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Originally Posted by Solecismic
. I think you genuinely believe you've bent over backwards to be overly fair. You haven't come close. And I'm getting tired of your constant whining about it.
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When you claim I've said something I demonstrably haven't, I have to point that out or we aren't having a discussion, I'm just being a doormat. From my perspective, from early on in the conversation you tilted the 'rules of engagement' so far in your favor that the thing literally fell over, and I let most of that be. I don't call that whining. I have no idea how to even respond productively.
You've asked a couple of times in recent posts about China. I don't want to just pretend that hasn't been said or isn't worth considering, but I can't respond to that other than by repeating things I've already said multiple times, and which comments you didn't consider worthy of responding to. I see no use in that.
Here's a practical example from your most-recent post of what I mean:
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Originally Posted by Solecismic
Methods of extraction have improved and they are more expensive. And now, in many areas around the world, any methods are forbidden. Games are played with leases, oil companies pass along those coasts, focus on different markets. The end result is that we pay a lot more for oil and then we pay incredible amounts for failing technologies like wind and solar.
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I think some of this is arguable and much of it is flat-out not true. Leaving aside the graphic flere-imsaho posted, I seriously have no idea how to productively respond to the rest of it. Options as I see them:
- Agree with it 100%. That would be a lie and there's no point in having a discussion if I'm going to be a doormat.
- Just say I don't agree. We're into Big Lebowski territory there, aka 'that's just like your opinion, man'. We can go around the merry-go-round of 'you're wrong' 'no you are' as many times as we wish, but we will get nowhere but tracing the same circle.
- There's almost nothing here that's specific enough to be refuted, or confirmed, supported or knocked down. What games are being played, by whom, to what degree, with what affects? Same for almost every phrase in this paragraph, with the exception of part of the last sentence. If I provide contrary examples, you can just say you were talking about something else.
- I can ignore it, which can be seen as disrespectful although you can't reply to
everything in a conversation like this. And I've even been accused here of ignoring things I did not, in fact, ignore so ...
- The great majority of scientific inquiry is placed outside what you will consider, by your own statements.
I'm not asking you to argue against your own statement, I'm just saying 'what is a reasonable way of disputing this kind of statement'. What types of things could I even say that would in your opinion be productive to the conversation, short of being in agreement with everything stated? If it's a fault of mine as a poster so be it, but I don't see any way to do that. It's what I refer to as the Circle of Insulation, and it's something that seems to be particularly prevalent on this board, not specific to you by any means. When all reasonable potential paths of criticism are cut off as being invalid, there's no way in.