Alright. The Senti-Serlin Poll.

The BBQ Pit
21

Actually, Serlinel is at least somewhat tolerable in the smokers thread, if a little nutty.

Where he was really, truly dangerous and completely whacked out was actually a thread in MPSIMS. Can’t remember what it was called or I’d do a search and link to it, but it was about booby trapping your valuables to deter thieves. Apparently, Serlinel was advocating doing such a thing, because apparently the life and health of a thief was not as important to him as his stuff. He gave detailed descriptions of how he planned (or did?) these booby traps. Not only was that paranoid and illegal (if he did it, and someone was injured, they’d have a case against him), but it’s just plain dangerous. I would have no problem if the Reader chose to yank that entire thread because it gave detailed descriptions of how to do things that are illegal and can hurt people.

However, I don’t believe that Serlinel should be banned. Some of his more dangerous topics could easily be pulled, but as is he’s no better or worse than any other asshole who happens to hold opinions that are contrary to the norm. He may be a complete nutjob about it, but I don’t see anywhere in the rules of this board that states you have to be sane to participate. If that were the case, this board would be pretty damned empty. :wink:

22

Sorry Coldy, I’d vote no, as he hasnt been outright trollish as he has been in the past.
He cant say anything new to us, and he knows he’ll be banned if he steps out of line…

so I’d let this one roll out to its natural conclusion.

23

OK, so most of you are basically saying: “He’s an asshole alright, but there’s little we can do about that. He doesn’t violate board rules (although he gets really close sometimes), therefore he cannot be banned immediately”.

True enough, I suppose. Thanks Libby for reminding us of that thread he started about Traps against Car Thieves. It is truely deranged. This is exactly the sort of thing I mean: the guy is just bordering on insanity, and should actually be in a psychiatrists office instead of in front of his computer.

Having said that, JohnLarrigan has a point as well. He seems to be very careful in when and how he insults people. Surprisingly enough, he has avoided this thread so far. I’m sure he’s READING it, he can’t miss it! Yet, he’ll only start names after he has been challenged in a less than polite manner in one of his (mostly pit) threads. Clever. If anything, it shows some restraint. It does not hide the true nature of the beast, however.

24

You didn’t post a true nature of the beast thread Coldfire, but if you did, the results would be different from this thread. You can count me now. Thanks for the thread link, it removed any tiny lingering doubt I might have entertained.

picmr

25

He pisses me off no end, but I’ve still got to say no. The administrators of this site have never made a practice of banning people for expressing unpopular opinions, and IMHO, that’s how it should be.

26

NO.

Coldfire:

And you’re not getting off that easy, weaselbreath. You have been witty and topical in the past, but this time the meter is pegged on Bullshit. I read Sentinel’s smoker’s rant, and you are getting just a little too smarmy. If he’s such a troll, why is everybody doing so goddam much feeding?

I also read the car thieves / booby traps thread. This’ll keep you up at night; I only disagree with some of what he said.

For those who may not know exactly what a troll is, and those who should know better:

‘An electronic … communication which is intentionally incorrect… or the act of sending such a message. Trolling aims to elicit an emotional reaction from those with a hair-trigger on the reply key.’

Now Sentinel isn’t exactly my favoritest poster, but he says what he says and then sticks around to argue the point. You may not agree with his methods or conclusions, he is a hard nosed bastard, and he could beef up the cites. This is not in any way an endorsement of the content of his arguments. But it takes two to tango, chuckles.

So help me out; shed some photons on just exactly how Sentinel is in conflict with the purpose of this board whilst you are in harmonious alignment. Or, you could just shove off until your dick stops bleeding.

Hasta.

27

speakeasy:

Coldfire said poll, not troll.

28

Green Bean:

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=23172&pagenumber=2

Coldfire said troll.

29

'twas a silly joke, speakeasy. :cool:

30

More precisely, I explained the abbreviation DNFTT at the request of Sentinel himself. In addition, I agreed with the sentiment. And I still do.

Come on, speakeasy, read the entire thread. The guy is making up medical facts and scientific findings as he goes along, providing no more than narrowminded and unfounded propaganda cites as proof. If such propaganda can’t be found, he’ll resort to a mere “sorry, no link, but I read about it and I have been working in the medical field for years”.

I have no problem with that OP either. Sure he can smoke in designated areas. It’s all the bullshit and unfounded nonsense that gets on my nerves, and ruins a good OP for him as well.

So what we got is someone who categorically refuses to produce evidence for ridiculous claims. Does the name Phaedrus ring a bell?
Distributing bogus quotes and false statements with no proof to back it up is in conflict with the purpose of this board, IMHO.

So you better think again before you call me Weaselbreath, OK?

31

COLDFIRE

OK, I stayed out of this, judging it best not to stick my nose in, until now.

I’ve been reading various medical, sociological, psychological and geological texts and articles for over 30 years. YOU THINK I can recall every last page number, heading and author? I have read over 1500 science fiction books, do you think I can quote chapter, title and page number I took a saying from? I have a personal library of over 2000 books. Do you think I can recall what is in each one just by memory alone? Even you, with your obviously superior intellect could not.

By the way, shit-for-brains, I don’t make things up, especially for this board because there is always the chance that some obsessive compulsive fanatic (Byz comes to mind) might spend 20 hours of web browsing digging up facts to contradict me. Now fuck off!

To the rest of you gentle readers, I apologize for my profanity and intrusion. Carry on.

32

ok Cold count me as a yes.

And I’ll tell you why too. This guy is an idiot and a rude one to boot. Byzantine hasn’t said one word on this thread, but dear old Mark Serlin aka Sentinel aka too freaking many names for me to rember, has to go and attack her.

I don’t open this waste of space’s threads, nor do I lower myself by speaking to him. He proved to me a long time ago just how hopeless he really is.

33

Ayesha, you know he’s gonna call you Byz’s butt buddy now, right?

Sentinel said:

No, and you’re making it seem like we expect you to. Which is absurd. A mere book title would suffice. How big is your house? How hard is it to look up a title? I’m sure you’re gonna tell us know about the big fire of 1994 which burnt down your entire medical literature collection :rolleyes:.

No, but this statement does explain a lot. Seems like you’re mizing the Science Fiction with the Science Reality a lot.

Like I said, no one expects you to be a human search engine. The problem is, that you provide no proof whatsoever.
I can’t argue with your statement about my intellect: you’re spot-on.

34

[/]David Attenborough Hat on[/]

As we peer out from the bushes surrounding this clearing, we can see the infamous Serlinel, or its latin name, Trolius Stubbornius, awake

it’s barbaric yalp,

brings to mind, its forefather, Phaedrusaurus Rex, who would annoy the indigenous people of Dopangea, the Doperai, with his incredible bark, before saying he’ll be back later on that night to supply proof to his bark, and never doing it……

here we have a small demonstration of the Serlinel’s ability to stuff up…

the Serlinel can sometimes believe that fantasy can overlap into reality.

while the serlinel recognises its betters, it tries to use sarcasm to delay the inevitable

the Serlinel likes to have sneak attacks on the uninvolved, that is quite frankly lame, but we know it will turn and run if the uninvolved came back. It seems to forget that using facts in an attack, or even a defense, considerably adds to the likelihood of success.

oohh, it appears that the Serlinel is starting to get sensitive……

but, if you listen closely, you can here the rumble of the trollasaurus hunters in the distance…………

35

9.0, Larrigan :smiley:

36

Quite frankly this is the most pathetic thing I have ever read. If he gets your back up so much IGNORE HIM! Don’t read what he has to say. You are obviously in disagreement with him when it comes to just about everything so why bother? To be honest this whining travesty of a thread makes me want YOU banned Coldfire but of course I’m not that petty. This merely reinforces my belief that Dick Advocaat is the only Dutchman worth listening to :stuck_out_tongue:

37

Green Bean:

Oops, my sense of humor was temporarily out of order. Had to install ball bearings, everything’s going to ball bearings these days. (I like the shades.)

Coldfire:

I read the thread again…aaargle. But I’m not interested in dissecting Sentinel here. I can do that myself.

[So you better think again before you call me Weaselbreath, OK?]

Um, sure dude, just like I thought about it last time. Down here in sub-basement 13 that’s an honorable salutation, or have you forgotten? Which leads the main issue, what do you think the purpose of this particular board is, anyway? Last I heard it was the place to vent your spleen without getting any on civilized folks. Seems to me that’s what Sentinel was doing.

Yes I remember Mark Serlin / Nightwatch2 / LadyLust / etc (and Phaedrus too). Even I can’t read all that shit on a full stomach. Moderators must have been very naughty people in their past lives. And the sock puppet thing has got to go. But as xenophon41 so capably pointed out, you can’t say he isn’t entertaining.

And that little hand waving session with the cites; in the entire thread I didn’t see you provide any links at all. You just waved the royal hand and demanded more. Get up off that Bahaus furniture and dredge up a little R&D of your own if you don’t like it.

Because regarding addictive behavior and genetic predisposition, he was at least sorta in the direction of the facts. [See cites below] If you’d taken your own advice and spent a little quality time with a search engine you’d know it, too. In fact, I have to assume you did know that and were trying to make a point. That’s cool, but I didn’t see it. Try leading by example. Us teeming millions are safe; Sentinel is in no danger of convincing anyone of anything until he polishes his delivery and coughs up the references. Don’t worry; if you get tired of reading his tirades there will still be plenty of people lurking around to shoot him out of the saddle, starting with me.

Weighing in multiple times with troll accusations and random insults adds nothing to the conversation. Wally, are you listening? Love your sig lines, but your voice carries. After that it was cute but obnoxious. Of course, this is the Pit. But don’t expect to be taken seriously after the first one or two broadsides. That’s right, you two have a little paint on you yourselves.

Step back and have a look, old salts like you should be able to see the delicious irony in that kind of posting. You need to lead by example, not just sniveling and sniping, fun as those activities can be. In fact, the strongest argument for Sentinel being a troll is he seems to have caught himself a few live ones here. Snap out of it, gents.

[cites]

The essentials of addiction are:
A drug which causes neuroadaptations leading to progressively increasing
use and withdrawal symptoms
A resulting chemical imbalance in the brain which can be temporarily
relieved by the drug
A method of use which results in a rapid delivery of the drug to brain tissue
[http://www.biopsychiatry.com/]

Cigarettes have these attributes in spades. If you were to design a drug to be addictive it would look very much like a cigarette. In particular, nicotine is absorbed through the lungs very quickly and crosses the blood-brain barrier readily, resulting in a rapid rise time. This sort of Pavlovian reward training acts on areas of the brain that are not under conscious control. These factors lead to a self reinforcing incentive trap that can be impossible to break without external help. The fact that cigarette withdrawal symptoms do not result in cramping agony may actually increase the addictive effect due to the absence of aversion training. In a fight with an external force, you nearly always either win or lose. Addiction leads to a fight with the most evenly matched opponent possible; yourself.

There is also good medical evidence to show that some people are more susceptible to addiction than others and it may be genetically based due to variations in the sympathetic nervous system.
[http://www.nih.gov/news/pr/apr97/nida-04.htm]
[http://sciborg.uwaterloo.ca/~t5brown/alcohol.html]
And research points to the conclusion that all of the common addictive drugs operate on the limbic-cortical structures in related ways.
[http://www.biopsychiatry.com/rewardcircuitry.htm]

[/cites]

38

Of course I didn’t provide any links. It was Sentinel who made some wild statements. Should I be the one supplying the proof for his erratic brain waves? I call him on his lack of evidence in the strongest of terms: surely it would have been very strange had I provided the evidence for him. And I only demanded more because he came up with bogus links.

What is Bahaus furniture?

The truly amazing thing is that you have actually done Sentinels work: you provided some decent evidence for his points. However, the points at hand are still only marginally related to Sentinels OP in the NON-SMOKERS thread. But let’s not get into that over here.

39

bauhaus= Latin Drinhing Emporium…

What he means is waving your barstool…

but I dont know what that means either

40

Barstool??? No., surely it refers to the Bauhaus design school. They are best known for the concrete/ steel box that was the forerunner of the skyscraper, but they also designed rather austere furniture.