KPAO by Dave Cortright

Regarding those people who are “not doing things the right way” on NextDoor— one perspective

To me, the thing that most degrades the quality of NextDoor are the posts about other people “not doing things the right way” with no apparent introspection for how the post helps—or in the vast majority of the cases, does nothing to—reduce or eliminate said behavior.

 

Some things to potentially consider before writing up your next “they’re not doing it the right way” post:

1. Do you think the people engaging in said behavior are on NextDoor?
2. Even if they are, do you think people who would choose to engage in that behavior will suddenly see the light and change their errant ways because of your post?
3. Are you an expert in the rules and regulations regarding said behavior? There are a lot of nuances to most situations, even ostensibly simple ones.
4. Have you pursued official channels for reporting/enforcement of said behavior?

 

If you answered “no” to any of these questions, then please consider your true motive for the post. It could simply be you venting about how the world isn't the way you would prefer it to be. And you know what? I get it. It's a great, big world and there's a huge swath of  behaviors I  don't agree with. But I also know that posting a rant about it to a small group of neighbors—99–100% of whom do not engage in that behavior and probably agree with me—will not improve things. Ask yourself: “Will this actually help fix the problem, or is it just an expression of anger and frustration?”

 

And yes, I understand that some might find this ironic—me posting about people on NextDoor not using it in the “right” way. I don't see it that way. I see it as posting an observation about how some have chosen to use NextDoor. I have no expectation that anyone change their behavior based on this post. But I do feel that increased awareness of other perspectives such as this once might lead to more thoughtful and compassionate use in the future. And if nothing else, at least I was able to vent about it to my neighbors. 😉

Actually free electronic tax filing available at turbotaxsucksass.com

All of the big software tax prep companies have free versions due to their agreements with the IRS, but they use every web design dark pattern in the book to try to prevent people from actually using them. That’s why The Patriot Act Netflix show created this site to cut the bullshit and get you straight to the ones that are actually free, rather than ostensibly free.

TurboTax Sucks Ass (actually free tax filing)

Look at the Trump shitshow around us—the DNC and Hillary Clinton is at least partially to blame

Let me be clear—I do not absolve Trump or his enabler-in-chief Mitch McConnell from their actions. But it has only been possible for us to be in this situation because of the hubris of the DNC and Hillary Clinton back in 2016.

4 years ago in June 2016, I posted that the DNC should really be looking at the polls a lot more closely and nominate the person who had the better chance of beating Trump. But of course they didn't do that. They optimistically bet that—despite the clear divisiveness engendered by Hillary Clinton—swing voters in swing states would begrudgingly vote for Clinton over Trump. They played chicken with the American electorate and lost.

I bring this all up now because as easy as it is to point fingers at the current administration as the problem, it was the DNC that effectively handed them the reigns. To paraphrase Trump, there are fuck ups on both sides. Here are some articles about the aftermath of the 2016 campaign that support these claims:

Team Bernie say Hillary ‘Fucking Ignored’ Us in the Swing States (The Daily Beast)

How Clinton lost Michigan—and blew the election (Politico)

Trump Out-Campaigned Clinton by 50% in Key Battleground States in Final Stretch (NBC News)

Not Enough Men Worth Marrying—an economic approach to the declining marriage rate

New research suggests there is a mismatch between what men have to offer and what women want in a partner.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/meet-catch-and-keep/201909/are-there-not-enough-men-worth-marrying

It’s not the placebo effect, it’s the social connection effect

Modern medicine has only been around for a brief instant in the history of humanity. Penicillin isn't even 100 years old. And yet somehow we've been able to survive and even thrive for the vast majority of our existence. How is that possible?

 

Our bodies naturally have systems in place to keep us healthy and free from the common modern ailments: heart disease, diabetes, cancer, dementia... The further we stray from our EEA way of living, the less effective these systems are at keeping us healthy. Since we are social creatures, our genes select for hosts that do the best job at being social. I believe that the reason shamans and medicine men (and the placebo effect for that matter) work is because our bodies are positively responding to the validation of a respected member of our social group reaching out to us, connecting with us, and essentially saying: “You are an important and valued member of our social group. We want you to get better so you will stick around and continue to be part of the group.” And that validation triggers all of those defense and repair systems to kick into high gear.

 

Social cohesion around a shared story is more important than truth

One of the most profound results in all of social psychology is that of Solomon Asch’s conformity research. In a group of 8, if the other 7 members of the group all coalesce around an answer that is wrong, the 8th person will conform to the group consensus on at least one occasion 75% of the time. And perhaps more importantly, these people often created stories that made them believe the answer to be true.

It is such a common pattern throughout history and even currently in society that it's actually shocking we don’t talk more about it. The Elephant in the Brain book covers this pretty well, in addition to the You Are Not So Smart blog (and associated books and podcast).

Here are some examples of the world fighting against the actual truth because the lie had been so firmly entrenched for so long:

Heliocentrism: Despite the fact that the earth revolves around the sun, Galileo found staunch opposition not only from the religious, but also from fellow scientists such as Tycho Brahe. “Pope Paul V instructed Cardinal Bellarmine… to order [Galileo] to abandon the opinion that heliocentrism was physically true.”

Adult neurogenesis: [The dogma for the longest time was that] the adult brain doesn’t make new neurons. This is the basic premise of all the miserable, untreatable neurological diseases out there. And starting in the 60s, there was a one lone prophet named Joe Altman whose career was basically ruined because he was about 30 years ahead of the curve. And then in the late 80s, early 90s, some technique got a lot more sensitive and was able to show adult neurogenesis in the brain like crazy. —Robert Sapolsky on the Freakonomics podcast

Flat Earth: most cultures believed the earth to be flat. The first record of a spherical earth hypothesis was by Pythagoras in the 6th century BC. The truth spread slowly, and even China didn't subscribe to a spherical earth until the 17th century. And yes, even today there are groups of people who believe the earth is flat.

Cargo Cults of the South Pacific: primitive tribes in the South Pacific were introduced to modern civilization by seeing runways being built and airplanes delivering cargo in support of the war. They believed if they built their own runways (and other aviation-related accoutrements), the gods would send the planes to them loaded with cargo (mana from heaven).

Religion: This is the big one. And actually the cargo cults previously mentioned are just a modern instance of religion. Stories are interpreted, told, and retold to bond the followers around a particular way of thinking and living life.

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This all makes perfect sense when viewed from the perspective of what maximized our ancestors chances of survival and reproduction. Cohesive bands of humans were much more likely to withstand adversity than individuals or even smaller groups. Getting to a shared story on the way the world worked—regardless of how accurate it was—created a stronger sense of community which would work together for the common good.

Razors in the wild

I’m a big fan of the Principle of Parsimony, otherwise known as Occam’s Razor. A razor is simply a logical concept that eliminates unlikely explanations for a particular conjecture. Here are a couple that I find gratifying.

The Holy Grail is really the cup of a carpenter:

 

Deducing the location of jewels hidden in a large, wooden house (from Tales of The Thinking Machine, The Mystery of the Flaming Phantom)

“The man who hid these jewels hid them only temporarily, or at least that was his purpose,” said The Thinking Machine, irritably. “Naturally he would not hide them in the woodwork of the house, because that might burn; he did not bury them in the cellar, because that has been carefully searched. Now, in that house there is nothing except woodwork and chimneys above the cellar. Yet he hid them in the house, proven by the fact that the man he killed was killed in the house, and that the outside ground, covered with snow, showed two sets of tracks into the house and none out. Therefore he did hide them in the cellar. Where? In the stonework. There was no other place.

“Naturally he would not hide them on a level with the eye, because the spot where he took out and replaced a stone would be apparent if a close search were made. He would, therefore, place them either above or below the eye level. He placed them above. A large loose stone in the chimney was taken out and there was the box with these things.”

Physical pain and emotional pain are both useful survival tools

I previously blogged about how there are no “bad” emotions, and in fact all emotions exist for a reason (otherwise natural selection would have weeded them out long ago).

The common pitfall we have is we naïvely want to minimize pain and maximize pleasure (or contentment). So when an emotion that makes us feel bad comes up, we do all sorts of convoluted tricks to try to avoid it (denial, mapping it to another emotion like anger or sadness, distraction…). But of course that doesn't change the truth that the emotion came up, and it did so for a reason.

Physical pain works the same way. If we lean against a hot stove, we experience pain and—while it is a negative feeling—it is overall a good thing. It minimizes harm to our bodies. It would be misguided to treat physical pain the same way we typically treat emotional pain. Pain is there for a reason. It is important information about how you are relating with the rest of the world. It's time we started listening and acting accordingly.

Human society today is like an industrial chicken factory (CAFO)

Humans were designed to live in bands of 30–45 members. Now we live in a world where you can come into contact with hundreds or even thousands of people every day, and orders of magnitude more if you count virtual interactions. Our brains simply aren't designed to manage a network of relationships that complex, as Robin Dunbar has shown.

While pondering this recently, I made the connection with how we mass-produce chicken meat. There are huge buildings filled with up to 20–30,000 chickens. Of course this is much larger than the number of birds that would naturally live in close proximity, and it screws up their pecking order. To keep the chickens from self-harm (pulling out their own feathers) or injuring others, they cut off most of their beaks when they are chicks.

Cram too many humans into close proximity without the proper tools to healthily navigate and manage such a large network and you wind up with similar problems—mental health, self harm, and harming others.

Live Every Day as If You Didn't Know How Many You Had Left

I understand the sentiment behind the adage “Live every day as if it were your last.” It’s a way of saying be more present and enjoy the moment now. Don’t delay all of your gratification.

Others have already pointed out some of the flaws in this reasoning. The primary being a very real possibility of focusing on short-term, narcissistic and hedonistic gains. It means an end to the iterated prisoner’s dilemma. The primary check and balance in any system of cooperation is the possibility of future retaliation. When retaliation is a real possibility, then cooperation (with occasional retaliation if required) is the best strategy. If the relationship has a known finite end, it removes that governor and makes it much more likely one side or the other will defect.

Yes we are all going to die, but we don't know when. And not knowing when is a powerful force in keeping us all on track and cooperating.