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Love after life: Richard Feynman's letter to his departed wife (2017)

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Re: Love after life: Richard Feynman's letter to his departed wife (2017)

#111

Post by nuancebydefault »

andyjohnson0 wrote: post #20
the_af wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In addition to your comment, what I find mind-boggling is how easily people swing between the two extremes of opinion: it seems every public figure must either be adored and admired, or reviled and ostracized. People (myself included, I don't exclude myself from being human!) do not want to contemplate public figures as complex individuals with dark and bright aspects. It's always all or nothing. So Woody Allen went…

> People cannot bear the thought that artists, scientists and public figures in general are real people, with flaws and all. Possibly related to the Fundamental Attribution Error in psychology: "The fundamental attribution error (also known as correspondence bias or over-attribution effect) is the tendency for people to over-emphasize dispositional or personality-based explanations for behaviors observed in others wh…

I wonder if this deterministic labeling of persons as good/evil as a whole is what Nietsche meant with "slave morality"?

Re: Love after life: Richard Feynman's letter to his departed wife (2017)

#112

Post by nuancebydefault »

NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #24
the_af wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In addition to your comment, what I find mind-boggling is how easily people swing between the two extremes of opinion: it seems every public figure must either be adored and admired, or reviled and ostracized. People (myself included, I don't exclude myself from being human!) do not want to contemplate public figures as complex individuals with dark and bright aspects. It's always all or nothing. So Woody Allen went…

> So Woody Allen went from being an adored auteur to someone who not only was declared guilty of a horrible crime in public opinion, but also people felt entitled to declare his cinema was never good to begin with To enjoy entertainment of anyone not a saint makes you a bad person. And I want to state emphatically for the record I am a good person. I believe in all the right things, and disbelieve all the wrong ones.…

If I understand what you wrote correctly, you only enjoy entertainment of saints? Also, when you find out later they are not, you will change your opinion?

It feels a bit off to me. People are not good or bad. First of all what is good or bad depends on culture/geography. Second, every person has many good and bad treats according to any culture.

Re: Love after life: Richard Feynman's letter to his departed wife (2017)

#113

Post by jacquesm »

Dig1t wrote: post #101
reducesuffering wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Didn't do anything wrong" is sleeping with married woman and saying in his autobiography: > those bar girls are all bitches, that they aren’t worth anything > I’m not going to be a gentleman to such worthless bitches > I think to myself, “Typical bitch" > I stop suddenly and I say to her, “You… are worse than a WHORE!" Ya, it's just our puritanical culture...

Anything sounds bad if you take sentences out of context. Read the rest of chapter and pages leading up to this part. He talks about how he struggled getting back into dating after his wife died and initially he tried dating very chivalrously, being kind and buying drinks for ladies. He found that most women would take his free drinks and ditch him. The lines you quoted from his book are about his mental shift, and a…

> He found that most women would take his free drinks and ditch him.

If the option to ditch him wasn't there then the drinks weren't really free, were they? It sounds more like him buying someone a drink came with expectations attached.

Re: Love after life: Richard Feynman's letter to his departed wife (2017)

#114

Post by NoMoreNicksLeft »

nuancebydefault wrote: post #112
NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So Woody Allen went from being an adored auteur to someone who not only was declared guilty of a horrible crime in public opinion, but also people felt entitled to declare his cinema was never good to begin with To enjoy entertainment of anyone not a saint makes you a bad person. And I want to state emphatically for the record I am a good person. I believe in all the right things, and disbelieve all the wrong ones.…

If I understand what you wrote correctly, you only enjoy entertainment of saints? Also, when you find out later they are not, you will change your opinion? It feels a bit off to me. People are not good or bad. First of all what is good or bad depends on culture/geography. Second, every person has many good and bad treats according to any culture.

> Also, when you find out later they are not, you will change your opinion?

Hardly. I always knew they weren't saints, and always disliked them for being Nazis.

Bad people can't be talented or skilled. If they were, it would be as if the universe was condoning their behavior.

Re: Love after life: Richard Feynman's letter to his departed wife (2017)

#115

Post by dang »

Related. Others?

Love After Life: Richard Feynman’s Letter to His Departed Wife (2017) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24204678 - Aug 2020 (1 comment)

Richard Feynman's Extraordinary Letter to His Departed Wife - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19280764 - March 2019 (12 comments)

Feynman's Letter to His Wife - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10375283 - Oct 2015 (60 comments)

Richard Feynman’s Love Letter to His Wife Sixteen Months After Her Death - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7893757 - June 2014 (1 comment)

Re: Love after life: Richard Feynman's letter to his departed wife (2017)

#116

Post by the_af »

nuancebydefault wrote: post #112
NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So Woody Allen went from being an adored auteur to someone who not only was declared guilty of a horrible crime in public opinion, but also people felt entitled to declare his cinema was never good to begin with To enjoy entertainment of anyone not a saint makes you a bad person. And I want to state emphatically for the record I am a good person. I believe in all the right things, and disbelieve all the wrong ones.…

If I understand what you wrote correctly, you only enjoy entertainment of saints? Also, when you find out later they are not, you will change your opinion? It feels a bit off to me. People are not good or bad. First of all what is good or bad depends on culture/geography. Second, every person has many good and bad treats according to any culture.

You are in agreement with the comment you're replying to.

The commenter is using irony to make a point.

Re: Love after life: Richard Feynman's letter to his departed wife (2017)

#117

Post by Dig1t »

jacquesm wrote: post #113
Dig1t wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anything sounds bad if you take sentences out of context. Read the rest of chapter and pages leading up to this part. He talks about how he struggled getting back into dating after his wife died and initially he tried dating very chivalrously, being kind and buying drinks for ladies. He found that most women would take his free drinks and ditch him. The lines you quoted from his book are about his mental shift, and a…

> He found that most women would take his free drinks and ditch him. If the option to ditch him wasn't there then the drinks weren't really free, were they? It sounds more like him buying someone a drink came with expectations attached.

He specifically says in the paragraph OP is quoting from that he would ask them outright for verbal agreement that they would sleep with him later before he bought them drinks. If he got consent before anyone drank anything, what exactly is the problem?

Re: Love after life: Richard Feynman's letter to his departed wife (2017)

#118

Post by Dig1t »

reducesuffering wrote: post #106
Dig1t wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anything sounds bad if you take sentences out of context. Read the rest of chapter and pages leading up to this part. He talks about how he struggled getting back into dating after his wife died and initially he tried dating very chivalrously, being kind and buying drinks for ladies. He found that most women would take his free drinks and ditch him. The lines you quoted from his book are about his mental shift, and a…

> but nobody was hurt You actually have zero idea who or how people were hurt because this is one side from Feynman. It's bad for the same reason that a goal of making lots of new friends and then backstabbing them is bad. Sure, it can be highly successful to making new friends. Not so long term beneficial, friendly, or moral though...

He said that he would get verbal agreement to sleep together before buying drinks.

How is getting consent to have sex and then later having sex equivalent to stabbing a friend in the back? I don’t understand the analogy.

Unless you think one-night stands are morally wrong, I don’t really see any problems with his actions.

Re: Love after life: Richard Feynman's letter to his departed wife (2017)

#119

Post by jacquesm »

Dig1t wrote: post #117
jacquesm wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He found that most women would take his free drinks and ditch him. If the option to ditch him wasn't there then the drinks weren't really free, were they? It sounds more like him buying someone a drink came with expectations attached.

He specifically says in the paragraph OP is quoting from that he would ask them outright for verbal agreement that they would sleep with him later before he bought them drinks. If he got consent before anyone drank anything, what exactly is the problem?

And you actually believe that (1) this one sided story is the truth and that (2) even if it is that verbal agreement is enough in a case like this? I'd expect the vast majority of the people that you made such an offer to to treat it as a joke and if it wasn't to teach you an object lesson in what is and what isn't a binding offer. To treat this as a study in contract law is weirding me out on multiple levels at once, Feynman's, and those that think this is a normal interaction between people. Revolting, really.

Re: Love after life: Richard Feynman's letter to his departed wife (2017)

#120

Post by scotty79 »

pyuser583 wrote: post #102
growingkittens wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you remember what paper in particular? I would like to read the study about rates of false abuse accusations in areas with strict divorce laws.

I doubt you’re to find good statistics on domestic abuse in the 1950s.

I wouldn't be surprised if they were only slightly higher than modern ones. Humans historically become less violent but it's very gradual.
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