The Definition of Skepticism

[ahhell]

It's going to vary by context and respondent.


There are proponents of both approaches. Some more cynical than others.


This seems far too much like gatekeeping, to me. The last thing this forum needs is more "you're doing it wrong" and "that's not how we define it here".

You have a notion of what sound reasoning looks like. When you see unsound reasoning, you can critique it according to that notion, without getting into a slapfight about terminology and definitions. If someone is begging the questeion, you can just point that out. You don't have to sidetrack into "that's not skepticism".

Don't get sidetracked by attempts to change the subject to a definition of skepticism. Stay focused on the merits of the argument itself: The premises, the evidence, the reasoning, the conclusion. Put your effort into modeling good skepticism, not getting other people to agree with your definition of it.

---

As an aside, I think "scientific skepticism" is a poor choice of words. That said, also think the scientific method can be translated to a more general set of rationally skeptical practices:

• Form testable hypotheses
• Test the hypotheses you form
• Provisionally accept the results of your tests
• The strength of the results are proportional to the strength of your tests; learn to design strong tests
• Avoid reaching conclusions when you have no test results or no testable hypothesis
• Ask people to show their work (premises, evidence, reasoning, conclusions) before accepting their claims
• Remember that life's too short to make this your entire personality, or even your entire persona. Go outside and touch grass from time to time.

I think it would only be gate keeping if you use your definition to then say, person X is not a skeptical. I would think its fine to say person X is not being skeptical about issue y. I mean, I don't know anyone that's always equally skeptical of all things at all times.

Also, I not a huge fan of scientific skepticism as a term but I think we need to include the scientific, if nothing else, to distinguish it from philosophical skepticism and climate skeptics or vaccine skeptics or what not.

 

[Hercules56]

I took the silence following that comment as acceptance by the forum as a whole.
And yes, I believe that there is a hierarchy in this forum, and I am the bottom of the pile.

That's a position you have chosen to take.

 

[Cosmic Yak]

Should really be in a thread in FMF but if folks want to come up with a replacement/expansion for the "The International Skeptics Forum is an online community dedicated to fostering critical thinking and skepticism." sentence that is on the forum homepage I'll change it.

I started a thread about this:

https://internationalskeptics.com/f...cism-included-on-the-home-page-please.375559/

The idea was depicted as the first step on the road to fascism. What makes you think this suggestion will be more widely accepted now? What's changed?

 

[Cosmic Yak]

Why would you think that?

From my own personal experience on this forum.
Examples:
I revealed that I'm a vegetarian. Result? Massive pile-on, got torn to pieces by very angry and vocal opponents of vegetarianism. Not one voice in favour. Conclusion? The forum as a whole is strongly opposed to vegetarianism.
I posted that I had been caught up in the closure of Heathrow Airport. Result? Massive pile-on, with people telling me I shouldn't be flying (from Saudi Arabia back to the UK, to see my friends and family), and that I didn't deserve any compensation from the airline for not providing a hotel room for the night (which they are legally obilged to do). Not one voice in favour. Conclusion? The forum as a whole is opposed to flying, or at least to me flying.
Last one: my suggestion that we include a definition of scepticism on the home page. Result? Massive pile-on, with my idea being depicted as the first step on the road to fascism, and people comprehensively rejecting the very idea of scepticism. Not one voice in favour of the idea. Conclusion? The forum as a whole is strongly opposed to defining, encouraging or utilising scepticism.
I assess the tone of the forum by the balance of posts for and against any particular comment, claim or idea. If all the comments are against, and none are for, then my conclusion is that the forum as a whole is against. I do not consider that to be an unreasonable position.

 

[ahhell]

From my own personal experience on this forum.
Examples:
I revealed that I'm a vegetarian. Result? Massive pile-on, got torn to pieces by very angry and vocal opponents of vegetarianism. Not one voice in favour. Conclusion? The forum as a whole is strongly opposed to vegetarianism.
I posted that I had been caught up in the closure of Heathrow Airport. Result? Massive pile-on, with people telling me I shouldn't be flying (from Saudi Arabia back to the UK, to see my friends and family), and that I didn't deserve any compensation from the airline for not providing a hotel room for the night (which they are legally obilged to do). Not one voice in favour. Conclusion? The forum as a whole is opposed to flying, or at least to me flying.
Last one: my suggestion that we include a definition of scepticism on the home page. Result? Massive pile-on, with my idea being depicted as the first step on the road to fascism, and people comprehensively rejecting the very idea of scepticism. Not one voice in favour of the idea. Conclusion? The forum as a whole is strongly opposed to defining, encouraging or utilising scepticism.
I assess the tone of the forum by the balance of posts for and against any particular comment, claim or idea. If all the comments are against, and none are for, then my conclusion is that the forum as a whole is against. I do not consider that to be an unreasonable position.

Maybe not unreasonable but that does ignore some pretty commonly observed behavior on the internet and surveys. That being that there is usually going to be a negative bias. Folks opposed to a thing are pretty much always going to be more motivated to respond to it than folks who aren't, and of course the more extreme opposition the more motivated.

I do think that silence can't really be taken as meaning anything on a forum. Could be the forum mostly doesn't care or mostly doesn't think they have much to say or mostly thinks someone else has already said whatever they were going to say as well or better than they would have.

 

[EHocking]

"Critical thinking and skepticism" does cover it. But yeah, absolutely, it might not hurt to spell out what that actually amounts to. It's obvious enough, but then again clearly there's times when it isn't actually obvious. Can't hurt to add a sentence or two expanding on that brief and otherwise perfectly fine descriptor there.

I would only disagree in that the introductory paragraph describes the purpose of the forum.
It need not define scepticism, but do what it does, describe the discussions that we want to engage in at ISF, sceptic or no.

 

[Cosmic Yak]

Maybe not unreasonable but that does ignore some pretty commonly observed behavior on the internet and surveys. That being that there is usually going to be a negative bias. Folks opposed to a thing are pretty much always going to be more motivated to respond to it than folks who aren't, and of course the more extreme opposition the more motivated.

I do think that silence can't really be taken as meaning anything on a forum. Could be the forum mostly doesn't care or mostly doesn't think they have much to say or mostly thinks someone else has already said whatever they were going to say as well or better than they would have.

OK, I get your point. It's kind of a less extreme variant on the idea that, for evil to truimph, it is necessary only for the good to do nothing. I was not aware that this was a widespread thing, either. It's certainly not something I do, at any rate. Is this really a thing?
That said, it does mean that I have, on several occasions here, been left feeling like a lone voice in the wilderness- isolated, embattled and attacked on all sides, and often (as per my examples) over what I consider to be fairly non-controversial issues. If the rest of the forum doesn't care, or doesn't care enough to speak up, then I think it fair to assume that this amounts to tacit support for the cynics, trolls and bullies that lurk among the threads.

 

[Orphia Nay]

Should really be in a thread in FMF but if folks want to come up with a replacement/expansion for the "The International Skeptics Forum is an online community dedicated to fostering critical thinking and skepticism." sentence that is on the forum homepage I'll change it.

"The International Skeptics Forum is an online community dedicated to fostering critical thinking and empirical skepticism."

 

[Cosmic Yak]

"The International Skeptics Forum is an online community dedicated to fostering critical thinking and empirical skepticism."

I think that would still need an explanation or definition, in layman's terms: if you google that phrase, it delivers some quite difficult, and therefore off-putting, definitions.

 

[Orphia Nay]

The International Skeptics Forum is an online community dedicated to fostering critical thinking

Then just that bit. It's the "skepticism" bit that's so problematic., so get rid of it.

Or, "The International Skeptics Forum is an online community dedicated to fostering logical and critical thought."

 

[Cosmic Yak]

Then just that bit. It's the "skepticism" bit that's so problematic., so get rid of it.

Or, "The International Skeptics Forum is an online community dedicated to fostering logical and critical thought."

You want to remove the scepticism part from the introduction to the International Skeptics' Forum?

 

[Hlafordlaes]

...I believe that there is a hierarchy in this forum, and I am the bottom of the pile.

Consistency and skill in application of fact-based reasoning is the natural scoring mechanism for ISF, I venture. Not aware of any formal rankings being done, however.

...one might say that skepticism involves deriving an acceptable path for reason to follow.

Acceptable paths include using empiricism when discussing the natural world and well-constructed logic when employing reason, all while retaining awareness of the fact that claims about matters outside nature cannot be proven nor shown in nature.

 

[Orphia Nay]

You want to remove the scepticism part from the introduction to the International Skeptics' Forum?

Yep, since absolutely nobody can agree on it. Leave the name though.

What did you think of "The International Skeptics Forum is an online community dedicated to fostering logical and critical thought"?

 

[arthwollipot]

The idea was depicted as the first step on the road to fascism.

It was not. I've read that thread, and not only does the idea never get depicted as "the first step on the road to fascism", you are the one picking fights, starting with your post #13. I started this thread as a response to your suggestion, in order to foster a discussion of what the definition you requested should consist of. Is that dismissal? Or is that me taking your suggestion seriously and going the necessary next step?

 

[Cosmic Yak]

It was not. I've read that thread, and not only does the idea never get depicted as "the first step on the road to fascism"

Read theprestige's comments again. I am exaggerating, but not by much.

, you are the one picking fights, starting with your post #13.

That post was me complaining about the entirely negative reaction I'd had to my suggestion. That is in no way "picking a fight", and there is no reasonable interpretation of that post that could lead to such a depiction.

I started this thread as a response to your suggestion, in order to foster a discussion of what the definition you requested should consist of. Is that dismissal? Or is that me taking your suggestion seriously and going the necessary next step?

It was a nice thing to do, but there still seems to be a majority against scepticism here.

 

[Helen]

Just have this thread linked, it's a pretty good representation of how the forum works

 

[arthwollipot]

Read theprestige's comments again. I am exaggerating, but not by much.

You're exaggerating enormously.

That post was me complaining about the entirely negative reaction I'd had to my suggestion. That is in no way "picking a fight", and there is no reasonable interpretation of that post that could lead to such a depiction.

The reaction to your suggestion was absolutely not "entirely negative".

It was a nice thing to do, but there still seems to be a majority against scepticism here.

And this is unwarranted.

 

[steenkh]

I assess the tone of the forum by the balance of posts for and against any particular comment, claim or idea. If all the comments are against, and none are for, then my conclusion is that the forum as a whole is against. I do not consider that to be an unreasonable position.

If you remember my participation in the Hamas terror attack thread, I was also piled upon, among others by you, but I never thought that the forum as such was against my views, only the vocal participants in that thread. None of your examples are good examples of what the position of the forum as a whole is, and they are not even examples of all participants.

 

[dann]

I don't think I participated (or even saw) any of the threads mentioned here:

From my own personal experience on this forum.
Examples:
I revealed that I'm a vegetarian. Result? Massive pile-on, got torn to pieces by very angry and vocal opponents of vegetarianism. Not one voice in favour. Conclusion? The forum as a whole is strongly opposed to vegetarianism.

I am not a vegetarian. I am not even weakly opposed to vegetarianism. I am not very interested in discussing vegetarianism. However, when looking at a thread like that, I would have been interested in the arguments presented for and against vegetarianism, not in the number of people for and against. It is also possible to be a vegetarian and criticize some of the arguments for vegetarians or a carnivore and criticize some of arguments for eating meat. Besides, it's a spectrum, isn't it? From veganism to ovo-lacto vegetarianism and even pescatarianism and pollotarianism. I could live with most of those, but I would miss roast pork once in a while.
As it is, I don't know how I would have 'voted' in a thread like that.

I posted that I had been caught up in the closure of Heathrow Airport. Result? Massive pile-on, with people telling me I shouldn't be flying (from Saudi Arabia back to the UK, to see my friends and family), and that I didn't deserve any compensation from the airline for not providing a hotel room for the night (which they are legally obilged to do). Not one voice in favour. Conclusion? The forum as a whole is opposed to flying, or at least to me flying.

I can see your problem. It sounds reasonable as you present it here, but I have no idea why people would be opposed to flying in general or to you, in particular, flying. There are a lot of reasons why flying in general should be limited and replaced with more environmentally friendly means of transportation, but that is still not an argument against flying as such, but against the environmental costs of the current way of flying. During the worst part of the pandemic (and even now), there is also the aspect of transmission of virus, but that also has more to do with the how of transportation than with flying as such.
The question of compensation sounds like it should have been in trial and errors. I don't see why people would side with the airline, based on what you write here.

Last one: my suggestion that we include a definition of scepticism on the home page. Result? Massive pile-on, with my idea being depicted as the first step on the road to fascism, and people comprehensively rejecting the very idea of scepticism. Not one voice in favour of the idea. Conclusion? The forum as a whole is strongly opposed to defining, encouraging or utilising scepticism.

I think the vast majority of people on the forum are in favor of encouraging and utilizing skepticism, so it sounds weird to me that people would have rejected "the very idea of scepticism." However, I don't think a definition will contribute much to encouraging and/or utilizing skepticism. I don't think a more concise and elaborate defintion will change how people think and act, like, 'Oh, so that's what I have been doing wrong the whole time! Now that I know the definition, I'll mend my ways.'
I didn't like the idea of calling skeptics brights. It's as nonsensical as Mensans calling themselves intelligent, but I don't know if this has anything to do with the discussion you are referring to.
Maybe a definition of what skepticism isn't would be more expedient, but I still wouldn't expect it to make much of a difference.

I assess the tone of the forum by the balance of posts for and against any particular comment, claim or idea. If all the comments are against, and none are for, then my conclusion is that the forum as a whole is against. I do not consider that to be an unreasonable position.

The balance of posts says nothing about what people who don't participate in any given discussion think. I have been 'piled on' a couple of times to the extent that my opponents were convinced that I was the only one who thought what I did. But when they made that conclusion explicit, they turned out to be wrong.
You don't have access to information about what "the forum as a whole" is for or against. There is no such thing as the forum as a whole.
You can always make a poll, but it will only give you the answers from people who participate in it. Not everybody does.

 

[jt512]

"The International Skeptics Forum is an online community dedicated to fostering critical thinking and empirical skepticism."

I would change "is" to "was." Otherwise, I think that statement is entirely accurate.