Bizarre Argumentation

[aesmael]

    Something else from class. We were being shown the way some items were catalogued in the TAFE library and looking at The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. One of the copies had listed under 'other titles' The Chronicles of Narnia bk. 2, but no series title. It struck me as very odd that someone could read that on a book cover and conclude it to be a title of the book rather than an indication that this book is in fact the second volume of a series. Odd, but also familiar.

    It reminds me of an argument on the talk page for Wikipedia's article on the Cult of Skaro. One person was disputing that the four daleks of the cult survived the end of Doomsday. When presented with a quote from Evolution of the Daleks -

Doctor: How did you survive then?

Dalek Sec: Emergency temporal shift.

They said they think it is very weak evidence and do not believe there is continuity, althought they did admit "that the coincidence of an emergency temporal shift in both stories suggests that the writers may have intended it to be the same Daleks, despite the lack of direct evidence onscreen". They also said "I nevertheless think that the many direct statements on Wikipedia that these are the same Daleks are overly confident given the dearth of real evidence."

    I find it remarkable that people can be presented with such a strong circumstantial case and conclude that there is no link in question, or only a very weak one. In this case, a black dalek, the only one we have seen so far, is accompanied by three gold daleks, all four the only daleks we have seen to use names. The black dalek is shown escaping at the end of the episode via "emergency temporal shift". In a later episode a black dalek with the same name is seen with four gold daleks also with the same names as the daleks seen previously. They are treated by the Doctor as if they are the same daleks from before and when asked how they escaped, admit to the emergency temporal shift we saw earlier.

    This is not a weak case. It is not proved to a certainty, and I can easily think of explanations which would show it to be untrue, but one thing it is not is weak. The wikipedian in question would, I surmise, be convinced only by dalek's-eye-view footage of the entire escape and arrival in Manhattan.

    So, yes. It puzzles me that some people, no matter how strong the evidence, seem to flat out refuse to make connections between what they see and instead treat each case as a separate, entirely unrelated entity.
    Yep, that catalogue entry reminded me of Creationism. Somehow, someone took the words 'The Chronicles of Narnia, book 2' from the cover of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and concluded that this was an alternate title for the book, not the series name and volume number. In fact it is an alternate title for the book. It is also a very clear indication that this volume does not stand alone, but has continuity with what came before and after.
    Of course, closer examination reveals that the Narnia books are not a simple ordered series. They were not published in the chronological order they are presented in, and were written in yet a different order. But, one needs to investigate to discover this - the manner of connection is less obvious than the fact.

Comments

[stacis-leak.livejournal.com]

Well not only that but the cult of Skaro is a WELL KNOWN group of Daleks, well known because in the original series they were the ONLY Daleks to actually have individual names.

So finding a Dalek called Sec and assuming it's the same is roughly equivalent to finding a Borg called Hugh. It's not the same name that makes it the same one, it's the fact that it HAS a name...

[aesmael.livejournal.com]

Really? I remember someone (possibly) the Doctor, saying how unique and special it was for daleks to have names at all but I did not know they (the Cult, not necessarily those particular daleks) were from the original series. Well, at first I thought they were, but then I received the impression otherwise, somehow.

[lost-angelwings.livejournal.com]

I dunno what you're talking about >.> But I do know Wikipedian ppl are notorious for being obsessive about their POV to the point that they'll accept almost nothing as proof that they're wrong. :(

[aesmael.livejournal.com]

That's because if they are proven wrong they puff out of existence. Such proof-duels are the chief mode of advancement within wikipedian ranks, and hotly contested.