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Snake oil, fraud, confirmation bias

It is becoming increasingly apparent that many threads about legitimate topics devolve into one or more of the contributors here making claims of snake oil, fraud, or confirmation bias thereby derailing the conversation beyond the valid and relevant thread topic and this is getting ridiculous. For anyone here who honestly holds the position that there is snake oil and fraud in the world of Music Reproduction Systems I challenge them to prove their claims in court it should be an easy task based on the claims they make here in Audiogon  AND they will make a fortune because in the US once proven they can file a class action suit and profit enormously from the efforts of others to deceive. These people regularly claim that "there is no evidence" that things such as cables or fuses make a difference when in actual fact Audiogon is filled with evidence that these things make very real differences in Music Reproduction Systems of course those who claim fraud reject that evidence as "confirmation bias" but in absence of any documentation from them they are only repeating the claim they have made so many times that has been refuted many times here by those who have demonstrated to there satisfaction that they make a difference.   I think in actual truth the real fraudsters here are those that repeatedly make these claims of snake oil and fraud and often they have no experience to back up there claims they simply say the claims are impossible!
clearthink
kosst_amojan
2,095 posts
 
What the hell are you talking about? Do I need to make sure my kid is completely aware of the full extent of my intellect in order for her to know I want her to clean my room? Non sequitur... One has nothing to do with the other. What kind of loving God doesn't make his will obvious? There's those points where it can be confusing, but they're rare. I studied and taught this stuff. You're picking the wrong subject to challenge me on. 
hifiman5's avatar
hifiman5
1,611 posts
 
@kosst_amojan  When does God make his intentions known?  Delusions of grandeur?  I hope you get to the point that you are able to realize your need for help.  All the best, sincerely! 
kosst_amojan
2,095 posts
 
Pal, if you want to stick your head in the sand and ignore the obvious, it ain't gonna be me you need to account to. I really hope you open your eyes and see the obvious. 
asvjerry's avatar
asvjerry
609 posts
 
*sigh*  The 'tempest in a tea cup' continues....on and on, anon....

One of the 'function' keys on the typ. keyboard needs an app that makes "IMHO" appear....because most of the 'sturm und drang' that appears whenever an OP launches into a 'controversy' over 'something' that's stepped on their tail by 'someone' posting 'something' that's contrary to their 'HO'....

This activity reminds me of what would occur if one were to affix the tails of 2 cats together in some fashion, and suspend them from a 'clothesline'....for those of us who remember such an item....a 'clothesline', just to be clear....

(Please note:  I do not recommend, nor approve of such treatment of felines, and will call the authorities if I witness such behaviour.  It's an 'analogy'.  If you don't recognize the word, look it up.)

Now, I suspect that many of 'us' simply like to view the 'push/pull' of such seemingly endless forums as a version of 'cheap thrills', a 'slow motion car wreck' of sorts.  I used to be of that audience.  "Let's watch these fools fight over the quantity of angels on a pin head!"

Now...I'm just bored.

In the future...(how about tomorrow?)...post your 'grievance', supply an address to another site (preferably far from here) and have your online version of a back alley confrontation Elsewhere.

Yes, I can and will go 'elsewhere', having delivered 'MHO'.

To paraphrase an old McDonalds' ad line, "You deserve a brick today."

Consider it delivered.  I'll send you the bill....;)
geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
14,147 posts
 
This thread is an excellent example of the Galileo Inquisition. I have posted frequently on the subject of Science having become the new Religion. Is this thread an example of Lone Wolf terrorism? I.e., while officially a part of the Scientofic community, an individual is inspired by what he perceives as their will.

THE GALILEO INQUISITION

The Galileo affair (Italian: il processo a Galileo Galilei) was a sequence of events, beginning around 1610,[1] culminating with the trial and condemnation of Galileo Galilei by the Roman Catholic Inquisition in 1633 for his support of heliocentrism.[2]

In 1610, Galileo published his Sidereus Nuncius (Starry Messenger), describing the surprising observations that he had made with the new telescope, namely the phases of Venus and the Galilean moons of Jupiter. With these observations he promoted the heliocentric theory of Nicolaus Copernicus (published in De revolutionibus orbium coelestium in 1543). Galileo’s initial discoveries were met with opposition within the Catholic Church, and in 1616 the Inquisition declared heliocentrism to be formally heretical. Heliocentric books were banned and Galileo was ordered to refrain from holding, teaching or defending heliocentric ideas.[3]

Galileo went on to propose a theory of tides in 1616, and of comets in 1619; he argued that the tides were evidence for the motion of the Earth. In 1632 Galileo, now an old man, published his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, which implicitly defended heliocentrism, and was immensely popular. Responding to mounting controversy over theology, astronomy and philosophy, the Roman Inquisition tried Galileo in 1633 and found him "vehemently suspect of heresy", sentencing him to indefinite imprisonment. Galileo was kept under house arrest until his death in 1642.

......................

In case someone missed it the first few times around, here it is again.

Intro to Zen and the Art of Debunkery

"As the millennium turns, science seems in many ways to be treading the weary path of the religions it presumed to replace. Where free, dispassionate inquiry once reigned, emotions now run high in the defense of a fundamentalized "scientific truth." As anomalies mount up beneath a sea of denial, defenders of the Faith and the Kingdom cling with increasing self-righteousness to the hull of a sinking paradigm. Faced with provocative evidence of things undreamt of in their philosophy, many otherwise mature scientists revert to a kind of skeptical infantilism characterized by blind faith in the absoluteness of the familiar. Small wonder, then, that so many promising fields of inquiry remain shrouded in superstition, ignorance, denial, disinformation, taboo . . . and debunkery."
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