4 ms·

That's Interesting (1971) [pdf]

46 points by azhenley 7y ago

seamyb88 7y ago
Incredibly interesting: article applying scientific methods to society gets little attention from those who apply it to silicon. It's not that the data is too noisy, or the subject too inconclusive, I believe. It's that the field is constantly telling us that negatives such as crime and deviance are caused by wealth inequality. We don't want to hear that when we're aspiring to be Jeff Bezos.
- mighty_bander 7y ago
  I only read the abstract because, well, I don't find the subject all that interesting, but isn't the paper stating the opposite? It states that interesting theories deny the assumptions of their audience.
  - jchook 7y ago
    Perhaps that’s why we don’t find this paper itself interesting — it merely affirms our intuition that we find information interesting when it goes against our previous assumptions.
azhenley 7y ago
I do find the first sentence of the abstract to be quite interesting: "How do theories which are generally considered interesting differ from theories which are generally considered non-interesting?"
- LameRubberDucky 7y ago
  I think it's related to what my wife always says to me when I get concerned after listening to too much news. "News is news because it's different from the norm. No one wants to read that nothing different happened." She worked for a newspaper for 10 years, so I respect her explanation.
  - jchook 7y ago
    Be that as it may, the question itself seemed interesting, despite coming from some quite fundamental considerations.
susam 7y ago
Interesting opening lines in the "Summary" section: > QUESTION: How do theories which are generally considered interesting differ from theories which are generally considered non-interesting ? ANSWER: Interesting theories are those which deny certain assumptions of their audience, while non-interesting theories are those which affirm certain assumptions of their audience. I like how this paper can be applied to itself in a self-referential manner to explain how interesting this paper is to a reader! :-)

46 points by azhenley 7y ago

Incredibly interesting: article applying scientific methods to society gets little attention from those who apply it to silicon. It's not that the data is too noisy, or the subject too inconclusive, I believe. It's that the field is constantly telling us that negatives such as crime and deviance are caused by wealth inequality. We don't want to hear that when we're aspiring to be Jeff Bezos.

mighty_bander 7y ago
I only read the abstract because, well, I don't find the subject all that interesting, but isn't the paper stating the opposite? It states that interesting theories deny the assumptions of their audience.
- jchook 7y ago
  Perhaps that’s why we don’t find this paper itself interesting — it merely affirms our intuition that we find information interesting when it goes against our previous assumptions.

azhenley 7y ago

I do find the first sentence of the abstract to be quite interesting: "How do theories which are generally considered interesting differ from theories which are generally considered non-interesting?"

LameRubberDucky 7y ago
I think it's related to what my wife always says to me when I get concerned after listening to too much news. "News is news because it's different from the norm. No one wants to read that nothing different happened." She worked for a newspaper for 10 years, so I respect her explanation.
- jchook 7y ago
  Be that as it may, the question itself seemed interesting, despite coming from some quite fundamental considerations.

susam 7y ago

Interesting opening lines in the "Summary" section: > QUESTION: How do theories which are generally considered interesting differ from theories which are generally considered non-interesting ? ANSWER: Interesting theories are those which deny certain assumptions of their audience, while non-interesting theories are those which affirm certain assumptions of their audience. I like how this paper can be applied to itself in a self-referential manner to explain how interesting this paper is to a reader! :-)