3 ms·

why do people repost three-year-old articles? because it's easier than finding new ones saying the same thing. this is like anthropic reasoning--always true, r

• gojomo 14y ago
  Why would a 'new [article] saying the same thing' be any better? Aaronson has a parallel post about Anthropicisms, which seems to share your skepticism about their value: http://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=101 http://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=101 For the 'Malthusianisms', I'd agree the name isn't exactly right, and I could quibble with his specific examples. But the observation that things are in their current and often 'sucky' state because some balance between tensions has been reached is often useful. It can help us get past frustration or superficial ranting about a situation, to investigating the real forces at work. And, while some could take from this analysis fatalism, I think it instead highlights what's necessary to be effective. Simply tugging a little in the direction of one of the existing forces is rarely the best path to change. You've got to approach such dynamically-balanced situations from an oblique angle, and apply other forces/insights to jump it to a new equilibrium.