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This is a huge problem in our society in so many ways. Three examples I've personally noticed. 1. While working at typical working class jobs, if you happen t

This is a huge problem in our society in so many ways. Three examples I've personally noticed. 1. While working at typical working class jobs, if you happen to talk about geek/intellectual stuff e.g. with coworkers - middle class people typically do NOT like that. It really grinds their gears. Even passing references to do with current events. You can talk about sports or something else you're supposed to be interested in. This is allowed. You can explain this a dozen different ways but I am convinced it shows something nasty in their character. Don't get me wrong, these are good people but they have this weakness. 2. Not so much attractive women per se as socialites, they have a real problem when they lose their looks. I think the more social you are the worse it gets. Broadly speaking women gradually become less attractive to the opposite sex over time and they are painfully aware of this. Some women are so invested in their appearance that when it goes they undergo terrific emotional turmoil that men probably can't understand (imagine going senile in front of your competitors!) and it produces a mother lode of neurosis. On the other hand women who accept themselves warts and all are easier to get along with. 3. Some people are plain or even ugly. This makes them invisible to many people on a bunch of levels. It can't be a great feeling. The general point is that all kinds of people should keep an open mind about others. Obviously our bodies are a vehicle and it is what our minds are that really matters. There is also a huge diversity of minds, and that is fine too. I don't know if you've ever had a meet-up with people from an online forum before who you've previously talked to for years, but contrariwise to internet opinion people are never what you expect. Without the online community you'd probably have never talked to those people in a thousand years. That's why I didn't like Facebook. It was a return to the old badness.

deleted 10y ago
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sebringj 10y ago
Those are some great points, especially about how women's identities change as I've seen that from some of my relatives. But just to be slightly different, I view this as an observation of human nature in general rather than it necessarily being bad or good, although it does seem unfair. I doubt this will ever change unless we somehow genetically modify people to be more empathetic but could be jenga for something else.
- internaut 10y ago
  I share your concern about jenga! Evolution makes blithely shortsighted errors. We're about as intelligent as we are required to be in order to survive. We're stuck at local maxima at every level from the personal to the political and that is a problem. That is why using artificial aids like books for recording memories and genetic splicing is the right thing to do. Biology should not be accepted as Physics. It is alright to cheat and interfere. I will now sound like I'm contradicting myself but I'm not. Evolution has accomplished results with brute force that we do not comprehend. Some of those results appear stupid to us but there exist secret underlying patterns that are not available to our minds. Our instincts contain heaps of responses that we often regard as stupid e.g. blushing, jealousy but they are likely adaptions that helped us survive so we will require an understanding of their function. This is the great truth of conservatism and complex systems. Things are the way they are because reasons. That the proponents of this view can't explain themselves articulately is not relevant. The reasons are real. You are not your frontal cortex. That's just the Speaker in the house of parliament. That's why jenga is a problem. Jenga gives us the FDA. Jenga eventually produces a caste system. The great project is to somehow open a third door nobody has noticed. Let me know if you figure it out! Uncoincidentally I like Patri Friedman's idea of constructing seasteads. I don't want to sound like I'm allergic to work but real change is hard work! It is like everything interesting happens at edges of things.
  - sebringj 10y ago
    That makes sense. There are plenty of evolutionary cruft we have though such as an appendix we don't need or the odd way the recurrent laryngeal nerve ended up. It does hint at room for improvement, however impossibly difficult that may be to predict what improvements are good.

deleted 10y ago

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sebringj 10y ago

Those are some great points, especially about how women's identities change as I've seen that from some of my relatives. But just to be slightly different, I view this as an observation of human nature in general rather than it necessarily being bad or good, although it does seem unfair. I doubt this will ever change unless we somehow genetically modify people to be more empathetic but could be jenga for something else.

internaut 10y ago
I share your concern about jenga! Evolution makes blithely shortsighted errors. We're about as intelligent as we are required to be in order to survive. We're stuck at local maxima at every level from the personal to the political and that is a problem. That is why using artificial aids like books for recording memories and genetic splicing is the right thing to do. Biology should not be accepted as Physics. It is alright to cheat and interfere. I will now sound like I'm contradicting myself but I'm not. Evolution has accomplished results with brute force that we do not comprehend. Some of those results appear stupid to us but there exist secret underlying patterns that are not available to our minds. Our instincts contain heaps of responses that we often regard as stupid e.g. blushing, jealousy but they are likely adaptions that helped us survive so we will require an understanding of their function. This is the great truth of conservatism and complex systems. Things are the way they are because reasons. That the proponents of this view can't explain themselves articulately is not relevant. The reasons are real. You are not your frontal cortex. That's just the Speaker in the house of parliament. That's why jenga is a problem. Jenga gives us the FDA. Jenga eventually produces a caste system. The great project is to somehow open a third door nobody has noticed. Let me know if you figure it out! Uncoincidentally I like Patri Friedman's idea of constructing seasteads. I don't want to sound like I'm allergic to work but real change is hard work! It is like everything interesting happens at edges of things.
- sebringj 10y ago
  That makes sense. There are plenty of evolutionary cruft we have though such as an appendix we don't need or the odd way the recurrent laryngeal nerve ended up. It does hint at room for improvement, however impossibly difficult that may be to predict what improvements are good.