“I Think Syndrome”

~ Dr. Laurence B. Brown, MD
Author of The Eighth Scroll, MisGod’ed, God’ed, and Bearing True Witness

You can’t say, “I think the earth is square” when there is an established fact that the earth is spherical. You can’t say “I think Switzerland and Swaziland are neighboring countries” when there is an easily reachable atlas indicating that Switzerland is located in Western Europe while Swaziland is in the African continent. You should not say, “I think Obama and Osama are twins because their names closely match.” You can’t say “I think it’s ok to drink sulfuric acid because it looks like water” when you can get a litmus paper to conclusively determine whether the solution is acidic or not. Similarly, you can’t say, “I think all religions are right, they worship the same God”, “I think Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism e.t.c. represent differing paths to the same destination!”, “I think the true religion is . . .”, “I think the purpose of life is to eat, live and die”, “I think when people die, they go to heaven . . . ”e.t.c., when there is an authentic source to factually answer all these questions. Mere opinions which are not backed by scriptural evidences are unreliable. With opinions, you certainly have a right to be wrong but with facts, you don’t have a right to be wrong. This resonates well with Thomas Sowell who said “reality is not optional.”

The true word of God is enough to eliminate the “I think syndrome”. The true scripture contains the words of God. And when God says, it is a fact not a hypothesis/assumption/possibility. God’s Word is truth [Psalm 119:160; John 17:17] and God “. . . cannot lie . . .” [Titus 1:2]. All doubts are normally silenced in confidence of divine guidance. It is an act of total ignorance to pretend you are smarter than God. By disagreeing with what He informs you through His (authentic) scripture for He is All-Knowing. “Should He (i.e. God) not know,- He that created? and He is the One that understands the finest mysteries (and) is well-acquainted (with them).” [Q 67:14.] The authentic scripture will factually answer what the true religion is? What is the purpose of life? What happens during and after death? Who will go to hell? How to live on earth? . . . and any other dilemma humans have. There is no room for thinking when the right answer is readily available. Ignorance in the absence of information may be excusable, but willful ignorance in the face of the True Word of God is a global disaster. Samuel Johnson said: “Knowledge is of two kinds. We know the subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information on it.” Now, wanton display of ignorance is when we don’t know the subject ourselves and we don’t bother knowing where to find information on the subject. However, when one is pushed to make an opinion, he should know full well that it is not a fact. He should say “that’s just my opinion,” but he must always end with, “I could be wrong.”

A semblance of success will be seen when we discard the unfounded opinions or attitudes vis-à-vis religion. As it is said, “Assumption is the mother of all screw-ups.” Amazingly, the Muslim Holy book elucidate on people who are doomed by saying that “. . . most of them follow not except assumption. Indeed, assumption avails not against the truth at all. Indeed, Allah is Knowing of what they do.” [Q 10:36] And Prophet Muhammad said, “. . . there will remain ignorant people who, when consulted, will give verdicts according to their opinions whereby they will mislead others and go astray.”[2] There is another story where some knowledge-deficient men gave an opinion which was to be followed by their sick fellow. As a result, the sick man died because by implementing the opinion suggested, it aggravated his sickness. On hearing this, Prophet Muhammad became very angry at these men who gave a wrong opinion. “Why didn’t they ask (from an authentic source) when they were ignorant,” [3] the prophet said.

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Excerpted from Salim Boss’ book “They are either Extremely Smart or Extremely Ignorant”
For more articles from this author, please visit his website; www.extremelysmart.org You can also Get the Book in both hard-copy and ebook formats from the author’s website.
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NOTES
[1]Brown, Laurence B. MisGod’ed: A Roadmap of Guidance and Misguidance in the Abrahamic Religions. USA: BookSurge Publishing, 2007.pp. 275-276.
[2]Bukhari, Vol. 9, Bk. 92, No. 410.
[3]Narrated by DaraQutny.