I, for example, loved 180 Proof's posts precisely because he made effective use of fonts, styles, colors, etc. to emphasise the important ideas - someone could get it almost at a single glance. — Agustino

You like skimming the text, reading only what the author presents as the important ideas. How do you know that your idea of what is important is the same as the author's?

You like skimming the text, reading only what the author presents as the important ideas. — Metaphysician Undercover

At first. If there's anything important there, I will read everything.

How do you know that your idea of what is important is the same as the author's? — Metaphysician Undercover

If the author is worth reading, he should at least be aware of what his message is, otherwise how can he attempt to convey it? If he's aware of his message, then I'll get an idea of it from his main points. Then if that idea is sufficiently convincing, I will read what follows.

So my idea of what's important doesn't matter. All I care is what is this author trying to communicate - and is it important?

Most these discussions involve argumentation. In my opinion, what is important is not the assertion but the argument which supports the assertion. To put the assertions in bold is just an annoyance, like someone shouting at you.

Most these discussions involve argumentation. In my opinion, what is important is not the assertion but the argument which supports the assertion. To put the assertions in bold is just an annoyance, like someone shouting at you. — Metaphysician Undercover

I think this is one of the things that's wrong with modern philosophy. It's not the argument - but the insight that counts. Argumentation is merely a form of presentation - maybe a way of convincing someone by tying a conclusion with other beliefs that someone already has - thus convincing them how the new belief (conclusion) fits in the environment of what he already knows about the world (premises).

It's insight that makes you a great philosopher - not the ability to be argumentative. I'm scouring for insights, arguments are secondary.

I don't know what's come over me, but on this occasion I agree with Agustino. I liked 180 Proof's quirkiness. The triumph of Facebook over MySpace, for example, is partly a triumph of a melancholy uniformity over lively self-styling. I think some user control over font, colour and so forth is an enhancement. Mess is not always A Bad Thing..

I may have to go and lie down.

The lunatic can go around shouting out great insight, but it's the ability to justify what you claim which makes you a respectable philosopher. That's because it's when you're within the process of justifying your assumptions, that you realize which intuitions are guiding you in the correct direction. Without this act of justifying, the insight you shout out is just random nonsense; which, by the way, constitutes a large portion of many posts. And there is no reason to provide the poster with the means to attract ones attention to such nonsense. Insight, without the capacity to express oneself appears as drivel.

Can't you center somehow with the "code" option? And do other stuff?

EDIT: I just tried but couldn't manage.

I don't know what's come over me, but on this occasion I agree with Agustino — mcdoodle

:o

Only a few of the BBCode tags are recognised, and the rest will just appear in the post as written in the editor.

You should simply be aware that many forums are doing this, and they're not having problems because of it. There's nothing messy about centring text, using colors, etc. — Agustino

I'm aware that other forums are doing that. They look messy and unprofessional. If this was just a forum for casual chitchat, then maybe. But it's not.

Au contraire! If this was a forum just for casual chitchat, then you should have simplified things as much as possible - like now. For simple chitchat people wouldn't need additional features (think Facebook). But because this isn't such a forum, you should give users more possibilities.

No, you've got that the wrong way around. It would definitely make more sense having that option if this were just a forum for casual chitchat. Then looking professional wouldn't be such a concern.

Urgh. Look at this crap. It's awful.

Along with reply, share, and flag, posts should have a link button, so you can refer to specific posts.

They do. If you click on the "4 hours ago" or whatever time it is, the link will appear in the URL, and you can copy it.

Along with reply, share, and flag, posts should have a link button, so you can refer to specific posts. — Srap Tasmaner

That's exactly what the "Share" link does.

I liked 180 Proof's quirkiness. — mcdoodle

180 proof was legendary but he was to the point and had concise, almost perfect oneliners. Augustino is legendary with his own quirkiness now, as he is, but to further inflict us with essays of rainbow vomit where we would need to wear ultraviolet sunglasses just to read his posts, it would probably get him banned and I wouldn't want that.

I think the site looks perfect as is. All this place needs is the palm-face and rolly-eye emoticons. I miss them.

I'm an old arty-fart, I quite agree the forum looks ok as it is, and it won't put me out if nothing changes, but I dislike this Facebook-like conformity.

I'm an old arty-fart, I quite agree the forum looks ok as it is, and it won't put me out if nothing changes, but I dislike this Facebook-like conformity. — mcdoodle

I cannot see how considering that the former addition of 'likes' is gone and indeed there are no personal picture posting. It is nice to indulge in some aesthetic pleasure, but alas some here would take it to another level that it may reduce the quality of posts into scintillating ad hominems.

Mind. Blown.

Actually I just assumed that "Share" would bring up a selection of social media buttons like it does on loads of other sites, so I avoided clicking it.

Thanks also @Agustino. I guess that amounts to a sort of "back to the top of this post" function. Odd.

Thanks guys!

A lot is not so good here, but anything is better than nothing.

1. Citations should be in grey body to distinguish them better from the answer.
2. We should get a set of basic logical and mathematical symbols, and some more smilies.
3. We should be able to mark words ot sentences and color them differently.

All that would help serious argumentation.

3. We should be able to mark words ot sentences and color them differently. — Pippen

I've pointed out this before:

One thing I totally hate about the interface of this forum is that there's no adequate text editor. I can't centre text, can't wrap text around images, use different fonts, change font size, etc. It would make communicating stuff more interesting if we had a Word document kind of interface which gave you full flexibility. — Agustino

Right - you can check out other forums then. I don't remember old PF being messy, or somehow being affected by the "lack of common standards of presentation". I used colors and headlines several times there, and it was very successful, no one said anything. I remember several people, including 180 Proof, using colors and different font sizes too! — Agustino

2. We should get a set of basic logical and mathematical symbols, and some more smilies. — Pippen

Agreed :D

We should get a set of basic logical and mathematical symbols — Pippen

We have MathJax.

$$\int_{a}^{b} x^2 dx$$

A lot is not so good here, but anything is better than nothing.

1. Citations should be in grey body to distinguish them better from the answer.
2. We should get a set of basic logical and mathematical symbols, and some more smilies.
3. We should be able to mark words ot sentences and color them differently. — Pippen

1. Quotations are indented and surrounded by big quotation marks and are sufficiently distinguishable from the rest of a post, at least to me and I suspect most others.
2. As Michael said, we have MathJax.
3. I don't see at all how colours would help, and I don't know what you mean by "mark words or sentences".

So your three complaints--two of which are eccentric and one of which is already a feature--don't seem to add up to "a lot is not so good here".

In the biography section, it asks you to state your "Favourite philosophers."

Can we Americanize (i.e. improve) this to read "Favorite philosophers"?

Done.

In the biography section, it asks you to state your "Favorite philosophers".

Can we Englishize (i.e. correct) this to read "Favourite philosophers"?

No. But I've left "Favourite quotations" in the interests of fairness.

Fine. Then you might as well change "Favourite quotations" to "Favorite quotations".

You're too fast. See my edit.