Re: The Psychology of Responding to Crackpots

From: Chairman of the Ozzy Osbourne Appreciation Society (mathgeek42_at_hotmail.com)
Date: 06/29/04 

Date: Tue, 29 Jun 2004 18:43:30 GMT

Tron Furu wrote:
> Hi,
>
> As a lurker and possibly a crackpot (without the energy), or at least an
> ignoramus ...:
>
> In our favour: Some groups with no crackpots have for that reason very
> little traffic, since they are the ones who tend to bring in a little
> controversy. But, as apothecaries know, the poison is in the dosis.

I guess that depends on the quality of the controversy.

A lot of the recurring "controversies" in sci.logic, such as
"disproofs" of Cantor's diagonal argument and 1 <> .999...,
etc. aren't bona fide controversies.

I tend to agree with others that some good comes out of
crank threads since the anti-cranks are motivated to
present very careful arguments, and also might explore
odd cases that wouldn't come up in most books.

... but there is a point when it all gets silly IMO.
Like the halting proof threads, which I think are out
of control.

Cranks have no interest in learning about the subject
which they are critical of (they have no respect for it).
They will not read books which would require them to do
exercises and follow proofs; which would force them to
think about the precise meaning of each definition and
carefully consider its consequences. Their motivation
is only to speak and be heard.

When cranks get into a defensive mode, I think
it helps them more in the long run to be ignored.

The longer the debate rages the more likely it is for
the crank to write or imply any one or more of the following:

1) They are a genius on the scale of the founder of the theory.
2) Anti-cranks who've studied the topic extensively for years are
    ignorant and don't have the gift of seeing the "real" truth
3) the establishment is afraid of them
4) and so on

Obviously, the more they say stuff like this the less
likely they are to have an "oops, I was wrong" moment.
Consequently, I think these elongated debates reinforce
their resistance to education.

Returing to the comment about how we may be lucky to have
more news traffic due to cranks:, I prefer moderated
newsgroups even though they might have less traffic
than non-moderated versions because most of what gets
moderated is going to be junk anyway.

>
> "Daryl McCullough" <daryl@atc-nycorp.com> skrev i melding
> news:cbqdtf01855@drn.newsguy.com...
>
>>I have a problem. I have a very hard time ignoring crackpots like Peter
>>Olcott when they post.
>
>
> I always feel like there is some way to reach
>
>>them---that if you can only simplify the issues enough, that they will
>>see the light and understand.
>>
>>But it never happens. Never. You can really tell after one or two
>>posts that someone like Peter Olcott is never going to be able to
>>understand anything of substance, because they have the idea that
>>they *already* understand better than anyone else. They have a
>>psychological barrier to understanding that can never be bridged
>>by words, or formulas, or analogies.
>
>
> Well, in a sense, this goes both ways. For you to feel that "if you can only
> simplify the issues enough, /that/ they will see the light and understand" ,
> don't you have to have "the idea that /you/ *already* understand better than
> anyone else"?
>
> I am convinced that such disagreements as between PO and the cognoscentii of
> sci.logic are based on some point that is not made subject of discussion;
> i.e. PO's convictions reston some assumption to which your counter-arguments
> do not penetrate. If so, that could be seen as a psychological barrier on
> the part of you cognoscentii. My personal example is from a thread on Marx
> in alt.philosophy, where somebody posted a critique of Marx by Steven M.
> Pinker; to which I responded by questioning Pinker's authority on Marx; to
> which the reply was an even longer quote by Pinker on Marx. A bit of petitio
> principii there. The point is that some cogniscentii do not really penetrate
> into the nature of the criticism raised, but cut it off with some school
> book quote, which as often as not does not hit the mark in the centre of the
> criticism, but goes to a minor supporting argument which, even if resolved,
> leaves the original question intact. Thus one has prepared the ground for
> innumerable rounds of minor skirmishes on strategically unimportant outposts
> (no pun inteded).
> As for the PO vs. sci.logic, I tried to diagnose the point from which PO
> makes his critique, which, to me, seems to be a strict logical positivist
> language theory, disallowing self-contradictory statements; which embroiled
> me with messrs. Frege and Witt on the question of denoting in (the original)
> Frege and Russell; with one of my interlocutors plainly stating not being
> drawn to the thread on the basis of the original question.
> I remain convinced that if the discussion in general would penetrate to that
> point, the problem could be resolved, either in some kind of agreement, an
> agremment to disagree on some basic choices, or in the elucidation that PO
> might be right or be wrong but is not doing e.g. logic. Perhaps one would
> find this solution only in other places, but I couldn't mean that and at the
> same time uphold your diagnosis, so I remain in my conviction because I
> *already* understand better than anyone else.
>
>
>>Now, if I can only work on my own obsession with responding to
>>these people.
>
>
> The first lesson, does it start now?
>
> T
>
>

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