[reb]

the way people seem to work as best i can tell:

1. everyone has some belief about 'god'; either for, against or can't figure it out
2. everyone knows, i think, that whatever their belief about 'god', if there is a sentient being who exists as 'god', that being likely doesn't give a rat's ass what people think
3. the hating/baiting/debating of everyone who doesn't believe the way we (as individuals) do gives us all something to do other than work-god forbid-or do anything productive.

we is so special, i'm SURE god cares about what happens to us...obviously, the respect for each other flows like water in a flooding stream in every thread on the internet and on every street in the world.

waste of time to ask for respect. has to be earned.

nasty little bonobos.

[TheLastMohican]

	Originally Posted by plotthickens
	Qualifying posts and disqualifying responses is rather far removed, I'm afraid.

Unless I'm mistaking what you mean by qualifying/disqualifying posts, I don't see much of any difference.

	And if you're not proposing rule changes, what exactly are you proposing?

I'm proposing behavior changes. OPs can make their preferences and/or premises clear, and others can take those into consideration when deciding how or whether to reply.

[tooboku]

	Originally Posted by TheLastMohican
	It's not that far removed from standard enforcement of adherence to topics. But again, I'm not proposing changes to rules or moderation in the first place. (I've stated this four or five times by now.)

I keep repeating this as well. I never made and formal request to change any rules or procedures but it is being treated like I have. It was just an observation and hopefully a carefully worded and polite request that people consider the context of a discussion before posting something that is probably unrelated.

Originally Posted by Imperator

In other words, I think the reason threads typically devolve around God's existence so fast isn't because anyone's trying to derail anything, it's because we all, perhaps unconsciously, go by your standard online argument and debate format whereby the initial question must be valid. If it isn't, then it's not so much a discussion as it is a thread to see who agrees with the OP. That's no fun either.

Yeah.. to be fair, a lot of people fail at setting up the context and parameters that the discussion is expected to go by. I realize that. I even find it annoying. It is not so much the unsupported claims though. Things of this nature should be very difficult, if not impossible to articulate. It is more of a lack of curiousity about one's own faith. To just take it as it is dictated without exploring it... as if you just know it all. To quote one of the biggest athiests on the planet "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

I don't think there is anywhere on the internet where you can't expect some sort of debate. In fact it should be welcomed. However, even if a person doesn't set the context, if it is obvious that there are implications being made, it is a little counter productive for people to continue on as if they didn't notice. Emotions run especially high on such a topic.