Philosopher's Lounge first sentence description

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Philosophy Explorer
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Philosopher's Lounge first sentence description

Post by Philosophy Explorer »

The description to the Philosopher's Lounge opens up with this sentence:

"Chat about anything your heart desires here, just be civil." Does this sentence restrict what type of threads can be posted in the PL section? What does it mean to you? (I'd like to hear from my fellow members on this)

PhilX
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Re: Philosopher's Lounge first sentence description

Post by Misty »

Philosophy Explorer wrote:The description to the Philosopher's Lounge opens up with this sentence:

"Chat about anything your heart desires here, just be civil." Does this sentence restrict what type of threads can be posted in the PL section? What does it mean to you? (I'd like to hear from my fellow members on this)

PhilX
"Chat about anything your heart desires heer, just be civil," to me means any topic is OK as long as people are polite to each other.
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Re: Philosopher's Lounge first sentence description

Post by Spiral Out »

Philosophy Explorer wrote:What does it mean to you?
I would assume there are still some restrictions in effect (other than civility). I would think that the topic would still be required to be philosophical in nature (since this is a philosophy site) and posts that contain advertising and such would still be prohibited.

I'd like to hear the site admin's take on this too.

What are you getting at, PhilX? Anything particular??
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Re: Philosopher's Lounge first sentence description

Post by Eckhart Aurelius Hughes »

The respective forum descriptions for each forum describe what topics fall in that category.

However, the restrictions on what can and cannot be posted is determined by the forum rules. All posts on the site must follow the forum rules. While some of the particular rules generally do not apply to the off-topic section, that itself is explained explicitly in the forum rules.

Granted, where there are rules regarding staying on-topic, what qualifies as on-topic for any given topic/post is in large part determined by the description of the topic or forum in which it is posted.

However, there is a lot more to the forum rules than just staying on-topic. For instance, the description of the "Epistemology and Metaphysics" forum is "Discuss any topics related to metaphysics [...]" but of course that refers to what topics are to be posted there as opposed to a different forum on the site; it does not mean that any topic that happens to be about metaphysics is allowed there because, rather, what is allowed is determined by the forum rules. Again, to repeat, the forum descriptions are not the forum rules. The forum rules are the forum rules.

With all that said, I am interested to hear what people think about the respective forum description(s) and what it "means to them". If the description of some forum somehow seems to imply the forum rules do not apply, that is incorrect, so I would like to know so I can adjust the forum description to not be misleading.
My entire political philosophy summed up in one tweet.

"The mind is a wonderful servant but a terrible master."

I believe spiritual freedom (a.k.a. self-discipline) manifests as bravery, confidence, grace, honesty, love, and inner peace.
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Re: Philosopher's Lounge first sentence description

Post by Philosophy Explorer »

Spiral Out wrote:
Philosophy Explorer wrote:What does it mean to you?
I would assume there are still some restrictions in effect (other than civility). I would think that the topic would still be required to be philosophical in nature (since this is a philosophy site) and posts that contain advertising and such would still be prohibited.

I'd like to hear the site admin's take on this too.

What are you getting at, PhilX? Anything particular??
If you remember, you had moved my "Do Crocodiles Have Ulcers?" from the science section to the PL section at my request about a year ago (as I originally thought it was philosophical enough, but when it wasn't getting any response, figured it wasn't philosophical enough so I decided to relocate it down to the PL section).

Okay so it was lying down in the PL section without any response for about a year. Suddenly I received a board warning without explanation about my crocodile thread. Scott said I was spamming and trolling (which wasn't true). Why? Because Scott then said I copied the thread from another website to here (again not true, just the opposite - I copied the thread from here to the other website. Since I'm the original author of both threads, I challenged Scott to find yet another website that I could have copied from which I know he never will). Ironically after I restored the thread to the PL section myself, it is now starting to get response (Harbal with his funny response - I had to respond to his off-topic response with my off-topic response to get him to be on-topic which I successfully did).

It's now interesting to note that my first sentence thread was initially disapproved by a moderator - that's what it says in my inbox. But immediately after that, I get notification that my first sentence thread was approved by a moderator - go figure.

So Spiral Out, take another look at my crocodile thread and try to figure out what's so spammish about it or what is it advertising? I've been having it out with Scott on this one (I feel he has it in for me).

PhilX

-- Updated October 26th, 2014, 10:32 pm to add the following --
Philosophy Explorer wrote:
Spiral Out wrote: (Nested quote removed.)


I would assume there are still some restrictions in effect (other than civility). I would think that the topic would still be required to be philosophical in nature (since this is a philosophy site) and posts that contain advertising and such would still be prohibited.

I'd like to hear the site admin's take on this too.

What are you getting at, PhilX? Anything particular??
If you remember, you had moved my "Do Crocodiles Have Ulcers?" from the science section to the PL section at my request about a year ago (as I originally thought it was philosophical enough, but when it wasn't getting any response, figured it wasn't philosophical enough so I decided to relocate it down to the PL section).

Okay so it was lying down in the PL section without any response for about a year. Suddenly I received a board warning without explanation about my crocodile thread. Scott said I was spamming and trolling (which wasn't true). Why? Because Scott then said I copied the thread from another website to here (again not true, just the opposite - I copied the thread from here to the other website. Since I'm the original author of both threads, I challenged Scott to find yet another website that I could have copied from which I know he never will). Ironically after I restored the thread to the PL section myself, it is now starting to get response (Harbal with his funny response - I had to respond to his off-topic response with my off-topic response to get him to be on-topic which I successfully did - btw - it does say COMMUNITY & OFF-TOPIC which I assume applies to the PL section).

It's now interesting to note that my first sentence thread was initially disapproved by a moderator - that's what it says in my inbox. But immediately after that, I get notification that my first sentence thread was approved by a moderator - go figure.

So Spiral Out, take another look at my crocodile thread and try to figure out what's so spammish about it or what is it advertising? I've been having it out with Scott on this one (I feel he has it in for me).

PhilX
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Re: Philosopher's Lounge first sentence description

Post by Spiral Out »

Philosophy Explorer wrote:Suddenly I received a board warning without explanation about my crocodile thread. Scott said I was spamming and trolling (which wasn't true).
I support whatever decisions the site admin makes since this is his site and also since I have personally found that his decisions and judgments make sense to me based on my level of knowledge about any particular aspect of philosophy and this philosophy site and rules.
Philosophy Explorer wrote:It's now interesting to note that my first sentence thread was initially disapproved by a moderator - that's what it says in my inbox. But immediately after that, I get notification that my first sentence thread was approved by a moderator
At present, we are effectively a number of individual moderators acting individually. I think it might be more consistent, yet perhaps a bit less fluid, in moderating posts and new topics with a 3-vote system where any new post or topic would be voted on by each moderator, with majority vote determining the approval or disapproval of the post, with the site admin obviously having veto power. (I hope I'm not opening a can of worms here)

This might delay things just a bit and it should create a more consistent and fair moderation process but it might not be functionally feasible and might be unnecessary to the specific goals the site admin has in mind for the site.

I'd like to get the site admin's opinion on this idea.
Philosophy Explorer wrote:So Spiral Out, take another look at my crocodile thread and try to figure out what's so spammish about it or what is it advertising?
I personally don't see any issue with the thread aside from the fact that it doesn't interest me and I don't see the philosophical nature of it in my subjective judgment, however, I might not be aware of something that the site admin is aware of regarding your thread, and I'm also not the deciding authority on this site.
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Re: Philosopher's Lounge first sentence description

Post by Eckhart Aurelius Hughes »

Philosophy Explorer wrote:Suddenly I received a board warning without explanation about my crocodile thread. Scott said I was spamming and trolling (which wasn't true). Why? Because Scott then said I copied the thread from another website to here (again not true, just the opposite - I copied the thread from here to the other website. Since I'm the original author of both threads, I challenged Scott to find yet another website that I could have copied from which I know he never will). Ironically after I restored the thread to the PL section myself,
You re-posted a deleted post without approval? I have re-deleted the post and put you on probation.

If there is a request for further explanation on the original finding that it was rule-breaking or the decision to delete it, then that appeal cannot be made in this topic but must be made according to the Procedure for Complaining about Moderator Actions.
Philosophy Explorer wrote:It's now interesting to note that my first sentence thread was initially disapproved by a moderator - that's what it says in my inbox. But immediately after that, I get notification that my first sentence thread was approved by a moderator - go figure.
I've just checked the logs. It looks like you accidentally posted it twice. The first copy was approved at 8:33am on October 26, and the second copy was disapproved with the note "duplicate topic" at 8:34am by the same moderator.

***
Spiral Out wrote:At present, we are effectively a number of individual moderators acting individually. I think it might be more consistent, yet perhaps a bit less fluid, in moderating posts and new topics with a 3-vote system where any new post or topic would be voted on by each moderator, with majority vote determining the approval or disapproval of the post, with the site admin obviously having veto power. (I hope I'm not opening a can of worms here)

This might delay things just a bit and it should create a more consistent and fair moderation process but it might not be functionally feasible and might be unnecessary to the specific goals the site admin has in mind for the site.

I'd like to get the site admin's opinion on this idea.
I think that system would be preferable--perhaps at least with new topics. The biggest problem would simply be man-power, since all three or more of the involved moderators who need to approve the post. Perhaps, another option might be to require any two moderators to approve a post before it will be approved, assuming no other moderator disagreed. For instance, perhaps I could program the queue to work such that once one moderator approves a post it will not longer show to that moderator in the queue but still show to the rest. Then if a second moderator also approves it (presumably not even knowing whether or not it had already been approved by the first) it is approved. If at that point the two moderators already disagree, then we could have it either have to wait for a third or more moderators to weigh in or it could just come directly to me at that point.

What do you think?

As to the topic at hand, I think the issue may be less with moderators having different opinions but with the forum rules being unclear about what is and is not allowed in the off-topic section. It is clear that the forum rules put certain limitations on it, and that the forum description (e.g. 'just be civil') is not a replacement of the forum rules. For instance, if someone posts pornographic pictures with spam links to porno sites, I'm sure we would all realize that is prohibited and delete it. But there is a huge range between situations that clear as opposed to what is clearly allowed. Hopefully, somehow we can succinctly alter the forum rules or the forum description or both to make it succinctly clarify a little more specifically where that elusive distinction is.
My entire political philosophy summed up in one tweet.

"The mind is a wonderful servant but a terrible master."

I believe spiritual freedom (a.k.a. self-discipline) manifests as bravery, confidence, grace, honesty, love, and inner peace.
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Re: Philosopher's Lounge first sentence description

Post by Spiral Out »

Scott,

The first two-agreeing votes being the determining factor for the approval/disapproval of posts/topics is basically what I meant by the 3-vote system. The third vote only being necessary if the first two were in disagreement. The third vote could either be another moderator (if available) or it could be you, but you have assigned moderators to take some of the work load off so I'm assuming that you're thinking there shouldn't be too much disagreement between mods on a regular basis, especially if the rules and guidelines for each individual forum is more clearly outlined, as you said.

I think it's a good idea for a bit more clarification as to what is to be expected for each forum in order to prevent any misunderstandings or misinterpretations. There are a lot of intelligent, deep-thinking and analytical people here and unless these expectations are very specific with nothing left in the way of interpretive value, we may have some confusion, disagreement and/or animosity between moderators and members.

Also, could there be a moderator section (other than the logs) that could list any specific notes, alerts, or other suggestions/recommendations about previous post deletions, member actions, probations, etc.? I think that a higher level of communication and feedback would help greatly.

Thank you.
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Re: Philosopher's Lounge first sentence description

Post by Eckhart Aurelius Hughes »

Spiral Out, I have copied your post into the moderators forum and will respond there.
My entire political philosophy summed up in one tweet.

"The mind is a wonderful servant but a terrible master."

I believe spiritual freedom (a.k.a. self-discipline) manifests as bravery, confidence, grace, honesty, love, and inner peace.
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