What id like is... for those "applying science to their claims" to be civil about it (Sarkus for example).!!!
Does the moderator list need updating?
- Thread starter Magical Realist
- Start date
What id like is... for those "applying science to their claims" to be civil about it (Sarkus for example).!!!
sculptor
Valued Senior Member
Thank you!
And what I'd like is for those promoting the woo to not display their contempt - by ignoring, or trying circumvent, the conventions of science - in the first place.
But I doubt that'll happen.
When someone talks b*llocks there should not only be no surprise when the response is open sarcasm or whatever but also no condemnation of those doing so.
Or perhaps you'd manage to be politely credulous if someone walked up to you in real life and claimed that they actually had 3 hands and were 27 feet tall.
Assertions with no evidence that contradict known facts (or invent their own "facts") deserve zero respect and those promoting them deserve none either.
Unless you're positing that such posters are mentally ill and should be treated as if they weren't rational socially-adjusted adults (i.e. they don't fall under any "normal" rules of personal interaction).
Magical Realist
Valued Senior Member
What would the eternally vigilant guardians of science do all day if they weren't defending it from the threat of moving chairs and tiny orbs floating around in graveyards? Such an impregnable fortress! Why this fanatical overdefensiveness I wonder?
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Oh look!
Yet another comment based on a twisted perspective.
The civil discussions in the fringe areas are interestin an informational... the rip-em to shreds/grind-em to dust approach gets old quick an is not a benifit to anyone includin Sciforums.!!!
As it stands... the best recourse is to completely ignore those unwillin to be civil.!!!
Ah.
We should put all the cranks on ignore?
Okey doke.
What happens when they don't learn but hang around promoting more crap?
Magical Realist
Valued Senior Member
sculptor
Valued Senior Member
It's the effect of a lifetime of dealing with f*cking idiots.
I thank any learnin is more likely to occur from civil discussion.!!!
Magical Realist
Valued Senior Member
I agree! I think a lot of science cheerleaders treat the paranormal so harshly because they don't want it to gain any respectability as an explorable field. Besides, it's so much easier to disparage something in a sarcastic curmudgeonly manner rather than critique it from an objective standpoint.
Bells
Staff member
Exactly!
How is that club where you denigrated, abused, insulted others and then went on to lie and slander others going? Still going strong, I see? And from what I can see, some of you still haven't learned from the moderator who prevented you all from being reported to the owners of this site.cluelusshusbund said:
When members deliberately ignore science, fabricate and post things that are clearly unreal in the process, then a certain level of derision will usually ensue when they repeatedly fail to support their argument with any evidence and ignore scientific evidence that clearly disproves them and their extraordinary claims. Certainly, a lot of leeway is given in the 'Fringe' forums, however only up to a point. Posters who make claims have to be able to back them up. This would be the same in any debate or discussion format. Relying or using the 'it's the woo forum, so it shouldn't matter' argument is not the best way to go about it.
Civility dictates that one supports one's claims.
Apart from carefully sidestepping my actual point i.e. that the cranks, when ignored, tend to carry on anyway. you're also not addressing my previous point: that by posting crankery on a science forum, essentially asking to be taken seriously scientifically but continually ignoring (or, see MR's posts above, denigrating the scientific view [sup]1[/sup]) the cranks are the ones that are being uncivil.
In a similar argument, on a different forum I used this analogy: what they're doing is turning up at a performance of Othello and demanding "respect" while skateboarding round the auditorium. (Or vice versa, it still holds).
Please explain why someone should be treated to a "civil discussion" when they can't be bothered to extend that courtesy [sup]2[/sup] in the first place?
Regardless of the language/ terminology used the ATTITUDE is uncivil.
1 Which is ridiculous since they're basically looking for scientific acceptance.
2 Or consider that they personally are excluded from any convention to be civil.
Yeah, the point you're missing here - which is the one you miss every time - is that the "paranormal" will gain scientific respectability ONLY by agreeing to, and working by, the rules of science.
If you're not looking for scientific respectability then bugger off to the type of forum that will accord you the respectability you're looking for.
Everything in science that has become "respectable" has done so by subjecting itself - time and time again - to the rules, and accompanying harsh citicisms, that pertain to science.
Yup, when zero evidence is provided for the claims [sup]1[/sup] then we can't address that evidence. Thus: curmudgeonly sarcasm helps pass the time while we wait (usually in vain) for some clue or other to strike the crank.
1 Cranks also have a habit of ignoring what actually constitutes evidence from a scientific perspective.
Asking posters on the fringe sections to back up their claims scientifically is ridiculous.
You know why they can't. It's because it's all nonsense.
How are you supposed to prove nonsense?
Either have a fringe section, or don't, but please don't be hypocrites.
You know why they can't. It's because it's all nonsense.
How are you supposed to prove nonsense?
Either have a fringe section, or don't, but please don't be hypocrites.
So essentially the fringe forums are there purely for people to troll?
Since they can't provide evidence, and we're not expected to ask for it, there's no genuine reason for those forums.
Any "hypocrisy" appears on both sides: their claims to have it and ours in asking for it [sup]1[/sup].
I wonder which is greater?
Your view is noted however: I shall refrain as much as possible from bothering to look at those sections [sup]2[/sup] given that it's now established that they don't expect to be taken seriously and aren't (despite MR's comments above) asking to be respected (and are therefore being duplicitous in posting on a science forum in the first place).
And I agree: remove the woo sections. Let the cranks go elsewhere for "validation".
1 Or did you mean the mods/ admins for allowing such sub-sections in the first place?
2 Presumably you're of the opinion that there's no value whatsoever in pointing that bullsh*t actually IS bullsh*t for the benefit of any lurkers/ casual readers/ the uninformed?
We want them to prove that their beliefs have some scientific merit.
They can't do that because they don't require scientific proof for their beliefs.
For example. Evidence that ghosts exist.
1. People have talked to ghosts.
2. People have felt the presence of ghosts.
3. Sounds recorded on tape sound like voices.
That is the evidence they are willing to accept,
because it is belief not science.