Why are people so sure of themselves, even when they're misinformed?!
Why are people so sure of themselves, even when they're misinformed?
People answer the questions in here as though their opinions or tiny bits of knowledge are incontrovertible facts. Why is it that the people with the least legitimate, objective basis for their ideas on here seem to be the ones who are cockiest about them, and rudest to those who disagree? Further, why is it that many of the individuals who readily acknowledge the potential fallibility of their own arguments seem to actually have the most solid factual evidence? What is with the people in this forum? Additional Details
2 days ago
Just another addition, due to the nature of answers being received: this was entirely intended to be in the Vegetarian/Vegan section. It is the individuals in this section that I find most guilty of this, in fact. I'm speaking mainly of those who come up with tirades promoting their own lifestyle, based only on their beliefs and little fact, whether this be the meatless or the meat eaters. Both are as guilty as the other.
Answers: 2 days ago
Just another addition, due to the nature of answers being received: this was entirely intended to be in the Vegetarian/Vegan section. It is the individuals in this section that I find most guilty of this, in fact. I'm speaking mainly of those who come up with tirades promoting their own lifestyle, based only on their beliefs and little fact, whether this be the meatless or the meat eaters. Both are as guilty as the other. Because no one wants to be wrong. It's that simple. When you do things a certain way (whether it's the way you eat or how you walk), and do them that way for a loooong time, you automatically believe your own ways are right. When someone else tells you that you're wrong, you immediately become defensive and then go on the attack. It's a vicious cycle.
Also, no argument is infallible. I've spent waaay to much time in Philosophy class poking holes in arguments from brains much more adept than my own.
note: you should NEVER take anything from Y!Answers to be fact... ever. These are the opinions of people from all walks of life, including a few knuckleheads like me.
An idiot believes he knows everything, only the wise truly believe they know nothing. Just a point of random curiosity, but were you going somewhere with this train of thought? Why did you put this in the Vegan/Vegetarian section, or were you misinformed on which area this belonged?
Talk about least legitimate. People easily become stuck in their ways. And for some reason people seem to pick and choose a few subjects that they are passionate about. That's not a problem in this forum - that's a problem with human beings in general.
Those who know the least, think they know the most.
The more you know - the more you realize how little you know. The more you know :: the more you realize you don't know. Only fools are completely convinced of their own infallibility. Wise people recognize that they might be wrong. Some folks have a deeply seated need to be correct. All the time, every time. They will form and opinion and relentlessly attempt to convince they are right because they HAVE to be right.
They are usually the youngest ones who have much to learn and just aren't open minded enough to realize it yet. Simply put, any topic that deals with what some would consider "life or death" or even just cruelty to animals is going to evoke passionate remarks. Anywhere there is passion, there is bound to be turbulence. The most problematic trend I see here (and everywhere) is that the people at the base of the population equate "misinformed" with "dissenting opinion." Shouldn't this be in the Religion and Spirituality section? Nobody is more "sure" about their views than the ultrareligious. And when it comes to thinking their opinions and bits of knowledge are incontrovertible fact, it's the fundamentalist religious folks who epitomize such arrogance. This is so appropriate for the V&V section, where the amount of misinformation, the lack of critical thinking, ethical fraud and lack of nuance has reached astronomical and scary proportions in comparison to even the R&S forum. I mean look at the quotes that vegans posted on this forum:
"I am NOT going to care about six billion people. It's illogical. Only certain members of the human race are worth helping/saving."
That could have come from Hitler! And then they tried to defend it!
Absolute lunatics on this forum!
Then we have a lout from the UK a greedy chicken farmer who is "Super Vegetarian" and polices everyone else, and he wrote he sells hay to fatten cattle that are being slaughtered and rips some poor fellow who chooses to call himself a pesco-vegetarian. Agreed. There is a lot of misinformation on both sides of the vegetarian/meat issue.
I can say without a doubt that a vegetarian diet can be a very healthy choice if the individual has a well balanced variety of foods. Anyone who says that isn't true is wrong, point blank.
However, when vegetarians say they will automatically live longer or something, that isn't always true. You never know when you are going to die. I think that in this forum it's because many, perhaps most, of the contributors are very young, many still in school. Thus they have the idealism, passion and arrogance of youth, the certainty that they 'know it all' and that their position is the only right one, combined with the zeal of new converts and a lack of life experience..
I didn't see the quote Skully gives above, so I don't know the context, but it is appalling whatever the context. But bear in mind that many of the more ridiculous questions, answers and rants in this forum are posted by trolls who are trying to make vegetarians and vegans look bad.