Bright Copper Kettles

I am constantly changing the list of blogs I currently like to read (sidebar). It is partly continuous improvement, and partly continuous redefinition of what the list is actually a list of. At the moment it is a carefully variegated (sp?) selection of my favourite newest finds in random order.


I have removed actual real life friends' blogs from the sidebar because reading their blogs is an unchangeable fact. Unchangeable facts don't belong on my everchanging list. Of course this may all change when I redefine the list contents again.

I have also removed the political section. It is too tiring and not exactly fun reading political comments with an election just around the corner. Besides, I have assigned the task of keeping up with politics to the Universe. I have better things to do, such as paint and sleep and populate this blog with completely random ramblings.

And just in case the Universe forgets, I still have my aggregator. All the blogs that have ever been in the sidebar, and indeed all the blogs that I have ever had a passing interest in are accumulating in my aggregator. I very rarely delete. I'm always positive that at some time in the future I may want to revisit a long forgotten blog interest.


...

Anyway, getting to the original point of this post: I really really like AgnostoLibertarianTechnoGeek (ALTG). It seems that ALTG is not particularly concerned with defending his opinion. Yay! How refreshing! Yay! Someone like me! It is so rare to find someone like me that when I do find a similarity, no matter how small, it makes my day.

Actually ALTG may be nothing like me in other ways, who knows?

It was funny (or maybe really boring) how I found ALTG ...
A post about whether a 4 year old should have to wear Nappies at the Pool on Sir Humphrey's caught my eye.


I don't have a strong opinion on this topic at all as I detest and avoid public swimming pools (although I am curious as to what the opinionated people would think if the swimming pool had been privately owned). Anyway I thought that seeing as the post featured such universally interesting topics like "poos" and "rights" it might generate relatively heated (ie interesting) discussion.

The comments weren't that heated perhaps due to the recent effort at sir humphrey's to avoid profanity and personal insults (how boring!). But I did discover this interesting site: www.enlightenedcaveman.com and this interesting blog: Chaos Theory.

And then Chaos Theory had this thoughtful quote by David at AgnostoLibertarianTechnoGeek

I think the mistake that we make sometimes is assuming that people are interested in *ideas*. People are not interested in ideas. People are interested in picking sides, then listening to cheerleaders for their side confirming over and over again why their side is right. When confronted with an opposing opinion, generally anger is the result, as they are unequipped to challenge the opinion with actual rational thought

Such a thoughtful piece of writing. It resonates completely and at the same time I disagree slightly. After all I am interested in ideas and I am a person. I do not mind being opposed and actually enjoy reading opposing views. I like having my perceptions and ideas shifted by something or someone. Although perhaps that is because I am unequipped to challenge opinion with rational thought! Yes, I readily admit it, and no, I don't particularly care :)

Yet...I tend to think that in general people are incredibly defensive of their opinions and not particularly willing to listen to different ideas/viewpoints. So many people seem to know they are right. And I have no desire to even begin to communicate with such people. There is no point.

Yet...debating can be fun. Sometimes I like disagreeing just for the sake of an argument. I don't actually need to believe/agree with what I am saying/writing (is this lying?). I like arguing for things I disagree with because it forces me to rethink and re-evaluate. Who knows. I might even change my mind.

I wish there was a spellcheck. This post has been far too long to have no errors.