h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Heh..it's easy to stay level-headed when you don't actually have any opinions. Observations are a lot harder to get work up over. (The nihilist's cop-out? wahahahaha)

Okay, I chose something simple (possibly too simple) to make the point, I'll accept that. The difference in approach, however, is valid. Refer to point above about the four minute mile- at least I am attempting to make a rational judgement. Even if the end conclusion is incorrect, at least it is founded on a demostrable process, rather than blind belief.

OK - but what ultimately makes 'the process' better than blind belief? Really? Can we make that assertion? If we claim to be able to, at what point are we all hyprocrites?

>>If Adele does read Hoo's posting and the ones that come after it without yikesing it herself, then I think she will benefit from that.<<
Dear Azahar, I can read (even the backlog!.
Do you have *any* idea how superior you sound?

"OK - but what ultimately makes 'the process' better than blind belief"

The fact that one is actually using the grey goo between one's ears. What's the point otherwise? Simply repeating something you've been told is something a jackdaw can do. *Thinking* is what humans do.

In what way is logic using more neurons than belief? Is that really the yardstick by which we value arguments? How is the intently engaged scientist using more grey stuff than the intently engaged Catholic scholar? One's God is in a petri dish and the other's is in a book. What ultimately is the difference?

Adele,

Blicky mentioned he had considered yikesing one of Hoo's postings to you. I then said that I didn't believe in yikesing postings. I then said that if you didn't yikes that posting yourself and read what came after (most of which was people, including me, supporting you about Hoo's low blow) that this might be benificial to you.

For you to know that other people here were willing to back you up, at least when the argument seemed to be getting a bit out of hand.

I attempted this once before on your behalf (I realize you are not normally here when most of us are due to the time difference) but then you came to the conclusion that I was calling you - oh, can't remember exactly - moronic and unable to be educated? (although I had said no such thing at all)

And now you are saying, after once again I tried to back you up, that I am somehow attempting to sound superior?

Okay, fine. Sorry I tried.

az

ps
I also never said anything at all about you not reading the backlog.

You're right, you were trying to back me up, but the way you expressed it came across as being patronising - as if I wouldn't be able to tolerate him, and would 'yikes' what he said - but that if I could overcome my impulses, then I might 'learn'...
If that's not what you meant, I am sorry for my misunderstanding...

Nyssabird said:

"how can you really prove that science and logic are superior to say, faith and intuition."

For millenia mankind has had available an intuitive and faith-based cure for cholera - prayer. I think we all know how effective that is.

Almost exactly 150 years ago, the epidemiologist John Snow applied science and logic to the problem. In 1848-1849, there were 52,000 deaths from cholera in London. In 1866, after Snow's work, there was another "epidemic", and the death toll was 2,200.

I'd say reducing the death toll by over 95% is a pretty good proof of the superiority of science.



Adele:

"I have said, and mean it, that I will *not* respond to Hoo"

Then I make this appeal to the other, less.... angry posters to this thread.

I have made a number of reasonable and substantive points to Adele. I have done so in an intemperate tone, it is true, but I believe with some justification.

Nevertheless, whether or not you agree with my mode of expression, you may still, possibly, agree my points remain valid. Since Adele has now chosen to ignore anything *I* say specifically, regardless of its validity (the ultimate ad hominem argument, I might add...), may I appeal to anyone else who cares to challenge Adele on some or all of the following points, in the hope she may respond?

1. She has unapologetically lied about abortion rates and population increase rates.
2. She further lied by saying that my figures differ from hers, when in fact they agree to five significant figures.
3. Her risk of breast cancer is non-zero, just like mine, scream though she may.

There are many other points I've made to her that she has ignored, but they're mainly to do with Adele's mode of expression (poor baby-ism, irrelevancies, ignorance) and are not related to the substantive points above.

If anyone thinks that honesty has any value in debate, I invite you to challenge Adele on the points above in your own way.

If not...

Well, I just hope SOMEONE in this thread values honesty in debate.

H.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1035386,00.html

"In what way is logic using more neurons than belief? Is that really the yardstick by which we value arguments? How is the intently engaged scientist using more grey stuff than the intently engaged Catholic scholar? One's God is in a petri dish and the other's is in a book. What ultimately is the difference?"

No difference there, in my eyes. The Catholic scholar is *thinking* he's a *scholar*. He's interesting in exploring his belief and the basis for it. I was comparing blind faith and thought, not religion versus science.

Hoo, even when people are not talking they can be saying a lot.

That you have defeated and disproved almost all of Adeles hastily put assertions is clear, but do you need to defeat her aswell?

Infact what Adele stated in her last post shows a difference that maybe down to using clearer more tempered language or may even be a change in position.

I agree that terminations are not a good alternative to using other forms of contraception and sensible family planning though the right to have them must remain in place.



On the subject of terminology I think it is valid to knock Nerd for his continued use of PBA because as others have stated he used it as a tool to try and prove his ideas. On another thread he tried to say slavery ended hundreds of years ago. Though he was only out by 50 years or so in respect of the US his use of language was once again dilliberately misleading.

"That you have defeated and disproved almost all of Adeles hastily put assertions is clear, but do you need to defeat her aswell?"

I don't regard admitting I was wrong as "defeat". When I'm shown that I'm wrong - and it does happen now and then - I regard it as a valuable lesson learned, and am usually thankful for the experience. However, other people do seem to interpret being shown they're wrong as "defeat", and obviously deal with it in different ways.

What would be nice, what I was aiming for, was some acknowledgement from someone who had lied that they'd been found out and were in some way contrite. As you say, the lack of contrition says as much, if not more than, the original lie, about the quality of the person concerned.

The reason I bang on about it is because in a fast moving conversation it can sometimes be easy for someone to attempt to gloss over things they've said and present themselves as an honest person with an opinion worth listening to. It's obvious that people who use lies to support their side of an argument really, really don't like being reminded of it, to the point where they will resort to the ultimate ad hominem argument of simply ignoring anything a disputant says.

H.

*pictures a contrition booth* Father Hoo..I ask forgiveness...

Hmm..I get the feeling that my ideas would be better off in an epistemology forum. My points really aren't very helpful here because I tend to rattle on philosophical esoterica. It's hard for me to remain on one particular level of abstraction .

Nevertheless...I still maintain that as PBA is terminology used in legislation that we should feel free to use it in converstation. And I think accusing Nerd42 person of using language to pull heart strings, persuade, whatever is a fair bit of that kettle pot blackness thing.

Do you mean a confessional Nyssa?

A read of http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/457581 will show (an admitedly biased) reason why the term 'partial birth abortion' is both dangerous and medically vague.

No..I meant contrition...

so it was a really lame play on words. Going to bed now....

Okay- I'm trying to work and debate at this end

(re: article - yes, definitely biased and poorly argued, but it does imply an important fact - it doesn't matter what term you use, it's essentially useless if it has no working definition, and it must be very frustrating to medical practitioners to be held to laws made by people who obviously have little means of conceptualizing what medical procedures entail.)

Hoo said 'What would be nice, what I was aiming for, was some acknowledgement from someone who had lied that they'd been found out and were in some way contrite. As you say, the lack of contrition says as much, if not more than, the original lie, about the quality of the person concerned.'

I wonder why you keep saying lied. As I see it, Adele may have obtained faulty statistics & misinterpreted them but I don't perceive deliberate intent to deceive. To me, you do seem to be unneccessarily vindictive. But that's just my point of view.

nyssabird-
what country's legislation are you referring to when you said that the term PBA is used in legislation, making it ok to use in conversation? I am not challenging you (although i was not aware it had been thus used), i merely ask because if the country in question is the United States, and if the legislation in question has been enacted or proposed by the current administration, then it only proves my original point (that it is an inherently biased, and non-medical term), because the bush administration and the hard-right in general has taken their "policies" on abortion and women's health directly from rabid anti-abortion "activists"