no, for example.

Versus accepting sarcastic and degrading diatribe as conversation?

Seeing something, does not entail a need to engage it. In fact I almost didn't react to your....viewpoint at all, but I simply couldn't resist.

art,

a few things interesting in that perspective:

i don't understand your position on debate, or the way you are speaking with it. i could be incorrect, but the way i read that its as though you're trying to position opinions within personal vacuums, which seems perhaps interesting given your thoughts on the way society shapes the individual..or my reading of them. from my perspective, its almost as though you're taking what i consider argument / debate, and simply rephrasing it as discussion. perhaps i'm missing something. assuming my viewpoint and yours do not coincide, then i would posit that our viewpoints take on elements of meaning because of the contrast between them, and that contrast is naturally a debate, whether implicit or explicit.

as for facts...how much of a technicality are you dealing with? would you take exception with the statement that there are certain things that are so reproducible they become facts in a de facto sense, although if you get into the metaphysically exacting frameworks perhaps it is difficult to call them facts?

/that was quick thinking judy.

/damn you tec: beat me to it. i wasn't sure if wanted to feed el troll or not, but it seemed to be already getting a meal, so why not? at least we can stand up for what the tfp...um...stands for. that came out well.

piglett thanks for your interest in this subject. How about if we take the discussion to a new thread?

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthr...65#post2250065

I sometimes disagreed with Falwell, but I had no ill will towards him on a personal level. RIP, Jerry.