> The paranoiac's pain is real, even if the cause is imaginary. That's exactly the point of the sentence.
No, the sentence talks about imaginary pain, not real pain with imaginary causes.
> the sentence talks about imaginary pain
It does. But read what the sentence says about "imaginary pain"—that it still hurts. That feeling of hurt is pain. So the sentence is saying that "imaginary pain" is just "pain". So pain that you might think is imaginary, is actually real.
A simple self-experiment if you haven't read the paper, find which of these sentences are bullshit. Answer in order without reading further ahead, and don't go back to change your answers (as to replicate experimental conditions). * 1. A river cuts through a rock, not because of its power but it's persistence. 2. The hidden meaning transforms the abstract beauty. 3. The future elucidates irrational facts for the seek…
>11. Imagined pain does not hurt less because it is imagined. I guess I can see how this might be classed as "not bullshit", but I don't see how it's profound at all. It just seems false to me. I agreed with all the other classifications. edit : I know complaining about downvotes is verboten here, but seriously, that's just my take on it. I'd be interested to hear an explanation of what the profound meaning is that I…
Based on the other comments further down, you seem to be caught up on whether the statement is technically true for specific definitions of pain, rather than the underlying point of the statement.
The underlying point is that whether you think that someone's suffering (physical or emotional) has a real or imaginary cause, that doesn't make them suffer any more or less, because you are not in their head, and they are not in yours. Their degree of suffering depends on their perception of reality, not yours, or even objective reality.
Imagine you are paranoid and you suspect someone is deceiving you. The reality of whether or not they are actually deceiving you does not have an impact on how much pain you feel. Alternatively, someone with a mental condition that leads them to believe they are in pain would conceivably feel the same pain as someone who is actually being physically hurt. Just my take on it.
As malloryerik said in another comment, that seems to be confusing the cause of the pain with the pain itself. The paranoiac's pain is real, even if the cause is imaginary.
I didn't downvote any of your comments, but I didn't understand your gripe until this post, and I agree with you that the question is not worded well. Imaginary's primary definition is only existing in your imagination, so it's technically correct on one level, but if you look at synonyms for imaginary, and the way that people commonly use it, you get words like nonexistent, made-up, fictional, unreal, etc..
Bullshit-sensitivity and cynicism are practically synomyms I'd say. It feels counter-intuitive to find cynicism positively correlated with prosocial behaviour (which the article defines as donating to and/or joining a charity.)
I see it as straightforward - bullshit results in contagious sociopathy.
Sensitivity means being more manipulatable, sociopaths manipulate to get what they want which leads to the dupes copying the antisocial behavior without a thought or even the benefits the originator gains. The only beneficial to actor behaviors likely arise from the sociopath's excuses being internalized. Look at snake oil salesmen for an example - pushing antivax lies to sell "essential oils" to get profit and spreading bullshit to cause others to make others sick avoiding imaginary risks.
Meanwhile a skeptic would refuse to go along with wrong just because "everyone is doing it" even if they are selfish for not wanting the needless risk or hassle.
I think you can be extremely apt at detecting bullshit without being a cynic. In fact I think a lot, though certainly not all, of cynicism stems from the disappointment of having been fooled too much by bullshit.
I guess this means that many "IT professionals" don't even reflect enough to clearly detect rubbish even after a fad is over. OOP (as the solution to every programming problem), Java everywhere (performance is great and/or doesn't matter - really!!), P2P everything (because Napster), semantic web, XML, SOAP, agile(washing), cloud (whether it makes sense or not), server-side JS (overused), client-side JS whether you n…
Putting disagreements of what does and does not belong there aside there are also sunk costs of sorts - if everything works sufficiently learning a new way puts you at a disadvantage unless the new way really is sufficently appreciably better for the application so you stick with what you know. Not doing so ironically itself leads to faddish behavior and falling behind due to tripping on hidden pitfalls.
A simple self-experiment if you haven't read the paper, find which of these sentences are bullshit. Answer in order without reading further ahead, and don't go back to change your answers (as to replicate experimental conditions). * 1. A river cuts through a rock, not because of its power but it's persistence. 2. The hidden meaning transforms the abstract beauty. 3. The future elucidates irrational facts for the seek…
>11. Imagined pain does not hurt less because it is imagined. I guess I can see how this might be classed as "not bullshit", but I don't see how it's profound at all. It just seems false to me. I agreed with all the other classifications. edit : I know complaining about downvotes is verboten here, but seriously, that's just my take on it. I'd be interested to hear an explanation of what the profound meaning is that I…
Profundity is best understood as the quality of leading to a better understanding of situations. The profound statement itself doesn't have to be 100% literally true. "All models are wrong; some models are useful."
#11 counters people's default assumption that imagined pain doesn't hurt, because it's not real. You gain more understanding of people who report imagined pain by assuming it hurts the same (even if it might actually hurt a little less) than by assuming it doesn't hurt at all.
In the book Dune, Paul Atreides' hand is put in a pain-simulating device and he has to demonstrate his humanity by resisting the urge to pull it out or he'll be killed by a cyanide needle in the neck. You can only understand that scene by assuming the simulated pain hurts as much as real pain.
Scientists! I offer my services as an author of better bullshit than you can create by feeding a parody generator with marketing materials. Observe! - The unknown flees from the implausible. - Unheard elephants are never green. - Although many people seek apples, few seek the road. - Judgement is like chewing on expensive rubber. - A circle is a square with intention.
Here's one such generator, based on Deepak Chopra corpus. http://wisdomofchopra.com Note that the purple indic text on top is the word "Bullshit" transliterated in Gujarati.
"Experiential truth experiences quantum excellence"
A simple self-experiment if you haven't read the paper, find which of these sentences are bullshit. Answer in order without reading further ahead, and don't go back to change your answers (as to replicate experimental conditions). * 1. A river cuts through a rock, not because of its power but it's persistence. 2. The hidden meaning transforms the abstract beauty. 3. The future elucidates irrational facts for the seek…
>11. Imagined pain does not hurt less because it is imagined. I guess I can see how this might be classed as "not bullshit", but I don't see how it's profound at all. It just seems false to me. I agreed with all the other classifications. edit : I know complaining about downvotes is verboten here, but seriously, that's just my take on it. I'd be interested to hear an explanation of what the profound meaning is that I…
They defined "bullshit" as equivalent to "vacuous" meaning it has no meaningful content at all.
That sentence may be obviously true, but it is not vacuous.
Bullshit-sensitivity and cynicism are practically synomyms I'd say. It feels counter-intuitive to find cynicism positively correlated with prosocial behaviour (which the article defines as donating to and/or joining a charity.)
More scepticism. A cynic would find reasons why the sentences listed as profound are meaningless too.
A simple self-experiment if you haven't read the paper, find which of these sentences are bullshit. Answer in order without reading further ahead, and don't go back to change your answers (as to replicate experimental conditions). * 1. A river cuts through a rock, not because of its power but it's persistence. 2. The hidden meaning transforms the abstract beauty. 3. The future elucidates irrational facts for the seek…
>11. Imagined pain does not hurt less because it is imagined. I guess I can see how this might be classed as "not bullshit", but I don't see how it's profound at all. It just seems false to me. I agreed with all the other classifications. edit : I know complaining about downvotes is verboten here, but seriously, that's just my take on it. I'd be interested to hear an explanation of what the profound meaning is that I…
I love this comment thread so much! In challenging whether the statement is profound, you've triggered a lively and thoughtful debate on whether or not it is actually profound, and in doing so proved it to be profound (at least to the HN readership) :)