ID/Evolution Discuss

Who do you think won?

  • Carleas
  • Mad Man P
  • Philosophy itself
0 voters

Let’s have discussion of the Inaugural Debate on this thread.

Anyone like to comment on the difference between allowing ads and allowing posts about ID? Is there a “moral” difference?

Of course there is a “moral” difference!

There is a huge difference between “scientific evolution” and “ID theory”, because “ID theory” is a spineless attempt by Moralists to grab power from the domain of science. That is why they call ID a “theory”. I suppose that Christians could call God a “theory” too, but I don’t see how that would help their endeavors.

I see that Christians (of whom are ignorant & indolent) just need to get it through their thick skulls that God has fled from them. If I were Him too, then I wouldn’t want to have anything to do with the pathetic bunch of squabblers. They are weak and dying, desperate for their Father to come back. Well, he’s not. Deal with it. And it shall be dealt with, harshly…

How do you deal with a “thick” skull? Easily, as an amputating doctor, you buy an industrial sized saw (or just say “fuck it” and get a sledge hammer and chisel). Thus, “ID theory” (that sleight of semantics makes me sick… :-& ) needs to keep its “shit” out of “science”. Science is about practicality. It deserves to stay separated from both philosophy & spirituality (religion).

Thank you, thank you, I’ll be here all week folks (i.e. Faust)!..

(jk) :laughing:

:sunglasses:

And to actually answer your question: Yes, “ID theory” should be allowed to buy ad-space on any website (especially ILP), because if their arguments aren’t strong enough to stand on their own grounds, then they’re just throwing their money away (which is happening). They can even drill it into the heads of 100,000,000 infants–in the end, those infants are going to “grow up” and face “reality”. Reality isn’t as merciful as I would be to them (which isn’t very merciful). :-$

Allow the ads, because people need choices, if you keep the choices from them how can they learn?

Science is full of theories that cannot be proven fully. So it is made up of hope faith and belief just as philosphy and religion are. Science cannot prove that superior being does not exist. But, oddly it strives to prove there are other inhabitable planets… I dunno know, but that seems wishy washy to me… its like ; "look there is a planet that could have had life on it or does, but really there is only us, but, see, that planet shows signs of life, but, nothing can be superior to us, but, hey that is a very old planet , older than ours, but we are the only sentient beings in the universe…

its worse than being on a boat during a storm, scientists make you seasick :-&

Some things are just FALSE… they can be PROVEN false, beyond any and all reasonable doubt… such as creation… why on earth should we spread that garbage around? what option should people have? the option of being compleatly wrong? what can they possibly learn from believing something that is demonstrably false?

We’re not talking about a matter of opinion here… that’s like saying “Hitler killed a bunch of jews” is just an opinion… we should allow people to hear about the other side that says Hitler gave jews candy and kissed their babies, then flew away to the north pole to live with santa.

C’mon Kris! you can’t be serious!

I’m all for openmindedness but not to the degree that our brains fall out!

Because if we took all the false out and kept only the true, how could we tell what was false and what was true? People have to know falseness in order to avoid it. Remove it and they can’t know it.

Besides, I kind of think folks here are a little smarter than dumb. I think 9 out of 10 can figure out false from true.

And if it comforts folks to think there is intelligent design and not a whirling dirvish of chaos and uncontrollable things, well geez , man let them have that security, life is hard enough. Why remove any sort of comfort unless you just want the company? Science and religion are not at odds because they have to be, its only because people have different security issues. “Mine is right yours is wrong so I will take your comfort away to punish you for being wrong”… it does not help people to leave them cold and alone, it only hurts them.

Kriswest

This is a philosophy forum… it should have SOME dedication to truth and critical thinking.

off course people are allowed to be dead wrong… and idiotic… but why the hell should we HELP them spread their idiotic views? don’t we have better things to advertise?.. like diapers.

I’m all for allowing creationists to post here and try to convince people on their own… that’s cool…

But taking money from them in order to do it for them? that’s a different story…

That’s like a math teacher telling kids 2+2=7 because someone payed him too… that’s just wrong!

hate to jump in before the debate was over, but this was just too good to pass up…

no, your argument is that you have the power to act in any way you see fit… you prefer to be seen as neutral and that is in your power but it only because you have the power to make the appearance is it even an option… the question of a transcendent “should” is not addressed… you wish to appear neutral and are using your power to appear as such… just because the power isn’t used outright/overtly doesn’t mean the power isn’t there or used…

-Imp

I was a bit surprised to find the AD of Scientology on the top page, the other day.

Why do we have to have ADs, to begin with?

To pay for ILP and keep it running. (I guess.) :-s

Although I disagree with Mad Man’s position, I believe that he “won” the challenge for a very specific reason.

Mad Man pointed out that yes Carleas has biases, but obviously he does not “care” enough about the ads to take concern to them and “ban” them. For example, Mad Man says that some of the ads are blatantly false, propaganda, and most importantly, that they are harmful–he is right. However, Carleas does not ban them, because they are subconsciously “not harmful enough” to warrant his attention. If in fact there were ads promoting Nazism (or hell, Terrorism), then I am 100% confident that Carleas would pay special attention to such a thing. But, he doesn’t pay attention to these ads that Mad Man has claimed are “harmful”.

Because Carleas did not address this point sufficiently, I feel that he has lost the challenge. Since everybody censors things to a degree, then which ads should be allowed? That decision rests on Carleas, yet he has avoided the issue as to why exactly he shouldn’t ban these particular ads. It is not so much about the virtue of free speech, the argument rests on “why shouldn’t Carleas ban these particular ads”. And with the challenge complete, why shouldn’t he ban these ads? It is because he is paid to keep them, which keeps ILP running. This could be seen as another virtue, which has not been touched upon in the challenge…

In the end, because Carleas avoided making the case as to which ads should stay and why (assuming he would allow a pro-Nazism/Terrorist ad if it paid the fee), I see that he has “lost” this one.

(Just my $.02)

“A fool and their money are soon parted” If a person did not read the fine print on a contract does that make the contract null and void? If a person is over 18 and makes a contract then its their right to do so , if they do not check out the complete contract and understand it then it is their fault if they lose. You want to hold people’s hands to keep them from making mistakes. People can’t learn if others direct them. the ad is there and if someone chooses to use it then they have a right to do so. It is not illegal in fact it falls under free speech. If the person wishes to pay to hear someone’s opinion then they have a right to be parted from their money.

Impenitent, You say “appears” a lot, but I think that’s unnecessarily precise. If I actually do my best to be unbiased, it stands to reason that I should appear unbiased. Actually, by specifying, you make it sound like the appearance is the aim, and any actually impartiality is just a happy accident. But, you’d just come right out and say that if that’s what you thought, whouldn’t you? :wink:

Nah, the ads keep the site alive. Right now, proceeds match upkeep costs almost exactly (actually, they’re a little short!).

RealUnoriginal, I think you’re assuming that I would remove ads for Nazims or terrorism. I don’t necessarily have to make that statement. But, ultimately, the ad software that’s in place here filters what shows up, so I don’t think it will ever be an issue. If I am to claim any bias in my choice of what ads run, it is my bias in favor of techonology, which I think can make better decisions in this case than a human could.

-Imp

You’re correct.

Mad Man P then needed a better knowledge of how the ads are placed and how exactly they are chosen to have beaten you in the challenge. His point was the best one though, “you” are biased–it’s undeniable. However, when you default your bias to an algorithm (technology), then you are alleviating your responsibility on a different issue. Perhaps you should find a different way to fund ILP than to apparently allow the spread of misinformation… Though, that would require work. It would then be reasonable to pass on this work if you are not able to undertake it. Then, Mad Man P becomes part of his own argument–would he be willing to spend his time and money to help you find an ulterior method? His values would be expressed and if he were a hypocrite, then you would be the winner…

Anyway, enough with the if-then scenarios…

Your winning doesn’t change the observation that the spread of misinformation is occurring and that we have responsibilities as “intellectual superiors” (if any of us indeed are) to help people garner “better” information that can be accessed. Then again, where do you draw the line as a mentor vs. a babysitter for strangers?

Why make a distinction between seeing and reading minds?

Where’s the poll?

This is a response to Mad Man from the actual debate forum. I put it up here so Faust could close the debate.

I was talking about the rhetorical tactic, not his decision to use a computer to do the dirty work, just so there’s no confusion. The rhetorical tactic is something like, “I’m not wrong, but even if I was wrong I’d still be right.” That tactic can be picked apart.

If we were to agree with you on our own, you would have won the debate before it even started! :slight_smile: Be thorough…not excessive, but throrough.

That’s true, but I think the more important part of that sentence was “explicitly say why either or both was bad.” Carleas thinks it’s false and still puts it up, so you needed to focus on why it was bad to put up intentional or unintentional lies. I still think defering to Nazis or bigoted people is a bad case. I think most black men have a far greater emotional reaction to the ‘N’ word than most theists do when you attack their religion, and that most Jews give the Holocaust a little more weight than a misguided online advertisement. No one is getting persecuted for believing in evolution by this ad; it implies evolutionists are stupid or wrong, but that’s expected in any debate on religion. The evolution/ID debate has been mostly blood-less, and to suggest that it can escalate into something meaner is tricky; you may fall victim to a slippery slope fallacy youself if you’re not careful.

Essentially, I think the ‘badness’ of the ad needed to be dealt with on a lower level. You were on the right track with the obvious but appropriate comments about this being a philosophy forurm. I think you could have appealed to common sense and maybe some type of peer review; why help propagate a clearly falsifiable theory (evolution is wrong) that has nothing more interesting to say than its ID counterparts that don’t try to attack evolution? Criticism is important, but only as far as it takes to accept or reject the assertions of an opponent. Evolutionists have answers to the criticisms in the ad; these responses don’t prove evolution, but it shows that the ad has been acknowledged and is no longer necessary. To talk about it further is a waste of time, and letting it lie around for the uninformed to grab hold of is just going to start the cycle over again.

I suppose I could have gone for the “quality” appeal… you know the “If we advertise anti-evolution we might lower the overall quality of the site and thus attract the wrong sort of people” line of argument.

or perhaps have delved into the tesk of showing the harm of believing evolution to be impossible.

The truble is. I figured I had everything pinned down. The ad was false information, which was granted. It follows that the ad served no other purpose than to misinform people about the status of evolution. Now what possible reason could anyone have for agreeing to advertising false information?

Money.

And that’s what it came down to… Carleas was basically saying that the page needed to make money to survive. From there he went on to say, that since the forum ought to remain philosophically neutral, the best thing to do would be to relegate the responsibility of choosing the ads to an algorithm, so that he would be left out of the process and thus maintain neutrality.

I pointed out that this algorithm was his choice, and that whatever followed from that choice was on him. I denied him the possibility of neutrality, and asked him, in light of that, to justify advertising what he knew to be false information.

I even offered to give him a list of ads, which were not mistaken, that could replace the anti-evolution one and make the page the needed amount of money. Denying him the excuse that the forum needed the ad to support itself.

In my mind it was game over.

But I played a good hand poorly… took too much for granted and didn’t explain myself fully and in enough detail. Nor did I spend much time attacking Carleas’ defense.

It’s a fair judgement… but a poor conclusion.

I made a deal with Carleas before the debate that if I won, the ad would be removed and if he won I’d tolorate it… So now I have to tolorate that garbage… #-o

At any rate…

I would like to thank the judges for their fairness and time.

so… thank you. :smiley:

Hey Mad Man, you were great. Thanks for the debate. I was biting my nails waiting for the decision.

I thought the strongest part of your argument was when you brought it back to money. I thought that was a good tactic, and it had me worried. I don’t know that I responded particularly well to it, either, because my argument was, as Anthem pointed out, slippery slope, i.e. a fallacy.
I think what you should have done more of is to highlight why this ad is significantly different from other ads that might have come in its place. Maybe there’s a difference between saying “evolution can’t be proven” and “jesus didn’t exist”. I don’t see it, but I think you could have made it seem more plausible.
I do also think you got a little over-confident. At some point, I was regretting the judges we chose, but it may have helped me in the end, because you knew you didn’t have to make as strong an argument, and you let it get away from you.

But all in all you were great, and, contrary to Anthem, I liked when you were “over-the-top”, it added a lot of life. :stuck_out_tongue:
Thanks again for debating me; we should do it again once some others get a chance to duke it out.

I’m happy you knew you were doing that :slight_smile:

Well then it’s good for you that you weren’t judging, eh? :wink:

I suppose he did warn us that he was going to be entertaining, but I just didn’t like the smarminess. You know, it’s so hard to convey tone on the internet…maybe I would have liked it more if Mad Man did this in person. If I knew him better I may have had a better feel for his internet tone, but that would also take away from my objectiveness. This is difficult!

I think the lesson is it’s a major consideration for future debates. Having a free-fom judgement is fine, but keep in mind that it allows subjectivity to creep in. It’ll happen anyway, but some type of scorecard may be appropriate for more contentious debates.

Anyway,I think just based on the points made by either side Carleas got this one, so I didn’t feel terrible about voicing my opinion on the style.