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SF Weekly: "Who's Crazier - Birthers or Truthers?"

Completely shameless derail here jakesteele and apropos of nothing, but as a fellow Star Trek fan, I gots to know:

Where does that "In the insane society the sane man must act insane" quote you attribute to Mr. Spock come from? I've seen all of the TOS episodes, all of the movies and read an embarrassingly large number of the books and that quote is ringing no bells.

If I had to guess, I'd say it's a misremembered corruption of Spock's line from the end of the episode "Mirror, Mirror":

"It's far easier for you as civilized men to behave like barbarians, than it was for them as barbarians to behave like civilized men."

Someone somewhere (not necessarily you) mentioned it and like a lot of misinformation on the web it spread. As a purveyor of truth I'm sure you want to be sure of your facts and want no part in the spread of erroneous information, right?

Anyway, just thought I'd mention it, sorry for the derail and Live Long and Prosper!


good lord I need a girlfriend


This is where the Mr. Spock quote comes from.

#17 – Elizabeth 1
[adding to the derail]The only other place I remember ever hearing that quote, and having it attributed to Spock, is in the movie version of Cyra McFadden's novel The Serial: a Year in the Life of Marin County, which I highly recommend (both the book and the movie.) A kid says it to the main character, who asks, "Who said that?" and the kid says, "Mr. Spock in Star Trek."

It probably came from this quote. Can’t remember the episode, though.

“It is the insane man who is deemed sane in an insane world.”
 
But there was never a prominent left wing movement akin to the likes of the Birther movement during Bushes Presidency attempting to discredit the legitamcy of his tenure..
The equivalent would be the National Guard memo silliness. Not quite the same, but close enough.
 
SF Weekly gets it right in my opinion. The Truthers are crazier, but the Birthers are dumber. We all know that there are more dumb people than crazy people, ergo the Birthers seem to be more numerous than the Troofers. And the Troofers are starting to get a little hot under the collar about being compared to Birthers:

How utterly despicable.

"Birther" is an obvious attempt to smear "truthers" with the nut-ball brush.

Off topic but important. Has anyone else noticed that Alex Jones has become totally right-wing, unhinged and fringe lately? He's so committed to this silly and well debunked Obama birth certificate hoax that he has literally made a laughing stock out of 9/11 Truth seeing as how he claims to be the godfather of the whole thing. I for one am embarrassed to mention his name or show his films anymore. I have once adamant truthers telling me that they question whether or not 9/11 was even an inside job now based on his recent insanity. They believe that he just latches on to any kook theory in order to promote his website and sell films. It's getting harder and harder to defend Jones.

Heheh, Alex became totally right-wing, unhinged and fringe lately? Crap, I thought he was a nutbar loony tunes survivalist the first time I listened to him. But now that he's talking down Obama, suddenly the 9-11 fruitloops who happen to be leftists are suddenly realizing this guy's not their ally?
 
This is where the Mr. Spock quote comes from.

#17 – Elizabeth 1
[adding to the derail]The only other place I remember ever hearing that quote, and having it attributed to Spock, is in the movie version of Cyra McFadden's novel The Serial: a Year in the Life of Marin County, which I highly recommend (both the book and the movie.) A kid says it to the main character, who asks, "Who said that?" and the kid says, "Mr. Spock in Star Trek."

It probably came from this quote. Can’t remember the episode, though.

“It is the insane man who is deemed sane in an insane world.”


I won't belabor the point, this derail has gone far enough but I remain skeptical that the character of Mr. Spock ever uttered those words in a Star Trek TV episode, movie or even book (I'm sure you'd agree that some character misquoting Spock in the book/movie mentioned by Elizabeth I hardly counts). I am, however willing to change my opinion if you can provide some compelling evidence. Heck, in a case like this I'd even settle for a heavily compressed YouTube video:p At any rate, if I am right about this, I probably won't be the last Trek nerd to question the provenance of your quote, so you might as well save yourself some aggravation and embarrassment and check it out for yourself.

To wrap up (and get slightly back on the proper topic) I offer you another quote, in a similar vein to yours:

"In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king" - Erasmus

The Internet can often seem like the land of the blind; full of ignorance, paranoia, half truths and outright lies. You may have felt like a one-eyed king on some of the CT sites you have visited in the past, but here I think you'll find that the vision of most of the so-called "Debunkers" is at least 20/20 and it is you, not they who needs an appointment with the Ophthalmologist;)
 
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If you had to read their minds to tell the difference then it would mean they both used the same methodologies for different purposes reasons. The definitions show a distinct difference between the two. Pseudoskepticism is the anti-christ of true skepticism.
But the definitions don't tell me how to distinguish between the two.

You say that: "A pseudoskeptic is someone who cloaks denialism in the language of skepticism and critical thinking". Very well, then: so if someone claims to have seen fairies at the bottom of his garden, then the true skeptic, who is prepared to be persuaded of any claim, no matter how startling, if presented with sufficient evidence, will say: "You will have to show me some good evidence for that claim, or I shall not be convinced". Whereas the pseudoskeptic, a bigot who has closed his mind to the possibility of fairies, will "cloak denialism in the language of skepticism", and will say ... "You will have to show me some good evidence for that claim, or I shall not be convinced".

How, then, are we to tell the two apart?

---

P.S: here is a believer in fairies complaining about "pseudoskeptics":

The 'pseudoskeptics' can simply ignore the issue of consciousness for now, but they won't be able to understand the UFO/ET situation, or one of the major implications of contact. Any advanced technological civilization visiting our world (and their 'technology') will have not only a vastly greater understanding of physics, but of metaphysics and consciousness as well, and they will certainly be using this knowledge for their purposes here, in ways that most humans cannot imagine, much less understand.

Humans have long interacted with strange beings from countless other realms, such as angels, fairies, ghosts, etc.
​
 
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So then, a true skeptic will only ever conclude "undecided" and "proven", and never conclude "unproven"? And they'll never put sugar in their porridge.
 
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Sorry about derailing the thread, I wasn't thinking when I did it. Won't happen again.

IMHO, Truthers trump Birthers.
 
I also have to consider who are more deplorable, and that is where Truthers easily top Birthers.

To me, as a non-American, the idea that a few of your less sane, less intelligent citizens would question (despite the evidence) the authenticity of Obama as an official "born" american is silly, stupid, but RELATIVELY harmless.

Truthers, however, falsely accuse many people (none of which besides Cheney and a couple of others are they brave enough to call out by name) of murdering 3000 Americans. Such false and evidenceless based accusations alone make the truthers the more vile of the two lots...by a landslide.

TAM:)
 
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It does sort of cheer me how quickly the epithet 'Birthers' has stuck. There was a time not very long ago when it felt like something that was only used among skeptics as a humorous nod to the similarities in reasoning between the two conspiracy groups. It's pretty funny that it's become the commonly-accepted term.

Now adherents to every CT will be "-ers," just as every political scandal is a "-gate."
 
But there was never a prominent left wing movement akin to the likes of the Birther movement during Bushes Presidency attempting to discredit the legitamcy of his tenure..

Except the person who first brought the issue up was a prominent liberal, Senator Philip Berg.

Added:

youtube video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=39aHQP5rN5k

(I don't know how to imbed videos on this site).
 
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(I don't know how to imbed videos on this site).


If you have...

Code:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=[hilite]39aHQP5rN5k[/hilite]

...you want to use...

Code:
[PLAIN][yt][/PLAIN][hilite]39aHQP5rN5k[/hilite][PLAIN][/yt][/PLAIN]
 
Except the person who first brought the issue up was a prominent liberal, Senator Philip Berg.

Not a senator. Not a prominent liberal. (I don't even know if he's a liberal, but I'll accept it for the sake of argument, since he was a supporter of Sen. Clinton, so it fits.)

And anyway, how does that (I mean, the true parts of it) in any way refute this:
But there was never a prominent left wing movement akin to the likes of the Birther movement during Bushes Presidency attempting to discredit the legitamcy of his tenure..



The Birther movement may have been set off by Berg, and Berg may be a Democrat and even a liberal, but that doesn't make the Birther movement a left wing movement by any stretch of the imagination.
 
Except the person who first brought the issue up was a prominent liberal, Senator Philip Berg.


Philip Berg is a lunatic lawyer, not a senator. He's also a truther, who has represented some of the truthers who brought unsuccessful and fantasy-laden lawsuits against George Bush and others, alleging complicity in the 9/11 attacks, among myriad other allegations of wrongdoing and conspiracy.

The guy is a complete fruit loop.
 
The Birther movement may have been set off by Berg, and Berg may be a Democrat and even a liberal, but that doesn't make the Birther movement a left wing movement by any stretch of the imagination.
I totally agree. But let me rephrase for context. There was never a prominent left wing movement to argue the legitamcy of Bushes presidency akin to the right wing birther movement of today.
 
My bad, one of the videos I saw called him a senator.

I found this in searching for his position and title:
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2066207/posts

But now I know he is a 911 cultist (I refuse to call them truthers because they're nothing of the sort) he has ceased to have any credibility in my eyes. He was once one of the Deputy Attorney Generals of Pennsylvania. So that probably does make him prominent. And I believe he is a registered Democrat, so that has a high probability of making him a liberal.

But, since he was a supporter of Clinton, it would stem to reason the real motivation for him bringing in this lawsuit was to discredit Obama in any way possible. The election would have had a different outcome if he was successful, and more than likely we would have a conservative as President now. Unfortunately he didn't realize the effect it would have on the people who just can not accept that Obama is a Citizen of the USA. Sometimes a a rolling stone does gather moss, it seems.

And here's an interesting Wiki on him.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_J._Berg

But despite all of this, I'd still call the 911 cultists crazier. So since Berg is one of the cultists guess where that places him.
 

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