Open Minded Non Believer is this a contradiction?

Answer 1

Open minded means that you are ready to listen and accept new or different ideas.

It is the recognition that what you think you know is always a limitation. We can believe anything we want but we must be open to any possibility and capible of adjusting as new things are learned.

If we have closed minds we can't adjust our beliefs if something we had previously believed turns out not to be true.

Open mindedness facillitates growth. Closed mindedness is stagnation.

Answer 2

Actually, just the opposite is true. BELIEF is the antithesis of an open mind. Belief is an insidious mind-killer... it cuts one off from the honest consideration of alternative possibilities.

Open mindedness is an expression of the willingness to consider alternative possibilities... and 'intellectual honesty' goes hand-in-hand with that. Intellectual honesty implies one's willingness to question and to doubt the validity of one's own assumptions.

I should clarify my use of the word 'belief' here. It is perfectly acceptable, in everyday discourse, to say things like:

* I believe OJ did it.
* I believe the sun will come up tomorrow.
* I believe in god.

However, in deeper discussion, it is necesary to recognize that there are different nuances of meaning for the word 'belief' in those three statements... subtleties that seem to escape the notice of most Christians.

In the first sentence, 'belief' connotes a strong opinion.

In the second sentence, 'belief' represents a reasonable expectation based upon knowledge and experiential reference.

In the third sentence, 'belief' represents a certainty that one knows the absolute objective 'truth' about some aspect of existence and reality.

It is in the sense of the THIRD meaning that I say that 'belief' is an insidious mind-killer. In that sense, such a belief is essentially a DELUSION, since it is arrived at by non-rational processes... faith... wishful thinking.

Once one is possessed of such delusions, they provide a neat, tidy explanation for everything. Where rational people struggle with sorting out facts and evidence to arrive at a reasonable explanation, 'believers' do not struggle at all... in the epitome of intellectual dishonesty and intellectual laziness, they just declare "God did it." Where the rational person is forced to admit "We don't know... yet", the 'believer' again declares "God did it."

The intellectual toolbox of the rational person contains such items as biology, cosmology, chemistry, physics, mathematics, logic, physics, philosophy, history... (the list goes on), the believer's intellectual toolbox consists of... oops... wait a minute... believers don't HAVE an intellectual toolbox. All they have is the Wholly Babble, and the brilliant assertion "God did it", and the brilliant intellectual position for countering the facts and knowledge uncovered by science... "Ain't SO."

Answer 3

It's no more a contradiction than open minded believer. Believers don't change their minds either.

Answer 4

No way, One has to a NON BELIEVER to be OPEN MINDED.

Just think of a Juror. One has to start with NO preconceived ideas to decide if the accused is guilty or not depending on the evidence only. If a person BELIEVES the accused is guilty he will not be selected to the jury.

Belief is a PRECONCEIVED idea and u cant have it to be OPEN MINDED.

Answer 5

No.Open minded believer-is this a contradiction?

Only in Giggles can you find belief and open mindedness.

Answer 6

Mmm, well.... Does open-minded mean to you that *they* will consider everything, or just that they're ok with *you* believing it? As a great man once said, "Keep an open mind, but not so open that your brain falls out"

Answer 7

More accurate than an open minded 'believer'

Christianity? Jesus? Dying?

What is the Imacculate Conception supposed to mean?

(NOT A VIRGIN BIRTH! - betcha never knew that.)

Jesus, the basis of Christianity? .

If Jesus died, he could NOT have been God.

Gods do not die? Do they?

If Jesus 'died' on Friday and 'undied' on Sunday, what else besides Saturday was sacrificed?

Did Jesus give up Saturday for us? Big deal!

If Jesus died for our sins, there should not be any more sins, else why go through with it?.

If Jesus really DIED, he should be dead, dead, dead!

If you swallow this stuff, you are not going to like the folks who don't. You want them to swallow it too.

Christians want everyone to convert to their non-thinking in order to be 'saved'.

Believing and not thinking is like choosing a mental illness and becoming lost.

What is a Christian Principle?

Answer 8

Of course. You don't even need to be religious to see the oxymoron here, you just need to be an OPEN minded person that is ok at English.

Answer 9

i imagine you want to take a route or 2 in philosophy. there's a wide distinction between idea and awareness. "won't be able to recognize the solutions..." is not any reason to fill the voids with superstitious nonsense. with none type of data in besides there is not any reason to count on any type of god. there is a large number of data that gods were invented by people. there is a large number of data the Bible is a cultural diary of the civilization builders. the autumn of Adam and Eve, for example, is clearly the tale of the rural Revolution. there is truly no reason to believe something supernatural in the Bible or the different textual content. "vast Bang" I refer you on your own 2d vs three-D party. If the curvature of spacetime is closed and curved then all of what human beings on the following say about the great Bang is valueless. Stand and face north and commence walking in a immediately line. the position do you eventually end up? the total idea of the 'first reason' is stupid and meaningless even as one considers the quantum consequences cutting-edge. a persons' lack of awareness of technological expertise or truth is not in any respect a reason to believe in the supernatural. "Proove gods do not exist?" (sic) This argument isn't incorrect because this is elementary, this is incorrect because this is blind to common sense and the load of data. you won't be able to instruct i do not own a tin of mushroom soup. If i'm claiming I do own a tin of mushroom soup, the load isn't on you to disprove it. it should be just about no longer a threat for you to disprove it. on the different hand, it should be really common for me to instruct it if it were authentic. i do not attempt to instruct gods do not exist. i will go back notably darned on the fringe of proving gods are something else although. Gods are memetic beings that stay in the minds of believers. This definition satisfies the coolest purchase of the religious experience and calls for no longer something supernatural. therefore, there is not any reason in any respect to think about a extra convoluted (ie, supernatural) definition. I reject those comments as drivel because they're drivel. the individuals who make those comments haven't any theory what they're speaking about. no longer all critiques are both supported by data and common sense. there is no longer something obdurate about continuously rejecting improper arguments like those. in case you do not realize why those are improper arguments, i'm afraid that asserts a ways extra about you than it does us atheists.

Answer 10

I don't hink so either...one can be open minded...it doesn't mean you have to believe in any one religion at all...

"A mind is like a parachute...it works a lot better when it's open."

Arthur Q