[killJOY]

I subscribe to Skeptic magazine and frequent their site, because I think it's important to have a firm grounding in critical thinking.

I thought I would find some like-minded thinkers there. And yet, look how these fuckers have addressed peak oil on this thread (it's obvious which character I am):

http://www.skepticforum.com/viewtopic.p ... highlight=

[bobaloo]

I have a real problem with that group of so-called skeptics. I consider myself a "skeptic", in that I don't believe anything without evidence, but when presented with evidence I WILL believe.

That group has a definite predefined agenda, and data which is contrary to that agenda is simply ignored. That is not a true skeptic.

[Pops]

Actually the guy in the cool beret (that pic alone is enough to keep me from looking at the rest of the site) started out with a fairly reasonable position and then quickly revealed that the Energy Fairy was hiding under his hat wearing a green eyeshade.*

And to tell you the truth it is probably one of the least reactive (as in knee-jerk refusal) discussions I’ve seen. But then I’m a skeptic here at PO.com too, I argue with both the Doomers and Landers.
(tho not much of a critical thinker - if a thinker at all)

I did like the 3rd or 4th poster (from AZ no less) more worried about only 1 month of food that only 50 yrs of oil.



*Codeword for economist.

[avo]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('killJOY', 'I') subscribe to Skeptic magazine and frequent their site, because I think it's important to have a firm grounding in critical thinking.

I thought I would find some like-minded thinkers there. And yet, look how these fuckers have addressed peak oil on this thread (it's obvious which character I am)

[MicroHydro]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('bobaloo', 'T')hat group has a definite predefined agenda, and data which is contrary to that agenda is simply ignored. That is not a true skeptic.

[bbadwolf]

Sigh...at least they're not religious.

Then again, there's one lad in particular that seems to think ecomonics is science. We have not an inkling as to how to deal with a contracting ecomony. Economists are used to being right about 75% of the time. That's simply because we have for the last century been growing about 75% of the time. They predicted growth and we grew. Now they think it's a natural law!

Skeptics as a group suffer from the same fundamental problems of the general public from which they are taken. And they are no smarter, just have different bisaes. Dogma is always dogma, there is simply no replacement for thinking.

-bbad

[TWilliam]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('bobaloo', 'I') consider myself a "skeptic", in that I don't believe anything without evidence, but when presented with evidence I WILL believe.

[GoIllini]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('killJOY', 'I') subscribe to Skeptic magazine and frequent their site, because I think it's important to have a firm grounding in critical thinking.

I thought I would find some like-minded thinkers there. And yet, look how these fuckers have addressed peak oil on this thread (it's obvious which character I am):

http://www.skepticforum.com/viewtopic.p ... highlight=

[CrudeAwakening]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MicroHydro', '
')They have also been used (along with Popular Science under Ben Chertoff and Nova under Tomlinson) to bash the 9/11 truth movement by setting up straw men arguments to knock down and ignoring the numerous pieces of evidence that prove the official US govt conspiracy theory to be impossible

[Ardalla]

I glanced at this site and they seem to be anti D&G/conspiracist, but fairly accepting of PO itself -- at least in some timeframe. I didn't see anything really insulting.

[GoIllini]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MicroHydro', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('bobaloo', 'T')hat group has a definite predefined agenda, and data which is contrary to that agenda is simply ignored. That is not a true skeptic.

[Keith_McClary]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', 'I') too visited the site. There was not one itoa of sceptical reasoning. It was just more blather.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('GoIllini', '
')There were more convincing arguments than a silly non-published, non peer-reviewed document written by a no-name, no-Phd guy back in the '70s that we were going to hit peak oil in 1990.

[killJOY]

Thank you all. This is very productive.

I use Michael Shermer's book Why People Believe Weird Things in my writing class to advance a project on the evolution-creationism debate. To see how far he has fallen with the straw man 9/11 debate just breaks my heart.

I agree, too, that these Skeptics are dogmatic. The remark about their defending conventional wisdom is right on.

If you go back to that link I gave you, you'll see that that JD character who was bounced out of here is there plugging his peak oil debunked site.

He calls us "unsavory characters."

When I began researching PO, my fear was that the word wouldn't get out in time and it would be "too little, too late." This seems to be coming true.

Never DID I DREAM of such vigorous opposition being the main obstacle.

To quote Shake-speare:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'B')ut yet the pity of it, Iago.
O Iago, the pity of it, Iago.