So over on the alt-right subreddit, because of course there is such a thing, the regulars are discussing an article from a century-old encyclopedia suggesting that Jews are many times more likely to be insane than their goy counterparts.
A fellow calling himself Motor_City_Cobra offers a rather, well, perplexing explanation for this alleged fact. See how many sentences you can make it through before getting completely baffled! (I got through four!)
You guys should probably just stick with the “Happy Merchant” memes, because that makes no damn sense at all.
Wait, so this person thinks that the subjective mind is a construct while social institutions and culture are not?? Saying Jews invented the subject is like saying Jews invented consciousness. Freud pioneered psychology as the study of the subject; he didn’t create the subject. Non-Jewish white philosophers were also interested in subjective exerperience, i.e. Kant.
Trying to understand what this guy is trying to say and it’s just like … wut?
@EJ
So they published something they couldn’t read and couldn’t understand on the strengths of the author’s credentials, and presumably a glance at the last paragraph which nicely confirmed their own biases?
This doesn’t speak well of them.
Welcome to half the darn journals out there 9_9
@Pie:
Remember that Sokal was (and still is) a respected authority with a history of excellent work and serious publishing. It probably never crossed their minds that he would take the opportunity to deliberately humiliate them.
You’re entirely right that they should have run the paper past some other physicists first; but the fact that they didn’t catch him out when he acted with malice doesn’t excuse that malice in the first place.
@Kat:
Good point! Probably should’ve worded that a bit differently…
@EJ:
Agreed. I wouldn’t say the same about science as there’s a technical aspect that can require explanation, which is less to confound than to clarify.
Even then, I’ve found plenty of sources that make certain scientific concepts more accessible to the laymen. It makes trying to understand more complicated jargon easier over time.
And Deepak Chopra is so full of shit…
I actually liked some of my philosophy courses in college, but that was less about memorizing specific philosophers and esoteric concepts than applying critical thinking to a variety of scenarios concerning ethics and the like.
Again, it being accessible helped a lot. Thus I actually like Philosophy as a subject, but am less enthused by those who obsess over certain philosophers, as well as expressing their ideas in ways incomprehensible to anyone but them and assuming that makes them superior.
@Scildfreja Unnýðnes:
Seems a bit elitist to me, honestly…
@Dalillama
Certainly doesn’t help you have free market absolutists whose arguments for deregulation may as well be hymns sung in a church. Seriously, it’s hard to not hear “God” when they say “the market” and “Satan” when they say “the government.”
And what happened to Chile boils my fucking blood. It was one of the things, when I learned about that, that made me despise capitalism more than ever before…
@NickNameNick, it’s entirely about elitism. Makes my skin crawl. Frankly, a lot of it is just them trying to desperately prove how smart they are. (speaking, ahem, as a scientist and all that…)
Because these guys are Nazis but they are Nazi nerds.
@Scildfreja: I only partially agree.
There are overt elitists. Fuck ’em. I remember learning the difference quite early in my career — by my third year of undergrad I could spot who was a scientist versus who was a shithead that did science. My first year of grad school I decided to switch fields because the field I had started in had too many of the latter.
But communications is *hard* and to get good at it requires a lot of work. A lot of bad communicators know they suck. They excuse their poor skills with a thin veneer of elitism over a core of poor self-esteem.
As a teacher to a bad communicator, you have to relentlessly chip away at that veneer and let them shed it with positivity and hope and support.
At CMU we had a tradition of weekly seminars in each interest group (AI, theoretical computer science, systems, etc etc), with an expectation that as a student you should give at least one a semester, all through grad school. There was a low barrier to proposing a new seminar series. Cookies improve turnout.
Also, there was a degree requirement to give a good research talk, one of the requirements in lieu of comps (took me three times).
And there was a student tradition of getting together to practice giving talks; it was normal to give one or two practices to peers before going to a conference. You’d invite everyone and a half-dozen of your friends would show up. Again, cookies help.
EJ:
Physicists also have a reputation to uphold:
What I’ve tended to see is one side moves into the field of the other by learning the jargon of the other, and learning the basics of the other’s science. Bioinformatics is computer scientists learning to speak bio, for example.
Egos get in the way of that.
@numerobis
Reminds me of when I described a program I was using for work to my ex (an SDE) and he decided it would be incredibly simple to build a replacement program for it. This type of program is extremely complex and there are dozens of major competitors with mature products for offer, but I describe a simplistic version of what it does to answer a question about what I do and suddenly he thinks he understands the whole problem and can have a solution in months. Pfft.
DA FUCK DID I JUST READ?
@kupo: Been there, done that. Then I worked on a series of real applications. I think I’m wiser now.
@numerobis:
I would really, really like us to stop upholding that reputation.
Empty calorie media/news? Empty Calorie Media would be a fun name for an entertainment store (videos, games, music, etc.) If I ever have a desire to set up such a store, I call dibs on the name!
Aha! So the white supremacists ARE cultists of the Elder Gods! No wonder they have such a warped world view; close contact with eldritch abominations does tend to be very damaging to one’s mind and sense of humanity.
What’s your chant go like? Something like “Ia! Ia! Trump Fthagn! Ph’nglui mglw’nfah Trump ‘Murica wgah’nagl fhtagn!” ?