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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   5460 thread views

Quality Contributions Report for April 2023

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. Here we go:

Quality Contributions to the Main Motte

@ymeskhout:

@gattsuru:

@johnfabian:

Contributions for the week of April 3, 2023

@Soriek:

@FiveHourMarathon:

@grendel-khan:

@ymeskhout:

Recognition Diplomacy

@naraburns:

@07mk:

@FiveHourMarathon:

Contributions for the week of April 10, 2023

@HlynkaCG:

@TracingWoodgrains:

@FlyingLionWithABook:

@Soriek:

@RandomRanger:

Transitive Reasoning

@Lewyn:

@self_made_human:

@roystgnr:

@RandomRanger:

@TracingWoodgrains:

Contributions for the week of April 17, 2023

@gattsuru:

@ControlsFreak:

@faul_sname:

Identity Politics

@throwawaygendertheorist:

@RenOS:

@SophisticatedHillbilly:

@FCfromSSC:

Contributions for the week of April 24, 2023

@naraburns:

@faul_sname:

@Dean:

@self_made_human:

Discriminating Taste

@RenOS:

@Unsaying:

@Esperanza:

@FCfromSSC:

@MonkeyWithAMachinegun:

@laxam:

@DaseindustriesLtd:

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There are people who argue things like, "our understanding of money has changed" and that sufficiently low interest rates (such that they cover just inflation + a reasonable salary for the employees necessary to facilitate the loan) are acceptable now.

However, I am becoming more and more convinced that the Church hasn't officially developed its teaching in this direction at all. I think loaning money on interest is still a sin. It's not a sin to accept a loan under such terms (though should be avoided if possible.) And yes, this does mean that the Vatican Bank is - at the very least - a near occasion of sin to a lot of people. But that shouldn't be surprising, given what we know of Vatican Bank officials.

If you want to learn more in depth, New Polity did a series on "Good Money."

Church Leaders are not very outspoken on this topic these days. I can only speculate as to why, a charitable guess would be that if the average Catholic understood that the entire system on which they base their livelihood on involves sinning, they will either reject the Church's definition of sin or become scrupulous. It's rare for people to take the middle way, that we live in a fallen world but it's not a sin to be taken advantage of.

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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.


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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."

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


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