Poll: Does Buzsaw Deny Obvious Error?

Hi, all!Buzz asked me to start a poll. This is from Message 257: I guess Buzsaw wants a referendum on whether people agree with this point or not. Seems like both votes and/or comments would be valid responses.--Percy

I appreciate that this is at buzsaw's request, and not an attempt by Percy to rally the troops, but unless I am asked individually by the one wanting a "self-evaluation", I'll decline to comment.Rather than focus on negative aspects, let me say that in the recent discussion, buzsaw disagreed with good grace, and that Percy, as usual, behaved with not the slightest show of malice or unfairness.Disagreement is inevitable in these discussions. So also is somewhat irrational argument or poor comprehension. Pointing out errors in argument is not a personal insult or cause for moral judgement; even if you disagree on the matter.Cheers -- Sylas

Though I guess I agree I started this way, I don't think I ended this way. When Buzz once again asserted that we were giving up on convincing him because our arguments and evidence were weak I could have ignored it, but I instead stated my opinion that what looks to him as weak arguments and evidence is actually a lack of comprehension on his part.Hopefully few here view a lack of comprehension as a negative. None of us understand everything, and I enter myself into evidence as exhibit 1. But I think everyone should be amenable to exploring the nature of their understanding when questions are raised about it.Politely explaining scientific viewpoints to those willing to listen, even if they don't accept, can be very rewarding. I know it has been for me. One of the puzzles EvC Forum tries to address through effective moderation is how to deal with a wide variety of difficult debating styles, one of which is displayed by Buzsaw. Abandoning the field of discussion to allow Buzz to declare our evidence and arguments weak is not an option. But pointing out lack of comprehension skills isn't constructive, either. And continuing to politely describe the scientific viewpoints over and over again has been shown to not work, as well as unfairly taxing our time and tempers. There seem no satisfactory answers.--Percy

I think I will follow your lead, Sylas, and wait until Buz more clearly asks my opinion.

Actually, if I remember correctly, what I asked for was a ballot vote thread. I didn't specify, but I had in mind a yes or no anonymous vote. I realize, of course that being one of the scanty few here who are bonafide ID creationists, relative to the great number of evolutionists, it was a risky proposal, given so many regard "incorrect statements" as anything contrary to one's views of science and the interpretation of what one observes. This's my problem with what I regard as personal attacks by Percy. Things like infinite space, boundless space, expanding space between things without movement of those things, Big bang, no outside of, endless time, infinite universe, regulated universe via ID, diety, relativity, boundless space, expanding universe, infinite density, origins, et al. All these physics subjects have scientists on both sides of the isle of interpretation and conclusions. My interpretations and conclusions concerning nearly all of these are contrary to the large majority here who go with the secularistic and evolutionist view. In debate I have the need to repeate my unpopular position on these things. The great debate thread went on and on page after page with discussion on many of these issues. I thought it was interesting and productive dialoge. But then, as has happened so often in the past, Percy gets personal and begins to belittle my intelligence rather than sticking to the thread topic with fair and square debate. Via google, most of the positions I refused to concede, were positions which some people of much higher education and scientific knowledge than I would agree with, such as boundless space, infinite universe, et al, yet Percy sees the need to get personal with me and belittle me for dogedly holding to a view opposed to his on these. Though there are scientists who would have espoused my position on much of what was debated all the pages of the great debate discussion thread, were they members here and involved, I was left pretty much alone in all those pages to debate a sizeable number of counterparts. I believe I debated in a forthright, intelligent, fair and square manner with all these posters, who, imo, never imperically refuted my arguments as to have been proven to be false. Most had their viable answers and I had my mine, depending on how one interprets the observed. For example, one person sees space as static and things in space moving. Others see space expanding so as to give the appearance of things moving away from one another, yet being static/unmoving. Though narry human being has ever observed the vast unknown unseed area of the universe beyond our ability to observe, one hypothesizes unbounded space and an infinite universe whereas another hypothesizes bounded finite space. As to which one hypothesizes, the opposing views on this alone makes a big, big difference on how one is going to interpret what is observed. The same goes with ID.I could go on and on here, but having said the above, what I'd like to see here, is an anonymous ballot. Why? Because the vote would then be more forthright and objective and non-personal. Some who agree with Percy might be reluctant to publically vote against the underdog/minority simply to show kindness and not appear vindictive. Others who are ideological friends of Percy, but feel his charges are overblown/overstated might not want to publically vote accordingly.Actually, the voting could be done separately from the comments, so as for those who wish to comment could do so without revealing their actual vote.I would hope that those who care to participate in the thread would take a good look at the whole thread of the GD discussion, or at least a scan of it (I now this would take some time) and determine whether my posting conduct was doged and stubborn nonsense on my part or whether my arguments were worthy of debate. After all, I think that is the issue here.I did not request this thread to get myself in the spotlight. I hate having to continually defend my posting conduct with threads like this, because of Percy's relentless personal attacks (as I see them), but when he demeans my posting integrity here, I see no alternative, but to challenge those attacks until such time he is willing to get specifc and show that my behavior here is indeed CONSISTIANLY, I SAY CONSISTANTLY, out of order. I say, "consistanly," because none of us here including myself are squeeky clean in our "modus operendi."I would hope the ballot and voting, as well as the remarks would be objectively based on my modus operendi and not on whether my views are correct in the idiological eyes of the voter. This should not be a referrendum on ideology nor should it be a rehashment of the topic debate science issues.

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In Jehovah God's Universe, time, energy and boundless space had no beginning and will have no ending. The universe, by and through him, is, has always been and forever will be intelligently designed, changed and managed by his providence. buzsaw

1. Percy, you admitted to learning something from the thread, and I certainly learned a lot from this debate. Hopefully others did as well.
2. Some challenges were presented by arguments which made the thread interesting, imo......interesting to the point that even my more scientifically apprised counterparts were scratching ideological heads (their own), doing some challenging physics and generating rigorous debate about some questions many have coming to mind from time to time in life.
3. It was a multipage debate allowing the members to get into the mind of a bonafide ID creationist on science/physics problems about the universe.
4. In all those, pages of fair and square debate, minimal evidence of "taxed tempers" can be shown, as I remember without checking. I believe the most taxed temper was my own, after you and Ned did your modus operendi thing of getting personal with me by maligning my posting modus and comprehensive skills. This, after I consistenly, objectively, painstakenly and forthrightly responded to nearly every poster in the entire lengthy multipage thread. One exception was Brad Mc,Fall, whose vocabulary and phraseology was above my ability to comprehend for response, for the most part. I extended a considerable amount of time and thought into that thread, and frankly was infurioriated to have you and Ned come at me after all this effort on my part to debate from a minority view, a host of counterparts on the Great Debate subject between Jar and myself.This message has been edited by buzsaw, 01-23-2005 13:07 AM

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In Jehovah God's Universe, time, energy and boundless space had no beginning and will have no ending. The universe, by and through him, is, has always been and forever will be intelligently designed, changed and managed by his providence. buzsaw

Buz dear, if what you are looking for is the poll I posted at John Davison's request than I can set it up for you.Poll found here Message 1

First, anonymity isn't possible here, and you know that. There are no forums here that permit unregistered posting.And what you actually requested in Message 256 was: I believe I followed your request. What your asking me to do is convince you that my view of your behavior is correct. That is an impossible task. You're rarely convinced by anyone of anything, and certainly not about anything concerning your own behavior.Let me describe what I observe you doing without assigning you any self-justifying motivations.First you make a statement that is intepreted as being wrong, and it garners several replies pointing out that it is wrong. You deny that it is wrong because you actually meant something different than what people thought. People point out you're still making arguments consistent with your wrong statement. You argue that they are not really inconsistencies. The discussion quickly bogs down and the original point becomes forgotten or lost. When this is mentioned later as an example of this behavior, you deny that anyone ever proved that this was the case.I think my earlier question that you didn't answer is something worthwhile for you to think about. How do you tell the difference between something you think you understand but don't, versus something you think you understand and do?--Percy

I like to talk to Buz, but for my part, this accurately describes his behavior in almost every thread I've participated with him in, except maybe the religion threads (where the advantage of knowledge is often on his side.)I don't see this as Percy's personal vendetta against Buz, but it's not lost on me that we're on the same side of the ol' "aisle".Oh, and I don't think anyone would begrudge a reluctance to respond to Brad.This message has been edited by crashfrog, 01-23-2005 14:33 AM

1. Could you cite an example?2. The main difference I see in dialogue with you in comparison to Percy is that you generally do deal with specifics and refrain from personal attack, so far as I recall.
I hope that you and others who post here will cite specific examples of my inability to comprehend issues to the extent that I need to discuss those specific issues. Unspecified generalization will accomplish nothing so far as discussion of the alleged problem goes here.3. Please note that I did ask a number of questions, particularly to Sylas who was patient and gratious in responding to them. The reason I asked these quesions is so as to comprehend better, his position. After his response, I then often discussed the problems or alternatives that I considered to be possible. On occasion his answers to questions were followed by another question relative to his answer.4. Persons familiar with the debate should remember that after I suggested an interpretation to the grids of Asgara's charts, after having thought about it I did post a refutation to my own interpretation and corrected my position. The reason I waited until the next day to do this is that after I shut down and went to bed, I thought about it and realized that I had been misstaken.

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In Jehovah God's Universe, time, energy and boundless space had no beginning and will have no ending. The universe, by and through him, is, has always been and forever will be intelligently designed, changed and managed by his providence. buzsaw

What I'm asking you to do is to document that my behavior is consistantly incorrect as your unspecified generalized charges imply. Big difference. How do you expect to convince me without documentation and being so generalized? Isn't that what the guidelines call for?Let me describe what I observe you doing without assigning you any self-justifying motivations. If you're referring to the grid interpretation, please document that my behavior subsequent to correction was as you say. If it's not that, what are you alluding to. Certainly you cannot document that this was my consistent behavior in in the 8 or so page thread. I responded with a three point answer. What in it did you not understand? Wherein did I not answer? Again, Percy, this is an example of your meanspirited modus operendi. If you didn't think my answer was adequate, imo, you should not charge me with failure to answer, but to do the decent thing and specify as to how you considered that it was not sufficient. I hate trying to dialog with you as opposed to other nicer posters for this very reason. You're a nice guy to your ideological friends, but imo, you need to learn to be fair and balanced in treatment of posters as head admin.

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In Jehovah God's Universe, time, energy and boundless space had no beginning and will have no ending. The universe, by and through him, is, has always been and forever will be intelligently designed, changed and managed by his providence. buzsaw

All I can say to that, my friend, is to be glad you've not been on the receiving end of Percy's alleged fairness and balance, as this ID creationist has been these past, nearly 2 years. I've managed to get along with most posters here over time. If Percy would treat me as well/fair and balanced as most of you all do, we wouldn't be discussing this thread, imo.I would think that, given the lack of ID input here for evo posters to debate and readers to read, Percy would welcome unique views to make it interesting and balanced as well as someone who is willing to take the time and put in the effort to afford this variety. It appears that the only ones he really in his heart wants are those who are easily trounced by him and his idiological friends, so as not to allow the waves of discenting views to rise too high in his town.Many threads, in which I have been the principle counterpart to the majority over the time I've been here get red hot, which indicates to me that though posters don't agree, they welcome the challenges I put forth.Percy, imo has a lota good qualities. He's smart and efficient. For the most part he provides a good forum for the www. I guess it's this unjustified vendetta he seems to have with me that often makes life miserable here when he goes on personal attack. The only thing I can attribute it to is that I, being an undegreed layman am able to intelligently go a number of pages with the best minds here and able survive the gauntlet of the counterpart overhelming majority arguments. I weigh my positions carefully before sticking my neck out, though there are times that I mess up as is unique to all posters at some time or another.Thanks, btw, for you gracious comments concerning my behavior.

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In Jehovah God's Universe, time, energy and boundless space had no beginning and will have no ending. The universe, by and through him, is, has always been and forever will be intelligently designed, changed and managed by his providence. buzsaw

Yes, I was aware of that, but thought there might be a provision for voting, which would not require a user to post, perse, in doing so. In the NOPC forum I participated in before coming here as in the old Newsmax forum, posters were able to do that without posting, but by pressing a yes or no vote button.

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In Jehovah God's Universe, time, energy and boundless space had no beginning and will have no ending. The universe, by and through him, is, has always been and forever will be intelligently designed, changed and managed by his providence. buzsaw

Yes, and I'm trying to search for it now, but it's half-remembered. It was another one of these "what's the deal with Buz?" kinds of threads; I think maybe Schraf started it? Do you remember the one I'm talking about? I think we're all worried that you're simply going to turn this thread into an argument about each specific example, rather than about how these obviously connected behaviors can be rectified. I would be surprised if examples are particularly forthcoming; I know we've tried it before and what happens is, we rehash the argument where the difficulty occured because you won't see it as part of the overal pattern we're describing.I think you have a legitimate right to see examples of what you're being accused of; but in order for those to appear I think we'd like to see some assurance on your part that you're going to accept the examples as part of the pattern we're trying to describe and not rehash the original discussion where it took place. Even if you disagree with the pattern itself, which you have every right to do, you need to understand where we're coming from on this, and so you need to not sidetrack the topic with discussions of the original context of the examples. I'm not familiar with the most recent debate in question so if you're behavior has recently undergone a sea change, I wouldn't know. Percy doesn't seem to think so, and I presume that he was a better observer in your debate than I was. (I think I maybe looked at the thread twice.) But maybe I'm wrong.All I wanted to get across was that at least one other person, who is motivated by no malice towards your person (because I like talking with you), agreed that Percy's assessment appeared accurate. Who knows? Maybe we're all crazy and you're the sane one. A concientious communicator would want to know why he seemed to be the odd man out, however.

The very best part of this thread is that Buz himself started it.http://EvC Forum: WHEN BUZ QUITS THE THREAD -->EvC Forum: WHEN BUZ QUITS THE THREAD