WingNews logo WingNews GitHub [2]

thirteenfingers's comments

thirteenfingers | 9 years ago | on: Whether You’re a Democrat or Republican, Your Social Media Is an Echo Chamber

I think that's a great approach. Personally I haven't been on social media for a couple years now (for various reasons including concerns over data privacy) but I considered having all those opposing views at hand to be one of the principal benefits of social media - in fact, that was the main reason I stayed on social media as long as I did.

> Such a thing was not very possible to do before social networks

I would say it was definitely possible, it just took a bit more effort. (Since leaving social media I've made a point of reading left-wing and right-wing opinion sites side-by-side. It's very illuminating.)

That said, it does seem like for the average user the tendency is for social media to become an echo chamber.

Edit: formatting

thirteenfingers | 9 years ago | on: How Anxiety Warps Your Perception

Likely third-party voter here:

(1) I suspect every voter has a threshold of evil-ness beyond which they simply can't in good conscience vote for Candidate X, even if Candidate Y is evil-er. For me, we've passed that threshold.

(2) I don't live in a swing state, so my vote already has only symbolic significance. As such I'd rather go on record voting no confidence in either Clinton or Trump, and vote for someone that I think would actually do a reasonable job if by some miracle they became president.

(3) I know Gary Johnson and the other third-party candidates have no chance of winning - _this_ time. I accept that (in my opinion) we're screwed for at least the next four years no matter whether it's Clinton or Trump, but if as many votes as possible go third-party this election, maybe - just maybe - third-parties will gain enough credibility to have a reasonable chance next election, or else the two major parties will finally get the message and pick better candidates.

thirteenfingers | 10 years ago | on: Why we should all learn from the ancient Greeks

> mostly philosophers

No wonder you say you can find the Greek stuff "pretty boring." There's so much more to Greek literature than philosophy. Try

* Homer - the closest thing the Greeks had to the Bible, yet so different in spirit in that it raises unanswerable questions about the Greeks' beliefs, without affirming them

* Aristophanes - slapstick humor

* Sophocles, Euripides, Aeschylus - the great tragedians

* Herodotus, Thucydides, Xenophon - some of the greatest historians ever, although they fall somewhat short of our modern standards for historical rigor

* Lysias - mainly valuable as a record of the Greek legal process

* Lucian - for satire (if you don't like philosophers, you'll love Lucian)

thirteenfingers | 12 years ago | on: Circle of fifths and roots of two

Players of bowed stringed instruments run into this difficulty too. When playing with piano, cellists often have to tune both their lowest and highest strings to the piano, and then sort of average out the discrepancy in the two strings between.
page 3
newer