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EStokes comments on Welcome to Less Wrong! - Less Wrong
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Good attitude. I'm much the same, both in enjoying learning new things even when it means relinquishing a previously held belief, and in feeling slightly guilty when I cause someone to change their mind. :) LW has actually helped me get over the latter, because now that I understand rationality much better, I'm accordingly more confident that I'm doing things correctly in debates.
I'm glad you mentioned your Christianity and your specific belief that it is rationally justified — I'll be curious to see how it holds up after you've read the sequences Mysterious Answers to Mysterious Questions, How to Actually Change Your Mind, and Reductionism. (I hope you'll be considering that issue with that same curious, unattached mindset — if Christianity were false, would you really, honestly, sincerely want to know?) If I may ask, what specific beliefs do you consider part of your Christianity? The Holy Trinity? The miracles described in the NT? Jesus's life as described by the Gospels? The moral teachings in the OT? Creationism? Biblical literalism? Prayer as a powerful force? Heaven and Hell? Angels, demons, and the Devil as actual beings? Salvation through faith or works? The prophecies of the Revelation?
Not in response to anyone, but to this thread/topic.
Is this really something that should be on LessWrong? LessWrong is more about debate on new territory and rationality and such, not going to well-tread territory. There are many other places on the internet for debate on religion, but there's only one LW. Perhaps /r/atheism, (maybe being careful to say that you're honestly looking to challenge your beliefs and not test your faith.)
Unless there are new points that haven't been heard before, or people are genuinely interested in this specific debate.
Just not sure this is the right place, and want to hear other people's opinions on this.
Well, thus far, I've mainly seen, "Welcome to LessWrong ... let's poke at the new guy and see what he's thinking!" I don't think we're getting into any real serious philosophy, yet. It's all been fairly light stuff. I've been trying to self-moderate my responses to be polite and answer people, but not get too involved in a huge discussion, because I agree, this wouldn't be the right place. But so far, it's seemed just some curiosity being satisfied about me, specifically, and my theology - not theology as a whole. As such, it certainly seems to belong in a 'Meet the new guys' thread.
Additionally, I'm personally not here to challenge my beliefs or test my faith, though I certainly won't turn it down as it happens. Given the lean of belief in the place, I expect it to happen. My main draw, however, isn't theological but instead in the realm of discovering a knowledge base and discussion area based around rationality, containing elements of discussion which have already done the work I've been running in circles in my head because I've been lacking someone to talk about them with!
Let's just not take the discussion outside this subthread.
I should apologize for having kicked off the topic - I had some vague ideas of someday getting on the IRC channel and bouncing thoughts back and forth, and didn't realize that it would inevitably become a conversation in the thread here if I mentioned it.