Open-mindedness vs. Close-mindedness

[_charity]

Great thread Guy, thanx.

For Charity:

I think it took a tremendous amount of open-mindedness to leave the Mormon church. I had everything in the world trying to keep me there. Family legacy, immediate family, a wanting and desire for it to be true for 35+ years and also trying to make it true and years of living it and faking it, etc. etc. I had my whole life invested in this belief system and way of life. I cannot see how you can consider someone closed-minded who can walk away from all of it as I did about 20 years ago.

Now, why can I predict the common TBM reply? Oh why? I didn't study enough, didn't pray enough, wasn't patient long enough, I wanted to go sin outside of the church, someone hurt my feelings, and on and on. But it was none those, it was a preponderance of the facts. The scale tipped out of favor for the church and tipped to it was not true, but all a man-made, 19th century creation.

It took an open mind to get to that conclusion, a closed mind would have me back there "keepin' on keepin' on" for twenty more years.

You won't find me saying any of that "TBM reply." If you say none of those were your reasons, I believe you. (But that isn't saying that I don't think other people could have those reasons.)

I can't find the Ensign I am looking for, but there is an article that has this in it: Don't let the things you don't know lead you away from the things you do know. I would think that for a 35+ year period, you were having spiritual confirmations of different things. Otherwise why would you have stuck it out that long? So, what was it that made the "what you don't knows" more important that the "what you did knows?"

[_Bond...James Bond]

Not sure people can be openminded, but people can definitely be closeminded.

For evidence: Look at coggins on economic theory.

[_Inconceivable]

I can't find the Ensign I am looking for, but there is an article that has this in it: Don't let the things you don't know lead you away from the things you do know. I would think that for a 35+ year period, you were having spiritual confirmations of different things. Otherwise why would you have stuck it out that long? So, what was it that made the "what you don't knows" more important that the "what you did knows?"

Charity, charity charity...

Know is a pretty strong word to throw around.

Here, let me help you:

"Open your mind. Permit things (potential facts) that (may) lead you away from the things (conjecture, assumptions) you (think you) do know."

35 years - If anything, time makes it more difficult to shake the scales of closed mindedness. Particularly if we have drawn incorrect conlusions many years previous.

Confusing spiritual manifestations as spiritual confirmations is understandable. You might open your mind and consider them spiritual clues instead. I simply drew incorrect conclusions/assumptions for over 35 years as well. It took a great deal of humility to admit I was wrong to follow those that had betrayed my trust.

-----

Before: Joseph Smith - righteous role model, hero, the Lord's annointed, Legal Administrator, Restorer of the Gospel, next to Jesus, beyond reproach, valiant in the testimony of Jesus, someone I would have willingly died for.

After: Joseph Smith - False Prophet, Pirate, Trunk Slammer, adulterer, ripe with iniquity, betrayer of trust, thief of virtue, liar, reprobate, unchaste, covetous, law breaker, covenant breaker - never read the Book of Mormon or at least didn't understand it. He should have been sent to Jesus to be judged much sooner than his time appointed (the fateful gunfight). Son of perdition. I would have been better never to have known him.

[_charity]

I can't find the Ensign I am looking for, but there is an article that has this in it: Don't let the things you don't know lead you away from the things you do know. I would think that for a 35+ year period, you were having spiritual confirmations of different things. Otherwise why would you have stuck it out that long? So, what was it that made the "what you don't knows" more important that the "what you did knows?"

Charity, charity charity...

Know is a pretty strong word to throw around.

Here, let me help you:

"Open your mind. Permit things (potential facts) that (may) lead you away from the things (conjecture, assumptions) you (think you) do know."

35 years - If anything, time makes it more difficult to shake the scales of closed mindedness. Particularly if we have drawn incorrect conlusions many years previous.

Confusing spiritual manifestations as spiritual confirmations is understandable. You might open your mind and consider them spiritual clues instead. I simply drew incorrect conclusions/assumptions for over 35 years as well. It took a great deal of humility to admit I was wrong to follow those that had betrayed my trust.

-----

Before: Joseph Smith - righteous role model, hero, the Lord's annointed, Legal Administrator, Restorer of the Gospel, next to Jesus, beyond reproach, valiant in the testimony of Jesus, someone I would have willingly died for.

After: Joseph Smith - False Prophet, Pirate, Trunk Slammer, adulterer, ripe with iniquity, betrayer of trust, thief of virtue, liar, reprobate, unchaste, covetous, law breaker, covenant breaker - never read the Book of Mormon or at least didn't understand it. He should have been sent to Jesus to be judged much sooner than his time appointed (the fateful gunfight). Son of perdition. I would have been better never to have known him.

Isn't it interesting that we can both know the exact same "facts," interpret them differently, and come to the opposite conclusions. But I think there is a diference between us. I knew all your interpretations first, and then came around to the opposite view. It sounds like we followed different processes.

Edited to add: One of my grandmothers, dear, sweet woman that she was, hated Mormons. Although she had never known one in her life that she could recall. She died before I joined the Church. I have often wondered how she would have accepted me after that.

[_bcspace]

To me, being closed minded implies an unwillingness (or inability) to consider arguments or evidence contrary to one’s positions (by consider, I mean to make a “good faith” effort to consider), to consider the possibility that one is mistaken, etc.

By that definition, I must be open-minded. And yet I remain TBM. Hmmmmmm. The problem now for most contrary evidence or arguments is that I've seen it all before. It's just old wine in new bottles.

[_Inconceivable]

Isn't it interesting that we can both know the exact same "facts," interpret them differently, and come to the opposite conclusions. But I think there is a diference between us. I knew all your interpretations first, and then came around to the opposite view. It sounds like we followed different processes.

I have always viewed adultery, lying, coveting, cheating, betrayal of trust etc. as wrong, Charity.

Before: same
After: same

Before: Didn't know Joseph Smith was evil
After: Changed my mind based on the preponderance of evidence

Before (as a Mormon after the trial): OJ guilty
After: I haven't changed my mind.

Good grief.

[_guy sajer]

To me, being closed minded implies an unwillingness (or inability) to consider arguments or evidence contrary to one’s positions (by consider, I mean to make a “good faith” effort to consider), to consider the possibility that one is mistaken, etc.

By that definition, I must be open-minded. And yet I remain TBM. Hmmmmmm. The problem now for most contrary evidence or arguments is that I've seen it all before. It's just old wine in new bottles.

I've never said or implied that being open-minded necessarily means that one abandon currently held beliefs, including Mormonism. It doesn't mean that their not open-minded, but it probably means that they're poor empiricists (at least on this issue).

"I've seen it all before," yes, I imagine that Holocaust Deniers, alien abductionists, Big Foot believers, etc. often say the same thing.

[_Pokatator]

Great thread Guy, thanx.

For Charity:

I think it took a tremendous amount of open-mindedness to leave the Mormon church. I had everything in the world trying to keep me there. Family legacy, immediate family, a wanting and desire for it to be true for 35+ years and also trying to make it true and years of living it and faking it, etc. etc. I had my whole life invested in this belief system and way of life. I cannot see how you can consider someone closed-minded who can walk away from all of it as I did about 20 years ago.

Now, why can I predict the common TBM reply? Oh why? I didn't study enough, didn't pray enough, wasn't patient long enough, I wanted to go sin outside of the church, someone hurt my feelings, and on and on. But it was none those, it was a preponderance of the facts. The scale tipped out of favor for the church and tipped to it was not true, but all a man-made, 19th century creation.

It took an open mind to get to that conclusion, a closed mind would have me back there "keepin' on keepin' on" for twenty more years.

You won't find me saying any of that "TBM reply. If you say none of those were your reasons, I believe you. (But that isn't saying that I don't think other people could have those reasons.)

Charity you have personally told me to rely on someone else's testimony until I get my own.

You have told me that you were sure that I got confirmation but didn't recognize it when I said that Moroni's promise never worked for me.

Those are TBM replies in my book.

I can't find the Ensign I am looking for, but there is an article that has this in it: Don't let the things you don't know lead you away from the things you do know. I would think that for a 35+ year period, you were having spiritual confirmations of different things. Otherwise why would you have stuck it out that long?

Yes, I had inspirational moments when I went and saw Old Yeller as a kid. I had inspirational moments when I went and saw Braveheart as an adult. And yes I had few moments of inspiration at church just like attending a motivational speaker or listening to Billy Graham. Inspirational church speaker/Old Yeller about the same, except I cried during Old Yeller. But Moroni's promise never worked. I never got a testimony that Joseph Smith was a prophet or that anything about the church was true. The church is confirmed by feelings and emotions which I believe now is the wrong way to judge something but I never even got that about the church.

Why stick it out that long? BIC, family heritage and legacy, conformity, peer pressure, not knowing any different for a long time, wanting to believe it, wanting Moroni's promise to yield something, trying to please parents then spouse, trying hold a marriage with children together, and endless other reasons for 35 years.

So, what was it that made the "what you don't knows" more important that the "what you did knows?

So what did I know? I knew at 6 years old that all my friends could get up and bare their testimonies that Joseph Smith was a prophet, that the church was true, etc. But I didn't know how they knew because I didn't know. They couldn't tell me then how they knew either. At 7 it didn't get better either or at 8 or 9 or on and on. They were just pleasing mommy and daddy until they convinced themselves and by the way closed their minds.

My list of what I "KNEW" was non-existent. I had a few things I thought were good things like the WofW or that the Mormon way of life was a good way to live. I got my "strokes" from family, friends and people in the church for going through the motions. But I have never had any concrete knowledge of any one thing that I absolutely "KNEW". What I didn't know became important enough to seek out and find out for myself some truths. You seem to suggest that paradigm of ignoring what I don't know and just stay in the church with what I know but really I don't know nothing in the church as true. I kept an open-mind and looked outside the church. I could finally start seeing another side of life. I have never regretted it.

What I didn't know became more important than what I did know because what I did know or thought I knew became false.

[_moksha]

To me, being closed minded implies an unwillingness (or inability) to consider arguments or evidence contrary to one’s positions (by consider, I mean to make a “good faith” effort to consider), to consider the possibility that one is mistaken, etc.

By that definition, I must be open-minded. And yet I remain TBM. Hmmmmmm. The problem now for most contrary evidence or arguments is that I've seen it all before. It's just old wine in new bottles.

I've never said or implied that being open-minded necessarily means that one abandon currently held beliefs, including Mormonism. It doesn't mean that their not open-minded, but it probably means that they're poor empiricists (at least on this issue).

Empiricism would seem to be a poor decision making tool in the metaphysical realm. A leap of faith is what is required here.

[_charity]

Now, why can I predict the common TBM reply? Oh why? I didn't study enough, didn't pray enough, wasn't patient long enough, I wanted to go sin outside of the church, someone hurt my feelings, and on and on.
Charity you have personally told me to rely on someone else's testimony until I get my own.

You have told me that you were sure that I got confirmation but didn't recognize it when I said that Moroni's promise never worked for me.

Those are TBM replies in my book.

Yes, I had inspirational moments when I went and saw Old Yeller as a kid. I had inspirational moments when I went and saw Braveheart as an adult. And yes I had few moments of inspiration at church just like attending a motivational speaker or listening to Billy Graham. Inspirational church speaker/Old Yeller about the same, except I cried during Old Yeller. But Moroni's promise never worked. I never got a testimony that Joseph Smith was a prophet or that anything about the church was true. The church is confirmed by feelings and emotions which I believe now is the wrong way to judge something but I never even got that about the church.

Why stick it out that long? BIC, family heritage and legacy, conformity, peer pressure, not knowing any different for a long time, wanting to believe it, wanting Moroni's promise to yield something, trying to please parents then spouse, trying hold a marriage with children together, and endless other reasons for 35 years.

So, what was it that made the "what you don't knows" more important that the "what you did knows?

So what did I know? I knew at 6 years old that all my friends could get up and bare their testimonies that Joseph Smith was a prophet, that the church was true, etc. But I didn't know how they knew because I didn't know. They couldn't tell me then how they knew either. At 7 it didn't get better either or at 8 or 9 or on and on. They were just pleasing mommy and daddy until they convinced themselves and by the way closed their minds.

My list of what I "KNEW" was non-existent. I had a few things I thought were good things like the WofW or that the Mormon way of life was a good way to live. I got my "strokes" from family, friends and people in the church for going through the motions. But I have never had any concrete knowledge of any one thing that I absolutely "KNEW". What I didn't know became important enough to seek out and find out for myself some truths. You seem to suggest that paradigm of ignoring what I don't know and just stay in the church with what I know but really I don't know nothing in the church as true. I kept an open-mind and looked outside the church. I could finally start seeing another side of life. I have never regretted it.

What I didn't know became more important than what I did know because what I did know or thought I knew became false.

It became false in your decision making process. You accept as facts things I don't believe are facts. And you don't accept as facts things that I think are.

And about the TBM replies. I was responding to what you said in this thread. The others you brought up are things I said and fall into the category of TBM replies. You just didn't mention them here, initially.