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  • My proposal to all of us regarding discussing sensitive topics

    My proposal to all of us regarding discussing sensitive topics:

    I have no problem discussing current Iraq situation, however if we are going to do so, we should apply a few restrictions.

    My proposal:
    1. Whoever posts such thread should define the scope the thread covers. All subsequent posters in the thread should post only about issues regarding defined scope of the topic.

    For instance one thread is discussing POW's and violation / nonviolation of Geneva convention and double / nondouble standards of sides in conflict. Reasons for war and morality of starting or nonstarting the war is off topic of that thread.

    It's similar to hardware thread. If someone for example posts a thread asking about network cards and person B posts that Intel Pentium 4 CPUs suck and therefore Intel NICs suck as well and person C comes and starts deffending Intel CPUs, person D starts talking about AMD CPUs and then person E about VIA chipsets, such thread will derail and it will not contribute much to original topic.

    2. All posters should debate and attack or deffend only ideas put forth by other posters. Personal attacks and name calling should be avoided.

    It's akin to calling someone nVidiot, fanATIc or MAven in graphic board thread.

    3. All arguments should be derived either from facts (a fact is something that can be objectively detected by any person without impairments in same circumstances) and credible news sources.

    To continue hardware example: If someone says that AMD or Intel (open source or closed source) sucks, some will agree and others will disagree.

    However If someone says that he has benchmarked in scientific and documented manner, that can be independantly repeated, CPU A and CPU B in config C, using application D and that CPU A performed better, that's a fact. Also if someone says that benchmarks published by say www.aceshardware.com claim that Intel Pentium 4 processor performs better in Lightwave than say AMD AthlonXP processor (credible news source), we can all agree that when building system for Lightwave rendering, where perfomance matters over price, Pentium 4 is more suited to the task.

    4. We should avoid generalizations and other sophisms, and be clear about our arguments.

    Examples: All mac owners are elitist basdards, real men own a PC.

    You are artistic pot smoking mac owner and don't know even what HAL is, therefore, all your computer opinions are wrong.

    5. Also I belive we should avoid pasting or linking news and no discussion in first post thread. It would be better to post / paste / link news and then define scope of discussion as well as state some arguments for our opinion.

    Another optional proposal:

    We could have one thread regarding posting breaking news, which should be mainly limited to that. However I believe we should simply post news, source and not link poster to the news.

    And we could open a few threads discussing issues. However such threads should be limited to certain topic: For instance if we're discussing POW's, rasons for war, ICC, president's legality (I posted those two and have pulled back from discussing them.) are clearly of topic and should be keept out.



    Comment: Most of us live in parliamentary democracies or other forms of representative democracy. As we all know representatives do discuss issues and they do dissagree, however they have clear rules, which they have imposed on themselves and they try to not to go of topic and not exercise insults and personal attacks and they don't back their claims by sophisms and they do bring facts, documents and testimonials to be credible.

    Think about level of discussion in British House of commons when discussing such issues.

    We should be aware of the fact that some people might have different opinion and we should respect that.
    Last edited by UtwigMU; 25 March 2003, 00:25.

  • #2
    Careful UtwigMU, I might just take you up on that: please, practice what you preach: A few minutes ago a reply you gave to a post I made could have been easily construed to imply that I was a Nazi.

    I am not a Nazi, nor am I implying that you accused me of being a Nazi. However, if you read carefully the post to which I am referring, you can see how it could be read two very different ways:

    Quote:
    "Although your argument was used by SS and Wehrmacht when they executed members of resistance, Geneva convention says..."
    End Quote

    This could be interpreted as contextually saying: "Since you used an argument used by the SS and the Wehrmacht, you are therefore a Nazi."

    Or "The convicted SS and the Wehrmacht used the argument unsuccessfully at the Nuremburg Hearings" Which they did do, and it is moot whether or not they were convicted of those crimes as defined in the GC. For what they did, they had to have new criminal terms defined for their actions.
    Last edited by MultimediaMan; 25 March 2003, 00:36.
    Hey, Donny! We got us a German who wants to die for his country... Oblige him. - Lt. Aldo Raine

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    • #3
      Here's a quote from Arstechnica's battlefront rules proposal:

      Battlefront is forum for comparative crossplatform discussion. It's there to keep Linux, Windows and Macintosh forums clean.

      Elements of a good BF Discussion

      Originally posted by Horatio:
      I've been giving some thought to the structure and flow of arguments here, and I thought I'd do my piece to help improve the quality of debate around here.

      It seems that many disagreements in the BF stem from the lack of structured debate and unskilled participants. Lately, we have seen an increase in trolling, and many, many more posts that, while somewhat on-topic, are little more than invective. This has been extremely frustrating for many of the more moderate BF members, and has indeed caused many to leave the BF, which IMO is a great loss to the BF community. My post here today is to try to address the problem with debating here, and try to bring to light what I believe are the elements and structure of a good debate.

      _Structure_
      Debate needs a form and structure, else people will try to sidetrack topics. I am not saying this is the only way to structure a BF discussion, but simply one way. So, without further ado, I will present what I believe is a good methodology for debate.

      It begins with claims, or a statement, backed with some supporting evidence. The first question that must be asked is "Is this a BF topic?". This contains subquestions like "Where is the contention?" or "is this truly a cross-platform topic?". The jist of this determines whether the topic should be posted at all.

      The next element is clarification. All sides should ask questions, and clarify definitions (e.g. "What do you mean by marketshare?", "Over what period did this occur?") such that there can be no ambiguity of meaning. Also define the scope of debate so that it is easier to remain on topic, and posts that deviate from the scope of discussion can be easily identified and ignored.

      Now, we must state our assumptions. Our debates are often hypothetical in nature, so we must state the assumptions that will be taken as fact. For example, in the TCPA discussion, we assumed that there were both secure and insecure parts of a computer system. Without stated assumptions, there is a tendency to use one's own assumptions, which can very quicky become non-constructive (e.g. RMS saying that to him, proprietary software is fundamentally wrong precludes any debate on the merits of proprietary software with him). That is to say that arguments become circular upon themselves (e.g. creation is fact because it says so in the bible - if we have not agreed that the bible is fact, this argument is non-constructive and self-circular).

      The previous points establish the axioms upon which the discussion can be based. The mean reason these are necessary is so that there is a clear view of the topic. Once the sides can agree on the topic, the discussion can move forward.

      The claimant side's evidence must be examined now. This evidence must be argued as to its validity. Evidence must also be impartial in nature. MOSR is not a good source of Mac facts. Slashdot is not a valid source for Linux of MS facts. Random personal websites are not a good source for anything (Sekrit APIs, TCPA). Evidence need not be presented all at one, but some must be presented to even begin. However, to refute points, evidence need not be presented. The evidence in question must stand up to the question, else additional supporting evidence must be presented. Remember that the burden of proof is upon the claimant, and you cannot attempt to force the other side to prove the opposite ("Prove that God didn't create the earth and heavens").

      All of the above elements form the preamble and the start of the actual discussion. At this point, we can analyze the topic in our usual, excruciating detail.

      We should examine the causes and effects, and refine the problem space, and express our diverse points of view. All of these arguments should rest upon the solid foundation we have created in the preamble, allowing us to explore every detail of the area, and attempt to find common ground.

      Ultimately, the goal is to come to a resolution. We sometimes determine that the initial claim has no merit, and sometimes arrive at a course of action. This rarely happens, however, as one side tends to lose interest in the topic, and the thread dies. Alternately, one of the various trolls, thread craps until the post has to be locked.

      _Discussion Pitfalls_
      I have seen many, many discussions get sidetracked for no reason other than lack of debating experience, and I'd like to address some of the various argumentative pitfalls I've seen. I'm sure there are a ton of others, but here are a few.

      _Analogies_
      Analogies should be avoided except in very specific cases. When analogies are made, one has to question the validity of the analogy (Mac:PC :: BMW:Ford). Unless there is an absolute 1:1 relationship between the pairs, the argument will drift into arguing the correctness of the analogy, and much time and energy will be wasted. If there are holes in the analogy, there will be an artifical and offtopic debate that detracts from the main thread.

      _Rules of evidence_
      The chief rule of evidence is that if you make a claim, you must provide evidence. Links, excerpts, and book references are all good examples of evidence. If articles are long, don't expect people to read the whole thing (DOJ stuff, for example), so provide excerpts. However, do not highlight/embolden sections, and do not selectively quote. Provide enough context and information to be useful to the debate. This will prevent useless posts that start "did you even read the article you quoted?"

      The second rule of evidence is that evidence must be based on fact or statistics. Now, both fact and statistics are inherently "gappy", that is to say that they are not all encompassing, but merely serve to provide some empirical backup to an argument. They are not self containing arguments however. Additionally, this means that evidence must be impartial, and not be opinion or conjecture. Too much editorializing happens today in the media, so one must be careful about selecting sources of evidence, and the methodology and assumptions that underlie the evidence being presented.

      _Fallacies_
      Many members of the community here employ a great number of logical and argumentative fallacies. The best site I've found that exposes these fallacies is http://www.intrepidsoftware.com/fallacy/welcome.htm page. I'll illuminate upon a few of the more popular ones here.

      The most common fallacy used here at Ars is the _ad hominem_, which basically means attacking the person, instead of the argument. The most egregious examples of this take the form "Soandso is a Corpware employee and only presents marketing BS here", or "Soandso gets paid to post here, everything he says should be disregarded". This type of attack adds nothing to the debate except invective, and is bannable. Please don't do it. Even marketing "evidence" needs to be refuted. And if it is truly BS, then it should be easy to dismiss. But attack the argument, destroy the evidence. Don't make it personal.

      Another very popular fallacious is the _argumentum ad populum_ which is the appeal to popularity. This takes forms like "Everyone knows that the Mac UI is better than the Windows UI", or "90% of people don't know what Linux is". Unless you can truly show that those blanket statements are true, you've committed a logical transgression, and your argument is null and void.

      The slippery slope argument is popular in a lot of the hypothetical threads. This is where you take one statement or fact, and extend it to an illogical conclusion. An example of this is "Apple gained .1% marketshare this quarter, soon it will dominate the PC industry". The conclusion, while possible, is extremely unlikely.

      There are a host of other fallacies in common use, and I try my best to point them out when they are used. They are most often used to support a weak position, so if you find yourself using fallacies to back your argument, step back, and rethink your position a little. From there, you should be able to make your argument, and force your detractors to attack the merits of your argument, instead of the structure of your argument.

      _Conclusion_
      So why did I write this? I am one of the people that has become very annoyed and frustrated by the tone discussions have taken in the recent past. I am committed to improving the quality of debate here, as I have shown in my posts on various topics, often attacking the style of an argument when it is lacking in something. My hope is that members of the extremist camps (*lots, the ABM moron brigade, the NBM stonewallers, etc.) learn to make points and argue coherently. In the end we can all benefit, and have much less of the BS, IBTL crap, and most of all, keep a more professional and thoughtful environment here in the BF.
      Last edited by UtwigMU; 25 March 2003, 00:36.

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      • #4
        I think you just need to apply common sense. I know when one poster refers to a group they are in 99% of the cases referring to the minority. Some people automatically presume you mean everyone and also confuse issues this will always happen.
        My own rule is if I don't like the thread I don't post in it. If I don't understand the subject they're talking about or have no info I don't post in the thread.
        Chief Lemon Buyer no more Linux sucks but not as much
        Weather nut and sad git.

        My Weather Page

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        • #5
          Originally posted by The PIT
          I think you just need to apply common sense. I know when one poster refers to a group they are in 99% of the cases referring to the minority. Some people automatically presume you mean everyone and also confuse issues this will always happen.
          My own rule is if I don't like the thread I don't post in it. If I don't understand the subject they're talking about or have no info I don't post in the thread.
          I think I do that, and hope I do. At the moment most of my posts are trying to show people another viewpoint A shame so many fail to see that...
          Meet Jasmine.
          flickr.com/photos/pace3000

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          • #6
            Again, I have to agree with The Pit, even though he is Anti-Chicken I don't see what the big deal is. If you get upset, or don't like political threads, don't read them. IMO this is being blown way out of proportion. People in different areas have different views. I for one, like hearing different views. Who knows? They may even change my mind!
            "I dream of a better world where chickens can cross the road without having their motives questioned."

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