Re: Fwd: Re: Odd...

On Tuesday 23 September 2003 11:05 pm, Aaron J. Seigo wrote:
> apparently unlike you, i prefer to have actual facts to work with rather
> than limited circumstantial evidence and conjecture before i make sweeping
> statements.

Circumstantial evidence and conjecture have served me remarkably well in the 
past ;). Although I agree no jury would convict.

> actually, i'm not interested in arguing whether or not this was a MDK issue
> any further, since not only do we lack the data to carry on such an
> argument , but i think there's a much more interesting topic here: how and
> why people reach (often spurious) conclusions.

Sounds fun. Let's do that.
Although I don't agree my conclusion was spurious. Undersubstantiated, but not 
spurious.

Although, I guess you weren't referring specifically to any particular 
spurious conclusion.

> On Tuesday 23 September 2003 03:40, Daniel Cassidy wrote:
> > Aaron J. Siego wrote:
> > > humans do have a tendency to take input and form its interpretation upon
> > > the template of past experience. perhaps something similar is happening
> > > here?
> >
> > Umm, I believe that the common term for what you are describing is
> > 'wisdom'. So I will take this as a compliment.
>
> wisdom is one possible good aspect of this learning behaviour; superstition
> and prejudice are some of the possible negative aspects of this learning
> mechanism.

Umm, superstition is based more on the fact that people have a tendency, 
especially when young, to accept the word of those they perceive as their 
superiors without question. Much like religion, which is pretty much a 
synonym.

Oh, I do love a good stab at an unrelated topic. :)

Oh, and prejudice is based more on xenophobia than anything, at least IMO.

(And no, a dislike for Mandrake does not count as a 'prejudice', since I am 
basing my dislike on my experiences with that particular distribution. A 
dislike of Mandrake based on my dislike of Lindows *would* be a prejudice. 
(Yes, I am aware that you never suggested I was prejudiced, but I thought I'd 
knock down that comparison before someone thought of it.))

I don't seriously believe that what you describe is a major contributor to 
either problem. Indeed, information becomes pretty useless unless you have 
some past information ('experience') against which to compare, categorise and 
interpret.

> my statement wasn't meant to be either a compliment or an insult, but
> rather a description of a human learning mode that often leads us to
> abandon more scientific (and often more useful) methods of discovery in
> lieu of simply drawing conclusions out of thin air, often without even
> realizing we're doing that...

Umm.

1. Product A doesn't work as expected on system with hardware configuration X.
2. Product doesn't work as expected on system with hardware configuration Y.
3. Product is advertised as working on certain systems including those with 
hardware configurations X or Y.
=> Product A is faulty.

Spot the non sequitir.

> we justify it by creating plausible stories based on what we have perceived
> around us in the past, and rely on the comfort that brings to make up for
> the lack of hard evidence. politicians, scam artists and IT industry
> "analysts" often rely on this tendency.

Except that said individuals tend to have their arguments fall down when laid 
out as above.

> > > in any case, i fail to see how the fact that you have had problems with
> > > MDK makes any difference to the fact that many people, including Andy
> > > and myself, have and continue to use MDK to great success.
> >
> > It doesn't. But the reverse is also true.
>
> ROFL.. no shit, sherlock. you stated the reverse in your email, the one i
> was replying to. in fact, i used the same wording you did hoping the reader
> would recognize that and realize the turnabout concept... or is this just
> where i'm supposed to say, "oh yeah! well the reverse of the reverse is
> also true!" ? ;-)

Actually, I just wondered how long I could keep talking without contributing 
to the discussion in any way :)

-- 
Dan.

DISCLAIMER: Please do not take my statements wildly out of context and 
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