Kavik Kang wrote in message ...

Hi Richard,

Greetings, yourself, Kavik.

As anyone who's read my posts before would surely know, I agree with
everything Richard has said here. I was, in fact, one of the early people

in

this newsgroup to advocate the concept of, well, too put it simply,

nutcases

on both sides. There are honest sceptics (which I would certainly be myself
if personal experience hadn't got in the way), and those with an honest
interest and rational reasoning behind leaning toward an ETH... and then
there are "Foaming True Believer's" and "Raving Lunatic Debunkers". The
first group... life would be great if they could just be allowed to discuss
the subject they are interested in. The second group, well, they prevent
that.

I disagree, somewhat.  I don't think that it is any more constructive to
listen
to the fanatics at one end of the argument than the other.  Both sides are
based on the irrational, emotional needs of the arguer, not on the merit of
their arguments.  Other than that, I agree with what you say.

The inbalance comes in the nature of the two negative groups. The "Foaming
True Believers" are, very unfortunately for us proponants, usually either
someone with some type of emotional or, yes, even psychological problems,or
even just plain nuts. As you might expect, they don't hold up too well in a
debate, nor should they, and I think the rest is history. The "Raving
Lunatic Debunkers", just as unfortunately, are usually at least intelligent
enough to write coherently, and their love (for some it really seems too be
a need) for the their debating style, founded in dishonest trickery, is
their primary reason for participating. That's a bad combination for the
proponant's side. The FTBs make themselves easy targets, and throw
themselves right at the RLDs, who have a demented need to rip them apart.
This has long been one of the main problems with the whole subject.

Yes, the FTBs, as you call them (I used to call them the "New Age Brothers
of the Purple Crystals"  ;-) tend to fall into the same category that we
used
to call the "flower children" in the 60's.  They tend to be dingy,
air-headed,
and generally non-logical in their thought processes and arguments.  The
RLDs tend to be anally retentive types, which makes them very rational
sounding
and tight in their logic.  So, they are much better debaters.  I tend to see
it
as a debate between interior designers and accountants, if you can imagine
it.  d8-]

Richard Caldwell,  aka  Buckaroo Banzai