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ephemera  never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake  1yr ago (ryandv.substack.com)   Edited 29d ago   2356 thread views

Explorations in Identity and Media

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What is the black mirror?

Your cell-phone, the name being coined by the TV/streaming series of the same name. Modern phones are literally black mirrors, which makes the metaphor all the more piquant.

What do you mean by digital vampires?

My interpretation: vampires avoid mirrors; people who avoid the black mirror, who don't participate in phone culture, might be argued to be less real than those subsumed by it, given how central phone culture and the net generally are to current existence. Think of the Amish. Are they "real"? Are they significant, do their concerns matter? Do you care about them at all? Do they have even the slightest impact on your life?

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

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."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


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