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What he doesn't understand is that there's a difference between "referencing" something and "talking about" something.
There's nothing wrong with "talking about something", but there is something a bit hypocritical about criticizing someone who uses Wikipedia to gain information as compared to not referencing anything at all.
And I say this as a person who, generally, finds a lot of good stuff in his posts.
I can't speak for what Mircea does or does not understand, even though I do, on occasion, lean toward the latter because I'm not as unbiased as I'd like to be. I can, however, on the basis of my 8 months here, draw an opinion on the quality of someone's responses on this site. Here I've come to observe a great tendency toward gish gallop where quantity is far more important than quality, after all, it's easy to drown out factual errors in white noise.
It's hard to judge something like this without succumbing to an impulse to attribute intentions. I try hard not to do it (and I fail more often than I care to admit) but I just can't help but feel that where there is so much loud white noise and general patting of own's back and singing of one's own praises, many of the inaccuracies are concealed and a lot of the scrutiny and accountability is reduced or removed altogether either by motive of effect. And if it were by motive, not referencing information would seem like a fairly logical step to avoid scrutiny.
There are many religions; there is only One science.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tzaphkiel
"Anything that is not a fact is not reliable. If it were, all faiths in the world would be one faith, not dozens of faiths."
that's like saying if food was reliable there would only be one flavor of food, not dozens of flavors of food.
if music was reliable there would only be one type of music not dozens of types of music.
if books were reliable there would only be one section in the library, not dozens.
and in that one section there would be only one book, not dozens of books.
if learning was reliable there would only be one degree offered at university.
Incorrect. It is a category of what is valid and what is not. It isn't about many things that can be valid or many things that may not be.
You mention food. There are many different kinds of food and whether one prefers one or another is personal preference. Whether it is edible or not is an empirical fact, not preference.
There are many books on many subjects, and what subject one prefers is personal preference. But they are either true or not. preference or belief about what it true, doesn't make it true though one can fiddle the semantics as 'true' for that person, that merely means 'faith' and isn't true in the empirical sense. Of course we are in the 'complex question' area here, where a book may contain a mix of true, false and half true or even metaphorically true. As with any books we have to use our judgement and experience to evaluate books, just as any other claims or arguments. Which is why we have debates and apologetics.
I concede that this is an easy one to get confused about, but I still say that the same thing applies - Fact and personal preference are not the same thing.
Incorrect. It is ab category of what is valid and what is not. It isn't about many things that can be valid or many things that may not be.
You mention food. There are many different kinds of food and whether one prefers one or another is personal preference. Whether it is edible or not is an empirical fact, not preference.
There are many books on many subjects, and what subject one prefers is personal preference. But they are either true or not. preference or belief about what it true, doesn't make it true though one can fiddle the semantics as 'true' for that person, that merely means 'faith' and isn't true in the empirical sense. Of course we are in the 'complex question' area here, where a book may contain a mix of true, false and half true or even metaphorically true. As with any books we have to use our judgement and experience to evaluate books, just as any other claims or arguments. Which is why we have debates and apologetics.
I concede that this is an easy one to get confused about, but I still say that the same thing applies - Fact and personal preference are not the same thing.
A person can have a personal preference and that can be a fact about that one person. Outside of that one person, of course there are facts that are independent of preferences. But we speculate their meaning, their intentions, their implications until we gather more information.
BTW, I am in agreement with you if that was not clear in this post.
I can't speak for what Mircea does or does not understand, even though I do, on occasion, lean toward the latter because I'm not as unbiased as I'd like to be. I can, however, on the basis of my 8 months here, draw an opinion on the quality of someone's responses on this site. Here I've come to observe a great tendency toward gish gallop where quantity is far more important than quality, after all, it's easy to drown out factual errors in white noise.
It's hard to judge something like this without succumbing to an impulse to attribute intentions. I try hard not to do it (and I fail more often than I care to admit) but I just can't help but feel that where there is so much loud white noise and general patting of own's back and singing of one's own praises, many of the inaccuracies are concealed and a lot of the scrutiny and accountability is reduced or removed altogether either by motive of effect. And if it were by motive, not referencing information would seem like a fairly logical step to avoid scrutiny.
I can only say that for the last few pages I haven't seen anything about New Atheism, either explaining it or attacking it; for or against. Has the thread run out of purpose? One explanation is all that is needed.
New atheism is Old atheism with a Voice.
Within atheism you can have all kinds of what old Arach might have called 'sects' like anti -religion or militant/activist atheism. This is atheists who see a need to do more than just disagree with the claims of religion or even to make those disagreements public, but see the grip that religion has on society, and particularly and very powerfully in the US, and want to do something about it.
Not all atheists want to do that. Some are actually against it (Prof. Stavrakopulou is the prime example (1) while there are theists who are on board with us. The 'Nones' (as has been observed) aren't always atheists. Some are irreligious theists. Anti -religion is not in fact limited to atheism, New or Old. It is a campaign against the influence of organised religion, and even Theists can see the need for that initiative.
(1) I do hope that she has rethought her position and realised that we New atheists are fighting for her rights and trying to get rid of the problems that she has complained about - both from established and orthox Theism and sexism.
I can only say that for the last few pages I haven't seen anything about New Atheism, either explaining it or attacking it; for or against. Has the thread run out of purpose? One explanation is all that is needed.
New atheism is Old atheism with a Voice.
Within atheism you can have all kinds of what old Arach might have called 'sects' like anti -religion or militant/activist atheism. This is atheists who see a need to do more than just disagree with the claims of religion or even to make those disagreements public, but see the grip that religion has on society, and particularly and very powerfully in the US, and want to do something about it.
Not all atheists want to do that. Some are actually against it (Prof. Stavrakopulou is the prime example (1) while there are theists who are on board with us. The 'Nones' (as has been observed) aren't always atheists. Some are irreligious theists. Anti -religion is not in fact limited to atheism, New or Old. It is a campaign against the influence of organised religion, and even Theists can see the need for that initiative.
(1) I do hope that she has rethought her position and realised that we New atheists are fighting for her rights and trying to get rid of the problems that she has complained about - both from established and orthox Theism and sexism.
I was thinking New atheism is Old atheism with consequences that are finally felt. The bite.
Incorrect. It is a category of what is valid and what is not. It isn't about many things that can be valid or many things that may not be.
You mention food. There are many different kinds of food and whether one prefers one or another is personal preference. Whether it is edible or not is an empirical fact, not preference.
There are many books on many subjects, and what subject one prefers is personal preference. But they are either true or not. preference or belief about what it true, doesn't make it true though one can fiddle the semantics as 'true' for that person, that merely means 'faith' and isn't true in the empirical sense. Of course we are in the 'complex question' area here, where a book may contain a mix of true, false and half true or even metaphorically true. As with any books we have to use our judgement and experience to evaluate books, just as any other claims or arguments. Which is why we have debates and apologetics.
I concede that this is an easy one to get confused about, but I still say that the same thing applies - Fact and personal preference are not the same thing.
But they are either true or not. preference or belief about what it true, doesn't make it true though one can fiddle the semantics as 'true' for that person, that merely means 'faith' and isn't true in the empirical sense
It seems like you are saying that unless something is a fact that it is not true. That only facts are true. That is a false dichotomy.
To say all personal preference is faith is saying that your preference and taste in food, music, art, poetry, and exercise are "merely faith."
That to me is convoluted. "Your opinions about food are merely faith" "your views on sculpture are merely faith" "your taste in music is merely faith" that sounds very convoluted.
The words "view" "belief" "opinion" "personal preference"
convey something very different than
"merely faith"
and on the spectrum of maturity and development, biting others is a behavior seen in toddlers or young children.
These threads are full of people who have all sorts of different perspectives, opinions, levels of critical thinking, ability to reason and styles of writing, brief and/or long-winded...
Always seems to me that being critical about how someone may or may not write the ideal comment far as they are concerned, directly related to the topic or not, is just more "white noise," but easy enough to tune out if you ask me. Simply distill from these threads what matters most to you, discard the rest and comment accordingly.
What's so hard?
Not like even the best of threads can avoid the same dead end regardless...
Right?
Last edited by LearnMe; 09-18-2019 at 11:17 AM..
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There are many religions; there is only One science.
might have called 'sects' like anti -religion or militant/activist atheism. This is atheists who see a need to do more than just disagree with the claims of religion or even to make those disagreements public, but see the grip that religion has on society, and particularly and very powerfully in the US, and want to do something about it.
