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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
 Posted - 11/05/2001 : 03:52:58 [Permalink]
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Note to the administrator:
Have I committed some infraction by asking people who may be likely (but not guaranteed, I don't know them) to agree with me to come join in on a discussion? Is it also an infraction if some of those people think that it might be fun to discuss some of the ideas that they have fun discussing in other areas? Is it possible that they might actually consider themselves "skeptics" and might enjoy conversations in these forums other than this one?
Lisa Lisa, sad Lisa Lisa - Cat Stevens |
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 04:13:39 [Permalink]
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In case anyone is wondering, the reason at least some of the links in Rubysue's first posts don't work is that they have a period included in the URL's.
Lisa Lisa, sad Lisa Lisa - Cat Stevens |
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Trish
SFN Addict
USA
2102 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 04:26:58 [Permalink]
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quote:
Trish, I've said I'd watch my attitude toward Rubysue, and I will do the same to you. It may in fact be possible that it has to do with chauvinism. However, if you compare yours and Rubysue's prose with Garrette's and don't see that there is a difference, well, I really don't know what to think. I would say that if Slater had gone on very long with me, I would probably have called him hysterical, too. It seems women have the most patience.
Hmm, I was just wondering if you realized the point. Once you started - no matter how reasoned I thought my posts - that colored your thinking regarding them, IMHO. I know there was a difference in the timber of my posts and Garrettes posts - however, that changes throughout some of my posts. I hope you can see that, I made the attempt to change my *attitude* (?) after going back and reading some of my earlier posts. Though we have differences of opinions regarding politics, I think we can work toward some common ground. I like solutions over rhetoric.
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One of the ways that I have said things that may be seen as attacking is to suggest that you seem to think you're right because any other possibility seems to insult you. That's not a condition for rightness. However, now that you're lumping us with conspiracy theorists and flat earthers, I understand your problem with that. I don't think they're the same thing, but I understand it. I'm not sure what to do about it.
No, I think it's the limits of the written form. Some of what you write can be viewed as personal attacks. The line between attacking the position and attacking the person is a fine one and easily crossed when operating in a limited form of communication. I know when I'm being reasonable and when I'm ranting by how hard I strike the keys. That's a measure of my emotions regarding a position.
As for viewing you with CTs...well, the language and rhetoric are the same. Calling people sheep for following their own convictions regarding a topic and implying they are not skeptical enough to understand or should not be called skeptics is the same line taken by many CTs. I've seen that too often. My skepticism, my personal inquiry into politics, in part based on my blue collar background had lead me to where I am.
To attempt to squash that, or undermine that position by calling it following the crowd is ridiculous. Especially considering that I'm a registered Independent (non-affiliated)voter. I enjoy the research I do into many issues.
LP, attempted to group me with Ayn Rand followers because I happen to think Capitalism is more favorable for economic growth and progress than is Communism. It's apparent that many communists (at least of the Stalinist/Leninist kind) failed to read Das Kapital. If they had they would realize that the US is acctually following along the path as predicted better by Karl Marx than by Adam Smith. Something the Soviet Union failed to do. Karl Marx operates in stages, Capitalism with a period of heavy industrialism, followed by socialist programs instituted by government, followed by the nationalisation of private industry eventually leading to equality in pay and status for all individuals. That's Marx - what the former Soviet Union went through was Leninist and later Stalinist in nature only loosely based on the tenets of the latter portions of Das Kapital. The reason there were so many problems with the former Soviet Union was they were missing the industrial base required to supply their society with the necessary products. Additionally, the Soviets were unable to build the industrial base themselves. This is where their form of communism failed.
Ok, this was one of my favorite subjects and I could discuss this all day. However, the subject here seems to be Chomsky. With whom I do not agree, and I wonder as to his motives for maintaining staunchly his position regarding this issue. The view was somewhat common (I think I remember this) during the 60s (OK I'm not old enough but most of the people I know are). Things have changed, has Chomsky's message or is it the same? (Sorry, I can only read what is on the web - and unfortunately I don't get a clear idea on when some of these things were written.) Then, as I do with anyone pointing out a particular point of view - I ask myself - what is his agenda? From his writings I see no desire to improve the government - just a consistent tearing down or chipping away at the current government. This goes back to my earlier statement - I prefer solutions to rhetoric. At least a solution I can look at, and say does this work? Fighting an opinion is just that - fighting an opinion. Chomsky puts his opinion forth - he gets like minded to people to hold a mock trial - yeah, I can see him getting the conviction he wants. Who defended what here. I'd like a transcript of the trials....
That is what your friend failed to do. She offered no support for her position - came in spouting the same thing you said when we first crossed swords (so to speak). At least you offered some websites as references. She offered nothing more than her say so.
It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them. -Mark Twain
Edited by - Trish on 11/05/2001 04:27:43 |
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Piltdown
Skeptic Friend
USA
312 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 04:43:22 [Permalink]
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I wonder what evidence Noam Chomsky can provide that there was a massive air raid on Japan after the surrender? I have a whole library of World War 2 references. Not one of them mentions any such incident. I heard a speech a while back by Dr. Curtis Paul Ramsey (a linguist incidentally), in which he claimed that thousands of US Marines had been killed during the US "invasion" of Lebanon in 1958. I asked him what his source was, since every other account of this incident gives the death toll as 0. His answer: Professor Noam Chomsky. Dr. Ramsey also mentioned, again with Chomsky as the claimed source, US invasions of the Dominican Republic in 1962 and 1965, also with massive American casualties. The '65 incident really happened, with 25 Americans killed, according to every detailed account. The news archives here at Texas Tech (including Pravda, Izvestia, and the Daily Worker) contain no account of such an invasion in 1962.
Chomsky cultists are apparently unaware of something very important about the good doctor: he is a liar on the scale of Joseph Goebbels, engaged in a campaign to re-write history on a massive scale. His analyses of history mix biased interpretations of factual incidents with off-hand references to things that never happened. In a most literal imitation of Goebbels, the latter technique implies that the incident is so well-documented that it doesn't require exposition in the given context.
This big lie technique is the stock-in-trade of Chomsky ally Ramsey Clark. Gorgo, has it occurred to you that Clark's claims are not more extensively discussed simply because they do not merit serious discussion? You once alluded to discussion not being "permitted". Permitted by whom? Who has the power to stop it? This seems no different from any number of garden-variety claims about conspiracies of suppression in a rigidly controlled consortium of media. Have you ever heard of David Icke? He also accuses the "corporate media" of conspiring to suppress discussion of his ideas. In his case, those claims involve the US government permitting lizard aliens from the 4th dimension to abduct American citizens for food. They do this in return for alien technology, you see. Sure enough, little discussion of Icke's claims is "permitted" either. He has every bit as good a claim for a conspiracy of suppression as does Ramsey Clark. The mock trials staged around Clark's claims are just that, a mockery, organized and controlled by Clark and his allies. I once wrote to Clark and offered to go to Panama at my own expense and exhume the mass graves where the US Army buried the many thousands of Panamanian civilians it allegedly killed in 1989. Clark only needed to provide some information on the approximate location of these mass graves. I never got a response.
Abducting UFOs and conspiring against conspiracy theorists since 1980. |
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 04:46:28 [Permalink]
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quote:
Hmm, I was just wondering if you realized the point. Once you started - no matter how reasoned I thought my posts - that colored your thinking regarding them, IMHO.
That much might be true. I did notice that you tried to change your attitude, and when you did, I tried to change mine towards you.
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As for viewing you with CTs...well, the language and rhetoric are the same. Calling people sheep for following their own convictions regarding a topic and implying they are not skeptical enough to understand or should not be called skeptics is the same line taken by many CTs. I've seen that too often. My skepticism, my personal inquiry into politics, in part based on my blue collar background had lead me to where I am.
Well, hopefully I don't view people as sheep, and while I understand the term, I don't think I used it. What I've been saying is that you are not correct because you're pissed off, in fact your pissed off is what is keeping you holding on to what you believe. That doesn't make you wrong, that just doesn't seem to be particularly good skeptical thinking. I say "seem" because I could be wrong.
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Ok, this was one of my favorite subjects and I could discuss this all day. However, the subject here seems to be Chomsky. With whom I do not agree, and I wonder as to his motives for maintaining staunchly his position regarding this issue. The view was somewhat common (I think I remember this) during the 60s (OK I'm not old enough but most of the people I know are). Things have changed, has Chomsky's message or is it the same? (Sorry, I can only read what is on the web - and unfortunately I don't get a clear idea on when some of these things were written.) Then, as I do with anyone pointing out a particular point of view - I ask myself - what is his agenda? From his writings I see no desire to improve the government - just a consistent tearing down or chipping away at the current government. This goes back to my earlier statement - I prefer solutions to rhetoric. At least a solution I can look at, and say does this work? Fighting an opinion is just that - fighting an opinion. Chomsky puts his opinion forth - he gets like minded to people to hold a mock trial - yeah, I can see him getting the conviction he wants. Who defended what here. I'd like a transcript of the trials....
Sorry, I don't completely understand the trial part here. I don't know that I can put Chomsky's ideas in a few words, but I don't understand the idea that understanding flaws in your own thinking is somehow an attack. That's a big part of what he's saying, and I don't think that's so evil.
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That is what your friend failed to do. She offered no support for her position - came in spouting the same thing you said when we first crossed swords (so to speak). At least you offered some websites as references. She offered nothing more than her say so.
Well, while I'm sure that she's a wonderful person, I have not yet earned the title "friend." I don't know who she is. What she's done is ask for something substantial to talk about. Rubysue has basically said nothing except that she doesn't like Chomsky's ideas, and she believes the wild unsubstantiated claims against him regarding anti-Semitism and Faurisson and Cambodia. Take those last three items aside and talk about where his evidence for what he says is wrong and you won't see that in anything Rubysue has said.
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It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them. -Mark Twain
Edited by - Trish on 11/05/2001 04:27:43
This quote has a great deal to do with Chomsky's message.
Lisa Lisa, sad Lisa Lisa - Cat Stevens |
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Trish
SFN Addict
USA
2102 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 05:30:52 [Permalink]
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quote:
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As for viewing you with CTs...well, the language and rhetoric are the same. Calling people sheep for following their own convictions regarding a topic and implying they are not skeptical enough to understand or should not be called skeptics is the same line taken by many CTs. I've seen that too often. My skepticism, my personal inquiry into politics, in part based on my blue collar background had lead me to where I am.
Well, hopefully I don't view people as sheep, and while I understand the term, I don't think I used it. What I've been saying is that you are not correct because you're pissed off, in fact your pissed off is what is keeping you holding on to what you believe. That doesn't make you wrong, that just doesn't seem to be particularly good skeptical thinking. I say "seem" because I could be wrong.
I'm not angry, I know when I'm angry and I generally delete the swear words and rework anything before I post. Tho the premise may be the same, without the anger.
Oh, and the sheep thing came from SJ. Mea Culpa.
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Then, as I do with anyone pointing out a particular point of view - I ask myself - what is his agenda? [snip] Chomsky puts his opinion forth - he gets like minded to people to hold a mock trial - yeah, I can see him getting the conviction he wants. Who defended what here. I'd like a transcript of the trials....
Sorry, I don't completely understand the trial part here. I don't know that I can put Chomsky's ideas in a few words, but I don't understand the idea that understanding flaws in your own thinking is somehow an attack. That's a big part of what he's saying, and I don't think that's so evil.
No understanding flaws in your own thinking is not a bad thing - however, Chomsky - if this is what he is saying - needs to turn that upon himself as well. How much of the rhetoric has become so ingraned without thought to changing his ideas because he's been saying the same thing so long that he's stuck in a rut?
The trial: Putting US presidents on trial for war crimes. If you get like minded people to stage a trial - no matter the persuasiveness of opposing counsel - you will get the result for which you are looking. I'd like to see a transcript of this trial. I'd imagine that only supporters of the mock trial would participate - therefore there is already a preexisting bias. Generally when that happens a change of location is requested.
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That is what your friend failed to do. She offered no support for her position - came in spouting the same thing you said when we first crossed swords (so to speak). At least you offered some websites as references. She offered nothing more than her say so.
Well, while I'm sure that she's a wonderful person, I have not yet earned the title "friend." I don't know who she is. What she's done is ask for something substantial to talk about. Rubysue has basically said nothing except that she doesn't like Chomsky's ideas, and she believes the wild unsubstantiated claims against him regarding anti-Semitism and Faurisson and Cambodia. Take those last three items aside and talk about where his evidence for what he says is wrong and you won't see that in anything Rubysue has said.
Prove the claims counter to Chomsky are wild and unsupported. What evidence for what is wrong? Countries have been screwing it up since before the US existed. It was the US that founded and currently supports the UN. The US is not required to subjugate its sovereignty to any body whether it was instrumental in its creation or not. The UN has no teeth except that given to it by its constituents. People keep throwing around the *International Courts* as tho it's an actual entity. A Court can be convened by the UN, but that courts power is subject to those who have members in the UN, not the other way round. This country, no country is yet ready to subjugate itself to the authority of a *World Government*. You have to be honoest - there is not enough cohesion in the world to support a world government. It's the us against them mentality. It happens.
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It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them. -Mark Twain
Edited by - Trish on 11/05/2001 04:27:43
This quote has a great deal to do with Chomsky's message.
Maybe so, but I think Twain predates Chomsky and the message has more to do with exercising our first amendment rights. I don't need to agree with Chomsky to appreciate the meaning of the quote.
It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them. -Mark Twain
Edited by - Trish on 11/05/2001 05:34:54
Edited by - Trish on 11/05/2001 05:37:22 |
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Tokyodreamer
SFN Regular
USA
1447 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 06:03:28 [Permalink]
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quote:
Lets cut the US up - my vote the Taliban gets the Southern States - sorry TD - you'll probably have to move.
That's ok. My allergies are kinda bad here anyway, and I'm hoping a change of climate remedies that (I'm certainly not getting rid of my cats!). Thanks for caring. 
Gorgo, a question: You seem to steadfastly believe that anger and reason are utterly and completely mutually exclusive. I don't want to hijack the thread too much, but I was curious as to why you think this. Just because someone is angry, doesn't automatically invalidate what they are saying.
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Sum Ergo Cogito |
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 06:13:59 [Permalink]
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quote:
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Lets cut the US up - my vote the Taliban gets the Southern States - sorry TD - you'll probably have to move.
That's ok. My allergies are kinda bad here anyway, and I'm hoping a change of climate remedies that (I'm certainly not getting rid of my cats!). Thanks for caring.
Gorgo, a question: You seem to steadfastly believe that anger and reason are utterly and completely mutually exclusive. I don't want to hijack the thread too much, but I was curious as to why you think this. Just because someone is angry, doesn't automatically invalidate what they are saying.
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Sum Ergo Cogito
No. Of course you're right and I just said as much. What I am saying is that, for instance, Trish's attitude is, and forgive me Trish if it seems as though I'm slamming you, that is not my intention, and I'm not quoting you, I'm paraphrasing - I was in the fucking Marines for five years, so Chomsky is wrong. This is not skeptical thought it is thought born of an emotional attachment. Just because it is an emotional attachment doesn't make the statement wrong, it just makes it suspect. I'm not telling people not to be angry, I'm just saying that emotional attachments can cloud judgment and reason.
Lisa Lisa, sad Lisa Lisa - Cat Stevens |
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 06:31:03 [Permalink]
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Regarding Ramsey Clark. There are many reasons why there is no discussion. One is that he couldn't get a very big publisher. Some will say that's not surprising because he's a kook, Ramsey would say that's the "corporate media." I tend to agree with both although I doubt he's a complete kook. One reason might be is that no one wanted to embarrass the old guy. Another good reason is that Bush was on a big roll and there was a lot of noise about making him a god and any criticism just got drowned out.
As I've said, I'm not a defender of Ramsey Clark, but I think his books are worth reading with a little bit of caution.
Trish, I think maybe I've confused you. It's Ramsey Clark that's held the trials not Chomsky. If you do a search you can find info on the net. If not, I'll try to find it for you if you're interested.
Lisa Lisa, sad Lisa Lisa - Cat Stevens |
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 06:31:58 [Permalink]
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Now, this is a reasonable question. I'll see what I can find out, unless someone else has a quick reference.
quote:
I wonder what evidence Noam Chomsky can provide that there was a massive air raid on Japan after the surrender?
Lisa Lisa, sad Lisa Lisa - Cat Stevens |
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 06:38:52 [Permalink]
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I defy anyone to find in any of Chomsky's writings where he promises "Utopia."
Lisa Lisa, sad Lisa Lisa - Cat Stevens |
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 08:11:33 [Permalink]
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I know Chomsky has mentioned the thousand plane raid, but I don't remember a '62 invasion of the Dominican Republic. Does he cite a book, or what?
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I wonder what evidence Noam Chomsky can provide that there was a massive air raid on Japan after the surrender? I have a whole library of World War 2 references. Not one of them mentions any such incident. I heard a speech a while back by Dr. Curtis Paul Ramsey (a linguist incidentally), in which he claimed that thousands of US Marines had been killed during the US "invasion" of Lebanon in 1958. I asked him what his source was, since every other account of this incident gives the death toll as 0. His answer: Professor Noam Chomsky. Dr. Ramsey also mentioned, again with Chomsky as the claimed source, US invasions of the Dominican Republic in 1962 and 1965, also with massive American casualties. The '65 incident really happened, with 25 Americans killed, according to every detailed account. The news archives here at Texas Tech (including Pravda, Izvestia, and the Daily Worker) contain no account of such an invasion in 1962.
Chomsky cultists are apparently unaware of something very important about the good doctor: he is a liar on the scale of Joseph Goebbels, engaged in a campaign to re-write history on a massive scale. His analyses of history mix biased interpretations of factual incidents with off-hand references to things that never happened. In a most literal imitation of Goebbels, the latter technique implies that the incident is so well-documented that it doesn't require exposition in the given context.
This big lie technique is the stock-in-trade of Chomsky ally Ramsey Clark. Gorgo, has it occurred to you that Clark's claims are not more extensively discussed simply because they do not merit serious discussion? You once alluded to discussion not being "permitted". Permitted by whom? Who has the power to stop it? This seems no different from any number of garden-variety claims about conspiracies of suppression in a rigidly controlled consortium of media. Have you ever heard of David Icke? He also accuses the "corporate media" of conspiring to suppress discussion of his ideas. In his case, those claims involve the US government permitting lizard aliens from the 4th dimension to abduct American citizens for food. They do this in return for alien technology, you see. Sure enough, little discussion of Icke's claims is "permitted" either. He has every bit as good a claim for a conspiracy of suppression as does Ramsey Clark. The mock trials staged around Clark's claims are just that, a mockery, organized and controlled by Clark and his allies. I once wrote to Clark and offered to go to Panama at my own expense and exhume the mass graves where the US Army buried the many thousands of Panamanian civilians it allegedly killed in 1989. Clark only needed to provide some information on the approximate location of these mass graves. I never got a response.
Abducting UFOs and conspiring against conspiracy theorists since 1980.
Lisa Lisa, sad Lisa Lisa - Cat Stevens |
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 08:19:46 [Permalink]
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This is the line you were referring to? Not exactly damning evidence, Rubysye.
"A clue to the nature of his scholarship was
right there on the cover sheet of the 50page screed, where Finkelstein thanked Noam Chomsky."
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By the way, one last "turd" in the Chomsky punchbowl and I'll be off to a real life for a while. Here's a link to an interview with Chomsky about the Faurisson affair and a link to an article from The New Republic. The interview with Chomsky is a classic - he commits just about every fallacious argument error on the books, formal and informal, and is so coy and devious as to be nauseating. When I did a search on Holocaust denial and Chomsky on Google, I got MANY links to explore in addition to the ones I've already noted. Chomsky has a relationship with Finkelstein, as noted in the tnr article, who is associated with a Canadian Holocaust denier and his publications. Is a Palestinian home state and/or the destruction of Israel so important to the left that they would actively deny the horrors of history?
http://monkeyfist.com:8080/ChomskyArchive/essays/kolodney_html
http://www.thenewrepublic.com/archive/0598/050498/diarist050498.html
rubysue
If your head is wax, don't walk in the sun.
Edited by - rubysue on 11/04/2001 21:09:02
Lisa Lisa, sad Lisa Lisa - Cat Stevens |
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 08:34:21 [Permalink]
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Piltdown, are you able easily to look at March '89 A.M. Rosenthal column about the tenth anniversary of the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty and post it here?
The archives of the NYT don't go back that far. If it's not easy, don't bother.
Lisa Lisa, sad Lisa Lisa - Cat Stevens
Edited by - Gorgo on 11/05/2001 08:34:53 |
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
Posted - 11/05/2001 : 08:53:44 [Permalink]
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Piltdown, I don't find any chomsky references regarding marines dead in 1958 in Lebanon. Again, what is Ramsey's source? What book?
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I wonder what evidence Noam Chomsky
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