4 ms·

Why are you blaming external factors instead of yourself or your personality?

by maxklein 18y ago

Alex3917 18y ago
Because I'm not a brain in a vat.
- maxklein 18y ago
  Yes, but how will assigning blame help you solve the problem? You have a problem, you know the solution, and you keep maintaining the problem because you perceive this problem as not being your fault, but somehow the fault of external factors. Most problems exist in isolation of their causes. Let's say you have a flat tire on the highway. Sure, it would be interesting to know how it happened, but that has nothing to do with the problem. The problem is that you are on a highway with a flat tire. The solution is to fix the flat tire. How it happened is not relevant.
  - Alex3917 18y ago
    "You have a problem, you know the solution, and you keep maintaining the problem because you perceive this problem as not being your fault, but somehow the fault of external factors." In all seriousness, I don't see how you get this from the my comment, esp. in light of the second paragraph. My basic argument is just that surfing the web is rational for an intellectually curious person in the context of compulsory schooling, but that it's a difficult habit to shake once the context changes and it's no longer rational. I think you're reading too much into this.
    - maxklein 18y ago
      My point is, the world is full of people who whine about problems and always find something else to blame for the problems, no matter how abstract. It's rare to find the man who realizes that everything he fails at is ultimately his own fault, because everyone is free to do whatever they want.
      - keating 18y ago
        > because everyone is free to do whatever they want. Citation needed. > It's rare to find the man who realizes that everything he fails at is ultimately his own fault Incompatible with the other claim. If other people are free to do whatever they want, they are free not to cooperate with you. If you fail to get Megan Fox to want to engage in mating behavior with you, it may well be due to circumstances beyond your control, like not being her "type". We aren't free. We have a lot of built-in unconscious drives that push and pull us in one direction or another. Our decision-making process is wired up through genetic happenstance and upbringing. Our parents, schools, cultures, and religions programmed us to a large degree and then turned us out into the world.
        maxklein 18y ago
        If I cannot lay Megan Fox, it's because she decided not to. Excercising my freedom does not give me the right to take away someone elses freedom. If however, Miss Fox says no to me, and I take that to mean that I will fail with all chicks from then on, then that is my own bloody fault, and its something I can change easily by trying for other chicks. So when someone blames his reading of reddit on his high school, I say that's silly, and its something he is absolutely in control of, and can change without affecting anybody elses freedom.
        kc5tja 18y ago
        "Excercising my freedom does not give me the right to take away someone elses freedom." Nonetheless, in this hypothetical situation, you failed in your quest to lay Megan. Therefore, by your own words, it is your own fault. This myth, that it is your own fault if you fail to achieve your own goals, forms the foundation for conservative viewpoint in this nation. I'm not here to preach the gospel of the Left (they have their own mistaken views too), but you have to concede, as heart-breaking as it is, that the Right isn't always either. Recognizing a situation for what it actually is necessitates that we take human behavior as an animal into consideration when observing our own behavior. Taken in the original context of the statement, the author's claim that our failures are "our" fault is an indictment, not merely an observation. "Failure" is never just a black-and-white situation. We live in a complex, chaotic world. It's time it's addressed as such.
aaronsw 18y ago
Maybe because he doesn't want to make the Fundamental Attribution Error? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error

Why are you blaming external factors instead of yourself or your personality?

Alex3917 18y ago

Because I'm not a brain in a vat.

maxklein 18y ago
Yes, but how will assigning blame help you solve the problem? You have a problem, you know the solution, and you keep maintaining the problem because you perceive this problem as not being your fault, but somehow the fault of external factors. Most problems exist in isolation of their causes. Let's say you have a flat tire on the highway. Sure, it would be interesting to know how it happened, but that has nothing to do with the problem. The problem is that you are on a highway with a flat tire. The solution is to fix the flat tire. How it happened is not relevant.
- Alex3917 18y ago
  "You have a problem, you know the solution, and you keep maintaining the problem because you perceive this problem as not being your fault, but somehow the fault of external factors." In all seriousness, I don't see how you get this from the my comment, esp. in light of the second paragraph. My basic argument is just that surfing the web is rational for an intellectually curious person in the context of compulsory schooling, but that it's a difficult habit to shake once the context changes and it's no longer rational. I think you're reading too much into this.
  - maxklein 18y ago
    My point is, the world is full of people who whine about problems and always find something else to blame for the problems, no matter how abstract. It's rare to find the man who realizes that everything he fails at is ultimately his own fault, because everyone is free to do whatever they want.
    - keating 18y ago
      > because everyone is free to do whatever they want. Citation needed. > It's rare to find the man who realizes that everything he fails at is ultimately his own fault Incompatible with the other claim. If other people are free to do whatever they want, they are free not to cooperate with you. If you fail to get Megan Fox to want to engage in mating behavior with you, it may well be due to circumstances beyond your control, like not being her "type". We aren't free. We have a lot of built-in unconscious drives that push and pull us in one direction or another. Our decision-making process is wired up through genetic happenstance and upbringing. Our parents, schools, cultures, and religions programmed us to a large degree and then turned us out into the world.
      - maxklein 18y ago
        If I cannot lay Megan Fox, it's because she decided not to. Excercising my freedom does not give me the right to take away someone elses freedom. If however, Miss Fox says no to me, and I take that to mean that I will fail with all chicks from then on, then that is my own bloody fault, and its something I can change easily by trying for other chicks. So when someone blames his reading of reddit on his high school, I say that's silly, and its something he is absolutely in control of, and can change without affecting anybody elses freedom.
        kc5tja 18y ago
        "Excercising my freedom does not give me the right to take away someone elses freedom." Nonetheless, in this hypothetical situation, you failed in your quest to lay Megan. Therefore, by your own words, it is your own fault. This myth, that it is your own fault if you fail to achieve your own goals, forms the foundation for conservative viewpoint in this nation. I'm not here to preach the gospel of the Left (they have their own mistaken views too), but you have to concede, as heart-breaking as it is, that the Right isn't always either. Recognizing a situation for what it actually is necessitates that we take human behavior as an animal into consideration when observing our own behavior. Taken in the original context of the statement, the author's claim that our failures are "our" fault is an indictment, not merely an observation. "Failure" is never just a black-and-white situation. We live in a complex, chaotic world. It's time it's addressed as such.

aaronsw 18y ago

Maybe because he doesn't want to make the Fundamental Attribution Error? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error