Spearthrower wrote:

Willing to do what?

To make this happen - this being 'be kinder and more tolerant of each other'

How?

BY sharing your own experiences.... with others who will not judge etc.

You got it. Asking for kindness, tolerance, nonjudgemental.

Spearthrower wrote:
He's not asking us anything other than whether we're willing to share our experiences.

That and what you identified above - mutual kindly tolerance of woo.

Spearthrower wrote:... a further invitation to like-minded people to join in some kindly tolerant people who will agree that whatever you imagined happened is real.

Spot on that. It was all there in the OP.

But agreeing that "whatever you imagine happened is real" is not what ratskep is about, is it? That isn't scepticism and it is absurd to come to a sceptical community with talk of woo and a request for no scepticism.

GrahamH wrote:

Spearthrower wrote:With such low numbers of members, we really don't need more guard dogs barking at strangers. People have bad ideas, but surely that's why we'd want them to come here, to engage those bad ideas and increase skepticism and reasonable thinking about issues. Not keep everyone away who happens to believe in some woo?

Which is it? Do you want more people with "bad ideas" to come and be welcomed with acceptance of those "woo" ideas or do you want to meet them with challenge and scepticism?

I can see why Spearthrower is becoming increasingly frustrated with you, Graham. Are you deliberately attempting to misrepresent? or has your comprehension really become so poor now? It is obvious what is being said here: you welcome people, irrespective of their ideas, then you proceed to dismantle their bad ideas, even whilst being welcoming to them, as people. Even if the OP is asking for acceptance of bad ideas, it is clearly evident that Spearthrower is not.

Spearthrower wrote:With such low numbers of members, we really don't need more guard dogs barking at strangers. People have bad ideas, but surely that's why we'd want them to come here, to engage those bad ideas and increase skepticism and reasonable thinking about issues. Not keep everyone away who happens to believe in some woo?

Maybe so, but I don't expect anyone is bringing their woo here because they're looking for a way out, and we can't retrace the steps they took to find their way in. That's probably the only way for them to find their way out, and all the skepticism in the world applied to the end product doesn't try very hard to figure out how they took the steps they did. They wanted to take each step of that journey or they wouldn't have done so. The alternative is to discover they were forced into it. Unfortunately, even kindly skepticism is all too often taken as contempt. All woo has in common believing stuff with no better reason than that one wants to believe it, and any believer who admits that gets much kinder treatment from me than they might otherwise.

NoemaNovel wrote:Have you ever experienced something you couldn’t explain, or had a dream that disturbed you because it felt so real? Have you ever tried to explain this to anyone only to be told that you have “an over-active imagination”?

Why would I try to explain it to anyone else, especially if I understood (falsely or otherwise) that reality is what is going on in my mind and not necessarily in anyone else's? I'd have to believe that I can bring someone else into my reality, which is a bit of a paradox if I believe that my reality is just in my mind and his reality is in his. At that level, what's the point of talking to anyone about anything, especially if other people are just figments of my personal reality?

NoemaNovel wrote:Are you willing to help make this happen by sharing your own experiences of your reality with others who will not judge or criticise it but will accept it on its own terms?

Um, yeah. "Its own terms" are not out there beyond someone's personal reality, are they? This is my guess as to why Hermit decided the OP was unmitigated drivel. It's all there in the OP, contradicting itself in layer upon layer of bullshit. In the case of NoemaNovel, you gotta watch out for that first step; it's a doooooooooozy {Groundhog Day).

Hearing about someone else's experience under those circumstances is about giving them a voice. You don't need a voice if you just spend all day talking to yourself and the other folks talking about their experiences that are just figments of your reality.

Cito di Pense wrote:

NoemaNovel wrote:Are you willing to help make this happen by sharing your own experiences of your reality with others who will not judge or criticise it but will accept it on its own terms?

Um, yeah. "Its own terms" are not out there beyond someone's personal reality, are they? This is my guess as to why Hermit decided the OP was unmitigated drivel.

My objections are more basic than that. NoemaNovel's thesis, if you can call it that, breaks here:

NoemaNovel wrote:Since everyone perceives everything in their mind, “reality” can only ever be what our minds make it, so that what seems real to us is real.

His last nine words simply do not follow from the first 17. The "since ... so ..." is an unadulterated non sequitur.

A couple of posters have suggested he might have meant something like "what seems real to us is real to us". Perhaps, but what of it if he did? Try "What seems red to me is red to me". Wonderful, fine and all that, but where, I ask myself the rhetorical question, can I go from there?

Sure, NoemaNovel also exhorts us to "be kinder and more tolerant to one another" and to not judge or criticise someone's "reality" but accept it on its own terms. The problem with those exhortations is that neither have any connection with a discussion of the topic, Reality and the mind unless one accepts and adopts hippy-style thinking.

These are the reasons why I regard the OP as unmitigated nonsense.

Hermit wrote:

Cito di Pense wrote:

NoemaNovel wrote:Are you willing to help make this happen by sharing your own experiences of your reality with others who will not judge or criticise it but will accept it on its own terms?

Um, yeah. "Its own terms" are not out there beyond someone's personal reality, are they? This is my guess as to why Hermit decided the OP was unmitigated drivel.

My objections are more basic than that. NoemaNovel's thesis, if you can call it that, breaks here:

NoemaNovel wrote:Since everyone perceives everything in their mind, “reality” can only ever be what our minds make it, so that what seems real to us is real.

His last nine words simply do not follow from the first 17. The "since ... so ..." is an unadulterated non sequitur.

A couple of posters have suggested he might have meant something like "what seems real to us is real to us". Perhaps, but what of it if he did? Try "What seems red to me is red to me". Wonderful, fine and all that, but where, I ask myself the rhetorical question, can I go from there?

Sure, NoemaNovel also exhorts us to "be kinder and more tolerant to one another" and to not judge or criticise someone's "reality" but accept it on its own terms. The problem with those exhortations is that neither have any connection with a discussion of the topic, Reality and the mind unless one accepts and adopts hippy-style thinking.

These are the reasons why I regard the OP as unmitigated nonsense.

This is all well and good. But I do believe that it was your dismissiveness towards the individual, as opposed to your issues with what was written, that was objected to.

GrahamH wrote:
You got it. Asking for kindness, tolerance, nonjudgemental.

I think I get what NoemaNovel is trying to say.

I must admit that reality is not what we perceive it, so the phrasing “reality” can only ever be what our minds make it is misleading. Our perception of reality is a reflection of whatever reality is.

I'm going by the adage that understanding might lead to kindness, tolerance and being nonjudgemental.


edit spelling

Destroyer wrote: do believe that it was your dismissiveness towards the individual, as opposed to your issues with what was written, that was objected to.

Well, that's tone policing, for ya.

What you report are your feelings about what was written by Hermit about what was written by the OP. If you can follow that, thanks for sharing your fee-fees with us.

Cito di Pense wrote:

Destroyer wrote: do believe that it was your dismissiveness towards the individual, as opposed to your issues with what was written, that was objected to.

Well, that's tone policing, for ya.

What you report are your feelings about what was written by Hermit about what was written by the OP. If you can follow that, thanks for sharing your fee-fees with us.

No. what I have reported is the discussion that has been taking place between Spearthrower, Hermit, and GrahamH.

JJ jumped the shark when he started misrepresenting and lying. I see nothing similar in the OP’s *checks OP* single post posting history. So yeah tolerance is still due.

Destroyer wrote:

Hermit wrote:

Cito di Pense wrote:

NoemaNovel wrote:Are you willing to help make this happen by sharing your own experiences of your reality with others who will not judge or criticise it but will accept it on its own terms?

Um, yeah. "Its own terms" are not out there beyond someone's personal reality, are they? This is my guess as to why Hermit decided the OP was unmitigated drivel.

My objections are more basic than that. NoemaNovel's thesis, if you can call it that, breaks here:

NoemaNovel wrote:Since everyone perceives everything in their mind, “reality” can only ever be what our minds make it, so that what seems real to us is real.

His last nine words simply do not follow from the first 17. The "since ... so ..." is an unadulterated non sequitur.

A couple of posters have suggested he might have meant something like "what seems real to us is real to us". Perhaps, but what of it if he did? Try "What seems red to me is red to me". Wonderful, fine and all that, but where, I ask myself the rhetorical question, can I go from there?

Sure, NoemaNovel also exhorts us to "be kinder and more tolerant to one another" and to not judge or criticise someone's "reality" but accept it on its own terms. The problem with those exhortations is that neither have any connection with a discussion of the topic, Reality and the mind unless one accepts and adopts hippy-style thinking.

These are the reasons why I regard the OP as unmitigated nonsense.

This is all well and good. But I do believe that it was your dismissiveness towards the individual, as opposed to your issues with what was written, that was objected to.

Looking back at my first two posts in this thread I must admit to having started off as being roundly dismissive of the opening post's content while not bothering to give any reasons for my dismissiveness whatsoever. And yes, in addition to summarily dismissing the OP's content I also targeted the individual himself when I accused him of only being here to spruik his book.

It turns out, as SkyMutt pointed out here, that I was wrong. NoemaNovel is not the book's author. He is just an inchoate fanboi. (Yes, more dismissiveness towards the individual.) The book's actual author is described by her publisher as

a lawyer and freelance writer, illustrator and photographer. After leaving Amsterdam she studied archaeology, anthropology, philosophy and the history of religion in New York, Paris, Naples, London and St Petersburg, before settling in England where she spent the rest of her life.

Noema is her only novel.

Hermit wrote:

Destroyer wrote:

Hermit wrote:

Cito di Pense wrote:
Um, yeah. "Its own terms" are not out there beyond someone's personal reality, are they? This is my guess as to why Hermit decided the OP was unmitigated drivel.

My objections are more basic than that. NoemaNovel's thesis, if you can call it that, breaks here:

NoemaNovel wrote:Since everyone perceives everything in their mind, “reality” can only ever be what our minds make it, so that what seems real to us is real.

His last nine words simply do not follow from the first 17. The "since ... so ..." is an unadulterated non sequitur.

A couple of posters have suggested he might have meant something like "what seems real to us is real to us". Perhaps, but what of it if he did? Try "What seems red to me is red to me". Wonderful, fine and all that, but where, I ask myself the rhetorical question, can I go from there?

Sure, NoemaNovel also exhorts us to "be kinder and more tolerant to one another" and to not judge or criticise someone's "reality" but accept it on its own terms. The problem with those exhortations is that neither have any connection with a discussion of the topic, Reality and the mind unless one accepts and adopts hippy-style thinking.

These are the reasons why I regard the OP as unmitigated nonsense.

This is all well and good. But I do believe that it was your dismissiveness towards the individual, as opposed to your issues with what was written, that was objected to.

Looking back at my first two posts in this thread I must admit to having started off as being roundly dismissive of the opening post's content while not bothering to give any reasons for my dismissiveness whatsoever. And yes, in addition to summarily dismissing the OP's content I also targeted the individual himself when I accused him of only being here to spruik his book.

It turns out, as SkyMutt pointed out here, that I was wrong. NoemaNovel is not the book's author. He is just an inchoate fanboi. (Yes, more dismissiveness towards the individual.) The book's actual author is described by her publisher as

a lawyer and freelance writer, illustrator and photographer. After leaving Amsterdam she studied archaeology, anthropology, philosophy and the history of religion in New York, Paris, Naples, London and St Petersburg, before settling in England where she spent the rest of her life.

Noema is her only novel.

Appreciated. Now, if NoemaNovel does return to the thread, or has been reading the responses, perhaps he/she will learn why the ideas that were presented are nonsensical.

Destroyer wrote:if NoemaNovel does return to the thread, or has been reading the responses, perhaps he/she will learn why the ideas that were presented are nonsensical.

This is not going to happen. NN has pasted the exact same post in a small number of other sites without returning to them. There also is a twitter account containing dozens of tweets by NN about the novel, and an "official" website dedicated to it. What there is not, is any trace of discussion. NN is not interested in that. He is only interested in "spreading the message".

GrahamH wrote:

Spearthrower wrote:With such low numbers of members, we really don't need more guard dogs barking at strangers. People have bad ideas, but surely that's why we'd want them to come here, to engage those bad ideas and increase skepticism and reasonable thinking about issues. Not keep everyone away who happens to believe in some woo?

Which is it? Do you want more people with "bad ideas" to come and be welcomed with acceptance of those "woo" ideas or do you want to meet them with challenge and scepticism?

And once again. The pattern is becoming habit.

Your implication is that I said that bad ideas should be accepted, whereas, you will not find me ever having said that, so the dilemma is of your own manufacture. Once again, you have simply made up bullshit and tried to foist it off.

Of course, it's not hard to resolve your dilemma anyway: people should be welcomed while bad ideas should be challenged. That's what I actually said in the sentence you're supposedly replying to.

Hermit's original response mocks the idea by likening it to hippies but offers no challenge to the idea aside from that mockery, and then tells the newcomer to "go away" based on his assumption that they're here to promote a book.

In the most charitable reading, GrahamH: you need to pay more attention to what is actually being written instead of responding to things which aren't being written.

GrahamH wrote:

Spearthrower wrote:

Willing to do what?

To make this happen - this being 'be kinder and more tolerant of each other'

How?

BY sharing your own experiences.... with others who will not judge etc.

You got it. Asking for kindness, tolerance, nonjudgemental.

Spearthrower wrote:
He's not asking us anything other than whether we're willing to share our experiences.

That and what you identified above - mutual kindly tolerance of woo.

Spearthrower wrote:... a further invitation to like-minded people to join in some kindly tolerant people who will agree that whatever you imagined happened is real.

Spot on that. It was all there in the OP.

But agreeing that "whatever you imagine happened is real" is not what ratskep is about, is it? That isn't scepticism and it is absurd to come to a sceptical community with talk of woo and a request for no scepticism.

I am not sure who you think you're going to convince with this strawmanning.

Destroyer wrote:

GrahamH wrote:

Spearthrower wrote:With such low numbers of members, we really don't need more guard dogs barking at strangers. People have bad ideas, but surely that's why we'd want them to come here, to engage those bad ideas and increase skepticism and reasonable thinking about issues. Not keep everyone away who happens to believe in some woo?

Which is it? Do you want more people with "bad ideas" to come and be welcomed with acceptance of those "woo" ideas or do you want to meet them with challenge and scepticism?

I can see why Spearthrower is becoming increasingly frustrated with you, Graham. Are you deliberately attempting to misrepresent? or has your comprehension really become so poor now? It is obvious what is being said here: you welcome people, irrespective of their ideas, then you proceed to dismantle their bad ideas, even whilst being welcoming to them, as people. Even if the OP is asking for acceptance of bad ideas, it is clearly evident that Spearthrower is not.

Yes, it's very difficult to explain this any other way, and unfortunately, GrahamH hasn't just been doing this to me, but this has been the pattern of all his exchanges over the past few days with everyone. It very much looks like deliberate misinterpretation.

For me, members build up a kind of credibility credit wherein when they habitually post with clarity, integrity, substance etc. but then have a few testy or silly posts, you can just assume they're having a bad day in the real world and that this explains it. This encourages me (and I assume it's true of others) to give them a bit of tether to not respond in kind, but to assume that whatever it is, they'll work it out and go back to normal. But it can't excuse dozens of posts spread out over a week.

Hermit wrote:
Sure, NoemaNovel also exhorts us to "be kinder and more tolerant to one another" and to not judge or criticise someone's "reality" but accept it on its own terms. The problem with those exhortations is that neither have any connection with a discussion of the topic, Reality and the mind unless one accepts and adopts hippy-style thinking.

The problem with those exhortations are that they don't exist in the OP, but rather you made them up. That's the actual problem with those exhortations. You can't blame the OP for your mischaracterization, and doubling down on it when it's been pointed out is certainly not going to magically make it change.

Further, you've repeated your mockery of the ideas in the OP, but still haven't challenged them with any substance.

Hermit wrote:
Looking back at my first two posts in this thread I must admit to having started off as being roundly dismissive of the opening post's content while not bothering to give any reasons for my dismissiveness whatsoever. And yes, in addition to summarily dismissing the OP's content I also targeted the individual himself when I accused him of only being here to spruik his book.

Right, which is why I said:

http://www.rationalskepticism.org/topic ... l#p2728958

To me, this is actually a topic worthy of discussing and showing why this presents a problem, and to make suggestions about how we might be able to overcome it.

If X is real to someone and you just tell them they're an idiot and to go away, they may go away but they still continue to believe X is real. Instead, if you can show them why the seeming real is not logically linked to the actually real, then you may offer them some way of navigating the quagmire they're in.

Honestly, I was surprised. You usually take these opportunities to be... a little pedantic, if anything... but thereby create a dialogue. I expect that kind of guard dog behavior from some people, but not from you, which is why I in turn challenged it.

Spearthrower wrote:With such low numbers of members, we really don't need more guard dogs barking at strangers. People have bad ideas, but surely that's why we'd want them to come here, to engage those bad ideas and increase skepticism and reasonable thinking about issues. Not keep everyone away who happens to believe in some woo?

If you were concerned about numbers you would be well advised to lay off your petty attacks on long term members.
Hermit may have been a bit harsh in response to the OP asking for an unsceptical hearing on a sceptical forum, but your aggression to hermit was the greater sin borne of a partial understanding of the OP . And you just kept going. Look to your own behaviour.

GrahamH wrote:

Spearthrower wrote:With such low numbers of members, we really don't need more guard dogs barking at strangers. People have bad ideas, but surely that's why we'd want them to come here, to engage those bad ideas and increase skepticism and reasonable thinking about issues. Not keep everyone away who happens to believe in some woo?

If you were concerned about numbers you would be well advised to lay off your petty attacks on long term members.

And which 'petty attacks' would they be, GrahamH?

And isn't it just a little self-serving for you to be accusing me of that now?

GrahamH wrote:Hermit may have been a bit harsh in response to the OP asking for an unsceptical hearing on a sceptical forum, but your aggression to hermit was the greater sin borne of a partial understanding of the OP . And you just kept going. Look to your own behaviour.

My aggression to Hermit?

Point out where that aggression was before you shoved your oar in and started shit-stirring.

http://www.rationalskepticism.org/topic ... l#p2728722

Spearthrower wrote:

Hermit wrote:

NoemaNovel wrote:what seems real to us is real.

Sorry for raining on your maiden post, but I have not heard anyone uttering such unmitigated nonsense since hippies roamed about freely in the wild.

I don't think it's quite as bad as you're making out, just a little unplumbed and poorly worded.

Hallucinations, delusions, even god experiences... they are best described, I think, by our brains doing something a-typical and our minds failing to perceive the distinction between something internally generated and something originating in the external world.

Any detectable aggression there?

No?

http://www.rationalskepticism.org/topic ... l#p2728958

Spearthrower wrote:But for example, it is valid:

what seems real to us is real (to us)

Thus hallucinations, delusions, mystical nonsense... what this means is that people aren't lying: they genuinely believe that the dysfunctions of their brains represent something real in the world.

To me, this is actually a topic worthy of discussing and showing why this presents a problem, and to make suggestions about how we might be able to overcome it.

If X is real to someone and you just tell them they're an idiot and to go away, they may go away but they still continue to believe X is real. Instead, if you can show them why the seeming real is not logically linked to the actually real, then you may offer them some way of navigating the quagmire they're in.

How about there?

http://www.rationalskepticism.org/topic ... l#p2728992

GrahamH wrote:

Spearthrower wrote:Now try reading what I wrote Graham. This is becoming a disturbing pattern.

I read what you wrote and pointed out some specific problems with it. If you read what I wrote and have some points to make in reply go ahead but don't post vacuous "you didn't understand my brilliant post" non-replies.

Funny. From my perspective, that's where the aggression started. Perhaps you should tone police yourself?

You also need to stop strawmanning me GrahamH as I am sure you're well aware that people on this forum are quite capable of reading and thus aren't easily misled to believe that someone's said something they clearly haven't.