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minority-one

-23 karma · joined October 9, 2015

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minority-one··on I Would Rather Be Herod’s Pig: The History of a Taboo
Can you touch on the Hammurapi (however you spell it) and its lack of animal food prohibition (or as far as I can remember, pork at least was not prohibited)?

> It deepened my faith but I must say most are terrified at learning too much will change their faith, which they shouldn't in m opinion.

Can you talk more about "most are terrified at learning too much"? Do people think through studying rigorously they will inevitably shed beliefs?

minority-one··on Should cars be fully driverless? No, says an MIT engineer and historian
And it's weird how people bring up the idea of an elevator to the moon more often than they bring up putting cars to run on rails. They could be 100% self-driving that way, and accidents would probably be nil.
minority-one··on Counterintuitive economics of a chess tournament
> How does it hurt men, hurt competition, for women to have their own prize?

This has already been answered and I'd like to hear your rebuttal.

It hurts men and competition by devaluing the prizes. To quote jstanley again:

"She's no better than me, but she is a WGM and I am nothing".

Do you see how this hurts competition directly? Like it or not people compete for the recognition which is embodied by the prize. If the prize can now be given out without full attainment of the skill being tested for, then it loses its meaning and its signaling value.

> For whatever reasons, women aren't competitive with men (in chess, at this point in time)

I'd also be curious to hear from you why you think the reasons for this are "whatever reasons" - I'm presuming by that you mean, that the reasons are inconsequential or they don't matter or they are not important. Why do you believe that to be the case, without first knowing what the reasons actually are?

EDIT: all players have their own ELO score but they are still competing for the prize, which is the embodiment of the attainment of certain skills. If women can win this prize without attaining the same skills then this is devaluing the prize. Please address this directly, if you will. Again, to make this clear, players compete for the prize, not for the ELO score. If players did not compete for the prize, there would not be a prize.

minority-one··on Apple facing huge chip patent bill after losing case
Sometimes it does. Fight fire with fire, an eye for an eye, history is replete with references to common sense refuting what you are saying.
minority-one··on Counterintuitive economics of a chess tournament
How is it derailing the conversation? Are we keeping you from having your arguments in other branches of the comment section?

Why should there be a section for people who want to talk about the aspects you want to talk about, but not a section for stuff I and others want to talk about?

I understand you might not like to click on a chess article to find something else being discussed. Well, that happens to all of us in different ways. The way I deal with it is, I simply skip the comment branches that I don't care for.

minority-one··on Global coalition tells Facebook to kill its Real Names policy
> I do think that legislation should be avoided if it's not necessary.

In other words: if legislation.necessary? then enact else avoid.

> On the other hand, if an issue is important and legislation can get the job done, we shouldn't shy away from it.

In other words: if issue.important? and legislation.effective? then enact else avoid.

These two are contradictory. Which is it for you?

minority-one··on Police stop guarding embassy refuge of Julian Assange
I really meant reify, as in "turn an abstract thing into a marketable thing". Monetize would mean something else.

> Is this really a workable view of criminality and justice?

It worked for 400 years in Medieval Iceland. If you are interested in debating this I'd like to hear from you why you think that what you say would happen if this was in place, in fact did not happen when this was in place.

minority-one··on Why Is Stoicism Having a Cultural Moment?
Again I must take offense at your misconstruing what I said.

If I actually had said that Jews are trying to destroy the world, you'd be able to quote that. In fact I do not think Jews are trying to destroy the world, and this can be easily verified by the fact that most of them are content to live their lives as normal human beings.

Secondly, if I thought Jews were trying to destroy the world, then I would be incredibly paranoid of talking about this subject, seeing that those who do foolishly believe in such an outrageous idea receive quite a bit of unpleasantries.

Instead, I am trying to civilly talk to you about a book I've read and the knowledge it imparted to me, and I'm even offering you to pay for the book and shipping so that you too can glance at this knowledge which you already basically understand half of, and your reply to my offer is to slander me and say you wouldn't talk to me in person. I would never expect this level of intolerance coming from a trans person who I'd assume has experienced first-hand the pangs of ostracism.

Please, listen to me. You are severely downplaying the influence of the schools of thought we have been talking about. I extend my offer once again to pay for the book and shipping if you promise me you will read it.

minority-one··on Neuroscientists use maps of people’s brains to predict reasoning ability
On the other hand, there's a consensus in the scientific community that IQ is the best predictor of outcome in life, despite the factors you've mentioned.

In other words, all being taken into consideration, it turns out IQ has an incredible predicting power regarding the lives of individuals. It's actually better at predicting life outcome than any other factor.

> And, of course, nurture over nature [...] matters way more than genetics.

That is the opposite of what current research into IQ has shown so far. If you go on YouTube, you can find interviews with Charles Murray, and that will help you understand this better.

> A good musician can become a good sharpshooter, a good programmer can excel at architectural engineering.

Yes, but it's not likely to happen (or you'd have oodles of examples). Predicting is all about what's more likely, and in this capacity, IQ has proven over and over again to be the single best predictor.

minority-one··on Why Is Stoicism Having a Cultural Moment?
Thank you, dang, I appreciate the concrete guidelines. I was actually thinking of emailing you over this.

I promise you I will try to behave as you have proposed here. I think those are fair guidelines. In fact I very much appreciate your laying them down clearly like that. If the "no negativity" policy were as well fleshed-out as you just did here I think it would be more helpful.

I will abide by your rules because I want to keep posting here. But if I abide by the rules and you still detach my threads as off-topic, then it will have been an unfair deal in my opinion.

I'd be curious to know, respectfully, if you chided the user to whom I was replying, since what they said can easily be construed as instigation:

> No, it's not. The Eugenic movement started the quest for the "better" brain nearly a century and a half ago, and we all know how that turned out...

"we all know how that turned out" DOT DOT DOT is instigation and we all know he's rubbing the Holocaust on everyone's faces without spelling it out. To me that is a foul silencing tactic and it needs to be called out on. That is what I attempted to do when I made my "carry on" remark, after having substantially and politely fleshed out the topic in that same reply.

So as you can see, from my end your enforcement sometimes looks biased.

EDIT: In fact I'd like clarification on this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10381398

Their post amounts to nothing more than "Intelligence research is actually 150 years old and it ended with the Holocaust".

Now what do you call that? Isn't that snarky flamebait? It looks like it to me. Shouldn't that claim be toned down a little? Shouldn't it be substantiated a little more?

I want to respect you but for that you will have to uphold your vetting standards equally amongst all players.

minority-one··on Thresholds of Violence: How School Shootings Spread
What did you expect from making schools Gun-Free Zones?

Did you expect criminals to obey the sign?

How many school shootings do you think we would have per year if schools were full of security guards?

How many bank shootings have we had this year? Do banks employ lots of security guards?

How ridiculous is it that we protect cash so well but we don't think kids should be protected?

minority-one··on Why Is Stoicism Having a Cultural Moment?
I take issue with your accusing me of trolling on the other comment. I am being playful but I am not trolling. What I am talking about is a concerted effort that began with Psychoanalysis in the beginning of the 20th century and moved on to the Frankfurt School and then the New York Intellectuals and now takes the form of Cultural Marxism. I recommend that you look up these keywords to learn more about the behaviors you have rightfully noticed. If you're interested in information with scholarly citations about this subject I recommend The Culture of Critique, it's a book that will open your eyes. I'd be willing to send you the book for free if you don't want to pay for it. That's because when I find people that seem to be on to the truth (like you), I give them a chance to peer deeper into the darkness.

Like I said, I took all the hints from things you said. It's clear you see it too. I understand people are very leery of pointing fingers especially when the conversation involves certain untouchable groups. However, as a trans person I'm sure you have courage in spades to study this subject without prejudice and preconceived notions you might have acquired during education in school.

If you still think I'm a troll, I'd really appreciate it if you could explain to me how better I could approach this subject with you without coming across as a troll. I can do it easily in person, but online it seems to always come across as trollish, I suppose because mentioning Jews is something usually seen done by shady characters with hidden agendas. However, I believe one can talk about Yakuza without indicting all Japanese, or talk about the Mafia without indicting all Italians.

minority-one··on Neuroscientists use maps of people’s brains to predict reasoning ability
The movement for the better brain started much before half a century ago.

If you study Jewish history you will find out they have been doing this all along. For instance, as a very literate culture, they would encourage the less capable of learning to leave the faith, much like a Rumspringa without end. This had the effect of culling the less intelligent, which was an effect they understood and seeked purposefully. On the other side of the coin, as opposed to Christianity which discourages its representatives (priests) from reproducing, Rabbis were encouraged to have prolific offspring on account of their being the most educated people, and the community engineering so that there will be more intelligent Jews (sons of cultured Rabbis) than unintelligent ones (those who are encouraged to give up on faith studies).

But yes, evil Germans and their eugenics, carry on.

minority-one··on Why Is Stoicism Having a Cultural Moment?
Let's put together a bunch of what you said, because you are indeed so close to guessing, and I don't doubt you can, as a fellow anarchist.

Behavior patterns of Group X (that is then passed on to other groups):

- being a special and isolated group from the rest of human kind

- having suffered uniquely

- having unique significance

- pulling the special-group card all the time (say, to stifle criticism)

- believing other groups are assaulting them on all fronts (say, like a paranoia towards an outgroup)

- attempting grand standing on their being the most oppressed by society (say, by discussing on a TV show whether their suffering was the most awful of all)

- never admitting they are wrong on something (say, in History, where if you disagree with their version, it can only be because you might hate them)

I gave you many hints but as you can tell, the hints come from your posts. You are so spot on. But now you must guess, who is Group X who is influencing other groups to adopt this same behavior?

minority-one··on Why Is Stoicism Having a Cultural Moment?
Who started it?

Who is the group X that started the routine of saying "we are group X and we are special and isolated from the rest of human kind because of our unique suffering and/or significance"?

I'll give you a chance to answer.

minority-one··on Police stop guarding embassy refuge of Julian Assange
If you're being serious then I'll give you a serious answer.

Exempli gratia, let's pretend I was raped. I should be able to reify my victimhood and sell it to a lawyer, thereby transferring to that lawyer the right to extract compensation from the perpetrator.

Now there's a market for it and the price is whatever a lawyer is willing to pay. You will quickly see a market form around it. This was done in Medieval Iceland for longer than the United States has been a country, so mind your glass ceiling when criticizing this idea.

minority-one··on Global coalition tells Facebook to kill its Real Names policy
I'm pretty sure pmlnr meant "the only way to peacefully/morally force companies is by spending your money somewhere else".

We all know violence and threat (what you suggest) works. Some of us are trying to decrease the amount of what you suggest in the world.

New legislation is a direct threat to companies, backed by the power of the government to fine and arrest those who disobey. Why go to such lengths when it's much easier just to stop going to Facebook? Only a perverse sadist would prefer legislation over ostracism.

minority-one··on How I Teach Gerrymandering
> Once you believe those few things, it's easy to understand why politicians aren't evil, they're just vested in their group

So you judge politicians based not on their actions but on their supposed intentions?

> Maybe we could call it a constitutional republic?

Nice save. A constitutional republic is the true "a better government, one tweak at a time" since federalism is the laboratory of government.

No one even remembered that was the point of federalism here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10290172

minority-one··on Autodesk Graphic
That's because vectors are unitless. I've had to constantly explain this to graphic designers I've worked with...
minority-one··on YouPronounceIt: Search for a word, get videos of YouTube speakers pronouncing it
That's because what tantalor left out is that anglophones started misspelling that word in the 17th century, when it was actually spelled "key" from old French "kay".

So it's not so much a word that you go "ah I'm so clever I can pronounce it right", but more one that you go "some people along the way started misspelling this too often and the people who knew better didn't do a good job in correcting them".

And why should I know how to pronounce a word that current anglophones don't know how to spell? It's a tongue-in-cheek question, people.

minority-one··on Mapping Neighborhood-Level Obesity in the United States
So the only thing you can think of to explain this is cultural factor?

You don't think genetics could be a factor here at all?

minority-one··on Stephen Hawking Says We Should Really Be Scared of Capitalism, Not Robots
You're the only voice of reason on this thread.

What we should be really scared of is a population whose majority clamors for democracy yet prefers to trust government over holding representatives accountable.

The problem is the people have been rendered powerless through mis-education to the point they've forgotten their non-interventionist history. Keeping guns is necessary but not sufficient for the government to fear its people.

People have also been convinced the only way to get educated is to go into debt, since independent thought is ridiculed on mainstream entertainment venues. That gives governments an opportunity to control what people learn.

It goes on and on but it all starts with what you rightfully noted, that this is no Capitalism, but Corporatism. I wouldn't expect a university professor (even an economist) to understand this finer point as I know first-hand those people either have approved opinions or they don't have a job in academia.

For those who only dabble in economics (and here I include up to Ph.Ds in Economics) here's a hint: if your economy only has one money, and its price is centrally controlled, as interest rates are by the Fed in the U.S., what you have is not Capitalism, because no saving of capital is taking place.

minority-one··on Stephen Hawking Says We Should Really Be Scared of Capitalism, Not Robots
Where do people get this idea that HN is full of libertarians? If you hang around you will see most people's reactions are far to the left and libertarian answers get consistently downvoted.