What is the appeal of ambiguious language? Why do people tend to use when talking about mystical or religious things? What is the psychological appeal of such language.
I'm not familiar with your post history could you give a few key examples or perhaps a general characterization of your postings?
When it comes to philosophy, religion, and the spiritual often times not only does leaving the language ambiguous leave some mystery/intrigue to the writing but it allows the writer to reach a larger base of people with his ideas. By leaving the idea slightly ill-defined it allows the writer to express a main concept/component of his idea while allow others to interpret the meaning in their own way.
To me its just an indicator that they haven't thought out there ideas entirely. I mean theres using metaphors and then theres saying something that sounds metaphorical and presenting it like it is some magic knowlegde. I'm reffering to the latter
Being ambiguous is fine as long as you actually elaborate and specify what you mean. The ambiguity is sometimes necessary to sum up an entire thought , but often times people just use analogies and ambiguous statements to sound smart and act like they've made point, then when someone asks for elaborations they give an extremely weak sauce answer and fall flat on their faces. These charlatans are like squids squirting out ink when fleeing ,which blinds anyone that follows it from the truth. Observers who are not well read may equate something they don't understand to be something extremely intelligent and complex . These charlatans create a mirage , misleading any curious soul.
The psychological appeal is simply the realization that the target audience (whom an author is always carefully considering) might take from the language what is missing in themselves and somehow apply it to their own life and relate. The beautiful thing about ambiguity is that it is timeless. An example is the world ending. Every generation puts itself through this phenomenon at least once in a lifetime. Because fear motivates and controls, it is an excellent way to ensure ones particular religion is passed on and survives from one generation to the next by essentially "brainwashing" (no offense intended towards the religious) the next generation by using fear as a tactic to ensnare those whom are somehow incomplete. The ironic and fascinating part is that even though the threat never materializes, the crippling fear that it might forces (encourages) parents to essentially "poison" their children so that they pass on the fear and the cycle. At least that's how I interpret it I did the math last night amd if someone spends 2 nights a week at church or 6 hours a week, it equates to about 2 hours per day of brainwash (repetitive language, warnings, and fear). While that is beyond the point, I found it interesting to be aware of this fact.
Okay, my math might be off or I may just not be "logically inclined," but if a person spends 6 hours at church, how does that equal 2 hours of " brainwashing" per day?
If they think about what ever was in the brainwashing material later it will strengthen the belief even more. So many varibles when it comes to how brainwashing affects people!
It depends on the sources you're referring to, but if it's in say, Buddhist or Taoist text there's a reason. It's called writing with 'veiled intent' a way of writing teachings so that anyone looking at them from the outside or a lower level of skill will not understand what they mean. It's done by mixing metaphors with literal statements, so you can only understand what you're really reading about when you get to the right level. One of the aims is to stop people trying to read ahead of their skill level and get the wrong idea about what ultimate nature or a quality of it is. This is important, as getting a wrong understanding about reality will 'block' you from going any further. People can be blocked for weeks, months or years, so it's better if they are protected from higher texts to some extent. MelT
Doesn't science result in ambiguity especially when it comes to a topic that aren't coherently mastered in? Take the example of the latest article: "weed lowers your IQ", at first they were confident from their data but later they said they were unsure whether or not that the claim is true. Why would say something as it "valid and then say something else, if they don't know then that should have rechecked.