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Interesting that in one section, he casts doubt on the notion that mathematical models can accurately describe reality, and in another, he uses a heart rate mon

Interesting that in one section, he casts doubt on the notion that mathematical models can accurately describe reality, and in another, he uses a heart rate monitor to conclude that he doesn’t have emotions.

stevenwoo 9y ago
Two things - a.) the scientific hypothesis that heart rate is elevated via uncontrolled nervous system response in the human body is well accepted versus most economic hypothesis appearing to be post hoc explanations rather than theories that can actually predict the future as he clearly writes the second thing out when critiquing some things his professors said b.) the over stated diagnosis - maybe he's slightly psychopathic or so unfamiliar with Western centric interpersonal culture it doesn't affect him. :)
dwaltrip 9y ago
I don't think our economic models are comparable in accuracy or reliability to a heart rate monitor.
- quicklime 9y ago
  I'm not sure that's the right comparison. A heart rate monitor is not a mathematical model of human emotion, it's just a measurement tool. And it's one that is no more accurate or reliable than the tools we use to measure the price of a trade. Real world markets are much more complicated than economic models, just as human emotion is more complicated than the author's model of no change heart rate = no change in emotion.
- aaavl2821 9y ago
  Nor are heart rate monitors an accurate or reliable predictor of emotion
analog31 9y ago
I thought it was brilliant. He "innocently" exposed the whole class as a hoax.
- fahayekwasright 9y ago
  Are you really so sure? It’s not an easy thing to maintain awareness of the workings of one’s emotions, especially for someone raised in a repressive, collectivist culture that doesn’t value the internal life of the individual, and especially if that individual is on the spectrum, in which case the emotions are “buried” even deeper.
  - sinkpoint 9y ago
    If an emotion is neither experienced nor physiologically detected, does it really exist?
    - fahayekwasright 9y ago
      Emotions come from the unconscious. Of course they can be difficult to detect. Nonetheless they can shape our thinking and behavior dramatically. Read Carl Jung, “The Undiscovered Self.”
  - ordu 9y ago
    If his emotions are buried so deep, that there no way to see real world consequences of them, than maybe it is better to say, that there are no emotions? I think, that mottos in Western culture are just pathetic ones. Western culture knows nothing about how to raise steady emotions in people. I was born in USSR, and I saw how it should be done. But there is one consequence: with experience comes tolerance to external attempts to raise my emotions by some lovely motto. Now it is really hard to. "All people deserve to live healthy lives" -- what is it? I was grown on ideas of Worldwide Communist Revolution and bringing freedom from damned capitalists to all people? I read books, I watched films, discussed this in a classes, I learnt world history in terms of societies struggling to make one more step toward communism. And after that I hear motto for preschool kids. The topic for boring school essay about role of Communism in bringing healthy life to everyone. I had eaten tons of this shit before I came to a school. I have eaten even more in school. Why I should have any emotions now? Really, I can hardly believe that any adult can be touched by such a motto. I'm unable to understand it, even when I try to imagine how it could be, if I was not born under ideologic pressure. The Black Swan can be a good motto, because it is a symbol of some non-trivial idea, because it reminds me something that I can forget to think through one more time. It reminds me about ideas which I want to think through again and again. But "healty lives for everyone" is something like communism, it will not be like that in the overseeable future. It is just one more ideologic lie, which is must be spoken due to some social protocol. Pointless tradition.
erikb 9y ago
Well, one cannot not use models. Even if one explicitely avoids using models that avoidance in itself is a model.

stevenwoo 9y ago

Two things - a.) the scientific hypothesis that heart rate is elevated via uncontrolled nervous system response in the human body is well accepted versus most economic hypothesis appearing to be post hoc explanations rather than theories that can actually predict the future as he clearly writes the second thing out when critiquing some things his professors said b.) the over stated diagnosis - maybe he's slightly psychopathic or so unfamiliar with Western centric interpersonal culture it doesn't affect him. :)

dwaltrip 9y ago

I don't think our economic models are comparable in accuracy or reliability to a heart rate monitor.

quicklime 9y ago
I'm not sure that's the right comparison. A heart rate monitor is not a mathematical model of human emotion, it's just a measurement tool. And it's one that is no more accurate or reliable than the tools we use to measure the price of a trade. Real world markets are much more complicated than economic models, just as human emotion is more complicated than the author's model of no change heart rate = no change in emotion.
aaavl2821 9y ago
Nor are heart rate monitors an accurate or reliable predictor of emotion

analog31 9y ago

I thought it was brilliant. He "innocently" exposed the whole class as a hoax.

fahayekwasright 9y ago
Are you really so sure? It’s not an easy thing to maintain awareness of the workings of one’s emotions, especially for someone raised in a repressive, collectivist culture that doesn’t value the internal life of the individual, and especially if that individual is on the spectrum, in which case the emotions are “buried” even deeper.
- sinkpoint 9y ago
  If an emotion is neither experienced nor physiologically detected, does it really exist?
  - fahayekwasright 9y ago
    Emotions come from the unconscious. Of course they can be difficult to detect. Nonetheless they can shape our thinking and behavior dramatically. Read Carl Jung, “The Undiscovered Self.”
- ordu 9y ago
  If his emotions are buried so deep, that there no way to see real world consequences of them, than maybe it is better to say, that there are no emotions? I think, that mottos in Western culture are just pathetic ones. Western culture knows nothing about how to raise steady emotions in people. I was born in USSR, and I saw how it should be done. But there is one consequence: with experience comes tolerance to external attempts to raise my emotions by some lovely motto. Now it is really hard to. "All people deserve to live healthy lives" -- what is it? I was grown on ideas of Worldwide Communist Revolution and bringing freedom from damned capitalists to all people? I read books, I watched films, discussed this in a classes, I learnt world history in terms of societies struggling to make one more step toward communism. And after that I hear motto for preschool kids. The topic for boring school essay about role of Communism in bringing healthy life to everyone. I had eaten tons of this shit before I came to a school. I have eaten even more in school. Why I should have any emotions now? Really, I can hardly believe that any adult can be touched by such a motto. I'm unable to understand it, even when I try to imagine how it could be, if I was not born under ideologic pressure. The Black Swan can be a good motto, because it is a symbol of some non-trivial idea, because it reminds me something that I can forget to think through one more time. It reminds me about ideas which I want to think through again and again. But "healty lives for everyone" is something like communism, it will not be like that in the overseeable future. It is just one more ideologic lie, which is must be spoken due to some social protocol. Pointless tradition.

erikb 9y ago

Well, one cannot not use models. Even if one explicitely avoids using models that avoidance in itself is a model.