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All of JohnnyCat's Comments + Replies

2014 Less Wrong Census/Survey
JohnnyCat20

"Identifying with" something or "Identifying As" something has an explicit meaning to me, which is that it is something I would call myself. Some of this may come from training and industry I'm in, but it's what you think of yourself as.

For instance, someone who doodles occasionally may or may not identify "as an artist", but anyone who paints professionally almost certainly identifies as an artist. Someone who paints regularly as a hobby probably identifies as an artist; the doodler may be more idle about it and not really ... (read more)

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4ChristianKl
There are probably plenty of people who paint walls who don't identify as artists.
4Zubon
Parallel examples: * Almost everyone below a certain age plays video/computer games, but only a small subset of those people would self-identify as "gamers." * You exercise, but do you think of yourself as an "athlete"? You lift weights, but do you think of yourself as a "weightlifter"? * You are married, but is "spouse" a core part of your identity? You have reproduced, but is "parent" part of your core identity?
3Richard_Kennaway
I see, I think. It does not seem to be something that I do. For example, I play taiko regularly as a hobby, but if someone asked, "but do you identify as a taiko player", my reaction would be "wuh?" Going off on a tangent, how fixed or malleable is this mental experience? Has anyone who does "identify with" this or that tried as a meditative exercise, experimentally identifying with other things instead?
2014 Less Wrong Census/Survey
JohnnyCat10

Undoubtedly a point of controversy.

Examples:

  • In some societies, a great many people play games, if only mobile/phone/web games. Yet only a fraction of them would "identify as gamers".
  • Birth genders vs. "identification".

Or, myself: I identify as an LWer but only made an account today, and certainly haven't yet finished all of the sequences. I could feel like a bit of a poser, or worry others would call me "fake", but that's not actually relevant to my own self-identification.

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2014 Less Wrong Census/Survey
JohnnyCat120

You are probably one of the few people who can identify an exact year when you forgot your SAT scores.

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3TobyBartels
Hopefully roryokane will remember this year … it may come up on a survey later!
2014 Less Wrong Census/Survey
JohnnyCat360

I identify with being "mixed race" far more than any individual race (which feels distinct to me from "other", but it was still the only choice for me).

I learned/confirmed non-zero answers about myself for questions I hadn't previously/strongly considered. This could be considered a "bonus" for taking the survey.

(Finished.)

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3Elund
Not technically a race, but then again neither is "Hispanic", which keeps getting treated as if it was a race. Race is a social construct anyway, so might as well. I'm a bit surprised "mixed race" didn't occur to me as an option to suggest. It is true that I don't emotionally identify with either of my races, but I don't emotionally identify with "mixed race" either, probably because I wasn't raised in a community of mixed-race individuals and don't know that many mixed-race people. I feel like there isn't really a unique shared culture to unite us. Upon reflection, I've decided that if "mixed race" became available as an option on a future LW survey, I would continue to pick "other", because I really do identify with the human race more than anything else. The word "identify" is key though. If it simply asked what race I am, I would defer to the general consensus for how people should be classified, because I'd assume that's how the survey-writers want us to answer.