why do so many discussions turn contentious?


just venting....why do so many discussion posts need to turn  contenious and nasty?  do you guys find that constructive and/or enjoyable?  I have no clue who or how this forum is moderated, but I sure would love to see a stop to that...it makes me feel like this hobby is dominated by total jerks.

Can't we play nice, share OPINIONS and OBSERVATIONS, realizing that  they often are subjective and biased.  
"if you dont have anything nice to say, say nothing"?  If you wish to disagree, do it in a constructive and mature fashion, no need for "argument ad hominem"...

with all the chaff, one must waste so much time finding the wheat, figuratively speaking.  

I doubt my writing this will change anything, but, like most social media, people writing to others without facing them does not bring out the best, sadly......



128x128jw944ts
Could this be more about the characteristics of personal belief than of science?  The same basic issues of religion and empiricism?
Audio-goners:

You might find Paul Graham’s Hierarchy of Disagreement to be of use. Paul is a tech nerd with a number of valuable patents to his name. He noticed that social media by its very nature tends towards conflict because it generates more traffic. 

See

https://blog.adioma.com/how-to-argue-pg-hierarchy-of-disagreement/

and

http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html

Follow these simple guidelines, not much can go wrong.
Read and reread many of the responses and it's easy to agree with many who offer objective, rational insights into the swampy fringe areas. The fringe area as named has persisted since the invention of printing press.  However, now with the availability and freedom of the Net, those  compelled to wrap themselves in self-righteous garb and spread the plague of misinformation find support with little effort.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/08/12/philip-agre-ai-disappeared/

 

Philip Agre, a computer scientist turned humanities professor, was prescient about many of the ways technology would impact the world

By Reed Albertotti

August 12, 2021 at 1:30 p.m. EDT


In 1994 — before most Americans had an email address or Internet access or even a personal computer — Philip Agre foresaw that computers would one day facilitate the mass collection of data on everything in society.

That process would change and simplify human behavior, wrote the then-UCLA humanities professor. And because that data would be collected not by a single, powerful “big brother” government but by lots of entities for lots of different purposes, he predicted that people would willingly part with massive amounts of information about their most personal fears and desires.

“Genuinely worrisome developments can seem ‘not so bad’ simply for lacking the overt horrors of Orwell’s dystopia,” wrote Agre, who has a doctorate in computer science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in an academic paper.

Nearly 30 years later, Agre’s paper seems eerily prescient, a startling vision of a future that has come to pass in the form of a data industrial complex that knows no borders and few laws.


Post removed