Nice to see you fellow primate! Long ago I stumbled across some sensationalized description of an article that apparently said that people with ADHD (or was it Asperger's?) see photos of neutral faces as hostile, or something to that effect. Could that be your affliction?
Before the Olympics in Sochi I saw on tv Russian hosts being taught how to smile towards fellow primates as they visited. Perhaps there's something like that for the cam? Or perhaps your obscure co-blogger could snap a pic unbeknownst to you when you snigger at some snide remark about his latest post?
Anyway, you should be proud to reveal your face, it's a big step for a writing primate. Kudos!
>>Long ago I stumbled across some sensationalized description of an article that apparently said that people with ADHD (or was it Asperger's?) see photos of neutral faces as hostile, or something to that effect. Could that be your affliction?
Although I have some aspie traits, I'm rather sure that I really look hostile/angry/crazy in most photos I take. Other people mostly look nice in their photos!
>>Before the Olympics in Sochi I saw on tv Russian hosts being taught how to smile towards fellow primates as they visited. Perhaps there's something like that for the cam? Or perhaps your obscure co-blogger could snap a pic unbeknownst to you when you snigger at some snide remark about his latest post?
I really could use a coach who tells me how to look on different occasions. I haven't really figured out how to do that (probably one of my most aspie traits). If I ever get important enough for that thing to matter, I will have to hire an expert who tells me how to perform appropriate facial expressions for every occasion, especially when cameras are involved. But that is very unlikely to happen. Once I asked my sister, who is a psychologist, if she knows about anyone specializing in helping people who are only a little bit aspie to appear entirely, completely normal. She said she knew about nothing of the kind.
This places your commentariat in an interesting double-bind. If we agree with your overall point, there's the implication we also agree that you look strange-enough to change how we receive your words. And yes I'm making something of a joke.
I'm torn. The human realm has been interpenetrated by the realm of ideas for so very long that it is obviously too late to disambiguate the two. At the same time, we see worse off than our less-compulsively-verbal/conceptual ancestors 40 or 100 thousand years ago.
Ha ha, well, I thought about that risk, but I assume that I look so ordinary that no one would be very surprised by a photo of me. Where I live I'm practically irrecognizable in any crowd of more than 20 people.
I think your references have "percent" where they should have "page."
> If any person ever succeeds in thinking something serious, that serious thinking came to being in the body of a primate living in a world of primates. Especially thinking on social issues.
Oddly, I've had to learn to care about social issues and status games. Over time I've realized it's because I'm so fearless and naturally overconfident that I instinctively take everyone as an equal or a non-entity, which I've since learned is a mistake. Now I try to read everybody, not just my own friends and family.
I strongly doubt I'll ever post a photo of myself as you've done, but I'm very animated, and people comment that I could have been a radio announcer. I find it much easier in real life to catch and hold people's attention than online - what's tough in real life is finding anyone that I want to listen to. (Most people are pretty boring; you can tell by clicking the "explore" button on Substack.)
>>I think your references have "percent" where they should have "page."
That's intentional. I once discovered that the page numbers of e-books don't match the page numbers of physical books. Since I own very few of my reference books as physical books, I don't know what to do about that other than referring to a percentage throughout the book. Otherwise I will refer to the wrong page compared to the physical book.
If you could have been a radio announcer in real life, I could have been an investigative journalist. I'm good at listening to people and asking them questions. As long as people talk about themselves l tend to find them interesting. But that is easy for me to say, since I spend most of my time secluded. People who spend most of their awake hours among strangers probably can't afford such an attitude.
You are wise! Never before have I encountered such a citation method. I will begin using it immediately!
> People who spend most of their awake hours among strangers probably can't afford such an attitude.
Yes! Also most people wander around with an expression and voice tone that says "I am very boring, and also crazy." Neurotypicals are very sensitive to such things. See for example:
van Tilburg, W. A., Igou, E. R., & Panjwani, M. (2023). Boring people: Stereotype characteristics, interpersonal attributions, and social reactions. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 49(9), 0 to 43 percent, which was somewhere around the point at which I got bored
Begley, S. (1998). Is everybody crazy?. Newsweek, 131(4), 0 to 100 percent, because the answer is 100 percent yes, everybody is crazy
Ha ha ha, that's Apple Pie! Having two references in storage proving that people are boring and crazy (at least some of them).
I find boring people rather fascinating. And crazy people too, of course. If someone could just write a book called "I'm boring, this is how it's like being me", I would devour it.
It helps a lot when a comment section contains people who know each other from other venues and are otherwise on friendly terms. A generation ago the Internet was full of discussion sites rather than blogs, and some of those were absolutely phenomenal. I always preferred that format, even, but for whatever reason they've mostly died out.
You don't look very flimsy to me. You actually look quite strong-faced.
I think if I met you and talked to you I wouldn't take you unseriously. Not because of how you look but because my autism most likely prevents me from caring about things like that.
Well, to be fair there are many people who score fewer primate status points than me too. I just have the feeling that since I don't excel in that game, I should be grateful for the opportunities the internet offers to avoid it.
Autism is great sometimes. Not always, but sonetimes. Being with people who are on the autistic side often feels more like writing compared to being with neurotypicals.
Oh, that's true! When I was a young teenager I scorned online communication, preferring written letters which allowed handwriting to tell an emotional story. Eventually I learned to sense people's emotions through raw text, but I still miss most of what I'd get from face to face. Neurotypicals use a lot of animal communication which austistic people tend to miss, or grope around with.
*Shakes head in embarrassment for neurotypicals while smiling ruefully to signal humor and sympathy to other neurotypicals who need the reassurance of reading my mind in my eyes*
Nice to see you fellow primate! Long ago I stumbled across some sensationalized description of an article that apparently said that people with ADHD (or was it Asperger's?) see photos of neutral faces as hostile, or something to that effect. Could that be your affliction?
Before the Olympics in Sochi I saw on tv Russian hosts being taught how to smile towards fellow primates as they visited. Perhaps there's something like that for the cam? Or perhaps your obscure co-blogger could snap a pic unbeknownst to you when you snigger at some snide remark about his latest post?
Anyway, you should be proud to reveal your face, it's a big step for a writing primate. Kudos!
>>Long ago I stumbled across some sensationalized description of an article that apparently said that people with ADHD (or was it Asperger's?) see photos of neutral faces as hostile, or something to that effect. Could that be your affliction?
Although I have some aspie traits, I'm rather sure that I really look hostile/angry/crazy in most photos I take. Other people mostly look nice in their photos!
>>Before the Olympics in Sochi I saw on tv Russian hosts being taught how to smile towards fellow primates as they visited. Perhaps there's something like that for the cam? Or perhaps your obscure co-blogger could snap a pic unbeknownst to you when you snigger at some snide remark about his latest post?
I really could use a coach who tells me how to look on different occasions. I haven't really figured out how to do that (probably one of my most aspie traits). If I ever get important enough for that thing to matter, I will have to hire an expert who tells me how to perform appropriate facial expressions for every occasion, especially when cameras are involved. But that is very unlikely to happen. Once I asked my sister, who is a psychologist, if she knows about anyone specializing in helping people who are only a little bit aspie to appear entirely, completely normal. She said she knew about nothing of the kind.
This places your commentariat in an interesting double-bind. If we agree with your overall point, there's the implication we also agree that you look strange-enough to change how we receive your words. And yes I'm making something of a joke.
I'm torn. The human realm has been interpenetrated by the realm of ideas for so very long that it is obviously too late to disambiguate the two. At the same time, we see worse off than our less-compulsively-verbal/conceptual ancestors 40 or 100 thousand years ago.
Ha ha, well, I thought about that risk, but I assume that I look so ordinary that no one would be very surprised by a photo of me. Where I live I'm practically irrecognizable in any crowd of more than 20 people.
I think your references have "percent" where they should have "page."
> If any person ever succeeds in thinking something serious, that serious thinking came to being in the body of a primate living in a world of primates. Especially thinking on social issues.
Oddly, I've had to learn to care about social issues and status games. Over time I've realized it's because I'm so fearless and naturally overconfident that I instinctively take everyone as an equal or a non-entity, which I've since learned is a mistake. Now I try to read everybody, not just my own friends and family.
I strongly doubt I'll ever post a photo of myself as you've done, but I'm very animated, and people comment that I could have been a radio announcer. I find it much easier in real life to catch and hold people's attention than online - what's tough in real life is finding anyone that I want to listen to. (Most people are pretty boring; you can tell by clicking the "explore" button on Substack.)
>>I think your references have "percent" where they should have "page."
That's intentional. I once discovered that the page numbers of e-books don't match the page numbers of physical books. Since I own very few of my reference books as physical books, I don't know what to do about that other than referring to a percentage throughout the book. Otherwise I will refer to the wrong page compared to the physical book.
If you could have been a radio announcer in real life, I could have been an investigative journalist. I'm good at listening to people and asking them questions. As long as people talk about themselves l tend to find them interesting. But that is easy for me to say, since I spend most of my time secluded. People who spend most of their awake hours among strangers probably can't afford such an attitude.
> That's intentional.
You are wise! Never before have I encountered such a citation method. I will begin using it immediately!
> People who spend most of their awake hours among strangers probably can't afford such an attitude.
Yes! Also most people wander around with an expression and voice tone that says "I am very boring, and also crazy." Neurotypicals are very sensitive to such things. See for example:
van Tilburg, W. A., Igou, E. R., & Panjwani, M. (2023). Boring people: Stereotype characteristics, interpersonal attributions, and social reactions. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 49(9), 0 to 43 percent, which was somewhere around the point at which I got bored
Begley, S. (1998). Is everybody crazy?. Newsweek, 131(4), 0 to 100 percent, because the answer is 100 percent yes, everybody is crazy
Ha ha ha, that's Apple Pie! Having two references in storage proving that people are boring and crazy (at least some of them).
I find boring people rather fascinating. And crazy people too, of course. If someone could just write a book called "I'm boring, this is how it's like being me", I would devour it.
Writing longform on blogs seems to work well (which is one reason I encourage it, https://theredquest.substack.com/p/write-your-player-blog-its-an-advertisement-but-not-in-the-way-you-think). Writing short-form on Twitter and similar networks seems to work poorly. Comments sections work when they're sufficiently small and sufficiently groomed.
The number of people inclined to write and think long appears to be low, so that's probably part of the story.
It helps a lot when a comment section contains people who know each other from other venues and are otherwise on friendly terms. A generation ago the Internet was full of discussion sites rather than blogs, and some of those were absolutely phenomenal. I always preferred that format, even, but for whatever reason they've mostly died out.
Yes. And it also helps to avoid the most polarizing issues. Not arguing for one or another side in the culture war makes it easier to avoid that war.
You don't look very flimsy to me. You actually look quite strong-faced.
I think if I met you and talked to you I wouldn't take you unseriously. Not because of how you look but because my autism most likely prevents me from caring about things like that.
Well, to be fair there are many people who score fewer primate status points than me too. I just have the feeling that since I don't excel in that game, I should be grateful for the opportunities the internet offers to avoid it.
Autism is great sometimes. Not always, but sonetimes. Being with people who are on the autistic side often feels more like writing compared to being with neurotypicals.
Oh, that's true! When I was a young teenager I scorned online communication, preferring written letters which allowed handwriting to tell an emotional story. Eventually I learned to sense people's emotions through raw text, but I still miss most of what I'd get from face to face. Neurotypicals use a lot of animal communication which austistic people tend to miss, or grope around with.
That must be why neurotypicals tend to use a ton of smileys when they write: They would prefer not to be writing to each other at all, actually.
*Shakes head in embarrassment for neurotypicals while smiling ruefully to signal humor and sympathy to other neurotypicals who need the reassurance of reading my mind in my eyes*