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The death of a public intellectual

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Re: The death of a public intellectual

#221

Post by unixhero »

noelwelsh wrote: post #82
unixhero wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah how so?

I've looked into a few of Huberman's citations and found some very small samples sizes. He makes a big deal of what are a best very small optimizations instead of focusing on the really impactful but boring health advice (eat well, exercise, get enough sleep). This is very common in the health / fitness space, because for most people the basics are all you need and the basics are really basic, but to make bank you ha…

Yeah they are really long. I would say that the flavor of it seems very fact based. So to me not a bad contributor.

Ok I see the point. Thank you.

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#222

Post by migro23 »

Kye wrote: post #213
migro23 wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once I heard Kendi's definition of racism (1) I could no longer take that guy seriously. He is a social justice warrior public intellectual of the post modernist variety leading me to think he is either innocently and unknowningly deluded or an intentional and nefarious grifter profitting from giving apparent credence to the hard left hardliners. A similar role that Jordan Peterson leverages to make a living arguing…

Not knowing anything about him, do you think I should weigh a 2 minute off the cuff answer in a Q&A segment over what I might find in the 320 page book ubermonkey suggested? The framing of the video is plainly and severely biased, so I have to be suspicious about editing and what context or expansion/correction I might find in a longer clip, plus how the framing itself affects my own interpretation. edit: Having read…

Granted a book can contain much more context that might help the author save face but claiming that the "framing of the video is plainly and severely biased" is tenuous. Why? Because the clip was self contained, It contained 1 question "Please give your definition of racism" and 1 answer that was a definition of racism that was self referential.

You could claim he mis-spoke but c'mon, here's a guy who wrote a book about racism, his full time gig is lecturing primarly around the topic of racism in a University and appears all over the place speaking about it. If he cannot give a straight-up coherent definition of racism off the cuff then there is something seriously wrong. My guess is that this compeletely inadequate definition he gave truly reflects how he thinks and frames the topic of racism and articulating it so briefly it highlights how ridiculous it is.

You may disagree with this interpretation and that's fine but claiming the clip is biased is weak because the clip itself is complete, no editing/cutting and contains 1 very simple question and a complete albeit incoherent answer. Indeed the video contains added text but ignore that, just focus on what he (Kendi) says. That should suffice to support my previous comment.

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#223

Post by renlo »

Joker_vD wrote: post #125
michpoch wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you are trying to be a well-rounded person with well-founded opinions on different topics, it makes sense to believe that there are others like you who are further along the way. Maybe that's the issue with me. The more I learn, over years, the more cautious I become about forming an opinion . It's very rare that things are black or white, I can see it being all very grey. So if I see someone describing, with fu…

> It's very rare that things are black or white, I can see it being all very grey Yes, it's much easier to paint the whole world one color than trying to paint it in two colors: you'd have to make distinctions and that's quite hard. But on the other hand, if two colors are not enough to paint the whole world, surely one color is even less enough?

Philosophical dithering; reduce any concept to micro black-and-white distinctions to create the perception of grayscale when viewed in whole

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#224

Post by barrysteve »

bakuninsbart wrote: post #100
michpoch wrote: post #77

> The story goes something like this, I get recommended a clip on YouTube, there’s a man who is calm, articulate, and says something that completely violates the narrative. How fascinating. Is my understanding of the world completely wrong?! I need to read everything this man written. I think author understanding of the world is not wrong, but his approach - definitely. He expects to find some "wise man" who would ha…

If you are trying to be a well-rounded person with well-founded opinions on different topics, it makes sense to believe that there are others like you who are further along the way. Both of your examples have a very strong technical component, either understanding the underlying biology/epidemiology or understanding war theory and practice. It is indeed unlikely that someone is an expert in both. But many important t…

It's not really English to have a 'well-founded' opinion..

Opinions are not based on knowledge or certainty.. they're opinions.

I miss when opinions were a thing you said to get the 'nothing' out and a probative suggestion that started conversations.

Locking opinion down to knowledge and certainty is essentially non-sensical in English.

The old saying was 'opinions are like assholes, everyone's got one'. Perfectly encapsulates how serious opinions are.... not at all serious, by design.

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#225

Post by y0ssar1an »

> First it was Jordan Peterson, then it i was Eric Weinstein, then Chamath, the list goes on. Most recently, it’s been Peter Zeihan.

Man repeatedly falls for the worst "public intellectuals" (really, pretentious charlatans), discovers that they're not trustworthy, and runs to the internet screaming "THE PUBLIC INTELLECTUAL IS DEAD." nah brah, you just have bad tase.

Jordan Peterson -> an incoherent rambler. He's incapable of putting together straightforward premise1-premise2-premise3-->conclusion arguments. If you ask him "how's the weather?", you'll get an hour long brain spew about Ancient Rome, Napoleon, woke feminism, and the worst Holocaust takes you can imagine.

Eric Weinstein -> a narcissist mathematician who came up with a theory of everything, but refused to publish it because real physicists might criticize it and hurt his feelings. He wanted to be recognized as the new Einstein based solely on a video of a talk to a non-physicist audience. His podcasts are mostly rants against the Physics Deep State and Big Science, which he calls the "Distributed Idea Suppression Complex", because they're all in a big conspiracy to suppress his genius ideas.

Chamath -> don't know him.

Peter Zeihan -> just another hyper-caffeinated prognosticator who claims to know the future.

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#226

Post by varnaud »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #63
nerdponx wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, that's precisely why I don't like him, thank you for articulating it so clearly! I want to compel the people around me to speak a certain way, and I have built an identity around that, and Peterson's cutting social commentary shakes me to my core.

Why don't you like him then?

For the things he says. I'd encourage you to look for criticism of him online. He his the obligatory subject of plenty of video essayist on Youtube, it's kind of a meme at this point.

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#227

Post by louwrentius »

virtualritz wrote: post #211

It's noteworthy but sadly not surprising[1], that someone like Peterson is listed as an 'intellectual'. This man talks like ChatGPT when asked to clad a text of the most basic ideas, frequently completely missing the point, into sophisticated-sounding language. The other names tell me nothing; but having the former in the list kept me from looking up the latter. [1] https://www.currentaffairs.org/2018/03/the-intellec…

Jordan Peterson is - according to his own admission - what a dumb person thinks an intellectual sounds like.

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#228

Post by blueflow »

virtualritz wrote: post #211

It's noteworthy but sadly not surprising[1], that someone like Peterson is listed as an 'intellectual'. This man talks like ChatGPT when asked to clad a text of the most basic ideas, frequently completely missing the point, into sophisticated-sounding language. The other names tell me nothing; but having the former in the list kept me from looking up the latter. [1] https://www.currentaffairs.org/2018/03/the-intellec…

95% of times when i hear about Peterson, its someone trying to discredit him. Then i go to Youtube, search for what Peterson said about $topic, and can't find shit that i would even bother about. This stuff is getting creepy. Where is all the dislike coming from?

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#229

Post by alwyn »

BryanLegend wrote: post #215
virtualritz wrote: post #211

It's noteworthy but sadly not surprising[1], that someone like Peterson is listed as an 'intellectual'. This man talks like ChatGPT when asked to clad a text of the most basic ideas, frequently completely missing the point, into sophisticated-sounding language. The other names tell me nothing; but having the former in the list kept me from looking up the latter. [1] https://www.currentaffairs.org/2018/03/the-intellec…

I'm sure I'll get downvoted here, but I think Peterson is brilliant. His books have absolutely given me insightful ideas that have improved my life and relationships.

12 Rules for Life was mostly good, it definitely helped me with some things. I liked his earlier podcasts on JRE and other shows.

However, I couldn't get through Beyond Order at all; I had to drop it fairly early. I think I still like the Peterson from 5-ish years ago. How he currently is, and how he has _mostly_ been for the past 2 years or so does not align with me anymore.

Re: The death of a public intellectual

#230

Post by Kye »

migro23 wrote: post #222
Kye wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not knowing anything about him, do you think I should weigh a 2 minute off the cuff answer in a Q&A segment over what I might find in the 320 page book ubermonkey suggested? The framing of the video is plainly and severely biased, so I have to be suspicious about editing and what context or expansion/correction I might find in a longer clip, plus how the framing itself affects my own interpretation. edit: Having read…

Granted a book can contain much more context that might help the author save face but claiming that the "framing of the video is plainly and severely biased" is tenuous. Why? Because the clip was self contained, It contained 1 question "Please give your definition of racism" and 1 answer that was a definition of racism that was self referential. You could claim he mis-spoke but c'mon, here's a guy who wrote a book ab…

Humans aren't robots. Every prolific public speaker messes up and says something that's complete nonsense while trying to collect the right words. Surely this isn't the first time he's been asked this question on camera if it's such an important part of his persona. Why this clip? If he consistently defines it poorly, that's one thing. I can't take what could be his worst attempt to define it as normal on this clip alone.
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