Dialogue and Reason

Here are two pieces of conversations on blogs which are very thought provoking and therefore I decided to share these.


First one is the my dialogue with Atanu Dey in his post of Open Thread
Sukesh:
I almost regularly read your blog and deeply influenced by the reasoning and arguments you present.
But a negative trait is coming out. I find myself unable to reason beyond your arguments. I feel that my faith towards your reasoning is obstructing me to go beyond the scope and find more arguments or counter-arguments. That makes me paranoid.
Maybe it is because of my understandable limitation of knowledge of the field.
Can you tell me any solution so that I can think from scratch with a new perspective?
Atanu Dey:
Reasoning independently is simple if you take care to build from the basics. Nothing that is not consonant with how you perceive the world can make sense to you. So I would not worry if I find myself in agreement with someone whose premises I agree with.
The only, and most important caution, is that you should be totally skeptical of all claims of authority. As the Buddha said, if it does not accord with your reason, reject it.

I agree.

Second one is my dialogue with Vinod Sharma in his post Gauranga Baba
Sukesh:
Before finding answer for "why did I leave him", I suggest you first find answer to "why I followed him" in the first place.
Then you should think of what is the difference between 'following' and 'in agreement'. I mean the difference between "why one 'follows' someone" and "why one is 'convinced' by someone and yet remains skeptical".
Vinod Sharma:
You are very young but have a head beyond your years.

I am flattered.