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Do you remember, Gome...
The fun Sam Clements had with this subject in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, especially with the solar eclipse? Isn't virtually the same mindset operating when people gamble? I know you've seen the odd little quirks gamblers use to ensure their "luck." Down here in the Los Angeles area, for example, radio ads advise gamblers that if they go to this or that Indian casino instead of driving all the way to Las Vegas, more of their luck will remain for the gaming tables – and people actually buy into this.
At times I think the task is hopeless. All I want to do is board the first available starship and go somewhere else...but my astrologer has advised me to wait until next year – my chart will be in better shape then, she says.
posted by
arGee
on January 21, 2007 at 5:25 PM
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arGee - now that I have had supper, let me try respondng to your comment
one more time. (I deleted the first response)
Your comment isn't nit picking but instead expands on my point. There are but two ways that an accurate prediction can be made; examining existing data or what is known and drawing a conclusion from that knowledge being one way (this basically describes how you would tell us the sunrise in Calcutta 2,000 years from now). Or, examining all that is around us to extrapolate as to how things will develop in the future. The example I give in this post was one such attempt, failed or not. A "prophecy" on the other hand suggests divine or otherworldly inspiration has allowed the subject to see that which eludes all others. Despite what folks say and aside from lucky guesses or predictions so vague that their fulfilment was inevitable, there have been no successful prophecies. Nostradamus and others like him may have in fact hit the nail on the head a few times, without specific dates, times and places they were bound to sooner or later. A simple examination of the odds should tell us that some will get it right, some of the time.
The example used the most by those who like to advance prophecies as viable is unfortunately the worst example in the coming of the messiah. If ever there was a prophecy that was forcibly self fulfilled, that was it. . . . I do not know how we combat the forces of irrational thought that are currently overwhelming us, other than to continue to offer rational thought in its place.
posted by
gomedome
on January 21, 2007 at 4:10 PM
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I don't mean to be picky, Gome...
But I can tell you to an astonishing accuracy exactly when the sun will rise in Calcutta 2,132 years and five days from now. I can make an unlimited number of other entirely accurate predictions about a nearly infinite number of things and events.
I know this isn't what you meant, but this goes to the heart of the matter. Because young people no longer are taught to think critically, they are incapable of distinguishing between the kinds of predictions you were talking about and the kind of predictions I mentioned above. Since it is intuitively obvious that a person with the right knowledge can make the kind of predictions I mentioned, Non-critical thinking can lead to the conclusion that predictions of the kind you mentioned are equally viable.
Except for massive reeducation, I know of no way around this. Do you?
posted by
arGee
on January 21, 2007 at 2:57 PM
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