Zink

We need a standard high school class that is some kind of intro to epistemology, how to study something scientifically, how to root out bias, and maybe even a little on logical fallacies.

How many high school grads are even aware of the concept of confirmation bias?

I fear we as a collective society are just so, so bad about knowing how to find the correct answer to something. Despite all the technology at our fingertips, so many people learn things the same way humans have for centuries: somebody I trust told me!

Is the memory of voters really so poor?

How are we supposed to avoid repeating the mistakes of history when the voting public can’t even remember why they scrambled to get out and vote for Biden 4 years ago?

I mean, if Harris lost to somebody like Romney or McCain, sure I could see that voters weren’t excited by the campaign plus the racism/sexism angle. But to just ignore how absolutely insane Trump was as President, and all the open messaging about how next time will be worse, never mind all the criminal and traitorous stuff… it’s insane.

Well the good news is that the probability of such a program happening has gone up.

The bad news is that you are disqualified if you have all your teeth or any kind of college degree.

Your first paragraph isn’t even an exaggeration. The worst part for me about being around conservative relatives and acquaintances is the negativity. They are addicted to anger and outrage and jealousy. They are always complaining about something or talking about things that other people have or how much money they make.

Eh, I’m not interested in supporting them, but the code is free and open source. I’m using a client written by not-them, to connect to a server run by not-them, and reading federated content from dozens of other servers run by not-them.

I appreciate the reply. Thanks for the discussion!

He cheated before the 2016 election by committing dozens of felonies, and we were unable to sentence him before the 2024 election. Sad.

I ‘member when the reality distortion field was just a Steve Jobs and Apple thing.

We were such sweet innocent summer children.

Oh yeah I get that. The disbelief and disappointment are off the charts for me.

But to continue my train of thought, what’s worked well for my mental state is to give myself permission to focus on the small scale and those close to me rather than (justifiably) dwelling on the fucked up state of society at large.

So instead of worrying about whether society is worth saving, I worry about whether my own sanity is worth saving, and by extension whether it is worth trying to have a happy and fulfilling life. And that’s not just being selfish. It’s equivalent to putting on your own oxygen mask on an airplane before you help others. With my head on straight, I can help improve the lives of those around me, and that is not only worth it but feeds back into making my own life and mental state better.

And from time to time I also like to remind myself about how insane it is that we even exist, that clouds of matter formed billions of years ago in supernovae were able to coalesce and form self-aware brains. It just makes me more interested in learning about existence and the universe.

And when I point that attitude towards the fucked up things in society and the world, it certainly doesn’t make those things better. I think about how I am watching significant history being written, and I can at least be an engaged witness even if I can’t change the course of that history. Though I do try where I can, and of course vote accordingly.

When I have gone through this thought process lately, I’ve concluded that even if I plan my life in the most cold robotic way possible, my mental health and general well-being are at their best when I am compassionate towards those around me.

So first you must ask yourself what your true goal is. Do you want to “win” some shallow materialistic version of life? Or do you want to help others, or just be happy regardless of what it takes? Then that helps inform later decisions.

My automatic assumption has always been that saving everything, retiring early, and being a recluse was my path to a happy existence. It’s just what I felt I wanted to do. I bet I’m not alone there.

But then I had the great luck to have COVID come around and fuck up my career and finances in a few different ways. Now I’m stable again at work and my finances are a disaster, but I’ve waded through so much shit mentally that even though big retirement account balances feel great, that’s not what creates real joy, contentment, and even optimism.

…In my brain anyway. It’s like we all have slightly different owners manuals but we don’t get a copy of it and have to reverse-engineer it. In my case I had some things I cared about a lot get torn away, but I still had my family, and I realized that without that stuff that got taken away I was still the same person and was just fine. That definitely flipped a switch or two. Well, that and a grueling couple years dialing in medications, lol. Anything that helps!

Confirmation bias is a hell of a drug

You are giving way too much of a pass to a lot of evil people and their propaganda by blaming it only on the voters.

I’m not completely disagreeing with you though. I’m a white dude in America too and the ignorance and gullibility of many of our citizens is astounding.