After looking at an article titled “What is Scepticism” by Brian Dunning, I asked myself “do we all dare to call ourselves Skeptics?”
Abstracts from his article…
Skepticism is the process of applying reason and critical thinking to determine validity.
Skepticism is, or should be, an extraordinarily powerful and positive influence on the world. Skepticism is about redirecting attention, influence, and funding away from worthless superstitions and popular misinformation toward projects and ideas that are evidenced to be beneficial to humanity and to the world.
Skepticism is an essential and meaningful component of the search for truth.
Most importantly he states: “The scientific method is central to skepticism” and a skeptic “maintains a doubting attitude toward values, plans, statements”
I reject the highlighted bits. (got a link ?)
Skepticism, or rational, critical thought have absolutely no obligation to be a "positive" influence" nor meet any other social criteria. It's entirely possible, for example, that religious belief has had a positive influence on believers lives & society, but skepticism demands the entire structure be questioned, doubted, and IMO rejected, despite any positive value.
I think "the scientific method"(SM) is widely misunderstood and instead used as a form of 'religion' (with unquestioned tenets) by many. The SM is a schema for including/excluding empirical theories into a congruent whole. Theories are rejected on the basis that their cannot be evidence on the claim (e.g. hidden variables); that they are inconsistent with the existing evidence base; and then by the peculiar basis that they make unnecessary presuppositions (Occam's razor). This last criteria can (and has) lead to false theories being included, while more successful theories would be rejected. Occam razor is not part of any tenet of rational or critical thought - it is a pragmatic rule that appears to work reasonably well in MODELLING the observable world in the long run.
SM exemplifies this one principal of skepticism (all theories are subject to question - no "settled science"), but is NOT foundational to skepticism. In fact SM includes this peculiar, and logically unsupportable rule. Further the scientific method is only applicable to empirical evidence and cannot be applied to logic or mathematical claims (which certainly must the the subject of skepticism too).
In light of the above I have a serious concern about the way people in the Forum respond to seemingly well thought through information contained in posts. Responses such as these are worth nothing… nothing and do not in my opinion contribute anything to a search for truth… or whatever.
“Really?”
“OH MY GOD!!!!!!!!!!”
“Uhguuu!”
Yes, I find these sorts of responses, when not followed up with some specific
rational rebuttal out of place too. It's very disturbing to see that some poster makes a detailed argument, and the response is some disrespectful snark or a laughing-dog or roll-eyes gif. They make this more of a forum for emotionalism.
Another annoyance is that too many posts merely include a slur or other derogation in place of logical rebuttal. Calling someone a racists for disagreeing w/ point of Obama econ policy, calling someone an oppressor or greedy for pointing to difficulties in socialists econ policy idea, or even suggesting "Godwin's law", when someone makes a comparison to NAZI suppression of dissent. None of these have any bearing on the argument and none represent valid rebuttal.
As light of the above I suggest that people responding to posts should:
Make an effort to understand the point of view expressed in the post.
Apply critical thinking in evaluating the content of the post.
Define your own point of view and present it in a logical way.
I feel we should be very skeptic about our own inputs to the Forum.
Same. Posts might either support or rebut points of the OP argument, but the only criteria available should be evidence or logical considerations. I don't greatly care about so-n-so's emotional outbursts, tho' it's interesting that the same few posters appear incapable of anything else.
Imo, some people take their role as a sceptic, and most of the time, themselves, far too seriously.
I don't generally feel the need to conduct an experiment before saying such things as:
“Really?”
“OH MY GOD!!!!!!!!!!”
“Uhguuu!”
But if you fail to present any specific points of disagreement, with a rational or evidence based argument, then you are just lacing the forum with your emotional scat. Personally, "I don't generally feel the need .." to listen to your unevidenced OPINIONS, tho' I'd like to understand your ARGUMENTs. That is the point of the forum - no ? How do emotional utterance advance the forum ?
Fwiw I think lesswrong.com does a much better job of keeping arguments in the realm of reason.
