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PaperclipPerfector  5mo ago (text post)   4001 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 23, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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Fwiw, posting history is always open to the mods. While I personally dislike it when people make their profiles private, I understand some people do have legitimate doxxing concerns. Also, it's really annoying when people do the reddit-style "I just searched your posting history and found you posted something months ago that I will now use as a stick to beat you with."

True, but you shouldn't have grown that stick off your branch if you were concerned about being beaten with it. (Has a more tortured metaphor ever been created?:)

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A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

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