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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   1442 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for May 18, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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What is your favorite candy / little snack?

I wish you didn't ask. I'm fasting.

Why??? This is the time to feast my friend. The fasting just ended. ;D

No one sent that memo to me. :/

I'm ... experimenting. For several reasons.

It's an interesting experience.

Hah I'm going off the Christian calendar. Even if you aren't a Christian, there are deep resonances in religious calendars with the seasons as to why the Lenten fast is when it is, etc etc

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A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

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