get organized! there are loads of community-based action groups that provide mutual aid services. the democratic socialists of America is a great example but there are plenty of other options if that’s not for you

I want to get better at deeply understanding people, which probably starts with getting better at listening

not within your lifetime though. you just have to have faith in the peer review process. also peer reviewing typically does not involve actually reproducing the results

nuance won’t hurt you I promise

but you can’t! are you personally able to verify the results of every scientific investigation ever performed? think about what’s currently happening in psychology. loads of old foundational studies have been found to be irreproducible. and yet people had faith that they were conducted honestly and appropriately

that’s not true. there are things that are not definitions. like my bed for instance, there are aspects that are arbitrary (my personal preferences, design choices, etc) and aspects that are not arbitrary (its physical form that exists beyond definition)

yes but you still have to have faith in the ability of another person to do science and not falsify evidence

but to people with faith, their faith is evidence-based

yes but translation from evidence to what caused the evidence to exist requires assumptions, like the fact that trig works. I’m not saying assumptions are bad, just that they should be acknowledged

maybe you’re the one who doesn’t understand the ramifications of its meaning

literally every definition ever is arbitrary

just make sure you slow down and savor it

they were complaining about things that are only unpleasant because of their own feelings toward the situation

can you elaborate? I’m not sure what your point is

yeah except that logic relies on base assumptions, which are ultimately chosen based on gut feelings

facts actually are very difficult to define. imagine telling an alien about the fact that people stop at stop signs, when the alien potentially has never seen a road, car, or stop sign

just because it has a reason doesn’t make it not arbitrary. you can ultimately come up with a reason for all arbitrary decisions

my point was more broad. most products are design based on what the “market” wants, instead of what the individual making it wants. thus results in a diluted product that does too many things and all poorly

and that’s the secret to a good product

absolute scales are still arbitrary. you would probably want to use a scale that measures “perceived heat” which is different than average kinetic energy