MoonDragn said:
If it was that easy you could dismiss entire religions. It doesn't work that way. The reasoning behind the belief is never logical disproving it will just get you arguing with the person.
Starting from the point of disproving something is not the way to go. First, the method to disprove it could be just as flawed as the reasoning, and with a lack of credibility nobody is going to respect your findings.
In your example, your doctor is human, and can make mistakes. However making ONE mistake doesn't mean he made another with homeopathy. Thats like going shopping for milk and bringing home cheese instead. Does that mean you don't know how to shop? No, maybe the process is flawed and needs to be examined further but you can't condem a process entirely until you are sure exactly where it breaks down.
Perhaps your doctor made the mistake with another medication due to a recomendation by a collegue. Perhaps he placed a misguided trust in that person. However he chose to send you to homeopathy cause he saw alot of positive feedback from his patients.
Heres an example of religion... The bible was written by men who saw visions. Men who see visions are often locked up in insane asylums. Therefore the bible is an invalid book.
You see where I'm going with this? The bible has alot to merit it despite its origins but to dismiss it based on one aspect of it is rediculous.
And, apparently, you can't read, either.
This doesn't mean I start believing that it is ineffective; but at this point, I have no valid reason to believe in homeopathy, and must either discover a new line of reasoning to support my belief, or must change that belief.
As for your 'Bible' example, actually, I consider the Bible to be a thoroughly discredited piece of fiction, as well. And I do, in fact, dismiss entire religions for precisely those reasons.
What you have created is, in fact, a straw men. Very few, if any, of the writers of the Bible claim to have seen visions.
Here's a better example: the writers of the Gospels have been claimed to be contemporaries of The Messaiah, accurately portraying the key events of the life, death, and rebirth of Christ. It is, however, demonstrably true that several of the Gospels were not, in fact, written by men alive during Jesus' life; therefore, to believe that the Gospels are an accurate first-hand account of the events of the Resurrection is irrational and illogical.
The first five books of the Bible are supposedly written by Moses; however, as the final book describes the death of Moses, it is highly unlikely (if not impossible) that Moses wrote this final chapter. Therefore, believing that Moses is the author of the entire five books is fallacious and illogical.
Belief: The Bible is the infallible Word of God, and must be taken literally.
Fact: The Bible makes several glaring errors, such as defining bats as a type of bird, and failing to predict the existance of other actual stars and planets, as opposed to lights fixed in the firmament of the heavens.
Conclusion: The belief that the Bible is the infallable Word of God, and must be taken literally, is erroneous and illogical.
...
And so it goes.
In each case, you can choose to go on believing what you believe, in which case you are being WILLFULLY ignorant; or you can try to learn something, which may also return you to this state of belief, or may not. The skeptic chooses the latter; too often, the non-skeptic chooses the former.
But when evidence simply doesn't exist, one way or another, there seems to be two classes of people: those who choose not to believe until evidence appears, and those who choose to believe until counter-evidence appears. Generally, I am in the second group; I believe in a great deal of things for which no evidence exists - as long as no counter-evidence exists, as well. Most skeptics belong to the first group. Personally, I don't see either side as 'right' or 'wrong' in this case... just different.
But once someone presents evidence indicating that something cannot exist, I stop believing in it... if the evidence is that conclusive, and no evidence to the contrary appears.
And anecdotal evidence, testimonies, and the like are automatically discounted by myself and by skeptics, it seems, largely because we know how wrong people can be. 50 million Elvis fans, you know?
Or do you?
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