#1173 Question my morals; they question me

[snellios]

If someone said and could prove that they'd seen the future, and all your progressive thinking was wrong;

• abortion led to social decay and the slippery slope to infanticide and involuntary euthanasia
• gay marriage destroyed families and made kids depressed
• banning guns and removing the death penalty led to soaring crime levels
• banning all nukes and

Comments

[snellios]

(i would revise my opinions)

[txvoodoo]

If all that were true, progressive wouldn't BE progressive anymore, by definition.

"Promoting or favoring progress toward better conditions"

So progressive policies are those which favor a better way - not dogmatic.

[snellios]

i was using progressive in the semantic way 'progressive' is often used now; when conservatives refer to "progressive liberals" non-ironically, they aren't meaning that conservatives do not want what is best, they refer to the specific set of beliefs regarded as 'progressive'.

But that is a semantic issue anyway! Would you reform?

[txvoodoo]

Yes, because the root of my progresssivism isn't semantic, but in the goal. So I'd reform to whatever ended up being the tru thing that helped humanity more.

note: it wouldn't be influenced just by SPIN.

[snellios]

about 18 months ago I wouldn't have revised my opinions. I would have thought that human rights were human rights for a reason, and we should keep them no matter what. Now I think that's a little naive.

But it's questions like this that make me realise (and usually most other people) that I am a consequentialist... The much simpler question is 'If you could time travel and shoot Hitler in 1938) would you?', but whatever i didn't think of that LOl.

icon to prove a twitter point!

[bana76]

I agree with you two.
I believe what I believe because I genuinely think it's better for us and for our children.
Some of my "political" thoughts go against my .. "personal" beliefs.
For example, I'm absolutely pro-choice, but I can't see myself - right now - having an abortion.
And a bunch of other things, I'm that way about.
It just so happens most of my beliefs align with that of progressive/lefty political parties.
If truly, all of this was wrong.. then yeah, I'd think about changing my opinion.

But I mean.. at the end of the day, it's my opinion, right?
I'd change if I REALLY believed it and saw the proof.

[nolongeratheist]

A lot of studies are showing that proving things wrong just reinforces the incorrect belief in most people- not sure if this is because the proof isn't 'right' or proper cognitive dissonance, but there seems to be some evidence for both.

[snuffkin]

Whoa, it's too early for this shit.

I'd probably change my opinion on these things if I saw proof of it myself.

also re: shooting Hitler: I would not do it because I don't think that it would lead to a better version of history. I mean, it could, but it also could make everything worse.

[thennen]

Exactly. Also I believe there's an inherent evil in people, and the extenuating (emphasis on the partial of "partially justifying") circumstances were more important in Hitler's rise to power than Hitler himself. So even if Hitler never existed, the Holocaust still could have happened with a different person in charge.

[bazzarati]

"Could be worse" is a phrase that I quite like. Just because something isn't great, or how you had imagined it, doesn't mean that taking another path would be any better. This future could be the best of a bad bunch?

Thus we see that actually I'm an optimist, despite what many would believe, and that I think having faith in your own beliefs is important.

I guess also you could talk about the nature of the future, "is it in flux?" and all that. Or whether it was the means to the end that caused the unhappiness and other troubles, so whether a different approach to the same ideals would be a better choice than a total shift in perspectives.