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Comment by danielvaughn | Hacker News Reader

I'm not sure if this is a new trend, or if I've only just begun noticing it over the last decade. People seem to have completely lost the ability to infer the meaning of words if it lies beyond face value. What a trite, shallow interpretation.

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Watch older movies to see this in action. A older movie might say "The terrorists will get their hands on uranium!" and leave it at that, the audience understanding the implications. A movie from the early 2000's goes as far as "The terrorists will get uranium and make a bomb!", expecting less than the audiences from before. Now it's "The terrorists will get uranium, make a bomb, and blow up San Francisco, killing millions of people, including women and children!" and repeat that statement 4 - 5 times so that the lowest common denominator in the focus group gets it.

People are always playing the "I Never Actually Said" gotcha-game these days. Someone says A, B, and C, which strongly, and obviously imply D, but when you push back against D, the retort is "Ha! I never actually said D... You're putting words in my mouth!" This often happens when D is some abhorrent viewpoint, but A, B, and C are benign when taken strictly at face value.

Not saying there was anything abhorrent in this thread, but I agree with you that I'm seeing this pattern more and more in today's hyper-sensitive climate.

Yeah but that's not what my comment was, was it? If anything, I might have been reading inferences that weren't intended by the author.

Why do you feel the need to be so condescending? Someone disagrees with your perspective and its because they are the least intelligent person in the room?

my point is that we should oppose the system that forces everybody to be in market competition with each other. I understand the position being forwarded, but I think it's describing a system that's antithetical to human values and thus should not be just accepted as a fact like gravity.

Perhaps it is you who is being shallow and trite, not understanding the actual objection I have. I know that what the OP is saying is a description of how to optimise your economic standing - I've done it plenty myself because optimisation comes naturally to me; I'm saying that's a shite way to live and invest your time and energy.

Markets can behave in ways that are either competitive (my tomatoes are better than your tomatoes) or co-operative (my tomatoes are a perfect complement to your cheese). And sometimes they morph from one mode into the other.

Maybe this is a definitional argument, but I'd say the latter would be complementary, not cooperative. A cooperative model is one where people work together to achieve an outcome, like two kids working together on a school assignment.

Outside an individual company, competition is favoured over cooperation, except when companies work together on e.g. supply chains.

Yep, you're correct about that terminology, thanks. I'll leave my comment as-is because it'll be less confusing for anyone reading yours.

It's possible that companies (knowingly or unwittingly) co-operate under some circumstances, though - even if competition is generally the {expected/favoured} model.

This has always been the case, but you notice it more and more over time due to your own continually deepening perspective.

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