who knows? picking little pieces of fact combined with maturity changes lots of libs...and some, well

I'll take that as a "no!"

I doubt I've ever changed anyone's mind on politics on this or any other forum on the internet or IRL,  and I don't suppose I've ever expected to.  

Some exchanges are purely for entertainment purposes, and some give me insight into thinking that is sometimes quite different from my own.  At the very least,  it will allow me to take a closer look at my own beliefs,  and I would say some exchanges have lead me to rethink some positions to some degree.  A 180 on my part is extremely unlikely, but the exchange can serve a purpose.

No way anyone here will change their mindset.

Long held opinions out weigh Facts. 

A conversion would be considered treasonous and a sign of weakness.

Good -- I don't have to take that as a no. (g!)

My thoughts exactly, internet debates are something I no longer feel the desire to participate in. Pointless.

However I do reserve the option of pointing out hypocrisy when I see it. That keeps me busy enough.

"Does anybody even know somebody who knows someone whose political orientation (or even a single political belief) was changed due to political discussion on this board?"

JP, Agree with this but have an exception to that rule.

As we all know, ones belief about climate change is very much influenced by your political belief.  The field of climate science as most know it, is more about politics. Any  discussion with Al Gore is a perfect example.

The Climate Acord is entirely political. Following it exactly would do almost nothing to effect the climate but that doesn't matter because the political entities have sold junk science to us for their political agenda.

The reason to state this is that I have completely changed many minds in this realm. Climate science has been hijacked for a political agenda because almost nobody has all the weather/climate data and expertise in the field to analyze it in detail to confirm or bust what they are told. If we are told a particular event was unprecedented and happened because of climate change.......California drought, Super Storm Sandy, Record heat Waves.............we assume that the sources(which are sometimes biased scientists-and trust me, scientists have agenda's and like the rest of the human race-emotions and party affiliation) are authentic.

Welcome to the world of metmike. As an atmospheric scientist, I DO have the data and I have spend 2 decades objectively analyzing it. So when somebody makes a claim that climate change is increasing droughts..........I show them the powerful, comprehensive data that conclusively shows planet earth has been greening up the past 40 years and that there is LESS drought. 

Note my responses in this recent post about drought and CO2. 100% conclusive evidence that the planet is massively greening up......even deserts are greening up. Not despite increasing CO2 but because of it(and the best weather/climate for life in the last 1,000 years).  The original question was something different(cloud seeding)  but I expanded the discussion to bust something that we hear all the time "droughts are caused by climate change" 

https://www.marketforum.com/forum/topic/9235/

There is 100 times more to it and I would not even mention all of this without having a convert that you all knew pretty well. Alex McCallum, founder and previous moderator of MarketForum. 

Not many of you knew that Alex was very liberal and his views on climate change were pretty strong a decade ago.............many incorrect. If you've been with us for that long, you probably remember, that Alex nicknamed my very long winded posts on climate change/science........epistles.

But he liked them so much, that he created a special section in the forum Library called "climate talk" which had most of my long winded  "epistles" on climate change.  It was awesome for me because instead of writing a new epistle when somebody would try to push bad climate science, I could just sent them to the forum library.

Several months ago, in a discussion with Kate McCallum she was telling me how liberal Alex was and that she and he were very like minded. She told me that the only thing that they ever disagreed on was climate change.............because I had changed Alex's views with my posts here. 

I then spent some time sharing with her alot of the same information and she was shocked to hear much of this for the first time. She has a professor/scientist friend in Australia that is a climate activist that she was going to share my links with. Have not heard back. 

But my question was about this board, not the old board. And while discussion about "climate change" -- and I'm so old I can remember when it was called global warming -- has become politicized, I don't agree that it is, at heart, a political issue. It is fundamentally a scientific issue. 

So there. 

So the old board doesn't count?

Dang!  I guess when it's your question, you get to make the rules(-: