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naraburns  nihil supernum  2d ago (text post)   2437 thread views

Quality Contributions Report for November 2024

This is the Quality Contributions Roundup. It showcases interesting and well-written comments and posts from the period covered. If you want to get an idea of what this community is about or how we want you to participate, look no further (except the rules maybe--those might be important too).

As a reminder, you can nominate Quality Contributions by hitting the report button and selecting the "Actually A Quality Contribution!" option. Additionally, links to all of the roundups can be found in the wiki of /r/theThread which can be found here. For a list of other great community content, see here.

These are mostly chronologically ordered, but I have in some cases tried to cluster comments by topic so if there is something you are looking for (or trying to avoid), this might be helpful.

Quality Contributions to the Main Motte

@naraburns:

@DiscourseMagnus:

@Rov_Scam:

@SlowBoy:

@Muninn:

@Dean:

Contributions for the week of October 28, 2024

American Needs a Trump

@nomenym:

@MaiqTheTrue:

@georgioz:

Contributions for the week of November 4, 2024

@Walterodim:

@Dean:

@flailingace:

@urquan:

@doglatine:

Contributions for the week of November 11, 2024

@Hoffmeister25:

@Belisarius:

@Sloot:

@Gaashk:

Contributions for the week of November 18, 2024

@FCfromSSC:

@coffee_enjoyer:

@Dean:

@ares:

@DirtyWaterHotDog:

Dude (Looks Like a Lady)

@dovetailing:

@Primaprimaprima:

@OliveTapenade:

@Folamh3:

@naraburns:

@Amadan:

@JarJarJedi:

Contributions for the week of November 25, 2024

@Bleep:

@magic9mushroom:

@SerialStateLineXer:

@Primaprimaprima:

@RenOS:

@blooblyblobl:

@IGI-111:

@functor:

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I'm often as surprised by which of my posts get nominations, as which do not. This seems to be a running theme with many quality posters; the deeply researched effort post gets ignored, while the drunken schizo-post you tossed off at 2am pulls ten nominations and spawns a dozen quality replies.

I expect there's no single reason for this, but nominations tend to predominantly cluster on novelty, insight, authenticity, thoroughness, eloquence, and effort. Length correlates with several of those. In this case I expect the combination of thoroughness and eloquence on a topic of interest was a driver of nominations. But that is only a guess; those who nominated you are welcome to elaborate, or not.

I believe people are most persuasive when they're passionate and authentic. That doesn't mean every nutter shouting in the street is convincing, but there's something about a true believer that compels acknowledgement. The best reasons to believe in something are the reasons why the people who actually believe it, believe it.

Also, and this is just an aside... but is the best line of my comment here really the part where I'm qualifying my point?

Also, and this is just an aside... but is the best line of my comment here really the part where I'm qualifying my point?

If you think there's a better single-sentence(ish) quote that should be there, feel free to say so. I'm happy to update.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

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."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


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