Can we please get rid of the On the Fringe section?

It's nothing but a soapbox for the crazies. (me included)

 

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But that's where I think we ought to move the Religion Forum... :argue:

 

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There are many good reasons why it should stay, but I feel like they're wasted on such an argument as yours, since the best answer to your query is simply this: If you don't like it, stay out of it.

 

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What are these good reasons exactly (besides site traffic)? This is supposed to be a science forum is it not? Why are the people who post in this section against science allowed to continue posting without consequence? Why are some banned for this (Pincho Paxton) while others like masterov allowed to continually post new treads on the same topic?

 

hmmm... this has got me thinking. I really don't like a lot of the new rock n roll music being released now and there is a new rock station that I am able to get on my radio. I think I'll ask them to stop broadcasting....

haha...

Personally, I was attracted to this site to learn more about science in general and it has been an incredible tool for that. I am also interested (from an entertainment perspective) in the "fringe" topics that are discussed. I like reading about conspiracies (funny stuff), kooky theories, and the like. I think there is quite abit of interesting material that can be discussed about these topics without having to suffer (overly much) the bs that they bring with them. I like that members jump in there to stop the threads from becoming too much like "sharing campfire stories" and try to get people to be held accountable for their statements. For example, if someone has a claim, say to be telepathic or something, they should be encouraged to test their claims and get information here from people that work within (or understand the processes of) the scientific community. If they get a "hard time" because they are LIARS, then all the better.

 

Yes, but they are not playing this rock music on the classical music station, which would be the equivilent here. I would actually say it's even worse then that. Having converstations about bigfoot on a science site is like turning on the radio and listening to modem noise hour.

 

All I am saying is that just because it is "on my dial", I don't have to tune into that station at all. Just as you don't have to look in those forums... or am I missing something?

I would think that if someone is seriously looking to find evidence with credibility then a scientific site is where you could start at least. If they just want to share "ghost stories" then this probably isn't the right place.

 

I really am hoping that certain people involved with making claims about psychic abilities take up some of the members on their generous offers to conduct experiments with them... Now that alone is worth the price of admission, no?

 

Well, site traffic certainly is one such reason. But again, the good reasons are irrelevant, because there is nothing that says you must visit the subforum if you it bothers you so much. Just stay away from it.

You can ban it from your own life by simply avoiding it. Why is that not good enough? Why do you also want to take away everyone else's right to use it?

 

So again, stay out of that forum if it bothers you so much.

 

Why are they irrelivent exactly? If there are no good reasons to have it then why have it? Especially considering that it's current level of moderation is pathetic. Again, why ban pincho but let masterov continue? His claims are every bit as refuted as pinchos were, but yet here he still is posting garbage as science.

 

Uneven moderation is no reason to get rid of a subforum. That phenomenon exists everywhere, since moderators are human beings and capable of biases and bad days. I can't tell you why Pincho Paxon was banned and someone else wasn't, but I can tell you that it isn't cause for the closure of an entire forum.

So I offer the same advice for a third time: If you don't like it, stay out of it.

 

If the fringe didn't exist then all the crazies would spam the useful forums.

 

I'd like to know what the others are, personally.

By the way: I don't think that there is any motivation other than site traffic for any of the decisions taken regarding management of this site. Why would there be?

But that doesn't preclude the existence of other good reasons, and I'm certainly curious as to what they might be. I can't see any, myself.

The maintenance of subfora targetted at cranks attracts a continuous stream of such to this site, and has an impact on the overall quality of discourse in every subforum here. The entire reason that this place isn't an actual useful science forum (like the various others out there) but rather a nesting ground for cranks, trolls and the dicks who like tweak their neuroses, is exactly its early history as a gathering place for ufo nuts and other cranks and the continued impact of such to this very day.

My read is that the powers-that-be got tired of dealing with the level of drama that engendered, and so made an effort to sequester such into the fringe subfora, but did not want to actually go all the way and turn this place into a serious science site (justified fear of the competition in that space, as well as reticense about weathering a big drop in pageviews during a hypothetical transition, being the presumptive motivations).

 

The primary good reason would be that it's a place for cranks to mingle and have a platform for ideas that would otherwise flood the genuine science subfora.

Considering that you number among the very types of people you disparage, I'm curious if this isn't just some masochistic exercise on your part, or if you genuinely lack self-awareness. Did you not just come off of a ban for the type of behavior you list here?

Or are you just venting?

In any case, as I said above, the "fringe" subfora are places for the kooks and odd ducks to share their ideas without having more qualified or educated people bashing their skulls in. Yeah, those forums could be abolished, but what you'd find in the wake of that decision is an increase of crankdom in the legitimate areas. With no place to divert that kind of silliness, it would infest the rest of the site.

And again, if you don't like it, don't go there. It's not hurting the site, it's not hurting you, so just ignore it.

 

Plenty of other science fora do a better job at that, without maintaining any crank's nests. The reason they can do that is that they don't attract cranks in the first place. This is because they don't have any crank's nest fora, and the mods don't tolerate cranks in the real science fora.

Note that our mods already do not tolerate cranks in the science fora - the only difference would be that they'd ban them, rather than redirect them to the crank's nest.

Indeed, your "good reason" there is exactly the drawback to these fora that I already cited in response to your suggestion that simply ignoring them is sufficient.

"Masochistic?" Did I suggest somewhere that said things weren't fun?

The fact that I can cogently complain about a problem that I am myself implicated in doesn't imply any lack of self-awareness. Rather the opposite. It's your assumption that anyone who complains about the organization and function of this site considers themselves to be pure as the driven snow, and in no way implicated themselves, that is naive. I'm able to explicate these issues exactly because I'm up to my eyeballs in them.

No, that's the opposite of what would happen. There's no reason that cranks need to be pouring tons of energy into this site, and if they are not tolerated they won't be here. Go and look at pretty much any serious science forum on the internet - they won't have a crank's nest, and they will have less cranks in the "serious" fora as well (our "serious" fora are themselves extremely crank-infested despite the presence of the "fringe" fora. Heck, certain of the "serious" mods are themselves cranks). This whole place works by attracting cranks, not by being a serious science forum. The "fringe" subfora are simply repositories to make the management of said cranks easier.

It is hurting the site, to the extent that anyone wants this to be a genuine, serious "science forum." A cursory comparison to any of the serious science fora on the internet will make that abundantly clear, and quickly.

But, let me re-iterate: I'm not exactly complaining about the state of things. I'm one of the audience who is attracted to this place exactly because it provides a steady stream of cranks for me to back over the head and humiliate. But your readings of how that relates to the putative goal of a "serious science forum" is way off, as is your assessment of how serious this place even is (in the non-fringe sections, that is).

Although: notice that I, personally, do stay out of the crank's nests here. Those types are far too gone to bother with, except maybe for an occasional laugh at some extreme delusions. Rather, the juicy targets are the cranks who post in the "serious" subfora - exactly because they don't think they're cranks!. They compare themselves to the crank fora - but not to other, actually serious science sites - and fool themselves.

 

I've been to other science forums, and they all have their share of pseudoscientists, cranks, and kooks.

Oh please. You're arguing against the existence of these subfora because you think it would get rid of the trolls and loons. If you thought for a second that you actually were a troll or a loon, you wouldn't be lobbying for measures to rid the site of them.

Nonsense, of course. Cranks who aren't tolerated here make sockpuppets and return. Look at you--you started posting again when you were able to, to the hour. Your behavior has been rebuked and you returned like a boomerang.

And I'd love to see some of these sites where trolls and wackos don't exist. I just checked thescienceforum.com, and they have a Pseudoscience subforum. Scienceforums.net has a "speculation" subforum with the subtitle "Pseudoscience or speculatory threads go here." Scienceforums.com has an "Alternative Theories" subforum featuring two other subfora: "Strange Claims Forum" and "Silly Claims Forum." Physicsforum.com even has a "Skepticism and Debunking" subforum, with thread titles such as "Shipwreck in the Baltic Sea? A UFO" and "How to be a Wizard?" Sciencechatoforum.com has an "Alternative Theories and MythBusters" subforum that comes with the warning "Enter at your own risk."

So it seems like just about every major science forum has a place for their kooks and loons. So what the hell are you talking about?

Since most science forums have a similar subforum, obviously you're wrong. If the science being discussed here isn't of a high quality, that's on the posters in that forum, not the weirdos in the fringe forums.

I have no idea how serious this place is in relation to other sites. All I know is that if the seriousness is lacking, it has nothing to do with the cranks. They're everywhere, and all the large sites accommodate them.

Since I made this discovery on the first two pages of the Google search "Science forum," I would recommend doing a little research on your claims before getting ahead of yourself and telling others they're wrong. You're so busy claiming to "back over the heads" of our resident pseudoscientists that you didn't notice my 20-inchers rolling over yours.

Sounds familiar...:bugeye:

 

None have zero, but I know of plenty where they're a completely marginal phenomenon. This site has a very high instance of such, to the point where they crowd out sensible discussion and mature, informed people have long since ceased participating here. Whole place is basically a crank nest, and always has been.

I was very clear in the post that you are responding to here that I am not arguing against the existence of those subfora. I said this explicitly. Rather, I'm pointing out that the existence of these fora does have a larger impact on the rest of the fora. They are not some quarantine area as you suggest. But the fact that you are factually incorrect does not imply that I desire the exact opposite policy outcome as you advocate, nor that I agree with the positions of people you addressed your fallacies to.

The larger history of this site is informative - it started out as a dedicated, unambiguous crank-and-loon forum for people into UFO theories and alien biology and the like. The current state of things resulted from an effort to balance that with some concern for actual science, but it was never ambitious enough to live up to the advertizing claims, and there are of course carry-on effects from the origins, etc. And so we're left with a crank's nest.

Again, I was explicit that I am not so lobbying. Just pointed out that your opposition to said suggestions was based on incorrect assertions.

Likewise, I was explicit that I am not in the "trolls and loons" category, but rather the "dicks who like to tweak their neuroses" category. I'm confused as to how you missed all this - I was about as clear about it as I could be. And you responded explicitly to some of that material in that very post. Are you in such a rage that you aren't even reading through your own posts for consistency?

That statement doesn't even particularly bear on the stuff you are responding to, let alone render it "nonsense."

Nah, my ban expired many hours before I returned. Which you'd know if you'd been paying the sort of attention to imply there. What do you think you're proving with this, anyway?

Is that what you think happened?

You evidently don't know my history here well enough to comment on this stuff. Like essentially all of my bans for foul language, this one was entirely intentional on my part and undertaken for a combination of political tactics and the workload at my job mandating a break anyway. I know exactly where the line in question is, and exactly what the penalties are for crossing it, and made a calculated, deliberate decision to cross it in that instance. I've been at this game for, literally, years.

Moreover: how is the facts that the moderators continue to tolerate me ("rebuke" or otherwise, I was not permabanned) supposed to go to your point? It is exactly an illustration of the fact that this site attracts and cultivates trolls, cranks and dickheads, rather than taking pains to do away with them. If they didn't want dicks like me around, they'd actually ban me for real. But, as you can see in this thread, JamesR is himself king of the dicks, and very much covets me as a target for his condescension and abuse. He just needs to make sure I don't turn this place into a cesspit of cuss words, as that will trigger blocking filters in places like public libraries and so negatively impact site traffic.

I didn't say "don't exist." I said that there exist sites where such do not substantively get in the way of serious, scientific discussion.

I suggest you read those threads - they consist of rational, scientific types setting about debunking crank claims (and making a few jokes in the process). There are no cranks or loons to be found in those threads.

Actually, the implication is that it's on the management of the site, obviously. They're the ones with the power and responsibility.

Indeed - your blatantly superficial survey of said sites above produced totally incorrect, misleading conclusions. Given that you have no idea how serious this place is in relation to other sites, you should probably stop asserting that it's as serious as anywhere as a major premise of your attacks on me. If you can manage to do that and to cease attributing to me the exact opposite of my position, maybe we can even get somewhere useful.

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