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Keep your identity small (2009)

paulgraham.com

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Re: Keep your identity small (2009)

#151

Post by wry_discontent »

zyxley wrote: post #48
pystack wrote: post #34

I've realized there are things I can change and there are things I cannot change. I try not to feel too strongly on the things I cannot change, because it distracts me from the things I can change. For politics, I try not to feel too strongly about Trump and the electoral process. I would still vote, but I know it would have a minimal impact, no matter how strongly I feel. Instead, I focus my energy on my business, w…

The Serenity Prayer may resonate with you. > God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, > Courage to change the things I can, > And wisdom to know the difference.

I always remember this from Slaughterhouse Five.

God, I love Kurt Vonnegut.

Re: Keep your identity small (2009)

#152

Post by hackney »

zyxley wrote: post #46
jleader wrote: post #28

One of the biggest invisible biases is thinking you've managed to free yourself of invisible biases.

I'm reminded of the inevitable "I'm not biased, but I'm going to complain about this because I think it's an attack on me" that comes up whenever anyone on the internet mentions that institutional racism exists.

Belief is something everyone the world over lives and dies by. The only thing to worry about is if you have a positive belief, as opposed to a negative one. Negativity, in any form, is harmful to all, while being positive has the opposite effect. Summarily, all communication can and should be based upon opposing viewpoints. This does not make either one wrong, it is just the way it is. So I agree but would change it to "keep your identity positive", large or small is relative.

Re: Keep your identity small (2009)

#153

Post by madmax96 »

>the more labels you have for yourself, the dumber they make you

You could keep going, stripping yourself of all labels via the discovery that labels are neither good nor bad in a qualitative sense. But this begs the question "what is good?" And then you might conclude that you know what is good, and then form your labels as such.

Having labels isn't dumb; not being mindful of your labels is dumb.

Re: Keep your identity small (2009)

#154

Post by clock_tower »

jlg23 wrote: post #64
clock_tower wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Death to Emacs! It's as arrogant as it is shoddy; it has a narrow provincial name for the Alt key, and it makes you learn Lisp in order to make it handle backspaces properly! Also, you Limeys need to learn how to spell. (There, that should get the conversational juices flowing...)

The "narrow [, [sic]] provincial name for the Alt key" is actually what it was once called. And backspace just works as expected in a unix environment. > (There, that should get the conversational juices flowing...) Sane people here know when to engage in a conversation, no trolling needed.

Upvoted this for the first part (noticing the information while missing the pointless quibble about comma use, which should have been a red flag), before I saw the second. A "take back upvote" option would be nice...

Re: Keep your identity small (2009)

#156

Post by tremon »

Nadya wrote: post #148
tremon wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An atheist doesn't believe in the existence of god(s) Rather, an atheist believes in the non-existence of gods. We don't need a word like non-theist because we already have a word for it.

>Rather, an atheist believes in the non-existence of gods. We don't need a word like non-theist because we already have a word for it. No. That would be a gnostic atheist. One who claims to know and doesn't believe. Nearly every single atheist I know, and it is generally a safe assumption to make [0], is an agnostic atheist . One who doesn't believe but claims to not know for sure. If you ask me if gnomes exist, I wi…

If you ask me if gnomes exist, I will tell you I am a gnostic atheist

gnostic agnomist, I presume?

As for the rest, sorry, I don't subscribe to Smith's redefinitions as I'm not sure the distinctions make practical sense. More specifically, I don't support the definition of "agnostic theist" because in the context of religion, there is no distinction between "knowing" and "believing". An "agnostic theist" would be someone who still subscribes to the same religious identity and the distinction is therefore purely academic. Moreover, religions already have words to describe agnostics within their ranks: they're considered lost sheep, apostates or even heretics (depending on which religion and strength of its convictions).

Finally: the term "gnostic" has already been coined and does not mean the opposite of "agnostic". Gnosticism is a theist philosophy closely related to Christianity.

Re: Keep your identity small (2009)

#157

Post by erikpukinskis »

mseebach wrote: post #126
erikpukinskis wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't believe in widespread racism, what is your explanation for why people of color, as a group, keep having a bad time? It can't be some property of them, because believing that would be racist, right? If it's not them and it's not us (I'm white) then what is it?

You've clearly made up your mind and preemptively called everybody who disagrees racist. That's not exactly conductive for an insightful conversation. But I'll bite anyway: historical racism clearly still plays a significant role. Whatever the level of present-day racism, I'm sure we can agree that it's orders of magnitude lower than it was historical. The plight of people of colour today can be attributed to histori…

I haven't made up my mind, actually. I just asked you questions, didn't I?

I think your argument is sound. Axiom: there's actually not that much racism. Theorem: the remaining racism is confined to a small number of people.

I just disagree with your axiom.

Re: Keep your identity small (2009)

#158

Post by erikpukinskis »

tremon wrote: post #124
erikpukinskis wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't believe in widespread racism, what is your explanation for why people of color, as a group, keep having a bad time? It can't be some property of them, because believing that would be racist, right? If it's not them and it's not us (I'm white) then what is it?

If you don't believe in widespread racism, what is your explanation for why people of color, as a group, keep having a bad time? Why does it need a different explanation then why many people of the white persuasion keep having a bad time? When you selectively group people together, you will always get an identifiable pattern. But you can't then claim that the pattern is universal, since the pattern was predefined in…

That's a really good question. I guess I want to collect as many explanations as possible. I am interested in making society better, so I want to have thousands and thousands of explanations for every little bit of violence. So I can make decisions that undermine them when I have the chance. If I don't have the explanations its hard to understand what's happening and how to react.

I also collect explanations for why there is so much violence against white people. I think a lot about violence against men lately. But that doesn't stop me from thinking there are some instances of violence that are best explained as violence against women.

Re: Keep your identity small (2009)

#159

Post by erikpukinskis »

CheckHook wrote: post #121
erikpukinskis wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't believe in widespread racism, what is your explanation for why people of color, as a group, keep having a bad time? It can't be some property of them, because believing that would be racist, right? If it's not them and it's not us (I'm white) then what is it?

The previous and continuing actions of bad people but not "you" as a collective, just the racist ones. (I'm mixed race, not that it should make my point any more/less valid).

Well, you're assuming too much about me... I am racist, I see it happen every day.

Re: Keep your identity small (2009)

#160

Post by tehchromic »

altonzheng wrote: post #42
tehchromic wrote: post #38

"I think what religion and politics have in common is that they become part of people's identity" You might also say that people have identity and religion and politics use those to advantage. But is it wrong to have identity? I'd argue it as a basic human requirement. Religion can be considered a technology of group identity which was refined over millennium to be most effective at generating a unified form. Like al…

Wow, you just out-generalized Paul Graham. nice.

can you give me specific examples of how tho?
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