BF2S Forums EE Chats: New Testaments

mac did you like the girl musician who played in the bar in td season 2

Jay wrote:

uziq wrote:

half of the challenge with intellectual stuff is concentration and discipline so i don't buy those pandering and populist arguments. people memorise football statistics because it's a spectacle and a social rite. knuckling down and memorising enough to pass an LSAT exam or to get into problems in non-euclidean geometry is hard partly because it's so impenetrable and boring and has no ritualistic social value.

It all comes down to social value. Sports are cool, math is not. No one bullshits about calculus at the water cooler. There's no MathCenter making stupid jokes over highlight reel footage of a savant standing in front of a blackboard.

is there an echo in here or something?

Pocshy2.0 wrote:

Yeah, I mean, I get your point Uzique, but even if they could find a single subject they take an interest in. There are lots of subjects that I think would appeal to a large portion of the population (History, Sociology, Criminology, Literature come to mind). And you have to remember, some of the shit these guys remember is entirely tedious and nearly worthless in terms of ritualistic social value (nobody cares what the win percentages between the Yankees and Blue Jays are in home games played after 4pm). The ritualistic social value side of things is also something that exists in certain segments of society. I know lots of friends who pride themselves (and are valued and admired by their peers) for being able to solve obscure math problems and proofs.

you are a bigger an moran than i previously thought if you seriously think that the majority of any population seriously has the potential to be into sociology or literature. these are by their very definition minority interests. even before the rise of televisual media when the written word was all there was for entertainment and the dissemination of mass culture, the majority of people didn't care for reading much. it's a hyper-liberal and naive line to take to really believe that everyone's imagination would be inflamed by these ancient classical subjects, if only they had the tools and the right (humanist) education to open their minds!!! never going to happen. wasn't the case in pericles' athens and won't be the case in clinton's america. intellectual activity takes a certain sort of person and a certain sort of hard work. the majority of people, say from one of those neat little classical city-states, will be happier carving benches or tending to the topiary or whatever.

of course intellectual activity and academia has a ritual social value of its own. this stuff is called cultural capital, as defined so famously by pierre bourdieu. anyone who has had the misfortune to sit through a class of undergrad sociology #101 will be familiar with it. book learning or mathematical genius will be prized in certain milieus. but, again, these are necessarily minority pursuits, pursued by smaller and smaller social elites or groups of distinction. the reason that so many people are into football statistics instead of the topology of torus shapes is because there is hardly any division between 'work' and 'play' in the football stuff. it's a broader form of socialising to shoot the shit about the game, broader because anyone can grasp it who cares to suck back beers for a few hours a week and kick their feet up.

Last edited by uziq (2015-08-19 13:58:02)

RTHKI wrote:

college basketball is best worst ball

RTHKI wrote:

everyone here loves baseball. its meh.

Bow down and worship at the altar of Votto you heathen!

cowami wrote:

Jay wrote:

RTHKI wrote:

everyone here loves baseball. its meh.

Bow down and worship at the altar of Votto you heathen!

i thought you were a mets fan, you heathen!

I am, but he lives in cincy

RTHKI wrote:

mac did you like the girl musician who played in the bar in td season 2

Yes! She was actually more than just s singer they brought in. She had some part as a music designer or something for the show and they put her in it. It was her first big role and she just became famous for it. Good for her. I think this song should have been the opening credits

for the first time nfl mobile decided to send a notification to my phone. some guy i dont know tore his acl

Jay wrote:

uziq wrote:

hey americans how popular is bill burr over there

i like his blue-collar boston thing

Who?

bill burr.

he was in breaking bad, your all-time top tv show

Last edited by uziq (2015-08-19 15:08:33)

RTHKI wrote:

for the first time nfl mobile decided to send a notification to my phone. some guy i dont know tore his acl

I used to get notifications from Facebook when a girl I hooked up with in high school made a status update. It still happens from time to time with the same two people.

cowami wrote:

RTHKI wrote:

for the first time nfl mobile decided to send a notification to my phone. some guy i dont know tore his acl

lol, i'm not the only one that got it either? good!

I disabled the app

I think I've finally gone mental and I've got to tell you it's a great feeling.

uziq wrote:

Pocshy2.0 wrote:

Yeah, I mean, I get your point Uzique, but even if they could find a single subject they take an interest in. There are lots of subjects that I think would appeal to a large portion of the population (History, Sociology, Criminology, Literature come to mind). And you have to remember, some of the shit these guys remember is entirely tedious and nearly worthless in terms of ritualistic social value (nobody cares what the win percentages between the Yankees and Blue Jays are in home games played after 4pm). The ritualistic social value side of things is also something that exists in certain segments of society. I know lots of friends who pride themselves (and are valued and admired by their peers) for being able to solve obscure math problems and proofs.

you are a bigger an moran than i previously thought if you seriously think that the majority of any population seriously has the potential to be into sociology or literature. these are by their very definition minority interests. even before the rise of televisual media when the written word was all there was for entertainment and the dissemination of mass culture, the majority of people didn't care for reading much. it's a hyper-liberal and naive line to take to really believe that everyone's imagination would be inflamed by these ancient classical subjects, if only they had the tools and the right (humanist) education to open their minds!!! never going to happen. wasn't the case in pericles' athens and won't be the case in clinton's america. intellectual activity takes a certain sort of person and a certain sort of hard work. the majority of people, say from one of those neat little classical city-states, will be happier carving benches or tending to the topiary or whatever.

of course intellectual activity and academia has a ritual social value of its own. this stuff is called cultural capital, as defined so famously by pierre bourdieu. anyone who has had the misfortune to sit through a class of undergrad sociology #101 will be familiar with it. book learning or mathematical genius will be prized in certain milieus. but, again, these are necessarily minority pursuits, pursued by smaller and smaller social elites or groups of distinction. the reason that so many people are into football statistics instead of the topology of torus shapes is because there is hardly any division between 'work' and 'play' in the football stuff. it's a broader form of socialising to shoot the shit about the game, broader because anyone can grasp it who cares to suck back beers for a few hours a week and kick their feet up.

I don't disagree, in all honesty, and this whole conversation about opening the minds of Americans really is leading nowhere-- I'm not some sort of idealist dreamer. But, I do disagree in that I think certain subjects do have some degree of mass appeal. It's the in-depth reading and abstract thought that will never fly (as you hint at).

But to your prior point, I be an moran.