Comments on: Quote of the Day

By: LotharBot

LotharBot — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 19:17:58 +0000

On my board, the “bad faith participants” usually get an earful from me, and if they continue in bad faith, their posts get deleted. Over time, that’s led to a culture of mostly good-faith participation — partly because people know the expectations on them, and partly because the worst characters have all been chased off.

By: Roy Lofquist

Roy Lofquist — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 04:28:15 +0000

One of the most common faults, amongst many, is that people think they are smarter than they really are. To them, people who disagree are not quite bright and if they only repeat themselves enough people will finally see the light, become enlightened and acknowledge the superior intellect. There are many publicly acknowledged brilliant people who suffer from this malady.

The wise people whom I have known are always questioning what they know and learn.

I can’t remember where I heard it but this pretty well sums it up:

“If you don’t learn three new things everyday, and realize that you were wrong about three thing you thought you knew, then you’re just not paying attention”.

By: david foster

david foster — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 02:52:18 +0000

Fred…seems like the ER formulation would exclude virtually all novelists and screenwriters from the category of “very bright people.”

By: fred lapides

fred lapides — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 22:29:35 +0000

Depends whom one talks to and what it is about. Eleanor Roosevelt (pardon) had some nice ideas about this: very bright people talk about ideas; bright folks talk about Events; average people talk about people. But what would a Leftist know, right?

By: Shannon Love

Shannon Love — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 22:20:49 +0000

I think that many people view politics and political debate as a form of status competition. They receive emotional gratification from confronting and dominating others in a consequence free environment.

By: Lexington Green

Lexington Green — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 21:41:20 +0000

“in a bigger discursive space, richer possibilities would present themselves. Now I don’t know… ”

I DO know. Bigger discussion spaces merely invite more conversational parasites. The richest possibilities exist where the quality of participants is uniformly high. This usually means the group must be selective and small. The larger the number of readers, the more worthless the comments and discussion.