Wizard v Carleas: Debates

This thread will be a short debate, between Carleas and I, regarding the nature of debates/arguments/conversations and how they should be formally applied.

My first point will be that a third-party is unnecessary. Any average and decent philosophy forum should apply a “hands-off” approach to formal debating and arguments. Let the challengers and arguers argue as we like. The big problem occurs when a third-party (moderator/administrator/staff) steps-in, interrupts, and mucks things up. It’s like an unnecessary banker stepping in between a farmer and a businessman, wanting to interrupt their trading, and take a piece of the action for himself. Stay, the fuck, out! That’s my position.

Carleas takes the position of the banker. He “wants a piece of the action”. He can’t stand to see two people getting along without him. It’s not enough to provide a forum, a foundation, a framework for philosophy, he becomes greedy. He wants more than “just philosophy”, he wants to abuse his power and manipulate, interlude, stick his nose where it doesn’t belong. If I had a philosophy forum, and I probably should, and probably will, someday in the future, then I would employ a strict “hands off” approach. More libertarian. Allow the better and best voices to speak out. Don’t constrain them. Don’t become desperate for attention. Don’t interrupt them.

Allow minds to flourish. Allow arguments, debates, conversations, to flourish.

Now, I will concede that this is not my forum, and therefore, Carleas retains some degree of control over processes here. Thus he can, and has, interluded, interrupted, waved his hands in the air and said, “look at me! look at me! I am here! you cannot debate or argument without my permission and following my rules!” But who really wants this? Nobody. Most others on this forum will agree with me, just let debaters debate.

That’s why this forum is shit, and why this “debate sub forum” hasn’t been used in years. Because the policies are shit. Because Carleas is a pathetic attention-seeker, micro-manager, and control freak. Too over-shadowing. You hunch over a seed in the garden, yelling at it to grow, but you’re blocking the sunlight. Go away, and it will grow. Deny your urge to be a control freak. Instead, you laid the soil. The seeds are in. Hydrate and water, then walk away.

Let the participants do our thing. Let the seeds sprout and grow. Carleas prevents this. He doesn’t want it to happen.

He wants the “glory” for himself. To the point that he’d rather have a dead and lifeless garden, rather than a flourishing and healthy one.

So here are a few points about how a debate forum ought to work:

  1. Let posters use it, post in the debate forum freely. Take the staff/admin/moderator controls off. Why are they even on, meanwhile, nobody ever uses this sub forum? The answer is simple and obvious. Because nobody wants to deal with the bullshit. That’s why it’s not used, and won’t be used. I just went a step further. Fuck this micro-management. I’m going to get around it, and just offer a debate, which I did yesterday with Joker. Already, within a day, the staff wants to interrupt and shut things down. Is it a wonder or curiosity, the reason why, this debate forum, and even the general forum, are in a shit state? The problem is the staff.

  2. If the staff feels like micro managing everything, being petulant and control freaks, then split the sub forum into “Informal Debates” versus “Formal Debates”. In the formal debate section, Carleas can be a butt hurt school girl, all she wants. In the informal debate section, let users, guests, and posters to use this all we want. Let us make the rules and outlines for our own debates. Less, or no, micro management.

  3. Nobody really uses, or wants, “formal debates” anyway. Evidence? Proof? Look at this forum. Unused in years. Cobwebs. A waste of space. For a few main reasons. The main reason is the butthurt staff, who want to micromanage everything. The second reason is the lack of intelligent and strong willed posters, who have abandoned the forum over time.

  4. A “formal debate” should just outright declare a “judge” of a debate. Let the judge outline rules, processes, and conditions for wins and loss, if there is a demand for it. Differentiate between “open ended” and “closed” debates. There is none of this, on this website, mostly because it is over populated by retards here. But that’s beside the point. There should be a solid, good, experienced, trustworthy “judge” who both contestants of a debate agree upon, or must deal with, when it comes to “formal” debates.

The End. Carleas loses already. Thread closed. I win.

Lock the thread and put this on the top of Debate section as a reminder, for future references.

Again, that is not what the Challenges forum is for. As such, I’ve moved it to help and suggestions, where I’m happy to discuss your suggestion.

Arguments, conversations, and free-form debates happen all over the site. What you’re suggesting is that the only forum where that’s not the case, the forum dedicated to formal, structured debate, should also be moderated in the same way.

But then you don’t want other people involved in your debate, so you do want some intervention. Only certain seeds sprouting and growing, and with moderators enforcing, but silently, those constraints.

The debate forum is intended to be different from the other forums, in that the conversations are structured: the topic is settled, their participants are limited, their topic, posts, and/or post length are constrained, and, if the participants so choose, an arbiter evaluates performance. It’s meant to be a written form of the common oral debate competition, rather than the usual student union/coffee shop/pub chat of the rest of the site.

You can have all the free wheeling conversations you like, you’re just trying to do it in the wrong forum.

So, am I and Wizard allowed to debate or not? Wizard you can always join my forum for an informal debate as well which is certainly an option.

Yeah, of course you can debate, just set some parameters. They don’t have to be particularly constraining, just a defined length. I think Wizard’s opening post in that thread was a great challenge, and I’m happy to unlock it if Wizard is interested in getting an actual formal debate organized.

If not, there’s SG&E or, of course, forums like yours, HaHaHa.

OK.

“No debates are allowed, unless I dictate how they are run”

It’s obvious why the challenge and debate forums are dead, with a “parameter” like this.

Also both my threads were in the “correct” forum. Your attempt to move these threads only proves my point. You can’t withstand a debate, and so have to twist whatever you can, to have your own way.

This thread still belongs in the challenge and debate forum.

Any thread could be a debate, but the problem is that other people may hop in.

It seems to me a fair solution is that any two people (or more) can request that a thread be restricted to them for some period of time or number of posts. Carleas grants this and others are locked out or removed (I don’t know what the process is for restricting threads). If the participants want Carleas to have a role or to have other constraints, then they ask for them and he decides if he is interested.

I can see no good reason for not allowing people to do this.

If they create some monstrosity that Carleas does not want here, well he is still the local deity.
If they do it too often - by whatever criteria Carleas has - well, he can stop setting up the restricted threads for him.

I do not see harm in allowing this, though Carleas perhaps you have some concern I have not thought of.

Why can’t they get their own thread for some limited time or number of posts?

This is exactly how the debate forum works.

:laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: I didn’t realize at first that you had a forum.
Are the thugs holding the guns the philosophers? :wink:

Those are my henchmen and body guards. Every aggressive philosopher needs henchmen and body guards.

When ILP was young, and the young Benjamin who started the site was in charge. :smiley:

He was a bright young chap.

So I don’t understand what the problem is.

Wizard, Carleas, what is your point of disagreement in this thread?