Is this like check and checkmate if you don’t provide one?
I have seen other people in other threads us this word ‘cite’ and now they have requested one from me, but when I gave one they said it was too old or not new enough to warrant an intelligent discussion.
Fair enough so far … I did a search of FAQ’s without finding any explanation of this request. I politely ask the moderator Marley23 for an explanation and he politely gave me one and then another gentleman came forth with an explanation of his own that I have quoted:
It sounds to me likes he’s asking what happens if someone asks you for a cite and you don’t give them [a good] one.
As an example:
If in an argument about public schools I say that public schools have more drug addicted graduates then private schools. Naturally, someone will ask me for a cite. If I don’t provide one, are we done with my argument or can I continue to use it?
Why Mr Quatro is asking, I don’t know, seems it was pretty well explained in his OP.
You can, of course, make any argument you like, using any amount of evidence that you like. But on this board, if your evidence is insufficient, then people won’t take you as seriously. So really, the question is how seriously do you want to be taken, and by whom?
Because it isn’t a board rule, and it’s simply common sense, not just on the SDMB but everywhere, that you should back up your assertions with facts and cites, just like The Credible Hulk.
We don’t have it in our Frequently Asked Questions because the question is not frequently asked. In fact, this is the first time I can recall it coming up. It’s pretty obvious.
It is a constant struggle to perceive what is in front of your nose, and in that sense it isn’t obvious. Nobel Laurette Daniel Kahneman makes a distinction between system 1 and system 2 thinking. System 1 thinking is fast: “…it’s intuitive, associative, metaphorical, automatic, impressionistic, and it can’t be switched off.” I suspect it’s the source of most ideology and perception about the world.
System 2 is slow, lazy and tires easily. “To set it going now, ask yourself the question “What is 13 x 27?”” Most of us believe we are system 2, but actually we are system 1. System 2 is “…a supporting character who believes herself to be the lead actor and often has little idea of what’s going on.”
What we do on this board is System 2. Unsubstantiated assertions are worthless, no matter how firmly you believe them. We don’t know the poster’s track record, and furthermore most of us know that we don’t track our own record of predictions particularly well. So to evaluate a position we need to examine the logic of the argument and the supporting evidence for the key contentions. You don’t need a citation that the sky is blue.
So I will respectfully disagree with Colibri. A FAQ on rhetoric, valid argumentation, and the science of persuasion would be extremely useful. It is not on this board because the underlying material is not yet understood, though it has been studied methodically since before the days of Socrates. Admittedly somebody could summarize the state of current knowledge on the subject, but I don’t know anyone with that level of intelligence and expertise.
There is a pernicious idea that’s widespread in US society. It is that since everybody has a right to their own opinion, all opinions have an underlying equality to them. No. Some claims about the world simply match the world better than others. And the application of training, hard work and the experience of humanity will produce far better results on average than non-expert judgment. It’s not that the public is inferior: I’m saying that all of us have our areas of expertise and ignorance and that the wise learn to distinguish the two. Populists and demagogues are pretty much defined by their contempt for that distinction.
I didn’t say it might not be useful, just that the question isn’t frequently (in fact rarely if ever) asked. But even if we had one, I doubt that many people would read it, particularly those who are most in need of such instruction. Instead, what we offer is learning by experience through participation on the board. (Admittedly, there are many here, including some regular posters, who haven’t picked up the hang of it yet.;))
We frankly have too many FAQs already, and they don’t get read, so adding another that doesn’t come up often, well, it seems counter-productive. While I don’t disagree that a set of FAQ on “rhetoric, valid argumentation, and the science of persuasion” would be useful for many people, a quick Google-search yields many sites that already contain such info.
In fact, this is the first time I can recall it coming up. It’s pretty obvious.
