Pretentious Crap

[nomadthethird]

"I know I am blunt when I state my opinion."

But do you know you are sometimes extremely obnoxious?

In a way which makes - well, at least me - disinclined to take you seriously?

I get the impression that you don't quite understand why people are having the reactions they have to you. You seem to think it is because they disagree with you.

Disagreement is good. Your problem is different. It lies in the aggressive and arrogant tone with which you choose to express yourself. And your apparent unwillingness, or inability, to listen to what other people have to say. Neither of these traits is very productive of discussion.

You can continue to use this tone if you wish, but it does have its drawbacks.

As a side note, I regret the meds comment. But please refrain in the future from sending me abusive personal messages.

Hey Josef, good news!

Clown College is looking for a new Provost. You're a perfect fit.

If that doesn't work out, you could always just leech off the family fortune.

 

[josef k.]

Were you a difficult child, Nomad?

 

[zhao]

no, it's not about disagreeing.

nomad, really, you must realize that things like this:

did you ever listen to the lecture Nomad?

I've listened to all sorts of anthropological and biological lectures, Zhao.

dismissing another point of view without reviewing the information presented is just categorically wrong. in any discussion, in any context, on or off line.

and things like this:

It's probably not even worth discussing, though, because I'm going to get a bunch of nonsense from a vegan brochure that someone made up.

why the condescension? i've cited source after source of legitimate, peer reviewed works in the fields of anthropology and biology, and you dismiss all of them as "hacks".

nomad, we are talking about very big and complex subjects on which there are many different scientific points of view; subjects on which professional scholars disagree; subjects which have been the center of debate for centuries. your tone of condescension and ridicule only makes yourself look like a small stubborn child, and very far from the studious expert you pretend to be.

i am surely not, and sometimes far from being, perfect. but i have proven myself capable, time and again, of admitting to my mistakes, of being wrong, of having a narrow point of view, and recognizing the valid points of others.

it would be a service to yourself, nomad, to be more aware of your behavior, and learn to do some of these things mentioned above.

 

[vimothy]

30 pages -- seems appropriate ;-)

And I think there is also a way in which pretentious crap is about a refusal to put questions of your own identity - stance, position, desires, and posture, etc - into play.

Is there, then, something inherently pretentious about the internet? Or perhaps the internet is merely something that lends itself to pretension/pretentiousness particularly well.

 

[nomadthethird]

no, it's not about disagreeing.

nomad, really, you must realize that things like this:





dismissing another point of view without reviewing the information presented is just categorically wrong. in any discussion, in any context, on or off line.

and things like this:



why the condescension? i've cited source after source of legitimate, peer reviewed works in the fields of anthropology and biology, and you dismiss all of them as "hacks".

nomad, we are talking about very big and complex subjects on which there are many different scientific points of view; subjects on which professional scholars disagree; subjects which have been the center of debate for centuries. your tone of condescension and ridicule only makes yourself look like a small stubborn child, and very far from the studious expert you pretend to be.

i am surely not, and sometimes far from being, perfect. but i have proven myself capable, time and again, of admitting to my mistakes, of being wrong, of having a narrow point of view, and recognizing the valid points of others.

it would be a service to yourself, nomad, to be more aware of your behavior, and learn to do some of these things mentioned above.

I didn't dismiss any lecture. I dismissed the statements you made yourself directly, and nothing else.

Zhao, you were wrong about band level societies being the primary form of social organization for humans, and about meat being only a secondary food source. It would be a service to yourself if you got over it and moved on.

Your tone, where you make broad generalizations, and then are called out on them, and then are forced to back down from then, and then get upset at others, makes you look rather silly.

You did not cite a single peer-review source that backed up the claim that meat was not a vital source of nutrients, that hunter-gatherer societies were not the primary form of social organization throughout human history. In fact, the sources you cited actually confirmed the universally accepted notion that human metabolisms evolved around eating meat (among other things) for hundreds of thousands of years if not longer.

Nice try, though.

 

[nomadthethird]

It has not been the "subject of debate for centuries" whether humans evolved as hunter-gatherers, eating a diet comprised of meat and grains/fruits/vegetables, it's been accepted for about a century and it's been confirmed by the human genome project that this is in fact true, that we have certain proteins and characteristics that are consistent with species that eat meat. It's well-known that protein and fats are the most efficient source of energy for humans, due to being more calorie dense than carbohydrates. It is not debated.

 

[zhao]

the lecture which you refuse to listen to cites many many peer reviewed works. and it all agrees with what i have been saying.

and that's just one. i'm too sleepy right now but i can easily present more. but you won't read them and will just dismiss them so... not sure if i see the point.

 

[nomadthethird]

Science rarely deals in generalizations. In fact, I don't think good science ever does.

Does the lecturer actually say that band-level societies were the PRIMARY form of social organization, or simply that there were some band-level societies? Those are two very different concepts, especially where the relevance to evolutionary biology is concerned. I would never doubt that there could be a band-level society here or there, scattered around in pre-history. But they were a) not necessarily NOT also hunter-gatherer, and b) by far not the primary sort of social organization humans lived in.

Care needs to be taken when you're interpreting scientific data or theories. If you add something to the facts that isn't there, or isn't warranted, then you're going to draw conclusions that do not follow from the data/theory.

 

[zhao]

why

don't

you

just

review

the information

that i present

before drawing

conclusions.

it's only like, a 30 minutes long mp3.

 

[nomadthethird]

For example, hunter-gatherer societies were not necessary paternalistic or patriarchal. Many matriarchal societies were hunter-gatherer and I'm guessing that many band-level societies were as well, because the hierarchical structuring of a society and the subsistence-level practices of a society are two completely different concepts/forms of organization. One does not necessarily preclude the other.

 

[nomadthethird]

I'll look at it. And I'll bet you right now if this person is a legitimate scientist they weren't trying to claim that band-level societies and hunter-gatherer societies are completely antipathic social forms that didn't co-exist and that hunter-gatherer societies didn't exist.

 

[zhao]

or, alternately, you can just keep repeating what you know, assuming that it's all there is to know.

that's fine but makes for pretty boring discussion though.

 

[zhao]

I'll look at it. And I'll bet you right now if this person is a legitimate scientist they weren't trying to claim that band-level societies and hunter-gatherer societies are completely antipathic social forms that didn't co-exist and that hunter-gatherer societies didn't exist.

you have been misunderstanding from the very start:

band level societies ARE gatherer hunters.

for christ sake...

 

[nomadthethird]

you have been misunderstanding from the very start:

band level societies ARE gatherer hunters.

for christ sake...

That is NOT what you said before and you KNOW it isn't.

 

[nomadthethird]

The idea that because there's one tribe that is band-level that exists, that all tribes that ever existed were band-level, is patently absurd! Without hearing the lecture I can deducify that.

 

[nomadthethird]

or, alternately, you can just keep repeating what you know, assuming that it's all there is to know.

that's fine but makes for pretty boring discussion though.

Or you can misinterpret and add a bunch of shit onto a lecture you heard once and pretend that's what the lecturer said because you like how it sounds.

 

[nomadthethird]

So what is this guy's name?

 

[nomadthethird]

Nevermind, his name is Edward F. Fischer. I found it!

Here's a page of his that details the topics he speaks about in the class of the same name as the lecture:

http://www.teach12.com/ttcx/CourseDescLong2.aspx?cid=4617

What does it mean if someone raises his eyebrows when he meets you?
Is there such a thing as progress? Are modern technological nations really happier and better off than "primitive" hunter-gatherer societies?
What is the cultural significance of gift giving? What are the subtle social and psychological rules we follow when we give a gift, and what obligates us when we receive one?
How common is cannibalism today? What are the types of cannibalism and the beliefs associated with them?
In American garbage dumps, what item of trash serves as a clear stratographic layer, distinguishing one-year's trash from the next?
What's the difference between a matriarchal and a matrilineal society? Which is more common among world cultures?
Why are Starbucks coffee shops, reality TV shows, and tourist destinations such as Las Vegas and Disneyland so popular with American consumers?

re modern Western societies really the most affluent? This notion is doubtful, at best, based on modern hunter-gatherers. The Dobe Ju/'hoansi never go to bed hungry, have virtually no unsatisfied wants, and work only 20 hours a week.

Hmmm, doesn't sound like he has such a hard time with the "hunter-gatherer" designation. In fact, he calls the Dobe hunter-gatherers! But we'll see...

 

[...]

walking into the room and say "your ideas are full of shit and you are stupid".

Uh, I think that's a fine way to proceed! What's with all the 'nice-ness' anyway? The forum is called Dissensus, for fuck's sake! Shout louder!

 

[nomadthethird]

Uh, I think that's a fine way to proceed! What's with all the 'nice-ness' anyway? The forum is called Dissensus, for fuck's sake! Shout louder!

Besides, as I already amply demonstrated upthread, what I actually said was that it was stupid and naive to say that pre-modern humans were less violent than contemporary humans. I never called Zhao stupid and I certainly didn't "walk into the room" and say that out of nowhere, in response to nothing. I already told Zhao I was sorry if I didn't qualify that carefully enough.

I like the disagreements on here anyway, they're much more interesting than the high-five-a-minute fanboy circle jerks.