Gripes directed toward and gripes by Adminnemooseus

Thanks for the feedback, everyone!I was a little surprised that no one liked the individualized censored-word list. It wasn't intended as a way to become more heavy-handed, but less. The idea arose from Randman's tendency to introduce the subject of Haeckel in most threads that he participated in, combined with his ignoring all requests to stay on topic. Our only current option is to suspend Randman for repeated violations of the Forum Guidelines. The individualized censored-word list capability would provide moderators a less onerous option. Instead of issuing a temporary suspension to Randman, they could instead add Haeckel to his censored-word list.All enforcement options are ultimately imperfect since anyone can obtain a new email address and reregister, and there are programs which will mask your IP. Usually style gives away those who reregister, but sometimes it takes a while, witness John Paul's return under a different account not so long ago. Hmmm, apparently we never merged his new account with his original account. Anyone remember what name he used?

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

good point. i didn't think about that. you've changed my mind. you're just full of brilliant ideas today aren't you. good on you! percy. take note of this one. i dunno. you lost me on that one. sometimes people come in with really good ideas. and sometimes lurkers post great new topics (can't think of any, but it's bound to happen sometime). and just because someone has tenure doesn't make their new topics good. yeah. it's just the internet.

from personal experience, i've found that it becomes more of a joke than anything else. well, at least with me around that is. it's mildly amusing when newbies can't figure why their posts say something different than what they're sure they wrote. it's even mroe funny when they realize that they can't use certain words.and it's especially funny to toy with them when you know how to get around it.

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אָרַח

I wrote:

quote:

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Another idea that might be worth thinking about is to let people earn their right to start topics by first participating in existing dicussions for a while, in order to prove their ability to discuss things.

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Brennakimi responded: Really good ideas will survive an initial period of participation in existing discussions. Perhaps an appropriate thread already exists where the idea might be put forward. And lurkers might indeed post a great new topic, but that's not because they are lurkers, it's just because it's a great new topic. Also, the topic may be great, but that doesn't necessarily mean they are able to discuss it very well. The idea is that you don't get tenure by just posting any old garbage until you've reached a fixed number of messages, but that the quality of your messages is evaluated by one or more admins. If they think what you post is okay, then you might earn tenure with even one post.The point is that you prove to be worth it. I'm sure there are lurkers out there who have read these forums for months, or even years, and who by now know exactly what it takes to make a brilliant opening post. But there are also those who barge in here, guns ablaze, quote mining or spouting utter nonsense, and making it abundantly clear that they haven't spent even five minutes reading up on how things are set up here.

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science." - Charles Darwin.

I wrote:

quote:

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Another idea that might be worth thinking about is to let people earn their right to start topics by first participating in existing dicussions for a while, in order to prove their ability to discuss things.

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Not wanting to come over as presumptious or anything, but I'd like to make it clear that when I wrote this, I had alphablue82 in mind. His or her "New topic" is a case in point.This message has been edited by Parasomnium, 12-Jan-2006 09:33 PM

there's few messages that are "gripes at Moose".alphablue82 is a bit of a problem, but Lysimachus has been worse. And s/he has been around for over 1 1/2 years and has posted (as I type this) 334 messages.I'm not sure if you're proposing the exemption from the "Proposed New
Topics" process for the proven members, and requiring the "PNT" process for the newbees, or are suggesting a total "no starting new topics" for the newbees. The later is in affect (effect?) the same as a partial suspension.I think all members should have equal topic starting rights, until they abuse such rights. If abuses happen, then comes the partial suspension mentioned in the previous paragraph.I still think the "PNT" process should remain as is.Adminnemooseus

I'm sorry, I didn't mean to let it run off-topic. alphablue2 was the one I noticed. No, I'm not proposing that... nor that... but something like that. I think it wouldn't be a bad idea if they have to earn those rights. {added by edit}As I suggested before, some new posters might earn those rights with their first contribution to an existing discussion. But others might have to learn a few tricks of the trade, so to speak, before they could start a topic of their own. I think it could be (another) worthwhile method to keep the abundant growth of topics under control.This message has been edited by Parasomnium, 12-Jan-2006 11:39 PM

Certain unique threads are such that the minority Biblical fundamentalist position has only two or three active posters on the board to do the responses to a number of counterparts. This often necessitates intense high volumn of posting by the fundie. This is why these unique hot threads in which Faith and I sometimes get embroyled in get so intense and fast. Sometimes such threads are only of interest to one of the fundies or only one is available to participate in the short timespan of the thread. So that means that the poster has even more to do in order to keep up with the majortiy counterparts interested in the subject.Often in these threads two people get into it at length, page after page. When this happens it may, on occasion, become necessary for admins to access the nature of the exchanges as to whether alotayada is the problem or that it is a good and substantial debate. I'm glad Randman is back. Imo, we do need more active IDers in order to help aleviate this problem.AbE: changed AdminBuzsaw to buzsawThis message has been edited by buzsaw, 01-13-2006 12:30 AM

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Gravity is God's glue that holds his universe together.

i agree that such threads should be taken into account. in fact sometimes that sort of thing can happen on a rather ordinary thread. but i think the best is a per minute post limit or so. it's widely precedented. and maybe rollover posts? but limited a bit. we don't want people not posting for a year and then posting 8000000000000000 posts randomly one day. not that it's plausible...This message has been edited by brennakimi, 01-13-2006 12:41 AM

and you bring it up in a topic such as one of the "General discussion of moderation procedures" topics, please include a link back to the topic and/or message(s) in question.From here: Prior to Admin having supplied the information, it seems that no one else did. I suspect Admin had to expend a fair amount of effort just to track down the "thread in question". I know I've had to do like efforts in the past.If the problem discussion goes on for a while, it certainly wouldn't hurt to occassionly repeat the link.Adminnemooseus

I think that's a great suggestion. Perhaps it can be run just like POTM, but rather "problem of the moment".Restrict discussions of problems to a link citation followed by a short discussion of the problem.On the specific example you gave, the admin did not supply the correct link at all. Indeed it showed a running assumption by the admin in question which likely contributed to problems he was having with me. I believe that points to issues on both sides of the equation.People with issues can be more specific, and mods taking action need to take the time to try to understand the problem they are dealing with. If they don't know, then they should ask for clarification.

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holmes
"If you're going to kick authority in the teeth, you might as well use two feet. " (K.Richards)

Time to reactivate this topic.I've been wondering if we need a new forum called "Position Statements". It could be set up that any member could start their personal topic there, where they could give a summary of their basic positions on such things as creationist or evolutionist, young Earth creationist or old Earth creationist, Christian or atheist, omnivor or vegan, etc. It could be set up to be "one message per topic, no replies". If a person wanted to change his/her position statemnet, they would edit their message 1, as always, preferably making clear what the edit changes were.Or perhaps such info should have a place at member profile pages.One thing about Faith - I may totally disagree with most to all of her positions, but those positions are very clear.Now that said, most directly, this message is a response to Robinrohan, who here, at the "Too much moderation on these boards?" topic, said: That message is an outgrowth of a series of Adminnemooseus messages at RR's "Proposed New Topic" (PNT) "Whatever brute or blackguard made the world": A study of an argument against God.There, in various messages, I said such things as: Please see the cited topic for the full conversation.Nowhere did I say that I though RR was a creationist. But somehow, in regards to moderations actions, RR somehow tends to get lumped in with the creationists. When s/he gets admin reprimanded and/or suspended, it seems it is the creationist side that comes to condemn the admin action.Now, I fully admit that I find RR to be a very confusing personality (which may or may not be the same as being a "confused personality"). You can check out his/her message via here. Perhaps it is because RR, despite being an atheist-nihlist-evolutionist, at least sometimes (my vague personal impression) argues topics as a "devils advocate"?Currently, as Minnemooseus, I have started a "Great Debate" topic titled What variety of creationist is Buzsaw? (Minnemooseus and Buzsaw only). There, in message 2, I said: Minnemooseus had also started the earlier topic aimed at Randman, titled Yec/Not Yec? - A "let's keep it short topic"Enough for now,Adminnemooseus

The following concerns the creationism/evolution debate, and not other varieties of debate at .Faith posts elsewhere: I'll make no judgement on his objectivity, but I think Faith may have hit upon something with the "neutrality".Now, for a moderator, neutrality is to be strived for. But Robinrohan (RR) is not participating as a moderator. In the creationism/evolution debate, creationism (particularly the YEC variety) and evolution are polar opposites. If one is indeed participating is said debate while truely comming from a neutral position, then one is comming from no position. Thus, maybe there is good reason why Moose and others are confused by him. Now, certainly, evolutionists can question and debate details in evolutionary theory. To what degree is RR is asking these questions from an evolutionist position, and to what degree he is asking such from some sort of "devils advocate" (ie pseudo-creationist) position is the question. I don't offhand have the answer to that question. So, English teacher type logical processing is superior to scientist type logical processing when it comes to considerations of evolutionary theory? Maybe this is a topic in itself. This, to me, sounds like the "An enemy of my enemy is my friend" type of reasoning. This is the sort of thing that Terry at Terry's Talk Origins did in regards to John A. Davison's non-Darwinist evolutionary ideas. John's position was totally contrary to Terry's YEC position, yet Terry loved John's input because it was against a common enemy. But when I point this out to them, I was rebuked as trying to "divide and conquer". The division was already there; It was not of my attempted creation. But John and Terry were totally unwilling to debate each other over their vastly different perspectives.Adminnemooseus

I think a major point is that Faith likes the idea that evolution is incompatible with Christianity, and so does Robin. Robin is so "neutral and objective" about this that he still phrases his argument that way (again, and again) even though evolution itself isn't really an issue in the argument.So I think that what Faith likes in Robin is a refusal to be logical, neutral or objective.

Maybe he will come along and explain himself on this, but my impression is that if he participates at all in those debates, which is pretty rare I think, he takes the position of an interrogator because he wants to learn from them, having no great knowledge of the science issues.He thinks the fossil gradations in some species are convincing proof of evolution though, and I forget what else. {Late edit: Oh, and the fossil "hominid" skulls he finds convincing. (Alas)} I would guess neither. He's trying to find out if the support for evolution really holds or not (and also, quite seriously, whether God exists}, and he, miracle of miracles, actually finds some of the arguments on the creo side to be reasonable -- the Fall for instance -- which can't be said for anybody else here. That's what I meant by his objectivity and neutrality. He believes in evolution but on the other hand, he sees implications of it that don't make sense -- in relation to the incorporeality of the mind for instance, {edit: or of theistic evolutionism} the idea that God must either be cruel or nonexistent if evolution is true, and so on. He also has problems with the idea of God, such as what he calls "the accidental nature of life" which seems to him would not be the case if there were a God; as well as the usual problem that there is no direct objective evidence of God. To juggle all these things as he does takes an objective mindset towards all of it, and I don't see this position represented by anyone here EXCEPT Robin. I meant "the scientists HERE" not necessarily all scientific reasoning. I think people here are logically very sloppy and don't mind calling something logical that just isn't, and insisting on it when it doesn't make a lick of sense. Robin was attacked for his reasoning as not being logical at all and that was indefensible in my opinion. If his logic is faulty in places, that should be demonstrable, but the opponents' logic was deplorable, but there is no way to prove that in this environment of bias where sometimes absurd things are said with a great deal of aggression. Actually it is based on identifying with him, or just appreciating how he thinks, because he is in a somewhat similar place to where I was before I became a Christian, though he goes about it very differently than I did.Edited by Faith, : added parenthetical note about theistic evolutionism for clarityEdited by Faith, : added a few things here and there, changed a wordEdited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : noted in post