Emotions are intrinsically good and bad

[Edwardo Piet]

TBH, dipping in to this thread as a noob, I have no clue what this is.

No worries. Trust me, it's not worth trying to figure out. Sometimes ignorance is bliss.

Yeah perhaps TD is better off not understanding.

But, more importantly, I think we're simply wasting energy by trying to change her mind.

That doesn't just apply to TD though.

I am really starting to feel the way Sam Harris seems to feel in this quote. Bold text added by me:

I want to begin by reminding our readers—and myself—that exchanges like this aren’t necessarily pointless. Perhaps you need no encouragement on that front, but I’m afraid I do. In recent years, I have spent so much time debating scientists, philosophers, and other scholars that I’ve begun to doubt whether any smart person retains the ability to change his mind. This is one of the great scandals of intellectual life: The virtues of rational discourse are everywhere espoused, and yet witnessing someone relinquish a cherished opinion in real time is about as common as seeing a supernova explode overhead. The perpetual stalemate one encounters in public debates is annoying because it is so clearly the product of motivated reasoning, self-deception, and other failures of rationality—and yet we’ve grown to expect it on every topic, no matter how intelligent and well-intentioned the participants. I hope you and I don’t give our readers further cause for cynicism on this front.

I think Sam Harris's observation here is highly accurate. I also think it applies to him as well, of course.