The social sciences and philosophy forums.

[Jupiter60]

Why did this board do away with the social sciences and philosophy forums it used to have?

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Social science topics weren't popular enough. You are still free to post such topics in General Discussion. We made a decision awhile back to ban philosophy because the topics ended up unproductive and in general conflicted with our community mission.

 

[jtbell]

IIRC we once had a Mentor with either a degree or significant coursework in philosophy, who "rode herd" on our philosophy forum. After she left, none of the rest of us had similar expertise, which we considered necessary to keep the forum productive.

 

[Evo]

IIRC we once had a Mentor with either a degree or significant coursework in philosophy, who "rode herd" on our philosophy forum. After she left, none of the rest of us had similar expertise, which we considered necessary to keep the forum productive.

And she admitted she couldn't bear going in there, poor thing.

 

[jtbell]

she couldn't bear going in there, poor thing.

I'd forgotten about that, but I believe it!

 

[Devils]

And she admitted she couldn't bear going in there, poor thing.

This is an issue with forums in general. People with specialist knowledge enter conversations on topics where everyone can have an opinion. The expert is then promptly "shouted down" by uneducated idiots. Its the reason I don't frequent generalist forums any more.

 

[Maaruk]

I'm a philosopher, and I dislike most other philosophers. I also don't like the academic discipline for the most part, I think a classical education would do. I've done more reading now than I ever did in school and it's all for enjoyment/knowledge.

Philosophy is a tough thing to do well.

 

[Devils]

Peter Thiel studied philisophy at Stanford. He went on to start Paypal, then become a billionaire. His talks are quite different from other technology gurus and well worth listening to.