Good discussion here, thank you. Thank you for taking the time to type it out. I agree that the feeling you have to convince people of things is something that it's healthy to free yourself from. Yet here we are, in the context of a communication platform that doesn't aggressively try to segment people into opposing groups, and then hammer their amygdala with feel-bad messages, and because we see a variety of viewpoints from people we regard as peers, even when we don't agree with them--even when their posts make us feel uncomfortable and strike an argumentative nerve--we slowly morph over time into someone who has absorbed some part of their message that we couldn't reason away. The insufferable other-ness is taken with a grain of respect, the reflexive pigeon-holing of a "bad" opinion is tempered by the feeling that you can't dismiss things outright, not until you've mulled over why someone you otherwise have viewed to be intelligent and level-headed would say that "wrong" thing, or be that "bad" kind of person. It's still possible to do this, but in the age of dystopia, we're fighting upstream, because the divisiveness is very intentional and it's more sophisticated than it's ever been. I've unplugged from the bad place, but not before it did some real damage. I don't know what the solution to this is, considering that "have all the information in the world at your fingertips" is a very temtping proposition.

I do still deeply believe that the reason everything is turned up to 11 has some legitimate basis--namely that the stakes are literally higher than they've ever been. The problem is-- everyone feels that way. We just don't identify the same root causes--or tilt at the same windmills. It seems obvious--to me-- that if you pick any point in history, the group causing the issues are whoever has developed the ability to generate an effective money>power>money feedback loop, with no consequences if people are harmed. There is a clear means, motive, and opportunity. It will never make sense to me that the enemy is some nerd bureaucrat. The breakdown of that theory, to me, is motive. It's a "collect underpants  >  ???  >  money" situation, I can't suspend my disbelief hard enough to cover that gap.

Last edited by Flint (2/21/2022 2:01 pm)

Undertoad wrote:

  you should also restrict yourself to your area of knowledge, which is where to find a guy to suck your dick for ten bucks

UT demonstrates how extremist he has become since he only listens to and automatically only believes Fox New, et al.   UT over 20 years ago did not use insults to prove something.  Only Trump style extremists prove their manliness by posting cheapshots.   Rather than prove a grasp by citing facts and numbers.

One preprinted paper says vaccines don't work.  So that is the only honest fact?
 
What has done so much harm to honesty, science, and a response to Covid?  The extremist "Me, Me,Me" attitude that is empowered by cheapshots and hate.  Joe Rogan does what Limbaugh, Hannity, and Trump also do.  Hype disparaging soundbites to obfuscate facts.  Appeal only to an extremist's emotions.   UT's need to post so many cheapshots and outright insults demonstrate  increasing extremism. He is no longer anywhere near moderate - logical and cerebral.

Citing vaccines and masks do not work comes from extremist liars - such as Trump.  Trump said it.  It must be true.  The word credibility also applies there.

UT said he is smarter than the generals.  Getting harder is to see a difference between these extremists.
 

Undertoad wrote:

Fauci himself is the second highest paid federal employee

Bezos makes Fauci's salary every three minutes.
 

Other than the tw distractions, I'm enjoying this turn in the conversation, and wish I saw it a couple days ago.

Agree wholeheartedly that joining political tribes is the new religion.  Humans are hardwired for religion and in its absence are seeking it out in other places.
 

No human being can evolve beyond being dominated by an emotional brain. There isn't just a kernel of emotion at the root of us, overlaid with a directing influence of conscious reasoning-- the emotional brain is our operating system. Believing that we can force our logical thoughts into a dominant position is a very dangerous hubris. We are an organic being, we must strive to develop awareness of our whole self, or else the undesirable traits we deny and attempt to suppress can be allowed to rule over our actions, unchecked.

Last edited by Flint (2/23/2022 12:48 pm)

It's easy to fall into the "brain as a computer" belief system-- especially for people like myself who are on the neurodivergent spectrum and have struggled many times in life with the inability to process emotional nuances as adeptly as a neurotypical person, and simultaneously are being praised and rewarded for feats of raw cognitive prowess. I view myself as a person who "thinks in flowcharts" and has to place new information into a "grid" to process it. It sure seems like I'm a computer, and it's an empowering self-identity to embrace my strengths via that metaphor. But it's a really flawed and unsustainable model that eventually breaks down like that Vulcan ambassador on Star Trek tNG who got emotional dementia and had to mind meld with Picard just to keep his sh!t together.

It's a good goal, but it's a life-long goal that one never achieves to a 100% level.

Wherever there is a disparity between believing in 100% mastery of a skill, and the actual/possible level obtained, there is an unobserved gap that errors can pass through undetected.
 

tw wrote:

Flint wrote:

Wherever there is a disparity between believing in 100% mastery of a skill, and the actual/possible level obtained, there is an unobserved gap that errors can pass through undetected.
 

There is always a first for everything, grasshopper.
 

This is a genuinely funny response.
 

Assuming both sides are a$$holes, with one side you get "cancelled" on social media, with the other side you end up "killed, kidnapped, injured" (or face the constant threat of being killed, kidnapped, or injured)* . . . yep this is exactly the same

. . .

*if this isn't terrorism, why isn't this terrorism
 

I apologize for spreading disinformation.

Regardless, when we post bullshit we should own it.

Yeah, when we had our first positive test in the house we didn't even bother trying to quarantine from each other. We just assumed we were all thoroughly exposed already. Hope J feels better soon.

That's interesting.  I wonder about the reliability of any of this data.  Clearly, early on in the first months, the Covid rates were somewhat unreliable because test kits in hospitals were in short supply.  Then the data got good once we had kits. Now I wonder about Covid rate reliability because people are testing at home and not always sharing their results.  I also wonder about mask usage rates.  How are they getting that number?  Self reported? If I were asked, I would say that I'm good about wearing a mask because I wear them on Metro and in the grocery store.  But I don't always wear them out in public.  I've been going to restaurants more and you don't wear them then,  I imagine Japan is the same. I imagine they mostly wear masks, but consider themselves mask wearers.   It only takes a moment being mask free, and you can get infected and that would explain the rise in 2022.  Plus I'm hearing the new variant spreads outside readily. And that's when even mask wearers take them off.