Criteria For Interviewees

Ok, so as long as Vortex's interview is held outside the hidden CT forum, he's not allowed to discuss HIV/AIDS with Bauer. 

I can't understand why that seems to come as news to you. We just had that conversation with Ian, didn't we?

Ok, so as long as Vortex's interview is held outside the hidden CT forum, he's not allowed to discuss HIV/AIDS with Bauer. 

Yeah, maybe some would consider that free speech. I don't.

I think it's about a small group of individuals who are so convinced of their position that they wish to censor any opposition or even discussion about the topic. 

It's dangerously arrogant in my opinion.

I'd rather be 'dangerously arrogant' then give a guy a forum whose views about HIV/AIDs have lead to the deaths of thousands upon thousands of people. I've treated people who've been on the antiviral medication.

Stan, I contacted Bauer once again, and he agreed to be interview outside of the main interview section. He is a man of tolerance (and irony) and thus can deal with fury of others quite easily. Something that I cannot say of some people here.

It is funny and sad (simultaneously so) how my initiative to interview the Science and Technology Studies (STS) scholar about science and its current problems turned into angry conflict with people who cannot endure being in the close proximity of someone they strongly disagree with. Even if this "close proximity" is a digital one.

It's not about 'disagreement' - it's about whether we want to host a man who's HIV/AIDS views have previously lead to the deaths of thousands. Maybe you should explain why you're so eager to give a man like this a platform?

I've been reading some more about Henry Bauer and his theories, and I'm afraid there is ample evidence of his utter incompetence as a scientist - at least in the 18 years since his retirement. (I don't know about his work in electrochemistry, but it seems he gave that up 40-50 years ago.)

Someone asked earlier whether we were supposed to think that those involved in the Society for Scientific Exploration are somehow tainted because Bauer occupied a prominent position in that organisation and edited its journal. My feeling now is that I'd be much more suspicious about the scientific standards of the Society and its journal, knowing what I do about the poor quality of Bauer's work. 

Fortunately, what's being proposed now is not an official PsienceQuest interview, but I suggest it would be a good idea if, for the official interviews, potential interviewees were cleared with the moderators before the planned interviews were made public. That way the reputation of the site could be protected, and everyone concerned could be spared unnecessary trouble and embarrassment.

I've been reading some more about Henry Bauer and his theories, and I'm afraid there is ample evidence of his utter incompetence as a scientist - at least in the 18 years since his retirement. (I don't know about his work in electrochemistry, but it seems he gave that up 40-50 years ago.)

Someone asked earlier whether we were supposed to think that those involved in the Society for Scientific Exploration are somehow tainted because Bauer occupied a prominent position in that organisation and edited its journal. My feeling now is that I'd be much more suspicious about the scientific standards of the Society and its journal, knowing what I do about the poor quality of Bauer's work. 

Fortunately, what's being proposed now is not an official PsienceQuest interview, but I suggest it would be a good idea if, for the official interviews, potential interviewees were cleared with the moderators before the planned interviews were made public. That way the reputation of the site could be protected, and everyone concerned could be spared unnecessary trouble and embarrassment.

Hey Chris, can you share your sources here?

Hey Chris, can you share your sources here?

I can share them, but as we're not meant to be actually discussing the theory here, it's probably better if I PM you, if that's OK. I'm happy also to PM anyone else who is interested.

I can share them, but as we're not meant to be actually discussing the theory here, it's probably better if I PM you, if that's OK. I'm happy also to PM anyone else who is interested.

You can post them on the thread concerning Bauer's HIV-AIDS views - one that was created by you in the hidden "Conspiracy Theory" subsetion.

You can post them on the thread concerning Bauer's HIV-AIDS views - one that was created by you in the hidden "Conspiracy Theory" subsetion.

I'm not a member of that subsection. The thread must have been created by a moderator moving one of my posts.

It's not about 'disagreement' - it's about whether we want to host a man who's HIV/AIDS views have previously lead to the deaths of thousands. Maybe you should explain why you're so eager to give a man like this a platform?

Why do I want to interview him here? Because I sincerely consider him to be one of the best thinkers on the nature and status of science, I'm certain that this part of his views deserve a hearing and discussion. The discussion that you will probably demonstratively ignore, rejecting the chance to engage Bauer and argue against his views, if you will find them incorrect.

And, BTW, did you ever learned anything about him and his ideas, except his support of HIV skepticism, which apparently utterly intellectually discredit and socially destroy him in your eyes?

Just FYI: a man may hold a wide range of different views, some of them true and some of them false. Holding false views in one area does not prevent holding true in other ones. Whether Bauer's views concerning HIV-AIDS causation is true or false, his views on science in general is simply another matter.

Now, to the claim that you are constantly repeating: one that Bauer's ideas, along with the ideas of other HIV skeptics, caused many deaths and great damage. The irony of that repeated claim - irony that, apparently, remain invisible to you - is that it is based on an strongly-beleived assumption, if not a total and unwavering certitude, that Bauer and HIV skeptics are objectively false. But what if they are objectively true? Did you at least once, for the fracture of a second, considered such possiblity? Since, if they are true, it is you, Chris and other innumerable HIV proponents who are mass-murderers-by-implication and global-destroyers-by-mistake.

What about that, Roberta? Your social status, and social status of countless human beings, are now held in balance, depending on the factual correctness of your (and their) positions. Since, if you all will turn out to be mistaken, after all, you are guilty of death and suffering of many people who trusted the mainsteam HIV proponence stance, and have chosen to undergo mainstream therapies (which, according to the position of the HIV skeptics, are devastative to their health - sometimes to the point of being lethal).

So, one way or another, it seems we already have a lot of mass murderers here on Psience Quest. Depending what side of HIV controversy is true, these unwitting devastators of multiple human lives are either David Bailey, Michael Larkin and all other HIV skeptics - or you, Chris, and other HIV proponents.

Maybe at least I - the HIV agnostic who was persuaded enough by HIV skepticism to lose certitude in the mainstream position, yet not enough to accept the alternative position wholeheartedly - am not guilty in unintentional mass murder? I suspect the most dedicated people from either side of the controversy may accuse me still, simply because I have not accepted their side's notions without hesitation.

Yet, I do not think anyone here - as well as anyone who will be here soon, like Henry Bauer - is a mass murderer. We all are good people who are genuinely concerned about the wellbeing of our fellow human beings, and want the best for them. That's why we decide either to put our trust in someone whom we perceive as genuine and respectable authority (and follow these authorities' prescriptions), or to search and analyse the available evidence and its interpretations by ourselves (and make our own choices according to the conclusions we have reached with this search and analysis). And that is why we try to persuade others that we are correct and the ones who disagree with us are not.

This is how it should be - the open discussion, based on the principles of free speech, free expression and free inquiry. How is should not be? It should not be censorship - or "no-platforming", to use the currently fashionable SJW-styled language.

An important note: I accept the position of Ninshub, Laird and some others that the interview with Bauer must be posted on the "Alternative Views on Science" section, rather than in the main interview section, since the topics that are going to be discussed are not directly related to psi and consciousness. What I do not accept is your pro-censorship position, Roberta, according to which Henry Bauer should not be allowed here at all.

My position is adamantly and unwaveringly anti-censorship - and yes, in this anti-censorship stance I unashamedly, even proudly, quite dogamtic - for the reasons both ethical and pragmatic.

The ethical reason for my decisive rejection of any censorship is that I value freedom most of all - much more than I value wellbeing; I also value dignity and integrity, and I value them more than wellbeing as well, even if not as much more as I value freedom. So, I maintain that people freedom to have access to the whole range of positions concerning any controversy, and to express their own postions, is more important than their safety. The intellectual integrity of people, which demands that they should learn to think by themselves and advance their critical thought, is also more important than safety. Their dignity, their right not to be treated like mindless idiots or hyper-sensitive "snowflakes", is, again, more important than their safety.

The pragmatic reason is the fact that every dominant scientific, technical and medical postion is always provisional and debatable - and may always turn out to be wrong, and dangerously so. That's why it is important to allow a wide and unrestrained public debate of any such issue, and let anyone - laypersons included - to make their own choices concerning their own safety, with all opinions and options being avalilable to them.

So, this is what I think about this issue. Now, I will turn to two interviews with that I must work - one is upcoming one with Loyd Auerbach (does anyone remember about him at all, with our Bauer-related debates?), and another one, in a more distant future, with the dreaded Henry Bauer himself.

Be good, Roberta. I consider you to be my distant friend - to call it so - as much as I consider the same about Henry Bauer. It is sad that you two will not meet in a vigourous yet polite debate.

Or maybe you will. Who knows? I still do not lose my hope that "snowflakiness" from which so many good and sympathetic people suffer nowadays is a passing condition...