Phi for All

Either or, is it? I call False Dilemma, since my stance is neither. And your second option is a strawman. You see why it's so hard to discuss this with you? The way you frame your stance is murky and belligerent, and sets the whole discussion up as confrontational. Can we try something different? Since you make it personal, if my daughter told me she never felt right being called "she" or "her", am I supposed to tell her she can't feel that way because that's how she was born? If she told me she was gay and I accepted that, why wouldn't I use the pronouns she wants me to? Every person who talks about us during a day uses gender pronouns several times in each conversation. If they don't feel right to you for any reason, that's got to be quite a burden. Every conversation you hear words ABOUT YOU that you don't feel right, that point out to you that you don't fit what people call "normal". If I look through another person's eyes, I can see how different their world is from mine. I'm glad it's that way, since if everyone was like me, the rest of you would be superfluous.

! Moderator Note Topics merged. The question "can you learn it in a week?" is now the opening post.

Well thanks for this. I let you know that a particular tactic was objectionable, you saw the merit in that objection, and you've agreed to make changes that will make our interactions more meaningful and help us both learn. I appreciate that, and it's the same spirit I try to have when I hear about what others find objectionable. Over the years, what I've found is that my perspective often overlaps with iNow, and where it doesn't he's usually got good points to make. They're usually so good that he defends them meticulously, and more than once we've scraped a topic down to the bone to get definitions and stances we can both accept. Trying to also deal with fallacious reasoning and misinterpretations from others, triple-refuting many arguments, and having to reiterate your main points ad infinitum often makes one look opinionated and intractable. I try to focus on the argument itself, and forget who is making it. None of this is personal, it should all be about the ideas, the science, the observations. Nothing should focus on attacking the person who's talking, only on the things they say and the way they're presented.

The whole thread I've felt like those supporting JP's claims are just trying to make up the most outlandish examples they can to support their view that the folks who're serious about this are delusional, with the caveat that they aren't suggesting people who actually deserve respect are delusional. Your posts in particular, koti, seem to reek of rolleyes and a lack of empathy for those interested in a serious dialogue. I was hoping to spin some of these more interesting topics off into their own threads since this one has become so toxic and boring. Right now, for some, the respect these people are asking for seems extravagant and ridiculous, beyond the basic courtesy we usually give to others. For some reason, this really pisses some folks off, but I think, like other efforts to be inclusive of more people, it will just take some time to show that what they're asking isn't that big a deal.

In koti's words, I think this is a primitive, dirty strategy where you keep bringing up refuted points. Here's what you and iNow said when he corrected you on this the first time: But now you're going back and claiming inference... AGAIN! Please stop.

! Moderator Note If you have any scientific support for your arguments, you should place it somewhere in the opening post, so members can assess whether discussing your topic is meaningful or not. Grandiose claims with no substance or support aren't interesting, nor are smug semantic tricks. To stay in Speculations, you still need to discuss actual science, because hey, Science Discussion Forums, right? You know the drill, please use more rigor when making assertions.

! Moderator Note You have a thread in Speculations for your pet idea. Please restrict your posts to that thread. Hijacking is against the rules.

! Moderator Note You need to present your case here. We have no way of knowing if you're simply trying to drive traffic to your YT channel, which is against the rules here. You need to support your assertions with mainstream science. Gut feelings aside, this is science discussion, so you need MORE RIGOR if you're going to persuade anyone here you might be onto something. We're rooting for you because it would be exciting if you're right, but you need to tick all the boxes and support your idea with evidence.

Personally, I think we should ignore the red herring. This is not about some cultural shift in sensibilities, or even about misapplied condemnation. This is about money and power influencing the optics of social media and news cycles. If I'm an A-list celebrity who makes $40M a picture, I have people who make sure my image is just the way I want it. If I do something insensitive or stupid, professional spin is at my fingertips. And if it was bad enough that folks want to boycott my movie, my publicist cries "cancel culture" and now I'm the victim instead of the asshat. This is one way wealthy folks/corporations cheat the system and stay in power. If I'm Chik-fil-A and I have hard, disapproving policies regarding gay folks or any religion but Christian, it benefits me greatly to shuffle off any guilt in the matter by claiming liberal bias and cancel culture is ruining my business. I can make a conscious decision to make myself the victim, in which case I lose the gay and non-Christian business (mostly), but all the folks who think the gays and non-Christians are ganging up on me are going to go out of their way to buy my chicken.

I think this stance is practically designed for confirmation bias. If you don't like the boycott, you can claim they're not serious, and are only jumping on the bandwagon. If I boycott your company, you can claim I'm uninformed. And if you don't agree with my reasons, you aren't going to accept them as evidence for boycotting.

I'm reading LOTS these days about extremists with access to technology that lets them take their marginal, radical views and multiply them to make them seem legion. But corporate spin has been much better funded for a much longer time. If anyone is weaponizing a social movement, it's between wacko loners with big gripes and internet anonymity, and large corporate machines cranking out propaganda and smear and sympathy for profit. It sure works out well for those folks if we feel too guilty to cancel them for reasons of our own.

Oooh, this should probably be its own thread. I'd like to know what the fuss is about. It makes no sense to me. Choosing something over something else is the basic definition of market consumption. The more choices we're offered, the more we're forced to choose. If something about that choice later makes us reconsider, we're free to choose something else. I really believe those companies/celebrities whose products or services have become objectionable are the ones calling it "cancel culture", and playing the victim card. To me, it's just part of how I choose between so MANY offerings. I've stopped doing business with companies that moved their HQ to foreign countries to avoid paying US taxes. I've stopped doing business with companies because I and others have been treated poorly by their representatives. I've stopped choosing old movies with Walter Brennan in them since I found out he was a horrible racist, same with Mel Gibson once he stopped trying to hide it. I buy shoes that aren't made by children for slave wages, because I used to, and I found out what was happening, and I cancelled my orders. Damn skippy I did. I don't see how this is some new kind of "culture", other than the fact that we now have more choices and options than humans ever had before, and more online groups that share their experiences. I've been doing this my whole life. I watched my father cut up his Monkey Wards card and mail it back to them after they tried to charge buyer's insurance without his signature. He wasn't the only one, and it wasn't long before that particular tactic was deemed illegal, and laws actually changed.

! Moderator Note We would prefer it if you'd focus on answering the science, and leave the trumping out of it. This might account for your past discussion forum failures, so let's approach this differently this time, shall we? If you're banned, it will be because you broke the rules, not because you challenged mainstream concepts.

But if someone asked you not to use it....

Here's a more down-to-Earth example I'd like you to consider regarding the gender terms issue. Some people are uncomfortable when anyone around their same age or work status calls them "sir" or "ma'am", because equals shouldn't use such terms of respect with each other. How do you feel about those terms? Are they really that different than he/him she/her etc? I have a bad habit of calling everybody I don't know sir/ma'am when I deal with them, and I never thought about how it might be misconstrued since many of these folks are younger than I am. I never intended it to be sarcastic or insulting, but others don't know that. I remember one guy who told me, "Don't call me sir, my dad's still alive!" I laughed, but that might really have made the guy uncomfortable and old.

! Moderator Note So, you're saying that mainstream explanations aren't "honest"? I'm not sure that worldview will work out on a science discussion forum. Since you're only going to get replies you're only going to ignore, I'm not leaving this open in Physics. Since you reject mainstream explanations overall wrt relativity, it's pointless to move this to Speculations, so I'm just going to close it. Two pages should be enough to show others where the trustworthy reasoning is.

! Moderator Note OK, help me out here. You're not asking questions anymore, you're claiming "relativity has failed in X" without supplying any science to support yourself. You know you can't just wave your hands or appeal to incredulity. This should be moved to Speculations, but that won't help if you aren't willing to offer more support. You're soapboxing pretty much here, and ignoring replies that you've asked for. If you want to stay in mainstream, listen to the mainstream replies you're getting and respond accordingly. If you want to defend your beliefs in Speculations, then please provide some science to support the stances.

"Undeserving" plays well with the average confirmation bias too. "I know I'm a good person who works hard, so I deserve whatever good thing comes my way, but when I hear about something good happening to others, I'm not so sure they deserve it." We do seem to worship the concept of rich, ruthless, shrewd businesspeople who will trample over everybody (except you & me, obviously) to get what they want. That kind of wealth seems to buy MUCH more than its dollar value; our ethics, our honor, our compassion, and our sympathy are for sale because of this jealous outlook.

I feel this way too! And to me, some of Jordan Peterson's arguments seem just as intolerant. And the fact that he claims to be a liberal pointing out the absurdity of the liberal position on these specific minorities doesn't pass the stink test for me. I think JP is more like me, and is choosing when to apply his conservative/liberal stances rather than paint himself with a wider brush. And I think he's tricking "conservatives" who think the gender terms issue is silly into thinking a "liberal" is siding with them. I think JP is helping right wing thinkers marginalize a group they don't approve of, for whatever reason, and you can bet it will be taught that way in schools if they have anything to say about it.

I think it means, "Are you lazy? ---> Blame those less fortunate than you because it's easier than actually addressing the problem..."

Actually, I'm hoping you can identify a specific part of this overall discussion that you'd like to focus on, and then I can split your post (and any replies) off to its own thread where we can have a better signal to noise ratio. Some of the issues have overlap, but talking about them all at once hasn't been very productive for anyone.

If this were true, I don't think the wealthy would have as many problems paying their taxes. What they forget is that paying their fair share of their success within the system allows those who aren't as successful to prosper and bring their gifts and skills to the economy, which often don't revolve around making a profit or accumulating wealth. When the wealthy get it in their heads that they shouldn't be subsidizing those who don't have their skills, that's when the common folks start talking about revolution. This is a recurring cycle, but in modern times, the density of the wealth coupled with technology that spreads their spin on society to the masses probably makes them feel like they can finally force the middle and working classes to pay ALL the taxes from now on.

Very good point. I rather like walking on the sidewalks for a few dollars a year in taxes, as opposed to the monthly fee I'd be charged if they were privately owned. And don't forget, when a group wants to reduce taxation for social spending, they're usually also aiming to reduce funding for regulation as well. Our taxes pay to keep our goods and services free from contamination and bad practices. I would venture to say that these groups cost taxpayers several times what the OP's "lazy" citizens cost us. These "greedy" folks waste far more taxes, and don't contribute as much to the economy overall. And when they use their wealth to lobby for less taxes for themselves, they compound the problem for the rest of us.

True market capitalism requires those who are more successful within that system to subsidize those who are less successful within that system through taxation. Everyone is needed, but not all are good at accumulating wealth, so we need taxes for programs that fill the gaps in a system of private ownership. The wealthy don't need libraries and museums and swimming pools and parks because their homes have all these things and more, so taxes are required to build facilities the rest of us can share. I also think the depiction of social programs as free handouts for the lazy to be naive and small-minded, but to be fair, the right has been pushing this myth forever, or at least since Reagan and his Black Welfare Queen. FOX News famously pushes these myths and has since their beginning. More misinformation aimed at reducing much needed social spending, and a very sad perspective on modern life in large societies.

I used to feel the same way about threads where people focused mostly on ridicule and making the other person's arguments look silly rather than making their own look strong, but all we can ever do is voice our concerns and see if they're shared, and hopefully the reasoning gets the spotlight instead of the drama.