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Realizing a particular conversation as pointless is dismissive if you aren't open to attempting to understand other perspectives. A religious person telling a

• Synaesthesia 10y ago
  It's Sam Harris who refused to acknowledge pretty factual statements which Chomsky was making. Like the fact that the attack on the Sudanese pharmaceutical facility was an act of terrorism at least as bad, if not worse than 9/11.
  • andrewingram 10y ago
    Is that a factual statement?
    • Synaesthesia 10y ago
      It is. The 9/11 attacks were surely a horrific atrocity. The al-shifa bombing too. It destroyed much of the production of essential drugs for livestock and malaria in a country already on the brink. Werner Daum thinks "at least" tens of thousands of people died as a consequence.
      • andrewingram 10y ago
        I have no disagreement with you about the scale of fallout. I just have less certainty about whether it was an act of terrorism. i.e. I'm far from convinced it was an act intended to kill at that scale. Whereas with 9/11, it's almost a certainty they aimed to kill even more than they managed to. I'm still trying to work out for myself the extent to which intent matters when it comes to condemning an act, which is why I struggle to think of your statement as a fact.
        • Jtsummers 10y ago
          From the perspective of the Sudanese, and the families of the immediate victims, I suspect they'd call it either terrorism or an act of war.
        • icebraining 10y ago
          Chomsky's position to the question of intention, cited in the letters above, as given me pause for thought (considering that the attack was openly acknowledged as a retaliation for the earlier attacks on US embassies[1]): And of course they knew that there would be major casualties. They are not imbeciles, but rather adopt a stance that is arguably even more immoral than purposeful killing, which at least recognizes the human status of the victims, not just killing ants while walking down the street, who cares? (...) It is inconceivable that in that brief interim period evidence was found that it was a chemical weapons factory, and properly evaluated to justify a bombing. And of course no evidence was ever found. Plainly, if there had been evidence, the bombing would not have (just by accident) taken place immediately after the Embassy bombings (along with bombings in Afghanistan at the same time, also clearly retaliation). There’s no rational way to explain this except by assuming that he intentionally bombed what was known to be Sudan’s major pharmaceutical plant, and of course he and his advisers knew that under severe sanctions, this poor African country could not replenish them (...) [1] http://edition.cnn.com/US/9808/20/clinton.02/ http://edition.cnn.com/US/9808/20/clinton.02/
• throwaway729 10y ago
  > Realizing a particular conversation as pointless is dismissive if you aren't open to attempting to understand other perspectives 1. Your original charge was that Noam is arrogant, not that he is dismissive. Dismissiveness and arrogance are not the same thing. 2. Noam isn't dismissive in this particular. Refusing the reply to the email or replying only with terse non-acknowledgements would be dismissive. Spilling hundreds of words worth of ink to elucidate why you don't want to have a conversation is anything but dismissive. 3. Charging Noam with being dismissive toward his critics is a different claim with a different burden. It requires analyzing the preponderance of evidence, not one specific case. Just because Noam is dismissive of one particular critic doesn't mean that he's dismissive of his critics in general. > A religious person telling a scientist that a debate about religion with him would be "pointless" is indeed dismissive I fail to see how this is necessarily the case. For example, if the scientist's point is to change the religious person's mind, and the religious person is firm in their faith, then the religious person isn't being dismissive. On the contrary, the religious person is saving both parties from a fruitless and frustrating endeavor. > It may end up being pointless to the people making the arguments but not necessarily for the listeners. More analogous to Noam/Sam, if the scientist's point is to demonstrate the falseness of religious by disproving transubstantiation, and if the religious person explicitly said they do not believe in transubstantiation, then the religious person is well within reason to refuse an invitation, because regardless of the outcome of the conversation, the end result won't be informative to anyone. 3. If the Scientist pushes for a debate even though the religious person is not interested, he's most likely being a bit of jerk.
  • Synaesthesia 10y ago
    Funny because I thought Harris was quite dismissive "I don't appreciate your tone" (!)