4 ms·

If there was something I could impart to this generation, it would be this. I deeply admire your commitment to entrepreneurialism and to taking a bit of ownersh

If there was something I could impart to this generation, it would be this. I deeply admire your commitment to entrepreneurialism and to taking a bit of ownership over what you can learn in terms of "return on investment." However, I would caution you to remember still what is the most rewarding in life. Too often I see a never-ending status tournament for those in the elite schools (all of those mentioned), and it can tear apart those involved. Not too long ago, my company sent out teams to interview students from Stanford. Without fail, all of them mentioned some feeling of alienation from their peers due to the ridiculous status games. One foreign student who was relatively poor talked about dorm-mates who would fly first class back to LA or NY for the weekend and boast about it. It was a kind of revolting illustration. Helping your fellow human beings and living a life of service to them is what is ultimately important. I think this generation may actually be primed to give us a lot of hope in this regard, but I hope that you can listen to it. And if I may be so bold, I believe that many would be well-served by realizing that out there beyond the cosmos above us is something that deeply loves each of us.

paulryanrogers 7y ago
> And if I may be so bold, I believe that many would be well-served by realizing that out there beyond the cosmos above us is something that deeply loves each of us. Unfalsifiable claims like this one tend to have a bit of baggage like eternal punishment. IMO that's one thing plaguing plenty of teens in rural parts of the US. They need fewer overseeing eyes, not more.
- baryphonic 7y ago
  > Unfalsifiable claims like this one tend to have a bit of baggage like eternal punishment. Here's something that is falsifiable and true: the teen suicide rates in the oppressive and orthodox 1950s were much lower than they are in the "liberated" times today. I cannot and will not claim that this can be reduced to belief in a higher power (I would tend to be skeptical of such a just-so argument that fits my worldview without additional data). And in fact, my main point in the GP was not that people should believe in a higher power (though I do think that), but that I hope the younger generation can learn to reject these destructive status games that undeniably cause immense suffering and deprive children of their childhoods. Furthermore, our culture today routinely indulges in unfalsifiable claims that carry heaps of baggage. What is worse: eternal punishment that you are quite certain is not real, or the very real temporal punishment that can and has ruined lives in response to even inadvertent stumbling through cultural minefields? > IMO [baggage like eternal punishment is] one thing plaguing plenty of teens in rural parts of the US. They need fewer overseeing eyes, not more. This may be true as a trend, and insofar as it is, it is lamentable. But it is not nor has it ever been my way. I am here to show love and mercy, to serve and to desire justice; I am not here to pass judgment or hector. And part of that is speaking to what I believe and what I have experienced.
  - amp108 7y ago
    >> Unfalsifiable claims like this one tend to have a bit of baggage like eternal punishment. > Here's something that is falsifiable and true: the teen suicide rates in the oppressive and orthodox 1950s were much lower than they are in the "liberated" times today. I cannot and will not claim that this can be reduced to belief in a higher power You don't need to. Whether or not a result can be attributed to a belief has no bearing on whether the belief itself is true.
deagle50 7y ago
To expand on your point - I am starting to believe that the political correctness oozing out of teens and those in the early 20s today is actually compensation for a new form of selfishness that comes from being measured in real time on a global scale, and drives the non-stop status games you described.
- baryphonic 7y ago
  I could not agree more. This hit me hard during the interviews on the Stanford campus that I mentioned. I see the embrace of PC culture amount the younger cohort a result of the intense status competition, the resultant shallowness and lack of meaning associated with accomplishments rewarded by gains to status and prestige (even when the accomplishment is real and beneficial), and a paucity of explanations for why the status problem exists beyond repackaged Marxism wrapped in relatively strange philosophical ideas from the 60s and 70s. It's easy to judge young people, so I force myself to feel a great deal of compassion for them.
- Nasrudith 7y ago
  There are always poseur idiots in any movement (see the "Blockchain!" zombies and "Raw Water") but the political correctness is a result of actual moral standards based upon harm and could be called a successor or an usurper backlash to the hypocritical "morality" that was utterly obsesses with sexual norms while ignoring every other aspect of it. It isn't spoken of in such terms usually but what "political correctness" generally is referred to as detractors is essentially "new morals". They were judged unfairly by a broken, hypocrital and insane system and now they flip the table and judge it back harshly. The failure of the previous generation's systems of morality is literally a meme "Ok boomer" - and it certainly wasn't the first to judge back. There is still plenty of status shit in various forms going on top which matters to varying degrees subculturally if they give a shit or not but there is still a recognized objective moral "line in the sand" roughly where excuses aren't tolerated. "Everyone was doing it" as an excuse only further indites a complete lack of morals. A standard which evidently terrifies many who were alivr during the judged segment part of the everyone given the jump to embracing moral relativism.
  - 7y ago
eli_gottlieb 7y ago
>And if I may be so bold, I believe that many would be well-served by realizing that out there beyond the cosmos above us is something that deeply loves each of us. If I may be so bold, could I interest you in hearing the good word of dialectical materialism as interpreted through category-theory according to Robert Harper Thought?
- baryphonic 7y ago
  How many times can Hegel, Marx & Co. be repackaged and cause immense destruction (such as we are seeing at this very moment) till otherwise intelligent people will finally let it go?
  - eli_gottlieb 7y ago
    I would have thought the references to category theory and Robert Harper Thought (he's a homotopy type theory researcher) would have made the humor clear.

paulryanrogers 7y ago

> And if I may be so bold, I believe that many would be well-served by realizing that out there beyond the cosmos above us is something that deeply loves each of us. Unfalsifiable claims like this one tend to have a bit of baggage like eternal punishment. IMO that's one thing plaguing plenty of teens in rural parts of the US. They need fewer overseeing eyes, not more.

baryphonic 7y ago
> Unfalsifiable claims like this one tend to have a bit of baggage like eternal punishment. Here's something that is falsifiable and true: the teen suicide rates in the oppressive and orthodox 1950s were much lower than they are in the "liberated" times today. I cannot and will not claim that this can be reduced to belief in a higher power (I would tend to be skeptical of such a just-so argument that fits my worldview without additional data). And in fact, my main point in the GP was not that people should believe in a higher power (though I do think that), but that I hope the younger generation can learn to reject these destructive status games that undeniably cause immense suffering and deprive children of their childhoods. Furthermore, our culture today routinely indulges in unfalsifiable claims that carry heaps of baggage. What is worse: eternal punishment that you are quite certain is not real, or the very real temporal punishment that can and has ruined lives in response to even inadvertent stumbling through cultural minefields? > IMO [baggage like eternal punishment is] one thing plaguing plenty of teens in rural parts of the US. They need fewer overseeing eyes, not more. This may be true as a trend, and insofar as it is, it is lamentable. But it is not nor has it ever been my way. I am here to show love and mercy, to serve and to desire justice; I am not here to pass judgment or hector. And part of that is speaking to what I believe and what I have experienced.
- amp108 7y ago
  >> Unfalsifiable claims like this one tend to have a bit of baggage like eternal punishment. > Here's something that is falsifiable and true: the teen suicide rates in the oppressive and orthodox 1950s were much lower than they are in the "liberated" times today. I cannot and will not claim that this can be reduced to belief in a higher power You don't need to. Whether or not a result can be attributed to a belief has no bearing on whether the belief itself is true.

deagle50 7y ago

To expand on your point - I am starting to believe that the political correctness oozing out of teens and those in the early 20s today is actually compensation for a new form of selfishness that comes from being measured in real time on a global scale, and drives the non-stop status games you described.

baryphonic 7y ago
I could not agree more. This hit me hard during the interviews on the Stanford campus that I mentioned. I see the embrace of PC culture amount the younger cohort a result of the intense status competition, the resultant shallowness and lack of meaning associated with accomplishments rewarded by gains to status and prestige (even when the accomplishment is real and beneficial), and a paucity of explanations for why the status problem exists beyond repackaged Marxism wrapped in relatively strange philosophical ideas from the 60s and 70s. It's easy to judge young people, so I force myself to feel a great deal of compassion for them.
Nasrudith 7y ago
There are always poseur idiots in any movement (see the "Blockchain!" zombies and "Raw Water") but the political correctness is a result of actual moral standards based upon harm and could be called a successor or an usurper backlash to the hypocritical "morality" that was utterly obsesses with sexual norms while ignoring every other aspect of it. It isn't spoken of in such terms usually but what "political correctness" generally is referred to as detractors is essentially "new morals". They were judged unfairly by a broken, hypocrital and insane system and now they flip the table and judge it back harshly. The failure of the previous generation's systems of morality is literally a meme "Ok boomer" - and it certainly wasn't the first to judge back. There is still plenty of status shit in various forms going on top which matters to varying degrees subculturally if they give a shit or not but there is still a recognized objective moral "line in the sand" roughly where excuses aren't tolerated. "Everyone was doing it" as an excuse only further indites a complete lack of morals. A standard which evidently terrifies many who were alivr during the judged segment part of the everyone given the jump to embracing moral relativism.
- 7y ago

eli_gottlieb 7y ago

>And if I may be so bold, I believe that many would be well-served by realizing that out there beyond the cosmos above us is something that deeply loves each of us. If I may be so bold, could I interest you in hearing the good word of dialectical materialism as interpreted through category-theory according to Robert Harper Thought?

baryphonic 7y ago
How many times can Hegel, Marx & Co. be repackaged and cause immense destruction (such as we are seeing at this very moment) till otherwise intelligent people will finally let it go?
- eli_gottlieb 7y ago
  I would have thought the references to category theory and Robert Harper Thought (he's a homotopy type theory researcher) would have made the humor clear.