Well, I don't know which areas you have expertise in, but whatever it is
suppose you were trying to explain it and then someone kept making
pronouncements about it that showed that he or she did not understand
the field at all and kept denying the validity of your explanations then
how are you going to handle it. As an example let us suppose you have an
expertise in auto mechanics. Suppose you have studied all the manuals on
the subject and perhaps you went to a school that taught you the
subject. Then suppose you started telling someone about what was wrong
with a malfunctioning car right after that person has said things about
the way cars work that you know are untrue. Then suppose that person
started telling you that what you are saying could not be right because
you are leaving out any reference to the gremlins and fairies and elves
that get into the engine and make it stop working because everyone knows
that fairies and other supernatural beings are the only cause of
automobile malfunctioning and if you leave them out then you know
nothing about your field. Then wouldn't you feel just the slightest bit
exasperated?
_________________________________________________________________
Isaac Asimov
“Don't you believe in flying saucers, they ask me? Don't you believe in
telepathy? — in ancient astronauts? — in the Bermuda triangle? — in life after
death?
No, I reply. No, no, no, no, and again no.
One person recently, goaded into desperation by the litany of unrelieved negation, burst
out "Don't you believe in anything?"
Yes", I said. "I believe in evidence. I believe in observation, measurement,
and reasoning, confirmed by independent observers. I'll believe anything, no matter how
wild and ridiculous, if there is evidence for it. The wilder and more ridiculous
something is, however, the firmer and more solid the evidence will have to be.”
― Isaac Asimov
On 11/18/2018 9:38 PM, peter altschul wrote:
My goal when talking with people who disagree with me is to try to explain what I believe and why. Also, to try to det a glimmer about what the other believes and why.
No more, no less. Best, Peter
----- Original Message -----
From: "Roger Loran Bailey" <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> (Redacted sender"rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date sent: Thu, 15 Nov 2018 20:42:22 -0500
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: waging war with words
Miriam, you may call it debating, but, honestly, I rarely consider
myself to be debating. What I am trying to do is to explain things to
people who show that they do not quite understand it. That leads to a
lot of frustration for me when the other person thinks it is some kind
of debate. And it is completely exasperating when I can tell from the
statements made that it is a subject that I know more about than the
other person and then the other person starts lecturing me on it as if I
was the one who does not know what he is talking about. I am engaging
much more in a debate when I am discussing something like religion with
someone like Mostafa.
_________________________________________________________________
Isaac Asimov
"Don't you believe in flying saucers, they ask me? Don't you believe in telepathy? - in ancient astronauts? - in the Bermuda triangle? - in life after death?
No, I reply. No, no, no, no, and again no.
One person recently, goaded into desperation by the litany of unrelieved negation, burst out "Don't you believe in anything?"
Yes", I said. "I believe in evidence. I believe in observation, measurement, and reasoning, confirmed by independent observers. I'll believe anything, no matter how wild and ridiculous, if there is evidence for it. The wilder and more ridiculous something is, however, the firmer and more solid the evidence will have to be."
? Isaac Asimov
On 11/10/2018 5:18 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
I think that probably Sylvie is one of the smartest people I've known. She
handled participation on this list by posting articles and almost never
getting involved in discussions. I suspect that, that's because discussions
on the list don't feel like discussions. They feel like battles. Perhaps
that's just the nature of communicating by email or of any online
communicating. I listen to what the young people on podcasts say about their
twitter communication and it sounds as if they're all in constant daily
battle with opponents, even people who, supposedly, have views similar to
their's. At any rate, it does seem to me that attempting to win arguments by
trying to find statements that are absolutely unquestionable, is futile.
That's partially because there are varying levels of depth and meaning and
often additional facts that we don't know about or have forgotten about,
that can change the entire meaning of a discussion. All of this rambling
from me was caused by Evan's statement about how that one case of cancer,
caused by the Fukushima meltdown, is uncontrovertible. That's undeniable. Of
course, it's the only one that, the individual who wrote about it on
Wikipedia, knew about. So that's what was documented in Wikipedia and that's
what Evan quoted and then what? Does that mean that we had a debate and he
won? Does it mean that no other deaths were caused or that future deaths
related to that nuclear disaster won't take place? And when Roger and Evan
debate something and one of them bests the other with a logical argument,
what does that prove, except that in that instance, that particular
individual did better in the argument? We do all this debating and arguing,
as if what we say has some kind of impact or relationship to the truth. But
we don't have impact. Each of us continues to have our own take on things,
and we certainly don't know what relation to reality, our statements have.
I have one interesting little footnote. When I looked for articles on
Fukushima, the only article I found from the corporate media, was from The
Guardian, which is a British publication. And there was one from a Japanese
paper, I think the Tokyo Times, that I didn't read. Interestingly, there
were no articles from US corporate outlets. To me that says, "news
blackout".
Miriam
