Scott Adams used to give great career advice and cartooning tips. I think he got bored a few years ago and decided to become a professional troll. I will write some examples after work.
Okay I'm home now. Let's dissect the most famous example.
1) Adams compares women to children and people with mental disabilities.
2) Claims he didn't and that everyone who thinks that has bad reading comprehension. Also plays the victim card anytime someone accuses him of misogyny.
3) Writes article about hypnosis. Adams says he can convince people that two things are related without doing it directly. Gives example similar to the time he did with women and children.
4) Praises Trump for being a master wizard, whatever that means. Gives example where Trump associates two things without stating it directly.
5) Claims everyone is an outragist for thinking that Trump associated Mexicans with rapists.
And a quote: "They [Gawker] love me. And I love their hate-traffic, so everyone wins."
So, when americans say that someone "compared" A and B — do you guys, like normal people, mean that (1) said someone (in this example, Scott Adams) performed an operation of comparison, which may or may not have resulted in presenting some similarities between A and B?
Or do you mean that (2) said someone said that A and B are the same in some ways?
Because if you're using definition number 1, I don't see any problems with comparing anything to anything. But if you're using definition number 2 — well. To be frank, I can only call this definition stupid and idiotic, and if that's how you understand it, then yes, you do have really bad reading comprehension. And it's clear from quoted Adams text that he "compared" these groups of people as in 1. Not as in 2.
I don't know if you intentionally missed my point.
In his writing he describes how hypnosis can indirectly form associations between two things. This method also gives him plausible deniability, which allows him to say people have bad reading comprehension.
> Adams compares women to children and people with mental disabilities.
What was the point he was trying to make with the comparison? If he said "Like women, children and the mentally disabled have been oppressed by the patriarchy" it would mean something very different from what he did say, but your statement would still apply.
What I'm trying to say is that your first point, on its own, isn't sufficient to condemn him.
This is the issue I have with broad statements like "so-and-so compared X to Y" without specifying what the point of the comparison was. That's the point of a metaphor: to compare two otherwise unlike things in order to show how one has the trait the other also has. If I say a boxer has a glass jaw, I'm not saying his jaw is translucent, just that he is vulnerable to blows in a similar way that it would be if his jaw were made of glass.
This is important because I think people misinterpret metaphors on a regular basis.
I'm not up to date with the Trump stuff but what I thought was particularly disingenuous about the first example was that he said in advance that he was going to write something ambiguous that people would 'misinterpret' and then he made fun of them when it happened.
As far as I'm concerned, if you write something with the goal of communicating a particular idea to a particular audience then that's what you said. It doesn't matter at all what other meanings could be construed and whether they are more logical or not.
If I say something to a few people and I know that one of them will misunderstand it (the reason doesn't really matter) in a way that makes the statement untrue then I've just lied to that person.
On one hand I think he knows exactly what he is doing. He mentions phrasing and word choice in some of his posts.
On the other hand, he might just be completely clueless about race and gender issues. He says things like "If women want to avoid catcalling then why don't they just move? I moved to improve my life."
Maybe a little of column A, and a little of column B.
>"If women want to avoid catcalling then why don't they just move? I moved to improve my life."
Perhaps pointing out the hypocrisy of those actually using that rhetorical construct? Being someone that advocates a society without a state, and often criticizes it, I get that comment thrown at me many times. And people find it a perfectly acceptable and valid retort to what I'm advocating. Maybe putting it in the context of "women" (with gender issues currently being a prominent theme/topic in society), perhaps he can make the users of that construct look at it critically as a bad argument against anything.
Note, haven't actually read Adam's articles about women being mentioned here.
> If I say something to a few people and I know that one of them will misunderstand it (the reason doesn't really matter) in a way that makes the statement untrue then I've just lied to that person.
If you can avoid the misunderstanding, then sure. But even then you don't always have the time to explain yourself fully. Sometimes, the very ideas you are expressing are liable to trigger strong emotions in other people. It can't be helped.
But that's why I like his disclaimers. I know ahead of time that the point he is trying to make isn't likely the one that is salient to me on my first pass.
Right, but in this case he actually said in advance that this was what he intended to do. It was the purpose of the post, not a regrettable side-effect.
If you read it carefully, you will realize that he is not defending rapists, he is saying you can look at the situation as a mental health problem - similar to the EU view of drug abusers - they are not criminals, they are patients.
He has, multiple times on his blog, put forth his theory that humans are 'moist robots' - he does not believe in the concept of free will; so this post is entirely consistent with that.
Well, the whole concept of "morals" depends on free will, so if you don't really believe in free will, you shouldn't be saying that something should or should not be viewed as moral or not. In your worldview, being "moral" or "immoral" should just be words without a correct definition behind them.
I think he makes valid points, as far as can be inferred from the first articles that probably only quotes things out of context. If you don't see that women and men are treated in different ways then you have massive political correctness glasses clouding your vision. Ever wondered why it is always you who has to take out the garbage (assuming you are male and in a relationship with a woman)?
The second article just seems ridiculous, building up a fantasy straw man just because SA used "pegs and holes" as a metaphor. The article assumes holes are passive and just there to satisfy pegs. SA did not invent penises and vaginas...
This article seems to hold up to my personal anecdata, and that of many of the mentor figures I've had over the years. (I'd also note the 2007 publish date)
However, I've (as with the parent) read some of his writing recently that made me just shake my head and want to stop, and I say this as a die-hard Dilbert fan. His opinions on trump being some sort of personal-image savant at "hacking psychology" (don't recall the actual wording but it was spiritually similar) stand out to me as one I read and felt was somewhat far fetched.
Re: his articles on Trump. I'm not sure if he's right, but I do appreciate that he's been willing to make very specific predictions about the future. So far it seems like he's been pretty good at predicting how things will turn out for Trump. Maybe he's entirely wrong about why, of course.
I don't fault his making predictions; but an occams razor explanation seems FAR more compelling to me, that a character like trump provides an outlet for sentiments that haven't been well served by any _marginally_ viable political candidate. Combined with a boisterous personality (which dovetails well with what seems to be a rising anti-establishment sentiment in certain groups) and celebrity background, it fits neatly into America's tendency to lend more credence than might be deserved otherwise to stars, regardless of their individual ___domain specific merit. (c.f. other celebrity anti-vaxers and the recurring trend to have non-political notables on political talk shows)
Hindsight bias. Political pros have been predicting his demise for months, then backtracking to explain "what's really going on."
Only Adams has been unwavering in his predictions and the explanations behind them.
There are no celebrity anti-vaxers running for president, and just because non-political notables appear on talk shows doesn't mean they would poll well in Iowa.
I think Adams goes too far in predicting a general election landslide, but I'm impressed he has the balls to do it.
He has written a few articles that stray pretty far from modern Political Correctness orthodoxy; I think that's what is being referred to, not this article in particular.
