Closing of the topic "Remembering the CG Computer-Generated Pandemic Tyranny"

[AlexL]

4 hours ago, necrovore said:

What I propose is an open forum, where any ideas can be discussed.

You are free to create such a forum, but you cannot expect that a given forum owner, for example of this one, will tolerate on his premises the broadcasting of views he abhors. Or tolerate irrational behavior in a debate, for example when a person refuses to justify his claims, the concept of evidence-based debate etc.

4 hours ago, necrovore said:

It should be sufficient to require that the ideas have something to do with Objectivism.

This requirement will stop nothing: any idea may be found to have something to do with Objectivism😁

4 hours ago, necrovore said:

5 hours ago, AlexL said:

Harmed is that owner who does not want his property to be used in ways he does not desire, for example to spread ideas he hates.

I am not proposing to initiate force against anyone.

Not sure what you mean... In any case: force is not the only form of harm.

Edited March 4 by AlexL

[necrovore]

3 hours ago, DavidOdden said:

I have a general question about Objectivism, of the type “how does one use Objectivism as a tool for living?”. As I understand Objectivism, it is a central premise that man’s proper means of survival is reason, which is reducing knowledge to observation, forming concepts from measurable relationships among concretes then integrating this knowledge by logical rules into propositions.

There can be options in concept formation; the Japanese color 青い covers blue and also blue-green and maybe green in some contexts, and there are probably other examples where concepts in different languages overlap but don't coincide.

If this sort of overlap can happen between languages, it can also be possible between people who share the same language but perhaps aren't using a dictionary or aren't using the same dictionary. This doesn't mean that either one is non-objective, just as the difference in colors between English and Japanese doesn't indicate that either language is non-objective. The result of the difference is a lack of precision but not necessarily accuracy. Obviously, with differences in the units, the accuracy is slightly less, just like a translator might have to determine whether to translate 青い as "blue" or "green" in a particular context.

It's easier to be precise and to agree with things like the "meter" which can be measured easily than with things like the exact line of demarcation where a forum becomes something more like a magazine.

One could ask, what is the essential characteristic of a forum?

I was thinking of "openness" as an essential characteristic, and the reason I think it's essential is that a "forum" that isn't open is useless, not just to me but to everyone else; that's what makes openness essential.

This is not to say that "magazines" are invalid. There may be certain people whose opinions I care enough about that I might want them accurately represented. I might subscribe to their magazines. But it is telling that Leonard Peikoff, for example, hosted a Q&A, where he would answer questions, and he could pick and choose which questions he wanted to answer, and the answers were unambiguously his as opposed to what someone else thought he might say. It was a Q&A, not a "forum." He didn't host a "forum," invite people to post, and then ban opinions he disagreed with.

Also, Peikoff had already built his reputation, so people were interested in what he, in particular, had to say. What if you come up with a new idea? Where do you put it? Assuming you are not famous. Nobody approves of your idea yet because nobody knows what it is. Do you want to take a chance that you will get banned because people disapprove of it? Is it fair that you should have to take that chance? And what if you want to find new ideas that might have been come up with by other people, who aren't themselves famous enough to create their own forums? Where do you go to look for them? How can you find someone who runs a forum that allows new ideas, given that the forum owner has to take the risk that the new ideas might be wrong and that he has therefore sponsored wrong ideas?

If people have to censor ideas that they disagree with, people must have been grossly immoral for publishing Ayn Rand's books and ideas, since after all those people could not have agreed with the ideas already, since they were new. (Or else they were taking a chance on being immoral, sort of like shooting off a gun in random directions and being lucky enough not to have hit anyone. Which is also immoral. But anyway...)

3 hours ago, DavidOdden said:

Should personal attacks be prohibited, and if so, what constitutes a personal attack? How should we effectively communicate the distinction between disagreement and a personal attack?

A personal attack is an ad hominem, it's a fallacy. But the reason for banning personal attacks is not because they're ad hominem: the fact that they're ad hominem is what allows us to get away with banning personal attacks, because we know we're not accidentally banning any legitimate ideas.

The reason for the ban is because personal attacks tend to turn away the contributors who are attacked, and thus renders the whole forum useless to them, and less useful to others who might have wanted to read those contributions, or other contributions which might have never gotten made.

43 minutes ago, AlexL said:

You are free to create such a forum, but you cannot expect that a given forum owner, for example of this one, will tolerate on his premises the broadcasting of views he abhors. Or tolerate irrational behavior in a debate, for example when a person refuses to justify his claims etc.

I don't know if I want to try to run an open forum, because people might join and then demand that I suppress other people's views based on arbitrary criteria. Or if I didn't have time to moderate it myself, I'd have to trust someone else, and then they might start banning people for disagreeing with their views, and they might do a lot of damage before I stop them.

I wouldn't want to run a forum where I banned people for disagreeing with me, either. What if I ban someone on an incorrect basis? It would ruin the forum for everyone and destroy its value.

Wikipedia used to be great, until a cabal of editors formed who decided to take it upon themselves to rid Wikipedia of views they thought didn't have sufficient "notoriety" (because it was embarrassing to them that some articles about popular TV shows were longer than articles about important historical events -- so all they did was go around deleting articles because they lacked "notoriety"). This mostly happened on the English-speaking Wikipedia. Later, another cabal took over, this one consisting of leftists (or maybe it was the same cabal), with the idea of suppressing anything critical of leftism. As a result, Wikipedia has become less valuable and less useful, unless you are a leftist. (You can still use it if you are looking for an idea a leftist wouldn't disagree with.)

That could happen here, too. The site might end up supporting, not Objectivism per se, but a particular flavor of it, and it could easily be the wrong flavor or a distortion, and no one would be able to say anything about it if it were. It would become an echo chamber.

I suppose this is a problem of the culture at large, that people no longer tolerate views they disagree with, and that they wish to silence those views rather than engaging them in debate (and they can't accept the idea of just leaving their opponents alone, either; they have to silence them). The silencing of people is the main thing I am objecting to here; if there is some error in my definitions of "forum" and "magazine" then that error is not essential to my objection.

Maybe this tendency to reject opposing views is a product of the current educational system (because I suspect that a lot of the people calling for this are younger than I am and it certainly aligns well with the leftists who are taking over the culture at large).

Maybe it's also a problem that people don't want to see views they disagree with, so they hope some moderator will step in and ban those views before they have to see them. That sounds like the "safe spaces" that are being promoted in schools and universities, too, and it's the exact opposite of "Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion," which at least requires that you know what those facts and opinions are.

[AlexL]

15 minutes ago, necrovore said:

1 hour ago, AlexL said:

You are free to create such a forum, but you cannot expect that a given forum owner, for example of this one, will tolerate on his premises the broadcasting of views he abhors. [...]

I don't know if I want to try to run an open forum, because [...]

😁My remark above was not an invitation for you to open a forum.😁 Rather, it was to make a point of principle.

Edited March 4 by AlexL
Clarity

[EC]

34 minutes ago, necrovore said:

There can be options in concept formation; the Japanese color 青い covers blue and also blue-green and maybe green in some contexts, and there are probably other examples where concepts in different languages overlap but don't coincide.

If this sort of overlap can happen between languages, it can also be possible between people who share the same language but perhaps aren't using a dictionary or aren't using the same dictionary. This doesn't mean that either one is non-objective, just as the difference in colors between English and Japanese doesn't indicate that either language is non-objective. The result of the difference is a lack of precision but not necessarily accuracy. Obviously, with differences in the units, the accuracy is slightly less, just like a translator might have to determine whether to translate 青い as "blue" or "green" in a particular context.

It's easier to be precise and to agree with things like the "meter" which can be measured easily than with things like the exact line of demarcation where a forum becomes something more like a magazine.

One could ask, what is the essential characteristic of a forum?

I was thinking of "openness" as an essential characteristic, and the reason I think it's essential is that a "forum" that isn't open is useless, not just to me but to everyone else; that's what makes openness essential.

This is not to say that "magazines" are invalid. There may be certain people whose opinions I care enough about that I might want them accurately represented. I might subscribe to their magazines. But it is telling that Leonard Peikoff, for example, hosted a Q&A, where he would answer questions, and he could pick and choose which questions he wanted to answer, and the answers were unambiguously his as opposed to what someone else thought he might say. It was a Q&A, not a "forum." He didn't host a "forum," invite people to post, and then ban opinions he disagreed with.

Also, Peikoff had already built his reputation, so people were interested in what he, in particular, had to say. What if you come up with a new idea? Where do you put it? Assuming you are not famous. Nobody approves of your idea yet because nobody knows what it is. Do you want to take a chance that you will get banned because people disapprove of it? Is it fair that you should have to take that chance? And what if you want to find new ideas that might have been come up with by other people, who aren't themselves famous enough to create their own forums? Where do you go to look for them? How can you find someone who runs a forum that allows new ideas, given that the forum owner has to take the risk that the new ideas might be wrong and that he has therefore sponsored wrong ideas?

If people have to censor ideas that they disagree with, people must have been grossly immoral for publishing Ayn Rand's books and ideas, since after all those people could not have agreed with the ideas already, since they were new. (Or else they were taking a chance on being immoral, sort of like shooting off a gun in random directions and being lucky enough not to have hit anyone. Which is also immoral. But anyway...)

A personal attack is an ad hominem, it's a fallacy. But the reason for banning personal attacks is not because they're ad hominem: the fact that they're ad hominem is what allows us to get away with banning personal attacks, because we know we're not accidentally banning any legitimate ideas.

The reason for the ban is because personal attacks tend to turn away the contributors who are attacked, and thus renders the whole forum useless to them, and less useful to others who might have wanted to read those contributions, or other contributions which might have never gotten made.

I don't know if I want to try to run an open forum, because people might join and then demand that I suppress other people's views based on arbitrary criteria. Or if I didn't have time to moderate it myself, I'd have to trust someone else, and then they might start banning people for disagreeing with their views, and they might do a lot of damage before I stop them.

I wouldn't want to run a forum where I banned people for disagreeing with me, either. What if I ban someone on an incorrect basis? It would ruin the forum for everyone and destroy its value.

Wikipedia used to be great, until a cabal of editors formed who decided to take it upon themselves to rid Wikipedia of views they thought didn't have sufficient "notoriety" (because it was embarrassing to them that some articles about popular TV shows were longer than articles about important historical events -- so all they did was go around deleting articles because they lacked "notoriety"). This mostly happened on the English-speaking Wikipedia. Later, another cabal took over, this one consisting of leftists (or maybe it was the same cabal), with the idea of suppressing anything critical of leftism. As a result, Wikipedia has become less valuable and less useful, unless you are a leftist. (You can still use it if you are looking for an idea a leftist wouldn't disagree with.)

That could happen here, too. The site might end up supporting, not Objectivism per se, but a particular flavor of it, and it could easily be the wrong flavor or a distortion, and no one would be able to say anything about it if it were. It would become an echo chamber.

I suppose this is a problem of the culture at large, that people no longer tolerate views they disagree with, and that they wish to silence those views rather than engaging them in debate (and they can't accept the idea of just leaving their opponents alone, either; they have to silence them). The silencing of people is the main thing I am objecting to here; if there is some error in my definitions of "forum" and "magazine" then that error is not essential to my objection.

Maybe this tendency to reject opposing views is a product of the current educational system (because I suspect that a lot of the people calling for this are younger than I am and it certainly aligns well with the leftists who are taking over the culture at large).

Maybe it's also a problem that people don't want to see views they disagree with, so they hope some moderator will step in and ban those views before they have to see them. That sounds like the "safe spaces" that are being promoted in schools and universities, too, and it's the exact opposite of "Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion," which at least requires that you know what those facts and opinions are.

The first part of the forum's rules/guidelines that are pertinent to this discussion and that every poster agrees to upon sign-up. (Overuse or inappropriate usage of the laughing emoji is a personal attack but the guidelines were created a decade and a half before its introduction.)

 

Guidelines

 

 

Purpose

 

This website facilitates trade among those interested in Objectivism. The primary -- but not only -- form of trade will be information about Objectivism and discussion about its applications. Agreement with Objectivism is not required for participation. Anyone interested in Ayn Rand's philosophy may join.

 

Participation Terms

 

Each participant agrees, through use of this forum, to the following participation terms:

 

Consistency with the purpose of this site

 

Participants agree not use the website to spread ideas contrary to Objectivism. Examples include religion, communism, "moral tolerationism," and libertarianism. Honest questions about such subjects are permitted.

 

Respect for Ayn Rand and Objectivism

 

Participants agree to avoid making rude or insulting comments about Ayn Rand, her philosophy of Objectivism, the Ayn Rand Institute, the representatives and supporters of the Institute, or the adherents of the philosophy.

 

Intellectual honesty

 

Participants agree to be intellectually honest and to avoid, for example, claiming to speak for Objectivism; claiming as an Objectivist position a view contradicted in Objectivist literature; or misrepresenting either the source of a message or one's own identity.

 

Courtesy

 

Participants agree not use this forum to post any material which is knowingly false and/or defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, vulgar, hateful, harassing, obscene, profane, sexually oriented, threatening, invasive of a person's privacy, or otherwise in violation of U.S. law.

 

No personal attacks

 

Healthy debate is encouraged, but participants agree not resort to personal attacks, and do not belittle someone else's argument. Instead of making it personal, participants agree to use rational, persuasive skills to make a point or criticize another’s.

 

Debate and criticism about the policies of a local Objectivist club or organization should be confined to a single thread inside the Local Forums category.

[EC]

3 hours ago, EC said:

 

Also, it was this and I got a text to go to the recruiter but they wanted a certain number which I asked about and they said it was essentially a number assigned to members of the military or I suppose veterans that I of course have never possessed. Basically, the recruitment was though one of Skinwalker Ranch's Discord channels that I volunteered to become part of the tech team for after spotting many UAP and other anomalies via their private YouTube live stream.  Everything I caught on video was witnessed by many others, recorded,  and put into the official record. That I found so much so quickly along with the physics I provided and things like the entity in the ridge is an advanced AGI were what lead to all of this. 

I don't want this buried and it's blatantly obvious that they are using this against myself and other fellow Americans and using the deception to somehow involve what should be normal American citizens to do their dirty work via some sort of mass deception that they must through various highly illicit and illegal means (blinking emoji as I type this). They are literally at war with American citizens and I have been a target (blinking emoji again) ever since and have had my life destroyed by this highly illegal and extremely evil action to the point I have essentially nothing left.  These people that participate in this either directly against fellow Americans or via acting on whatever lies and distortions that cause them to engage in this are simply evil slow murderers via torture of essentially every type.  This was meant for our enemies not moral patriotic Americans like myself.  

[DavidOdden]

2 hours ago, necrovore said:

There can be options in concept formation

At the outset, I should say that Rand’s theory of concepts is inadequate in only addressing “concept formation” but also inaccurately describing cases of actual formation. Children do not form concepts (her postulations notwithstanding), they acquire them: the concepts already exist in the society, the child has to learn what the extant concepts are in that society. Adults may on occasion actually form concepts, for example “quark”, or “clade”, scientific concepts which refer to novel integrations. Then there is “concept redefinition”, where a person decides to reassign the accepted word–referent relation. This certainly does happen, but it frequently leads to breakdown in communication when one person posits a new word–referent relation, declaring for example “There’s glory for you!” rather than “There’s a nice knock-down argument for you”. Openness is not a characteristic of a forum, but it is a tautologically a defining property of an open forum, a type of forum. I will add that “forum” is like “emergent” and “information”, words that have exploded in popularity over the past 30 years where there is little agreement as to what they mean.

I do not fundamentally object to exploring new ideas, but I do object to any implication that new ideas are intrinsically good. A new idea may merit consideration if the idea is swaddled in a rational supporting argument. I suppose Wordpress blogging is one way in which anyone can set forth whatever new ideas they want, or, Google pages. I contend that the intended purpose of OO is not “exploring new ideas”, it is exchange of information about Objectivism and discussion of its applications. Notions of “good” and “bad” are not absolute, they are defined in terms of a specific purpose. If in fact the majority of content on OO ends up having no relationship to Objectivism and is indistinguishable from Twitter with no banning mechanism, then why would an Objectivist want to continue an association with this or some similar forum?

In the real scientific world, nobody of any repute uncritically publishes anything and everything submitted just because it is a “new idea”. There are places to deposit one’s uncritical unvetted new ideas, I just spam-can those emails. I would not say that OO is in any sense a scholarly publishing venue, but it does and should strive to be higher-quality than most social media. Quality-control standards are not defined in terms of the viewpoint expressed, they are defined in terms of the logic of the presentation. Sometimes the presentation is logically deficient, and there is a point where the abandonment of reason becomes especially deleterious to a forum dedicated to a philosophy that places reason, not emotion, in a central position.

You correctly identified the wording flaw in the guideline. The ukaze Do not post complaints about the behavior of any member on the forum is simply wrong, it is a mis-identification. I don’t propose a specific re-writing, I just offer a criticism of that rule to point out reason can be applied to laws and guidelines alike, so that we might identify a principle that better fits with the purpose of this forum. Which returns us to the question of the purpose of this forum – anything by way of guidelines that you think is clearly in error. For example, the central purpose of this forum (which I take to be an axiom, yet open for discussion)?

 

[monart]

9 hours ago, EC said:

It is 100% true and at this point you saying this nonsense makes me believe you are in on this. It's not a "parody" nor a "joke". So I'm considering banning you. And to call someone a "believer" in an existent while pretending it's something like a non-existent like a gremlin, unicorn, or a "God" is just ridiculous.  

OK, I'm re-considering and, also taking note of what tadmjones said, i'll grant that you're serious and not in jest. And, while I still find your report incredible, I also believe, from my studies of the deep state and secret societies, it could happen to someone. If true, do you need any help? How may I be of assistance? No need to ban me to keep me away, I'll stay away from you if that's what you want.

[necrovore]

2 hours ago, DavidOdden said:

I do not fundamentally object to exploring new ideas, but I do object to any implication that new ideas are intrinsically good.

On the one hand I see your point because maybe 1% of new ideas are good. Maybe even less.

People will disagree about which ones they are. That's to be expected.

People can also disagree about whether an idea is really new. (People may say, "Hey, it was new to me...")

On the other hand I think that good new ideas, rare though they are, are the whole point. There is nothing to be gained by recirculating and repeating the same old ideas; one might as well just read OPAR over and over.

It's like panning for gold. There may be a little gold but there's a lot of mud. If you are afraid of mud, though, you don't get any gold.

2 hours ago, DavidOdden said:

I contend that the intended purpose of OO is not “exploring new ideas”, it is exchange of information about Objectivism and discussion of its applications.

These are not mutually exclusive.

2 hours ago, DavidOdden said:

Sometimes the presentation is logically deficient, and there is a point where the abandonment of reason becomes especially deleterious to a forum dedicated to a philosophy that places reason, not emotion, in a central position.

It should be sufficient to identify the deficiency and stop there.

The ban hammer should be reserved for use against spam, harassment, illegality, or attempts to render the forum useless.

2 hours ago, DavidOdden said:

Children do not form concepts (her postulations notwithstanding), they acquire them: the concepts already exist in the society, the child has to learn what the extant concepts are in that society.

I think what the child learns is the word for the concept; the child must still form the actual concept on their own. I don't know if there's any requirement regarding whether the word or the concept comes first, but the concept is not complete without the word and vice-versa. A person can receive feedback, not just as a child but all their lives, about whether they have formed the same concept, based on how they use the word in their speech and writing.

2 hours ago, DavidOdden said:

Which returns us to the question of the purpose of this forum – anything by way of guidelines that you think is clearly in error. For example, the central purpose of this forum (which I take to be an axiom, yet open for discussion)?

When I say that I don't want the forum to be rendered "useless" I am implying that there is some use for it.

I think, discussion of Objectivism and its applications, its implications, where it fits in, and how to explain it to people.

That should be pretty close to what is already there.

--

Maybe there should be a part of everyone's profile page where you can see the posts that they have liked or thanked. Then if you don't like reading the whole board you can possibly find someone, or a few someones, who'll read it for you.

Edited March 5 by necrovore

[necrovore]

I should add something: this whole topic about what to allow on this forum is essentially philosophical and, more specifically, epistemological.

If this is an Objectivist forum then it should practice the Objectivist epistemology.

An essential feature of the Objectivist epistemology is the rejection of evasion. Objectivism requires the integration of all facts. It does not countenance the propping up of false abstractions through the suppression of counter-examples or counter-arguments. It rebuts false arguments, by identifying them as false (or in some cases arbitrary or irrelevant), but it does not evade or suppress them.

Rebuttal should not be hard. OPAR shows that it's possible to use abstractions to group arguments and rebut them all in a single blow, e.g., by identifying an argument as "Primacy of Consciousness."

Banning people from the forum because of their arguments is evasion of those arguments, pure and simple. (But it is proper to ban things which are not arguments, such as spam or harassment etc.)

The people who run this forum are free to run it however they want, just like they are free to evade in their own minds if they want. But when they start burning heretics, they aren't acting like Objectivists anymore. (Further, such action incorrectly suggests that Objectivism is no different from any other philosophy or religion).

Edited March 5 by necrovore

[EC]

12 hours ago, monart said:

OK, I'm re-considering and, also taking note of what tadmjones said, i'll grant that you're serious and not in jest. And, while I still find your report incredible, I also believe, from my studies of the deep state and secret societies, it could happen to someone. If true, do you need any help? How may I be of assistance? No need to ban me to keep me away, I'll stay away from you if that's what you want.

How would you be able to help?  I've been asking for help about what has happened from everyone and the situation has just continually got worse. 

[DavidOdden]

2 hours ago, necrovore said:

If this is an Objectivist forum then it should practice the Objectivist epistemology.

An essential feature of the Objectivist ethics is that man is not a sacrificial animal, hence the rejection of self-sacrifice. Objectivism does indeed require the integration of all facts, but not all statements represent facts. The only “fact” involved in an irrational statement is that so-and-so uttered a statement, and a rational man has no obligation to consider such statements. Case in point, a rational man on OO has no obligation to assimilate, address and refute some arbitrary communist racist woke screed – an arbitrary string of words is not ipso facto an “argument”. There is a point at which “argument”- and viewpoint-rejection are valid responses (I would say after a half dozen attempts to elicit signs of rationality from the author, another more-hopeful person might set the threshold at a dozen tries). A person who advocates self-sacrifice isn’t acting like an Objectivist anymore. A person who refuses to engage in moral evaluation isn’t acting like an Objectivist anymore. A person who sanctions evasion isn’t acting like an Objectivist anymore.

I do agree with your call for the forum to practice Objectivism (all of it, not just epistemology). Evasion is the antithesis of Objectivism, and I am glad that you now accept that point. Indeed, I would hope that people would be more scrupulous in calling out evasion when it happens

[EC]

5 minutes ago, DavidOdden said:

An essential feature of the Objectivist ethics is that man is not a sacrificial animal, hence the rejection of self-sacrifice. Objectivism does indeed require the integration of all facts, but not all statements represent facts. The only “fact” involved in an irrational statement is that so-and-so uttered a statement, and a rational man has no obligation to consider such statements. Case in point, a rational man on OO has no obligation to assimilate, address and refute some arbitrary communist racist woke screed – an arbitrary string of words is not ipso facto an “argument”. There is a point at which “argument”- and viewpoint-rejection are valid responses (I would say after a half dozen attempts to elicit signs of rationality from the author, another more-hopeful person might set the threshold at a dozen tries). A person who advocates self-sacrifice isn’t acting like an Objectivist anymore. A person who refuses to engage in moral evaluation isn’t acting like an Objectivist anymore. A person who sanctions evasion isn’t acting like an Objectivist anymore.

I do agree with your call for the forum to practice Objectivism (all of it, not just epistemology). Evasion is the antithesis of Objectivism, and I am glad that you now accept that point. Indeed, I would hope that people would be more scrupulous in calling out evasion when it happens

This is a near perfect post and is exactly what I have been saying implicitly in many recent posts. I need to start posting from my laptop again, if I can clear up the evil situation that has been caused solely by the extreme evil actions of others no matter how hard I fight back against these evil criminal domestic terrorists engaging in these evil crimes constantly against myself, so that I can write proper posts again instead of spur of the moment stuff from my second hacked phone. 

[necrovore]

1 hour ago, DavidOdden said:

A person who advocates self-sacrifice isn’t acting like an Objectivist anymore. A person who refuses to engage in moral evaluation isn’t acting like an Objectivist anymore. A person who sanctions evasion isn’t acting like an Objectivist anymore.

I do not advocate any of these things.

I think there's a confusion here between what the forum as a whole does (e.g., through moderation) versus what its individual participants do.

Part of this is the recognition that every individual participating here has the right to make their own judgment about which arguments are rational and why, as well as which arguments are worth responding to and which not. (And on the other hand, if they make invalid arguments, their arguments will be judged accordingly.)

I don't think such individual judgment should be usurped by the forum itself such as by banning arguments, which amounts to deciding that the participants shouldn't be allowed to see them or, possibly, that they shouldn't be allowed to make them.

I am aware that the resources of this (or any) forum are privately owned and that the owner can decide how they can be used. However, the amount of these resources for any single post is pretty small (and I'm sure the owners would like them kept small). Providing a public forum is not in fact a moral sanction upon everything people say there, just like giving away sheets of blank paper is not a moral sanction on whatever people happen to write or print on them. Nor can anyone who posts here claim (with any honesty) that their post, merely by virtue of not having been banned, is in agreement with the owners, or with Objectivism, or is any kind of award-winning great achievement.

Further, when the forum owners and moderators decide to exercise judgment about which posts are correct, then they are implicitly asking the participants to cede their right to make their own judgments. That becomes a cost for the participants, just as much as if you were asked to give up other rights you might have. They then have to consider whether it's worth it.

Maybe I helped precipitate this confusion by saying that the forum should conform to the Objectivist epistemology, but the role of the forum in the Objectivist epistemology is not to think for the participants but to make sure the participants are not blocked from thinking for themselves. Once one has decided to offer a forum, this becomes a negative obligation -- not a demand for more resources. (It is in fact banning stuff that requires more resources, because somebody has to make the decisions about what to ban, and those have to be checked for accuracy, etc.; this is why big companies like Facebook end up needing large censorship moderation departments where people look at posts all day, or else they need AIs to make those decisions automatically. It is why larger magazines need editorial departments to pore over manuscripts. It is why the East German Stasi needed so many people to monitor phone calls.)

Being open is a large part of what offering a forum is. That is the value it offers. It should be allowed to offer it.

Edited March 5 by necrovore

[monart]

16 hours ago, EC said:

How would you be able to help?  I've been asking for help about what has happened from everyone and the situation has just continually got worse. 

What kind of help have you been asking for, and from whom? At this point, I don't know yet how I can help, until I know more. But I do want to help in some way.

Edited March 6 by monart