Hullo there!

[holist]

Good morning (afternoon, evening, whatever) everyone,

I'm holist (observe the lower-case, please!), a name I have been using consistently, mostly over the .hu part of the interwebs, for about 20 years. Came here because an old friend of mine told me this is where science nuts congregate to ironize or downright patronize the hell out of nuts of other persuasions :)).

I am of the Discordian persuasion myself, with an avid interest, however, in things scientific or thereabouts (group or - rarely - individual efforts at making sense of the world we find ourselves in using an approximation of an ideal - intself somewhat arbitrary - of rational, empirical method). A while back, I meddled in philosophy in an academic setting, but got bored easily. Since then, I have been mostly a family man, earning the readies with boring but reasonably lucrative translation, which I am able to do on a self-employed, on-line manner at home and living also for my hobbies: reading (voraciously), painting (stone-age art is where my interest lies, and vaguely Chinese style ink paintings) and music (recently, I had a blissful year and a bit during which I was the musical director of a small nouvelle cirq-type circus company, and did two productions; and listening to my diverse collection of sounds).

Recently (as in two weeks ago), my patchwork family with 6 kids moved from Hungary to Britain (which led to jolly reunion with above-mentioned friend and hence my coming here). So far, it has been an unqualified success.

Glad to make your acquaintance.

holist

[holist]

oh, my blog is http://blog.holist.hu, mundane, has some artwork and family history, funny in places when translated using translate.google.com.

[holist]

Here you go! (http://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/professor-richard-dawkins-speaks-at-fair-hills-kindergarten-regarding-santa-claus-december-2-2006)

[DMB]

Welcome to Secular Café! I look forward to reading your posts. :wave:

[Silly Sausage]

Well hi there holist, nice to meet you. :wave:

This is usually the part where I usually say "Why don't you tell us something about yourself", but you've already ticked that box. :)

[Daynna]

Welcome holist!

[Goodchild]

Welcome! Hope you find conversation you enjoy here :)

[Barefoot Bree]

Welcome to the Cafe, holist-with-lower-case-h!

[holist]

SO you usually invite newscomers to say something about themselves, while on your profile page, you have "Fwibble" to offer? Interesting choice, unless I'm missing something :DD?

[rog]

Hello holist :)

[holist]

Welcome to the Cafe, holist-with-lower-case-h!,

Well, thank you, Barefoot Bree with two capital Bs!

[Silly Sausage]

SO you usually invite newscomers to say something about themselves, while on your profile page, you have "Fwibble" to offer? Interesting choice, unless I'm missing something :DD?

It depends on whether you're a fan of the show Blackadder (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackadder). :)

[Notta]

Love your avatar, holist with a lower case h.

Welcome!

[Shake]

Welcome, holist!

[Road Warrior]

Welcome holist! How were things in Hungary and why did you decide to move to Britain? How are the laws there for immigration or is this just a temporary thing?

If nothing else, you've piqued my interest on the latest happenings in Hungary. :)

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/hu.html
In 2010 the new government implemented a number of changes including cutting business and personal income taxes, but imposed "crisis taxes" on financial institutions, energy and telecom companies, and retailers. The economy rebounded in 2010 with a big boost from exports, especially to Germany, and growth of more than 2.5% is expected in 2011. Unemployment remained high, at more than 10% in 2010.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/16/RegionsHungary.png

[BWE]

Here you go! (http://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/professor-richard-dawkins-speaks-at-fair-hills-kindergarten-regarding-santa-claus-december-2-2006)
thank you. This made me laugh. Alas I have no such presents to return except the real bits which are perhaps less funny because they are real. But please accept my gratitude at any rate.

[BWE]

sigh. i should read the whole thread first I guess. Still, I did laugh. And thank you for that.

[Road Warrior]

there is no question of immigration per se, due to the following circumstances

as many of us european citizens are aware, hungary is a member of the european union ;)

now you may recall that one of the founding values and major principles of the community is the free movement of goods, services and labour

labour: that's me, that is

Thanks. I knew the economic rules were unified but wasn't sure about citizenship and/or immigration rules.

[holist]

okay

in effect, eu citizens are free to move (with some restrictions, bulgarians and romanians, for instance, need to apply for a permit before seeking employment in the uk) and to work in other eu states

i think that is a move in the right direction

in fact i think restrictions on the movement of people around the world are just plain and also morally wrong and we are sorely in need of a global political movement that would primarily advocate doing away with them

[Road Warrior]

I think eventually we will have a world government which allows such a thing, but, at least in this century, it will be a slow evolution to that ideal.

[Jobar]

Discordian, hey?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8f/Sacred-Chao.svg/300px-Sacred-Chao.svg.png

Obviously, those of us here who represent the Forces of Order are going to oppose you. Given that we have the Power and Authority here, you'll have to step very carefully to avoid our wrath. Are you smart enough, amusing enough, nimble enough to entertain us while you oppose us, thereby convincing us to tolerate your golden apples and like disruptions?

I look forward to finding out, with great interest!

:D

[Barefoot Bree]

A number of posts were forcibly relocated to a more fitting location in SS, here (http://www.secularcafe.org/showthread.php?t=15501), as they are not appropriate to an Intro thread.

[holist]

o no, you got it all wrong

you have the aneristic fallacy written all over you!

i am not here to entertain or to oppose
you are not a force of order

i'll have to step very carefully because... your wrath? is what, pardon me?

intolerate me at leisure!

i am not here to convince, i am here to be entertained

meeting people who are interesting to talk to does the job, whatever the medium

i am easily bored, however

stop being condescending! it makes you feel good about yourself, without letting you think carefully about whether it is actually warranted

for the time being it seems you invest effort in something that's not particularly worthy of it

i am reading random chunks of the most popular threads by way of taking breaks from an infinitely more boring job and i see no "us" here

mostly just alienated individuals engaged in nursery-style boohooing, blaming the scaepgoat or being blandly pleasant to each other

i need all the golden apples i've got

[Jobar]

Oh, but I *do* represent order here. Ours is the power to bind and to loose, to move and to leave, to allow and to forbid. (It comes with paying the bills for the site, y'know.)

For someone who says he needs all his apples, you've been chucking them about pretty freely.

We try to walk a line "between tyrannically enforced saccharine sweetness and anarchic snarling nastiness." We- I- recognize the need for chaos, as well as for order, even as I work on the side of order.

If you can recognize the need for order, even as you work on the side of chaos, maybe we can engage in a dance/duel which satisfies and entertains us both. However, if you try too hard to destroy order here- then you'll find out what it means to incur our wrath.

[holist]

Oh, but I *do* represent order here. Ours is the power to bind and to loose, to move and to leave, to allow and to forbid. (It comes with paying the bills for the site, y'know.)

okay, if you insist, boss, whatever

it must cost all of 10 or 15 dollars a month to keep this forum up unless you're being robbed

must enable some serious binding, loosing, moving and leaving, allowing and forbidding...

For someone who says he needs all his apples, you've been chucking them about pretty freely.

nah, it's just the golden ones, see?

We try to walk a line "between tyrannically enforced saccharine sweetness and anarchic snarling nastiness." We- I- recognize the need for chaos, as well as for order, even as I work on the side of order.

you are the second person to quote this line at me... i think that is rougly the line the mod team of any moderated forum worth its salt sets out to walk... and it is also what they often fail at, often spectacularly

also, weeding out obvious and boring trolling along with the advertising does not in itself guarantee a good forum

where are all the very interesting topics started by the admins/mods, with reasonably eloquent and detailed opening pieces?

If you can recognize the need for order, even as you work on the side of chaos, maybe we can engage in a dance/duel which satisfies and entertains us both. However, if you try too hard to destroy order here- then you'll find out what it means to incur our wrath.

rest assured, destroying order is not on my agenda

[Road Warrior]

okay, if you insist, boss, whatever

it must cost all of 10 or 15 dollars a month to keep this forum up unless you're being robbed

Regardless if it is a penny or a thousand dollars, it is free to you. Secondly, you're a guest here like all of us. I doubt the customs in Hungary are so different that it is considered normal behavior to be rude or obnoxious when a guest in someone else's home.

I'm a relative newcomer myself here and I find the moderation of this forum to be done well and with a light touch. In another thread on ideal governments there were posts where it was thought no government was needed because people would just voluntarily follow the rules. Forums such as these are proof that some form of government is needed because not all of us think alike.

Holist, I think you will like it here, so please relax a bit. Get to know the place before forming an opinion about it.

[DMB]

where are all the very interesting topics started by the admins/mods, with reasonably eloquent and detailed opening pieces?



What you find if you frequent discussion boards is that people'e interest sets very rarely coincide exactly. All they do at best is overlap.So one person's "interesting" is another person's "deadly boring".

You could try starting a few "interesting" threads yourself. I can't guarantee, however, that lots of people will flock to them.

[holist]

Regardless if it is a penny or a thousand dollars, it is free to you. Secondly, you're a guest here like all of us. I doubt the customs in Hungary are so different that it is considered normal behavior to be rude or obnoxious when a guest in someone else's home.


well look, it isn't free to me either
firstly, i pay for internet access, secondly, it is instantiated over the limited resources of the planet we all share
you are right about hungary - this is just me
though i think i was, more than anything, frank about strong intuitions
rude, possibly
obnoxious ("very annoying or objectionable; offensive or odious") - certainly not that
i may show you one day :)))


I'm a relative newcomer myself here and I find the moderation of this forum to be done well and with a light touch.


i am glad to hear that


In another thread on ideal governments there were posts where it was thought no government was needed because people would just voluntarily follow the rules. Forums such as these are proof that some form of government is needed because not all of us think alike.


thank you for recommending a thread!
i almost thought everyone was incredibly cagey here


Holist, I think you will like it here, so please relax a bit. Get to know the place before forming an opinion about it.
i think you are right
except - unlike most people on this forum - i have six kids and am just trying to sort out moving a family of 8 plus dog to another country - a move i am legally certainly entitled to make, but it seems the administrative side of things has been carefully designed to make this frustrating and difficult and time-consuming
as a result, the "too many opportunities, too little time" kind of pressure is exceedingly strong on me, so i make more use of gut reaction than i normally would

[holist]

DMB:

oh, the subtle irony, the stiff upper lip! the distance and the earnest and friendly cold shoulder!

glad to be back

are you actually uncagey enough to recommend a thread you like? i promise i won't misbehave

[Barefoot Bree]

holist, lack of proper capitalization and punctuation really is distracting, and makes your posts hard to read. Isn't the point of writing to communicate? Why, then, would you affect a style that puts up barriers to readers understanding your points? It may be a minor barrier, but it IS a barrier, and one with no plusses I can see except pointless attention-seeking.

[holist]

you almost hit the nail right on the head

it is attention-seeking

it is not pointless, though, not to me, anyway

also, it is my way of approximating speech and indicating that my utterances here are more aking to talking live than to considered writing

also, i honestly don't think it makes things hard to read in an age when we are almost all used to texting

on the other hand, why do you feel the need to feel superior to me and to kindly instruct me in the ways of the world? i wonder

[DMB]

DMB:

oh, the subtle irony, the stiff upper lip! the distance and the earnest and friendly cold shoulder!

glad to be back

are you actually uncagey enough to recommend a thread you like? i promise i won't misbehave

Since I have no idea what interests you, I won't.

[holist]

okay, let me help you out

i am interested in novel forms of social interaction and community-building facilitated by the interwebs

i am interested in making music and in listening to an extremely diverse variety of music

i am a Tom Waits fanboy (see, i break my own rules for him!)

i am interested in evidentially supported best practices in childrearing

i am interested in out-of-the-box (lateral thinking sense) politics

would you be so good as to recommend a topic now?

[DMB]

Since you say you have six children, would you like to start a thread on child-rearing best practice?

[holist]

tempting, but been there, done that

for years, in spades

so, not yet

[Barefoot Bree]

you almost hit the nail right on the head

it is attention-seeking

it is not pointless, though, not to me, anyway

also, it is my way of approximating speech and indicating that my utterances here are more aking to talking live than to considered writing

also, i honestly don't think it makes things hard to read in an age when we are almost all used to texting

on the other hand, why do you feel the need to feel superior to me and to kindly instruct me in the ways of the world? i wonder

Aren't you making assumptions about how many people are used to texting? We have a very wide spread of ages here (there's a thread with a poll on that somewhere in the Lounge); not all of us are coming from the same place technology-wise.

And it DOES make it hard for me to read. Nor am I the only one. There've been many, many conversations about this over the years I've been involved in this forum and others like it. The consensus is that proper punctuation, sentence capitalization, and spelling do greatly enhance readability and clear communication on text-based bulletin boards such as this.

Interesting that you should jump to associating supposed feelings of superiority on my part with apprising you of how your posts contain barriers to understanding.

[subsymbolic]

For heaven's sake holist if you are going to play the love child of Loki and Baba Yaga on these poor folk then at least bother to conform to the niceties of written English - if only to avoid a source of nagging distraction. I rather like what I have seen of Barefoot Bree personally and would consider it a boon if you could agree in forms of life before disagreeing in forms of logic. plz.

[holist]

i apologize sincerely for causing you a minor inconvenience

i have my reasons, however

your consensus is not my consensus

also, i could quote extensively, from this forum and elsewhere, people who are perfectly capable of being quite difficult to follow while observing your precious niceties of punctuation

(each paragraph is a sentence)

(i try to keep them short)

(pretentious, i know, but it helps me write)

(otherwise, i often end up with extremely complex and convoluted sentence structures)

[holist]

subsymbolic:

love child of Loki and Baba Yaga?????

oh my, what a pity i've chosen a nick already!

[David B]

i am interested in evidentially supported best practices in childrearing

That being the case, I will point you to a thread.

www.secularcafe.org/showthread.php?t=10607

The posts I found most interesting were a bit of a digression from the thrust of the OP, starting at post 6 and with a comment on it by my sister later, with a link to the research.

When pushing your infants around, did they face front or back to the pusher?

Which would be better, do you think, or would it make no difference?

David

[Richard46]

you almost hit the nail right on the head

it is attention-seeking

it is not pointless, though, not to me, anyway

also, it is my way of approximating speech and indicating that my utterances here are more aking to talking live than to considered writing

also, i honestly don't think it makes things hard to read in an age when we are almost all used to texting

on the other hand, why do you feel the need to feel superior to me and to kindly instruct me in the ways of the world? i wonder

Well if it is any consolation I have no problem reading your attempts to approximate speech the funny bits make it worthwhile.

[Beau]

He does indeed.

I'm enjoying his wit.

Why not use a pram?

[Richard46]

,,,,
And yes Richard46, I'm the po faced one, holist has a fine sense of humour.

I know; in particular his finely judged and original turn of a phrase has me in stitches. I mean "go out and get a life" how many could turn a Wildean phrase like that? Not to mention his self-deprecating sense of irony, the man is a master.

[Jobar]

subsymbolic:

love child of Loki and Baba Yaga?????

oh my, what a pity i've chosen a nick already!

You could make that your user title, like my own 'Zen hedonist'.

I got a good grin from it, too. :D

[subsymbolic]

Frontal Lobe Prostitute

holist as Holden Caulfield, who'd have thought it? :eek:

[Barefoot Bree]

Conversation on prams and slings has been moved to its own thread in the Lounge, here (http://www.secularcafe.org/showthread.php?t=15554).

As Jobar said elsewere, we don't keep our guests standing in the foyer talking- step into the Lounge and have a seat. ;)

[holist]

thank you for the kind invitation

i am happy to loiter a little longer, keeping the door close by just in case

:)

[holist]

the moment has come

i've had enough

sorry bunch of individuals that you are,

exceptions: Peanut, Politesse, subsymbolic and possibly 2 or 3 others

bye-bye

[DMB]

Goodbye. :wave:

[BioBeing]

No great loss. Bye.

[Old Woman in Purple]

Good riddance. At least a smattering of punctuation & capitalization are our friends.

[subsymbolic]

Well, I rather hope that the people capable of recognising the contribution that members like holist and myself could have made under a mildly different regime will have a think about whether this is the forum they want. I note that rather then the seventeen online here right now, at the high point in 2009 there were over six hundred.

Something isn't working.

Enjoy your forum, it has the potential to be really cool, but not like this.

Thanks to all the people who were cool or interesting, especially febble, BB and politesse.

[kennyc]

Just as well as far as I'm concerned. I expected it from the beginning.

[BioBeing]

You leaving too, subsy?

[Barefoot Bree]

I'm afraid I'll never understand the mindset of someone who joins a group (online, offline, workplace, schoolyard, whatever) and then immediately proceeds to tell them all they're doing everything wrong, spreads insults liberally, and they should be focusing on chocolates, not tennis (when the group is named Friday Tennis Club). Really? :dunno:

A group of people, formal or not, especially those which have been in existence for a while, have pretty much discovered or morphed into or came into being along the lines they want. Any newbie is not going to get much traction - if any at all - trying to change things. If a group isn't quite what you're looking for, or not quite what you thought they were, then the best thing is to a) adjust to it, b) keep looking! Yes, sometimes there's a c) join anyway and work slowly from within to make changes. But really - bursting in, spreading insults, and complaining loudly about the way things are run just isn't going to get you anywhere but frustrated and sooner or later out the door (on your own steam or not). You have to fit in first, slowly grow to a leadership position, and then you'll be able to slowly make the changes you want.

[holist]

A group of people, formal or not, especially those which have been in existence for a while

wot, like over TWO years???

venerable


But really - bursting in, spreading insults, and complaining loudly about the way things are run just isn't going to get you anywhere but frustrated
not for a fraction of a moment, believe me

and sooner or later out the door
so what's wrong with that?

it was indeed my expectation, too - but i figured i'd give it a go

that go is finished

You have to fit in first, slowly grow to a leadership position, and then you'll be able to slowly make the changes you want.

famous examples: jesus h. christ himself, the buddha, h. chavez, a. hitler, robespierre (no particular order there) in fact, successful revolutionaries on every scale, everywhere around the world

give it a rest, placatory woman

and bye again

[Barefoot Bree]

A group of people, formal or not, especially those which have been in existence for a while

wot, like over TWO years???

venerable

Quite. In internet terms, that's a couple of centuries, at least. :cool:

But really - bursting in, spreading insults, and complaining loudly about the way things are run just isn't going to get you anywhere but frustrated
not for a fraction of a moment, believe meEmotionally, I wouldn't venture to guess, not being able to read minds (nor claim I can) - but functionally, yes. Your attempts to change the milieu were frustrated, as in, not successful.

See? I can be a pedant, too.

and sooner or later out the door
so what's wrong with that?

it was indeed my expectation, too - but i figured i'd give it a go

that go is finishedExcept for popping back in to reply to sufficient provocation.

*rebaits hook and casts again* :evil:
You have to fit in first, slowly grow to a leadership position, and then you'll be able to slowly make the changes you want.

famous examples: jesus h. christ himself, the buddha, h. chavez, a. hitler, robespierre (no particular order there) in fact, successful revolutionaries on every scale, everywhere around the world

give it a rest, placatory woman

and bye againOoooooooh, argument via exception! Always good for a laugh. You can disprove ANYTHING by finding a single exception - except when talking about general, commonplace trends and conditions.

And what's wrong with being placatory? If nobody ever tried it, everyone in the world would be at each other's throats every moment. (I can exaggerate, too.)

Bye again. Till the next post.