[endominus]

Your original issue with the article was that once you've "settled" an issue, there is no reason to argue about it. I pointed out that a number of people do not "settle" issues in the way that you describe, and that argument serves to update their information and beliefs constantly.

You stated that a mind "cannot be changed if it was never made." I disagree; one does not need to have an absolute belief in something to "change their mind." By definition, any update of beliefs is changing one's mind. My mind changes often, but usually by small increments. A key part of that is argumentation; I constantly seek out counterarguments to my own beliefs to see if new data or points of view will sway me. In the absence of that, I argue against myself, to see if I can find flaws in my logic and update accordingly.

By that logic argument, as described by the original article, is extremely useful for ensuring that one's beliefs accurately reflect reality.

To me, your position that an issue must be "settled" in one's mind (whatever that means, because I don't think you're perfectly clear on that) before you can be said to "change your mind" doesn't make sense.

[9rx]

> By definition, any update of beliefs is changing one's mind. My mind changes often...

So would you say changing one's mind is a case where one seeks a different religion (where beliefs are thrown around freely)?

I can't imagine believing in something unless it is essentially irrefutable (e.g. 1+1=2). And where I have beliefs, I'm not going to argue them. What purpose would that serve? I have already established the utmost possible confidence in that belief for it become one. I have no remaining compulsion to keep trying to see what more can be learned when I am certain there is nothing more to learn. To continue to want to learn more about something you are certain can be learned about no more must be the definition of insanity.

If we want to lean on definitions, the dictionary is equally clear that a belief hinges on acceptance. "I am 60% confident that recursion is the best method for this algorithm." means that I don't know. "I don't know" is not a state of acceptance. That is not a belief.

[endominus]

>So would you say changing one's mind is a case where one seeks a different religion

I have no idea what you mean by this. I explained in detail what changing one's mind entails. It has nothing to do with "irrefutable" or deeply held convictions.

You have a nonstandard definition of belief.

First of all, "I don't know" is absolutely a state of acceptance. It is acceptance that the information is not fully reliable. Most things are unknowable; the vast majority of held beliefs are not arrived at through irrefutable logic but by simple trust in consensus. I believe that certain food is nutritious, even though I have not run tests on it myself. Data might arise later showing my beliefs to be false; that is why I assign probabilities to my beliefs, rather than certainties.

Second of all, your fallback to a dictionary definition is flawed in two ways. The first is that various definitions of "belief" exist; one of which (from https://www.wordnik.com/words/belief) is "Assent to a proposition or affirmation, or the acceptance of a fact, opinion, or assertion as real or true, without immediate personal knowledge; reliance upon word or testimony; partial or full assurance without positive knowledge or absolute certainty; persuasion; conviction; confidence." (emphasis added) Another definition given is "A conviction of the truth of a given proposition or an alleged fact, resting upon grounds insufficient to constitute positive knowledge."

The second way this argument is flawed is that dictionaries are descriptive tools, not prescriptive. That is to say, dictionaries are not arbiters of truth in language but merely reference documents for possible meaning, and where they differ from common usage, it is the dictionary that is incorrect.