Yes, but you were using M-W as your sole point of contention regarding typos. All I did was point out that other dictionaries do have qualifications. In a debate, one shouldn’t make statements that are based on a single source without checking to see if other sources disagree.
Would cosmosdan count? He was on the boards as recently as yesterday. I have to admit I hadn’t realized lekatt had bailed some months ago when I mentioned him earlier.
He left well over a year ago (in November 2004), which means between then and now you’ve paid at least one annual membership fee. Doesn’t this suggest you find the board has some merit after all?
Well, no, but I’m hoping it’ll sink in eventually.
I’m not saying that you were a sufficient cause of bannings, merely that you desired them, celebrated them, and in whatever rule-abiding ways you could facilitated them.
As for “others,” we seem to agree that “paranormal” discussions are dead in GD, and that’s good enough for me.
Right, the board is full of dicks. Glad we got that straight. I think there is a general principle that boards eventually get a hardened core of angry invalidators that drive other types of people away, and SDMB seems to have entered that state. I’m not hopeful about the future.
You may not like me, but I’m not a “dick” in the same sense as you and others are. I generally have rooted for and defended the underdog here and have been openly against the banning policy (which eventually turned into what I recommended–suspension–not that I was a major influencer; it was really just a no-brainer better policy after all).
Then you lack insight. It has only been the New Agers–the people most likely to provide a challenge to skeptics–that have been driven off. The reaon is pretty clear: New Agers actually believe in the importance of science and attempt to prove their beliefs in terms of it. Relgious people just have “faith.” You can’t abide the idea of NDEs proving the Afterlife or experiments proving psi, and you will mock, deride, invalidate, and use whatever social pressure you can to get us off the board.
But the upshot is that you can’t fight ignorance on that topic if you don’t have opponents. The smart strategy was polite tolerance of us to use us as an example, but you didn’t have the discipline.
In any case, we all know that the “fighting ignorance” thing was just bullshit that served the social system, anyway.
So, ostracism really is the best approach in your view?
The point here is that your jokes lacked the power to convince people that they were funny.
Well, I suppose it could be. Or perhaps its just that by and large New Age and Paranormal claims are easily ripped to shreds because there IS no evidence…aside from anecdotal…and so anyone who isn’t a wide eyed believer is not going to by into it without some rather substantial proofs. Nah…couldn’t be that, right? 
Show me some evidence that New Agers are banned because they are New Agers…or because of their beliefs. Same with suspensions. I don’t even buy off on beaten into silence, as most of them are pretty well immune to logic or science and continue to spout their thread bare theories long after they SHOULD have been beaten into silence. I’ve never heard of anyone on THIS board being banned or suspended though because of their belief in the paranormal. Feel free to expand on that thought though if you know of someone who has.
This board is about fighting ignorance (and it really is taking longer than they thought 
), and its dedicated to the scientific method (by and large). So of COURSE being a good skeptic is essential if you want to survive here…at least in GD and GQ. There are plenty of folks who aren’t atheists though (including me…I’m more a fence sitting agnostic type myself).
Horseshit. Its about backing up your claims with some kind of proof. Pure and simple. Show some reasonable (and anecdote free) evidence and you will win folks over. Make wide eyed claims without anything more to back it up than eye witness accounts and…you won’t do so well here. Simple as that.
Seriously, there are tons of boards out there where your New Age beliefs will be swallowed whole and eagerly anticipating the next spoonful…why would you choose THIS board if you have a minority complex?
Leaving me aside for a moment, the standards of evidence generally used and accepted on this board are far from arbitrary. Occam’s Razor, Scientific Method, etc…that kind of stuff. Its not arbitrary at all. Unlike the other side of the coin generally represented by the New Agers who want belief and faith without proof or based on anecdote and eye witness accounts but with nothing else to back it up at all.
No doubt. The fact I didn’t take it all that seriously probably helped a bit as well.
-XT
And neither are dictionaries arbiters in deciding complex questions such as this. My point in citing M-W was simply to show you that your ad hoc definition wasn’t the whole story. You were the one confidently proclaiming on the matter.
Further, there was the larger point of what kind of error, at base, you’re/your is. It’s a very common one; you were implying that it indicated some special grade of stupidity. You turned a snark on your part into a pretty worthless debate on typoness.
I recognize his name but don’t know his philosophy.
Keep in mind that my claim is not that New Agers have been banned or suspended, but that all have either met that fate or silenced on the topic of the “paranormal.”
I do. I can get computer help in GQ and it’s worth every penny of the subscription fee. I will keep reupping forever for that reason alone.
Even if that were the case, there still remains the black mark on your side of how we have been treated and how we’ve ended up and how your side has thoroghly enjoyed the negativity along the way. Pure glee and gloating describe the mood accurately, I believe. Actually, if our beliefs were really so easy to trash, I should think it had been easy for you to be gentile and clean about it.
They’re not. What happens is that the mob–a very skillful bunch of button-pushers–purposely whips them into a frenzy and they end up flaming out. A pretty standard social practice on Internet boards. And of course the mods here are mostly atheists and skeptics themselves and have participated in the Pittings and whatnot.
Well, you said it yourself: Such people should be mocked and ostracized.
I don’t see what “survival” really has to do with fighting ignorance. And what does “fighting ignorance” mean to you, anyway? Apparently it means to most of the skeptics here seeing ignorance as an incurable illness that must be quarantined. That is, you don’t enlighten New Agers, you make them go away.
We win people over all the time with just such evidence. Guess what? The “believer” contingent is ever so much stronger in the world than the Bitter Atheist Club. You’ve got most respected scientists on your team and you still can’t make headway.
No, the simple thing is that being a New Ager here equal being politically incorrect. You would treat the most educated, eloquent, and cite-steeped scholar (e.g., Dean Radin) the same as you would me or lekatt or SnakeSpirit–which is to say, with no respect or courtesy whatsoever.
I don’t. I gave up talking about paranormal topics, have posted much less on the board, and generally just use it as a useful tool now and then.
Strawman bullshit. You know about the Gansfeld experiments, etc. etc., but will always return to the same “no evidence” crap. It’s tiring shit like this that has made us give up. It’s not a debate, it’s an invalidation algorithm that convinces no one but your own sad little coterie.
Would that facilitation include reporting people to mods? It’s the only accusation I might have a chance of disproving, since I can’t prove I didn’t desire something and there have been occasions when I’ve posted a “good riddance!” or two after someone I disliked got banned. I don’t recall doing so in SnakeSpirit’s case. In fact, I expressed regret that his banning had led to all his threads getting locked, because I looked forward to kicking him around some more.
So, you’re not going to name specific people? I expected as much.
I don’t see you taking any steps to head off this allegedly impending doom. You’re not an effective ambassador of your philosophy, what with ad hominem attacks in GD (which I’ve not reported, but easily could). When your membership is up for renewal, will you pay or simply depart?
You have no idea what I can’t abide. I’d love some good evidence of the afterlife and psi and whatnot. So far, though, the more plausible explanations of hallucinations, wishful thinking and outright fraud have not been convincingly eliminated. And what ‘social pressure’ do you think I’m applying? Mod reports? A whispering campaign of libel conducted by e-mail? Give examples, if you can.
Hey, I have over 13000 posts, of which at most 1% are in threads largely or partly about paranormal topics. If all the New-Age types were to vanish, I rather doubt I’d run out of things to discuss on this board. Star Trek alone could take up the slack and not even notice.
As for lack of discipline, please supply examples. I know I’ve gotten a warning or two in GD, but not recently.
“Social system” ? This is a message board, not a commune.
This board is for discussion. If you don’t like how your favourite topic is being discussed, then perhaps you should move on. I won’t stop you, but I’m not kicking anyone out, either. You’re an adult, I assume. If you decide the level of criticism is too harsh, you should leave. The board should be tolerant, but I don’t want to see it engaging in spoon-feeding or hand-holding of posters who find the environment too rough for their delicate sensibilities.
I don’t think you can convince people that something is funny. A joke can be explained if at first it seems too obscure, but ultimately the laugh has to be spontaneous to be real, doesn’t it? This is certainly an odd subject to be analyzing. You didn’t find something funny? Okay, that’s a matter of personal taste. Is there something I’m missing?
Well, let’s see. You cited this: “an error (as of spelling) in typed or typeset material”. Now, you seem to be interpreting that as “an error in typed or typeset material”; this is clearly a bad definition; I might claim that any factual error is a typo, as long as I typed it (“Sorry, professor - when I claimed in my paper that Shakespeare was an axe murderer, it was a typo! You can’t punish me for that!”) Clearly, what is meant is “an error (as of spelling)” - the parenthetical is essential to the meaning of the definition; it’s not merely explanatory. The trouble is that “you’re” for “your” is hardly an “error as of spelling” (much less a wrong key press, as per the other definitions) - substituting one word for another is not a spelling error nor particularly comparable, as you yourself agreed, when you decided that “Dumbass” for “Aeschines” couldn’t reasonably be considered a typo.
Now let’s investigate your implication that all Bush voters have IQs at or below 70. There were more than 50 million of them; indeed, they constituted more than half of the voters. Clearly, it could not be the case that they all have IQs at or below 70. IQ scores are defined so as to form a normal curve; IQ 70 is two standard deviations below the mean, as IQ results are curved to a mean of 100 and a standard deviation of 15. But for Bush voters to fall at or below IQ 70, they could only form 2.27% of the population by the very definition of IQ. Since far more than 2.27% of the population voted for Bush, it’s plainly false that Bush voters’ IQs all fall at or below 70.
You play fast and loose with the facts; since you’ve presented yourself as a martyr for the cause of the “New Age”, does your lack of concern for simple factual correctness represent a common trait of “New Agers”? For their own sake, I should hope the rest of them have higher regard for the truth than you do. Your loose approach to fact in this thread has cast your previous arguments into even further disrepute.
This is particularly ironic, as you’ve dismissed all those who disagree with you as being either part of some mysterious cabal of right-wingers (I was particularly surprised to learn I was one of those!) or “skeptics” (a term you use - incomprehensibly - as a pejorative.) You’ve thus defined those who disagree with you as having specific sets of beliefs - and then dismissed them for having those beliefs. Not only do you, then, eminently meet your own definition of “dick”, but you’ve also illegitimately decided that people only dislike you because of their beliefs.
You, Aeschines, are therefore a hypocrite.
How do you reconcile this:
with this:
Did something happen to change your view in those critical 34 minutes?
So it’s just Great Debates which is sinking or has sunk into the abyss? Have other forums been affected? In the interest of accuracy, I suggest you not say “board” when you really mean specific forums.
And actually, there are plenty of computer-specific boards which are completely free, but if you want to pay and complain, go ahead.
Facilitation meaning participating in mocking and general contumely that has whipped people into a frenzy and gotten them banned or suspended.
Right, the “kicking people around” is what I’m talking about.
I don’t know what the point is here. Do you deny that discussions of the paranormal have been virutaly eliminated? And is there any problem with the categories banned/suspended/silenced covering all New Agers, past and present, as they clearly aren’t discussing their views?
You really have this thing about the rules and reporting things to mods. It’s an interesting facet of your personality.
You are correct that I am not a good ambassador of my philosophy on these boards. I think that’s another reason New Agers don’t stick around: You get sucked into the Dark Side.
Renew for the use of GQ from time to time.
The general “being a dick” to New Agers who have posted here, just like every skeptic here except SentientMeat.If all the New-Age types were to vanish, I rather doubt I’d run out of things to discuss on this board. Star Trek alone could take up the slack and not even notice.
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Yeah, but Cafe and MPSIMS are differernt boards, really. I came here originally for GD and philosophical debate, but the atheist-skeptic contingent now so dominates there that there really is no life. Only political debate.
I mean, it was actually in your best interest to treat New Agers nicely so that you could continue to have people to debate with on that topic.
C’mon, you really can’t be that ignorant.
Right, well, in general people don’t like being mocked when they try to debate, so indeed New Agers have moved on.
I think basic adult courtesy would be nice, but, frankly, you rarely see that anywhere on the Web, so the SDMB, for all its pretensions, is just average in that regard.
C’mon man, this is such superficial shit. All New Agers have been banned, suspended, or silenced. One of the three!
Doesn’t the 1:41 statement essentially say that you’re not claiming the New-Agers have been banned or suspended, but really they have, except the ones who were silenced? It contains its own contradiction.
In any case, you can help clarify the matter by naming “all” the New Agers and which of the three fates each has been subjected to. You can start with yourself, since you’ve clearly not been banned or suspended, you must have been silenced. Please cite specifically what is forcing you into silence.
Whatever, man. Semantics aside, the you’re/your there/their/they’re it’s/its type of mistake is made because the words sound the same and somehow (brain fart, whatever) you type the wrong word. Whether the word “typo” encompasses such an error is, I daresay, a matter of opinion for both social (usage of the word is not so definite as to include it or exclude it unambiguously, and probably no argument about it exists in academia, as it does concerning the split infinitive, etc.), and scientific (is typing the wrong word in this instance really the same type of brain mistake as simply trying to hit the right key and missing?) reasons.
Frankly, it’s a dumb debate.
That’s true, but you’re putting an awful lot of work to refute what was, after all, a simple snark.
I don’t consider myself a martyr at all. As for playing fast and loose with the facts, again, you have refuted a joke.
I hope for your sake you are engaging in satire of some type.
You dumbass. I never called you a right-winger. I said that those on the list were either one or another. Aren’t you an atheist?
Basically, yeah.
I have been a hypocrite on these boards many times in that I engage in vitriolic debate with people when I should instead be contributing love and positivity to the world.
GD and GQ are the heart of the board. GQ has been affected somewhat by PTP, GD has just generally sunk.
GQ is also useful for other questions now and then.
Doesn’t fuckin’ matter man, I said what I meant and I see no disagreement on your part that New Agers past and present fit one of the three categories.
Do we disagree? If not, then such a list has no purpose. If you do disagree, then all you have to do is produce a single counterexample.
Simple–arguing about paranormal matters on SDMB is tiresome, unpleasant, and fruitless.
Sure, people make dumb wrong-word mistakes all the time. The point is that it’s not a “typo”, even per the definition of the word that you cited. You claimed over and over that it was; I don’t think typing “you’re” for “your” is a terrible mistake, though in context it was quite amusing. Either way, you don’t seem to hold much of a regard for specific fact.
Also, I’d like a cite for your claim that “split infinitives” are some sort of topic of academic debate. As a linguist, I would imagine that linguistics would be the field that would discuss such issues - but there is no debate in linguistics at all, as the linguistic facts are quite clear: English does not have an infinitive verb form as some languages do, and “to” is a particle that often but not always precedes verbs in the plain form used in infinitival clauses. Nothing is being split whatsoever; further, the very concept of the “split infinitive” comes from a silly misapplication of Latin grammar to English. It’s simply false to claim that there is some sort of “debate” about the topic, at least in the area of linguistics - while there are unsettled discussions in syntax, this certainly does not represent one of them.
I have pointed out your being repeatedly careless with factual claims; it was not a lot of work at all, as I’ve had basic statistics courses and I understand how the normal curve works. I wouldn’t call my knowledge of statistics thorough - rather, this is a very elementary question.
Let’s call it educated snark. Watching your continual disregard for reality is something I find quite amusing, probably because I’m mildly drunk.
You started out with the “right-winger” claim. Others earlier in the thread pointed out that I didn’t fit the definition, before you decided that the ranks of your persecuters included more than just “right-wingers”.
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Aren’t you an atheist?
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Let’s say agnostic. I can’t say for sure that God doesn’t exist; the fact that it’s existence can’t (by definition) fall into the realm of evidence makes the question more or less irrelevant to me, as I don’t think we have tools that can find a meaningful answer. As to general spiritual beliefs, I’m far more flexible; I’ve had experiences that strike me as supernatural, but I am not certain that they were real in any sense, since it’s well-known that simple brain phenomena can account for “spiritual” experiences. I don’t know if they were real or just an artifact of the chunk of meat inside my skull; therefore I remain open to the question of the supernatural.
No. You have been a hypocrite precisely in that you have condemned others as “dicks” for behavior that you yourself manifest frequently, and in this very thread no less.
Dammit, BBCode is even harder for me when I’m inebriated. I beg the forgiveness of my readers.