EXAMPLE: PAT ROBERTSON CLAIMS GOD TOLD HIM BUSH WILL BE RE-ELECTED.
CONCLUSION: THIS MAN HAS A SERIOUS MENTAL PROBLEM.
CONCLUSION: THIS MAN HAS A SERIOUS MENTAL PROBLEM.
Quote from Shrewd Dude:
EXAMPLE: PAT ROBERTSON CLAIMS GOD TOLD HIM BUSH WILL BE RE-ELECTED.
CONCLUSION: THIS MAN HAS A SERIOUS MENTAL PROBLEM.
i don't care what's recognized by who.Quote from ARogueTrader:
Belief in God is not recognized by any accepted major psychiatric association as an indicator of schizophrenia or any other mental illness per say.
Quote from Shrewd Dude:
i don't care what's recognized by who.
A classic symptom of paranoid schizophrenics is not caring what other people recognize or think. Every day people who don't care or recognize what psychiatrists think are committed to mental intuitions.
do you think you guys are going to be eager to diagnose yourselves? like 90something percent of people are religious. and the few that aren't, how many have the balls to come out and make this claim?
Mental health is determined by behavioral responses. People who are religious demonstrate mental health in their activities, and as such are not as a group determined to be mentally ill by psychologists or psychiatrists.
think about it, has your god ever been proven to exist outside your mind?
They call it the practice of faith, not the practice of proof.
you guys really do have a problem.
A problem is the lack of a solution that gives rise to pain and powerlessness. You are the one who seems to be having a problem with those who practice religion.
Quote from Shrewd Dude:
shut up, ART. you're one of the most screwed up minds on ET.
Quote from ARogueTrader:
Ad hominem, in the vein of poisoning the well fallacy.
Description of Poisoning the Well Fallacy
This sort of "reasoning" involves trying to discredit what a person might later claim by presenting unfavorable information (be it true or false) about the person. This "argument" has the following form:
1. Unfavorable information (be it true or false) about person A is presented.
2. Therefore any claims person A makes will be false.
This sort of "reasoning" is obviously fallacious. The person making such an attack is hoping that the unfavorable information will bias listeners against the person in question and hence that they will reject any claims he might make. However, merely presenting unfavorable information about a person (even if it is true) hardly counts as evidence against the claims he/she might make. This is especially clear when Poisoning the Well is looked at as a form of ad Homimem in which the attack is made prior to the person even making the claim or claims. The following example clearly shows that this sort of "reasoning" is quite poor.
Before Class:
Bill: "Boy, that professor is a real jerk. I think he is some sort of eurocentric fascist."
Jill: "Yeah."
During Class:
Prof. Jones: "...and so we see that there was never any 'Golden Age of Matriarchy' in 1895 in America."
After Class:
Bill: "See what I mean?"
Jill: "Yeah. There must have been a Golden Age of Matriarchy, since that jerk said there wasn't."
Examples of Poisoning the Well
1. "Don't listen to him, he's a scoundrel."
2. "Before turning the floor over to my opponent, I ask you to remember that those who oppose my plans do not have the best wishes of the university at heart."
3. You are told, prior to meeting him, that your friend's boyfriend is a decadent wastrel. When you meet him, everything you hear him say is tainted.