Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Keep Your Identity Small

paulgraham.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 267 posts

Re: Keep Your Identity Small

#151

Post by mattmaroon »

pg wrote: post #88
irrelative wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just for some context, are people much more religious than when you were a kid? I had figured this was a relatively stable number. Or maybe you were referring to how fervent people have become with their religious views? I'm curious about the actual trend of religiosity, and I'm somewhat skeptical of anecdotal data (for the very reasons in your article). What is the general trend from someone who's been following thi…

are people much more religious than when you were a kid? Yes. It was very noticeable when I went back to Pittsburgh recently. When I was a kid, people went to church, but it didn't spill over into everyday life. They did it more as a matter of form. Now people's conversation is filled with religious references. Someone who 30 years ago would have said "we have two children" now says "we've been blessed with two child…

If you believe the small smattering of polls cited in this Wikipedia article people have actually become less religious over the last 10 years:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_the_United_States#B...

They moved from 94% believing in God to 73%. Might just be the small sample or differences in questions asked though.

Re: Keep Your Identity Small

#152

Post by danielrhodes »

pg wrote: post #88
irrelative wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just for some context, are people much more religious than when you were a kid? I had figured this was a relatively stable number. Or maybe you were referring to how fervent people have become with their religious views? I'm curious about the actual trend of religiosity, and I'm somewhat skeptical of anecdotal data (for the very reasons in your article). What is the general trend from someone who's been following thi…

are people much more religious than when you were a kid? Yes. It was very noticeable when I went back to Pittsburgh recently. When I was a kid, people went to church, but it didn't spill over into everyday life. They did it more as a matter of form. Now people's conversation is filled with religious references. Someone who 30 years ago would have said "we have two children" now says "we've been blessed with two child…

Sometimes I wonder if our perceptions of things are different because we have easier access to information/people or whether things truly are more widespread than before.

For example, are there really as many Evangelicals and fundamentalist Christians as it seems, or do they just sound louder because they are broadcasting on more channels?

It is often times the case that people/groups with less power or advantage are louder since they are trying to draw more attention and have less to lose in doing so. But for those not well informed, that loudness translates into legitimacy even though it can indicate exactly the opposite. PETA comes to mind as an example.

Re: Keep Your Identity Small

#153

Post by gjm11 »

bokonist wrote: post #39
gabrielroth wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would that happen? Just because the two fields have certain things in common doesn't mean they're indistinguishable.

Actually, the two are much closer than you think. All major religions achieved their growth and status by becoming the ideological arm of state power. Both politics and religion are fundamentally about how people think about the rulers.

"All major religions achieved their growth and status by becoming the ideological arm of state power." I wonder whether that's true. Because it seems hard to distinguish from this: "All major religions, because of their growth and status, acquired state power which fuelled their further growth."

To distinguish between the two, we'd want to look for religions that (presumably by good luck) got significant state power before they became widespread. Someone who knows more history than me may have more clue here, but the only example I can think of is that of the pharaoh Ankh-en-aten (= Akhnaten), who basically tried to introduce monotheism into ancient Egypt, with scarcely any success after the end of his reign. That's hardly conclusive, but it seems like evidence for the hypothesis that widespread belief matters more than state power in getting a religion off the ground.

Re: Keep Your Identity Small

#154

Post by cunard3 »

I think that for myself identity got formed by a progression of feeling-states informed by listening, writing, and learning. I can't feel proactively. I feel re actively and am formed. I think these feelings are like polarized or fissile material. The big polarized feelings get shaped by reading and listening.(by great books, for instance) Without identity, would a person have any motivation to act, is my question. I've tried hard not to be co-opted by isms or identity politics, but to participate, to have passion, you rely on the polarized core. Or at least, I do. In starting a business, or doing something for myself that takes passionate intensity I have always had to take a leap of faith. The faith is in myself and in the direction my inner polarized identity seems to be taking me. This is akin to what startup advocates mean when they say:"I couldn't have worked that hard for that long if it was only about the money." I agree with keeping a close eye on what you allow into your identity. keeping it small is a Tauist ideal that I find doesn't gibe with real life sometimes. Ego and pride can be really useful. Ghandi had an ego, as did MLK. It's a high ideal to be and to remain an uncarved block. A very high standard. Confucianism has sort of displaced the Tau in general society. I think because rules make it possible for people with all kinds of identities to make agreements and find ways of going forward.

Any takers for the idea of identity being required for motivation?

Re: Keep Your Identity Small

#155

Post by whacked_new »

Create wrote: post #139

I think pg is entirely missing the point: it isn't about identity. It is about [exercising] power, and its subjects. Identity, like technology (mentioned javascript) is just a tool for it. He might like http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/2733964 (it is available in several languages) -- it explains the obvious: religious wars are in fact not about religion, neither identity. To most, even believing people, it does no…

pg is not missing the point.

Protecting the identity is an act of securing one's control, and hence, power, and sense of survival fitness. Furthermore, groups sharing common identity strengthen the feeling of kinship, and hence again, stronger control. This is an evolutionary psychology interpretation (in which this topic has been discussed to great depths).

Notice that below a puberty it's much harder to find polarized arguments like the "wars" we talk about. One may argue that mental development is one reason, but another factor, closely related to development, is that at this age the brain is still highly malleable, and the identity is weak. A kid could argue vehemently about a particular idea (note this is different from preference, as in food). It is entirely plausible that if you get their parents and friends to influence them you could turn the entire idea around in a short time.

Not so with adults. They'd simply leave the premises and find people who agree.

That isn't to say you are wrong -- but that what you seem to think is an entirely different idea from what pg wrote is actually quite similar.

Re: Keep Your Identity Small

#157

Post by forsaken »

This is the same idea that is expressed in the concept of bike shedding on software projects. It comes up when naming things and other simple tasks.

When everyone thinks that they can have an opinion, then discussion degenerates into simple "mine is better than yours", same with politics and religion. Same with Vi and Emacs. Same with get_items() or retrieve_notes().

Look on some mailing lists for conversations over naming things for some good examples.

http://groups.google.com/group/django-developers/browse_thre...

Re: Keep Your Identity Small

#159

Post by dragos_stefan »

A wonderful essay and truly a joy to read. This is very close to some stuff that I read in Gurdjieff's writings some time ago, and it's the first time I see the concept of "identification as a bad thing" outside of those writings. Thanks for this insightful take on a very interesting subject for me.
Post reply on HN