4 ms·
I find it somewhat amusing that this article doesn't pick up on the fact that it is furthering the root cause of this very issue in the act of basing it on the
by tw1010 9y ago
I find it somewhat amusing that this article doesn't pick up on the fact that it is furthering the root cause of this very issue in the act of basing it on the book Sapiens. A core problem with these mythological trends is that they reduce world views down to easy-to-communicate little stories. This is useful for propagating ideas from person to person, but it necessarily has to be pithy and avoid too much detail. What we aught to do is to notice this historical pattern, and to take a stand against it. We should try to not be too persuaded by the book, or methodology, of the month (Sapiens right now) but to try to go back to the hard, tough, classics. We should try to build a foundation based on actual psycological and sociological research, instead of being steered too much by the, understandably attractive, mimetic pulls of water cooler philosophy.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- danblick 9y agoI used to think in terms of stories, but then I heard Tyler Cowen tell me a story about the dangers of stories, and now I don't think in terms of stories so much. (My story of personal growth.) https://www.ted.com/talks/tyler_cowen_be_suspicious_of_stories/up-next https://www.ted.com/talks/tyler_cowen_be_suspicious_of_stori... (PS: my comment is actually just a joke from the talk, but in any case I really enjoyed and talk and would recommend it.)
- dctoedt 9y agoObligatory cite: https://xkcd.com/552/ https://xkcd.com/552/
- NickHolt 9y agoCould you expand on why you feel that Sapiens is water cooler philosophy?
- kstenerud 9y ago"they reduce world views down to easy-to-communicate little stories." Yes, exactly. That's what you want. Make it too complicated and you lose people in the details. The content of the fiction you choose to operate under isn't as important as the collaborative power it unleashes.
- jsight 9y agoI'm not sure that trying to fight human nature is going to be a winning strategy. Stories may be oversimplifying, but it is exactly that strategic oversimplification that is important to many endeavors.