I really like the article layout of this website. It is something done by OP, or some framework that everyone can use?
How fateful?
171–180 of 343 posts
Re: How fateful?
#172Interesting how sometimes it does not matter. You meet in spacetime. I would not have relationships with my wife, who is subjectively perfect, have we met earlier in our lives. We have discussed this on multiple occasions and the conclusion was definite.
Re: How fateful?
#173i guess the next question is of those 33 recorded instances (or 41.25 possible instances), how many people were around the two of them? if they were literally standing within arms reach of each other, but also within arms reach of a dozen other people, it may not be that interesting if they never connected. but if they were within 5 meters of each other, and there weren't anyone else within a 100 meters of the two of them, that would have been a pretty awful missed connection.
Re: How fateful?
#174When my wife and I combined our photo libraries later in life, we found a photo of the two of us, back-to-back at a ball a few years before we first met.
I spent a week working at the Inmos plant in Colorado Springs in 1989, thousands of miles from where I lived at the time. It turns out I drove past my wife's house every day that week. We didn't meet until 1996.
Re: How fateful?
#175Plot Twist: When google's algorithms decided those two individuals should pair, it started showing them ads for the same events in order to increase the probability of them meeting. The goal was achieved by the system in 3 months, exactly as predicted with a 99% probability with a 95% CI. The system's next goal is to subtly nudge the couple to reproduce within the next year in order to help google meet their user acc…
That's some Black Mirror level dystopia there, and totally within the realm of possibility, if it isn't already happening. Sync that up with Apple Watch 8's ability to estimate ovulation, and poof, declining birth rate problem solved! I'm scared.
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Re: How fateful?
#176> It makes me feel very philosophical. Likely we had walked past each other every other week for three years with our heads down, or in the clouds, paying very little notice to the people around us. Past Channon had not the foggiest clue what impact an unnoticed stranger would come to have on her. Since learning this I can’t help but look at the passers-by in my day-to-day life in a different light. And no shame in g…
I don't really agree, if you sat down and talked with every single person you walked by throughout the day you would meet many people you clicked with, both on a friendship and romantic level. If the author was that outgoing they probably would have met their partner earlier, or she would have found someone she liked better. In other words I don't think who we end up with is some 1 in a million cosmic star aligning m…
I actually think that your comment is probably saying something similar to the above. It potentially is about 1 in 100 as you state, but the timing of it makes it far less likely for 1 in 100 to work out because both people may not actually be mentally or emotionally ready to settle into a monogamous relationship. At least, my own experience has led me to that sort of a worldview.
I've had relationships not work out for varying reasons, including going on vacation 'at the wrong time', or someone's ex visiting the city and making her feel like she can't 'move on' at the moment, stuff like that.
And I went through my own dating phase in which I was less mature and not ready to settle down with many of the people I met. Quite a few of them were perfectly great women with whom I likely could have lasted in a long-term relationship (of course, we can never really know). As I see it, the timing wasn't right, either for me (mostly for me) or for them. It was only after a few years of this that I was in the right mindset to stay with the person I happened to be dating at the time. Sure, that probably doesn't sound great, and I probably won't discuss this at length with my wife, but it's the way I view the world. I'd wager that something like 80% of the people I went on more than three dates with were 'compatible' enough that I'd pursue a relationship with them, but it only worked out long-term with the last one because we were both in the same mindset to give an earnest effort at making our relationship work at the same place and same time.
So, using dumb analogy math, 1/X (compatible person) chance times 1/Y (right timing, maturity, life experience, etc.), it works out to a lower probability 1/(X*Y).
Re: How fateful?
#177Plot Twist: When google's algorithms decided those two individuals should pair, it started showing them ads for the same events in order to increase the probability of them meeting. The goal was achieved by the system in 3 months, exactly as predicted with a 99% probability with a 95% CI. The system's next goal is to subtly nudge the couple to reproduce within the next year in order to help google meet their user acc…
That's some Black Mirror level dystopia there, and totally within the realm of possibility, if it isn't already happening. Sync that up with Apple Watch 8's ability to estimate ovulation, and poof, declining birth rate problem solved! I'm scared.
It's not much scarier than encouraging fertility via the religious apparatus or just traditional social norms
Re: How fateful?
#178Earlier quoted context omitted.
All depends on your threat model. A company openly collecting your data by your say so seems significantly less threatening (to me, to many others) than all the actors who are doing it without your knowledge or consent.
The point is, any / all data collection is - or should be - suspect. Today's benevolent actor is tomorrow's victim of a hack, or simply changes their spots. Furthermore, even data that is positioned as harmless (i.e., phone call metadata) can tell stories. Finally, per "The Age of Surveillance Capitalism" (and others) these minor privacy infringements add up and is used against us. There's no such thing as no threat.
I've concluded that the benefits significantly outweigh the, imo, fairly remote risks. It's that simple.
Re: How fateful?
#179Earlier quoted context omitted.
I took the pragmatic approach and said to myself "look, if Google really wants to know where I am the only way to avoid it is to go into the woods without my phone, so why not?" Then one day the Toronto Transit Commission police thought I was re-using someone elses streetcar fare because of how old it was. I just prefer the streetcar to subways, so I took a longer route. As soon as I pulled out my phone with my locat…
I think it was Isaac Asimov who wrote an article once speculating on a future utopia where there would be total information freedom and transparency - everyone would know everything about everyone's movements. You could see why it would be appealing - how could there be crime if you knew where everyone was at all times? No body could cheat on their spouse, no child would ever go missing. Seems hopelessly naive now of…
> No body could cheat on their spouse
Nobody could cheat secretly. They'd still cheat. The framing story in my favourite comic issue "Winter's Tale" has more or less exactly this be scenario, "I was going to tell you" he says. The people in Winter's Tale and most of that run (Gaiman's Golden Age of Miracleman) live in a utopia, but they're still people and they still cheat and lie. The larger point of the story is that children won't fill a hole in your heart.
Re: How fateful?
#180> It makes me feel very philosophical. Likely we had walked past each other every other week for three years with our heads down, or in the clouds, paying very little notice to the people around us. Past Channon had not the foggiest clue what impact an unnoticed stranger would come to have on her. Since learning this I can’t help but look at the passers-by in my day-to-day life in a different light. And no shame in g…
My husband and I are pretty sure we must have been in the same room at university on various occasions (we knew lots of people in common) but didn't meet until several years after we both left. I'm three years older and was four academic years ahead so think it is a good thing we didn't meet then - I don't think as a PhD student that I would have dated a first-year undergraduate!