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The death of a public intellectual

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Re: The death of a public intellectual

#131

Post by scruple »

formerly_proven wrote: post #121
farias0 wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is an obviously wrong approach. There are plenty of intelligent people out there, this doesn't keep them from being occasionally wrong. If you have access to the opinion of people who devoted their whole lives to the field in question, why would you seek it from an influencer that perhaps gained fame from being an authority in a couple of non-related fields?

In the last couple years there was more than ample opportunity to see how badly this approach fails, you have droves of these "public intellectuals" as TFA calls them for every crisis (COVID, energy crisis, russian wars, gaza etc.) and almost all of them are just Average Joes dishing out their BBQ-level hot takes in public. Remember all the math and physics PhDs in 2020 suddenly being genius experts on disease modell…

Yes. This was prominent when Russia invaded Ukraine. It was as if millions of people woke and decided, "I'm tired of being an infectious disease expert. Starting today, I'm a military intelligence expert!"

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#132

Post by justanotherjoe »

justanotherjoe wrote: post #130

Im no longer catholic, but i use Jesus as a comparison to thrse figures. It's what i call the jesus principle: "Would jesus have this many things to say?" Jesus was 'the son of god' and yet he didn't have that much to say when it comes down to it. Really. When you compile all the things he said, without duplication, it would probably fit in a one hour podcast. Now, take joe rogan's guest. Let's say Alex Honnold. He l…

im explaining it poorly. What i mean is that the principle is "if jesus didn't have that much to say,who is this guy that he talks for thousands of hours?"

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#133

Post by Almondsetat »

justanotherjoe wrote: post #132
justanotherjoe wrote: post #130

Im no longer catholic, but i use Jesus as a comparison to thrse figures. It's what i call the jesus principle: "Would jesus have this many things to say?" Jesus was 'the son of god' and yet he didn't have that much to say when it comes down to it. Really. When you compile all the things he said, without duplication, it would probably fit in a one hour podcast. Now, take joe rogan's guest. Let's say Alex Honnold. He l…

im explaining it poorly. What i mean is that the principle is "if jesus didn't have that much to say,who is this guy that he talks for thousands of hours?"

Yours is a bad example. Jesus said that the old law was still valid, which means that in fact you have to study the entire OT to get the full message. He just left it to the reader as an exercise

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#135

Post by justanotherjoe »

Almondsetat wrote: post #133
justanotherjoe wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

im explaining it poorly. What i mean is that the principle is "if jesus didn't have that much to say,who is this guy that he talks for thousands of hours?"

Yours is a bad example. Jesus said that the old law was still valid, which means that in fact you have to study the entire OT to get the full message. He just left it to the reader as an exercise

That's my point though. He didn't need to say it again cause he wouldnt add anything to it.

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#136

Post by anymouse123456 »

Jensson wrote: post #47
nerdponx wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but, one would think after spending even a couple of minutes with Jordan Peterson's corpus of output that maybe we shouldn't venerate people who happen to say one or two things that we find interesting.

Jordan Petersen talks a lot about life being a struggle and how to get through it and make the most of it. A lot of that resonates strongly in many people, it isn't something you would find faults in after watching a few minutes. And that is within his field of expertise so it makes sense that those points are pretty good. The problem is when Jordan Petersen starts to talk about other things than that, like politics,…

For me at least, there's a question as to, "which Jordan Peterson?"

There is the guy you just described, who existed before his year(s?) long struggle with addiction, and then there is the apparently (to me at least) bitter, resentful and angry man who returned after.

Since his return, his expressions, language, positions (and even clothing) have taken on a darker, angrier tone and there's a lot less hope in what I've seen.

For me, this makes this individual different from some others who may fade away over some of issues cited in the article, but remain essentially the same person.

His personality and message changed after a deep and difficult struggle.

I'm not trying to criticize or defend the man, just raising the issue that he may be different from some others in the list.

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#137

Post by seydor »

Popularity is not a good filter for importance, especially about future importance. In old times, editors would decide what gets popular, now algorithms do and they are quite dumb and don't take risks.

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#138

Post by anymouse123456 »

eBombzor wrote: post #4

Reminds me of Huberman.

Yah. This guy sends my bullshit detector into overdrive after just a few seconds.

Can't stand the smug certainty he throws off while describing some ridiculous molecular interaction that he clearly knows nothing about, because no one does.

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#139

Post by Almondsetat »

justanotherjoe wrote: post #135
Almondsetat wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yours is a bad example. Jesus said that the old law was still valid, which means that in fact you have to study the entire OT to get the full message. He just left it to the reader as an exercise

That's my point though. He didn't need to say it again cause he wouldnt add anything to it.

You are again making a mistake. Jesus didn’t have to add much because it was implicit that everything written in the OT was the truth.

Unfortunately if you don’t believe in Christianity there is no book or philosopher that has told the whole “truth” about the universe, so any new kid on the block might indeed have many things to say

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#140

Post by badcppdev »

Almondsetat wrote: post #133
justanotherjoe wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

im explaining it poorly. What i mean is that the principle is "if jesus didn't have that much to say,who is this guy that he talks for thousands of hours?"

Yours is a bad example. Jesus said that the old law was still valid, which means that in fact you have to study the entire OT to get the full message. He just left it to the reader as an exercise

Well imho you have to study the OT in the light of his new message. If you're a Christian then your priority is the message of Christ which seems quite broad and sweeping in a good way. And therefore contradicts all the intolerant teachings from the OT.

(Disclaimer: not a Christian. Constantly amazed at people who have faith)

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