[PsychoLandlord]

After my initial foray into Gen Disc, I realized that the level of thought put into debates on this forum are is in a league above most places on the internet and many areas of real life. At the very least, many members of the community appear to be vastly more knowledgeable than anyone I'm accustomed to interacting with, so much so that many conversations I have attempted to contribute to quickly run away into realms of which I have little to no understanding. As such, I have simply fallen out of such conversations, though, if I have been directly addressed I make an effort to respond to said address. Therefore, in the event that any of my posts in Gen Disc fall under the guidelines stated above, I apologize. 

[Droid803]

Closed captioning of this drive by post is brought to you by Droid803.

[BlueFlames]

Closed captioning of this drive by post is brought to you by Droid803.

The dubbed version was better!

* BlueFlames casually drives off.

[Nuclear1]

You're riding the line for someone we're already showing zero tolerance for.

[newman]

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Seriously though Battuta, you're fighting windmills. Internet discussions are much easier to walk away from than real life ones. Experience so far has shown participants in said discussions as being extremely unlikely to change their opinions even in the face of overwhelming counter-arguments. A person will just walk away from a discussion for a multitude of reasons, including:

a) person A's opinions are consistently being proven wrong by person B armed with substantiated facts, which is annoying so rather than go through the uncomfortable process of adjusting it's views according to reality the person A just leaves - as I will just point out this isn't the worst thing person A can do;

b) person A's opinions are consistently being proven wrong but that person decides to just ignore all the facts and continue to post the same thing in a variety of very similar ways, sometimes in multiple threads. Person B decides it has better things to do with it's life and leaves to prevent an aneurism;

c) person A belongs to the unemployed unwashed masses group and can't afford the internet, and has to wait until the court restriction of accessing the public library expires before they can access free wi-fi again;

d) person A does not believe in rationality;

e) person A is 12;

f) Snuffleupagii related reasons,

etc.

It prevents good discourse and is annoying, but at best this thread is going to curb that a bit for a short while.

[BlueFlames]

You're riding the line for someone we're already showing zero tolerance for.

Then in the interest of not being banned, I present to you DATA!



Do not question the origins or methods of this study!  They were gathered by means of SCIENCE(!) which is far beyond the comprehension of such mere mortals as yourself!

[Kosh]

[jr2]

Do not question the origins or methods of this study!  They were gathered by means of SCIENCE(!) which is far beyond the comprehension of such mere mortals as yourself!

Of course it is!  It's on Wikipedia and the first few Google^TM links that I found...

[JCDNWarrior]

Internet discussions are harder to do right, for me at least. It's much easier to articulate what I mean to say, and especially express better that I don't mean to suggest I know it all   Also being able to sit down, listen and respond makes for much better discussion than responses coming in sometimes hours later. Then there's the language barrier for some as well (For me, occasionally).

Nonetheless I hope I am not guilty of drive-by posting of course. I haven't spotted a lot of bad posting on the forums as well, most of the time enlightening or another way to look at things, so I'll definitely continue to lurk and look at what's being said and mentioned, trying to add to it when I feel it's neccesary.

Well then, let's continue our debates and conversations

[Sushi]

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Seriously though Battuta, you're fighting windmills. Internet discussions are much easier to walk away from than real life ones. Experience so far has shown participants in said discussions as being extremely unlikely to change their opinions even in the face of overwhelming counter-arguments. A person will just walk away from a discussion for a multitude of reasons, including:

a) person A's opinions are consistently being proven wrong by person B armed with substantiated facts, which is annoying so rather than go through the uncomfortable process of adjusting it's views according to reality the person A just leaves - as I will just point out this isn't the worst thing person A can do;

b) person A's opinions are consistently being proven wrong but that person decides to just ignore all the facts and continue to post the same thing in a variety of very similar ways, sometimes in multiple threads. Person B decides it has better things to do with it's life and leaves to prevent an aneurism;

c) person A belongs to the unemployed unwashed masses group and can't afford the internet, and has to wait until the court restriction of accessing the public library expires before they can access free wi-fi again;

d) person A does not believe in rationality;

e) person A is 12;

f) Snuffleupagii related reasons,

etc.

It prevents good discourse and is annoying, but at best this thread is going to curb that a bit for a short while.

g) Person A wants to contribute their to the discussion, but lacks the time/energy to thoroughly back up their opinion after they have said their piece.

[jr2]

Also.. if a topic hits upon many (5+) people's interest, and you have all of them responding, demanding that you "prove" your point and explaining their reasoning in extra-long posts with multiple points and opinions (and personal insults), and every time you try to address a part of what they said, all of them jump down your throat... well, there's really not much point in continuing the conversation.  In fact, if you even get one such person is online most of the time and 'debating' you, there's really not much point.  Every time you try to address a point, you have to read pages of information, not all of which relate.

EDIT: Yeah, pretty much what Sushi said.

[General Battuta]

Also.. if a topic hits upon many (5+) people's interest, and you have all of them responding, demanding that you "prove" your point and explaining their reasoning in extra-long posts with multiple points and opinions (and personal insults), and every time you try to address a part of what they said, all of them jump down your throat... well, there's really not much point in continuing the conversation.  In fact, if you even get one such person is online most of the time and 'debating' you, there's really not much point.  Every time you try to address a point, you have to read pages of information, not all of which relate.

EDIT: Yeah, pretty much what Sushi said.

Then have the grace to acknowledge their contribution and tell them you don't have time to reply. Don't continue to drop your own (or, worse, copypastes of someone else's) arguments in without bothering to take their responses into account.

[jr2]

Well, I figure if they are really looking for facts to base opinions from, if I drop enough hints they will find out where they need to go or at least what they need to look for to see where I'm coming from.

Even when I disagree with someone I can usually still choose to see things from their perspective just so I sort of know how they think and I find that interesting and sometimes useful in understanding them.

But it seems like people here when they are debating want a wrestling match.  They want to be knocked to the ground until they tap out with 'evidence'.

Here's a novel idea: if we both get down on our hands and knees, we can look together at the evidence laying around and draw conclusions.  We can share what we learn and what we think about what we learn with each other.  We will probably not agree but at least we will have more information and an understanding of how the other thinks.  Of course you want to convince the other person and you'll never give up trying, but you're ok with the fact that you see things differently, at least for now.  And you hope someday they'll come around to your point of view, while you keep an open mind just in case you might need a little adjustment of opinion yourself.  Who knows, maybe a third person will come along and show you both the missing part of the puzzle.

[General Battuta]

That's a wonderful idea; why are you not interested in participating in it?

You need to extend the same respect to others that you ask of yourselves. If you want to share what you learn, you need to respect other's right to share with you.

If you made an argument that two and two was five you would need to be corrected. Sometimes you just have to learn things you don't know.

[Mika]

What would then be an acceptable time delay for posting after the first contribution?

[jr2]

Yes.  But not bludgeoned with it.  There is a difference between explaining your opinion and shouting down the other person and calling their intelligence into question.  Just because someone doesn't come around to your point of view doesn't mean they aren't listening.  Indeed, if someone comes to your point of view instantly, then they probably either had no clue that your point of view existed or they are very easily swayed and influenced by others' opinion.

EDIT:

What would then be an acceptable time delay for posting after the first contribution?

lol.  Welcome to the internet.  The whole beauty of  a forum as a means of communication is that you don't necessarily have to post back soon.  It's all there for you to re-read.  As long as you don't have two or three entire pages about your post mixed in with five other pages about different things.  Then it gets a little hard.

[General Battuta]

That's not the issue here - the issue is disregarding other people's contributions and carrying on with your own.

If you have the time to contribute something to the thread, you have the time to read what people have said to you and, at the least, acknowledge it.

[Mika]

lol.  Welcome to the internet.  The whole beauty of  a forum as a means of communication is that you don't necessarily have to post back soon.  It's all there for you to re-read.  As long as you don't have two or three entire pages about your post mixed in with five other pages about different things.  Then it gets a little hard.

Exactly. I occasionally have time to contribute, occasionally I don't. When I don't and posted earlier in an interesting thread before, I find out three or four days later that there are four more pages in the thread, and that the thread itself has evolved to something completely different. When a topic is changed in a real life discussion, I don't try to pull it back to where it was and behave that way in the internet too. Hence my question: what is an acceptable time limit for re-railing a thread?

[IronBeer]

More often than not, whenever a discussion arises on this forum (not necessarily just GenDisc), whatever point I felt like making has already been very aptly argued by somebody else. While frustrating, I try to be gracious and simply NOT POST if I don't have anything insightful or unique to add to a conversation. More than anything, that's a testament to the quality of users on this site- not at all a bad thing.

[Grizzly]

That's not the issue here - the issue is disregarding other people's contributions and carrying on with your own.

If you have the time to contribute something to the thread, you have the time to read what people have said to you and, at the least, acknowledge it.

Considering that you ocassionally drop so much information into a thread that one can devote his entire life towards studying them, I can see that some people might find trouble replying. It takes people out of the discussion in a rather nasty way.