cconcepts

Something that beautifully summarises the Orwell/Huxley discussion for me is this quote by Neil Postman in Amusing Ourselves to Death:

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egotism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny “failed to take into account man’s almost infinite appetite for distractions.” In 1984, Orwell added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we fear will ruin us. Huxley feared that our desire will ruin us.

Surprisingly civil folks, thanks for the discourse.

Relevant comic: http://adam4d.com/death-of-christianity/

Friend, I think you misunderstood what I was trying to say

Yes, thankyou. An unhealthy habit for any worldview is to live in an echo chamber of people who agree with you.

They challenge my belief and make me think about it in ways I otherwise wouldn't. Miracles are, by definition, hard to believe and are a suspension of testable, repeatable scientific law. Something that, an all powerful God could do if that all powerful God really existed.

Very well written article. On a social note, it does feel as though (and I could be wrong) the seeming uptick in discussion about Christianity is because it is associated with the Trump/Republican/"How on earth did so many people vote for him?" question regarding US politics. As the article alludes:

> How Christianity went on to become not just a state religion, but the central fact of political life, and how Christian institutions of the Middle Ages both maintained and distorted the legacy of the ancient world, is another, different story.

That Christianity and its adherents are manipulated for political ends is a sad fact of life. This doesn't change whether or not Christianity is true, it simply confirms the biblical assertion that people are potentially naive

As a reflective person who reads Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and has become a follower of Jesus (Christian) I find the political association of Christianity and certain spheres of politics disheartening for the cause of logical discourse about the matter. In considering whether or not Christianity is true it is hard to ignore the actions of those who claim to be its adherents.

Yes, it seems an unusual number of people who support Trump identify as Christian - isn't that more likely to do with recent demographics than hypotheses about the lack of reliability of the biblical narrative about Jesus of Nazareth?

Where I am from (New Zealand) a lot of Christians I have spoken with are appalled by Trump and don't buy into the whole "Gawd Bless Americuh" narrative that Trump seems to use to persuade a certain demographic into voting for him.

No political agenda can encapsulate who Jesus of Nazareth was and what he came to do. If it could, that would render the notion of Christianity absurd in the first place.

EDIT: Clarity

> then starts talking about market sentiment and concludes by analyzing it's chart

You summarise my experience of the financial industry well. If you haven't already, read "Where Are The Customer's Yachts" by Fred Schwed - very entertaining and funny, in a kind of sad way: https://www.amazon.com/Where-Are-Customers-Yachts-Street/dp/...

Very well written. Although this article is quite emotive and could be considered an extreme point of view, I think it is important to read in order to understand the multitude of voices wanting to be heard in the current quagmire.

I disagree with some of the assumptions made but nonetheless think this is a voice that should be heard.

As a follower of Jesus (I have to be careful how I say Christian because of how loaded that term has become) I feel sad that the writer is marginalised as if it is something Christ would have done.

That Jesus has been attached to a particular political agenda is particularly heartbreaking.

Historically, when Christianity has gotten in bed with power it has been bad news for the essence of Christ and the humbling power of His work - I would argue this is because of the corruptibility of humans and not through something inherently wrong with Christianity.

I'm sorry for some of the things being done in the name of Christianity but this is an intelligent, thoughtful community - please find out for yourself who Christ really said he was and don't assume that what some powerbrokers say in Christ's name is true - their interests are vested.

I hope that HN continues its history of thoughtful, respectful discussion rather than the vitriol I am seeing elsewhere.

EDIT: Spelling/grammar

I dont get the indicators that its a new product. These guys look like they have been doing this since 2014: http://www.drawattention.co

About time.

Although I avoid them like the plague the subjective "feeling" of malls has always seemed to me like a succession of gimicks to get people to buy more stuff they dont need. Often, and this is really being presumptive, these gimicks seem most effective on those least able to afford them.

Less malls means less in-your-face marketing for the suceptible masses....unless of course someone built a massive online search engine that was equally effective at pumping ads in people's faces....

>"members of Congress attacking one another with sticks and hot pokers"

....in the good old days....

In the contract economy, imagine that all of us, with our small contracting companies and associated specialities, are day labourers standing at the dockside waiting to be hired.

The dock manager (Google) opens a gate to the strong looking fellows allowing them into the dock company's holding area. If they are not in this area (front page of appropriate SERPs) then they aren't considered by the task master who later comes to the holding area, scans the candidates that the dock manager has selected, and takes his pick to get the days work done - from which point it is finally up to the individual and their abilities to prove their ongoing worth.

Imagine if you needed to be an SEO, adwords and general internet marketing guru just to get the dock manager to look at you so you could get paid....

EDIT: Clarity

Any suggestions on where to search for such an email address?

So how do I combat against this? We're a small, honest company providing great products and services for the companies that need them but we're getting killed online because no one can find us.

I've forked out a lot (for us) on adwords and the return has been negligible to say the least.

Does this mean that the democratizing power of the internet has been swallowed up for small, lean companies like us who cant afford a mega adwords budget?

The spammy links thing fascinates me. I don't know much about search algos or SEO but on our small, industrial business site we couldn't understand why, after many hours and thousands of dollars spent on the procedures that Google recommends, our organic ranking in SERPs for a very niche product (of which we are one of only three providers in our region) was appalling - often page three.

It wasn't till we realised we had 10,000+ spammy links pointed at our site that we wondered whether we had been the victim of some malicious attack. We couldn't recover the penalty to the site no matter how hard we worked and have had to rebuild at a new domain as a result.

For small businesses like us, is it really possible for a competitor to just destroy our online credibility like that or am I just paranoid?

I started typing out a comment but you said what I was trying to say in half as many words, thanks

Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future - The subject is extremely interesting, challenging and thought provoking but I felt like Ashlee Vance (Author) was somewhat inspired by Walter Isaacsons Steve Jobs in terms of his portrayal of Musk as the genius who is somewhat a jerk. Either that or Vance was trying to convey that people like Musk and Jobs often are jerks....(6/10)

Extreme Ownership: Jocko Willink - entertaining listening in the car, perhaps no so much if you tried to read it. An impressive balance of storytelling and principles. (6/10)

Maximum City: Suketu Mehta - as someone who has lived in Mumbai for nearly five years, this book captured the pulse of the supercity as no other has. Able to describe the inherent beauty of modern India without resorting to the typical cliched western neuroses about the place. (8/10)

Seven Brief Lessons on Physics: Carlo Rovelli - Got recommended this book multiple times. Brief and succinct so Carlo must be commended for that. As a pop-science book it kind of paled in comparison to Bill Bryson's "Complete History" (6/10)

Rebels: Aris Roussinos - A raw, honest and powerful book that tells a story about many of the world's conflict zones from the perspective of someone who may get shot themselves. Refreshing and beautifully upsetting all at once. (7/10)

Mere Christianity: C.S. Lewis - A broad spectrum of thoughts about meaning and purpose that have obviously been considered for many years and then condensed in a very succinct way (8/10)

Business Adventures: John Brooks - A recommendation by Buffet and Gates, entertaining read with business principles built in (7/10)

Tools of Titans: Tim Ferriss - Obviously written for those of us who have allowed our attention spans to be destroyed by the constant sugary stimulation of the internet, Tim nails the balance of useful thoughts and observations from a broad array of guests while keeping it succinct and entertaining. (7/10)

When you're from NZ, no one is desperate to kill you or trade with you. Its a double-edged sword.

I'd agree with you if human worth was measured by how many zeros appear on your bank statement. Thankfully, it isn't.

It must be a vote of confidence to have such shrill and obviously poorly informed voices campaigning against you.

If they had some depth to their arguments they would at least make you think twice but such desperate tactics pretty much tell you that you're traveling in the opposite direction to the entrenched interests, attention seekers and outright weirdos.

Did not know about the crash.

> "Fuller told The New Yorker in 1966. Appealing to people to remedy their behaviour was a folly, because they’d simply never do it. Far wiser, Fuller thought, to build technology that circumvents the flaws in human behaviour – that is, ‘to modify the environment in such a way as to get man moving in preferred directions’. Instead of human-led design, he sought design-led humans"

You have to applaud Fuller for this insight which many similarly brilliant minds don't seem to grasp. Perhaps he can be included in this group;

1) Geodesic domes are a mathematically brilliant design but hopelessly impractical for many structures. Try fitting furniture in a curved house and dealing with a shape that either causes you to bump your head when you get to the edges or is so high in the center that you have an unnecessary volume to heat/cool.

2) The dymaxion car was similarly brilliant but completely missed the real reason that people buy cars: as a status symbol that looks cool, which the dymaxion did not.

The guy was a genius in my opinion but the failure of his incredible ideas to take off on a large scale shows that perhaps they appeal to my mind more for their idealism than practicality.

NOTE: Am currently reading Operating Manual For Spaceship Earth

In my line of work, the recent increases in health and safety legislation and resulting costs of compliance with having personnel on site in situations where they might get harmed in any way means that the return for automating processes is HUGE even compared to five years ago.

My prediction is that we will be forced into a situation where we have millions unemployed and needing universal basic income because they were educated to be employed in a system that suddenly lost its ability to accept any risk to people....which coincided with the technological ability to automate their jobs away.

The fact that people get hurt will eliminate their ability to be a viable means of production in many industries.

I can't remember where I saw this quote last year but it rang terrifyingly true to me:

"The people who used to tell me that Wikipedia is unreliable now get their news from viral facebook posts"

For those that need it in metric, a cake is roughly equivalent to a scone...

This is much more realistic. 3k psi will struggle to cut a cake.

If fracking causes earthquakes (perhaps thats a big if) then a satellite that shifts billions of metric tonnes of water around the planet on a daily basis must surely have an impact.

You're 500km north of epicentre and felt that. Im 150km south of epicentre and felt nothing.

> what are you going to do, go back to farming?

Oh no! How will we make money so we can buy food to eat!?....oh wait