All of wesley's Comments + Replies

wesley70

Wow. I predict that this will significantly increase my skepticism of TV interviews. I already knew this sort of thing could be done with quotes, but was completely ignorant of how imperceptible good audio edits can be, and of the cut-away technique.

wesley00

I agree. Sheldon seems to be the kind of character that perpetuates the myth: "People who are extremely intelligent and/or rational are unfeeling, boring, and don't understand social norms." Which is funny considering Sheldon seems to act unreasonably fairly frequently.

1Ritalin
Sheldon is not unfeeling so much as callous; he feels very much when it comes to him. He's also hardly boring.
wesley170

Did it. Was enjoyable for me!

wesley00

To clarify (I didn't do a good job above), I meant to ask "do certain perceived psychological effects (which probably do correlate with neurophysiological mechanisms) correlate with voting events AND significant positive and negative effects on the populace in terms of perceived well-being and productivity?

I did not know that about banking, although I did not expressly believe the alternative either. I will definitely look at that a little more. Intuitively I also agree with the sentiment that many other seemingly mundane things probably have a greater overall impact on societal production than relatively uncommon events.

1noen
Ok, I do wonder how one would distinguish between perceived effects vs real effects. The real effects of say civil rights legislation was greater freedom and opportunity for minorities. We are a better more productive society when we, at least in theory, give everyone an equal chance to succeed. That's the real material result of the 60's civil rights movement. The psychological effect of those who benefited was maybe "I am a valued member of society." I'm not sure how one teases that apart from the positive effect of simply being able to get a job or a loan without being discriminated against. I am just wondering out loud. I really wonder how much of a difference perception or attitude makes over and above real material changes. I suspect that my perceptions positive or negative of the results on an election are determined by whether or not I experience real benefit or harm. I also suspect that we sort of backtrack and revise our memories to convince ourselves that we are masters of our domain when the opposite may be true. But I don't know. I could be all wrong.
wesley00

I wonder if the psychological effects of voting on individuals (feelings of empowerment, possibly of hopelessness or hope) have a significant positive or negative effect on the populace in terms of productivity or well-being soon before and/or shortly after an election.

And if so, how the magnitude of such an effect might correlate with the scale, expected outcome, or actual outcome of a given election (or issue). i.e. might people feel more empowered

(a) After voting in a Presidential election where their votes have a smaller effect on the outcome, but wh... (read more)

0noen
If the confidence fairy has been shown not to exist. (The confidence fairy is the theory that the reason banks are not lending right now is due to a lack of confidence in the market.) Then why should we believe that feelings of hopelessness or empowerment will effect the economy? (productivity is an economic feature) What seems to me more likely to affect productivity is whether or not one got a good night's sleep the night before and ate a decent breakfast. If folk psychology (hope, despair) is epiphenominal then there is no reason to believe they have causal effects in the world.
3TheOtherDave
I'd also be interested to see how this compares to, say, how empowered people feel after their favorite football team wins or loses a game.
wesley80

Hi, my name is Wes(ley), and I'm a lurkaholic.

First, I'd like to thank this community. I think it is responsible in a large way for my transformation (perceived transformation of course) from a cynical high schooler who truly was only motivated enough to use his natural (not worked hard for) above average reasoning skills to troll his peers, to a college kid currently making large positive lifestyle changes, and dreaming of making significant positive changes in the world.

I think I have observed significant changes in my thinking patterns since reading th... (read more)

wesley30

I would be very interested in attending the meeting, it would be my first!

I'm a twenty year old male, grew up in the area, and am home from school until January. I'd be willing to attend at virtually any location in northeast ohio, and at almost any time.