1003 Frustration

Tuesday, December 05, 2006

Well, I found another way to avoid the "to do" list. I've been reading through The Dilbert Blog.

Scott Adams, it turns out, is (or was) a Mensan. He writes about his shock when he met Mensans in a group in a November 2006 entry. I'm not going to attempt to find the specific link right now, but if you go to the link above, then to the archives for November, then "find in this page" and search for "Mensa", you can read it if you like.

He uses words like loser, and dress like street people, and incapable of managing their own lives, but then he says that the most amazing and wonderful thing is that "you don't have to explain anything twice".

Yeah. I have to give them that. Most Mensans "get it" the first time. (Except for the occasional speed limit-challenged nuclear physicist, that is. And a few others with very narrow focus.) Not only do they get it, but in general they understand where you're coming from. You can float a preposterous idea just to see where it goes without someone picking the details to pieces. They'll accept that it's preposterous, then play with it anyway, and they'll understand that you don't really believe or espouse this stuff. Or if you do believe it, they'll understand "thinking out loud", as opposed to a fully formed philosophy. You can use examples that don't quite fit, and they'll see what does fit and ignore the details for the sake of argument, or try to come up with a better-fitting example. If you present a proposition at a very high level, they'll stay at the high level before delving into details, understanding that you need to build the scaffold before laying bricks.

In other words, they'll see where you're coming from, understand where you are, and help you to get to where you're going.

Mostly.

That's pretty rare.

I've also been reading the comments in Scott's blog. He gets very philosophical and has some less than popular opinions, and he gets over 400 comments on an average entry. I don't know how he can stand it, unless he simply doesn't read the comments.

As illustrated in Scott's blog's comments, people in general just don't "get it". Many simply miss the point of the exercise. Or they pick one tiny detail and chew it to bits. Or instead of seeing what part of a random example fits, they tear the example apart. They don't seem to understand that it's not the details or the examples that are important, they may or may not fit, it's not the way it's explained, that may or may not be well done, it's the CONCEPT. Look at the CONCEPT, people!

Comments like he gets would frustrate me. I'd want to respond, to try to explain it a different way, to try to get through to people. I can't stand being misunderstood.

When I read his argument against the existence of free will, I understood exactly what he meant - that a person's decisions are determined by physics and chemistry, by existing conditions and states, that we are simply "moist robots" and have no more free will than a programmed electronic robot. I understand and fully agree with his argument. 100%. We do not have entirely free will. At least not as he defines it.

Then I exercised my own free will and decided to go get a cup of tea. I didn't have to, I could have decided not to get a cup of tea. The problem with his argument is not that I may or may not have gone for the tea - it's in the definition of "free will". There are degrees of "free". Most of his commenters missed that distinction. I got very annoyed with all the people who told him he was nuts because "of course" they can make free will decisions. They didn't even think about why a particular decision was made. Idiots.

I am reminded of that housewife at the baby shower in 1976, who declared that she couldn't understand and didn't need "this feminism stuff", because, after all, "My husband lets me do anything I want." It would have been useless to attempt to explain to her what was wrong with that statement.

I guess some people never learn to fly.
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