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5/23/04

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Anton

Anton

Australia
September 2003

MAY 23, 2004 10:53 AM

Corruptive said:
ha ha. who needs to read the third page of this thread? if you scroll down it, you'll see roughly two people (perhaps a couple more participating periodically) discussing something the other one said on the previous post, and then there will be a quote from the first guy, posted by the second guy, followed by a defensive reply, and further accompanied by an attacking point, meant to be used as further reinforcement to their original point, that they failed to clarify in the first place!! and since the two of them dont reach any conclusion, their points are moot, a.k.a. pointless, other than having created the illusion of an interesting third page. whatever

ARRR!!!

[Edited on May 23, 2004 by Corruptive]



How I yearn to be a retard with no desire to discuss things, regardless of the possibility that ultimately any conclusions reached may not 'mean' anything.
whatever

kingcrac

kingcrac

Chicago, IL
September 2002

MAY 23, 2004 01:33 PM

Mike said:
My Uncle is a contractor and does work all over the middle east all the time.



In Iraq while Saddam was still in power with UN sanctions?

sinisterbhvr

sinisterbhvr

Buffalo, NY
November 2003

MAY 24, 2004 04:44 AM

Anyone who goes over there looking for work is an opportunist. I can't feel bad for Berg or anyone else that gets caught up in that shit when its associated with greed.
Berg knew the risks, he was no good samaritan like he has been portrayed.
So whether or not the CIA killed him or Al Queda is circumstancial.

Hussein

Hussein

I'm lost
March 2004

MAY 24, 2004 05:30 AM

SpaceInvader said:

saucy_son said:

SpaceInvader said:
Haha. You are a riot. I should have stated that this is Occams Razor and it has more to do with when there is more than one possible explaination to a phenomenon, and not social problems.



Haven't seen the video, and have no particular stake in the article, either. But on a philosophical level, I'd question whether you can apply Occam's Razor here. After all, the video isn't a "phenomenon," it's an artifact, something made by someone with the express purpose of creating a response in the viewer. In this case, the viewers' response has a great deal of political import. You may be right that the video depicts exactly what it seems to depict, but you can't be sure of that based on a principle of parsimony, however tempting that might be.



The video itself isn't the phenomenon, the beheading of Nick Berg is. Really, I have no idea what happened but until there's compelling evidence to convinve me, I'll stick with my application of Occam's Razor.



That's missing my point, isn't it? What we're talking about here is a video, and a video made for propaganda purposes. We have post facto knowledge that Berg was beheaded, and a video that purportedly shows that he was beheaded by certain people for certain reasons. Those are two different things. I don't see anything wrong with a skeptical approach to the video, and I certainly don't think anything like Occam's Razor applies here, no matter what conclusion you end up with.

To put it another way, it begs the question to apply Occam's Razor to the video evidence when the issue at hand is whether the video is evidence.

[Edited on May 24, 2004 by saucy_son]

Anton

Anton

Australia
September 2003

MAY 24, 2004 08:44 AM

sinisterbhvr said:
Anyone who goes over there looking for work is an opportunist. I can't feel bad for Berg or anyone else that gets caught up in that shit when its associated with greed.
Berg knew the risks, he was no good samaritan like he has been portrayed.
So whether or not the CIA killed him or Al Queda is circumstancial.



I feel sympathy for almost anyone who gets brutally beheaded. There are a few exceptions but on the whole, that's a terrible way to die.

In other news, I think you're a heartless dick. But that's just me.

kingcrac

kingcrac

Chicago, IL
September 2002

MAY 24, 2004 08:57 AM

saucy_son said:
That's missing my point, isn't it? What we're talking about here is a video, and a video made for propaganda purposes. We have post facto knowledge that Berg was beheaded, and a video that purportedly shows that he was beheaded by certain people for certain reasons. Those are two different things. I don't see anything wrong with a skeptical approach to the video, and I certainly don't think anything like Occam's Razor applies here, no matter what conclusion you end up with.

To put it another way, it begs the question to apply Occam's Razor to the video evidence when the issue at hand is whether the video is evidence.

[Edited on May 24, 2004 by saucy_son]



I have no problem with skepticism either, in fact I encourage it. However, what we have been talking about isn't the video itself but whether or not the phenomenon in the video (the beheading) was what it claims to be, the murder of an American by Islamic extremists in retaliation for the prison abuse, or whether there is a deeper and more complicated conspiricy behind the phenomenon. So instead of needlessly multiplying entities (ie, the man was held by the US, he dies in prison, the prison scandal erupts, the US concocts a propaganda scheme and beheads his lifeless body) I choose to stand by the empirical evidence (the video artifact) of the phenomenon (the beheading) and accept the explaination (he was murdered by extremists) as the most simple and logical explaination of that phenomenon, using the law of parsimony as my philosophical justification for doing so. Everyone else is welcome to come to whatever conclusion that most suits them.

That was the framwork of the discussion I was having, regardless of what you think is the issue at hand. What is the video if not evidence of a beheading? To say the video isn't evidence requires the needless mulitplication of entities which results in a complicated and convoluted theory that requires more assumptions than facts to prop it up. Ergo, Occam's Razor is applicable, in my opinion.

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