I find often the people who disagree with me the strongest can also go toe-to-toe with me in finding stories and evidence that confirms our beliefs and if I remember (and have the courage), I try to go deeper to talk about how I'm feeling afraid of this, this, and this, angry about this and this, ashamed of this, and so on, and try to imagine how they might be feeling across those contexts, and more often than not, realize we're both two humans trying our best. But goodness I can avoid going there sometimes, and if I do get there, it can be after a long long discussion with someone, and sometimes one or both of us gives up before we get to that point.

HNs rules are great in this sense, to continuously seek out curious conversations instead of the rather solipsist tendency to soapbox.

Now with politics and politicians this a much harder pill to swallow, because their literal job these days is to stand on a soapbox, and we as the public have gotten rather used to it, and voting in those who do the soapbox act the best. This is also because in general it’s hard to choose politicians beyond the local who we can relate to, and be invested in beyond retoric.

As much as I love this:

> HNs rules are great in this sense, to continuously seek out curious conversations instead of the rather solipsist tendency to soapbox.

I also just thought how HN may contribute to this through design. I'm replying to your post right now and I can only see your post on my screen. While I can click "parent" in the menu to see the chain of replies or "context" to see your post in the context of all the replies, I'm not able to see both a reply box and the context before your post on the same page.

So, it requires me to either keep in working memory what the parent said, and what the grandparent said and great grandparent, or maybe to have a multitabbed approach. Conversely, something like Discourse allows me to scroll up and down to see the previous posts while maintaining a compose window open.

Maybe this isn't the place for such a comment, I guess I just felt frustrated in another thread and worried I'd give a reply that either repeated what someone said before or didn't encapsulate the conversation.

I think these little details really matter in communication and how we often overlook them or discount them.

edit: Also, I'm not sure what you meant by "About Face," will you explain it more?

edit2: I think you meant this: https://www.invisionapp.com/inside-design/about-face-essenti...

— Ronald Reagan

I wish. And sometimes they do.

But there are lots and lots of people who have various religious/ideological dogmas. They do not show their kid the scientific method - they preach their truth to them. Because they feel they are right.

E.g. who do I love, what should I wear/watch/eat, where should I spend my money, etc.

Our culture has now taught a few generations that people get to decide their own truth, and they conflate preference for truth, and now we are witnessing what this means…

Ok, my feelings of love are not guided by a scientific method (except analyzing and reflect on what I feel).

But by deciding what to wear, eat, watch etc. I do apply the scientific method. Meaning I test out systematically, what works best for me. And I try to teach this to my children.

If it looks cold outside, but not too cold - I have the idea that a medium warm jacket of mine is enough. And then outside I see if it was adequate or not and next time under similar conditions I change accordingly, or go back to the house that instant.

Sounds like common sense and it is. But not everyone is doing it.

I seriously got shocked by people telling me, they walk in shoes hurting them, but they did so because of style. This sounds like insanity to me, even though I know in their specific setting it makes some sense - as style is important in their circles. But that just means those circles are far from science and rationality, if it leads to people wearing clothes not adequate for the weather and being cold and uncomfortable.

Determining what to optimize for is basically what preference is. Some prefer attractiveness and aesthetics over comfort, and in most cases there is no option that optimizes all variables due to complex cross talk…

After you choose which subjective preference to optimize for, you can definitely employ the scientific method to try to parse that further, but that comes after the preference:)

I think I can apply the scientific method also to preferences. Meaning if it really makes me happy, to be accepted in certain circles where the conditions are bad shoes, then so be it.

But personally I decided years ago, that this is not the case for me.

https://davidgoggins.com/book/

And people usually look at me strangely when I wear just a light jacket, when they look like Inuit.

But I would never intentionally wear shoes that do not fit right. There is no benefit in that - but it rather can mess up your whole body.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE3j_RHkqJc