What would make an idea "dangerous"?

a reply to: BrianFlanders

If you do not see the power of an idea as dangerous then you're not thinking it through far enough. Ideas are literally more potent than nuclear bombs.

All one has to do is look objectively at religion, and the blood it's spilled - to see that ideas can become very very dangerous. All the while convincing the adherents of the idea, that their cause is just and their murdering justified.

CdT

originally posted by: BrianFlanders
To say this thread has a "thought police" vibe going on would be an understatement.

A dangerous idea? Well, the idea that any idea is inherently dangerous is about as dangerous as anything else you could think of.

I will be collecting unapproved ideas for inclusion in the not-so-awesome ideas list of prohibited intellectual exercises from this thread.

Thank you for your assistance.

In my experience, arguments or points of view or evidence that disagrees with commonly held conceptions - to challenge concepts that are well-established in our society - such as concepts that have a controlling influence on others, is generally an attempt to challenge social order.

In that way such ideas can be dangerous.

I like to challenge what people consider to be "realities" in this world, there are many things that people "submit" to and accept, knowing (at least from their standpoint) that they cannot alter such things or that such things are set in stone.

If for example, people were to realise that voices in the head actually come from a distinguishable source, to have this proven with some kind of apparatus would be to challenge the entire psychological regime that is operating, thousands of individuals diagnosed with disorders will be validated when they claim that the voices are "real" - when this happens, we would have a disaster on our hands, as their "disorders" will not be disorders anymore, and that we have been wrongfully detaining and drugging the populace.

a reply to: OneManArmy

I think we're using different frameworks of how a person's consciousness works. Mine involves no central "self". All there are are networks of neurons which result in the illusion of a person - the subject - existing. The self is just another one of those ideas.

It sounds like yours separates the self from ideas, becoming more important than each of them in the process.

It's interesting to think about what it would be like to be in someone else's head. Too bad it's impossible for the foreseeable future because of the physical requirements of a brain transplant.

a reply to: Borisbanger

Who is to say what the proper use of an idea is? Even people who invent things don't always know the best ways to use their inventions. Every idea and invention has uses with unforeseen consequences, and the intention of the individual using them is of little ultimate use in judging the idea's impact on the world.

The printing press, for instance, crippled the memory of the individual because no one needed to memorize everything anymore.

The telegraph and television made so much information available that no one knew what to do with it.

An idea is dangerous when it is for selfish reasons, when it feeds ego whether independent or collective.

a reply to: BrianFlanders

A thought police vibe? Considered in the context, which is to say, "from a philosophy textbook," one might consider the possibility that it is a thought exercise from the point of view of an oppressive society. Obviously, that is only one out of any number of possibilities and I fully understand your confusion.

That being said, I was considering the properties of an idea that make it dangerous. That is to say, "what it makes a person do," which I understand may be a foreign concept while one is operating under the IDEA that what they do is not controlled by ideas but by an independent entity. That independent entity is simply another idea, with little or no more ultimate importance than any other.

a reply to: CirqueDeTruth

To separate religion from thought is almost as dangerous. The brain doesn't distinguish between fact and fiction. It just makes associations between phenomena collected from sensory organs.

Whether something is true or false is less a function of whether it actually happened as much as it is consensus and the way a person says something, how much detail they can give, etc.

a reply to: zackli

Divine Command Theory. That's an idea. A belief. A very dangerous one.

It essentially allows people to believe something is morally good and permissible even when it conflicts with their own sense of morality, or the morality of the modern World at large. So long as it's believed to be something god condones.

Dangerous actions are made manifest from this belief.

originally posted by: Ksihkehe
a reply to: BrianFlanders

If you do not see the power of an idea as dangerous then you're not thinking it through far enough.

Yes. I see the danger of the idea that ideas are dangerous.

a reply to: BrianFlanders

Well the idea of an idea being dangerous isn't dangerous. But an action based on the idea that an idea is dangerous is what is dangerous.

originally posted by: SystemResistor
If for example, people were to realise that voices in the head actually come from a distinguishable source, to have this proven with some kind of apparatus would be to challenge the entire psychological regime that is operating, thousands of individuals diagnosed with disorders will be validated when they claim that the voices are "real" - when this happens, we would have a disaster on our hands, as their "disorders" will not be disorders anymore, and that we have been wrongfully detaining and drugging the populace.

Wow - that idea is mind-blowing if you really think about it... which apparently you have. Just, wow.

If nothing else, that would be a good idea for a movie.

originally posted by: zackli
a reply to: BrianFlanders

A thought police vibe?

Yes. A thought police vibe. This idea was clear enough to most people before this bizarre Twilight Zone type atmosphere we have going on these days started.

That being said, I was considering the properties of an idea that make it dangerous. That is to say, "what it makes a person do," which I understand may be a foreign concept while one is operating under the IDEA that what they do is not controlled by ideas but by an independent entity.

In that case, ask yourself who is controlling a baby when it cries or throws a tantrum. Most dogs bark when they feel like barking and are not made to bark by anything external to their own minds. You can train a dog to bark on command but it will probably still bark on it's own when it takes a notion to.

What makes people horny? Is it an external force? No. That's silly. Unless the person is an imbecile, we should assume that people who do things do things of their own free will.

originally posted by: OrphanApology
a reply to: BrianFlanders

Well the idea of an idea being dangerous isn't dangerous. But an action based on the idea that an idea is dangerous is what is dangerous.

I know. I was just playing along.

originally posted by: BrianFlanders

originally posted by: Ksihkehe
a reply to: BrianFlanders

If you do not see the power of an idea as dangerous then you're not thinking it through far enough.

Yes. I see the danger of the idea that ideas are dangerous.

All ideas are dangerous. I believe your statement trying to refute my point actually supports it.dictionary.reference.com...

The formation of an idea is inherently dangerous.

In general terms or popular terms and culture, a dangerous idea is one that hurts the status quo or the higher ups or the ones in charge. A dangerous idea under this definition would be a boycott or a protest or a strike or lyrics that bring to light a crime or unethical action for the masses to hear. A new idea like a new religion or a popular political movement. You could say that Martin Luther King had dangerous ideas and that Ghandi had really dangerous Ideas, Lech Walesa had dangerous ideas...Emma Watson has dangerous ideas. Thank God Steve Carrel has her back, but I don't think Hermione Granger needs Brick to succeed.

originally posted by: amazing
In general terms or popular terms and culture, a dangerous idea is one that hurts the status quo or the higher ups or the ones in charge. A dangerous idea under this definition would be a boycott or a protest or a strike or lyrics that bring to light a crime or unethical action for the masses to hear. A new idea like a new religion or a popular political movement. You could say that Martin Luther King had dangerous ideas and that Ghandi had really dangerous Ideas, Lech Walesa had dangerous ideas...Emma Watson has dangerous ideas. Thank God Steve Carrel has her back, but I don't think Hermione Granger needs Brick to succeed.

Yeah. The US Constitution was once a dangerous idea. It seems to be becoming such once again, as there is hardly anything left of it that isn't a big joke to TPTB. For instance, the idea that the 4th Amendment is capable of protecting you from anything harsher than a stiff breeze in a real courtroom is highly questionable. The rest of it is more or less defunct at this point and they seem to be really hammering away hard at whatever is left of the First Amendment now.

a reply to: zackli

An idea is dangerous when it says focus on your happiness and don't worry about how you treat others. This leads to apathy and unknowingly hurting others, or even worse, knowingly hurting others but not caring.

a reply to: arpgme

Babies are people. They are operating under the influence of very crude ideas that they formulate without any words. Psychoanalysis in its most basic form (without the crazy stuff more based on individual interpretation in isolated cases) goes into that.

Dogs bark when they sense something that they have associated with their barking mechanism.

Tactile stimulation (for example) and ideas operating inside of their head make them horny. Things they have associated with sexual reproduction.

"Unless the person is an imbecile, we should assume that people who do things do things of their own free will."

Who should decide who an imbecile is? Why should we assume that there is this magical quality contained in a person called "free will"?

Because this is basically an argument between religion and science, I'm not going to continue the debate. No one will win in the end, but both of us will think we've won.