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PaperclipPerfector  9mo ago (text post)   2765 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for July 28, 2023

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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Just adding your weekly reminder that the Motte remains the brightest and best hope for open discourse on the internet. Be proud and relieved you are a Mottizen - we have made it to the shining City on the Hill, the one place online where truth and free speech are protected.

I'm doing all this grandstanding because I'm flabbergasted that right now Tildes, one of the other 'reddit-alternatives' that claims to stand for open and intellectual discourse, is actively and unapologetically censoring anything to do with the UAP hearings.

Many of the users there are rightly pointing out that it's insane that the moderators would block discussion about a literal Congressional hearing... but this is the doublethink that we Mottizens are up against:

Hypothesizing that aliens might well exist based on the vastness of our universe is not a harmful thing.

Believing in conspiracy theories based on zero credible evidence is incredibly harmful. This hearing centers around a man with absolutely zero evidence claiming that there is an arm (or arms) of the government operating above congressional and presidential oversight. The claim is that we are dealing with a massive, top-level coverup. Does that sound familiar to anyone else? Anyone want to quess which Qrowd is qoing to eat this shit up?

Giving these conspiracy theories a platform on a forum where discussion is purported to be high quality and based on intellectual curiosity is harmful. Have you ever noticed how people who believe in one conspiracy theory are more likely to believe in multiple conspiracy theories? Worse, they are even likely to believe all conspiracy theories, even those which are completely contradictory to each other.. This is called conspiracist ideation, or conspiracy theory monism.

Anyone who hasn't been under a rock for the last 8-ish years knows how harmful this can be. They helped elect a president who built our current supreme court. Check out /r/qanoncasualties if you forgot how it harms us on a more individual level. You could also go back further than Q anon and read accounts of witch trials, rapes, genocides, wars, and all manner of horrible things caused by false beliefs in conspiracy. Not to mention the countless deaths caused by vaccine avoidance - something that started long ago, but with which we are still dealing today.

Politicians having a hearing about this conspiracy theory is news, unfortunately. However, the conspiracy theory itself is not the news. Congresswoman Lauren Boebert openly discussed Replacement Theory, should we give that its own thread and discuss its merits?

The only posts we should have regarding this topic, in my semi-humble opinion, are well-written articles absolutely tearing our politicians apart for even humoring this hearing. Perhaps a good debunking article explaining that this whole testimony is based on hearsay and rumor, and explaining that someone's position in government doesn't mean they're immune to conspiratorial thinking.

Again, luckily there is some actual pushback on the site itself. But please, my fellow Mottizens, let this open display of intolerance remind you to keep your guard strong. Keep your eyes focused directly on the goal, and remember that if we let ourselves be distracted by our petty differences, the Motte may well become the same censored cesspool as the rest of the internet.

Be strong my brothers and sisters, and never forget the incredible and unique nature of this Forum that we have built. Don't take the Motte for granted, and be swift and sure when defending it.

Veritas omnia vincet.

Well, here comes the new version of the Inquisition, hunting out heretics. For goodness' sakes, if you don't believe in aliens, being able to thrash it out in discussion about actual freakin' Congressional hearings is the best thing you can do. Shutting all that down because "ooh it sounds like a conspiracy and that means the Qanon crowd and we must not indulge in Wrong Think" is terrible.

I had a look at the posts on tildes you linked and I'm flabbergasted myself. Maybe this is because I spent most of my time on forums which made themselves egregiously offensive on purpose in order to drive away people incapable of rising above those base responses, maybe it's just all the Nietzsche I've been reading... but the posters there seem absolutely pathetic and, despite their pretensions, utterly incapable of holding interesting conversations or opinions.

When you're so terrified of giving oxygen to the wrong kind of people or views that you demand the janitors sweep these horrifying, low-status opinions away because even seeing them causes you significant distress, you are fundamentally incapable of participating in a serious discussion on the topic. I might not agree with the neonazis, feminists, neocons or anarchosyndicalists but I have no problem reading their takes or views (I actually find engaging with beliefs I do not hold myself to be fun!) - if their arguments are bad I get to laugh at them, and if they're good then I get to have fun engaging with them seriously. But either way I actually understand their position and what they're arguing about. Without an understanding of what your opponents actually believe, how can you possibly talk intelligently about the issues that motivate them, let alone claim to have the correct position on an issue when you only understand one side's arguments?

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I find it funny because previously (pre-2016) conspiracies seemed to be primarily a left-wing thing (usually plots by Big-INSERT-INDUSTRY-HERE or the surveillance agencies), with some libertarian types thrown in. Seems that as the left has become the establishment, they've turned away from the theories, and as the right has lost establishment status, they've gone further into them.

"Actually big pharma is our friend." Not to be a terminal contrarian, but my favorite features of the left have eroded away recently. To the degree that they were selectively skeptical, they've lost it. Bah humbug.

Eh, I guess it could've gone in the CW thread but I was trying to make it more light hearted. I suppose it ended up being a bit more culture warry than I intended.

But honestly I'm still flabbergasted that "Qanon was a conspiracy theory ---> anything that is a conspiracy theory is right-wing nonsense" is still a live argument on the left.

And yeah dude, I would go so far as to say it is the main argument I see on the left. It has only gained steam in the last few years.

Believing in conspiracy theories based on zero credible evidence is incredibly harmful.

Somehow I doubt they'd be saying the same thing about Russiagate, a conspiracy theory based on zero credible evidence. But putting that to one side, this makes discussion pointless:

"My sources are credible, your sources are not credible. Voila, someone debunk this clown. No, the clown doesn't get to talk back."

Somehow I doubt they'd be saying the same thing about Russiagate, a conspiracy theory based on zero credible evidence. But putting that to one side, this makes discussion pointless:

Even the Durham report admits that there was credible evidence for Russiagate (namely that Donald Trump asked* Russia to hack and leak Hilary Clinton's e-mails, that Russia did in fact hack and leak John Podesta's e-mails, and that there was circumstantial evidence that the Trump campaign worked with the GRU and Wikileaks to maximise the political impact of the leaks). The core claim of the Durham report is that there was insufficient evidence that Donald Trump committed a crime** to justify the amount of resources devoted to the investigation.

* I am aware that Trump's supporters on this site say he was obviously joking. The GRU didn't take it as a joke, so I don't.

** Signal-boosting true-but-illegaly-obtained information is of course 1st-amendment protected. This just means that it isn't a crime, not that we can't take it into account when assessing the patriotism, integrity, professionalism, or lack of all of the above, of Donald Trump.

core claim of the Durham report

There was a lot of other stuff in the Durham report! https://www.cbsnews.com/news/john-durham-report-released-special-counsel-fbi-trump-russia-investigation/

The special counsel's examination also revealed senior FBI personnel "displayed a serious lack of analytical rigor toward the information they received, especially information received from politically affiliated persons and entities."

"Neither U.S. law enforcement nor the Intelligence Community appears to have possessed any actual evidence of collusion in their holdings at the commencement of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation," the special counsel found.

Strzok, Durham wrote, "at a minimum had pronounced hostile feelings toward Trump," and the investigation was opened "without ever having spoken to the person who provided the information" claiming there was collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.

"The speed and manner in which the FBI opened and investigated Crossfire Hurricane during the presidential election season based on raw, unanalyzed, and uncorroborated intelligence also reflected a noticeable departure from how it approached prior matters involving possible attempted foreign election interference plans aimed at the Clinton campaign," the report states.

Come on, Russiagate is completely and totally dead. That they then put a 'oh we don't find the FBI to have a political bias' on at the end doesn't revive Russiagate, it's just face-saving.

there was circumstantial evidence that the Trump campaign worked with the GRU and Wikileaks to maximise the political impact of the leaks)

Not really.

The core claim of the Durham report is that there was insufficient evidence that Donald Trump committed a crime

Or really any of the people that they started investigating. It's very good that they eventually found some actually bad stuff like tax/bank fraud by people, but that had nothing to do with what they set out to do and what they allowed the public to believe about Trump for years on end. One would hope that they'd do a better job of finding tax/bank fraud without going on a massive fishing expedition on basically zero predication for partisan political purposes.

Aren't you happy we have this place? :)

I don’t agree with censorship, but the dude isn’t exactly wrong in what he’s saying either. The hearings are based on nothing solid, nothing but one person, and that person essentially overhearing rumors of weird programs in the hall. There isn’t anything here to see, in my view, and quite a lot that hinges on things we have no evidence of. In fact, the people who should be interested, the physics professors, the astrophysicists, the xenobiologists and just plain ordinary biologists are not interested at all.

It is a conspiracy theory, and one based in fantasies that almost everyone here desperately wants to be true. We want the warp drive, we want Spock or Worf Or Chewy. But there isn’t real evidence. We haven’t found anything that points to life. It could well be out there, there could be an alien out there looking in our direction, but without proof, without evidence of a ship, a space station, or some planet out there with its own version of starlink, it’s just fantasy. These UAPs are angels for people who are not religious.

I’ll strongly agree that we should allow rigorous debate. I don’t want censorship here or anywhere else, it bad for truth detection. But I’m finding myself rather surprised at the rate with which nerds are willing to toss rationality over the side of the boat the minute they want something to be true badly enough. People (not all of them here) willing to hand wave known physics, or the complete lack of evidence in deep space, or the complete disinterest of subject matter expert’s because they just want it to be true.

The hearings are based on nothing solid, nothing but one person, and that person essentially overhearing rumors of weird programs in the hall.

But that's precisely why they should be discussed and debunked, if possible. If you shut everything down, then what is left is "The Congressional hearing is a serious investigation and they are taking this seriously so that means it is really true aliens exist and we have evidence they visited Earth" going around credulous people. Isn't that way more harmful?

I said we should allow debate. I would very much prefer that there’s a factual debate. My thinking is that when talking about something like that, it should require that the people debating should have to cite sources. It’s not that complicated, things where a conspiracy is claimed need to cite reputable sources to back up the claim. That’s the entire thing— I do take the idea of aliens fairly seriously, which is why I’m being very careful to not make claims that are not backed up by either known physics or physical evidence. That, to me, is part of taking it seriously. I feel the same way about the claims of election fraud in 2020 — it’s a very important debate which is why you have to look at the evidence and not just go with what you want.

The reason I think for contentious and serious topics a rule like “cite your sources” would be a good idea (and again I’m not for banning any topic, or any argument) is that it keeps the debate to facts and not opinions or supposition or cherry-picking of sources. If not, the debate itself becomes a mess of claims many of which will turn out to be dubious or fraudulent or opinion pieces.

I don’t agree with censorship

Then you've conceded the entire point, and nothing else you wrote is relevant to the conversation. No one cares what the dude thinks and says about the hearings, in fact conspiracists duking it out with anti-conspiracists is part of the fun. It's the censorship that's the problem.

It’s relevant in the sense that without the toolkit of critical thinking and a devotion to following the truth wherever it actually leads is dangerous. And I do in that sense agree with at least acknowledging the issues with conspiracies especially for people without the skills or the base knowledge to actually investigate these sorts of ideas. Qanon took off precisely because it was discussed by people with few reasoning skills in an atmosphere where those beliefs went unchallenged. This place has an above average record on both points. And I think were I in charge of a debate on these issues, I’d insist on effort-posting and citations of claims of facts. This would at least keep the debate fairly honest.

It’s relevant in the sense that without the toolkit of critical thinking and a devotion to following the truth wherever it actually leads is dangerous.

Lots of things are dangerous, and people are free to point out the danger all they want. Personally I find your self-appointment as a critical thinker devoted to following the truth wherever it leads to be dangerous. The only issue OP had here was the censorship, so I still don't see how pointing at the danger of the censored idea is supposed to be relevant.

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