The podcast If Books Could Kill manages to stumble on a fair amount of overlap between "power of positive thinking" / "The Secret" crap, and right wing politics in the books they review.
The sheer volume of "woo" and positive affirmation manifestation among my friends is vastly higher on the left side of the spectrum than the right.
Perhaps it's more to do with extreme personalities and wishful thinking.
That stuff is mostly harmless speculation/belief, and isn't equivalent to outright denying reality and seeking 'alternate facts'.
How conservative was DOGE's effort to save money. The story was conservative but the actions were radical.
I wouldn't equate conservatism with the flat earth crowd. I would equate the current majority closer to flat earthers than Columbus.
This is snark but also genuine, so far in my life I've seen a lot of different things called conservative...
I would also say that honoring the status quo is a finer more nuanced definition. The status quo is not that bad. Understanding one's actions might affect the status quo I think is a central conservative value.
I'm not sure why you feel the notion of conservatism has a hierarchy of goals. I see it as a simple idea that can be applied to almost any effort. Like any tool it can be applied in detrimental ways.
I believe absolute opinions on conservatism probably miss a lot of nuance.
Finally I think that arguments that conservatism is dangerous are mostly based on the fact that many people are making bad decisions and they are paying lip service to conservatism.
I'll tell you what...you stand on the shoulders of people who literally instigated and fought for change, and certainly didn't fight or work to keep a status quo that still had so many problems.
> I'm not sure why you feel the notion of conservatism has a hierarchy of goals.
Where did you get that from?
> Finally I think that arguments that conservatism is dangerous are mostly based on the fact
Like it or lump it, in the US at least, it is linked to people that do have dangerous attitudes, not caring about climate change, arguing against socialized health care or welfare benefits, trying to take away rights from minorities...just a constant flood of immoral, uneducated hateful stuff that only ever hurts.
I think we disagree about some subtlety of how society builds on its efforts.
The hierarchy quote is actually about wredcoll comment.
I'm obviously a conservative person. That conservatism doesn't accept different variations for the same word. I don;'t accept the conservative has a special definition in the US.
All of the shmabolic things you mention as conservative failures are what I'm complaining about it. I don't see them as conservative values because they cost us all more money and waste resources. The examples you provide I don't accept as conservative.
This is maybe why we disagree.
Huh? The human race progresses because of the 10% that drag the other 90% out of the muck into a better future, screaming and resisting every step of the way.
> All of the shmabolic things you mention as conservative failures are what I'm complaining about it. I don't see them as conservative values because they cost us all more money and waste resources. The examples you provide I don't accept as conservative.
So defend conservatism. List some values you think you can defend. Not wishy washy abstract stuff, really practicable stuff you think should be implemented.
I don't feel I have been overly abstract or wishy washy. I think we are discussing abstract ideals.
Understanding proposed changes to a current working environment I consider a conservative value.
Curiosity about long term costs and effects of decisions I consider a conservative value.
Conservation of resources I consider conservative values.
I truly believe we won't come to a common understanding. I'm curious about your age as I wonder about our experiences. I was born in 1968.
> Curiosity about long term costs and effects of decisions I consider a conservative value.
> Conservation of resources I consider conservative values
Those sound like good things to me.
They also don't sound like anything a republican politician has advocated for during my life time.
If you want to split the hair of republican vs conservative you are, of course, free to do so, but I doubt a whole lot of other people will really understand what you mean.
I think there's a lot to be said for asking why something should be changed and what will happen when you do, chesteron's fence style, but it's all too easy for that attitude to mask a position that's not actually willing to change.
Gay marriage is a pretty easy example. You certainly can, and probably should, ask why change it, but the vast, vast, vast majority of the people actually asking that type of question have no actual intention, or perhaps even ability, to change their opinion based on the answer they receive.
[EDIT] Which is unsurprising since the whole flat earth deal requires some sort of vast lizard-person conspiracy or whatever, and that's the kind of thing Qanon is, too.
Of course, you are not going to write down that you will win the lottery and then win.
But most people are their own worst enemy and self limiting to some extent. Focusing on what you want in life, and affirming it to yourself over and over, is effectively a way to brain wash yourself to change your own self limiting behavior and it’s not surprising that this is often successful.
But that's mild compared to what he says. He basically says he can influence the stock market with affirmations.
You should read the chapters. https://www.scribd.com/doc/156175634/the-dilbert-future-pdf. Starts on 218.
He does not say that.
> Starts on 218.
Actually it’s page 246.
Not even that. He says that affirmations resulted in him having a premonition. He does not generalize or predict that this will happen for other people, or even himself in the future.
Or it could be as you say. No way for us to know.
A premonition is a fancy name for an unconscious prediction.
Now does are the predictions "good", that is a completely different story. Probably depends on the information going in.
The problem with woo is you can always add more woo (bonus points if it has sciencey glitter). Goes from woowoo to woowoowoo.
Woo has no logical consistency and has nothing predictably predictive.
Ask manifestation believers why they are not successful or rich or whatever? You'll hear some fabulous reasons.
My neighbour paid money (I presume thousands) to do courses on learning how to unblock herself. The stated reason for the failure to manifest was due to blocks. Her explanation of the material was outrageous. I have yet to see the positive effect on her.
I don't manifest, yet I've got things others would like to manifest. Not sure there that fits in with the woo.
But after some time goes by and you get pinched in the mortgage crash, or your wife hits you with a divorce, or you get cancer, if you really believe you manifest everything into your life, then you have to believe you manifested the bad stuff too. So why did you do that to yourself? It's a rough belief system then.
Truly a master of manifesting my own reality, I suppose? heh. But seriously though, in think in the vain of the above, if "manifestation" is what someone needs to do as their trello or jira for themselves, more power to them.
He does not. I can’t prove a negative, but you, being the one making an assertion, could provide a quote (with context) which shows your assertion correct. Please do so.
> If it's possible to control your environment through your thoughts or steer your perceptions (or soul if you prefer) through other universes, I'll bet the secret to doing that is a process called "affirmations."
> I first heard of this technique from a friend who had read a book on the topic. I don't recall the name of the book, so I apologize to the author for not mentioning it. My information came to me secondhand. I only mention it here because it formed my personal experience.
> The process as it was described to me involved visualizing what you want and writing it down fifteen times in a row, once a day, until you obtain the thing you visualized.
> The suggested form would be something like this:
> "I, Scott Adams, will win a Pulitzer Prize."
> The thing that caught my attention is that the process doesn't require any faith or positive thinking to work. Even more interesting was the suggestion that this technique would influence your environment directly and not just make you more focused on your goal. It was alleged that you would experience what seemed to be amazing coincidences when using the technique. These coincidences would be things seemingly beyond your control and totally independent of your efforts (at least from a visual view of reality).
He then goes on to discuss stock, him taking the GMAT, etc. He later continues:
> I used the affirmations again many times, each time with unlikely success. So much so that by 1988, when I decided I wanted to become a famous syndicated cartoonist, it actually felt like a modest goal.
Then he talks about syndicating Dilbert.
He doesn't say, "I can influence the stock market with affirmations," but if you read what he wrote, he is very clearly arguing that you can change reality with your thoughts.
Earlier today I was reading your comment on mobile and thinking about the reply I would make. Now I am on a desktop making that reply. I'm pretty sure, therefore, that I can change reality with my thoughts, at least to some degree.
> Even more interesting was the suggestion that this technique would influence your environment directly and not just make you more focused on your goal.
> I don't know if there is one universe or many. If there are many, I don't know for certain that you can choose your path. And if you can choose your path, I don't know that affirmations are necessarily the way to do it. But I do know this: When I act as though affirmations can steer me, I consistently get good results.
I'm not the person you replied to, but I would say that "He basically argues that our thoughts can influence reality" is a fair description of these quotes and the rest of the chapter around it. Some of it is him referencing what other people told him, and he certainly hedges his statements a lot, but I certainly read it as him believing that his affirmations are directly influencing reality.
To me, the quotes you give seems aimed at people with preexisting beliefs in multiple universes or quantum woo, and he seems to want to convince people that affirmations can be viewed as perfectly reasonable in their existing belief systems. This does not mean that he believes what they believe.
Where I differ from you in my take on this is that I also weigh what isn't there. He doesn't provide any form of alternate explanation. Nowhere does he say anything that comes close to "I don't believe that affirmations work this way" or anything of the like. I also don't agree that his hedges clarify anything, rather they muddy the waters.
He presents a thesis, presents other people's arguments for that thesis, presents no arguments against, and then explains that he lives his life in a way consistent with believing in that thesis. The hedges fill one function: to make it harder to argue against him. If the arguments aren't his, the chapter stands even if the arguments fall.
To me, that is basically arguing for the thesis, but in a roundabout and quite defensive way. What other point would you say that that chapter conveys?
There is also the possible half point between atheism and agnosticism, where people self identify as atheism but will act according to some religious concept because they view it as important to their lives. To me it indicate strongly that beliefs, any beliefs, sits along a spectrum. A person can live their life in a way consistent with believing in something, either because they believe in it, or they don't know, or that they don't believe in it but still behave in that way because of a reason or an other.
He said he wanted to get rich on the stock market. Wrote an affirmation. Had a dream to by Chrysler stock. Bought stock, stock went up. By his conclusion, he manifested stock going up (because of how thoughts and perception can influence reality and e.t.c)
He does not say that.
When I buy X, it is guaranteed that X will tank the next day. It usually takes about 2 months for the market to forget that I bought X, and X will return to normal.
When I sell X, it is guaranteed that I sold for the lowest price that day, and X will rise dramatically for the next 2 months.
This problem is why I rarely trade. I'll hold a stock for decades.
Let's say you're not a confident person. If you tell yourself that you are a confident person, and try to act like a confident person would, you will likely become a confident person.
You changed your reality.
He basically argues that you can alter reality with affirmations.
Edit: BTW, you can’t copy the text on that PDF.
If you want to read a book that's closer to how the universe actually works, and how your mind should operate, read it: https://archive.org/details/B-001-001-709
E.g when the Spanish Empire ruled the world, the British were not very happy about that. With the British Empire, the French and the Germans fought them with every opportunity.
I'm an atheist, but many of the arguments put forth by atheists seem very lame to me.
If you want to persuade them to believe otherwise, then you have to come up with arguments which are actually persuasive from their perspective. This is a problem I see with a lot of smug atheist literature. It's also a problem I see with all the arguments from Christians about why I shouldn't be an atheist. I guess I seem approachable to them, I get a lot of well meant but totally fruitless conversion attempts. They are arguments which doubtlessly seem very sound to them, one who already believes, but totally fall flat to me, somebody who doesn't. Like telling me how many different people claimed to witness Jesus resurrection... that seems like compelling evidence if you already believe that the bible is reliable. Christians tell each other these arguments at Church, find it very convincing because they are already convinced and find it hard to imagine the frame of mind of somebody who doesn't believe, then with great earnestness present these arguments to nonbelievers and are puzzled when it doesn't work.
Well that's exactly what's going to happen when you confront most Christians with "Your god isn't real because he doesn't do as you command him to with your prayers." Prayer failing any empirical test of efficacy is convincing evidence to people who already don't believe but totally falls flat with people who do.
Knowing how most kings and queens have behaved throughout history, I think Sagan suffered from a faulty premise. The queen everyone loved best made it to 96.
[1] https://theconversation.com/long-live-the-monarchy-british-r...
Plausibly quite true. But given (1) how often the succession turned violent after a monarch died, and (2) how very little power the average person had - I'd say such prayers were entirely reasonable. If they made "life in the lower 99%" just 1% more bearable, that'd be a worthwhile RoI.
Demon-Haunted World is a book worth reading...but Carl often seems to forget that 99% of humans are neither huge science geeks (as he is), nor rationalist robots.
Have you seen the Sumerian King List?
And yes, that is basically what he says.
With infinite possible universes, you can guide which universe becomes your reality through affirmations.
Wacky perhaps, but the philosophies of consciousness and quantum mechanics are kinda wacky too...
---
On a relevant point, he talks about curing cancer.
Some minds only think when asked to.
A lot of time has past since I read Scott Adams view on manifesting. I got a decent way through before I realised it wasn't satire. It did seem clear to me that he was advocating a form of manifesting that went beyond either of those principles. That benefits came from manifesting in ways that no-other influence from yourself would be possible. That's essentially declaring it to be magic. Psychology I can believe, if you want me to believe in magic you're going to need a bit more.
From the point of view of an ADHD person, it doesn't surprise me at all that someone who had the ability to do a dumb task like manifesting would also have the ability to do meaningful things that that I find nearly impossible.
Adams's version of manifesting is "if you write stuff down, it's more likely that outcomes outside of your control will help you achieve your goal."
Those are not the same thing.
The concept of the book, as I understand it, is focusing your consciousness on something you want ”will cause the universe to bring it to you”.
The concept is silly to me (it’s the steps that you take to actually achieve the goal that make the difference), but in a way, it is a prerequisite to achieving the goal.
My biggest complaint is this type of thinking usually accompanies lots of “woo” thinking.
Our perceptions of reality are nearly always wrong.
> Those are not the same thing.
Here's an idea: get informed on the basics of what you are discussing before you tell me what it is and isn't.
Basically, lets say that you naturally have the drive to do work that is valuable and can make you rich, but you are just not sure if it will.
Writing down 100 times a day that you want to become rich and then becoming rich is not really related - you were probably going to be rich anyways, or on the most charitable interpretation, the writing helped you stay focused.
Now imagine you tell someone with poor mental health who struggling at a low paying job that all you have to do is write something 100 times a day to make it happen.
It aligns very closely with conservative thinking - a lot of conservative people think they worked hard for what they have, not realizing that they have been given a massive runway (such as not having college loans to pay back, being in a good school district, having parents who aren't crazy busy with work to dedicate time to support them, and so on)
>Now imagine you tell someone with poor mental health who struggling at a low paying job that all you have to do is write something 100 times a day to make it happen.
Sorry, did you think I was suggesting that it was good advice? Or that Doctor's should prescribe it?
> It aligns very closely with conservative thinking - a lot of conservative people think they worked hard for what they have, not realizing that they have been given a massive runway (such as not having college loans to pay back, being in a good school district, having parents who aren't crazy busy with work to dedicate time to support them, and so on)
The train has left the station. I do not think you were on it.
1. stay in school
2. learn the material in school
3. don't do drugs
4. don't do crimes
5. go to college, picking a major that pays well
That is a ticket to the middle class, and just about everyone in the US can do this.
BTW, I paid back my college loans.
I'm also well aware that I missed the chance to be a billionaire several times. I know I'm missing another opportunity right now, but am not seeing it.
Can we not do this kind of thing please?
Why should we always handle the topic with kiddy gloves when it is staring us in the face and breaking thousands of lives?
Isn't that literaly "political correctness"?
And that was not an examination, just some low effort attacks on the out group.
And while that obviously has limits, and is far from the magical technique some might claim - it's very hard to argue against things that work.
Visualization is a thing, something happens when you can see it happening.
It is absolutely not a unique failure to conservatives. But it does explain why there is so much interchange between crunchy granola hippies and qanon militias.
The actual cornerstone of conservatism is an instinctual preference for stability, order, and the familiar. The danger arises when this instinct is hijacked by a rigid ideology that resists truth and seeks control rather than continuity.
Which is, you know, what the American right is doing.
Yeah, that actually is an inability to process reality. Stuff changes, and things have never been stable or orderly.
And "order" doesn't fully capture it either, because the concept it gestures at can be more accurately described as "hierarchy" - as Kirk puts it, "a conviction that society requires orders and classes that emphasize "natural" distinctions".
In other words, everyone has a proper place in society, with some above and others below, and any attempts to remove that hierarchy are moral wrongs which require the transgressors to be put back in their place.
You can see how that core belief is intrinsically dangerous, and how nearly every controversial conservative belief about social classes falls out of it.
(It's also worth noting that this explains why conservatism's earliest champions were supporters of the aristocracy, and also why conservatism is more beloved by the old-money wealthy than move-fast-and-break-things new-money tech.)
See here is the thing- you don't know this is true. You never actually went and looked at the science or verified how much of it is fake. And yet, at the same time, you benefited from this science when its convenient to you because you probably don't realize that a medication or something you are using came from left leaning university.
This is what I mean by being out of touch with reality.
<< See here is the thing- you don't know this is true. You never actually went and looked at the science or verified how much of it is fake.
Technically speaking, neither do you unless you went over said data yourself. That said, some people did[2] and found that a good chunk of current studies can't be replicated. What does that say about the state of said science? Does it support your position? Does it support parent's post?
<< something you are using came from left leaning university.
The problem is not with left leaning or even right leaning. It is with people who blindly proclaim "Science!", but, at best, are an equivalent of annoying fanboys and, at worst, dilettantes, who feel compelled to use power of the state to squash people, who, in their mind, undermine their POV[1].
<< This is what I mean by being out of touch with reality.
And somehow, just to top it all off, they feel superior.
[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trofim_Lysenko [2]https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-39054778
It’s a misconception that every published paper must be true. Testing and invalidating results is a part of the process.
Talking about leftist ideology in science hints that you want to reject the consensus because it disagrees with your dearly held beliefs.
Sure, but it does undermine it.
<< The stuff that actually is thoroughly checked and widely accepted still stands, and is a much stronger foundation because it has been challenged and verified many times.
Which part of replication crisis is hard to understand? If it cannot be reliably replicated, then the foundation itself is flimsy bordering on tenuous.
<< It’s a misconception that every published paper must be true.
Bold, but I will attempt to respond with a straight face. Sure, but the referenced crisis does not affect one or even two papers. The problem starts when it hits sufficient number to make people question how much of those papers are just academia level reach arounds.
<< Testing and invalidating results is a part of the process.
Yes, absolutely. After all, exception tests the rule. The problem starts when the exception becomes the norm.
<< Talking about leftist ideology in science hints that you want to reject the consensus because it disagrees with your dearly held beliefs.
I would encourage you to read what I wrote and consider hesitating on trying to decode language as it is not your forte. I am not rejecting consensus. I am rejecting your premise.
edit: removed otherwise antagonizing language
Not really. Take something like vaccines. There’s a ton of verified evidence that they work, and the view that they cause harm is not well supported at all.
The fact that someone published papers about idk some obscure alkaloid causing mice to live longer and it’s the only paper ever written on this subject and it can’t be replicated, doesn’t say anything about the efficacy of vaccines.
There’s stuff that becomes a part of the consensus doesn’t do so based of a single paper.
The scientific knowledge is solid. And scientists know not to trust single unverified results.
If I may suggest something. If you are actually trying to convince someone, I would go with something a little less 'part of the culture wars in US'. That said, even for a coffeeless me it is laughably easy to dismantle this argument, but it will not take us anywhere useful.
Go with gravity man, it is genuinely harder to deny gravity.
The insanity and narcissism in this statement must be satire right? The idea that you're right and anyone who doesn't see that is clearly just incapable of recognizing they are wrong seems hypocritical at best and the same line of thinking that has lead to some lovely historical movements at worst.
... which inevitably breaks down when fundamental assumptions become disproven. And that's the point. Many "moderate" Conservatives still believe in the "trickle down" economy theory or that government debt is inherently bad and a government's budget needs to be balanced.
Both have been proven time and time again to be not just wrong, but outright disastrous in their consequences, and yet Germany voted that ideology into chancellorship, not to mention what is currently going on in the US.
The US seems to be combining the worst of both ideologies. I can't imagine what happens next.
Basically, conservatives got increasingly angry (because things inevitably do change), so they decided to give up on conservatism and flip the table instead. One intellectual upstream of Trumpism is the writings of Mencius Moldbug (Curtis Yarvin), who laid out how mere conservatism wasn't enough because "Cthulhu swims left" still, and coined his philosophy "reactionary". This also ties into one of the commonly-described dynamics of fascism - invoking an idea of some imagined idyllic past, as a reason that the current society needs to be attacked and destroyed.
I had never voted for a major party candidate in a national election until Biden 2020 and Harris 2024. I consider those solidly actually-conservative votes, and partially attribute them due to my getting older and more actually-conservative.
I grew up [second hand] listening to a lot of this, and as I came of age I could never understood why there was so much cynical condemnation of the system but yet the cognitive dissonance to keep voting for more of the system. But I guess farming this dissonant frustration was just the whole point. Another way of looking at it is that Trumpism is this populist monster escaping, devouring the Party traditionalists, and leaving Republicans with nothing but Trump.
In some sense I think that is large part of what's fueling the fascist energy is the fact that Trump is not a [traditional] Republican, a conservative, a moral person, a competent businessman, etc. So throwing your support behind him is already buying into a Big Lie where up is down, there are no values or morals, just purely allegiance to what Dear Leader has declared is true. That none of Trump's policy positions make sense is a feature for keeping that support in line - independent thinkers who would point out the contradictions are ostracized and othered. Essentially the worst social dynamics of "woke" most everyone was wary of, but we had/have forgotten how much worse they can be when power is wielded autocratically rather than bureaucratically.
We're going to find out if that is true or not.
Look at Germany: 16 years of austerity policy have left our infrastructure so thoroughly compromised it literally falls apart - we were damn lucky that that bridge collapse in Dresden end of last year didn't kill anyone!
And even in the US you see it with every presidential change: Democrat governments cut services and expenditures because the last Republican cut taxes for the wealthy, the frustration leads to people vote for Republicans who introduce yet another round of billionaire tax cuts and blow up the government debt by untold billions of dollars, rinse and repeat.
If you are writing "Repetitive Strain Injury".
and with a population desperate for any improvement in life these things end up finding a place, just like all the betting platforms all over the place. the only reason to bet is if you think you'll win.
Ye be needing a mirror, lad. A mirror to help ye pull out the log in yer eye.
But I do think that the wild admiration of manipulative people was genuine.
He has had some questionable views all throughout his life. In his book "The Dilbert Future", which was from 1997, the last 2 chapters are some wacky stuff about manifesting - i.e if you write something down 100 times a day every day it will come true and other stuff like that.
And while that may seem a far cry from the alt-right stuff he eschews, its really not - inability to process information clearly and think in reality in lieu of ideology is the cornerstone of conservative thinking.