Please use this thread for alerting admins to moderation issues and for discussion or complaints arising from particular decisions.
The Skeptical Zone
"I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible that you may be mistaken."
Please use this thread for alerting admins to moderation issues and for discussion or complaints arising from particular decisions.
FWIW, I don’t think banning is necessary. In my yahoo group, I’ve used “progressive discipline.” Couple of warnings, time-outs/suspensions, stuff like that. That’ll generally do it. People will either comply or split.
Waste Purification. Great name for a blog.
Yeah, I’ve seen that too, but I don’t think even that would be appropriate here. I feel the thing that makes TSZ unique is that it doesn’t have any locks on the doors of the patients’ rooms (or the building itself for that matter). So the lunatics roam the halls freely. And yeah…they scribble crap all over the walls, usually in crayon and Sharpie, but occasionally in their own excrement. No one’s obligated to read that crap, or interact with anyone roaming here for that matter. And no one has any real responsibility to scrub the crap off the walls either. Sure it’s a little Arkham-eque, but since the doors aren’t locked, you can always go away for a bit whenever you feel your sanity slipping…
That’s a good point, but as Neil remarks (rightly), Usenet worked okay only as long as it was mostly populated by university students – intelligent people. It’s not good in itself to curate one’s own experience; it takes intelligence to do it. Scum curating itself will still be scum and will find a way to affect others.
KN forms a club by himself here, something I at first chose to interact with. Nearly everybody else belongs to the two more populated clubs: (1) ID-ists barking the UD doctrine and (2) the rest of the membership barking back at them. The founders of this site form the core of the last club.
Instead of specific individuals, I find the tone occasionally annoying here. It’s a barking tone. This tone is native to UD, but this site was founded specifically to interact with the material of UD, so the founders and admins here themselves have the barking tone – the tone over at UD has dictated the manner in which these topics are discussed overall. And by now the tone affects basically everybody. Those who can’t cope with it must leave.
Worse still: When someone new joins, he is forced to pick a camp, and when it’s not the camp of the founders, then the general club here – including the admins – give him the treatment of the UD camp, no nuances allowed. Only KN seems to be able to escape this treatment.
Without barking and provoking, i.e. trolling, hardly anyone gets even heard here. That’s why KN’s most interesting posts generate little discussion – inasmuch as his posts lack the prevalent tone, the posts cannot be responded to in the prevalent tone, so they feel quite misplaced and get glossed over.
Erik,
Actually, some of the longest running, most popular threads here have been started by KN.
walto,
More often than by Mung?
We’ll see when/if KN can pull it off next time.
This probably should have been aimed at me. And yeah, I agree with this, but I submit that it’s because the site has no locks on the patients’ doors. I don’t think KN’s topics would garner the same level of discussion of the site did not allow the level of noise it currently does.
I’m pretty sure we should continue as we have been and let people vent here as they have been.
Richardthughes,
Obviously. Nobody has any better ideas, so that’s exactly what we’ll do.
Well, I’ll agree that nobody has proposed any better ideas, so that’s exactly what we’ll do for now.
And I assume, given your earlier comment, that this is what you meant.
Erik,
For my part, it’s because I have next to nothing to offer on the subject of philosophy. Science, yes, a tiny amount of bewilderment at certain metaphysical positions yes, but in the general case, not so much.
It is both a strength and a weakness that the site allows fairly unfettered rein to the trollish. It’s fun to allow the trollish to expose their idiocies, but a problem might be that one hopes lurkers look at their rantings through the lens of an education. That may not be the case. The imaginary watchers may be revelling at every doltish hit that the likes of phoodoo and Joe appear to score. They think like them.
Fortunately, I have always viewed this as a mere leisure activity …
DNA_Jock,
Indeed, I’m sure Lizzie would welcome any positive and helpful suggestions regarding how to improve the signal-to-noise ratio here. Her initial central aim in founding this blog, I believe was to encourage and enable communication and, if not agreement, at least better understanding across widely diverging views. I think she has been pretty successful, overall. With renewed input from her, TSZ could be again.
What I’ve noticed over time is once-regular commenters become less regular and there seems to be almost no influx of new members. I wonder if this is inevitable as the influence of the “Intelligent Design” movement continues to wane and the ID movement was previously a very popular topic of discussion. Or maybe it’s a generational thing. The blog medium is being superseded perhaps. Dunno.
Alan Fox,
Agreed. I view TSZ as a experiment in open communication, which is still ongoing. There are clearly flaws, but that’s a part of the learnings from the ongoing experiment.
To offer a substantive, snark-free response to Erik’s concern re tone, I reference the well-known observation that everyone has a “tact” filter.
For normal people, this “tact” filter acts on the person’s transmissions.
For nerds, the “tact” filter acts on their reception.
This causes no problems with like-to-like communication.
Normo-speak
Nerd-speak
Nobody is offended.
The problem with Nerd-to-normo communciation: there is no tact filter present in the communication channel:
More problematic, perhaps, is normo-to-nerd communication, where there are two tact filters in series in the communication channel:
There’s a lot of nerds around here. Normos may find this disconcerting.
Jock, I see what you mean, but find it strange that you use the word “nerd” there. The connotation must be a bit different in these parts.
On the subject of philosophy, are you disinterested or just unacquainted with the material?
There’s a series of books that I keep waiting on their release but their publication keeps getting delayed, so I keep putting off starting an OP. Call it an abbreviated version of Copleston.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_History_of_Philosophy_(Copleston)
DNA_Jock,
[Tries a little introspection. Thinks ‘Nah!’]
…
That’s the stupidest thing I ever heard!
Mung,
Not very good at it, and find it rapidly becomes impenetrable when people reel off a slew of authors. I have read and enjoyed John Hospers’ Introduction to Philosophical Analysis, and the occasional SEP article, but that’s pretty much it.
Yeah, there are so many concepts that depend on other concepts and your average joe is not acquainted with the history or the dependencies of the concepts. Abstract and concrete. Universal and particular. Act and potency. It’s hard to know where to begin, or once begun, to be aware of the potential quagmire.
I love to learn. That probably doesn’t come out so much in my posts here. 🙂
Assuming you have some time on your hands now, I could start a thread on:
Causation
Compositional Evolution
Evidence For Evolution
Which do you think would garner the most attention? Which would most interest you?
It’s the goal of understanding the root causes of our disagreements that most appeals to me about Lizzie’s experiment here. Personally, I would very much like to better understand why theists believe what they do, not only without evidence but often in the face of evidence. Unfortunately, we haven’t yet reached that point.
The root of the problem does seem to be that intelligent design creationism is now moribund at best. Uncommon Descent isn’t even pretending that IDC is scientific any more. Dembski has concluded that he can’t fleece the rubes with additional books on the topic. BIO-Complexity is a joke “journal”. All we see here are uninformed anti-evolution screeds, indistinguishable from the arguments long refuted by the Talk Origins FAQ.
The Skeptical Zone needs a broader raison d’etre.
Here’s one from my backyard:
Should we start a separate thread?
Nice.
Regarding those with a tendency to religious belief, I appear to be a deaf person trying to appreciate music. Just don’t get it.
But with Trump in charge, what happens now? Are decisions going to be made on reasonable arguments now. Or are the leader’s whims just going to emerge as tweets?
In the spirit of rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic, what about a page for exchanging recipes?
It doesn’t appear that you’re missing a sense, but you might be missing an addiction.
Mung,
I find compositional evolution the most interesting, but also hardest to sensibly keep on track when certain parties don’t even get the basics of simple mutational evolution. But it is a vital component of properly understanding sex IMO, which just doesn’t work within the so-called neo-Darwinian framework. Attempts to make it do so, or the expectation that it ought, have been wrong-footing biology since the 1970’s. That’s the real topic that interests me. I have some ideas that I’ve been chewing on for a decade or more.
I believe I have inadvertently blocked (ignore commenter) Robin. Can that be un-done?
sean s.
Go to Dashboard/Ignore comments
Restore commenter
No, with Robin it’s only one-way. That works best.
Actually, hit “The Skeptical Zone” on the top left, then “Dashboard,” then “Ignore Comments,” and anyone on “ignore” for you should show up with a button next to it to restore commenter.
Glen Davidson
GlenDavidson,
Done. Thanks. Pilot error + rookie mistake. TGIF.
sean s.
I’ll keep that in mind should I ever actually get around to creating such an OP. I’ll try to make it more broad than just the book itself to cover the evolution of sex itself and the impact of sex on evolution itself. That’s a nice idea.
kudos to the moderators for demonstrating that sucking at Lizzie’s teat may not be the best way to move this site forward. At some point, there’s just no more milk there.
Why not take another step without waiting for mother’s blessing?
For one thing, Lizzie still pays the bills. There’s nothing to prevent anyone setting up their own site and software. I’m all for experimenting.
Leaving aside your vulgarity, do you have any constructive suggestions? If I had your checkered history here I’d be very careful about recommending more censorship.
I’ve made a number of good suggestions. Perhaps now that you’re no longer “waiting for Elizabeth” you could take them under advisement.
I wouldn’t be the first person you’ve driven from the site with your heavy-handedness.
Please list them for consideration. Perhaps Lizzie will appreciate them.
I can be accused of many things, but heavy handedness in moderation is not one of them. Would you care to explain what you’re talking about?
Yes, I agree. Calling someone “fucking retarded” is against the rules. But if someone simply must speak that way to another member here, there’s even a special thread where they are permitted to do so without moderation censure.
People who can’t avail themselves of what is offered are in willful disregard to the rules and probably need something more than a simple tickle to get their attention.
Is it possible to restrict a person to being able to comment in Noyau for some length of time?
I added a line to my comment, that began with “####”.
It showed up converted to an h3 tagged line (header).
If that is due to “markdown”, then count me as not liking markdown.
Patrick you are not an authority and you don’t get to make bald declarations like that
LoL! What religious beliefs has science refuted? Show your work
That is your opinion and it is wrong. BTW mere evolution is NOT being debated. There aren’t any papers on bl;ind watchmaker evolution producing ATP synthase. So please stop with your equivocations. And no, I did not start with the conclusion atp synthase was designed. Obviously you have other issues.
But please do tell us how we can test the claim that atp synthase arose via natural selection and drift- I dare you to try
LoL! That paper gives lip-service to “evolution” and never says anything about natural selection. And using Judge Jones’ criteria that means it does NOT support your position.
As I said earlier-> your equivocation is duly noted.
Dang Patrick! Somehow I totally missed your deer pic from December 1. Really nice shot! Kudos!
LoL! Darwin’s isn’t a scientific theory as it is untestable. And no one has ever linked to any modern scientific theory of evolution. Why is that, Alan?
BTW if the theory is vague it isn’t scientific.
So to recap my claim of there isn’t a scientific theory of evolution stands, unrefuted as no one has linked to the actual theory. Alan’s false claims are duly noted.
The Markdown plugin has been disabled for some time. What you describe is, however, Markdown. I’ll poke around over lunch.
Thanks, same to you!
The beasties are a bit of a pest where I live. There are several in my back yard every morning. I like seeing them, but my youngest had Lyme disease a couple of years ago so they’re not without their disadvantages.
Patrick,
I thought skeptics didn’t believe in Lyme disease.
There might be some automatic markdown that is built into the WP software.
Yes, quite so I’m afraid (on all your points). I live in a suburban area, so we don’t get them in our backyard that frequently, but the buck above was shot in my backyard. Oddly, did not care about me walking up within about 30 feet and shooting that pic.
But mammals are not my main focus (to use a turn of phrase…) Here’s what I mostly shoot:
Nice! Do you have a website?
No. I just post some of my photos on Facebook from time-to-time. Mostly it’s just a personal hobby and opportunity to try new techniques. Quite honestly, I really don’t think most of my pics are “audience worthy”.
ETA: To elaborate a bit on that, I tend to see most of my photos having decent technical composition, while lacking emotional quality. My wife refers to most of my photos as “specimen shots”. That’s not, per se, an insult; it’s a characterization of the fact that I focus on “subjects” rather than “situations”. I’m trying to work on shooting more situational shots and thus capturing something more ephemeral than simply a “nice shot” of a butterfly.
Here’s one of my favorite shots. Technically speaking, it’s just ok; I could have done more with the light and the depth of field to get a better shot. But, it was one of the first times I caught some real action; an essence of the Blue actually being alive. Nevermind that this was a fairly tough shot too; this is a male Eastern-tailed Blue and it’s only about a quarter of inch across and I wasn’t using a macro lens. Those “boulders” he’s standing on…those are grains of sand.