it is monotheism.
I mean, among other religions, yes.
If the religious perspective is that there is a singular foundation to all things, then it is a monocentric religious view, and thus false.
Of course, there could be a singular principle(s), like Plato's One (which you should not mistake as being a God, like some try to), that are Foundational, but that is because they are moreso a principle(s) that the Polycentric Manifold necessarily adheres to rather than being an actual foundation itself (if that makes sense).
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For the sake of discussion, we are assuming some form of theism is true.
We can determine which of two things is more fundamental by seeing if one can be derived from the other without the reverse being true.
P1) X can be derived from Y.
P2) Y cannot be derived from X.
C) Y seems more fundamental than X.
When we look at monocentric and polycentric manifolds, we can see that polycentric manifolds are fundamental.
We can see this by thinking about a tree of life pattern of circles over an infinite plane. Not only does every circle have its own center, but every center is also the center of the entire pattern. This is similar to how every center of the observable universe (regardless of where the observation takes place) is also able to be considered the center of the universe, or how the universe expands from every single point equally.
This pattern is polycentric in nature, but yet each circle of the pattern can act as the basis of a monocentric system.
As such, if you have a polycentric manifold, you can derive a monocentric manifold from it.
However, the reverse is not true. No matter the nature of a monocentric manifold, you cannot derive a polycentric manifold from it.
So, replacing X and Y, we get:
P1) Monocentric Manifolds can be derived from Polycentric Manifolds.
P2) Polycentric Manifolds cannot be derived from Monocentric Manifolds.
C) Polycentric Manifolds seem more fundamental than Monocentric Manifolds.
Now, since we also know that Polycentric Manifolds actually exist, we can then take this a step further:
P3) Polycentric Manifolds exist.
C2) Polycentric Manifolds are fundamental.
C3) Monocentric Manifolds are not fundamental.
This is because if Polycentric Manifolds are something we could conceive are possibly more fundamental but do not actually exist, then it would be hard to say they actually are more fundamental.
Now, to relate this to theism, monotheism is a type of Monocentric Manifold, polytheism is a type of Polycentric Manifold. Thus, we can also add this to the argument,
P4) Monotheism is Monocentric and polytheism is Polycentric.
C4) Therefore, polytheism is true (derived from C2, C3, and P4).
Altogether, we have:
A) Some form of theism is true.
P1) Monocentric Manifolds can be derived from Polycentric Manifolds.
P2) Polycentric Manifolds cannot be derived from Monocentric Manifolds.
C) Polycentric Manifolds seems more fundamental than Monocentric Manifolds.
P3) Polycentric Manifolds exist.
C2) Polycentric Manifolds are fundamental.
C3) Monocentric Manifolds are not fundamental.
P4) Monotheism is Monocentric and polytheism is Polycentric.
C4) Therefore, polytheism is true.
Credit:
Argument is ultimately derived from Edward Butler's argument on the topic, with some help from Willdam to formulate the argument.
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@oromagi
To children? Not much and almost all that harm is in the past now.
What are your thoughts on how it might have impacted the immune systems of people via the hygiene hypothesis? Young children were not exposed to nearly the number of microbes as is normal, and (if the hygiene hypothesis is accurate) this might mean an increase in health issues down the line (like allergies, autoimmune disorders, etc.).
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@zedvictor4
I do agree that technology was already diminishing healthy social interaction from a psychological POV, but I feel as if the Covid lockdowns dialed it up to 11. Also, what are your thoughts on the possible long term effects to the immune system via the hygiene hypothesis + lockdowns and over-sanitization?
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I am talking both from a physiological and a psychological perspective.
The lockdowns drastically decreased social exposure with children, and masks also created a disconnect between face and voice, both very important for the psychological development of children.
The lockdowns, sanitization, etc. also will have drastically limited exposure to various microbes, and if the hygiene hypothesis is true that such exposure during adolescence is key to developing a proper immune system, then children could very well be at increased risk in the future.
So, how much damage do you think has been done? Do you think that people went way too overboard with the lockdowns? Do you think that lockdowns, mask, and/or other policies should continue to exist?
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A number of modern Hellenists also hold a festival on the Fall Equinox in regards to Persephone's Descent, as some stories have her in the underworld for 6 months with her ascending being the coming of spring.
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@Shila
But it does say "and more", and so using the Schrödinger defense, I both am and am not qualified on any subject not listed until my qualifications are observed. You, on the other hand, have nothing filled out, which means that you have no indication you are qualified in anything.
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@Shila
Nothing in your profile suggests you are qualified to comment on philosophy.
Nothing in your profile suggests you are qualified to comment on if people are qualified for things or not.
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@RationalMadman
Sure, buddy
Just telling you the Google results.
Putting the term "RationalMoron" in quotations causes it to look for pages with that specific term, using site:debateart.com limits the results to urls that include 'debateart.com'.
Combining the two and it has Google look for any instances of the term "RationalMoron" on a website with 'debateart.com' in the url.
Always possibly that Google missed something, but it makes it easy to cut down on a long search if you know the term you are looking for. Even checked for "Rational Moron" and got nothing. So, maybe Google is missing it, maybe you are misremembering the term, or maybe something else entirely.
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@Tejretics
- Factory farming should be illegal. Animal suffering is the world’s most pressing immediate problem.
I agree that it is a pressing issue, but not sure if I would say it is the pressing issue. I would also go further than this, in a philosophical sense, and say that wasting meat is also a moral issue. I do not support veganism, but I do think that if an animal is killed for the purposes of becoming food that it is only right to actually use the animal for that purpose. If you buy a bunch of meat just to throw some of it out, then that is a problem. I'm not perfect in this, but it is a standard I hope to be able to hold myself to some day.
- It sounds weird, but there’s a legitimate risk that artificial general intelligence (AGI) could cause human extinction -- I’d say something like a 1 in 20 chance in the next 100 years. There’s also more plausible-sounding risks like a sharp rise in inequality from being able to automate most tasks in the future. We should regulate companies like DeepMind and OpenAI more carefully, and fund labs working on making AI go safer.
Agreed.
- Nuclear power is good, but overrated. The focus of climate policy should be solar, wind, and, more speculatively, geothermal.
Disagree. Solar and wind power are great supplementary tools, but there isn't good evidence that they could be a reliable, primary source of energy for a grid. Geothermal is absolutely not focused on enough, but I feel as if there are too few areas where geothermal energy would be useful as a primary source of energy (as its efficiency is tied to geography to an extent). Nuclear is going to have to be the focus (unless we can find a way of efficiently getting energy from tides).
- Fracking should be legal in the US. It creates jobs and generates economic efficiency. Banning it would make energy sources more unclean and empower Russia and Saudi Arabia.
Yes, but purely from a political and not environmental or economic POV. There are other ways of generating jobs, but the US should try and prevent its allies from being dependent on Russian and Saudi oil.
- Gas tax holidays are bad. Gas taxes should be coupled with carbon taxes on corporations.
Agreed, but only because of how economically dependent we are on gas taxes. I think that we should not have gas taxes be that high at all, as to much of the economy relies on people using gas (whether for travel, equipment, etc.). When gas prices get too high, then we face issues that are "solved" by a gas tax holiday, but this is not a good solution.
- In general, hiring more police officers is a good idea. Most countries have fewer police officers than optimal. This might require increasing law enforcement budgets. Police over prisons is a good approach to criminal justice reform.
Agreed, but I think it also needs to be combined with better training, continual training, etc. Yes, this requires increasing the budget for law enforcement, but it is better in the long run.
- The current government in India has done more harm than good, both by mismanaging the economy and hurting India’s advancements on social justice. It’s quite plausible to me that even the Indian National Congress would have done a better job.
Do not know much about India, so won't give my thoughts on this issue (or others that are tied more to India).
- Feminism does more good than harm.
Very context dependent. From a global perspective? Sure. From a historical perspective? Sure (I think some mistakes had been made, but it was, overall, a positive). Are we talking about feminism in the west today? Disagree.
- Abortion should be safe, legal, and accessible, as should contraception.
Strong disagree on the abortion part, strong agree on the contraception part.
- Biden is partly responsible for the ongoing inflation crisis in the US.
Agree, but I think that 'partly' downplays his role a bit.
- Developed countries should admit a lot more immigrants, including low-skill immigrants.
Mixed on this one. High skill immigrants? Sure. Low-skill? Questionable. An important aspect to making immigration work is integration, but if there is too much immigration then the integration levels start to diminish. We can see throughout history that immigration without integration has been disastrous, and so there are real concerns that need to be considered. Furthermore, there is a real question on the impact an increase in potential employees give to employee treatment. The higher the number of people that can fill a position, the less valuable the individual is, and thus the treatment they receive diminishes. It is when it is harder to replace an employee that said employee gets better treatment. This also needs to be kept in mind.
- The War on Terror was, on balance, a success.
Eh? I mean, if it was a success then it was a Pyrrhic victory imo. The amount of laws implemented that just spit on the rights of the people, the further support of the industrial military complex, etc. Not something that bodes well for us.
- The invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 was, on balance, a good idea, even with the benefit of hindsight. Biden pulled out of Afghanistan too early, and, by cutting aid flows to Afghanistan, has since been an absolute failure there.
Disagree on the first part, agree on the second. There was no chance we would be able to have long lasting impact on the state of Afghanistan without basically colonizing it, and so it was just a way of assisting the industrial military complex. I agree that taking on al-Qaeda was a good idea, but the way we went about it was just wrong.
- Biden’s response to Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine has been, on balance, pretty good. The same goes for Zelenskyy’s response.
Disagree. The response has done nothing to assure our allies or anyone else that we would stick up for them. I am genuinely curious how Taiwan feels about what we would actually do to help when China invades.
- Rent control is a bad idea in most cases.
Agreed.
- Excessive zoning regulations, like the Floor Space Index in Indian cities, are very bad. Most coastal American cities are seriously hurt by it. Denser cities are both greener and more efficient.
Mixed on this one, but also would need to do more research into it.
- We should ban gain-of-function research and fund the Biological Weapons Convention a lot more. There’s a legitimate risk of major epidemics or even a pandemic that’s man-made.
Agreed.
- Developed countries are underpopulated. The US doubling its population would mostly have positive consequences. Population growth should be driven both by systems that make it easier for people to have kids (e.g., child allowances, efforts to lower the cost of living) and large increases in immigration.
Disagree, mostly because this would lead to more metropolitan areas, which just are not good for people's mental well-being. I also disagree with the last part, population growth should almost always be primarily from increased births.
- Biden has done a poor job on COVID vaccines. It’s time to invest in creating cross-variant vaccines, and speed up access to nasal and oral vaccines in developing countries.
Agreed.
- Conferences and events in US cities that continue to have mask mandates should abolish them. People can wear masks if they want to, but we’ve reached a point in the pandemic in the US where mask mandates are no longer required, and are frankly kind of silly.
Agreed.
- Free international trade is broadly a good thing.
Disagree. If you have two countries, one that produces a good through ethical means, pays the employees well, etc. and another country that produces the same good through slave labor, free trade on an international scale will allow the country using slave labor to profit (as they can produce the product for cheaper). This is an extreme example, but why do you think that made in China products are so popular (even when there are alternatives)? Because they are affordable, and that is what most people care about. This not only incentivizes countries using unethical policies to continue doing so, but hurts the economy of countries that try to be ethical in business practices. If everyone and every country were generally ethical, then I could see free international trade possibly being a good thing, but that just isn't the reality of things.
- It is very hard for developing countries to grow through services. Export-oriented manufacturing is the best tried-and-tested model for developing countries to catch up.
Agreed.
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@RationalMadman
If you Google "RationalMoron" site:debateart.com then this page is the only one that comes up, which means that the term 'RationalMoron' cannot be found anywhere on this website but this thread (at least, this is the only thread Google can find). So, if Shila did call you a moron elsewhere, it would likely not be in the form of 'RationalMoron'.
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@Shila
Your profile says you studied math and economics. None of the views you listed are covered by your education.
Formally studying some topics does not mean you cannot informally study other topics. Look at Bill Nye as an example. Bill Nye hosted a science education program, continued to work in various ways to educate the public in science, etc., but what he formally studied was engineering. Does this mean Bill Nye is uneducated in science? Not at all. He studied science beyond just his formal education in it because he was passionate, the same can be said of many people with many fields of interest. You do not need to have a formal education in something to be knowledgeable in it (hence why many academic journals do accept papers written by people without a formal education in the field, so long as the paper meets the standard for publication).
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