Hi stu,
Thanks for your warm comments.
I don't see it as a struggle. I intend to make use of the ignore feature to help manage my optimism. I've done so several times already. I've been recently thinking of ignoring YOU, because I have ART on the list and you've been quoting him so much; the second-hand ART-isms were beginning to seep through.
But seriously, I enjoy your posts when I have time to follow along. And I'm glad you know there's a point at which further efforts are fruitless when debating with whim worshippers. I learned that long ago. Got to guard one's time, it's just too precious.
Another thing I learned was demonstrated just recently with a reply I sent to jem. He hadn't gotten what I intended. I know that because I know my intentions. But I didn't read into his motives. Nor did I take offense to his question. Nor did I consider it necessary to focus on emotive terms such as "sounds specious" as many are want to react to on ET. I did my best to reduce his post to its essentials.
Then I reconsidered what I had written in the context of what he said I had meant.
My first premise was to assume, until proven otherwise, that he has good intentions, that he's not here just to waste time. Now armed with that perspective, I then sought within my own post what possibly I might have said that could be interpreted in a way that I had not intended. jem gave me enough clues to see that there are several ways to interpret "rules of evidence."
I then looked at the broader context. I had framed my example in courtroom terms, thus effectively biasing the more general tone of my intent. I had used a phrase, probably more loosely than I should have, that has a specific meaning in a parochial frame of reference, namely Law. I took another step back and realized that, indeed, there are cultures that have presumed guilt rather than innocence, i.e. one must prove one didn't do the deed which is quite different from my habitual way of thinking in the United States. I realized quickly, thanks to jem, that my choice of term could be interpreted by other readers as off the mark (from a more restrictive legal standpoint) to completely off the wall (from a cultural one).
And so, I strived to clarify terms (something you are keen on, stu, and that I admire in how you approach discourse). I have found that many seemingly irresolvable disagreements among honest people can often be reduced to clearly defining terms. And that rather than hurl insults about how stupid the other person is, I always try to understand what I failed to communicate clearly, if there was a better way for me to have said it.
In other words, I use people's feedback to improve, not to attack.
Of course, some things are unarguable. And those who clearly are intelligent, but who deliberately misuse their ability (again, for whatever reason--I'm not here to be a therapist) and claim that contradictions can exist in reality (not in our understanding of reality, but in reality itself), as one example, simply do not warrant any more of my time.
In that respect, though, I try not to get into name calling and such. (If I wanted to be moronic, I'd have referred to ART-isms as AUT-isms, for example, at the beginning of this post. But that's just silliness and doesn't serve to engender respect or understanding.) I also try not to read too much into what I perceive are other's motivations; sometimes that can take years of analysis so it's hardly fitting (unless an abuse is blatant) to be reading too much between the lines. This is a chat room, not AA.
As an example, the overuse of double-quotes you mentioned can clearly be the mark of a prevaricator if there is a history of those terms suddenly changing in meaning. I don't know that to be the case, I haven't been following any one participant that closely. And there are many other reasons for using them badly. It could just be a habit, as we all have them, peculiar to a writing style. It could be just another way for someone to highlight a term that they deem important. Or that they thought you thought was important.
That said, things are what they are, and if I find a pattern of real abuse (not in style but in content) in what is habitually leading to a lessening of value to me, it's off to the ignore list. Quick and painless and forever.
Cheers.
