This week's untied thoughts
Christianity is better than Islam for the same reasons why React.js is better than Angular.js
Vue.js and Angular.js, among others, give you a great deal of structure. They’re opinionated. However, the downside of a system that tells you how to structure your entire app is that it makes it hard to exit and to try something else. The punishment for apostasy in Islam is death. However, both Islam and Christianity share a lot in common. What’s good in Christianity is largely preserved in Islam. The imposition against loaning at interest in Islam can be replicated in Christianity.
There’s also a sense in which Christ sacrificing himself and asking his followers to do the same is also present in React.js. A lot of programmers want to write useful code, and imagine they have to get everything right from the start. React tells you to ignore this instinct, but it can only tell you to do this because it offers a way of writing user interfaces that makes it possible for you to add structure as you go. Often people get into React and assume they need a “state library”. This instinct would be correct if components couldn’t be easily removed, but they are, and should stay that way. That’s the idea.
You don't want to love people who are like you
Some of the deepest relationships you can have are with people who are different from you.
I always assumed that I’d get along with other programmers. No, I actually get along better with people who don’t even share my religion. I love people who aren’t like me, and I’m into whatever it is they do. I assumed I was weird for having this preference, but now I’m pretty sure everyone else is weird.
My argument about homosexuality isn’t that it’s unnatural. Nobody should care about this. We do many unnatural things; that’s not the core problem. The problem is you should be careful next time you like anyone because they’re similar to you.
What does Game-B have to learn from Foucault?
Game-B wants to create a social operating system that can function at the individual level and create people that are more moral and less willing to fight and engage in zero-sum struggles.
However, there’s already one such system. This system is communism. If you have people who have a zero-sum mindset in your society, and you can’t fix them, and can’t beat them down, then the last you can do is to give in to their demands and simply redistribute the goods. Once these goods are redistributed, the zero-sum people have little to do.
Being committed to a lack of commitment
There’s a way in which by not knowing what to do, you know exactly what to do. If you’re sufficiently noncommittal about something, you’re ironically as committed as any can be.
You can turn your lack of commitment into a commitment. If you keep going back and forth about something, maybe it’s sit to turn that question into a project. So if you can’t seem to find the answer to life’s questions, and it bothers you, then you’re a philosopher. This doesn’t imply you’re the next Nietzsche. There are many musicians; only a few make it big.
Can’t figure out what you’d like to eat, what your sleep schedule should be, who you should or shouldn’t be friends with, etc? There’s a place where such decisions need not plague you. What you’re looking for is a monastery / prison.
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The other thing is that if you actually care about truth, you’ll always end up in trouble. You’ll always want to look where you’re not supposed to.
There’s also a way in which you’re more likely to admit you’re wrong if you know you’ll be allowed to keep your position
If I know I’ll be kicked out for being wrong, I’m less likely to change my mind. I’ll double down. You might be confused why I would be so insistent on holding a specific belief, but
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Conservatives against mob rule forget that the structure of any legal system is itself a form of mob rule. It’s the society against the individual. What are rules? Certainly, they are put in place for a reason, but people learn to skirt these rules, and adopt social practices that obey the letter and not the purpose of the law. If, like the healthcare attached to jobs loophole, it’s accepted by society, we stop thinking of it as a loophole. We see the loophole as a fact of life
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The two common frameworks for rearing children are:
raise them up in a structure with good values
Nourish their interests and be the wind on their back
Neither is sufficient. If you focus too much on “rules” and only rules, you end up over making your point. If you focus too much on nourishing your child’s interests, you cause them to grow in the wrong direction, but faster
You wanna be ironic. You encourage their interests, but teach them the importance of foundations as a means of accomplishing their goals. You might help them accomplish dumb goals as long as they understand you’re against these goals. Since kids are resilient, you help them develop wisdom earlier in life when it’s still possible to correct. So you let them make big mistakes, but not irreversibly big mistakes.
But what if the kid is dead set on making the biggest possible mistake?