That it also changes in time and is not absolute. And also, in many ways, that it does it does not exist (in the sense that the “centre” in one dimension might be correlated with extremes in another)

But left and right aren’t absolute positions, they change in time. E.g. democrats now hold a lot of similar positions to what the republicans held in the 1980s (and also a lot of different ones).

Left and right are also a unidimensional approximation of a multidimensional value space… E.g. most people on the left disagree with nearly everything Marjorie Taylor Greene says, but they agree with her that the US should not be supporting Israel’s war on Iran.

There are also people on the left AND the right that oppose global economic liberalisation, but what is often called the “centre” supports it - clearly not a “middle” stance.

So how can you meaningfully define what is led and what is right, for the purpose of your reading?

Huh, cool. Which ones? And are they also sometimes written as a single character?

Depends how interesting or important or complex the thing is. If you tell me that your foot is 25cm long, I’ll believe you without question. If you tell me it’s 52cm, then you’re going to have a hard time convincing me (unless you’ve already convinced me that you’re a talking kangaroo).

This is why it’s much more important to be skeptical of people’s views on political issues too, because the situations are always complex, and important to different people in different ways.

Things that don’t very much over time, like your height.

How do you define the centre? Do you account for existing wide-spread social biases? E.g. systemic racism, or the neoliberal belief that we can have infinite growth on a finite planet?

Th key?

Yeah. I’ve had this discussing with others in different forms, where they are arguing that words have specific definitions…

I would go even further… My take is that what you said is right, but also, what a given context (like “cooking”) is can be very different for different people… So even in situations where three is really only one meaning for a word (rare, but maybe “broccoli” is an example), the word is understood differently by different people because it has different connotations attached for everyone (e.g. “I love/hate it”, “my grandparent used to cook it badly”).

Word definitions are like the lowest common denominator consensus version of those individual meaning, but they are changing slightly all the time as people change. Dictionaries are just documenting that evolution, but are constantly playing catch-up.

Yeah, I agree. Testing things out is super valuable.

Tbh, I often don’t know how to take poetry… Sometimes I think I value it just because it captures a vibe that is very important, but only at specific times or places. Maybe the world is too complex for anything meaningful to be true in all situations.

linguistic rules override physics pedantry.

Idk why, maybe because I’m a scientist, but this speaks to something in my soul

Where’s the original?

I don’t think it’s saying you should be brash and unsubtle. It’s just saying that you should commit, and give things the energy they deserve. Don’t half-arse things.

I think that can definitely be compatible with subtlety and nuance, if you want it to.

Yeah, good point. I agree that calling-in is better than calling-out, when it seems viable. There’s always the trade-off with how much energy you have available though.

Yes. My point is that everyone is on the spectrum, and a purely rational mode of decision-making does not exist in humans. Every decision has emotional components.

I never said that decisions are purely emotional.

Ah, ignoring evidence because it doesn’t support your pre-existing views. Text-book case of confirmation bias 😊

Oh yeah, I guess. I mostly associate it with actual voting

Yes, but they are inextricably influencing each other. Both are subsets of reality.

What is the value of tolerating trolls?

Guess we know where you sit on the Trolley Problem spectrum :P

This seems distinctly not a leopards eating faces moment?

Weird though… Nice to see them fracturing a bit. Hard to be optimistic though…

edit: horrific autocorrects