looking to learn something, or looking for reasons not to learn something.

Well, all I can say other than appealing to intuitions that might not be shared is this: I was looking to learn something when I read this stuff; I was disappointed that it seemed to consist mostly of bad thinking; after your confession I spent a little while reading your comments before realising that I couldn't and shouldn't trust them to be written with any intention of helping (or even not to be attempts at outright mental sabotage, given what you say this is all meant to be analogous to), at which point I gave up.

(If you're wondering, I'm continuing here mostly because it might be useful to other readers. I'm not very hopeful that it will, though, and will probably stop soon.)