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Re:Notes from a Flat Earth Conference by jfengel on Thursday August 20, 2020 @01:43PM (#24226100)
It's not just that I find the data persuasive, but that I find data persuasive. They don't. They reject the notion of data when it doesn't suit them.

That makes them not merely wrong, but dangerous to me. They will go out of their way to make my life worse, without being able to judge the cost to themselves. Regardless of what derogatory name I choose to call it, our outlook is fundamentally at odds. They've shown repeatedly that they wish to use it to harm me, and my names for them are going to be negative.

Re:Notes from a Flat Earth Conference by lisper on Thursday August 20, 2020 @01:55PM (#24226259)
Look, I'm on your side. I agree that YECs are both wrong and dangerous. My point here is that you cannot effectively oppose them on those grounds. They believe that you are wrong and dangerous, so the situation is symmetric. A mere belief that the opposition is wrong and dangerous cannot prevail on its own.
Re:Notes from a Flat Earth Conference by jfengel on Thursday August 20, 2020 @02:20PM (#24226571)
True. It just illustrates how deep a problem we've got here: once you've gone down the rabbit hole, there's no way back.

The only solution, if any, is democratic: containing the damage and reducing the numbers. They cannot be persuaded, but other people can. And unfortunately, I don't think that's all that effective, either -- in part because they ally themselves with other conspiracy theorists who insulate them from some of the consequences of their actions. They may not agree, but don't attack each other, and bolster common causes. Enough to win elections, especially when geographic, demographic, and historic quirks assign more political power to some regions than others.

If it were just creationists, they'd be (relatively) harmless kooks. As it is, they're always a step away from theocracy.