O Come O Come Emmanuel

The Off-Topic forum for anything non-LDS related, such as sports or politics. Rated PG through PG-13.
honorentheos
God
Posts: 3762
Joined: Mon Nov 23, 2020 2:15 am

Re: O Come O Come Emmanuel

Post by honorentheos »

Bret Ripley wrote:
Mon Jan 30, 2023 1:10 am
or b) an anthropomorphic pineapple having an existential crisis who only spoke French answered the door while we were tracting...
Huh. I think I would have found that deeply disturbing, personally, but perhaps the combination of missionary training and Téléfrançais leaves one prepared to deal with the Kafkaesque.
Fortunately, the youngish me of the time was immunized from such thinking due to being wholly unaware of Kaftka. It wasn't until after serving I found that hidden door. And, to be fair, there was more than one apartment dweller that would be a candidate for a Kaftkaesque protagonist we turned into regular contacts. Funny thing about European missions is you don't get let in very often so you tend to have very, VERY relaxed standards regarding who qualifies as a teachable contact. Ennui mixes nicely with loneliness which tends to be the most common trait among those we taught...though the combination tended to be insurmountable as a hurdle for attempting to inspire change. I probably owe my immune system's resilience in part to not observing the immediately prior state of cups emerging from off-limit kitchens from which I drank plenty of herbal tea...
honorentheos
God
Posts: 3762
Joined: Mon Nov 23, 2020 2:15 am

Re: O Come O Come Emmanuel

Post by honorentheos »

KevinSim wrote:
Fri Jan 27, 2023 11:22 pm
Marcus wrote:
Fri Jan 27, 2023 4:34 am

A “fair” debate? Wasting people’s time insisting they discuss nonsense is tragic.
There is currently no accepted theoretical model that would allow cold fusion to occur.
I'm not insisting that anyone discuss anything. I'm simply saying there should be a forum at which people can have a fair debate of any issue they choose. Nobody has to show up to such a debate if they don't want to.
This forum is such a place. I'm confident you could have a fair debate in the Celestial forum, and an even if aggressive debate in the Terrestrial forum. No one is tilting the table for or against a position systemically here. It just happens some arguments tend to survive that open environment better than others...

I'd also suggest there is neutral evidence but neutral debate is not something that exists on any topic, anywhere. What you CAN do is find people whose expertise in a field overlaps with a subject whose research is not about the topic specifically, but nonetheless has bearing on the topic of interest. It's one of the reasons I find the Book of Mormon and Book of Abraham debates over historicity to be non-starters. No historian. archaeologist, Egyptologist, geologist, biologist, geneticist, or other unaffiliated expert is presenting research or findings that make that debate one that can be grounded in historical research. The entire debate begins with an attempt to find space for those writings within the history as a matter of faith.

You should make peace with what actual neutrality looks like.
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