201–210 of 284 posts
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To misquote Alan Watts, all other religions are for people that need the Tao explained with too many words.
My favourite version to start with, and even more succinct than the original, is Ron Hogan's https://terebess.hu/english/tao/ron.html then you can move on to fancier translations.
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It is great that Jesus works for you, but you have to separate real-Jesus versus storybook-Jesus. No doubt he lived, but written stories can be elaborated on. For all I know, Jesus could have been the world's first great magician. The world has seen quite a few people in it, some quite remarkable - for which stories have been written. No deity or supernatural abilities need to apply. Words in a book/internet aren't a…
You are right, faith is always needed. Don't fall into a fallacy: just because "no deity or supernatural abilities need to apply" doesn't mean that a deity or supernatural abilities haven't applied. The only honest positions we can take are: I believe / I don't believe.
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> Jesus is not fictional. Strong claims require strong evidence. Some book written by many, some properly delusional or crazy folks, claiming various outlandish things not physically possible these days (staying away from word "lies" but not too far, basic physics laws worked the same 2000 years ago). Or preaching behavior absolutely unacceptable these days (Old testament would force you to be murderer pretty quickly…
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how can you comment on hacker news that you don't consume news?
I'd argue it's mostly trade news here, I'd assume the OP means commercial broadcasting, newspaper websites and the likes. Very different for your psyche in my experience.
The real grift has been in echo chambers changing peoples vocabulary such that we can use the same words but talk right past eachother, allowing extremely moderate positions to be reframed as extreme and making what ought to be minor disagreements unresolvable. People making an "I can see both sides" argument are completely missing the point - the issue is that most people can't see both sides, and even when they go…
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the words we use matter a lot. the "pro" and "anti" anything is a pretty large reason why all discourse has become so stupid sounding and talking with people about any issue is enraging. nuance is dead. the cultural zeitgeist is being controlled by algorithmic feeds that create neuroticism (i am definitely affected), general anxiety, and anger.
My take on this is that persons are great, everyone should know a few. Groups of people on the other hand are, and always have been, genuinely pretty awful in almost every way. IMHO this is down to some really basic primate stuff that's just inevitable. Social media is a big problem because it makes it easier to create groups, and algorithms are a big problem because they essentially take all of the dynamics that wou…
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals and you know it"
A lot of this goes away when you stop spending so much time on social media, which is a very poor reflection of "reality." Part of the problem is that there are a number of people who can't really look away, because they've built their livelihoods on it. Traditional media in many ways has come to rely on it too. Unfortunate mistake. Prominent figures on social media change their minds all the time, but they'll re-scu…
Social media figures aren't changing their mind in the same way, they are changing and optimizing their public performance.
Professional social media is a paid performance. We understand that Tom Cruise is not really a highly skilled jet fighter pilot but a well paid actor playing the role of one. No one cares what Tom Cruise thinks about Ukraine/Russia air defense tactics. This gets hidden in plain sight with social media though and why social media is hyper stupifying.
If all your relationships fail in the same manner, it is likely that the problem is you. > One friend became “convinced” that every major news story was manufactured consent. Another started treating political disagreement as evidence of moral corruption. A third began using the word "liberal" as if it was a personality disorder rather than loose coalitions of sometimes contradictory beliefs. Manufactured consent is…
> But exposing yourself to articulate versions of positions you oppose does something valuable: it makes you realize that intelligent people can disagree with you without being monsters or morons. The idea that being articulate implies intelligence and/or sanity is very common, but really a bit weird. You can find plenty of articulate defences of, say, flat earth theory.
Even with the number of articulate examples like this are far out numbered by the number of inarticulate arguments that the rule still has merit. Exceptions do not make the rule bad.