I think there is a real difference between 1) well thought out, carefully crafted, original, on-point "walls of text" that are just long responses
I agree that all walls of text are not made equally but my original point was, you can't answer 20 walls of text. Typically most of those walls say the same basic things.
Personally, with few exceptions, I often lose patience with long posts. Exceptions exist
and the occasional "wall of text" is forgiveable. I sometimes make huge posts myself. Warning, this one will be long.
and 2) cut 'n paste walls 'o text from some apologist website
Yes, I agree that cutting and pasting requires no thought. Summarizing an argument is better
or highlighting some key points the source makes. I'm in total agreement with you here.
, 3) the unedited, rambling, grammatically incorrect, free-floating stream-of-unconsciousness walls of text that we get from some people. Like wordybird of a few days ago.
I don't subscribe to the heuristic that gramatical correctness shows clearer thought1
. William Lane Craig
uses perfect grammar and I believe so does Eric Hovind
. People exist who suck and the mundane and focus on the complex.
Grammar correctness is a mechanical skill
that probably uses a very different part of the brain that logical thought. It is memorized.
I do agree that coherence
is important. This is related to how ones thoughts are organized
We just like to see people put some thought and time into their responses.
Sure. Theism inherently involves heuristics which are not particularly logical.
Even if a reply is short, it should show evidence of a thought process.
The problem is, we often get theists who really don't understand what they believe.
I'm not sure whether this is true or not. Many of them may suck at explaining what they believe. I can only guess at what goes on in their heads.
And they cannot admit that they just don't have a good answer to our questions.
Sometimes. Other times, you end up with an argument of axioms.