Common Friend: Pommer’s Law “A person’s mind can be changed by reading information on the internet. The nature of this change will be from having no opinion to having a wrong opinion.”
The same could be said for newspapers, radio, television, magazines, hell, billboards…..
Common Friend: Yup.
Common Opinion: By definition there’s no such thing as a “wrong” opinion. Perhaps this Pommer fella means an “ill-informed” opinion.
Wrong. An opinion is the result of deliberation, or at least it should be. The calculative faculty of mind is the space where opinion (doxa) is generated. Sure it deals with what is variable, and as such can not be proven false, that is until one acts on an opinion.
The issue here is “unit of thought” if one deliberates on the facts taken off a t-shirt, say “I’m with stupid. –>” that one is not aware of all or enough of the facts to make a correct opinion. A book length unit of thought say, “The autobiography of stupid” might give us more facts for deliberation.
Aristotle tells us that “Judgment and opinion can be quite mistaken” But he also suggests a lifetime of study be put into the deliberation of the facts on which an opinion is formed.
Common Opinion: We live in an era when most people don’t have the attention span to write “for you” in full rather than “4U” so I think Aristotle’s “lifetime of study” suggestion might be setting the bar a bit high.
I was merely pointing out that phrases like “wrong opinion” and “correct opinion” (yours) are unpleasantly redolent of Stalinism, at least to me.
In any case, I was actually thinking more of existential imponderables when I said there’s no such thing as a wrong opinion – I meant eternal questions like Is there a God? Does life have any meaning? Should Common W. Friend be nicknamed “Dubya” in honour of his middle initial? Stuff like that…
I found this quote:
“Philosophy as a “discipline” has no real thesis about “theoretical fascism” because it basically considers the latter to be beneath all critique.
But herein lies the weak point — of critique. It remains fixated on “serious opponents,” and with this attitude it neglects the task of comprehending the ideological template of “unserious,” shallow “systems.” To this day critique has thus not been a match for this modern blend of opinion and cynicism.” — Peter Sloterdijk in The Critique of Cynical Reason
And then this came to my inbox:
YES, I’M A BAD CANADIAN
I Am the Liberal-Progressives Worst Nightmare.
I am a Canadian.I believe the money I make belongs to me and my family,
not some liberal governmental functionary be it
NDP, Liberal or Conservative!I’m in touch with my feelings and I like it that way!
I think owning a gun doesn’t make you a killer,
it makes you a Canadian with a Gun ,that’s it .I think being a minority does not make you noble or victimized,
and does not entitle you to anything handed to you.I believe that if you are selling me a Big Mac, it should be in English or French. And when I take money out of the ATM/ABM I should have only those two options.
I believe everyone has a right to pray to his or her Godwhen and where they want to.
My heroes are John Wayne, Joe Carter, Wayne Gretsky, Roy Rogers, and Don Cherry.
I know wrestling is fake and I don’t waste my time
watching or arguing about it.I’ve never owned a slave, or was a slave, I haven’t burned any witches or been persecuted by the Turks orPersecuted any Native Indians myself and neither have you!
So, shut up already.I believe if you don’t like the way things are here,
go back to where you came from and change your own country!This is CANADA .
If you were born here and don’t like it you are free
to move to any Socialist country that will have you.I think the cops have every right to shoot your sorry ass
if you’re running from them..I also think they have the right to pull you over if you’re breaking
the law, regardless of what colour you are.And, no, I don’t mind having my face shown on my drivers license.
It’s the law, I think it’s good……and I think we should.I think if you are too stupid to know how a ballot works,
I don’t want you deciding who should be running our nation
for the next four years.I hate those people standing in the intersections
trying to sell me stuff or trying to guilt me into making ‘donations’
to their cause them.
Get Lost.I believe that it doesn’t take a village to raise a child,
it takes two parents.I believe ‘illegal’ is illegal no matter what the lawyers think.
I believe the Canadian flag should be the only one allowed in CANADA !
If this makes me a BAD Canadian,
then yes, I’m a BAD Canadian
and tough shit.If you are a BAD Canadian too,
please forward this to everyone you know.We want our country back!
This Bull-shit has gone far enough.