Edjumacation

[Mongrel]

Thirty years here too.

With the added knife-twisting of having a great deal of these predictions be very personal ones related to my immediate family's lifelong self-destruction.

[Thad]

So something has been going on recently with me. I joked a few weeks ago in #finalfight that I should change my nick to Cassandra, because all my truths I uttered in the mid 2000s and 2010s have now been coming true but nobody believed me at the time and even ridiculed me for being a doomer edgelord.

[...]

Now, I don't mean to slight Arc or yyler. I love those two guys to death, and god fucking knows I'm wrong about shit all the fucking time.

But that's the thing, I think: I think we're a reasonably sharp group of people who are good at observing the world around us and extrapolating trends, what it all means, and where it's going. I think a lot of us have a pretty good track record, but none of us is right all the time either.

I've got a pretty good track record for predicting the major-party nominees for president, except for, you know, that one time I was disastrously wrong. I try to keep stuff like that in mind and stay humble.

But yeah, it can be crazy-making when you spend years sounding the alarm about something that you know is important and people are straight-up dismissive about it. Occasionally I'll read a story about how farmers can't fix their tractors because of DRM and think back to the halcyon days when Blossom or I would talk about how DRM is an attack on ownership and people would tell us to shut the fuck up.

But, y'know, stewing over long-ago arguments isn't going to help anybody. Either people will think "hey, they were right about that other thing, maybe I shouldn't be so quick to dismiss their thoughts in the future" or they won't. IME saying "I told you so," while momentarily satisfying, is a pretty piss-poor way of convincing people to listen to you the next time.

And related to that point, not for nothin', I think you and I have both gotten better about making our arguments in a way that's more palatable to people, more likely to get them to engage our ideas than recoil because we were, y'know, being jerks about it.

I think we've all done some growing up, in how to express our own opinions and in how to react to somebody else's. I can't speak to anybody else in your life, but I like to think there's hope for everybody.

But now we've got a literal fucking whistleblower

*eye twitch*

So I bring all this up because textbooks are another one of my Cassandra Truths. I've been on them for longer than cops, even. Since about 1997. In high school. Because I read insane shit in my history textbook about slavery and thought "holy fuck, if California textbooks are this bad, imagine how bad southern textbooks must be."

They were mostly the same textbooks. State history aside, Texas pretty much chose the textbooks for everybody. That's less true now than it used to be, but even in the post-Common Core world, we're still largely seeing the same textbooks nationwide, with some per-state customizations.

(Common core is bullshit too, but for entirely different reasons.)

[Friday]

the halcyon days when Blossom or I would talk about how DRM is an attack on ownership and people would tell us to shut the fuck up.

oh my god are you serious jesus christ

*eye twitch*

I'm sorry, I'm from California. I don't use it as anything but an intensifier at this point. I know it's bad all over, but California is like the focal point of all bad habits when it comes to the English language.

They were mostly the same textbooks. State history aside, Texas pretty much chose the textbooks for everybody. That's less true now than it used to be, but even in the post-Common Core world, we're still largely seeing the same textbooks nationwide, with some per-state customizations.

Surprising. Well, like I said, the Cali textbooks were insane/bad enough.

And related to that point, not for nothin', I think you and I have both gotten better about making our arguments in a way that's more palatable to people, more likely to get them to engage our ideas than recoil because we were, y'know, being jerks about it.

Or as it's also known, "being 20-29."

[Mongrel]

This reminds me of a guy I know, Jack, who's quite good with predictions for the same reasons any of us might be, but who is also a very angry person and revels in it. He's not a bad person outside of his rage, but that one thing alone makes him largely intolerable (and I'm speaking as someone who's agreed with his predictions more often than not).

Let me tell you, Jack absolutely LOVES I-told-you-so-ing people about that sort of stuff. Forever. He'll dig up and quote shit he's said four, five years ago and say with a straight face that his posts have aged like a fine wine while others have aged like a fine milk (no really, he's legit described his conversations like that).

I mean... I guess if the world's going to hell no matter what you do or say, then that's one way to get your rocks off? So I guess I get it? It's a twisted kind of solace?

But trust me when I say that I'm damn glad no one here leans into that shittiness much, if ever. Seriously, holy shit, fuck that attitude.

[Brantly B.]

I feel like this world in general is more persuaded by "Fuck whatever that guy says" than "I agree with what that guy says". Which is the same mindset as "Voted Not-Trump" but writ large and mostly setting our lifepaths.

It didn't always used to be like this. I don't get the general sense that Baby Boomers or even Gen X were like that, even though they do vote that way. It's a sad, nasty, probably unintentional byproduct of being exposed to the idea of "Fuck that guy, and by association, fuck whatever he stands for" from a formulative age, by all forms of media.

I used exclusively male pronouns in this post on purpose.

[Brantly B.]

Lest you think that's a non sequitur, that's riding the angle of "Being right and being a dick about it does more harm than anything" that wasn't made explicit in the thread but it's definitely being hinted at, and which I've been explicit about before.

[mharr]

I get it though. Believing in the world we can see from here is a glorious cocktail of terrifying, horrifying and depressing. It's a hard sell. People would rather be scared of things they think they can shoot.

[Thad]

I feel like this world in general is more persuaded by "Fuck whatever that guy says" than "I agree with what that guy says". Which is the same mindset as "Voted Not-Trump" but writ large and mostly setting our lifepaths.

It didn't always used to be like this. I don't get the general sense that Baby Boomers or even Gen X were like that

People have been implying that a statement must be wrong because of who said it for so long that our name for it is in Latin.

[Mongrel]

It's probably something obvious, and I'm just having a senior moment revealing the advanced level of decay my brain is in, but I'm drawing a blank on the word you're thinking of here Thad?

[Thad]

Ad hominem.

Argumentum ad hominem if you're not into the whole brevity thing.

[Friday]

You don't go out looking for a job dressed like that, do ya?

On a weekday?

[Mongrel]

Hm, I guess modern usage didn't make me think of it that way, given it's more typically used now to criticize the person countering rather than the person making the original point.

You're right though - that's both the literal and functional translation of the Latin phrase after all.

[Thad]

Hm, I guess modern usage didn't make me think of it that way, given it's more typically used now to criticize the person countering rather than the person making the original point.

I mean I see a lot of people who think it's just a synonym for "insult", but it's not. It's a logical fallacy whereby you criticize the speaker rather than the argument. That's true irrespective of which speaker you're criticizing.

[Mongrel]

but it's not.

Well I was specifically making a comment about usage defining meaning. But we already (nominally) did the "literally!" dance yesterday, so :P

[Thad]

I've never seen anyone use it the way you're describing.

I've frequently seen people use it as if it just means "insult". It's worth pointing this out as a misuse because an insult is not a logical fallacy. Insulting someone as a stand-in for criticizing their argument is fallacious, but it's entirely possible to make a substantive criticism of someone's argument while insulting them at the same time.

Ironically, "you insulted me, therefore you're wrong" is itself an example of the ad hominem fallacy.

[Mongrel]

I've never seen anyone use it the way you're describing.

I've frequently seen people use it as if it just means "insult".

... that's what I meant.

[Thad]

Meanings change but the rules of logic don't.

If you accept that "ad hominem" means "insult", that doesn't make insults a logical fallacy. It makes ad hominems not a logical fallacy.

Circling back to how this relates to the conversation upthread: "Don't be an asshole, because people won't listen to you" is good advice. But so is "Don't reject facts just because they're stated impolitely."

Clickhole knows what I'm talkin' about.

[Friday]

related to that image:

the hypocrisy fallacy

Murderer: Murder is wrong

Normal person: lol no

[Upthorn]

"Don't be an asshole, because people won't listen to you" is good advice. But so is "Don't reject facts just because they're stated impolitely."

"Don't be an asshole, because people won't listen to you" is better advice, because it generally requires only that the person you're advising change their in order to be useful.

"Don't reject facts just because they're stated impolitely." generally requires that all of society change in order for it to be useful. And while yes, the world would be a much better place if everyone would just accept facts regardless of the tone they're stated in, "never in the history of humanity has 'everyone just' done anything."

Edit: I mean, fuck, you can't even get people in the "rationalist" community to accept facts from people they don't like. And "facts and logic" are their entire deal.

[nosimpleway]

Of course. on the Internet, there's much distinction to be made between insulting someone as a means of refuting their argument, and refuting their argument while just insulting them for kicks. "You provide oral pleasure to nutria, therefore you're wrong" is a fallacy. "You provide oral pleasure to nutria, and you're wrong" is okay-kosher.

or however that bit went.