OK, let me chime in.
I agree that perhaps less political discussion might be helpful for a
while. But the answer isn't to "ban" political discussion, it is to
have other discussions that are non-political.
The trouble is that so many of the big questions about the future MUST
be political and economic in nature. Deciding to spend trillions of
dollars on alternate energy will never happen without political and
economic debate. It is inherently political, as are just about every
human activity. Hell, even the purest of pure research has its
political squabbles over funding and who gets the corner cyclotron and
who disrespected who in the swimsuit issue of Chemical Abstracts.
For instance, we can't discuss the future of cloning and genetic
engineering without bringing up our current bioethics law and culture.
And this is surely going to bring in things like abortion, how medical
care should be funded, where human life begins and ends, etc. The
reason is that our ideas about how biotechnology should be applied are
already being applied right now, today, as we speak. We can't propose
a model bioethics platform for the future without comparing it our
current system of bioethics.
So...I propose that people who want to see less political discussion
refrain from posting in "pure" political threads, even if they see
someone saying something that they disagree with. Also, begin and
participate in threads OTHER than political threads.
I notice that certain people (I'm not saying who, but his initials are
JDG) tend to be instigators, and feel the need to stir things up.
Well, if you want to decrease such people's discussion of politics, you
need to distract him with other pretty things to play with. "Look,
over there! That guy said Captain Kirk is better than Captain Picard!"
And I also agree with Marvin, the biggest differences on the list are
not liberal vs conservative or environmentalist vs economist, but
between the people who prefer conversation and the people who prefer
debate. It is no surprise that John enjoys debate. I think our list
must accomodate people who like both. So, I would ask that people who
prefer conversation acknowledge that sometimes their hastily chosen
whimseys are going to be picked apart line by line, with footnotes and
links to tables of figures. And the debaters are going to have to
realize that the winner of a conversation isn't neccesarily the person
who puts in the last word. When you are debating, pay attention to
whether the debate is still about the topic, or has it morphed into an
argument over who disrespected who?
=====
Darryl
Think Galactically -- Act Terrestrially
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