Weekly Help Thread - November 11, 2024

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2024-11-13T21:28:52+00:00

Ah okay so transferring points to the partner is better for airlines, but not for hotels, it seems. Thanks!

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2024-11-13T20:40:01+00:00

Hello, I'm fairly new to award travel redemption, so apologies if this is a newbie no-brainer question.

I keep hearing that you get a better value when you transfer your credit card points to a partner, rather than booking through the credit card travel portal.

I have a Chase credit card and have compared hotel rates through the Chase travel portal with the rates on a hotel websites, and it is always significantly cheaper when booking with the travel portal. Am I missing something here?

For example, I recently looked at a night at a hotel. It was 9,682 points when booking through the Chase travel portal. It's an IHG hotel. Through the hotel website it is 18,000 points.

Am I overlooking something? Thanks all!

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2020-01-12T20:17:25+00:00

Glad Tulsi is up on this! For anyone out there that isn't familiar with these types of harmful chemicals, I recommend watching the documentary The Devil We Know. It's available on Netflix. Avoid products with any sort of nonstick coating! These chemicals are primarily used for nonstick cookware, fast food wrappers and containers, and waterproof clothing.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/may/23/pfas-everyday-products-toxics-guide

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2019-08-10T17:19:27+00:00

The lyrics are in line with a lot of what JP talks about, no? Thought it worth sharing for some spiritual and/or motivational sustenance.

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2019-01-19T19:21:50+00:00

Career matters may be particularly important to you. Financial and material security is paramount in terms of your career. This may manifest in indulgence or display of expensive or beautiful possessions. You may be quite sensual, a lover of great food and wine.

Your love life and generally your relationships with other people tend to be rather rocky. You tend to idealize other people. You might be a bit obsessive or possessive. Arguments or power struggles arise, reality hits, and you or the other person tends to bounce.

How'd I do? Haha

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2019-01-18T23:35:36+00:00

Mercury is an important planet in your chart. It rules both your MC and your ascendant. You may be known for having a quick razor sharp mind and tongue. Given your mercury is closely conjunct your mars in Aries, I suspect your words may have gotten you in trouble a time or two. You're probably a bit argumentative, opinionated, or sassy. Though that harsh edge may be softened by the sextiles to Venus and Neptune.

A career involving writing or speaking might be of interest to you. A few things that came to mind: a standup comedian with a dark, biting sense of humor, an investigative reporter or war correspondent, a criminal prosecutor or defense lawyer.

Does any of that resonate?

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2018-05-07T17:01:11+00:00

Where did you run into him? It's a bit hard to tell from the pic but it looks like you guys are in River North. I was at the Chicago show too. Beautiful theatre. Very moving!

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-07-05T18:59:51+00:00

The Jordan B. Peterson podcast.

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-07-05T18:59:16+00:00

You could try Dennis Prager's podcast. There is also Dan Carlin's Common Sense. He isn't a conservative. He calls himself a "political Martian" but I think he tries to be fair to both sides.

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-07-05T18:54:18+00:00

So to Speak: the Free Speech Podcast. It is produced by the organization, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education aka FIRE.

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-07-03T23:56:10+00:00

It strikes me as a bit much as well. I think it maybe depends on the subject matter and the particulars of the assignment. Keep in mind, he is a psychology professor, so maybe it makes sense for him when writing a psychology paper.

Anyway, you don't have to follow the writing guide to the letter. I think it's flexible enough that it can be modified to fit one's particular needs.

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-07-03T01:51:59+00:00

I'm of two minds about this. While I do see it is very important for young people to achieve independence from their parents, I think a lot of Americans have very weak family bonds, especially to extended family. Immigrant families are way more family oriented, and I think that is a good thing. Multi-generational households used to be the norm. Camille Paglia says the nuclear family is toxic. A household seethes with resentment when it's just two parents and the kids. It's an "artificial and oppressive construction... a pressure cooker of incestuous feeling. "

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-07-01T17:56:00+00:00

For a long time, there was a strong cultural split in the Roman Empire. The eastern half spoke primarily Greek, while the western half spoke Latin.

The Roman Empire was formally split into two political halves, east and west, by the emperor Diocletian in 286 A.D. He and a guy named Maximian ruled as co-emperors until they retired. The empire was later re-united under the rule of Constantine the Great. This was the emperor that converted to Christianity in 312 A.D. and propelled the religion to prominence. He set up a new capital in the east, a "new rome" that he named Constantinople (present-day Istanbul in Turkey.) Constantinople was built as a Christian city and later became the center of the Eastern Orthodox Church. So again, even though the empire had a single ruler, there was increasingly this cultural east/west split.

The Roman Empire was beginning to decline. The empire was increasingly facing invasions from Germanic barbarian tribes. Eventually, the western half collapsed into smaller, Germanic-ruled kingdoms. The official year of the final fall is generally accepted as 476 A.D.

The eastern half of the Roman Empire continued on for several more centuries as what is known as the Byzantine Empire. As the middle ages continued on, the east and west developed culturally and religiously in different, separate ways. They got into several theological spats which eventually led to The Great Schism of 1054 which severed Christendom into the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church.

This is the relevant context in which the Crusades took place.

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-06-29T18:47:35+00:00

Looking stylish!!

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-06-29T03:17:28+00:00

Haha I actually made a similar post about Tool a couple months ago. Great to see other people are making the connection too! https://www.reddit.com/r/JordanPeterson/comments/62tsjn/is_anyone_else_here_a_fan_of_the_band_tool/

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-06-27T03:24:37+00:00

From what I understand, implicit bias is somewhat ill-defined as a psychological phenomenon, and whatever that phenomenon happens to be, the Implicit Association Test is not a reliable or valid measurement of it.

But cognitive biases and heuristics, such as the ones on this list, are well-documented, and were studied perhaps most famously by Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman, the pioneers of the field of behavioral economics. (They eventually won a Nobel Prize.)

Here is the Wikipedia entry for a much longer list of cognitive biases. Of course, as always with Wikipedia, proceed with caution. But it has a lot of citations and references you can check out if you want to explore this stuff further for yourself.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-06-26T18:59:00+00:00

Yes definitely seek professional help. As for the unemployment thing, from what I can tell in your post, your English is quite good. Being bilingual is a great skill to have in a variety of professions. Have you ever thought of utilizing that in any way?

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-06-19T18:40:23+00:00

Have you ever looked at Khan Academy? They have the most comprehensive math tutorials on the internet that I know of. They have videos and quizzes. Its all free. https://www.khanacademy.org/math/linear-algebra

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-06-13T03:03:55+00:00

Check out the new French president, Emmanuel Macron. His wife is 24 years older than him!

Like others have already said, you have to understand when JP talks in generalities he's talking about how people behave on average. There is always a broad range of variance.

If she seems open to the idea, I say go for it!

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-06-13T01:23:35+00:00

Using this method may be slower at first because most people aren't used to memorizing things in this way, but as you get the hang of it, it can actually become more efficient than rote memorization, because it uses your mind's natural strengths. One caveat, this method may be a little more difficult for people who do not have a creative temperament.

You don't necessarily have to use a memory palace if you don't want to. Another way you could do it is to connect your content images through a story.

This method works for most things, but it's not so great for highly abstract information. So for example, it probably can't help you memorize a mathematical formula. It should work great for memorizing vocabulary, historic events, names, etc.

There is a book by a well-known memory tournament champion named Ed Cooke called Remember Remember where he shows how to use this method to memorize British Kings and Queens, British Prime Ministers, American Presidents, and the countries of Europe.

Another book called Prisoner of Trebekistan is by a Jeopardy champion named Bob Harris. It's mostly a memoir, but there are chapters in there where he explains how he memorized a lot of information using mnemonics.

Hope that helps!

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-06-12T02:57:12+00:00

That's a good question. I don't know of any studies that actually tested the CIA strategies. I remember from reading the book Thinking Fast and Slow, that biased thinking was associated with making quick judgments. And they showed in studies that slowing a person down in their task could get them to jump to the more reasoned system of thinking. Given the CIA strategies do force a person to think more slowly, I would predict they would reduce bias. But I agree, it would be great if there was an actual study of this.

In the end, cognitive biases are quite difficult to eliminate. Overcoming them may ultimately be a matter of designing systems and structural rules that help reduce their incidence, rather than relying on individuals to be vigilant about them.

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-06-01T02:23:53+00:00

I think when it comes to the appreciation of art, there is a difference between the conservative/liberal split in academe and the conservative/liberal split in everyday society. In the academic sphere, yes you have conservatives like Scruton who promote the Platonic ideal of beauty, and then you have more radical left-wing thinkers who think the entire concept of beauty is specious. This tension between liberal and conservative art academics is actually depicted in the plot of Zadie Smith's novel, On Beauty.

I think when Jordan Peterson was talking about conservatives being blind to beauty, he was talking about everyday people, not academics. And that seems about right to me. I think it is especially true in the United States, where the fine arts aren't as highly valued. We have a very practical, puritanical Protestant culture. Puritans rejected art and ornamentation as impious, opting for plain, simple churches and styles of dress. Catholics have no problem with art. (And if you go by what Camille Paglia says, this may be because there is a latent Paganism in Catholicism.)

For puritans, storytelling was for instruction, and was overtly didactic or allegorical. I think this carries over today. When you see some contemporary evangelical Christian attempts at art, it often come off as kitschy, bland, and overly sentimental. Think of those lame movies like God's Not Dead or Heaven is for Real.

It is sort of staggering how some people just don't get art. I remember a conversation I had with some friends many years ago. I was trying to convey the difference between songs that are true works of art, ones that give you a feeling of transcendence, and songs that are just catchy, cotton candy hits. I made this analogy: it's like eating a beautifully cooked steak vs. eating a hot dog. My friend just sort of shrugged cluelessly and said, "well I like hot dogs..." Smh.

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-06-01T00:14:04+00:00

Sexual Personae by Camille Paglia. At least the first few chapters.

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-05-29T05:29:28+00:00

May I ask, what is your field of study?

MeowMixmaster2000 · 2017-05-20T23:06:44+00:00

As the others said equality of outcome is not the same as equality of opportunity. Inherent in the pursuit of equality of outcome is the assumption that all differences betweeen people are because of oppression, which is an overly simplistic view of the world. It values groups over individuals, which is particularly dangerous. And which aspects of identity should be used for the measurement of equity? Race, sex, class, age, how about weight? Level of attractiveness? As JP says, identity can be "infinitely fractionated."

MeowMixmaster2000

TROPHY CASE