To the Members posting in the Pseudoscience section of Sciforums.com
Description
Pseudoscience is a forum dedicated to Theories and Science that currently aren't scientifically proven
and untested. This can mean radical theories that people come up with, that are built upon their own
metaphysical understanding that could potentially lack the academic backgrounding that would have
underwritten their suggestion by the necessary homework showing their metaphysics to contain errors.
Threads and posts in Pseudoscience aren't here to be ridiculed by the populous to prove they are false
or fictitious (although pointing out where a persons theory is ailing because of the base metaphysical
understanding being wrong is fair enough). Simply by the threads and posts being in the
"Pseudoscience forum" will suggest the theory/discussion should be taken with a pinch of salt and not
be cause to draw swords and engage in ridicule.
The suggested method of dealing with the forum should be that all threads exist here as false science,
unless they are defined by peer review as a "Protoscience", where the overall theory is not flawed by
the science, but purely flawed by the lack of testing or it's originality compared with that of the
consensus of science.
If it's termed a "Protoscience" then the overall thread will be moved to a better forum (should one exist)
than one that defines it false.
Moderation
Here is a brief account for what moderation to expect, The reason for declaring how such a task will be
done is to make sure that everything is dealt with Fairly and efficiently.
Moderation is not meant to be censorship, but it meant to help guide people into better posting criteria.
However to help you understand what does and doesn't warrant moderation, the following should aid:
Rules and Guidelines
What loose ruleset people should use as a guideline are those that are applied to the site as a whole.
If you don't conform to the rules, then you might find yourself moderated:
Quoting sources
In an attempt to lower the bandwidth usage of the forum through vast amounts of text thats usually
quoted from sources. Please attempt to generate only a single paragraph within a quote block from
the actual site you are quoting and include an anchor/url link to the source.
Otherwise quoting should consisted of similar to Harvard System for Citing ruleset, where sources are
placed within brackets or bibliographed at the end of the document.
More information on Hardvard System Citation can be found here:
http://www.csu.edu.au/division/studserv/learning/refguide.pdf
http://www.bournemouth.ac.uk/academic_services/documents/Library/Citing_References.pdf
No Advertising (Redux)
The forums have currently advertisements on that help to fund towards the forums upkeep, without
what ever amount they accumilate the forum owner might have closed this forum down along time
ago. This means by rights that advertisements on the forum are only here if they help pay the way
for it's upkeep and therefore adverts that are generated to take advantage of the board are frowned
upon. Such posts/Threads will be "Deleted" (not locked).
An advert pointing to an individuals website is not permitted unless it accompanies either the starting
point of a discussion or adding to a discussion (e.g. aiding with supplying the forums reader material).
No Character Assassination plots
The meaning of character assassination means that to dig around the forum archives or hunt around
the internet for "Snippets" of text written by a user on this forum to attack either themselves or their
beliefs within a post, is not tolerated.
Thread readers should be under their own investigative steam if they feel compelled to search out a
persons authenticity rather than allow the biase of others to mold their opinions through character
assassination propaganda.
If a user has provided a website URL, then readers can check out a persons "Legend" through looking at
their profile. It then should be up to the reader to create their own opinion of someones agenda or
attitude as apposed to listening to others.
The Moderator(s) to this sub-forum will attempt to remove any such attacks.
Harsh Commentary
The nature of a forums is peer review, a chance for people to comment in regards to a thought, theory or
overall policy that otherwise would have no way to vent or cast illumination upon a matter.
If your the poster:
You have to be prepared to have anything hurled at them in regards to their thought, if it hurts to have
your thought condemned by peers then "Please do not post your thought to the forums"
because the likelihood is there is always someone that will want to put you down for entertainment value.
If your replying:
Please don't be rude or use this forum as a way to vent from a busy day at work by tearing peoples
thoughts to pieces. Try to remember that people have thoughts and theories and sometimes haven't
either had the opportunity to find more information to backup their statements, or they haven't had the
education that would create some form of Industry Standard of thought/theory submission.
To both poster/Replyer:
If you find someone to be offensive repeatedly it is a very difficult thing to cover because usually it takes
two to tango, and therefore an argument or harsh word is usually caused by "tit for tat" methodology.
A suggested course of action rather than reporting a person, is to use the IGNORE function of the forum.
In the Preferences of the username in the forum, there is a Buddy/Ignore function, just type those people
that have been harsh to you in the Ignore boxes.
This will not stop them commenting to the post, but it does stop counterstrike comments from causing a
few harsh words to become an all out flamewar.
"Infractions" are a new addition to dealing with people that upset the status quo. Any long term
posters should have the capacity to use the infraction button on a user should they feel they have abused
one of the basic rules.
If you find yourself with an infraction that you feel is unfair, please approach a moderator to ask for such
infractions to be reassessed. If they are found unfair they will be removed.
Please be sparing with Infractions as misuse could result in consequences.
Post editing
If you find that your post has been edited then there will more than likely be a reason which will be appended
to the post after edit.
If a moderator edits your post, do not re-edit it without informing the moderator via PM (Otherwise depending
on your edit, it might be viewed that your intensionally stirring tension with the moderator.)
Post editing will occur if your post fails to meet a "loose" translation
of the guidelines. ("Loose" means that moderator(s) will not hold everyone
to the exact letter of the guidelines, however if your post is a complete
violation it will be edited).
Edits done by moderators will include a reason for the edit.
Threads
Thread closing will be done similar to post editing, If the thread is a duplicate of an already open and
active thread, it will be closed or merged (depending on how many posts the thread has).
In either event the moderator will post either Why it was closed or why it was merged.
Protesting unfair actions
If you should protest in any form at the unfair editing in the event of thread closures or post editing,
PM the moderator in question before creating un-necessary threads about "wrong doing", since if you
percieve a problem there might be an easy solution that can be done without causing loads of fuss.
[Such fuss could be perceived as a personal attack]
Protesting either Moderator(s) of this sub-forum or the actions of another Moderator on Sciforums
within any threads in this sub-forum is prohibited. Any Posts or Threads found doing this will be
Deleted/Edited with the potential for Warnings, Infractions and varying degree's of bans should the
problem's persist from any particular poster.
Debunkem/Debunking
Considering the nature of the Pseudoscience forum, there are sometimes concerns made from individuals
about "Debunking". "Debunking" in this translation means the purposeful exhortation of fallacious textures,
ideals and beliefs to subvert the general populous.
Sometimes people misunderstand the intension of Skeptics when they produce contrary theory and
evidence to the Believers consensus.
It's suggested that a true debate in a forum can stand up to the many arguments and angles implied, not
to have a debate placed under such scrutiny, would not a scientist make.
Therefore please be understanding about why contradiction is brought into topic.
Description
Pseudoscience is a forum dedicated to Theories and Science that currently aren't scientifically proven
and untested. This can mean radical theories that people come up with, that are built upon their own
metaphysical understanding that could potentially lack the academic backgrounding that would have
underwritten their suggestion by the necessary homework showing their metaphysics to contain errors.
Threads and posts in Pseudoscience aren't here to be ridiculed by the populous to prove they are false
or fictitious (although pointing out where a persons theory is ailing because of the base metaphysical
understanding being wrong is fair enough). Simply by the threads and posts being in the
"Pseudoscience forum" will suggest the theory/discussion should be taken with a pinch of salt and not
be cause to draw swords and engage in ridicule.
The suggested method of dealing with the forum should be that all threads exist here as false science,
unless they are defined by peer review as a "Protoscience", where the overall theory is not flawed by
the science, but purely flawed by the lack of testing or it's originality compared with that of the
consensus of science.
If it's termed a "Protoscience" then the overall thread will be moved to a better forum (should one exist)
than one that defines it false.
Moderation
Here is a brief account for what moderation to expect, The reason for declaring how such a task will be
done is to make sure that everything is dealt with Fairly and efficiently.
Moderation is not meant to be censorship, but it meant to help guide people into better posting criteria.
However to help you understand what does and doesn't warrant moderation, the following should aid:
Rules and Guidelines
What loose ruleset people should use as a guideline are those that are applied to the site as a whole.
If you don't conform to the rules, then you might find yourself moderated:
- No un-necessary bad or vulgar language.
- No Trolling (20 pages in the Mexican DoD thread explains why "by volume");
(This means no purposeful Off-topic posting with the intension of just acting up) - No Cross posting all over the board (Cross posters will be dealt with severely);
- No Advertisements/Blogs (Namely No ads like:
"Visit my website to discuss a particular topic" or Blogs telling your life story "day by day"); - No Cut and Paste posts or Plagurism (More severity than Cross posters);
(Cut and Paste means full documents/writings from other sites when a link will suffice) - No Cat fighting (Hairpulling, scratching and biting is not permitted);
[Cat fighting can also be translated as "No Personal Attacks"]
- No bumping of posts that hold your "Relevant theory", such actions will incur a lockdown
of the thread at the discression of the moderator(s).
[If you want your thread to stay at the top, then ask for it to be "pinned". If the thread is generic
in the sense that it's not selling one particular sites version of events then it's might be pinned,
otherwise it's at the discression of the moderator(s).] - Threads will be split and the majority thread locked when they reach 20 pages - No Exceptions.
Quoting sources
In an attempt to lower the bandwidth usage of the forum through vast amounts of text thats usually
quoted from sources. Please attempt to generate only a single paragraph within a quote block from
the actual site you are quoting and include an anchor/url link to the source.
Otherwise quoting should consisted of similar to Harvard System for Citing ruleset, where sources are
placed within brackets or bibliographed at the end of the document.
More information on Hardvard System Citation can be found here:
http://www.csu.edu.au/division/studserv/learning/refguide.pdf
http://www.bournemouth.ac.uk/academic_services/documents/Library/Citing_References.pdf
No Advertising (Redux)
The forums have currently advertisements on that help to fund towards the forums upkeep, without
what ever amount they accumilate the forum owner might have closed this forum down along time
ago. This means by rights that advertisements on the forum are only here if they help pay the way
for it's upkeep and therefore adverts that are generated to take advantage of the board are frowned
upon. Such posts/Threads will be "Deleted" (not locked).
An advert pointing to an individuals website is not permitted unless it accompanies either the starting
point of a discussion or adding to a discussion (e.g. aiding with supplying the forums reader material).
No Character Assassination plots
The meaning of character assassination means that to dig around the forum archives or hunt around
the internet for "Snippets" of text written by a user on this forum to attack either themselves or their
beliefs within a post, is not tolerated.
Thread readers should be under their own investigative steam if they feel compelled to search out a
persons authenticity rather than allow the biase of others to mold their opinions through character
assassination propaganda.
If a user has provided a website URL, then readers can check out a persons "Legend" through looking at
their profile. It then should be up to the reader to create their own opinion of someones agenda or
attitude as apposed to listening to others.
The Moderator(s) to this sub-forum will attempt to remove any such attacks.
Harsh Commentary
The nature of a forums is peer review, a chance for people to comment in regards to a thought, theory or
overall policy that otherwise would have no way to vent or cast illumination upon a matter.
If your the poster:
You have to be prepared to have anything hurled at them in regards to their thought, if it hurts to have
your thought condemned by peers then "Please do not post your thought to the forums"
because the likelihood is there is always someone that will want to put you down for entertainment value.
If your replying:
Please don't be rude or use this forum as a way to vent from a busy day at work by tearing peoples
thoughts to pieces. Try to remember that people have thoughts and theories and sometimes haven't
either had the opportunity to find more information to backup their statements, or they haven't had the
education that would create some form of Industry Standard of thought/theory submission.
To both poster/Replyer:
If you find someone to be offensive repeatedly it is a very difficult thing to cover because usually it takes
two to tango, and therefore an argument or harsh word is usually caused by "tit for tat" methodology.
A suggested course of action rather than reporting a person, is to use the IGNORE function of the forum.
In the Preferences of the username in the forum, there is a Buddy/Ignore function, just type those people
that have been harsh to you in the Ignore boxes.
This will not stop them commenting to the post, but it does stop counterstrike comments from causing a
few harsh words to become an all out flamewar.
"Infractions" are a new addition to dealing with people that upset the status quo. Any long term
posters should have the capacity to use the infraction button on a user should they feel they have abused
one of the basic rules.
If you find yourself with an infraction that you feel is unfair, please approach a moderator to ask for such
infractions to be reassessed. If they are found unfair they will be removed.
Please be sparing with Infractions as misuse could result in consequences.
Post editing
If you find that your post has been edited then there will more than likely be a reason which will be appended
to the post after edit.
If a moderator edits your post, do not re-edit it without informing the moderator via PM (Otherwise depending
on your edit, it might be viewed that your intensionally stirring tension with the moderator.)
Post editing will occur if your post fails to meet a "loose" translation
of the guidelines. ("Loose" means that moderator(s) will not hold everyone
to the exact letter of the guidelines, however if your post is a complete
violation it will be edited).
Edits done by moderators will include a reason for the edit.
Threads
Thread closing will be done similar to post editing, If the thread is a duplicate of an already open and
active thread, it will be closed or merged (depending on how many posts the thread has).
In either event the moderator will post either Why it was closed or why it was merged.
Protesting unfair actions
If you should protest in any form at the unfair editing in the event of thread closures or post editing,
PM the moderator in question before creating un-necessary threads about "wrong doing", since if you
percieve a problem there might be an easy solution that can be done without causing loads of fuss.
[Such fuss could be perceived as a personal attack]
Protesting either Moderator(s) of this sub-forum or the actions of another Moderator on Sciforums
within any threads in this sub-forum is prohibited. Any Posts or Threads found doing this will be
Deleted/Edited with the potential for Warnings, Infractions and varying degree's of bans should the
problem's persist from any particular poster.
Debunkem/Debunking
Considering the nature of the Pseudoscience forum, there are sometimes concerns made from individuals
about "Debunking". "Debunking" in this translation means the purposeful exhortation of fallacious textures,
ideals and beliefs to subvert the general populous.
Sometimes people misunderstand the intension of Skeptics when they produce contrary theory and
evidence to the Believers consensus.
It's suggested that a true debate in a forum can stand up to the many arguments and angles implied, not
to have a debate placed under such scrutiny, would not a scientist make.
Therefore please be understanding about why contradiction is brought into topic.
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