Modless Paranormal

Zillah

stevenmu wrote:

the problem is that any time a topic 'x' is being discussed, somebody always has to butt in with 'x is a load of BS', or 'there's no scientific proof of x', or 'x is just taking advantage of vulnerable people/idiots/people with mental illness'.

I hope you don't mean to imply that I've ever behaved like that?

stevenmu

Zillah wrote:

I hope you don't mean to imply that I've ever behaved like that?

Not all, I was trying to imply that you would be a true sceptic, but that this type of behaviour isn't truly sceptical. In fact I can think of at least one occasion, and there's probably been others, where you've not quite attacked someone behaving like that, but come pretty close.

Zillah

Oh good

CuLT

stevenmu wrote:

In any other forum this'd be considered trolling, it'd be the equivelent of posting in the games forum about how gamers are just wasting there lives and should go out and get a real hobby, or posting in the classical music forum about how crap classical music is and that everyone should listen to rock / metal, or ... well you see where this is going.

I see where you're going with it, but I think that the comparison with other fora is misplaced. There are no facts in dispute on the Games forum, the Music forum etc. The only thing people are discussing is their opinion.

You cannot refute that "World of Warcraft" is a computer game. It is a simple fact. You cannot refute that "Linkin Park" suck, it is an opinion. You can disagree, of course.

Paranormal seems to be a place where one opinion is prized over another. I grant you that trolling should be stopped in its tracks, but where no abuse is present people should take any criticism of their views and opinions or they shouldn't post.
In the real world people challenge these things, if they wish to not have themselves challenged they form a closed community to minimize this.

Shabadu

I agree with CuLT. Also- IMO if people are confident and sure about the existence of the paranormal they should welcome skeptics into the forum in order to try and convince others their opinions are fact under the rigour of external scrutiny. But that's just my opinion. The community you have there seems happy enough to prevent people from disagreeing with them, so why shouldn't ye.

It would make an interesting topic if someone wanted to open the debate fora again.

Time Magazine

My view on it is that, of all the boards, trolling is probably most likely to occur on Paranormal. On a place like Christianity; it's accepted by all sides that there's faith involved - but reasonable logic behind said faith, and thus debate is (probably?) encouraged.

Paranmoral doesn't have "logic" insofar as it's basically everything that's not been explained/hypothesised systematically but that does not detract from the right to have faith in it, just like Christianity. Debate, essentially, can't happen in Paranormal.

Of course reasonable/obvious suggestions/solutions should be fine. But a bit analgous Soccer needing invites; the absence of debate is a necessary evil to avoid trolling.

Regards.

stevenmu

CuLT wrote:

In the real world people challenge these things, if they wish to not have themselves challenged they form a closed community to minimize this.

In the real world people also only discuss some topics with like minded people. I don't discuss soccer with friends who's only opinion is that it's a girls game, or politics with people who's only opinion on the subject is that they're all a shower of ****ers. Conversations like this get dull pretty quickly. Similarly, repeated experience has shown that discussing paranormal topics with debunkers who simply think they're BS get dull pretty fast and at best end up with one or two 'believers' trying to explain to the debunker that just because there isn't scientific proof of something, doesn't mean it has to be BS. This goes in circles for a few pages before everyone just gives up frustrated.

To reuse an earlier analogy I mentioned, you wouldn't go to mass to tell people god doesn't exist, or to use yours, you wouldn't go to the World of Warcraft forum to tell everyone how crap it is, or a Lincoln Park forum to tell everyone how crap they are, or better yet you wouldn't post in FS thread that product x is no good, people should buy product y instead. They're all valid opinions and people have a right to express them, but there's a proper place for everything. If people think the topic of a paranormal thread is BS then I don't think they should post on it, they may have other usefull or interesting bits to add to other threads which is great, but I don't see where the big problem is with people not posting on threads when all they have in mind is to debunk the topic of it.

To be fair though, 'trolling' is probably the wrong word, I don't think that it's done deliberatly most of the time, but the effect is pretty much the same.

Zillah

Steve, I think its important we define exactly what we're talking about here. What you seem to be describing would simply be part of "off topic" posting. If you enter a discussion entitled "Where to Find Linkin Park lyrics" and begin complaining about how crap Linkin Park is, then its off topic. Similarily, if I arrive in a thread entitled "Good Psychic Mediums" and begin explaining that pyschics are all BS, that'd be off topic.

However, if someone started a thread entitled "Psychics, magic or deluded?" and someone posted why they think its all BS, thats perfectly valid. Its an opinion, one that can be debated with just as much as the opposite side of the fence.

Zombrex

stevenmu wrote:

If people think the topic of a paranormal thread is BS then I don't think they should post on it,

I agree fully with what you are saying, but there is a difference between that and replying to a "Whats the deal with this.." original post with "Nah, its not paranormal"

I mean some of the regular Paranormal "true believers" do that all the time.

Off the top of my head Solas (the previous mod) dismissed in a previous thread supersititions such as walking under a bridge as "urban legends" (ie nonsense) and in the thread about Orbs Mysteria said she doesn't believe Orbs were ghosts. This is seemingly fine because they believe in other paranormal events?

I can't see how this is any more or less insulting to an OP asking a question than a skeptic saying "no Orbs aren't ghosts they are errors in the film", or "walking unders a ladder is not bad luck"

Zillah

Angry Banana wrote:

the absence of debate is a necessary evil to avoid trolling.

Thats a lazy solution that would result in complete overkill. A vastly superior method would be to disallow trolling and have that moderated well. Which is the modus operandi of every boards forum.

stevenmu

Zillah, I agree with you completely there, I think the topic and how it's presented should be the main factor in deciding what type of responses are appropriate. The only problem with this is that most people aren't likely to be as specific in their phrasing of the original post, meaning common sense has to be applied, and the charter is there as a general guide on how to apply common sense, and the moderator there in case it's not applied correctly.

Wicknight wrote:

I agree fully with what you are saying, but there is a difference between that and replying to a "Whats the deal with this.." original post with "Nah, its not paranormal"

I mean some of the regular Paranormal "true believers" do that all the time.

Of the top of my head Solas (the previous mod) dismissed in a previous thread supersititions such as walking under a bridge as "urban legends" (ie nonsense) and in the thread about Orbs Mysteria said she doesn't believe Orbs were ghosts. This is seemingly fine because they believe in other paranormal events?

I can't see how this is any more or less insulting to an OP asking a question than a skeptic saying "no Orbs aren't ghosts they are errors in the film", or "walking unders a ladder is not bad luck"

Excellent, two fine examples. Firstly it's not nessecarily about people being insulted.

The first one you mention was a thread that was about a particular superstition (you may still believe it was superstition in general, but for the sake of this discussion let's just assume it wasn't). You posted up a history of that superstition, and I think possibly a rational non-paranormal explanation for it, which I felt was fine. You then proceeded to do, I felt any way, what amounted to debunking superstition in general. This almost prompted me to list some superstitions which have a firm basis in reality (people who walk under ladders are more likely to have a bucket of paint spilled on their head) and present some potential paranormal explanations for others. This in turn would have lead to you replying to the points I'd made, and me replying to that, which could carry on for several pages dragging the thread away from the superstion(s) initially presented by the OP. I've been involved in threads being pulled off-topic like this several times (which I'll freely admit is partially my fault).

In the second example mysteria presented an alternate paranormal explanation of what orbs are, iirc she believed they are related to paranormal energies but are not themselves sentient energy such as ghosts. I'll admit it was a little off topic, but it was only a small aside and was never likely to drag the whole thread off topic. Comments such as "no Orbs aren't ghosts they are errors in the film" is getting into the realm of debunking orbs as a topic. I think it's clear the OP was more interested in having his/her photos looked at to see if there was anything paranormal in them and perhaps finding out more about paranormal explanations for orbs. Part of that does naturally involve pointing out potential non-paranormal causes for the orbs in his/her photos, but that's quite different to "no Orbs aren't ghosts they are errors in the film". If the OP was interested in what problems he/she had with the camera, I think there's a photography forum here somewhere they could have posted in

On the other hand, I think "no Orbs aren't ghosts they are errors in the film" would be perfectly fine in a thread titled "Orbs, ghosts/errors ?".

Zombrex

stevenmu wrote:

The first one you mention was a thread that was about a particular superstition (you may still believe it was superstition in general, but for the sake of this discussion let's just assume it wasn't).

I realise that, but I'm not really talking about dragging a topic off topic. I'm more what she actually said. She said we are not talking about superstition in general because that is off topic, and I accept (now at least ) that discussion of superstition in general would be too off topic.

But the point I was making is that Solas gave the reason why we are not talking about supersitions like walking under ladders, why they are off topic, is because these supersitions are simply nonsense. Would that have been tolerated if a general sceptic had made such a sweeping claim?

stevenmu wrote:

I'll admit it was a little off topic, but it was only a small aside and was never likely to drag the whole thread off topic.

I see the point you are making, but it seems you can say it is anything as long as that "anything" is in some way related to something paranormal. If someone said "ghosts don't cause Orbs aliens do" that would be on topic, even if the topic decended into a argument between ghost believers and UFO believers. But as soon as someone gives an explaination that doesn't involve a paranormal "topic" a line is crossed.

Seems a bit silly to me, when the OP is asking a genuine question.

stevenmu

Wicknight wrote:

I see the point you are making, but it seems you can say it is anything as long as that "anything" is in some way related to something paranormal. If someone said "ghosts don't cause Orbs aliens do" that would be on topic, even if the topic decended into a argument between ghost believers and UFO believers. But as soon as someone gives an explaination that doesn't involve a paranormal "topic" a line is crossed.

Seems a bit silly to me, when the OP is asking a genuine question.

IMO, if this were to happen it would be off-topic and should be split into a new paranormal thread (like the current thread on card readers was split from the medium thread). Similarly, a "no Orbs aren't ghosts they are errors in the film" discussion is off-topic and should be split off into a new thread, but this time imo it should be a Skeptics forum thread, seeing as the whole premise for the thread would be scepticism (altough I personally wouldn't feel too strongly about it either way if it stayed in the paranormal forum). Ideally people would have the sense to branch off and form new threads themselves, instead of a moderator who may not have been following the whole thread having to split it.

Wicknight wrote:

I realise that, but I'm not really talking about dragging a topic off topic. I'm more what she actually said. She said we are not talking about superstition in general because that is off topic, and I accept (now at least ) that discussion of superstition in general would be too off topic.

But the point I was making is that Solas gave the reason why we are not talking about supersitions like walking under ladders, why they are off topic, is because these supersitions are simply nonsense. Would that have been tolerated if a general sceptic had made such a sweeping claim?

As I remeber it that wasn't a 'reason' Solas gave for the off-topicness, I think that was a seperate point she was making, which as it happens proves how the thread was being pulled off-topic.

Anyway I think that brings up something we need to consider, Solas is no longer moderator, Psi is the new mod with a new charter in place. Maybe we should all step back and take a deep breath and see how it actually works out before trying to argue about whether it works or not. If we try it out for a few weeks and give Psi a chance to work out any problems that may pop up, then we can at least make better arguments for the pros and cons of it all.