The Upper Room

Doubting Thomas

3:59 PM

room topic changed to The Upper Room: General discussion for Christianity.SE, pseudo-meta support, and help formulating questions. [christianity] [discussion]

TRiG

pseudo-meta support I like it.

Apr 8 at 22:18, by TRiG

@SanJacinto There is a chat transcript, but it's much easier to find stuff on Meta. Meta really is the designated place for discussing site policy. That's what it's designed for. It could be done here, but that would be fiddly. Also, any precedents set by the decision would be hard to find for future reference.

Doubting Thomas

@TRig :D it's really hard to type on this iPad lol

I say "pseudo" because like you said this isn't meta, but it can help for quick questions

Jon Ericson

4:14 PM

@DoubtingThomas Made the mistake of using an iPod touch to log into chat: it did not end well.

I ended up posting a search string. :-(

Doubting Thomas

@jonericson lol, nice. The iPad iterface is pretty good, Ism just horrible at typing

wax eagle

@JonEricson lol, mobile interface for chat is not the best. I can consume decently but not participate..

Jon Ericson

4:30 PM

@waxeagle That's my conclusion too. Now that I know how it works, I'm pretty much ok with that.

TRiG

5:20 PM

And this is how to deal with no-good lying bigots.

Why do people like Tony Perkins lie all the time?

Ugh. Ugh. Ugh.

So, I'm laughing, because if I didn't laugh I'd cry.

Jon Ericson

6:46 PM

@TRiG Ugh. That's truly hard to listen too. In fact, I wonder if it would do some good to ignore folks like this. I can't change them and I don't want them to have power over me. (Not even the infinitesimal power of making my day a bit worse.)

Stack Exchange

6:59 PM

-3

Q: Just a reminder to everyone

We established a while ago that lack of references to independent sources is not a valid reason to downvote or delete an answer because a requirement for such references would only serve to exclude answers from the perspective of Christian groups that either explicitly reject creating such docume...

discussion

Steely Dan

9:35 PM

@Caleb

@caleb please refrain from making up lies to justify deletion of a perfectly legitimate answer.

Now I have to go re-post it again, because for the second time today it was deleted based on a totally bogus rationale by people who obviously don't know how we do things here on Christianity.SE.

Caleb

@SteelyDan Don't bother.

Steely Dan

Oh, you'll go ahead and take care of it? Thanks, I appreciate it.

Caleb

I'm not lying or making anything up. I'm telling you how it is. You can like it or not or try to make a case for the community to change it, but for now, it's our job to enforce just what we've said so far.

Steely Dan

Yes, you are. When you said "pawn it off as somebody elses," I was doing nothing of the sort. You were making up a lie when you said I was doing that.

And when you said, "Primarily, it was noted that you are flouting the standards this community has established with regards to answer standards such as citing references if requested and representing some known body of Christians not forwarding your own personal ones,"

Caleb

If you would like to participate with quality answers in cooperation with community guidelines, that's fine. If you insist on going against those guidelines even when challenged with them, then there isn't much left to discuss.

Steely Dan

9:39 PM

that is simply not true, since we established some time ago that that is not the standard precisely because it has the effect of suppressing extreme minority viewpoints for which the sources that you (who clearly don't know how we do things here on Christianity.SE) demand simply do not exist

I am participating with quality answers in cooperation with community guidelines. It's apparent that you simply aren't aware what such a thing is.

You obviously don't know how we do things here, which is a problem if you wish to continue to participate on this site.

Caleb

@SteelyDan No. You tried for forward that idea but "WE" didn't establish anything, in fact you've been pretty strongly rebutted and the community is not behind your concept.

Also parts of your idea are contrary to SE principles that our community can't set anyway.

Steely Dan

Simply false. The purpose of this site is for people to find answers to questions they have about Christianity, where Christianity is defined to be "anything that self-defines as Christian." There have been zero proposals for requiring all answers sourced that are compatible with that fundamental purpose, given the problem I mentioned before.

Thus, all proposals to require sources so far are null and void, because we don't get to make rules that run counter to our basic purpose.

Caleb

@SteelyDan Then take my participation up with the SE community team. Their email is listed at the bottom of every page on the site. They can review all my actions, including deleted posts and comments.

Steely Dan

No need. You're the one in the wrong; the onus is on you to correct your errors.

It's not my fault you hate this site and want it to fail.

Caleb

The onus is on me as a moderator to enforce my best judgement for what is good for the site in accordance with my understanding of the SE network and our local community. If I err in that, the onus is on you to take it up with the SE community team.

I'm going to bed. Goodnight.

Steely Dan

9:45 PM

Wait, you're a moderator?

That was obviously a mistake on somebody's part, since you clearly haven't the slightest clue how we do things here on this site. We need to do something about fixing that. Will you help me with this?

Caleb

@SteelyDan Yup. Goodmorning ;)

@SteelyDan Sure. I'll save you the trouble of looking up the email you need to contact. It's [email protected]

Goodnight for reals.

Mason Wheeler

@Steelydan: Anyone with the diamond after their name is a moderator.

That's me, Caleb, El'endia Starman and Waxeagle.

Steely Dan

Aha, I see.

Mason Wheeler

When we talk about our community standards, we know what we're talking about; we're the ones who the community asked to maintain them.

Steely Dan

Obviously you don't, given your behavior so far today.

We don't get to make "standards" that run counter to our basic goal. That'd be ludicrous.

Mason Wheeler

9:51 PM

shrug One person with personal preferences does not a community make. If the rest of the community agreed with you, they would have argued for the rules to be other than what they currently are.

It's not like Caleb and I handed down these guidelines by fiat. I was actually against some of the rules, but the users came to a consensus about what they wanted questions and answers here to be like, and so I help uphold that.

2

Out of curiosity, what do you see as "our basic goal," that our community standards are running counter to?

Steely Dan

To provide a place where people can ask questions about Christianity (where "Christianity" is defined to be "Anything that self-identifies as Christian") and get answers to them from knowledgeable people.

If the community consensus is wrong, then the community consensus be damned. That's the only sane way to do it.

Mason Wheeler

You're pretty close.

Steely Dan

I'm spot-on, actually.

Mason Wheeler

You're missing one word that makes a big difference, though

Steely Dan

No, I'm not.

Mason Wheeler

9:56 PM

"To provide a place where people can ask questions about Christianity (where "Christianity" is defined to be "Anything that self-identifies as Christian") and get authoritative answers to them from knowledgeable people."

Steely Dan

I think I know what word you're thinking of

but I'm not missing it

never mind, I was wrong

but that doesn't change anything relevant to the answer at hand

err, to the issue at hand

Mason Wheeler

It does. Being authoritative requires sources. It's a lot like Wikipedia. If someone just says something, no one knows if that's real or if they just made it up because they felt like saying it, or if they sincerely believe it's right but they're mistaken about something.

That's why we ask for sources to back up doctrinal claims.

Steely Dan

No, it doesn't. I can be just as "authoritative" based on the knowledge I've obtained from firsthand experience--which in fact is as authoritative as you can get for strains of Christianity for which those "sources," for whatever reason, don't exist.

Requiring "sources" for answers reflecting those particular perspectives has the effect, intended or not, of suppressing those perspectives from this site, which is clearly counter to our basic goal here.

Mason Wheeler

Well, you haven't even identified the perspective. Your answer--the one that's been causing trouble--speaks of things that were "clearly" taught by "the Christ" (not a term that's in common use) but provides zero perspective to back it up. There's nothing authoritative about your answer; it looks more like a mini-rant than the type of answer we're trying to produce here.

Steely Dan

Let's take the Doukhobors, for instance. They explicitly reject any sort of fixed doctrinal statement and scriptural authority altogether, on the grounds that anything written by man is inherently subject to error. (continued on next line)

Now, an ethnographer studying them may have his own impression of what they believe, a historian might use interviews to put together an idea of what they believe, but we have to remember that we've outgrown the modernism of Malinowski's era. We now realize that the meaning of any cultural phenomenon is entirely a subjective experience. Thus, in order to provide an answer from a Doukhobor perspective (when it is relevant to the question that was asked), (continued on next line)

really the only one who can provide an answer that is in any sense "authoritative" would be a Doukhobor himself. And since he rejects the authority of any formal, fixed doctrinal statement, he's not going to be able to point you to any sources. Thus, by demanding he provide "sources" you have effectively suppressed the Doukhobor perspective.

Mason Wheeler

10:06 PM

Well then I'm afraid we'll have to suppress the Doukhobor perspective. Part of being authoritative is being verifiable. If someone else can't check your claims, they're not helpful.

Steely Dan

And that would be directly counter to the purpose of this site. The claim that "being authoritative is being verifiable" is simply one that has no place in postmodern academic discourse.

So we simply can't make such a rule. Those who insist on enforcing such a rule anyway are acting contrary to the purposes of this site, and need to cease.

enforcing that rule

Mason Wheeler

This is not a "postmodern academic" site. I don't believe I've seen anyone use the term "postmodern" in a description of what this site should be about.

Steely Dan

If we wish to be a valuable resource, we've got to accept latter-day advances in epistemology.

Otherwise we're not as good as we could be.

And if you don't want this site to be as good as it could be, then, frankly, you've got no business being here--you certainly have no business being a moderator here.

Mason Wheeler

This is supposed to be an authoritative site, and that comes straight from the top. It's part of the purpose of the fundamental Stack Exchange concept. If you don't like it, feel free to take it up with Jeff Atwood or Joel Spolsky. But attacking the moderators who try to maintain the standards that they set down won't get you anywhere.

Jon Ericson

@SteelyDan I've been reading about C. S. Lewis lately and he would probably say: "If we wish to be a valuable resource, we've got to reject latter-day advances in epistemology."

3

Mason Wheeler

10:11 PM

To be perfectly frank with you, you're about two rants away from a ban.

Jon Ericson

And if "latter-day advances in epistemology" means what you seem to imply that it does, I would agree with him.

Steely Dan

And for the reasons I've explained, requiring "sources" is, in certain cases, antithetical to the goal of authoritativeness. They actually make it impossible to obtain an answer that is authoritative in any meaningful sense. So we can require sources, or we can be authoritative. Which do we want?

Jon Ericson

@SteelyDan I think we want sources.

3

Mason Wheeler

You're being unnecessarily absolutist about this. In the vast majority of cases, the theoretical problem you're referring to does not exist. (It's worth noting that we haven't had to have this discussion with anyone else in the community besides yourself, that I'm aware of.)

If exceptional cases exist, we can treat them as exceptions on a case-by-case basis. But that does not warrant changing the general rules.

Steely Dan

You're right, it's not a problem in the vast majority of cases. But in those few where it is, we have a serious issue with how we treat those perspectives.

Mason Wheeler

10:16 PM

...which would be resolved with quite a bit less conflict if those perspectives were identified.

But they're not.

Your answers read like nothing more than personal opinions, and that's not acceptable.

Steely Dan

Sure they are. I've identified, for instance, the perspective I'm working from (not a Doukhobor, but basically similar in the aspects relevant for this discussion) in the past, and it hasn't seemed to help.

Mason Wheeler

do you have any examples?

Steely Dan

2

A: What's the main logical basis that is put forth by those Christians who don't believe in the existence of God?

I don't know that there's a "main" (in the sense of "universal and accepted by all atheist Christians") one, but I can certainly speak for myself: The assertion that "[believing] in the divinity and/or divine origin of Jesus Christ" is the "definition of 'Christian'" is not one I accept. It is ...

-4

A: On which date was Christ born?

Indeed, the question of when the Christ was born (remember, "Christ" is an epithet, not a personal name) presupposes that he was born and that he ever had a literal physical existence. Certainly, this is taken for granted within Pauline Christianity, but step away from that and you get Christian...

0

A: Are bad things in life Satan's doing or God testing/punishing me?

From an atheist Christian perspective, the answer is obviously no. The bad things that happen in our lives are either blameless accidents or the consequence of bad actions by ourselves or others (without any intermediary directing things around so there is a bad outcome). And since all people a...

-2

A: What happens to non-believers or believers of other religions after death?

From the perspective of atheist Christians, the same thing happens to them that happens to everyone else: they themselves cease to be, though whatever legacy they may have built lives on. Such a legacy is built by working towards building a world of brotherly love and compassion, per the teachin...

-3

A: Do all Christian views need to have a Biblical basis?

Not all Christians recognize Biblical supremacy, and not all Christians believe in a god. Remember, it's called "Christianity," not "Bibliolatry" or "Jehovahism." Thus, the answer to your question is clearly "no."

-4

A: Is paganism compatible with Christianity?

Sure they're compatible. As long as you're following the teaching of the Christ (universal brotherly love), then anything else you do is irrelevant.

-4

A: Take away the gospels, and how do we know that Jesus did what he was recorded to have done in terms of miracles?

Are you familiar with Leo Tolstoy's The Gospel in Brief and What I Believe? Essentially, he asserts the falsity of the miracles, claiming that they are a distraction from understanding the true essence of Christness that is to be found not in Jesus's person and acts but in his teachings. It is ...

(done)

Jon Ericson

@SteelyDan Would that be Christian Atheist then?

Mason Wheeler

It seems like Christian Atheism is a well-established perspective. Marc Gravell knows about them, and there's a Wikipedia article on the subject

Hardly too obscure to find sources.

Steely Dan

10:30 PM

Christian atheism is not monolithic.

I have developed a very specific form over the last year and a half.

Jon Ericson

@SteelyDan Most traditions aren't.

Mason Wheeler

That sounds like quite an effort. Why not write a book on it? Then you'd have a source. :)

Jon Ericson

@SteelyDan Can you give us the elevator pitch?

Steely Dan

Furthermore, mine is entirely my own work and began from no existing Christian atheist perspective, so I haven't a clue what similarities it might have with others and don't really care

Mason Wheeler

Well, that's the thing. Here at this site, we do care. We're looking for authoritative, verifiable answers.

Steely Dan

10:32 PM

If I put it in a book, then people will want to hold me to it when I change my mind on aspects of it later (as I inevitably will, as I have many times already)

and as I've explained to you, sometimes "authoritative" and "verifiable" are mutually exclusive

Mason Wheeler

If you think the rules need to be changed, feel free to start a discussion on Meta. (Note: Making a claim that something is already established, with no links to back it up, does not count.)

Steely Dan

@JonEricson The Christ is an ideal whom we should strive for; Jesus was an imperfect manifestation; we can discover what the actual Christ is by taking Jesus's teachings and stripping out the parts that are inconsistent with the Christ's main purpose, which is to save mankind, and adding in the bits that are necessary to save mankind that Jesus never happened upon

Mason Wheeler

But when you come in talking about how the rules are obviously wrong, and the moderators who are tasked with enforcing them are clearly unfit for the position, you come across as a troll. Trolls tend to get tossed out on their ear around here, because we've seen what happens to communities where they don't and we don't want that to happen here.

Is that clear?

Jon Ericson

@SteelyDan Will you go back and edit all your old answers? It sounds like you need to find some place that you control to work out your ideas.

Like a blog.

Steely Dan

I work them out in my head as I find reason and opportunity to. In the meantime, I offer what I have in answer to questions that are asked.

Mason Wheeler

10:35 PM

Agreed. I find that blogging--or any form of explaining something in detail--helps me understand my own thoughts and ideas better. That might be a good idea.

Steely Dan

"what I have so far"

Jon Ericson

@SteelyDan So there's a platonic ideal "Christ" and Jesus was an instance of the ideal?

@MasonWheeler Speaking of which. I'm procrastinating...

Mason Wheeler

@Jon: Are you supposed to write an article for Eschewmenical or something?

Steely Dan

I'm not totally comfortable with the characterization of it as being in a specifically Platonic mold--for one, because I don't hold that the only direction things in the real world can go is down--but I suppose that's an approximate way of describing it, yes

Jon Ericson

@MasonWheeler Yeah. And I'm supposed to leave for a loooong weekend. So I'm not sure what I'm doing here. ;-)

Mason Wheeler

10:39 PM

I suppose you'll stop procrastinating as soon as you get around to it? :P

Jon Ericson

@MasonWheeler Yeah. And I can stop anytime I feel like it.

I just don't want to.

@SteelyDan I really encourage you to read Plato if you haven't already.

And after that, Augustine's Confession.

Steely Dan

I'm rather familiar with both.

Too familiar with Augustine, in fact...translating Confession and De Civitate Dei were summer projects I embarked upon as an undergrad to keep my Latin sharp over the summer

Jon Ericson

@SteelyDan My hat's off to you. I can't even imagine reading Augustine in the original.

Steely Dan

really, Ecclesiastical Latin and the Latin of the church fathers is considerably simpler stylistically than classical Latin

Jon Ericson

@SteelyDan If you say so. It's all Greek to me and I don't speak Greek. ;-)

Steely Dan

10:48 PM

heh :)

Jon Ericson

@SteelyDan I love how Plato pulls his arguments out of thin air. But he always has a way to prove them.

Steely Dan

right now I'm working through Tertullian, and aside from some of the vocabulary (which is what I have a dictionary for :) ) it's some of the most straightforward I've ever encountered

Jon Ericson

It's almost like magic.

@SteelyDan Did Latin get "dumbed down" over time? I understand it was pretty complicated.

Steely Dan

Much of it is, as Latin became the language of the Church in the West, much of the men writing in it were not native speakers. So they preferred to avoid much of the ornamentation and complex style that orators like Cicero would have used

Non-native speakers weren't inclined to do that

In Cicero, you can find an adjective and the noun it modifies separated by five clauses and thirty or more words

2

Jon Ericson

@SteelyDan Makes sense.

Steely Dan

10:55 PM

(the "In Cicero" should have been before "Non-native speakers", btw)

either way is equally legitimate--word order is usually not terribly important in Latin syntax, so you could play pretty fast and loose with it a lot of time

but if you weren't a native speaker, weren't as comfortable in it as someone who was, you really weren't inclined to

Mason Wheeler

So they could do all that, but they couldn't split infintives? No wonder it ended up as a dead language! :P

Steely Dan

Well, it's kind of hard when the infinitive is a single word :)

It's not in English where you might say "to boldly go"; in Latin it'd just be "ire"

well

"to go" is "ire"

Mason Wheeler

(I know. That was a joke.)

Steely Dan

fair enough :)

Mason Wheeler

It's still that way in languages derived from Latin. In Spanish, the Enterprise's famous mission statement would be "Ir osadamente..."

But if you try and stick 30 words between the noun and the adjective, people are gonna look at you funny and say ¿Qué?

Steely Dan

11:14 PM

heh

Mason Wheeler

Anyhoo, are you aware that deleted answers can still be edited and flagged, and then undeleted by a moderator after review?

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