@Maw this may have changed since 2017

@Doc you

@Zuluzeit Oh, right! I forgot. 😄

Hahaha

In 17, they managed to squeeze out the only guy with intelligence/armed forces background. @Maw

I followed him out.

If I wanted speculation I'd ask myself.

exactly

Seems to have been a great deal of fretting over the title vs. purpose of this chat...and it was selectively outraged about.

It's not a massive issue *yet* but I'm still working on compiling a list that I'll talk to Faith about. For now the rules on off-topic chatter are very relaxed.

We're still relatively small.

No one uses general

As it's mainly used to discuss the stream @james j

Or was.

Create a philosophy chat

I have been tuning in and out, as I have divided attention atm. I think everyone, until very recently, was generally decent about conversational evolution.

Organic conversation leads to strange and perplexing places sometimes, it's only natural.

It's when it conflicts with others trying to have a conversation with each other that is on topic that it becomes a problem (to me anyway)

Well, as long as it is governed by the constraints of my personal preference, it's all good, I reckon.

Or if I'm 'losing' an argument.

Lol.

Lol

In general I'm not very strict about being on-topic, unless it is causing disruption as previously mentioned.

Which in a channel this size, is going to be semi-rare.

So I wouldn't worry about it too much.

well, I do worry about being the guy always derailing the discussions. I have that tendency.

Everyone does it.

It happens with political debates all the time.

Shifting the goalposts, pivoting, etc.

I regret what I started earlier 🙈

@Beth I thought it was fun.

Taxes -> _____ -> ______ -> Philosophical questions.

It got a bit too full on for my liking 😂

It's very common.

@Beth been online long???

Arguments are made of individual components that you sometimes have to disassemble to get to the root of the argument.

Which tends to not resemble the original argument.

which is fun when you suspect that all arguments stem from highly illogical belief systems.

I stopped posting on Facebook/Twitter a couple of years ago, this is my first month back in the online world 🙈

ah!

welcome back to the decline of the west.