Report Discussion Problems Here 3.0

I'd like to suggest that Bolder-Dash's "Life on Other Planets?" thread be renamed "Belief in God vs. Belief in Life on Other Planets - Which is More Reasonable?" or something similar. It's pretty clear that he intended to discuss that topic from the outset, and his thread title (and OP) currently make that technically "off-topic" as written.I don't think he should be hamstrung in that manner now that it's emerged that it was his intended topic all along.

Well, yeah, sort of. But as several people have pointed out, no one is saying they believe in life on other planets. They're saying that it seems like a reasonable possibility. I don't think Bolder-dash thinks God is just a reasonable possibility.But you're right, Bolder-dash doesn't really seem interested in his purported topic, and it has also been correctly pointed out that Bolderdash is trying to play a game of "gotcha," and when people didn't give the answers he needed he just accused people of giving those answers anyway. If everyone else in the thread can just follow the Forum Guidelines a bit more closely for a day or so then I can bring some moderation to bear. As gets pointed out repeatedly, when no one in a thread is following the Forum Guidelines it's kind of difficult to single anyone out.I don't know if you follow NFL football, but a week or two ago there was a major dustup between Cortland Finnegan and Andre Johnson. Punches were thrown, and both were ejected and fined $25,000. But Cortland Finnegan is a known instigator, so was it fair to treat them both equally? I don't think so, and I don't think the league thinks so, but there was no evidence that Cortland Finnegan was more to blame if you just look at that single incident. There was a basketball player a couple decades ago named Bill Laimbeer who was also an instigator who would goad players into major infractions. Robert Parish once punched him out.But instigators on a bulletin board have a more difficult time hiding their instigations, but only if everyone else behaves. I know it's satisfying to get your licks in, but this site is supposed to be a boring "just the facts, ma'am" science site.Edited by Admin, : Grammar.

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

I don't have any further interest in discussing the Bolder-Dash "gotcha" situation in that thread or this, I think the point has been made. I completely take your points about instigators.I'm genuine about my suggestion, though. Bolder-dash wants to contrast the reasonableness of two beliefs, and a lot of people, if not necessarily me, want to talk about it with him.But that's off-topic in the thread as currently titled, and I think what you said in that thread - which, to repeat, I have every intention of following - indicates that moderators are likely to view any discussion that compares those two beliefs as "off-topic".I'm just saying - that's what he opened the thread to talk about, that's what the people in the thread want to talk about, and if the obstacle to that is that the thread title makes moderators think that discussion is off-topic, we should have the thread title changed. This isn't an oblique response to your moderation of that thread, this is a genuine suggestion I'm making. Regardless of what I think about Bolder-Dash and his thread, he opened the thread to contrast the reasonableness of two beliefs, and it's not fair to hamstring him against discussing the topic he opened the thread in service of just because he may have been playing games with topic titles.It's possible that in addition to the title change, the thread may have to be moved. "Which belief is more reasonable" may not be an appropriate topic for "Origin of Life", and again, my only concern here is that the misclassification of the thread not become an obstacle to talking about what Bolder-Dash clearly opened it to talk about.Edited by crashfrog, : No reason given.

I have no objection if people want to discuss which belief is more reasonable. I guess it would have to be a comparison between "I believe God exists" and "I think it's possible that life exists elsewhere in the universe." I think it would be fine if you want to suggest that or something like that in the thread.

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

Over in Proposed New Topics we have a long rant from JH titled "Challenge for Evolutionists": Message 1Early on, in paragraph 2, the rant claims:

This reality is confirmed from biological studies on ancient bacteria. As stated, Almost without exception, bacteria isolated from ancient material have proven to closely resemble modern bacteria at both morphological and molecular levels. - The Paradox of the Ancient Bacterium Which Contains Modern Protein-Coding Genes ( Heather Maughan*, C. William Birky Jr., Wayne L. Nicholson, William D. Rosenzweig and Russell H. Vreeland )

I tracked down the article, even though there was no link, and found a critique as well. Seems there are problems.The critique questions the age of the bacteria which the above cited article claims to be ancient. This blows the JH rant out of the water just two paragraphs in. New evidence for 250 Ma age of halotolerant bacterium from a Permian salt crystal: Comment and replyPerhaps JH's rant needs additional supporting documentation before being approved.(I scanned the rest of the rant; what a steaming pile of PRATTs!)Edited by Coyote, : Just scanned the rest of the article

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Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.

I'm not sure what user aleesterdonald is up to. His two posts so far have been almost copied from other users' posts in the same threads and he makes no sense. I don't know what's up with that.See messages: Message 32
Message 6-MeldinoorEdited by Meldinoor, : No reason given.

It is as if he put an existing post into a English-to-Spanish translator and then into a Spanish-to-English translator.Is Dawn Bertot using a new login?

Those messages kind of look like those of a signature spammer, but there was not only no signature displayed, the poster never created any signature. Not a hint of spam to be connected to that ID.Maybe an extremely concise reincarnation of our much beloved Brad McFall?Maybe another appearance will clarify the situation.AdminnemooseusEdited by Adminnemooseus, : Tweak paragraph 2.

I also saw this: It seems like the post is a copy and paste from some conversation he saw.

Perhaps in the interest of avoiding off-topic banter, and getting some much needed moderation in that thread, it could be moved to the Faith and Belief subforum?-Meldinoor

I agree with Meldinoor that the thread Deconversion experiences should be moved (and moderated if possible).
The thread has attracted some very high quality posts and if a little moderation can get the thread back on track then I think that more quality posts will be added.Edited by Panda, : added link

I posted a response in the thread. No need to move the thread. The basic rules still apply. Just call for help when necessary.Thanks
AdminPD

Dawn Bertot busy digging rabbit holes in the thread again. Message 205Edited by jar, : add link

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

Dawn is still replying to off-topic posts: Message 220

Why is my message Message 41 "bad stuff"?Is it not on-topic to point out the flaws in someone's argument?Edited by Panda, : No reason given.Edited by Panda, : No reason given.