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Tell HN: Aaron Swartz's website is offline

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Re: Tell HN: Aaron Swartz's website is offline

#111

Post by ruseOps »

alasdair_ wrote: post #104
sudoscript wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What’s wrong with that argument? At an individual, probably nothing. But at a macro level, apathy is equivalent to a lack of legitimacy, which is a big problem. If the cancer of apathy spreads too far, the entire system comes crashing down. It’s like a party where your job is to bring one of the mixers. You don’t bring yours, nothing that terrible happens. No one brings any, and the party becomes a disaster.

>a lack of legitimacy Well... yes. And I view this as a good thing. The current US voting system is broken and I am not sure it is fixable simply by voting more - that simply entrenches the current system. I prefer to use illegitimacy and disenfranchisement to spur useful change to the systems themselves. I want to see somethink like ranked choice with an instant runoff, the abolition of the electoral college and a s…

Reforming the senate, but not the house?

Could you provide an example where you, personally, have used illegitimacy and disenfranchisement to spur useful change in a system?

While discussing real change, it feels like we should be as exact as possible. Haphazardly enacted real change does not seem useful in the least.

Re: Tell HN: Aaron Swartz's website is offline

#112

Post by chickenfries »

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #106
jordanpg wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, not what he says at all. He implies that everything you need to know to vote can fit on one side of an index card. The point is you don't need to follow the news to make informed voting decisions.

He also suggests reading books instead of daily news! He says weekly or monthly reviews would be fine too. This whole thread is full of people thinking he’s suggesting you stay ignorant, when really he’s saying the culture of everyone must read the news is wrong, and we can get our information from better sources than the news.

I mean the title doesn’t help. You might even call it click bait.

I think the “everyone should read the news” culture that Aaron describes is a straw man. Most people I know who read the news regularly know that it’s partially entertainment for them and that you can get your info from places other than the daily news. Only people like Donald Trump think that being informed means watching cable news all day.

Maybe I just haven’t met any of these people who think that books are bad but daily news headlines are good.

Re: Tell HN: Aaron Swartz's website is offline

#113

Post by chickenfries »

vehementi wrote: post #110
chickenfries wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If all you do is read voter guides then you have delegated your critical thinking to the organization that produces the guide. I would not call you a informed voter if all you do is read a voter guide every election.

I would not call you an informed voter if all you do is spend 23 hours a day consuming the 0.0001% of the news that time affords you

I don’t know anyone who does that. they might be well informed, I would have to see what they were reading but yes I would agree that 23 hours a day of news is not helpful. This is absurd.

Re: Tell HN: Aaron Swartz's website is offline

#114

Post by syn0byte »

chickenfries wrote: post #82
josefresco wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I like and respect who Aaron was and what he did for us all, I cringed when reading "I Hate the News" because it came across as very naive. It's the same logic young people use to justify not voting, also the same logic my fellow parents use as reason for not attending town meeting. Find new sources, find your news. While today's news doesn't effect you directly, it might tomorrow, or it might effect your frien…

Yeah this post is literally the same argument as “my vote has never changed the outcome of an election so why vote?”

The big pink elephant; In a lot of cases this is a rational, factual argument with the current system (In the US.)

Feel free to refute the argument's validity with empirical data. I would genuinely love to see it. I've seen apologetic researchers offer reasons for why their data isn't as damning as it seems, but never seen anything remotely close to proof of validity.

Re: Tell HN: Aaron Swartz's website is offline

#115

Post by pyrale »

sudoscript wrote: post #93
capulate89 wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And what's wrong with that argument? Democracy and voting aren't unquestionable goods. Just look at what became of most of the non-democratic countries that the US decided to "liberate" via forcing them to adopt democracy over the years.

> What’s wrong with that argument? At an individual, probably nothing. But at a macro level, apathy is equivalent to a lack of legitimacy, which is a big problem. If the cancer of apathy spreads too far, the entire system comes crashing down. It’s like a party where your job is to bring one of the mixers. You don’t bring yours, nothing that terrible happens. No one brings any, and the party becomes a disaster.

Well, after years without electricity, you may start thinking that people not bringing mixers is a symptom rather than a problem.

Re: Tell HN: Aaron Swartz's website is offline

#116

Post by chickenfries »

syn0byte wrote: post #114
chickenfries wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah this post is literally the same argument as “my vote has never changed the outcome of an election so why vote?”

The big pink elephant; In a lot of cases this is a rational, factual argument with the current system (In the US.) Feel free to refute the argument's validity with empirical data. I would genuinely love to see it. I've seen apologetic researchers offer reasons for why their data isn't as damning as it seems, but never seen anything remotely close to proof of validity.

This last presidential election was decided by several thousand votes in a few states. There were even closer local elections this year. One persons vote doesn’t ever decide things, but if you can’t see the absurdity of everyone taking that position, I don’t know what to say.

Re: Tell HN: Aaron Swartz's website is offline

#117

Post by dhimes »

capulate89 wrote: post #88
chickenfries wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah this post is literally the same argument as “my vote has never changed the outcome of an election so why vote?”

And what's wrong with that argument? Democracy and voting aren't unquestionable goods. Just look at what became of most of the non-democratic countries that the US decided to "liberate" via forcing them to adopt democracy over the years.

With apologies to Pascal[1]

You assume your vote doesn't matter. Then

If you are correct and you vote, nothing happens.

If you are correct and you don't vote, nothing happens.

If you are wrong but you vote, you help make change.

If you are wrong and you don't vote, you enable bad things to come about.

Game theory says to vote.

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_Wager

Re: Tell HN: Aaron Swartz's website is offline

#118

Post by chubot »

igneo676 wrote: post #70
soneca wrote: post #20

His post "I hate the news" (0) was(is) very influential for me personally. It was seminal in what become a rather significant change in my habits and view of the world. I am now very conscious that news are entertainment, purely and simply. With the goods and bads of any other entertainment form. From time to time, while explaining my position to others (often seen as kind of radical), I refer this post. I hope it co…

I love the ideas centered around summaries: 1. Weekly 2. Monthly 3. At the end of significant events Is there anything out there that provides this sort of service?

For Hacker News, there's https://www.hackernewsletter.com/

The idea is that instead of reading HN every day, you get an e-mail once a week.

People apparently use it, because one article I wrote was selected for it, and I saw that it drove significant traffic.

I'd like something for the nytimes and similar outlets too.

Re: Tell HN: Aaron Swartz's website is offline

#119

Post by markhalonen »

soneca wrote: post #20

His post "I hate the news" (0) was(is) very influential for me personally. It was seminal in what become a rather significant change in my habits and view of the world. I am now very conscious that news are entertainment, purely and simply. With the goods and bads of any other entertainment form. From time to time, while explaining my position to others (often seen as kind of radical), I refer this post. I hope it co…

I prefer to regard journalists as "pageview collectors"

Re: Tell HN: Aaron Swartz's website is offline

#120

Post by 0xferruccio »

Jaruzel wrote: post #63
0xferruccio wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's my secret stash: - https://www.quantamagazine.org - science-y - https://thebrowser.com - sometimes too intellectual or focused on literature - https://waitbutwhy.com - sometimes too simple - https://www.project-syndicate.org - sometimes written by people that are "talkers/politicians" not "doers" - https://www.gwern.net - The monthly newsletter is great - https://chinai.substack.com - Chinese Papers and AI new…

https://www.quantamagazine.org looks good. Thanks!

you're welcome :)
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