Dragonseer ... I think you're giving "these people" way too much credit. It's a bit of a catch-22. The reason there's no problem resolving a 4,000 year old Earth myth with
the facts, is that some folks just throw it all out the window. They stick their head in the sand, and that's it. They feel overwhelmed, frightened, scared ... so they abandon all logic and reason, and - most importantly - they trade uncertainty for a set of pat answers and ready-made solutions for all of life's problems.
No, the answers don't make sense (not for them any more than they do for rational, thinking people), and certainly they contain no real solutions for life's problems and challenges. But this isn't important anymore. As long as I have my plastic jesus ....
your lips move, but I can't hear what you're sayin'. They have purchased an ignore button, and some of them just press it and never lift that finger again. The others DO lift a finger, but it's a different one, and they too sit silently in defiance ... happy to show you that
one, middle finger, yet nothing additional of what we would call logic or reason. Fear, ignorance and self-righteousness after all, need no further defense.
At once (for me, personally) the most difficult, challenging and frustrating of cases, yet also the most hopeful ... are those who have readily adopted these nonsensical views, yet who have also chosen to try and refute their position according to the rules of logic and rational discourse. They are frustrating for the obvious reasons, and certainly they have achieved new levels of obstinacy and irrationality; however, their persistence, coupled with their refusal to relinquish altogether their thinking faculties, guarantees that at least
some Hope remains for them ... to one day see the light, despite their temporary eclipse of rationality. This brings a smile to my face!
There is no need to play Devil's Advocate; these folks give the Devil himself a run for his money! And why gripe over the flat-earth geocentrists when they provide so much amusement for the rest of us, at no more cost than the forsaking of their own, God-given power of Reason! We should thank our lucky Stars that such individuals are still sufficiently abundant among us to remind of
so well of what it looks like when we REFUSE to THINK, and that we ourselves may be spared the ordeal of having to go through such mind-numbing phases of temporary insanity.
Let's just remember to try and do our part, such that if and when we have the combined pleasure, privilege and woeful misfortune of stumbling across such an individual or gaggle of said personages, we at least make such gestures as are of custom, whereby we try to engage them in discussion ~ so that we might at once detect whether a shred of sanity yet remains, in which case we should seek gently to stimulate the thinking principle with fresh and renewed vigor, or, finding all rationality to have temporarily departed, we might spare both them and ourselves
wasted words and effort.
Yours Sincerely,
~ Taijasi ~
