Quite a few threads I saw used the phrase as per the title of this thread for its topic description, often when it is some kind of an sensitive issue, when more often than not, it is still being talked about somewhere else on the internet or IRL. These thread owners are indirectly criticising, openly being unaccepting, which ironically, being close-minded on their own towards the other so called closed-minded people. I would think that the more open-minded you are, the more accepting you would be towards differences, be it the difference in cultures, beliefs, opinions, preferences, behaviors, etc; yet, what gives?

It seems that, all of the sudden, the people who are labeled to be "close-minded" are second class people who shall be seen but not heard. Are we suddenly blessed with superiority, that suddenly being "open-minded" means we're now free to be with the "holier than thou" attitude. Which direction will a discussion lead to, or is there a specific answer we prefer to hear in place of the truth of the matter that cannot be achieved with the presence of close-minded people?

So where do we draw the line? When we call someone to be "close-minded", what do we have in our own mind? What are we closing down to? What justifies this behaviour? Should it be changed? How?

I know we're not supposed to take things on the internet seriously, but even off the internet, these people exists. How would you deal with them? Would you be brutally honest and point them their contradictory behaviour? Why so or why not?

I don't mean to be bitter and cynical, rather than, as V would put it, "remarking upon the paradox" and be anal about it.

TL;DR: Some "open-minded" people are not open enough towards "close-minded". What's up with that?

I second what you said. Though at times, the people who have already made up their mind about a topic tends to ruin the discussion, without giving proper insight on why they take their stand. I think instead of labeling threads "Closed-minded, back off", threads labels should rather read, "No blind statements"

Also, referring to the idea and not the main point of your topic, I'll include another scenario. There are some, who claim to not discriminate others, but while they don't discriminate against race, color, religion or culture, they do in fact discriminate "those who discriminate".

The human race is indeed a peculiar race~

Its not how open we are to other ppl....it is to new ideas and concept and willing to digest, without stereotyping, arguements from others.

If someone insults your religion and you can calmly debate back and/or explain, then I suppose you pass off as being open-minded. Those that rage, well they just fail.

Can you please define what is open minded not really open to accept the closed minded?
I am a little confuse with your statement, my idea of openness is simply allow debate and offer opinions while people who already made up their mind keep defending their thoughts, they cannot accept being doubted and it interpreted as insult.

Psychologically, everyone would abstain or at least deny the fact that they are associated in a term or phrase that has negative connotation. Until we are at a certain maturity level, we can not objectively tell "O.K, this is a subject where I can be very open/close towards other possibilities". We would prefer to think "I'm open-minded", because it seems that being open-minded is cool, seemingly intelligent. As if there is a mystical progressive sense with the phrase "open-minded. It is impossible to be associated with "lack of [solid] thought", "inability to conclude".

I would consider someone to have much more bravery and wit, by confronting and addressing these "close-minded" (or other "minds" for that fact), people who, as you put it, have made up their mind about a topic. Only this way you can truly evaluate for yourself whether someone is preaching with or without substance, whether or not the statements were made blindly, to influence or be influenced.

For example, say I ask "Why is the sky blue?", we can have quite a number of responds for it; some answer will be educated be it religious, some scientific, some would be anal and say "define 'sky' and define 'blue'". This discussion can go to various directions, the better the participants at articulating their thought, the more beneficial to anyone who reads. Had I pre-emptively prohibited a group of people I disliked, I would have missed the chance to address the most common misconception that is related to topic at hand, thus, incidentally co-produce "close-mindedness".



If the course of action we hold as the principle is to discriminate those who discriminate, then the very first subject of such treatment is yourself, isn't it? Doesn't seem to be the case.

There is a word for it, and we're sure it is what we use when someone does not practice what he or she preaches. But what do you make of this? Can we use the word?

Indeed.

To be open and willing to digest ideas indiscriminately is inclusive of us understanding why a person can become close-minded on a subject, wouldn't you agree? That is, to understand how an idea can be misunderstood or believed in the wrong way.

But, how well can or shall someone express their open-mindedness? Most of them seem to be open in one part but pretty wide shut on the others. Isn't this inconsistant?

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I just saw two new responds, let me work on it a bit.

This post has been edited by Sukebe: Feb 24 2010, 04:22 PM

open minded = people that agree with me.
close minded = people that dont.

you'd be surprised at how uncannily true this is.

Preseverance should have little to nothing to do with how open your mind is towards, say, insult. I can be very open-minded by intolerance of insults. Vise versa.

Let's say I claim to be an open-minded person, and I perceive that you are close-minded. Meaning I can believe anything, but you already have a set of belief and you are not willing to change it, but always ready to impose.

And I made this thread should the case be, that I refuse for people like you to post in my thread, so I put at the tag "close-minded people, back off".

This action, to me, is at best hypocritical, at least without wisdom. To have a discussion in an open forum is to address the myriads of thoughts that will poured into it. You therefore should not target the people themselves rather than the arguments.

I'm afraid so. Unfortunate.

This is a very good clip on what open-mindedness is....indirectly, u will understand closed-mindedness.


This post has been edited by maranello55: Feb 24 2010, 04:40 PM

Nice video. But I do believe the usage of "open/close-minded" can be more than just for ideas or explanation, though it is more appropriate to use it for these.

[In]Torelance to others are very much related to how open or close-minded you are too. This is what I'm marking.

Usually ppl that are close minded never realised that they are actually close minded. Many ppl that I know that says that they were open minded don't even know the true meaning of being open minded. To be open minded, one must realised that any possibilties of the truth is possible. To be a true open minded, we must also investigate on opinions that we don't agree or believe in. The more I know the more I realised how much I don't know.

BTW what's the difference between being close minded and being narrow minded ?


.

This post has been edited by Empathy: Feb 24 2010, 05:12 PM

In the case of religion, believers are closed minded about their god otherwise there will be uncertainty and must defend at all course from intelligent words to full scaled war over the centuries, it also segregate people by gang. Everyone have foolish self esteem and certain level of ego that sparks argument to win never to ration, they maybe stubborn but is able to continue doing a job and live a life so it works for them.

Do they care what is open minded? I don't think so, they only want attention and win otherwise in misery of doubt.

This post has been edited by 3dassets: Feb 25 2010, 11:06 AM

non believers are closed minded about the possibility of the existence of some yet unobserved power

Not everyone free thinker are like that, the argument is all possibilities rather than lock down / closed the subject. The possibilities trigger good fantasies and creativity otherwise a chair is just a piece of wood log or stone, such creativity is the drive of human civilization and we now believe medicine can cure compare to praying. Those who totally deny the creator / god is frustrated of the reality (misery of the poor) and believe in nothing.

Not true, non-believers have just not been provided with the significant proof of the existence of some "yet unobserved power". Though they(we, myself included), are keen to know more about this "yet unobserved power" and if provided with proper backing, are more than willing to be "believers".

This post has been edited by Mesosmagnet: Feb 28 2010, 11:19 PM

the very foundation of religion (faith) means that no backing of any kind is necessary.

lin00b,

The PROBLEM is most people are "Pretend" believer. If a person is TRUE BELIEVER, why do they care whether ANYONE agrees with him/her??

TRUTH / FAITH is NOT a popularity contest. It either is TRUE or FALSE. It does not change based on number of people believing.

As I had said before, a person can CHOOSE to believe gravity or not, it does not change the FACT that gravity exists.

A TRUE BELIEVER believe the existence of their BELIEF like GRAVITY. It EXISTS.

I am a TRUE BELIEVER. I do not need to convince ANYONE of my belief. It is THERE for ANYONE that CHOOSE to see. If they don't, it is STILL there.

Only "Pretend" believer has to convince people of their belief.

Dreamer

although commonly used in matters relating to the supernatural, open/closed mindedness is not only limited to that. i'm sure copernicus had a difficult time convincing the closed minded that the sun is the center of the solar system. similar problems exist now for string theory, quantum mechanics and all the other more abstract physics.

while fact remains fact no matter what, it would be a sad day for science and human when scientist go "think what you will, i'm not going to bother to convince you, i'm right regardless of what you think"

lastly, humans are social animals, the desire to be acknowledged and accepted is one of our main drive, and so we spend a lot of energy trying to convince our community of our views.

lin00b,

<< while fact remains fact no matter what, it would be a sad day for science and human when scientist go "think what you will, i'm not going to bother to convince you, i'm right regardless of what you think">>

We are talking about religion here. So, this has NOTHING to do with science. For a TRUE BELIEVER, God / Karma/ whatever will affect the person regardless of whether the person believe or not. And, a person will suffer the consequences of the non-believing. If a person does not believe that, a person is a NOT a TRUE BELIEVER.

<<lastly, humans are social animals, the desire to be acknowledged and accepted is one of our main drive, >>

For an ENTP like me, I am anti-social. I do not want to be accepted. Do not ASSUME all human beings are social animal.

Are you sure that you are an INTP??

<<the desire to be acknowledged and accepted>>

That is NOT a motivation for that kind of personality. That only works for F.

Dreamer

This post has been edited by dreamer101: Mar 1 2010, 03:07 AM

like i say, while open/close mindedness is commonly used in religion, it has other real life implication in the acceptance of new information, science, religion, business deals or otherwise. you are only looking at it in the religion context and ignoring all other aspect where acceptance of a new idea by others is more important than being right.

ok, statement corrected to "most humans are social animals..." since when does dreamer represent the world?

and despite what you claim, i do think that everyone have a base desire to be part of a group. difference is only a degree of "how much".

and i did not say that acceptance by others is MY motivation, i was making a general statement that (most) people have this motivation. and i understand that, though i do not empathize with that too much.

This post has been edited by lin00b: Mar 1 2010, 08:31 AM

U wan to talk about sex? I can either agree or disagree the best posture for having sex. But then, sometimes people who are close-minded are disturb and paranoid by the topic itself. The point is that if you wan to deny the existence of the topic which is sensitive and apparently you havent grow up , is better to back-off than come here whinning about how undeserve and ungrateful are we. I'm seriously wan to apologize of being harsh on what i said, because the fact is that i am so frustrated with some Malaysians. U know what i mean.

Talk about sex= dirty-minded
Question about GOd's capability = Devil
Talk about something deep = U are out of your mind


So be open-minded

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Added on March 1, 2010, 6:05 pmI seriously cant imagine if i talk about Allah in real life with Malay fren. They sure burn my house like they burn your church. LOL. Last time i opened a thread on evolution of God. I think they might feed my body to their kids if they knew my face in real life. Holy moly.
Welcome to 21st centuries.

This post has been edited by communist892003: Mar 1 2010, 06:07 PM

Closed minded people does not respect other people's believe and also do not accept other people's believe, and enforce his/her own believe on others...
Open minded people respect or accept other people's believe, and no not enforce his/her own believe on others

e.g. Topic: Naked beach
Closed minded people will critic the naked beach like hell, and no compromise.. and force their opinion that this is a bad idea
Open minded people will try to understand certain people's view, or accept or compromise with certain conditions that apply to the society

Just my 2cent opinion..

Add one more point, open minded ppl can quarrel like there is a war going on with their mouth but yet still able to be fren after the argument is finish. IS that wrong to influence people with what i thought?? Open minded can disagree with you and tolerate you while close minded would cut your pennis off if they disagree.

Just my 2cent opinion

This post has been edited by communist892003: Mar 1 2010, 06:16 PM

Yeah, valid point !!!

Personally I have had religious debates with my muslim friends, and they by no means have shown to feel even the slightest bit threatened. Also a topic of debate might not only have 2 options (agree/disagree), there may be other opinions regarding the topic, so being open-minded is to not blindly shut out others opinions but hear them out.

HaHa... communist892003 I think you have grown up since your first landing in this forum, still interested to enforce your philosophy concept to the people here? Now you are talking like one of us. The closed minded feel agitated when others don't agree with their views especially in religion and take it as an insult, the free thinker's intelligence is also insulted by religion and told that god cannot be questioned, as if we are not suppose to know who and what gave birth to us, never question your parents.

There are many intelligent replies but were ignored, I learn and enjoy those contributions that made me addicted to this forum.

you are mistaking close/open mindedness with conservative/liberal thinking.

GOod for you having that argument with civilise religious fren. If u are trying to said the entire entity of Malaysians are open-minded enough to talk about it, then the church and kampung wouldn't being disgrace by some extremists.
THere is two type of argument, whether is a discussion or debate, it is always up to the reader or critics whether to choose which one of it. Agree or disagree. Accept or denying. Most philosophers i could see prefer discussion because they are wise enough to do so and wouldn't self-contradict themselves. But we the malaysian, come on, not all of us are up to the standard to start a truly well-respected discussion, because the fact is that there is still many contradiction, irrationality and misunderstanding going on. If u can always succeeding by starting a discussion, is either u are passive-thinker and courtesy is your priority or the entire discussion group are wise and logic. The truth is stop being a hypocrite, we are nowhere near 1st class-minded citizen. I felt disgusted because it remind me of my dearly government. Let us start from scratch.

DEbate = comparison of facts based on rationality and logic
Discussion = Sharing is caring!!



COme and shoot me back!!! My pleasure!!!

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Added on March 2, 2010, 3:28 pmLong way ahead to talk like u guys. I fail my education and i prefer to talk broken english. Additionally, I never even read a book beside textbook, what else to said a book about philosophy. Here i am interested with philosophy and shitting inside here just to be part of it. Because, philosophy save my soul. AMen.
Erk, lai add facebook. Facebook is my only book that i interested.

This post has been edited by communist892003: Mar 2 2010, 03:32 PM

open minded - people who have a lot of experience, kind to accept everything people said and argue with a good point

close minded - never experience certain things, kind to use his own opinion only without knowing a good reason.

1+1=2

1+1=11, Be open minded

Depends on where you use the fomular

Reproduction 1+1=3, 4, 5...

Union 1+1+1+1+1... =1

Love 1+1=1

a+b=c

1+1=c

what is a and b?

wonderful, everyone is close minded for everyone will never experience certain things.

at the same time, please define "a lot"

well... its up to your own definition since this one is subjective...
thats my own and personal view...

Reminds me of a quote from Belgarath the Sorceror by David Eddings
It goes something like this


Anyway, I do agree with TS that we'll be shutting ourselves off to people whom are labelled as "closed-minded" hence being closed-minded ourselves.

However there are situations where these "closed-minded" people can be just a sore pain in the @ss don't they?

Tolerance would be the key to judge someone. As long as you don't go overboard. There's always limit to everything.

True. I like your comment. Simple as ABC, if you believe, you believe. No one can ever change that. You hold to what you think it is true for you.

@communist

Some people are just too sensitive when talking about religion. I for one, would love to share my views on Islam. I guess you met the wrong kind of people to start a discussion with. I can't say much as I don't the know the person you're dealing with. As I myself won't be having all the answers to your questions.

The title of this thread is : " closed minded back-off " . I think this is rather ridiculous since all closed minded ppl don't realised that they were closed minded. So the real closed minded ppl will also chip into this thread thinking that they were open minded.

.

Social aspect wise the "close minded" ones usually triumph over the "open minded".
We already had a pack of "close minded" beings running on top of our country. That's one living example.
Anyway i would nv regard this term without the open inverted commas.
Instead i always categorize them as narrow minded.

It depend on how open and how close are you. Sometimes people felt content even with slighty open door. One thing is true, no one is absolute open-minded. We are human living in an egg shell.

again you are mistaking conservatives with close-mindedness

I guess ur snapping on the wrong wire. It's base on how individually view upon other's character.
What i pointed isnt only entirely conservative.

Are you saying that Malaysians cannot be "1st class-minded citizens"? And if we do try we're being hypocrites? And what would you classify as a well-respected discussion?

at a risk of turning this into a political debate, why do you say the people running this country is "close minded"?

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Added on March 5, 2010, 3:39 amMany thought they are, because they are well-educated. I suppose it depend on what type of education they undergo. WE can become 1st class minded citizens, the point is we suppose to have become because we f*** our textbook more than the ah moi. We jump off the building more often than the ah moi because we fail to please our book. WHat our leader is symbolise who we are.

We choose the best for our parliment seat. and the best had been monkey. We dont get that before the election. Or perhaps when u are not under the pressure, u tend to hide your true identity??

Tolerance= hyprocrites + innocent+ A + B + C ....

We don't "tolerate" people who share our views. They're on our side. There's nothing to put up with. Tolerance is reserved for those we think are wrong. This essential element of tolerance--disagreement--has been completely lost in the modern distortion of the concept.

somehow i do felt please to see what going on at parliment, because the fact is that is how it suppose to be. Just that we started it after 50 years of independant.

once an ah moi professor scold the hell out of my fren who are like us (asian), my fren is pissed off that he accuse that professor of being racist. He mention our act to get educated is not an act of to be knowledgeable but somehow an act of cowardness. He tease that we are living in a system which is really safe and yet we are still thinking way to survive and that we the chinese are repeating the history itself of being called Weakman. But one thing he said ring true to me. " We should do something that we passionate for, that's the privilege of having peace in this world. As well a way to understand and express the love of peace. Peace is neither driven by the fear of death nor violent, but fear of living for nothing." He aslo added, "The price one pays for pursuing any profession or calling is an intimate knowledge of its ugly side." Now i finally understand why the ah moi recognize us as 3rd class minded people while most of the chin at australia university out performance the caucasian academically.

Not to said only we are close minded, we are low minded as well. I think that the root of the problem. Low minded> close minded??

I always refer to entire entity of malaysian, it would be wrong if u thinking i am pointing finger on you.

This post has been edited by communist892003: Mar 5 2010, 03:44 AM

Hm.. Since you know it would invite political debates then i wouldn't wana state the point.
You should be more aware of y i categorize it under "close minded" rather then conservative.
Read the newspaper and u'll get an insight on how u term conservative or "close minded" in their very deeds.

What u mention is partially true.
Though chinese still posses leading qualities in thinking. But malaysian and Singaporeans shares the same attitude and moral education. Even though chinese but they are far behind China and Taiwan chinese. Yup to be sad it's on the scale as ignorant. That's y u see "Ang Moh" despising on our pressence. Don't believe ? Check out how the kids in the society compare in China/taiwan and Singapore/Malaysia. Ever seen a kid screaming on top of his voice in public in china/taiwan like a monkey being in the proccess of slaughtering? If it's some rural or kampung place it's hard to blame. But in cities u catch that alot in malaysia/singapore. "We" already regard that as a "common scene" in the society.
I do not believe in being 3rd class minded beings or anything lower then that. I simply regard it as being ignorant.
What your "Ang Moh" Prof see was actually what dated back before the 80s of China/taiwan. Chinese in these country had advance so fast that we cant even believe that malaysian/singaporeans chinese is indeed from the same race. And seriously.. i nv hold on to westerner's words. They are just hypocrites who had an aim to talk u into something else. Of course we do not share passion in learning how to persuade countries to have nuclears and also promotes to sell nuclear to these countries. This is what westerners being doing for years.

This post has been edited by darkskies: Mar 5 2010, 09:13 PM

U anti-westerner?? It was just a conversation....Teasing than telling the truth??

This post has been edited by communist892003: Mar 6 2010, 01:24 AM

Right, narrow it is.
Since a believer already made up their mind, why bother what others says about them, that subject is closed.
Open mined is to open for discussions not to debate on a closed subject, the only thing to defend is power / influence / integrity that could threatens their kind as if being called stupid to follow ancient rules.

Nopes i juz don't believe in them that's all. I'll always weigh and see what they say before finalizing my judgement. I won't just simply think that something that these westerner made "written down" must be fact.
I enjoy mixing my critizing and truth spinning in between. Like having chocolate and lemonade at the same time but not mixing it together and having it at once. I don't tease or joke. I'm a failure in that ^.^

When opening a debate or discussion. U've got to accept the downside or upside of the subject. Everyone is entitled to revive something that had been closed instead of being stagnant to one part of the topic entirely. What i notice is lyn dude usually doesnt tolerate such actions and think it's forbidden and absolute zero tolerance for such grp and call them flammers. This already made whatever open discussion to be close instead of open. It's same as saying given freedom to everyone but with rules. Also same like the flyers floating around in the dustbin mentioning UNLIMITED BROADBAND but with Quota in mini letters.

I wonder if it is the same lyn dude,
It is probably one of the reason I took part in these threads that certain very narrow individuals tends to do that, some are smart & educated which is unfortunate that knowledge is not balanced with experience. They obstruct freedom and will be challenged by not their kind.

i state "open minded" as non believer n alwayz assxxxe others..

The closed minded tends to be a nuisance in a rational discussion and low mentality, make their presence everywhere to fulfill the insecurity in them just because they don't like it. These are shameless people who will not grow up and a burden to the society, while the others continue to make progress in science and contribute towards a civilized living environment.

Usually these people stick to their own kind but others are intrusive and feel ire when others is smarter and talented then them, continue to make a fool of their own kind but then it does fuel the ratings in this forum.

This post has been edited by 3dassets: Mar 10 2010, 09:40 PM

just like you.

Me? I am god to you, so you better behave or I shall turn you into a worm in your next life.

How is the act of trying to gain knowledge an act of cowardice? And how is tolerance related to the questions I was asking? And what does "Tolerance= hyprocrites + innocent+ A + B + C ...." mean? I don't get you because your statements are incoherent.

That is just someone racist ah moi teasing someone with his metaphor. i bet your brain can intrepret it well enough. About tolerance, it was merely an assumption.

Siham = oyster
SIham= XXXX

maybe u're lacking of artistic skill??

Probably the best video I have seen this year. Thank you for sharing!

Kubing, Kubing, someone put you in the video, you should watch!

How to share this on facebook. Why i cant share????? HELP MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

go to youtube, see share:facebook

DOnt have la, DOnt have the word "share" la ...SOhai youtube change the outfit.

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This post has been edited by marsalee: Nov 13 2010, 09:51 PM

Since one religion already claimed to be the last and only, their followers tends to think they are the absolute and the final. So they want us to stop having doubts which is the basis of improvement in reality, to wonder and then find the truth to solutions that developed into the science we know today.

Science continue to develop, religion remain primitive much like constitution law can be amended according to time and ideology not religious rules.

I can't even understand what you're trying to say not because I can't think but because there's a communication breakdown. Can somebody please interpret what he/she's trying to say?

Its the kind of language usually used in kopitiam that translated into alphabets, its emotion mixed with foul language when unable to communicate.

a open minded person - someone that is not confident of what him or her self is and is ready to experience and absorb as much as there is for them to take it. therefore the open armed approach towards everything so they can deduce what sort of person they are. i.e teenagers

a close minded person - someone that knows what he or she wants and that their decisions or perceptions are the utmost correct above everyone elses because they think they have experienced it all. they shuts off every entry of new inputs because they know they are better than most, hence the glass ceiling above them therefore making them very unreceptive of improvements of sort. i.e mom and dad

Good point, i felt sometimes baby are the most open-minded person, they are even ok when their parents get naked. They are even ok when they saw tiger.

Baby without the ability to think is open minded? Please explain.

or rather, you as a teenager is closed minded to all your parent's experience and maturity, deciding to label them as outdated, close-minded, unable to receive new ideas. maybe you as a teenager is closed minded to your parent's advise