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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   3365 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for January 1, 2023

Happy New Year!

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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But that's just the point - negativity (in media sources or elsewhere) doesn't seem, to me, to be about real proportionate evaluation, but a kind of circular mood-affiliation.

The comedian Dara O'Briain expressed this as "Crime is down, but the FEAR of crime is up!"

"Timmy and Janey ABSOLUTELY CRUSHED THEIR STANDUP THIS MORNING!!!!!"

Good Christ do I hate logging into LinkedIn for any reason.

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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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