Retire Free For All Forum?

My apologies. I'm usually better about that, I usually try and get other people back on topic... I must have had a lapse.------------------
"Illuminant light,
illuminate me."

Actually, Eta Carinae is probably the most studied star in the sky, due to it's erratic light output. Such supermassive stars are very short lived, and Eta Carinae is expected to go supernova in the not too distant future.Tell me, what happens if your God blows up?And, again, who said the nebula was dense enough to walk on? You?

OK, and this is way off topic as well.Wise, feel free, if you are so moved, to start an Eta Carinae discussion, perhaps in the Big Bang/Cosmology forum (which is also the default forum for most astronomical topics, it seems).

I propose that we abandon polite pretense and call it "siberia" (or maybe "cyberia") to describe it's function of being largely a place that people are "banished" to.

I like the idea of a "short-lived" topic area for unregistered posters. It seems to me that those who wish to remain unregistered can vent their opinions there and if they choose, ignore all reasoned discourse, while possibly sparking an interesting topic that registered posters can persue in the forum of their interest.I think the unmoderated but registered FFA should stay. While I sometimes lean toward agreeing that the FFA forum be moderated more closely, especially with the likes of certain posters, I think it can be a valuable insight into differing viewpoints, cultures and mentality's which would otherwise go unnoticed by many of us. Though I am particularly saddened by those who refuse to broaden their minds and think rationally, I agree with John stuart Mill, who argued that silencing an opinion is "a particular evil." If the opinion is right, we are robbed of the "opportunity of exchanging error for truth"; and if it's wrong, we are deprived of a deeper understanding of the truth in "its collision with error." If we only know our own side of the argument, we hardly know even that; it becomes stale, soon learned by rote, untested, a pallid and lifeless truth.I am reminded of forums in which valuable discourse transpired between people holding similar viewpoints on evolution but differed on definitions. These were brought about while debating with posters who held widely disparate viewpoints. It would be hoped that someone is learning something. Though this forum is not a democracy I think it would be a disservice for posters with "unique perspectives" to be banished to some far off field because their opinions differed. Many may hold them as being "wrong" or "misguided" but even science has room for them. They strengthen our knowledge of the world we live in, and increase our understanding of the cultures that surround us.If permitted to express and listen to alternative opinions and engage in substantive debate, people have been known to change their minds. Hugo Black is an example of a person who, when young, was a memebr of the Ku Klux Klan, who later went on to become a Supreme Court justice and was one of the leaders in the historic Supreme Court decisions, partly based on the 14th amendment, that affirmed the civil rights of all americans. It was said that when he was young he dressed in white robes and scared black people, when he got older he dressed in black robes and scared white people. Well, enough rambling.

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I propose that we abandon polite pretense and call it "siberia" (or maybe "cyberia") to describe it's function of being largely a place that people are "banished" to.

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For the breaking of forum guidelines, I sentence you to a lifetime of terror on Monster Island!

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I propose that we abandon polite pretense and call it "siberia" (or maybe "cyberia")

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Close this thread, open the NeXT? The other thread is full, the trolls will have no place to go? Ahhh, now I have to go listen to that music...to Be continued...------------------
"Illuminant light,
illuminate me."[This message has been edited by Rei, 09-30-2003][This message has been edited by Rei, 09-30-2003]

Here's an even better idea - how about a forum where the threads automatically close/expire after a certain predefinied time limit, to discourage meaningful conversation from accidentally occuring there and to mitigate storage problems...

A thread of mine was closed in FFA, and the admin message appeared to suggest that the topic was not relevant to FFA because it was not related to evolution/creation.Having started a couple of threads outside the EvC realm in both FFA and Coffee House, I do not want to continue being a nuisance if I shouldn't be doing that.Are all topics supposed to be strictly EvC? What about topics that are more or less religious agenda vs freedom? Or biases within evolutionary science?Thanks, and sorry if I was creating bad threads.------------------
holmes

My original vision for Free For All was for anyone, registered member or not, to write whatever they liked on any topic without fear of interference from moderators and administrators. One change that was made was to require registration, and we also came to feel it wasn't appropriate to allow unfettered lombasting of people who weren't participating in Free For All, and that posters shold stay on topic. Otherwise it has remained unchanged.------------------

--	Percy
	EvC Forum Administrator

The closed topic in question is "How did you celebrate protection from porn week". My closing message is here.I titled the message "Too much 'Free For All' ", and the content was:

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I think the use of the "Free For All" forum is getting out of hand. Most to all of the topics belong in the other forum. My choice would be to close the "FFA" to any more new topics.

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Comments? Go to "Retire Free For All Forum?".

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Also, it sure seems that the focus seems to be straying from the core area - Creation vs. Evolution.

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The above quoted was intended as commentary on the whole of the "Free For All" forum, and on the debate topics at in general. It was not aimed specificly at holmes' topic, although certainly holmes' topic was part of the situation.It seems that there was a bit of a typo(?) in there. The "Most to all of the topics belong in the other forum." would be better stated as "Most to all of the topics belong in other forums.", or something like that.

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Now please go to the thread I opened just for this whole issue and present your counterevidence.

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Closing this topic.

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Adminnemooseus

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Comments on moderation procedures? - Go to
Change in Moderation?
or
too fast closure of threads

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The internal quote was from holmes, from the previous message. Responding to that, and to the general thought that the topic had gone on long enough, I closed it down.Adminnemoosuesps: Not a well written message, but I had already been up much later than I wanted to be, and I was trying to inject input into several different topics that night."So many topics, so little time to close them all down"------------------
Comments on moderation procedures? - Go to
Change in Moderation?
or
too fast closure of threads[This message has been edited by Adminnemooseus, 11-17-2003]

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Here's an even better idea - how about a forum where the threads automatically close/expire after a certain predefinied time limit, to discourage meaningful conversation from accidentally occuring there and to mitigate storage problems...

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I think a message number or time limit might just cause people to babble even more, and they try to beat the deadline.There was a topic a while back, that got something like 70 new messages in 6 hours, before I closed it down. I seem to recall that a certain Frog stated that they thought the topic was doomed to get shut down soon, so they better post fast. Self-fullfilling prophecy. We better babble fast, before this topic gets closed for babbling.Adminnemooseus

But if the whole thread is automatically deleted, then we could avoid that problem, don't you think? And keep babble out of the other threads?

Proposed: Close current FFA to new topics.Get many of the topics that would have gone to the FFA, to better homes in the main forums. As I see it, many to most of the topics that have gone into the FFA, could just as well gone to one of the main forums. But the admins/moderators are not at liberty to do such moves.Start a new forum, for the "exiled" members, and perhaps the truly bad topics (although I would also like to really cut back on the starting of the truly bad topics).Please review up-topic also.Adminnemooseus

I'm a newcomer, so count for little, but the FFA is in fact a good idea, it allows people like me get a feel for this place.This place is very subdued, there seems little knock-about, too serious by half, and that is WITH the FFA, take it away and the place may have to deal with sterility.My opinion only... don't shoot me.