Also similar: Wal-Mart's low wages cost taxpayers $1 million per year.

Ahh! I actually submitted the wrong link. This is what I meant to submit.

An interesting Times article popped up yesterday that has some relevance to this (or at least to the political aspect).

Thank you. I agree.

No, we're not sure about that. That's a pretty speculative claim, and a subjective one at that.

That's one of the most interesting responses to what I wrote that I've read (so thank you). I agree completely about the shades of grey, and your example (crying) is dead-on (digression: that's the kind of torment that makes great fiction, whereas my black/ white doesn't).

When I write these things, I tend to employ a weird exaggerated technique to better outline my point. I think of it like the way I explained something to my daughter the other day, using two extremes to measure or evaluate those shades of grey. The example:

Suppose you want to find out if something is farther away from you than another object, and you know these two objects are the same size. To determine which one is farther away, you think of two extremes: imagine something a mile away, then imagine something an inch from your face. Which one is bigger?

Using that conclusion, you can determine which of the two objects is farther away by determining which one appears to be smaller. Reductionist, yes, but the technique works at times.

It doesn't work as well in cases like this, though; it just happens to be how I think. I depend on thoughtful people like you guys to illuminate the shades of grey.

@dfadeyev had some excellent comments on this post (via Twitter):

Nice post, but the thesis can be turned around too: where fundamentalism has a foundation, moral relativism has none, and so...

as a result those without a strong philosophy seek structure and identity in other things, such as materialism you mentioned...

In this way, powerful shifts in values are unavoidable, but it does not mean that you should give them up to avoid the loss...

Rather that you have the strength for the transition should it be proven right and just - i.e. strong opinions weakly held...

Which is to say: fundamentalism and radicalism are not inherently bad, what's bad are weak minds who cannot handle them.

I absolutely see your point, and the sense of entitlement you point out has, fairly or unfairly, been discussed at length, so I won't beat a dead horse. There's something to it (or we wouldn't be talking about it), but painting with such a broad brush based on personal experience is a dangerous logic game.

Youtube videos are not play. iPhone games are not play.

I've battled with this with my own daughter. Of course, I make her put down the screen and go outside and play on occasion, but games and videos are play. Its just a different kind of play than we're used to. The phenomenon will probably hold true, too: kids play at what they're interested in, so those kids who play at games and videos are likely to incorporate that interest in their chosen career, to a certain extent. I'm certainly not saying it's good for them, or that they don't need to put the screens down (I'm a huge proponent of that), but I don't want to say that kids need to play differently because they're not playing the way I did or want them to.

Tha'ts an interesting response to the "Twitter is killing our attention spans" argument. Pros and cons to everything.

That's a good point. Some have said that that aids our writing ability, by forcing us to think about the implied perception of our words. I think, on some level, it's true. It's also, I think, why we're so eager for better video chat.

You're quite welcome. I think most people are judging, but that's not the problem. The problem is that we give too much weight to that judgement. I remember posting a tweet a few months ago, and not having heard from a user who I'd regularly conversed with for a couple of weeks after that. I suddenly recalled a tweet that I'd posted that could've been misconstrued, and wondered if I'd offended her with that tweet. It was a ridiculous notion, but my imagination got the better of me. Perhaps there was judgement, but 1) in this case, it was all in my imagination, and 2) if there was judgement, how did that affect me, really?

Also, this is related.

Wow. I haven't tried to watch anything yet, but thank you for this. I'll probably write this up on Sssimpli next week.

I just discovered Unknown Mortal Orchestra a few weeks ago. I can't stop listening to it.

I don't think there's any denying that online education is a force to be reckoned with. It's still very flawed, though, and in its infancy. It will take awhile for institutions to catch up, too. We know the hazards of cubicles and of sitting, but the vast majority of businesses still requires both.

I tend to agree; I didn't go the traditional route, opting for the Navy instead, and missing my chance later. As a result, I spend a lot more of my time looking for and developing contacts and people who are interested in the same things I am.

Another missed point: it's difficult to build a house if you don't know how, and that's how I feel about education. You can cherrypick your learning and, certainly, further your education, but brick-and-mortar schools tell you in what order to stack those pieces of knowledge. They teach you how to build the house from the materials you've gathered.

Thinking about it in terms of axes makes a lot of sense. It was a hard notion to discard, which is precisely why it nagged me so much. If it was nagging, there must be something to it, though I didn't like the obvious conclusions (which implied hubris on my part).

It's hard to give them that chance if you immediately think that you are a select man and they are simply the serfs.

I agree completely, and let me be clear about the fact that I don't believe I'm better than those I'm referring to (mostly dear friends of mine). They're better than me in many ways. The difference I refer to is the desire to be better/ make things better versus contentedness with who they are and the way things are.

Nobody likes a proselytizer.

I learned that the hard way. When I started "proselytizing," I was in my early 20s... the age that we start to think we've got it all figured out.

It just sounds like you're running with a crowd that doesn't gel with you.

This, essentially, is the crux of the problem. I did my schooling in the Navy, so I never had the chance to discuss higher ideas with a group of peers. When I became interested in those ideas, I didn't have the 'new' crowd to discuss them with that most do who get the traditional college setting. So, while I love my friends dearly, this discussion of ideas is something that they (mostly) can't provide for me.

Thanks for the compliment, by the way. I'm sure this post will not sit well with some of the afore-mentioned friends, but it was in my head, so I had to get it on paper, so to speak. And thanks for the welcome to Hubski. Judging from the dialogue I've already seen here, this is a pretty fantastic community.

The blanket statement made me uneasy, too. Perhaps I swept over it because I was focused on the personal significance. Still, I think there is something to it. If most in that culture had the option to a) change the culture, or b) start their own culture, my guess is that many would go with the latter. That, to me, is the difference Deleuze is getting at.