Knowledgeable people

[liv]

One of my favourite things about DW is that it brings me into contact with people who know things, and sometimes they explain and then I learn.

jjhunter made a really interesting, thinky comment about alternative medicine in my obnoxious opinions post, and then expanded it into a top-level discussion (with citations!) which is well worth reading: The great strength of 'evidence-based medicine' is science; science also happens to be the source of many of its most profound & chronic problems. I want to follow this up and write something serious rather than provocative about my views of alternative medicine, which in fact are more to do with my views of mainstream medicine. But actually jjhunter is covering much of what I want to say from a much more knowledgeable position.

And in the discussion of MBTI related stuff, people were comparing MBTI to astrology, and jenett showed up with a really amazing comment which gives some of the historical context of Western astrology beyond the simplistic horoscopes that are used as a space filler in the backs of newspapers: it is vastly more complicated than just a single sign.

I imagine that some people who identify very strongly as skeptics may just not be able to get through those two posts at all. Personally, I found both explanations thought-provoking and not at all preachy, even as someone who doesn't personally believe in some of the principles behind the systems being explained.

I circled legionseagle mainly because I needed an antidote to people pontificating about the law who know even less than I do about the topic. Knowing more than I do about law is not exactly a high bar, but legionseagle is an actual lawyer and always writes both informatively and entertainingly. I particularly enjoyed her piece on contract law using Bilbo's contract with the Dwarves as an example: "The whereabouts of the Arkenstone" is a material piece of confidential information in anyone's book. The explanation includes the infamous Carbolic Smoke Ball case, which was part of my family mythology growing up; the reason why I know just enough to get impatient with internet-lawyer ignorance is that both my parents are lawyers.

So, who's learned something they didn't previously know from a blog post recently? Do pass on the links! And is there anything you'd like me to explain that I know more about than you do? It'd be good to do some informative posts of my own, as well as discussion-y ones.

Comments

[altamira16]

Far to many people treat skepticism as a religion.

[liv]

I think there are good aspects and bad aspects to skepticism-as-religion. Like, it seems to me a positive when people form communities with other skeptics, they look after eachother when a member is sick or struggling, they create life-rituals, and aim to provide many of the benefits of religion without pushing people to believe anything that doesn't work for them emotionally. Skepticism as currently conceived isn't really mature as a religion yet, but I can see they're building something that may become valuable, perhaps along the lines of the older Humanist movement.

But skepticism-as-religion is a problem when skepticism itself becomes a dogma. Instead of actually examining evidence (it's right there in the name, people!) some skeptics may treat even information about certain topics as if it were defiling, exactly like the worst kind of superstitious, unexamined religious taboos. Or making people who don't share mainstream skeptical beliefs into a despised outgroup like the unsaved in some kinds of religion. This story about a Pyschic being defamed as a fraud was a good example I came across recently.

[pretty_panther]

I learn things all the time! Sometimes it is about how people think, how backgrounds shape how people think, or just outright facts. I follow a lot of feminist blogs and such so I learn a lot of rather horrid facts about women and their position. Autostraddle.com is more than a blog now but it has helped me a lot with how to word genders, sexes and identities and such. I post a lot of the blog posts I find most fascinating as you will have noticed.


It isn't exactly something you know more about than me fact wise...as such but, if you don't mind I was wondering how you feel the UK is as a nation when it comes to an attitude towards Jewish people? If you have discussed this before and can provide a link I'd be happy to read it! I've heard some say anti-semitism is still a huge issue in the UK and others say it isn't. I have no experience with this. As far as I am aware, the only Jewish people I know are friends online and you are the only person that really mentions your religion. I may know more 'offline' but they have not disclosed their religion to me. I am unaware of any Jews in my town, so it isn't exactly a subject that comes up a lot you know? How do you feel the UK is doing on that front? Do you feel you face discrimination as a result of your religion at all? If so, is there anything I can do about it as a member of the public?

[liv]

Thank you, I'm really getting a lot out of your explorations of feminism and other gender rights movements, and I always appreciate your collections of links.

Regarding the UK and its attitude towards Jewish people, I think that would indeed be a good topic for a post; I know something about it from personal experience and something about it from factual knowledge, though I'm of course not an expert. This is what I wrote back in 2005; it's a very negative post because I deliberately chose to gather together all my personal experiences of antisemitism. In general I would say that the UK has made a lot of progress in rooting out antisemitism since WW2, and generally this country is more welcoming to Jewish citizens than much of continental Europe. But it would be a mistake to imagine that all antisemitism is confined to the dim and distant past, there are still a few, mostly minor problems.

[damerell]

I got through them, yes. I already knew most of that about astrology, but in any case none of that makes it any more accurate, and it's a bit of a red herring anyway; if we say Myers-Briggs is "like astrology", we mean the thing in the papers that makes vague warm-fuzzy statements about twelve kinds of people, even if something more complex has had that same name.

I think the other is essentially leading into a familiar fallacy; the state of the mind informs the state of the body, yes, but any particular approach that invokes that and then chases off into lala-land is not thereby improved.

[jjhunter]

If you're comfortable elaborating here or at the post in question, I'm curious where you're seeing fallacy - I assume you're referring to this portion of the post?

Scientists know the brain controls & directs the body. What scientists - what almost everyone, really - have trouble figuring out is what this means in terms of how a particular person's cultural assumptions about reality affects how their brain mediates between their body and their environment. This has huge implications for medicine, and concerns areas of persistent mystery & frustration for individual and public health. Why do placebos work? Why is there no exact word for 'depression' in certain cultures - and why might a traditional treatment for a depression-like ailment be measurably & incredibly effective within a particular cultural context but not universally?