Is it possible that both of you see the people on your side if the argument through biased lens of "clearly they are more intelligent people who have done way more research into the the matter because they reached the same opinion as me, and anyone who reaches a different opinion must not know as much as me or have ulterior motives."
No. I'm basing what I say on careful evaluation of people's arguments and stated justification for their beliefs. If I meet someone who has actually done more research into an issue than I have, I find that out and admit that it is the case; furthermore, I often change my position in response to meeting better and more-researched arguments than my own.
It is a rare day indeed when you find a person who will admit that someone who disagrees with them has done an adequate amount of research and fact finding and simply has reached a different well informed opinion.
I don't know where you hang out, but I (and many people I know, many of whom disagree with me on important issues) do it every day. For example, I'm willing to admit right now that you and I have a reasonable difference of opinion on differences of opinion. You're being reasonable enough here that you give me no reason to believe what you say is based on bias, and to give me every reason to believe you're basing what you say on serious thought.
We always want to believe people who disagree with us simply don't have all the facts or dismiss their opinions as misinformed ignorant sheep.
True. That's why we have to be very careful in arguments not to lapse into that kind of sloppy thinking. I never just dismiss someone I disagree with without asking enough questions about their position to know why they disagree with me, carefully evaluating their reasons to see if there's something real there, and offering my arguments to see what their counter-arguments are (and also on the off-chance I might convince them of my position; arguments serve a dual purpose here). I don't claim to be perfect or bias-free, but I think the process of careful examination means more of my assessments of people's positions are based on the actual strength of those positions than on my bias, and I regularly criticize people on the same side of issues as myself for not engaging in the same sort of rhetorical integrity (as well as for making weak arguments or just plain being biased).
Well, it's usually considered unethical to trick someone into sex under false pretenses. It's a bit impractical to actually make that illegal in most cases. But one might still want agents of the government to avoid doing it as part of their official duties.
Yeah, it's also usually considered unethical to deal in drugs. We usually consider it ethically justified when done to limited degree in the service of apprehending drug kingpins.
Bury their weapons and take an oath never to raise them again, except in self-defense.
See, there's a problem already even in the first sentence. Given how the Israelis are treating the Palestinians (choking off inflow of critical supplies, bombing civilian architecture such as power plants and claiming it's in "self-defense", retaliating against every attack by killing more civilians than the attack killed, et cetera) how is the Palestinian use of weapons not already in self-defense? It's a community using weapons to defend itself against outside aggression and violence. Even if the Palestinians do concede that what they're using weapons for now is not self-defense, how do you handle it when Israel acts aggressively again, and you and the Palestinians have a different definition of where the "self-defense" line lies?
Note that I don't take the Palestinian side in this. I think both sides need to make changes. But I see Palestine held to a literally impossible standard by Israel apologists, and I have a problem with that.
That the rest of the government is looking the other way when the police do it is a different matter.
We're not talking about the rest of the government looking the other way. We're explicitly talking about making it explicitly legal to do anything the police tell you to do. That's what rastilin proposed, and the loophole is that making it legal to do whatever the police tell you to would allow police to get things done that they can't legally do by having others do them.
I mean, if they're trying to infiltrate an organization (and accompanying social milieu) where there's a lot of sex, why wouldn't having sex be a legitimate part of their task?
For the same reasons that, when they're trying to infiltrate an organization that deals in drugs, trafficking drugs isn't considered a legitimate part of their task. It's a legal nightmare waiting to happen.
Maybe you don't watch Al Jazeera in Arabic. It's full of conspiracy theories. Even on the Arab-Israeli issue, I would say that that Fox is less biased than Al Jazeera.
I guess my mistake was to extrapolate (you are correct that I have only read/watched their English-language version). Still, most Americans' opinion of Al Jazeera is influenced by hearing stories that Al Jazeera "is the mouthpiece of terrorists" for playing the bin Laden tapes (which Western media did too, but they don't get criticized for it) and about Al Jazeera playing the terrorist beheading videos (which they didn't actually do, it was a lie from the beginning). Then I hear these accusations repeated over and over again, with no sources or evidence that it's actually true. It's good to hear from someone with direct experience.
It seems to me that almost every cheerleader of the War on Terror I've met was someone who limited themselves to the mainstream media and limited their discussion of the issue to repeating talking points
This is why I don't listen to people who watch Fox News.
I still listen to them, lest I lapse into bias. If we don't check ourselves constantly for biases, we lapse into dishonest thinking, and if there's one thing I can't stand, it's the act of being dishonest with oneself. So I listen to them, think hard about what they say, and continuously refine my understanding of the situation.
Do you not agree that the women involved are allowed to feel lied to and betrayed?
Sure, but I'm pretty sure drug smugglers who trusted undercover cops after said cops ran drugs for them feel lied to and betrayed too. Making someone feel lied to and betrayed isn't a crime, nor even morally repugnant if there are larger causes and ends in play.
Which is only true if you take "Muslims are dishonest"
Now, it doesn't mean that at all. They are the Fox News of the arab world.
[citation needed]
Plus, they are more than happy to not only editorialize completely lies and bullshit like Fox, but also go out of their way to push hate speech and propaganda. Basically, they are what Fox News would be if TV standards didn't prevent.
I'm pretty sure "TV standards" don't prevent Fox News from anything.
To be absolutely clear, I'm not saying Fox is awesome. I'm saying Fox News thus far, seems to have a line which Al-jazeera willingly went passed many, many years ago. Heck, actually for as long as I've known about them they've always been the garbage of the Arab world.
Can you give me specific examples? I've been reading Al Jazeera for years (not religiously, but occasionally), and I've been hearing people say things like you're saying now for years, and I have yet to see it backed up by one shred of evidence. Yes, they have some slanted editorials. Fox News reports that Republicans who get in sex scandals are Democrats. Fox News repeated the claims that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and links to al Qaeda years after both these claims had been proven false. Fox news has repeatedly reported that Al Jazeera showed terrorist beheading videos, even after it became clear that this was false. This is more than editorializing by Fox News; this is outright lying. So show me the specific outright lies coming from Al Jazeera, and I will gladly accede to your point.
I only RTFA with "sex" in the link text, but that one seemed a little bit ho-hum. I mean, if they're trying to infiltrate an organization (and accompanying social milieu) where there's a lot of sex, why wouldn't having sex be a legitimate part of their task? Like, duh? Next up, articles about how shocking it is that undercover cops infiltrating drug gangs sometimes handle drugs! And this is considered an appropriate police activitiy! Scandalous!
How addicted to the sinister police narrative do you have to be to have a problem with this? I mean, I like to criticize The Man as much as the next bloke, but I at least wait 'til there's something to criticize.
Now, off to read the other two articles...hopefully there's more meat to those stories.
Here's a new rule. If the police tell you to do it, whatever you were told to do is now legal. That will rapidly put a stop to this kind of underhanded stuff.
There's a really big loophole: that also allows the police to tell each other to do stuff, or (if we write the new rule so that police-to-police instructions don't count) they'll tell civilians to do what they want to do, and then we lose 100% of our civil liberties. No search warrant? Tell someone else to raid the house! Don't want to get in trouble for beating a suspect? Find the nearest sadist and tell him it's his job! Et cetera, et cetera. I like your idea, but I think in practice the cure would end up being worse than the disease.
Also, weren't there all these laws in European countries regarding lying about your identity when you're sleeping around; or does that also just not apply when the police do it?
Too bad "sex by surprise" and "rape by deception" don't exist in the UK, those charges would really come in handy here.
It's independent of Wikileaks and came to light via al-Jazeera, showing perhaps that the mega-leak meme is here to stay whatever happens to Assange.
I think history will find that Wikileaks and by association Julian Assanges greatest contribution to the world, will not necessarily be the Wikileaks service, but helping to cultivate a greater culture of leaking, by showing that it can be done effectively, and that your message will be heard.
Just wait until there are so many leaks everybody gets bored with them and flips back to American Idol the moment newscasters say the word "leak"
You realize the term "meme" predates its modern usage of describing "LOL cats", and other internet ephemera, right? The guy who coined the term, Richard Dawkins, coined it to explain much larger phenomena, like the evolution of society as a whole, and pretty much all evolving intellectual and sociological phenomena that is not immediately traceable to genetics.
Actually, you are both wrong. The English word "meme" has its roots in the French word "même".
But it was Dawkins who made it an English word. Yes, he partly based it on the French word même, but that doesn't make it wrong to say he "coined" it, because it wasn't an English word prior to him making it so.
The "correcting people who think 'meme' is some kind of internet slang" meme is clearly alive and well. Keep it strong, it may someday save us all (from devolution into/b/tards).
(my other post clearly shows I'm part of the devolution)
The "correcting people who think 'meme' is some kind of internet slang" is clearly alive and well. Keep it strong, it may someday save us all (from devolution into/b/tards).
Why in the fuck is this article on slashdot? The Middle East situation is not a nerd story, its not something that matters here. Tagging this story under security and internet makes no sense whatsoever. You can find this news anywhere else, not on an ostensibly tech oriented blog.
Yeah, fuck those policy nerds, and history nerds, and sociology nerds. If it's not strictly tech-nerd or sci-fi nerd, GTFO!
But seriously, from TFS:"...showing perhaps that the mega-leak meme is here to stay whatever happens to Assange."
Speculating on future trends in interactions between media, governments, and society is an inherently nerdy activity, and doubly so when the trend is started by an organization with "wiki" in its name.
Slashdot, you are jumping the shark with this. BTW, before you mod this down -1 consider its an ontopic meta comment.
Slashdot Mirror
Is it possible that both of you see the people on your side if the argument through biased lens of "clearly they are more intelligent people who have done way more research into the the matter because they reached the same opinion as me, and anyone who reaches a different opinion must not know as much as me or have ulterior motives."
No. I'm basing what I say on careful evaluation of people's arguments and stated justification for their beliefs. If I meet someone who has actually done more research into an issue than I have, I find that out and admit that it is the case; furthermore, I often change my position in response to meeting better and more-researched arguments than my own.
It is a rare day indeed when you find a person who will admit that someone who disagrees with them has done an adequate amount of research and fact finding and simply has reached a different well informed opinion.
I don't know where you hang out, but I (and many people I know, many of whom disagree with me on important issues) do it every day. For example, I'm willing to admit right now that you and I have a reasonable difference of opinion on differences of opinion. You're being reasonable enough here that you give me no reason to believe what you say is based on bias, and to give me every reason to believe you're basing what you say on serious thought.
We always want to believe people who disagree with us simply don't have all the facts or dismiss their opinions as misinformed ignorant sheep.
True. That's why we have to be very careful in arguments not to lapse into that kind of sloppy thinking. I never just dismiss someone I disagree with without asking enough questions about their position to know why they disagree with me, carefully evaluating their reasons to see if there's something real there, and offering my arguments to see what their counter-arguments are (and also on the off-chance I might convince them of my position; arguments serve a dual purpose here). I don't claim to be perfect or bias-free, but I think the process of careful examination means more of my assessments of people's positions are based on the actual strength of those positions than on my bias, and I regularly criticize people on the same side of issues as myself for not engaging in the same sort of rhetorical integrity (as well as for making weak arguments or just plain being biased).
Well, it's usually considered unethical to trick someone into sex under false pretenses. It's a bit impractical to actually make that illegal in most cases. But one might still want agents of the government to avoid doing it as part of their official duties.
Yeah, it's also usually considered unethical to deal in drugs. We usually consider it ethically justified when done to limited degree in the service of apprehending drug kingpins.
Bury their weapons and take an oath never to raise them again, except in self-defense.
See, there's a problem already even in the first sentence. Given how the Israelis are treating the Palestinians (choking off inflow of critical supplies, bombing civilian architecture such as power plants and claiming it's in "self-defense", retaliating against every attack by killing more civilians than the attack killed, et cetera) how is the Palestinian use of weapons not already in self-defense? It's a community using weapons to defend itself against outside aggression and violence. Even if the Palestinians do concede that what they're using weapons for now is not self-defense, how do you handle it when Israel acts aggressively again, and you and the Palestinians have a different definition of where the "self-defense" line lies?
Note that I don't take the Palestinian side in this. I think both sides need to make changes. But I see Palestine held to a literally impossible standard by Israel apologists, and I have a problem with that.
Breaking the law is not a loophole.
Um, yeah...did you even read my post?
That the rest of the government is looking the other way when the police do it is a different matter.
We're not talking about the rest of the government looking the other way. We're explicitly talking about making it explicitly legal to do anything the police tell you to do. That's what rastilin proposed, and the loophole is that making it legal to do whatever the police tell you to would allow police to get things done that they can't legally do by having others do them.
I mean, if they're trying to infiltrate an organization (and accompanying social milieu) where there's a lot of sex, why wouldn't having sex be a legitimate part of their task?
For the same reasons that, when they're trying to infiltrate an organization that deals in drugs, trafficking drugs isn't considered a legitimate part of their task. It's a legal nightmare waiting to happen.
It isn't?? Since when?
Maybe you don't watch Al Jazeera in Arabic. It's full of conspiracy theories. Even on the Arab-Israeli issue, I would say that that Fox is less biased than Al Jazeera.
I guess my mistake was to extrapolate (you are correct that I have only read/watched their English-language version). Still, most Americans' opinion of Al Jazeera is influenced by hearing stories that Al Jazeera "is the mouthpiece of terrorists" for playing the bin Laden tapes (which Western media did too, but they don't get criticized for it) and about Al Jazeera playing the terrorist beheading videos (which they didn't actually do, it was a lie from the beginning). Then I hear these accusations repeated over and over again, with no sources or evidence that it's actually true. It's good to hear from someone with direct experience.
It seems to me that almost every cheerleader of the War on Terror I've met was someone who limited themselves to the mainstream media and limited their discussion of the issue to repeating talking points
This is why I don't listen to people who watch Fox News.
I still listen to them, lest I lapse into bias. If we don't check ourselves constantly for biases, we lapse into dishonest thinking, and if there's one thing I can't stand, it's the act of being dishonest with oneself. So I listen to them, think hard about what they say, and continuously refine my understanding of the situation.
It comes down to sex by deception.
Do you not agree that the women involved are allowed to feel lied to and betrayed?
Sure, but I'm pretty sure drug smugglers who trusted undercover cops after said cops ran drugs for them feel lied to and betrayed too. Making someone feel lied to and betrayed isn't a crime, nor even morally repugnant if there are larger causes and ends in play.
Do you not agree that the women involved are allowed to feel lied to and betrayed?
sure, but if lying to get laid is a crime, you might as well lock up every male on the planet..
Well, I'm a male who has never lied to get laid, but maybe that explains why I rarely get laid.
Wars can be won, and enemies can be stamped out.
Tell that to the dead and consider the cost to the "victor". Wars can have first and second losers, and that's all.
In the words of the first US Congresswoman, "You can no more win a war than you can win an earthquake."
Which is only true if you take "Muslims are dishonest"
Now, it doesn't mean that at all. They are the Fox News of the arab world.
[citation needed]
Plus, they are more than happy to not only editorialize completely lies and bullshit like Fox, but also go out of their way to push hate speech and propaganda. Basically, they are what Fox News would be if TV standards didn't prevent.
I'm pretty sure "TV standards" don't prevent Fox News from anything.
To be absolutely clear, I'm not saying Fox is awesome. I'm saying Fox News thus far, seems to have a line which Al-jazeera willingly went passed many, many years ago. Heck, actually for as long as I've known about them they've always been the garbage of the Arab world.
Can you give me specific examples? I've been reading Al Jazeera for years (not religiously, but occasionally), and I've been hearing people say things like you're saying now for years, and I have yet to see it backed up by one shred of evidence. Yes, they have some slanted editorials. Fox News reports that Republicans who get in sex scandals are Democrats. Fox News repeated the claims that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and links to al Qaeda years after both these claims had been proven false. Fox news has repeatedly reported that Al Jazeera showed terrorist beheading videos, even after it became clear that this was false. This is more than editorializing by Fox News; this is outright lying. So show me the specific outright lies coming from Al Jazeera, and I will gladly accede to your point.
I only RTFA with "sex" in the link text, but that one seemed a little bit ho-hum. I mean, if they're trying to infiltrate an organization (and accompanying social milieu) where there's a lot of sex, why wouldn't having sex be a legitimate part of their task? Like, duh? Next up, articles about how shocking it is that undercover cops infiltrating drug gangs sometimes handle drugs! And this is considered an appropriate police activitiy! Scandalous!
How addicted to the sinister police narrative do you have to be to have a problem with this? I mean, I like to criticize The Man as much as the next bloke, but I at least wait 'til there's something to criticize.
Now, off to read the other two articles...hopefully there's more meat to those stories.
Here's a new rule. If the police tell you to do it, whatever you were told to do is now legal. That will rapidly put a stop to this kind of underhanded stuff.
There's a really big loophole: that also allows the police to tell each other to do stuff, or (if we write the new rule so that police-to-police instructions don't count) they'll tell civilians to do what they want to do, and then we lose 100% of our civil liberties. No search warrant? Tell someone else to raid the house! Don't want to get in trouble for beating a suspect? Find the nearest sadist and tell him it's his job! Et cetera, et cetera. I like your idea, but I think in practice the cure would end up being worse than the disease.
Also, weren't there all these laws in European countries regarding lying about your identity when you're sleeping around; or does that also just not apply when the police do it?
Too bad "sex by surprise" and "rape by deception" don't exist in the UK, those charges would really come in handy here.
you have respect for CNN? Body proves Bigfoot no myth, hunters say
I stand corrected. I should have said, "I would lose all respect for CNN if I found they gave a bigfoot story serious coverage."
It's independent of Wikileaks and came to light via al-Jazeera, showing perhaps that the mega-leak meme is here to stay whatever happens to Assange.
I think history will find that Wikileaks and by association Julian Assanges greatest contribution to the world, will not necessarily be the Wikileaks service, but helping to cultivate a greater culture of leaking, by showing that it can be done effectively, and that your message will be heard.
Just wait until there are so many leaks everybody gets bored with them and flips back to American Idol the moment newscasters say the word "leak"
I read the story, and I didn't see Palestine offer the one thing that will force Israel to compromise: a credible commitment to peace.
What exactly would they have to offer that you would find a "credible commitment"?
You realize the term "meme" predates its modern usage of describing "LOL cats", and other internet ephemera, right? The guy who coined the term, Richard Dawkins, coined it to explain much larger phenomena, like the evolution of society as a whole, and pretty much all evolving intellectual and sociological phenomena that is not immediately traceable to genetics.
Actually, you are both wrong. The English word "meme" has its roots in the French word "même".
But it was Dawkins who made it an English word. Yes, he partly based it on the French word même, but that doesn't make it wrong to say he "coined" it, because it wasn't an English word prior to him making it so.
Please, Internet, stop trying to force your sorry culture on the real world. This has nothing to do with memes.
Yeah, one person leaking some stuff and then inspiring another person to leak some stuff has nothing to do with "ideas or beliefs that are transmitted from one person or group of people to another" and "spread through the behaviors that they generate in their hosts." Nothing whatsoever. Totally different things.
The "correcting people who think 'meme' is some kind of internet slang" meme is clearly alive and well. Keep it strong, it may someday save us all (from devolution into /b/tards).
(my other post clearly shows I'm part of the devolution)
The "correcting people who think 'meme' is some kind of internet slang" is clearly alive and well. Keep it strong, it may someday save us all (from devolution into /b/tards).
Well, to be fair, the rape was retroactive, and so GP didn't know it was happening at the time or for a few days thereafter.
Why in the fuck is this article on slashdot? The Middle East situation is not a nerd story, its not something that matters here. Tagging this story under security and internet makes no sense whatsoever. You can find this news anywhere else, not on an ostensibly tech oriented blog.
Yeah, fuck those policy nerds, and history nerds, and sociology nerds. If it's not strictly tech-nerd or sci-fi nerd, GTFO!
But seriously, from TFS:"...showing perhaps that the mega-leak meme is here to stay whatever happens to Assange."
Speculating on future trends in interactions between media, governments, and society is an inherently nerdy activity, and doubly so when the trend is started by an organization with "wiki" in its name.
Slashdot, you are jumping the shark with this. BTW, before you mod this down -1 consider its an ontopic meta comment.
Sure. That doesn't stop it from being Flamebait.
This is seriously and honestly the most brilliant solution to the problem I have ever heard. I'm going to quote you.
I think you'd run out of nukes before you got to Shinto, Wicca, Sikh, Druze, and the like.
I think you underestimate the size of the world's nuclear stockpile.
While we're at it, can we hit Gold Base? Please, pretty please???