yguy

See my response to Daleth on this page.

fatherphil

do a search for organizations which might support the claim and i'm sure they could direct you to various data that would support their positions. somewhat like nambla claiming that sexual encounters between minors and adults is not detremental to the children.

brighid

I am sorry, but if you are supporting a position it is you who should do the research and provide the data.

Brighid

brighid

I would say you are really stretching it by saying he has NO idea what is good. It is perfectly reasonable (even if I don't agree) for someone to say a generally negative experience was positive for that person, being this is the purest of subjective claims.

You are still resorting to ad hominem attacks. Seligman may have a blind spot for this issue (as many people have blind spots for many issues ... just ask the average theist) but this does not make him unqualified to do his job as President of this organization. He does not do the research and therefore any personal views he may, or may not have are absolutely irrelevant to the data presented by independent researchers and therefore it is absolutely fallicious to discredit the work of these people because the president (whom they may not even know at all) made a statement you do not agree with.

So all the naysayers either prove up or quit with the diversionary tactics.

Brighid

Daleth

It's rude to refer to someone's replies as "one-line platitudes" but not rude to compare someone's position on working mothers to NAMBLA, eh? Tread lightly there, Phil.

The goal of NAMBLA is to promote sexual encounters between adults and minors. It is no surprise then, that they'll hold that as not harmful.

The goal of the APA is not to promote working mothers, but rather to promote good mental health and care for it in the US. Why then would they have a desire to say it's not harmful if in fact it is? Or are you (like yguy) saying the APA is about the same as NAMBLA and simply can't be trusted in anything they say?

Daleth

Based on what? A single opinion of a single president of the organization? Could it be that the APA voted for Seligman because of OTHER things he had to say and other accomplishments? You didn't respond to what I said about Clinton and what his presidency means about writing off what Americans have to say... perhaps what we say about honesty or about affairs.
To be honest with ya, I don't know a single thing about Fred Phelps. Were it not for mention of him on these boards, I'd never even have heard the name. Therefore I have no opinion of him or his supporters whatsoever.

HelenM

I should have used a couple more words and said 'so you have no proof to back up your opinion', which is what I meant.

I wasn't asking whether anyone has ever tried to back it up but only what your opinion was based on and 'it's a gut feeling' answered my question.

Do you think that some 'data' is more credible than other 'data' or do you think all data is so biased that there's no value in researching whether there is support for our 'gut feelings' or not?

Actually I do have another question: when you refer to a 'gut feeling' do you mean 'the conviction of the Holy Spirit', but you didn't want to say that here? In other words, do you consider the gut feeling to be from God and to carry more authority thereby, than simply your own opinion?

Helen

yguy

I think not.

The point is, Seligman didn't see any negativity in it at the time, and doesn't now. He should.

Some people have blind spots, and some people are blind spots.

As the head of an organization dedicated to promote distorted views of human psychology, I have no doubt that Seligman was consummately competent.

When I see evidence that anyone in the APA had or has misgivings about having an idiot like Seligman as his/her representative, I may have cause to reconsider. Things being what they are, I see no reason to modify my position.

yguy

Not just a single opinion, but an opininion which is indicative of latent Allen Ginsbergian insanity.

It doesn't matter if they had nothing to say about the statement in question.

Hey, I'm sure a lot of Muslims justify their hatred for America on the basis of Clinton - and they are not completely unjustified. If we're not careful, they and we will become the hoarders and wasters in a Dantean Hell.

Seeing how this has no bearing at all on what I said, I have to wonder if it isn't your way conveniently misunderstanding what I'm getting at.

Daleth

Oh, don't be such a drama queen, cupcake! Seligman's position is that children who have experienced CSA should be treated for the symptoms they present with and that treating them for symptoms they do not present with may be emotionally harmful to them. His position is not to endorse CSA or to make sexual encounters between adults and kids legal. Yeah, I know, you now have grounds to disregard anything and everything I say on any subject. I'll live.

Are you 100% sure that they didn't? Can you prove it? If they didn't, is it possible that it's because you've taken his comments out of context and decided they meant something far more damning then what he intended?


I didn't say anything about Muslims. I was addressing your personal inconsistency. So I quote, "Seeing how this has no bearing at all on what I said, I have to wonder if it isn't your way conveniently misunderstanding what I'm getting at."

Not at all. I am admitting to not really knowing what you're getting at every time you make reference to what my opinion may or may not be about Phelps or his followers because I know nothing about this person or what he stands for. I can't just fill in another name because knowing nothing about Phelps, I can't know if it'd be an accurate substitution. I can tell you that I've seen positive things in you and haven't written off every word you say, even though on a daily basis I read things from you that make me livid and rather ill.