Originally posted by Gazrok
I'm also thinking of the realities of modding such a division. It would be a logistics nightmare for the mods involved, and require an awful lot of thread moves on a regular basis, and dealing with hurt egos thereafter.... Not saying it's a bad idea, just unsure of the practicality of it from a moderation standpoint or a moral compass standpoint. It could have the unwanted effect of making the more "non-scientific" members or threads feeling "lesser" and thus not participating.....

Not necessarily... at least it seems to me the mods spend of lot of their time "breaking up" fights that erupt. This might actually reduce the workload. You may need to assign some new mods preferably with an acknowledged "expertise" and demonstrated fairness in dealing with opposing viewpoints in the subject forum they're assigned to but if you keep it simple and divide the Aliens & UFOs forum into say an "Alien Encounters" forum and a "UFOs" forum then maybe everybody gets what they want.

I suspect these two forums will develop their own communities and eventually they will self-regulate themselves to some degree. The end result could actually be to attract more membership and participation in both areas than what there is now due to those who are interested in one aspect more than the other not wanting to associate themselves with one or the other.

The "Alien Encounters" forum would give people a place to share their experiences with others relatively free from the physical constraints of establishing the reality of "UFOs". Overly demanding evidence based skeptical viewpoints would be somewhat discouraged unlike in the “UFOs” forum. I don't think they currently have that freedom anywhere else on the net at least on this scale and with this much visibility. ATS could be the first to break the mold of these two aspects of the phenomena being "lumped" together.

Anyway, if the “Alien Encounters” forum fails to take off and flourish on it’s own, it can always be merged back in. I don’t see any harm in seeing what happens do you?

Great idea HankMcCoy!

The newbie above nailed it. I concur... (& welcome aboard)

Great idea - tough to implement - hell to manage...

Although, thanks for the thought-experiment Hank...

Actually, I saw another idea in another thread, and it made me think of Hank's idea....

The suggestion was for a Contactee forum. That might be a better way to go, and neatly get around the whole "judgement" issue and modding difficulties, while still keeping the idea of Hank's suggestion. Just throwing it out there. The three amigos make the decision on new forums (with some input from the mods), so I'd suggest pitching it in the Board Business forum, if you think it's a worthwhile idea....

Not necessarily... at least it seems to me the mods spend of lot of their time "breaking up" fights that erupt

It may SEEM that way, but there's far more going on on this side of the curtain, that never is really that visible to the membership. Nothing covert or anything, just stuff you're glad you don't see, (like sexual harassment in U2U's to other members, network attacks, etc. in addition to the day-to-day maintenence of thread moves, cleanups, etc.)

[edit on 12-1-2007 by Gazrok]

The suggestion was for a Contactee forum. That might be a better way to go, and neatly get around the whole "judgement" issue and modding difficulties, while still keeping the idea of Hank's suggestion. Just throwing it out there. The three amigos make the decision on new forums (with some input from the mods), so I'd suggest pitching it in the Board Business forum, if you think it's a worthwhile idea....

Do you think a 'Contactee' forum would get more support from Mods? I am more than willing to rewrite the concept with the contactee forum if others think it would be beneficial to the forum. I posted it here to get an idea where everyone else is on this topic, and from the different threads I saw yesterday, and the various responses to those threads, I personally think SOMETHING needs to happen.

Anyone else want to post some input before I start writing up a new proposal?

A contactee forum may be easier to manage, though the original posting premise contains the same dilemma:

How do you separate out the overlapping material that clearly falls into more than one "category". I.e., who makes the judgement call regarding the suitablity of a topic or thread with elements of both science and theology to be 'classified' into one category or the other? What criteria is applied to those ubiquitous "gray/grey areas" (pun intended) that have intriguing topic matter delaing with scientific curiosities and theological elements both?

Thanks again, Hank for the proposition. Certainly an interesting and worthwhile discussion.

Worth a try, but i'm afraid both sections will continue to be littered with countless threads about the woman eating reptilians from sirius, the 2012 landing, ashtar sheran and other new age nonsense...which are proliferating as the forums are becoming more and more popular.

Originally posted by Outrageo
A contactee forum may be easier to manage, though the original posting premise contains the same dilemma:

How do you separate out the overlapping material that clearly falls into more than one "category".

If it was a matter of simply adding a contactee forum, and not so much a science vs. theology split, contactees would be free to detail expereinces with both scientific and theological/religous content freely, without worrying about whether or not the claims are provable. The emphasis shifts from provablity to whether or not the information being presented is from aliens to a contactee, whether abducted or meditating, or whatever.

Hank,

An excellent, excellent idea!

In fact, your frustration is a theme I see repeated over and over again on many UFO releated websites.

I honestly don't believe ATS is the place for such a thing, however, because its origins and its strength lie - in a large part - due to it's inclusiveness and the freedom of expression granted around here.

I believe - what is really needed - is a website that is specifically tailored to only scientific discussion of UFOlogy - and which is moderated by a self important tyrant.

This website could serve as a good supplement to the already heady discussion here at ATS.

I believe I know someone who is currently designing such a site which he plans on being fully functional by March of this year (2007).

I'm not sure - but I believe his site might have the same name as his internet personna...

If only I could remember his name ;-)

Originally posted by HankMcCoy
Do you think a 'Contactee' forum would get more support from Mods?

Well Gaz is a supermod and it sounds like he's willing to consider it so why not see what they think?

Anyone else want to post some input before I start writing up a new proposal?

You mean you're not done with it yet?

Let us know here when you post it over there.

Originally posted by HankMcCoy
If it was a matter of simply adding a contactee forum, and not so much a science vs. theology split, contactees would be free to detail expereinces with both scientific and theological/religous content freely, without worrying about whether or not the claims are provable. The emphasis shifts from provablity to whether or not the information being presented is from aliens to a contactee, whether abducted or meditating, or whatever.

Hank, I have been following your idea(s) with interest regarding separate discussion areas, and would love to see some version of it happen.

My only input? I think that contactees who are currently complaining about being treated unfairly in the main UFOs & Aliens forum would quickly feel starved of crucial attention if given their own place to play. They seem to enjoy the opportunity to "change minds" and have knowingly started some of the most provocative threads on ATS.

Just saying: I don't think they'd want to stay there, and that's what would become a nightmare for the mods. The rules become one level harder to apply.