I agree in principle with what DT has to say but, for the most part, I ignore his GD posts.
The real issue is and always has been class war. DT gets that but, for some reason beyond my comprehension, insists on blaming republicans and conservatives for what is endemic on both sides of the aisle. Yes, the Pubs take the public stance against “big govt”, namely UHC and govt regulation of predatory corporations, but the Dems (in general) offer little but the illusion of opposition in the smoke of Congressional “debate”, waged in good part among themselves.
Religion is clearly organized and institutionalized superstition in the service of the wealthy. When any idiot is assured 30% of the vote simply by claiming to be “saved” and taking a stance against abortion and gay rights while increasing military spending and cutting taxes and social programs, what more needs to be said?
That’s actually an interesting debate in itself. I know there are people who are ardent skeptics who will debunk nonsense and psuedo-science emphatically, but who tip toe around religion. I think the idea there is that… you probably can’t seperate people from religion, it’s too well ingrained - and there are many people who have a half-assed belief for religion and it doesn’t really affect their behavior or harm them too much… so… if you want to try to bring them to your side on an issue (say, if you want to debunk astrology or creationism to them), then treating the religion with kid gloves while debunking the less well established nonsense makes a certain degree of pragmatic sense. There’s definitely room for finesse on the issue, although I do admit a desire sometimes when discussing religious to say “wait a second, we’re all adults, right? This is a serious discussion? What the fuck is wrong with you?”
Ignoring Der Trihs by giving him another Pit thread, keeping it on the front page for a few days, and adding his name to the database a couple of hundred more times.
How’s that working out for y’all?
I guess you can count me as another who doesn’t mind DT. He’s over the top sometimes, but IRL I am surrounded by conservatives (these particular ones are basically regular person versions of Beck, Hannity and Limbaugh), so his posts have helped me open my eyes (and keep 'em open) to seeing things from a different point of view.
Errrm, have you actually read what the guy has to say about the Democrats? He thinks they’re yellow-bellied pussies, he’s not a Dem cheerleader by any means. He seems to have a “lesser of two weevils” approach to party politics.
But it still makes my point. DT fosters the idea that anyone but corporate CEOs and their Congressional and SCOTUS hirelings actually have a voice in shaping foreign and domestic policies. Oh, progressive groups can snipe on many social and environmental fronts but in the end, it’s all just more of the same.
“Things witch they consider facts”? Seriously? Fact: Republicans are evil. Fact: Pro-life hates women. Those things sound like facts, not opinions, to you?
How about the poster that says “9/11 was caused by X and Y”, and another poster says “9/11 was caused by neither of those things”. He got Modded for “debating”. In light of that, do you honestly, then, find it appropriate to post such ridiculous drivel in a thread where it can’t even be countered, much less debated?
They’re opinions, and thus unwelcome in the thread. You’re being ridiculous, but only because you agree with what he said.
But the ability to alter one’s perceptions to accept certain moods is a necessary part of the appreciation of art. It is the entire underlying basis of all aesthetic appreciation.
Also, you are saying that the placebo effect is somehow of no value. Psychosomatic doesn’t mean that something isn’t happening. If a massage is meant to relax a person, and it does indeed relax them what does it matter if the metaphor used to do so adheres to the scientific rigor of people who are not involved and whose opinions don’t matter one bit?
Well, with psychic phenomena people like to say, “It’s cold-reading.”, or more specifically, in actuality it’s “warm-reading”, as though that somehow diminishes it. Divination is as much about aligning and sussing out perceptions than anything else. You’ll probably like a crude little heathen dismiss the value of Tarot Cards. But then you might miss the point of Tarot Cards, which are meant to reveal internal perceptions of self. Most Tarot readings I have had, had little to do with the actual future, outside of the ability to suss out things that I was thinking in the background, and bringing them to the foreground. Their ability to predict the future only worked as it regarded their ability to reveal my inclinations.
He’s not right about religion because his views on religion are childish and simplistic. He doesn’t understand the role of religion in history. If you want to talk to an atheist who is unambiguous in his atheism, but understands the historical role of religion, talk to Maeglin. Der Trihs is useless on this topic.
He’s not mentally ill, he has Aspergers, which I think explains a lot of his ideas. People with aspergers in my experience fixate on the most simple answer. Which is often true if one isn’t trying to understand subtle variations. It’s a blocky, boxy, simple way to view reality.
That might seem like an opinion, but it is in fact verifiable.
The Earth was not created in seven days, and there is no archaeological evidence of a flood which covered the whole planet (not to mention that this is obviously impossible).
The majority of Christians, IME, believe those stories are not to be taken literally and that Bible is accurate.
Here’s a link about days not being translated properly in English: The Days of Genesis
The main point is the OP didn’t seem to mind posting facts that could be a cause of debate. DT was posting his own, which I’m sure he believes are factually correct. I see no reason for a moderator to jump in or for one to believe he’s getting special treatment.
I don’t know. Often times I feel like telling him to stop helping- I largely agree with him, but I think he’s so aggressive and confrontational that it’s counterproductive in convincing people who disagree. I often skip his posts if they’re going to be political or religious in nature.
That said, when he’s off of his hot-button topics, he can be quite funny. I enjoyed his take on why sexbots won’t be kicking women out of the bedroom any time soon:
You’re ignoring the rest of my post. It does matter what they believe since I’m talking about interpretation and translation; both of these things make all the difference in the world when it comes to inaccuracy. You’re also ignoring the greater point I brought up.
Well, since you are debating it, I guess you’re right. I was simply using that example as evidence of the opposite, since even the most creative reinterpretation does not actually mean the Bible is factually accurate.
Der Trihs was far from the only person in that thread posting positions they consider clearly true with respect to what is moral, ethical, good, etc. So, yes, I don’t consider him out of line in any way. Perhaps you don’t agree with what he said? Perhaps you think some of what he said was inaccurate? Well, whoop-di-doo. That’s the whole fucking point of the thread.
Sure. That’s the stated purpose of the thread. If you don’t like it, your problem’s with the OP who started that thread and the mods who’ve enforced the prohibition on debate within it, not with Der Trihs.
I don’t agree with everything he said. But, as I said above, his posts in that thread were not in any way anomalous.
Sorry, that’s not what the word fact means. Just because other people are being complete idiots and using the term incorrectly doesn’t make Der Trihs more right.
So what you are saying here is that low evidentiary standards for others validate having low evidentiary standards for Der Trihs?
If your problem’s with the word “fact” in that thread title, take it up with the OP, who gives no indication that the way that thread has played out is in any way not in keeping with their intentions. If your problem’s that Der Trihs is not keeping with the flow of that thread or is getting special treatment, then you need to show that his posting in that thread is anomalous, which it is assuredly not.
