Don't Argue. Ask Questions

Handling Contention

Do Not Refute as such; Do Not Mock; Avoid Negative Facial Expressions and Excessing Sighing; Be Friendly. 

Only Ask Questions

EXAMPLE: 

You are presented with the following as proof of another's conviction:

Overpopulation is a major cause of biodiversity loss and smaller human populations are necessary to preserve what is left

Authors of Study:

Philip Cafaro, Pernilla Hansson,Frank Götmark

 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0006320722001999

Read the study, while asking yourself these questions (Note: For online investigative critical thinking; patience and more sleuthing required, as needed)

______________________________ 

On Specifics:

Who are the authors of this study?

What are their backgrounds?

Who was involved in their education and training? (Is this a factor? Why or why not?)

Would you say that the study is all factually true or that some of it is true (i.e., only to the extent of the study's inherent limitations, viz., it is one study among many studies)?

If it only selects studies that support its preferred study's position (accepting other studies with only minor deviations) is that properly scientific and/or does that concern you?   

---------------------------------

Note: Are you going to quit reading at this point?

---------------------------------

 What are the bona fides of the journal that published them?

Are "bona fides," (whose bases for being bona fides, once being closely examined) reliable?

What are this journal's published commitments to science, biology, bio-diversity and ethics?

Are each of those clearly defined so as to remove presumptions as to what they are actually supporting? For example, does "peer-reviewed science" mean only "those who think like them" and exclude peers who disagree with them who may have been excluded from the "peerage" groups: academic/clinical/think tank institutions? [the consensual reality and culture trance test]

 

Who and what are the bona fides of the website on which the journal is featured and the article has been published? Are we able to judge the degree of credibility from that examination?

How do the images and text "flow" to produce a psychological effect upon those viewing its content?

Does that overall effect promote a sense of comfortable credibility? Why or why not?

Where might that content of the study's subject matter fall on the objective/subjective scale? Or better yet, is it possible to rate any content in such a way? If possible, why; or if not possible, why not?

 

More Generally

How do the parts of a presentation relate to the whole of its message to viewers/readers? Namely, the holistic effect.

Is the message one that is embedded with coded language intended to steer the judgment and opinion of viewers/readers by appealing to their preferred socio-cultural biases? (More to the point, how closely do the values presented in the study align with those that are broadcast in the media?)

Does one need an advanced degree to truly grok what "the messenger" is conveying? Why or why not?

Is the analysis of how a message is related connected to the so-called B.S. detector? If so, how so?

Can you apply the above questions that are begging a deeper analysis to the following diametrically opposed stance?:

http://annavonreitz.com/bunnymath.pdf

 

Finally: Is it possible that the thesis of the above study is presented in such a way so as to be acceptably-geared to all empathizers with nature's bio-diversity in order to play on one's naturalistic sympathies (while tending to throw attitudes and concerns about humans as artificial and harmful)? In other words, "My God, who would be against the flourishing of our planet's flora and fauna except non-caring, greedy human exploiters?" 

Grammar error: not "life"; "lives." OK?
Approach others with loving care.

Are You a Conspiracy Therapist?

 

Chem-Blast Targets

(Click once to enlarge)

Yep, and I'm accepting new clients...

Here's one I'd like to counsel. 

She's the Johns Hopkins 

Dean of the School of Nursing

https://twitter.com/SenRandPaul/status/1626259237985824768?s=20

Institutions proudly herald those, such as this hapless dean, as part of the invasion of cowardly “bodysuits” into, within, and among their woke ranks.

Others (like the guy in the 22-minute video below) might just self-medicate to stop the overwhelming, helpless sense that something is terribly wrong on our planet. 

https://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/?p=265228 

We sometimes get a reprieve and second chance at life, bringing along with us the ability to “seed grace” among fellow illusion-sufferers—those, like us, who have been caught and lost within the simulacrum, in the worldly lies and seemingly endless dissimulation.

Will this dean of the JH School of Nursing receive enough grace from Sen. Rand Paul—or some other "grace-seeder"—in order to help her come to her senses? We can only pray to the Good Lord and wish and hope so.

The Constitutional Crux

But doggone it, light a fire under them!

First Go Here:

Jack & Margy Flynn ~ America's Two Constitutions Is the Crux of Corruption That Engulfs the Nation

Then Go Here:

Jack & Margy Flynn’s Website

We're talking about No. 5, here:
The Law of Action

                  Go,Go,Go! 

Tribute to Elmore James

Is the blues—as more than a few contend—all about "getting' drunk and losin' yer baby"? Let's consider that for a few beats...

Elmore James is probably 99% on the second side of that blues equation; he's not much on memorializing gettin' drunk, as in hell-raising down at the local juke joint. Instead, losin' his baby is what he sings about; his drinkin' songs are geared toward gettin' some gal off his mind.  Case in point: One More Drink.

Goodbye Baby stands tall as one of the top "losin' yer baby" songs. But note, he's the one ditchin' her!—a tune immortal!

Here's the one to play over and over for when that muddy shoe is on the other foot—that is, when she ditches you! Something Inside Me.

Perhaps his two most popular tunes are It Hurts Me Too and Dust My Broom. Classics: he's downhearted but he shakes out that broom in the morning in a kind of salute to another day! That's the blues—life goes on and somehow a wellspring of optimism rises (eventually) from out of the darkest of days.

And then there is the one that Stevie Ray Vaughn picked up on: The Sky Is Crying.

Finally, let's go out on Shake Your Money Maker that 'standard,' made popular by Magic Sam, Houndog Taylor, and a bunch of other bluesmen down through time.

In the end, Elmore James stands firm as the primal mover and shaker of that fallin' apart sound, and as a solid master and commander of the blues slide guitar. He came from a nobler generation that didn't glamorize gettin' your head tore up just to carouse in public with other dirty drunks. No, Elmore James was a gentleman—one bluesman who suffered more from wimmen than from whiskey.

Let that be a lesson to you youngin's out thar! But oh yes, blues is surely about getting' drunk and losin' yer baby. Maybe though, the former should mostly follow the latter; we're all subject to heartbreak but not all of us drink as an anti-dote to all and every old thing. (That in itself is a hard blues lesson to learn.)

For more on the blues, see The Blues Memoir of Stubby Knuckles (scroll to the bottom of the page).

For more on Elmore James (and a ton of other recording artists), I recommend goin to the place I snagged the bluesman’s portrait at the top of this page: From the Vaults