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#1 |
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Olympic Equestrian Wannabe
Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: Defending the Alamo
Posts: 9,255
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Heroes of the CT wars?
How do y'all do it? Just reading CT sites makes me kick and scream and fall down foaming at the mouth (a la John Belushi's editorials on classic SNL newscasts.) Forget logical refutation.
For all that, I'm FASCINATED by conspiracy theorists - the illogicality, the muddled thinking, the refusal to inspect evidence, the circular reasoning. Any theories (conspiratorial or otherwise) about where conspiracy theorists come from? |
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#2 |
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Philosopher
Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: The ol' Same place
Posts: 6,204
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__________________
My heros are Alex Zanardi and Evelyn Glennie. |
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#3 |
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Philosopher
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: 44:57:19N, 73:16:18W
Posts: 5,490
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__________________
I tolerate with utmost latitude the right of others to differ with me in opinion without imputing to them criminality. I know too well all the weaknesses and uncertainty of human reason to wonder at its different results. -- Thomas Jefferson |
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#4 |
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Graduate Poster
Join Date: Aug 2001
Posts: 1,806
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Beady, you illustrate a great point about apealling to authority. I encounter posts from people who claim that because they or the source of their insipid information is a government employee the anecdote must be true.
As you demonstrate, just because someone is a government employee does not mean they are not a total f*cking nutjob. Everytime I hear "weel, my source, who works for the government says..." I think of the last time I was at the DMV being served by a government employee. Hard to take that source seriously. And of course, the flip side is true. You claim to work for the gov and I am sure you are rational, intelligent and well informed.
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By convention there is color, By convention sweetness, By convention bitterness, But in reality there are atoms and space. --Democritus (c. 400 BCE) |
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#5 |
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Muse
Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: Buggery's Island
Posts: 543
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__________________
The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. Albert Einstein
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#6 |
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Philosopher
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: 44:57:19N, 73:16:18W
Posts: 5,490
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__________________
I tolerate with utmost latitude the right of others to differ with me in opinion without imputing to them criminality. I know too well all the weaknesses and uncertainty of human reason to wonder at its different results. -- Thomas Jefferson |
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#7 |
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Abiogenic Spongiform
Join Date: Sep 2002
Location: In a handbasket
Posts: 8,911
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#8 |
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Graduate Poster
Join Date: Aug 2001
Posts: 1,806
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__________________
By convention there is color, By convention sweetness, By convention bitterness, But in reality there are atoms and space. --Democritus (c. 400 BCE) |
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#9 |
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Master Poster
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: Alberta
Posts: 2,538
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Just read through the numerous threads about Conspiracy Theories here on this forum, and you'll be amazed at the stupidity that some people can show.
You are correct when you refer to "circular reasoning" as that is all I have seen from the CT'ers in every single thread in this section. |
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#10 |
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Philosopher
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: 44:57:19N, 73:16:18W
Posts: 5,490
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I just posted this in another thread. It's a sort of follow-up to an earlier post I made here, so thought it would bear repeating:
Quote:
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__________________
I tolerate with utmost latitude the right of others to differ with me in opinion without imputing to them criminality. I know too well all the weaknesses and uncertainty of human reason to wonder at its different results. -- Thomas Jefferson |
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#11 |
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Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: May 2006
Posts: 10,408
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You ever see the bell curve demonstrated with marbles and nails? There are always going to be a few marbles that fall on either end. Loose marbles, we might call them.
CTs start with the conclusion and work backwards through the evidence to find what supports that conclusion, then desperately try to discount the rest as either misdirection or coverup. The key to dealing with them without losing it is to remember this is an intellectual exercise. If you cannot leave the emotions behind, you are not ready to deal with them unless you get lucky and the opponents leave themselves wide open for an emotional response that wins. Second, know where the opposition is weak and hammer at it. Every 9-11 nut knows that the passengers on the planes is the one thing they do not want to discuss. Alan Colmes asked Jim Fetzer about the passengers something like eight times, and each time Fetzer managed to steer the conversation away from the passengers and onto a CT point within two sentences, and yet when Colmes finally nailed him down he rattled off some nutbar stuff about he didn't know how many of them were paid. And the next time Colmes got him off into the Barbara Olson running Italian Lira along the Polish-Austria story. |
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My new blog: Recent Reads. 1960s Comic Book Nostalgia Visit the Screw Loose Change blog. |
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