From Editor Robert Parry: At Consortiumnews, we welcome substantive comments about our articles, but comments should avoid abusive language toward other commenters or our writers, racial or religious slurs, and allegations that are unsupported by facts. There are plenty of conspiracy theory sites; this is a journalistic one.
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Robert Parry is a longtime investigative reporter who broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for the Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. He founded Consortiumnews.com in 1995 to create an outlet for well-reported journalism that was being squeezed out of an increasingly trivialized U.S. news media.
There is something deeply troubling about the nature of this admonition. Outcomes arise from the the logical progression of events which may or may not be observable. But those events must have occurred, unless we are to reject the empirical world and embrace the notion that sometimes, no reasonable explanation exists. That would be faith, not logic. When available evidence is incomplete, there is always more than one plausible progression of events which may have produced the outcome. Thus, the “most likely” explanation becomes nothing more than a consensus until proven otherwise. Evidence may be concealed, withheld, emphasized beyond its relative significance, or in many cases simply ignored. “Iran-Contra”, the “October Surprise”, “Fast and Furious”, and the Tuskegee Syphilis experiments were also “conspiracy theories” once upon a time. That “limited hangouts” actually exist is proven by the recent story about the fake “Seattle Times Website”. I don’t mean to suggest that overly cautious editorial scrutiny implies a lack of critical thinking, but it may imply a political decision to, as they say in the military, “stay in your lane”. I wish you luck in your fundraising efforts and continued success an all your future endeavors.
I value your articles so I will always be a good little boy!
Ok, so I just donated $25 twice a year for two years. I would be willing to give more but before that I need you all to get a Consortium News app going because I read most of my daily news on my phone. Let’s get to it people!
When I bought my first internet computer, I spent a lot of time struggling to learn how to make searches and generally navigate on the new medium. One of my early discoveries from the near-random Drunkard’s Walk was this:
The Geocentrism Challenge
CAI will write a check for $1,000 to the first person who can prove that the earth revolves around the sun. (If you lose, then we ask that you make a donation to the apostolate of CAI). Obviously, we at CAI don’t think anyone CAN prove it, and thus we can offer such a generous reward. In fact, we may up the ante in the near future.
You can submit your “proofs” to our e-mail address [email protected]. We will then offer a response. Both your “proof” and our response will be posted on the CAI science page at our website. If you do not want your actual name listed, we will change your name, but your contents will be posted. If you do not want either your name or your contents posted, then you are not eligible for a reply from CAI nor the $1,000 reward. CAI will be the sole judge of whether you have successfully proven your case. But since CAI is built on its reputation of honesty and truthfulness, rest assured that if you do indeed prove your case, you will be rewarded the money.
Now a word of caution. By “proof” we mean that your explanations must be direct, observable, physical, natural, repeatable, unambiguous and comprehensive. We don’t want hearsay, popular opinion, “expert” testimony, majority vote, personal conviction, organizational rulings, superficial analogies, appeals to “simplicity,” “apologies” to Galileo, or any other indirect means of persuasion which do not qualify as scientific proof.
The $1,000 Challenge will go on indefinitely. So, if you’re up for the challenge, take your best shot!
The guy who wrote that has taken it down from his site; it appears that even fanatical Catholic loons have a limit to the abuse they’re willing to take. But the gentleman still sells a CD titled “Galileo Was Wrong: The Church Was Right” wherein he ‘proves’ that the Earth is the center of the universe, and does not move in any manner whatever.
If this particular gentleman is brought in as an author to this or any other site where I post, he’s going to get as much of a drubbing as I can manage. Ditto for the Climate Change Deniers, the Young Earth Creationists, the Holocaust Deniers, and so on. If this means I’ve broken any rules about being respectful to idiots, then I’ll shake the dust from my sandals and depart.
Some people live in a dream world of their own making. At least two things encourage this. 1) the internet makes the location of similar fools easy, and as a crowd they feel empowered. 2) “Self Esteem” education has encouraged every manner of idiot to embrace his ignorance and backwardness. I understand that wasn’t the program’s goal, but I definitely see it as an unintended result. These types tend to be quite immune to “facts”, by the way.
When I encounter an author with whom I’m unfamiliar and writing about a topic in which I’m uninformed, I check to see if he’s written anything obviously foolish. How else can I take a measure of the man? If he’s written something to the effect that Abraham Lincoln is among the worst of the US presidents, he’s off to a VERY bad start, and my scrutiny of his output will be redoubled.