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sempervirens
climber
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Dec 18, 2017 - 04:19pm PT
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Not talk and argue in circles all day long like most of you .......
Ha, ha, funny.
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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Dec 18, 2017 - 04:50pm PT
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sempervirens,
Don’ t take my chiding too seriously. It was not meant to be personal, as I have made this complaint so many times that it must be tiresome to most folks who frequent these threads.
People want to argue about ideas, but in doing so, they often revert to some online dictionary and cut-and-copy a word and its definition—as if to imply that settles anything or provides understanding of an issue. In my view, it does neither, and it reflects poorly on the person who does so.
I’d say that anyone who really understands an issue competently can talk about it clearly using their own words. Virtuosos do so with added personal style. Masters do so in ways that look as though a genius 6-year old said it.
All this cutting and pasting that goes on around here are indications of stupidity and ignorance.
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WBraun
climber
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Dec 18, 2017 - 05:05pm PT
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LOL .... even Mike is using st00pid now.
And copying and pasting insanity was started by that useless knows nothing at all dog guy.
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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Dec 18, 2017 - 07:06pm PT
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(You kill me sometimes, Werner.)
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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Dec 18, 2017 - 07:47pm PT
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Not talk and argue in circles all day long like most of you .......
Tasks best left to our philosophy contingent.
Is it just me but does this thread now seem like a literature class from hell?
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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Dec 19, 2017 - 06:52am PT
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^^^^^^
It only takes a few seconds to scroll through that stuff.
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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Dec 19, 2017 - 12:05pm PT
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I've developed mouse finger.
I am probably the only person here not to read every word of these WOT literature posts. I apologize for my failures. I just can't do it. I've tried, but after a few paragraphs my eyes glaze over. I am hopelessly illiterate.
I appreciate how mathematics can be so succinct.
Until it's not, right Yanqui?
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Dec 19, 2017 - 12:56pm PT
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moose is with eeyonkee, I am with Sean Carroll...
Sean Carroll tweets...
"It makes me deeply sad that a tenured university professor could write something like this about higher education. There is more to learning than the labor market." -Sean Carroll
In response to...
"First and foremost: From kindergarten on, students spend thousands of hours studying subjects irrelevant to the modern labor market. Why do English classes focus on literature and poetry instead of business and technical writing? Why do advanced-math classes bother with proofs almost no student can follow? When will the typical student use history? Trigonometry? Art? Music? Physics? Latin? The class clown who snarks “What does this have to do with real life?” is onto something." -Bryan Caplan
What's College Good For?
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/01/whats-college-good-for/546590/
May the Gods of the Enlightenment help us.
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WBraun
climber
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Dec 19, 2017 - 01:48pm PT
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Modern education is the slaughterhouse of the soul ........
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Dec 19, 2017 - 02:13pm PT
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I appreciate how mathematics can be so succinct.
Reading Peter Woit's recent blog posts (and comments) on the math world's attempts to vet Mochizui’s proof of the abc conjecture, the lay-person comes away with the impression math is anything but succinct.
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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Dec 19, 2017 - 03:49pm PT
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From healyje's link:
"I have deleted my earlier tweet which I wrote being unaware that S.Mochizuki is Editor-in-Chief of the journal to which he submitted his papers. This is unfortunate. It creates the appearance of a conflict of interest & hence undermines one's confidence in the refereeing process."
Would be simply amusing were the mathematics run of the mill stuff. These number theory conjectures can be animals. Stayed away from them, myself.
;>\
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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Dec 20, 2017 - 05:42pm PT
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Why do English classes focus on literature and poetry instead of business and technical writing? Why do advanced-math classes bother with proofs almost no student can follow? When will the typical student use history? Trigonometry? Art? Music? Physics? Latin? The class clown who snarks “What does this have to do with real life?” is onto something."
-Bryan Caplan
By this description the modern man needs no appreciation for narrative or stories, has no poetry in his life, needs no taste for beauty and artistry, will never be moved by music or amazed by the complexity and mysteries of physics.
The strange thing is the idea that abolishing these leads to a "real life," as declared by a "clown," no less.
They used to feed salt peter to young priests, believing it killed their libido...
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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Dec 21, 2017 - 08:07pm PT
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That's OK.
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unlocked gait
Gym climber
the range
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Dec 22, 2017 - 07:41am PT
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as atoms are the building blocks of matter;
lies are the building blocks of religion.
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Dec 22, 2017 - 12:48pm PT
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as atoms are the building blocks of matter;
lies are the building blocks of religion.
There are those that will never understand the difference between a lie and a metaphor and are as curiously calcified in their position as the most ardent religious fanatic.
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Lennox
climber
in the land of the blind
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Dec 22, 2017 - 01:03pm PT
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I know it’s only “commercial” sci-fi, not real literahchah, but it seems apropos.
Fifty thousand years ago there were these three guys spread out across the plain and they each heard something rustling in the grass. The first one thought it was a tiger, and he ran like hell, and it was a tiger but the guy got away. The second one thought the rustling was a tiger and he ran like hell, but it was only the wind and his friends all laughed at him for being such a chickensh#t. But the third guy thought it was only the wind, so he shrugged it off and the tiger had him for dinner. And the same thing happened a million times across ten thousand generations - and after a while everyone was seeing tigers in the grass even when there weren’t any tigers, because even chickenshits have more kids than corpses do. And from those humble beginnings we learn to see faces in the clouds and portents in the stars, to see agency in randomness, because natural selection favours the paranoid. Even here in the 21st century we can make people more honest just by scribbling a pair of eyes on the wall with a Sharpie. Even now we are wired to believe that unseen things are watching us.
Peter Watts,
Echopraxia (Firefall, #2)
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sempervirens
climber
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Dec 22, 2017 - 01:06pm PT
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There are those that will never understand the difference between a lie and a metaphor and are as curiously calcified in their position as the most ardent religious fanatic.
Agreed. Take any crazy opinion, ridiculous nonsense point of view, illogical ignorance and you can find someone who would claim it, wouldn't you?
But what if someone tells you what to believe is a lie and what is metaphor? And if you dare to disagree they attack you, ostracize you, throw you out of your family, force you to have sex with them (as in fundamentalist Mormons), make war on your country, or behead you. True, any group of humans can try to do that, but religion has the advantage of their follower's faith.
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Dec 22, 2017 - 01:31pm PT
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Again, humanity, like nature itself, tends to cruelty. There is no need for religion in the practice of that cruelty and in many respects that cruelty is simply humanity's natural state. If anything religious practice acts as a mediation to the terrible things humans are capable of.
Except in the broadest sense bordering on meaninglessness natural selection doesn't explain the incredible refinement of the aesthetic experience or the ability to see in terms of metaphor as in that cloud looks like a bunny. To think that aesthetic refinement is but the vestige of some primeval condition is to dismiss its importance and humanity's importance as well.
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sempervirens
climber
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Dec 22, 2017 - 01:56pm PT
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Yeah, there is no need for religion in order to commit atrocities. It's just that religion makes it so much easier for those who wish to do so. Have you addressed that? Have you addressed all the tragedies that the religious have caused?
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Lennox
climber
in the land of the blind
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Dec 22, 2017 - 02:17pm PT
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the ability to see in terms of metaphor as in that cloud looks like a bunny
Seeing the bunny is related to our evolutionarily hard-wired pattern recognition ability.
That we find certain linguistic constructions aesthetically pleasing might be related to that.
I think metaphors are a valuable way of looking at something and gaining another perspective, but it would be taking it too far to say that because you have a good understanding of an analogy that you have a good understanding of the reality.
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