This is something I’ve been thinking about for a while now: the creation of a Way of the Mind forum.
While I love to write here, and to read and reply to comments, I also find that, quite often, people end up talking about something different. It’s a very small community, here, so far, but it’s there… and maybe it should be encouraged.
I don’t know when I’ll launch the forum; maybe in a month or so. My plans are for it to have several sub-forums (christianity, other religions, atheism, politics, society, individualism, maybe others), and anyone can start new threads, as long as they’re appropriate for the sub-forum.
The forum will be described as being for atheists, humanists, individualists, libertarians, objectivists and such; it will not be restricted to those, of course, and intelligent posts by Christians (for instance) will be welcome. Insults, threats of eternal damnation and similar, however, will not be welcome at all. 
So… do you think this is a good idea? Do you see yourself participating in that forum (while still reading and commenting on this blog, of course )?
As I said, it won’t be up for a month or so, I think.
EDIT: change of plans. It may actually be up sooner than I thought – probably in less than a week. Naturally, I’ll announce it here when it happens.
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Being someone who has, on occasion, “hijacked” the original intent of a post I think it would be a great idea and place to continue those ’side’ conversations that sometimes get going in the comments of a post. I would use it.
Sounds like a good idea to me. I’d like to use it. I’m enjoying posting comments on your blog, though there does seem to be an awful lot of labelling going on – something you seem to encourage here with your talk of atheists, humanists, individualists, libertarians, objectivists etc. Isn’t there a danger that in labelling themselves in this way, people are placing restrictions upon the extent to which they are open to new ideas? In the same way that – oh, just name a category at random – fundamentalist Christians do.
Simon: well, a forum needs to have a “point”… that is, one or more subjects. People will be told that the forum is mostly for — or, that most members are — atheists, humanists, etc.. They’ll be warned about it in advance. It won’t be restricted to those, of course, that’s not what I want. Besides, we’re all individuals. I simply don’t want people to be shocked because they’ve just entered “a den of godless atheism!” (a pleonasm if I ever saw one!)
As I said, a Christian who can participate in an intelligent discussion will be more than welcome. But (s)he should be prepared for the fact that most people there are non-theists of some kind. And I really don’t want anyone “witnessing”, saying we’re slaves of Satan, threatening eternal damnation, repeating Pascal’s Wager for the 637th time. Those people are not only rude, but also annoying.
WHATS WRONG WITH ETERNAL DAMNATION?!
Joking of course.
I think it’s a good idea, because like in a bar you could say “Take it outside”.
I also hope that this isn’t something we’ve irked you into.
Looking at a couple of the threads here, I myself have gone way off topic for a number of replys.
That’s bad. It looks bad too. When you look at some of these posts it’s like “let’s talk about cake” and then everybody’s argueing McDonalds VS Taco Bell instead.
[quote post="170"]I also hope that this isn’t something we’ve irked you into.[/quote]
Nope, don’t worry about that.
I believe this will be the best of both worlds. I’ll keep posting here, and I’ll welcome your comments, but you can also start new threads, instead of moving the posts’ discussion off-topic.
I have looked at a lot of forums over the years.
The only ones that are successful have a large enough
membership ( I would guess in the 1,000’s) so that
there are several new posts everyday.
In other words, I think you only need a forum
if you are getting too many bog comments to handle.
Cheers
Michael: thanks for the tip. However, here it’s not really a question of quantity, but of off-topicness. What I want is to leave the blog discussions on-topic, while having a way for people to start new topics, without being dependent on me to do so.
Yes, I need a place to vent my midget rage
.
I do like the idea though, most forums don’t allow religious discussion on the grounds that it turns into flame-wars.
This could be different.