Posts by Andre Alessi
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Hard News: Limping Onwards, in reply to giovanni tiso,
Isn’t it a little limiting?
Well, any definition of philosophy would be limiting, because philosophy fairly frequently involves questioning limitations of all sorts, including its own. (Crikey this is getting meta!) I was putting forward a counterpoint to Danyl’s perception that philosophy made something of a virtue of obscuritanism, which hasn’t been my experience at all.
It’s all well and good to devote one’s time to “investigating the mysteries of the universe”, but if you can’t then phrase the results of your investigations in a way that other people can understand and agree (or disagree!) with without having access to your own private experiences, it’s hard to see the value in the exercise. That’s what I was getting at-philosophy’s value lies in its derived methods for discussing the nature of things in such a way that people can come to some kind of agreement about what we’re all talking about, and can be clear about the bits that we disagree on.
EDIT: All of this is to say that figuring out what makes a good argument or a bad one isn't incidental to philosophy, it's central. Figuring out how we talk to other people in such a way that allows rational agreement or disagreement is a core element of philosophical study, and it's the most useful skill I feel I took from my degree (except for being able to answer the question "What's the meaning of life?" with all manner of hilarious one-liners.)
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Hard News: Limping Onwards, in reply to Russell Brown,
Question: how many of you here are Usenet veterans, and is that where you learned your culture of internet argument?
I started on alt.religion.wicca and alt.magick* in the late 90's-it was my first introduction to talking to other people on the Internet. That's where I learned about things like Godwin's Law (in its original form) and trolling, and flame wars, and how accusing someone of having child porn on their servers was the ultimate conversational nuclear option. Thinking about it now, not much has changed.
* - It's odd now, as an atheist, to think about how involved I was in the online culture of a religion back in the day.
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Hard News: Limping Onwards, in reply to Danyl Mclauchlan,
(I still find most philosophers totally incomprehensible, in a way that most scientists aren’t, so I am not entirely sold on his point.)
Just to go off on a slight tangent on this topic (being the proud owner of a BA in Philosophy): you know who calls out philosophers who write incomprehensible philosophy most often? Other philosophers. John Searle's takedown of postmodernism is passionate and clearly stated. Philosophy is an attempt to develop strategies to get people to agree with each other, which is where its central value lies. If a philosopher writes a book and noone agrees with him or her (especially if noone can figure out what they're trying to say) then chances are it's bad philosophy, and worthy of as much derision as bad science.
I've used the skills I was taught in philosophy in my last couple of jobs to the benefit of the companies I've worked for: everything from being able to critically think about processes and policies and providing improvements, to knowing how conditional statements work so my Excel spreadsheets do the work of three people with the click of a button.
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I'm loving The Adults. Utterly surprised by it. And Gravy Rainbow has been great for watching local hipsters turn themselves inside out trying to distance themselves from it.
Since buying a 16 GB MicroSD card for my phone, I now have my entire music collection on the go with me, so I've been relistening to stuff I forgot I even had. This one song jumped out at me and it's been on high rotate ever since. Sigur Rós - Hún Jörð (Hassbræður remix) from the very early Von brigði remix album. They're often written off as pretentious ethereal wank, but I think this track does a pretty good job of showcasing the underlying guitar-nerd rock band roots of the project:
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Hard News: Perverse Entertainment, in reply to recordari,
That must have been one hell of a party.
I like to think that it looked something like this.
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Hard News: Perverse Entertainment, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
You hate Christians because you’re homosexual.
I read that as "You hate Christmas because you're homosexual" and I was gearing myself up to agree with him. Everyone knows the gays hate seasonal interior decorating and drinking warm alcoholic drinks.
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Hard News: Perverse Entertainment, in reply to Alex Coleman,
I’m slowly convincing myself that the GOP doesn’t actually want to win; that they have moved on from politics being anything other than a fundraising exercise. That’s not to say that they will try not to win, only that if they do it will be incidental.
I don't know, I think Lucy's information vacuum is part of the equation here. They can talk to people who do not know and will never know that Michelle Bachmann is crazy, because what they see her say lines up with everything they see in their news sources. That electorate isn't small, and the Democrats ignore it at their peril (see the 2004 and 2008 presidential elections, and the 2010 midterms.) No matter how crazy these people are, they will be voted for.
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Speaking of people who should be parody accounts but aren't, has anyone figured out why Tau Henare is still allowed to use Twitter? He's the New Zealand equivalent of 50 Cent, only with fewer No 1 singles to his name.
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Hard News: Perverse Entertainment, in reply to Robyn Gallagher,
I don't care about Redbaiter's blog. I care that NZPA is closing.
I've found the response from many journalists regarding NZPA's closure to be pretty confusing, honestly. It sounds like a lot of people think this is the result of company politics, rather than any sort of economic decision. Surely that'd actually be pretty major news, then?
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The idea that parties should be forced to field two separate and incompatible slates of candidates has no virtue that I can think of.
It's a made-for-talkback proposal. Any time a party that isn't ACT, National or NZ First proposes legislation of any sort, the cry will be "Out-of-touch elitist list MPs imposing their will on Real New Zealanders!"
I am interested in creative tweaks to our electoral system, but that's one that just seems wrong-headed on so many levels.