Entries tagged 'author:steeph' (Page 8)

The Bad Web Entry created on 2024-07-19 Authors: steeph (370) Categories: #100DaysToOffload (41) Computers (19) Open Web (2) The Small Web (3) Web Browsers (5) World Wide Web (10) Languages used: en (255) edit

A lot has been written about the declining usablity of the World Wide Web due to web sites not respecting what visitors really want or need. So I'll just summarise here before I'll try to get to the point.

Megabytes of CSS and JS to display 15 Kilobytes of content and another few megabytes of ads and other bloat. It has become completely normal to have a hundred and more tracking cookies installed for wisiting a single web page. Many popular sites can't be read by at least some people because the distracting ads have become too much. These are the first major problems that come to my mind. Depending on who you ask the problematic development has started in the last couple of years, about a decade ago, in the mid-2000s or even in the 1990s. But most people above a necessary age to have experienced the difference seem to agree that the web experience was a better one in 2005 than today. Back then RSS was integrated by many popular sites. You could use it to read Twitter and subscribe to YouTube channels, for example, and sites that still offer it in the background used to place links to feeds visibly, not hidden in the source code for browser extensions to discover them. Web browsers themselves could not only display RSS feeds but placed an icon next to the address bar when a feed for the currently viewed page was available. RSS is often used to show how the web was more open in general. Even commercial web sites were created with a more open approach. A site were you had to register before you could view its content was an exception for which privacy was the reason, not monetary expectation or greed. This is the time to which most people seem to want to return to. When I say most people, I mean most people whose thoughts on the open web I read, which is those who post to the open web and are interested in such things to a degree that they want to write about it. So what I probably mean is "most people who are dissatisfied with the current state of the web". It's possible that most people, or most internet users, love the way things are going now and hate the ideas advocates of the open web have, whether that is for or against their own good.

Sometimes I boost thought-out or new takes on the subject, well formulated demands or promotions of software solutions on the fediverse. And I often think about this myself. Because the web has brought me so many nice things and I want it to be a positive thing in society as well, which, overall, it doesn't seem to be anymore. What does the web need to make it better again?

First of all, the open web isn't gone, nor has it shrunk in size. There way more personal blogs, open networks and non-commercial projects out there than 20 years ago. Even new web forums open all the time. But it's less visible below the very very loud, commercial web. Maybe the greedy web is a good name for what I mean. Not every commercial web site is an example of how the web is devdeloping in a bad direction in my view. I want to be able to get information about a business from the business-owner themselves when I'm interested in their services, for example.

A search engine that returns links to non-commercial sites first, unless you really need information that can only be found on a page of a greedy site. I think- let's just not talk about the many problems (not even just challanges) that such a search engine would introduce if it is to be useful in practice.

A browser that only links to non-bloated/non-tracking/non-greedy/open web sites or warns when a link leads to a less-nice site. Again, I don't have the time right now to list all the problem that there would be if an attempt to implement this would be made. Maybe I'll write another entry about my deeper thoughts on the technological solutions that I mention here. But these thoughts don't contain any real solutions. So I don't know.

Create a literal small web, that only uses resources from and only links to, web sites that are following the same standard (e.g. only (X)HTML4, maybe only CSS2, possibly restriction on JS usage). That is in principle similar to building a whole new network, as is Gemini and Gopher doing. (I know Gopher isn't new, but I reckon the majority of sites is.) I forgot what other protocols with similar aims are there. As far as I know none that are widely used. There are initiatives to restrict the WWW to a smaller or older set of standards. Those probably influence site builders (mainly in personal web sites), but won't change the web as a hole. And so you'll eventually while browsing come across a site that doesn't restrict itself it what it's linking to, or you'll catch yourself linking to a bloated site because it's important to link to the original source of something.

JavaScript needs to be optional again. I've recently come to think that this is actually the one major goal among the technological changes that the current web would need to undergo in order to make it user-friendly and more usable again. In a time where you couldn't 100% expect that visitors were using a client that understood JavaScript, and had it enabled, web developers didn't have much of a choice and built in fallbacks so that a site was still usable without JavaScript. But the number of visiting clients without very good JavaScript became so small that it started to look optional, and in reality became not only optional but even rare, that fallbacks are included. JavaScript really took over the web. I could make so many words around this but don't have much time left this morning. Not only are there sites that are empty without JS loading the entire HTML. Such a thing isn't even special anymore.

If you are creating a new web browser, please include a switch in the GUI that allows to enable/disable JavaScript permanently (until deliberately switched on again) either entirely or for the currently viewed site. Or, maybe make it off by default.

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Deutsche Untertitel für A Brony Tale Entry created on 2024-07-18 Authors: steeph (370) Categories: #100DaysToOffload (41) Bronies (2) Documentary (1) Fandom (1) Films (22) My Little Pony (10) Subtitles (1) Languages used: de (88) edit

Es gibt da eine weniger bekannte Dokumentation über Bronies, als die Bronies-Doku. Auch über die bekannte von John de Lancie gäbe es etwas zu schreiben. Aber egal. Einfach vergessen. Die muss nicht gekauft werden. Interessanter (auch weil weniger bekannt) ist die Doku mit dem Titel A Brony Tale.

A Brony Tale von Brent Hodge gibt einen Einblick in das Fandom von My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic indem die Frage "Was sind Bronys" langsam und aus der Sicht von Ashleigh Ball beantwortert, während sie entscheidet, ihre erste Brony-Convention zu besuchen und Fans ihrer Voice-Arbeit trifft. Ashleigh Ball kennt ein Publikum von Fans bisher nur von Konzerten ihrer Band. Als Sprecherin zweier Hauptcharaktere in der Animationsserie (im englischsprachigen Original) wurde sie aber auch unter Bronys ein Name und häufig zu Panel auf Fan-Conventions eingeladen. Es gibt auch Einschätzungen anderer zu dem Fandom, aber keine wirklich kritische Beurteilung oder negative Betrachtungsweise. Ein guter Film für jemanden, den die Frage oder das Thema interessiert. Aber keiner, der weit ins Detail geht oder viel Wissen über die Subkultur vermitteln will. Die Bewertungen haben recht viele Ausreißer nach oben und untern, liegen aber größtenteils im unteren Mittelfeld. Also, nichts besonders Tolles, aber als Teil des Fandoms fand ich ihn sehr gut.

Nachdem der Film veröffentlicht wurde gab es wohl auch mal Pläne, ihn im deutschen TV zu zeigen. Jedenfalls hatte mir Brend Hodge derzeit glaubhaft gemacht, dass es Interesse eines Senders gegeben hätte und quasi nur noch ein Termin gefunden werden musste. Ich hatte damals meistens Zeit und Kopfkapazitäten frei und habe gerne und viel an Gemeinschaftsprojekten mitgearbeitet oder bei Crowd-Sourcing-Aktionen mitgemacht. Mein Angebot, dass ich die deutschen Untertitel für den Film schreibe, um eine Entscheidung für die Ausstrahlung im deutschen Fernsehen wahrscheinlich zu machen, nahm er dankend an. So habe ich gelernt, Untertitel zu schreiben. Praktischerweise gibt es gute freie Software, die die Arbeit erleichtert. Als professionell ist das Ergebnis sicherlich nicht anzusehen. Die Zeilen sind viel zu verbos und bestimmt hier und da zu direkt übersetzt. Aber ich halte das Ergebnis für benutzbar und frei von Fehlern. Aus der Ausstrahlung ist wohl nichts geworden. Vielleicht war es auch ein Missverständnis, weshalb ich danach nie wieder von ihm gehört/gelesen habe.

Aber die Untertiteldatei wollte ich dann doch mal irgendwo veröffentlichen, weil sich das mit brauchbarer Software so gehört. SRT und XML (SubtitleEdit-Datei, nicht TTML) sind im Anhang verlinkt. Der eigentliche Film nicht, weil ich das bestimmt nicht darf. Schade. Naja. Keine Ahnung wie brauchbar die Untertitel heute noch sind, bei den ganzen Tools, die die Untertitel-Arbeit mehr als nur vereinfachen.

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Alternative Web Browser Engines Entry created on 2024-07-17 Authors: steeph (370) Categories: #100DaysToOffload (41) Computers (19) World Wide Web (10) Languages used: en (255) edit

I don't think I have to spell out the problem with the current shape of the web browser landscape in detail. Almost every HTTP client uses one of the now three big engines, WebKit, Blink and Gecko. Blink, as the big bad Google one is definitely one that nobody should consciously choose to use. Not everybody trusts WebKit much more because it is developed by another powerful global player that inadvertently collects more data in one hand than can be considered healthy, Apply. And Gecko, the one developed by Mozilla has been criticises for being pushed into a direction that is less free and user-friendly than it is expected from Mozilla. Since Mozilla has received large sums in funding from Google for a while it can be argued that any recent fork of the engine has a history of being influenced by Google. All the other large engines are no longer developed and thus not seen as a possible choice for the future. But there are some options to be discussed for users who want to avoid using a browser that relies on one of the big engines. And there are signs that the lack of competitive differences in browser engines will be reduced in the coming decade.

I like that the recent financial development in the SerenityOS/Ladybird project has prompted discussions about alternative browser engines and has shone some light on upcoming new browser engines written from the ground up. The interest in a new kid on the block has been growing over the last couple of years. So it should not surprise that several projects are undergoing and aim to create alternatives to the current big three browser engines. But in my eyes most of them are still not well-known enough. Not all are equaly useful. So I've decided to mention some options that could replace a mainstream browser at least in some use case.

Using Old Browsers

Yes, I'm covering the less practicle options, too. Using an old browser with security issues that won't be fixed not only might add security holes in the system it is used on, it also doesn't do anything to tackle the problem. The development of browser engines that are used in newer releases will not be affected by some people using them less. Choosing an older browser merely sends a signal and possibly changes statistics to look like you now also forget updating for a long time. But there is range of different lightweight browsers with engines that have no trouble with HTML4 and CSS2 and also offer good JavaScript support. KHTML (Konqueror) becomes an option again, Internet Explorer with Trident or EdgeHTML could get another chance and an old Opera with Presto could continue to shine. But you might need to maintain an envirement of outdated libraries to make your choice over a long time.

Flow

The Flow browser with its own HTML engine is developed by ekioh, a company with experience in developing browser for various embedded devices. As a free product, the preview of a Raspberry Pi version is available. But browsers for all major operating systems are planned. It uses an existing JavaScript engine the JS support is better than with other newly written browser engines. But it also doesn't add as much competition in the market in this regard. I have not tested Flow. As a product from a commercial business it didn't look interesting enough, yet, even though it is reportedly relatively mature.

Haphaestus

The Haphaestus TV Browser is a project by Adrian Cochrane that forms a web browser specifically aimed to be easily navigated with with few buttons (like on a TV remote control). It is a very interesting project because it is made up from several individual parts (CSS engine, font rendering, box layout engine, …) that all are written from the ground up in Haskell. A JavaScript engine is not part of the project. The web is nowadays more pleasant to browse without JS anyway. Adrian also recently started a free year-long course that encourages others to write their own HTML rendering engine (surely with the intention to collect experience for future paid programming courses).

Goanna

Of the browsers that use the Goanna engine, I see Pale Moon recommended most often. Goanna is a fork of Gecko that, by now, differes in features from the current gecko engine. It looks like Goanna may be the way to keep using a relatively old engine that supports all majer web standards very well with an actively developed browser that runs reliably in the OS of your choice. It may not be performing as well as current Gecko browsers like LibreWolf, but there's supposedly a smaller chance that their developers have been influenced by payments from Google.

Dillo

Small, realy light-weight, very simple and currently with no intention to pay any attention to scripts. Older versions of Dillo had been ported to many other systems. The current version 3 is only developed for the now big OSs (Linux, BSD, OS X). But it is very light-weight and snappy compared to mainstream browsers. CSS support is still lacking in the eyes of users who are used to every positional property to work. (Float support is also still missing.)

LibWeb, LibJS

The Ladybird web browser is becoming more known now that a company has been formed around it that has been promised major funding for the next few years. The project started as "the web browser of SerenityOS" but has since gained indipendent support and in turn supported hope that a novel web browser with a new engine will be established on the market of web browsers in the near future. The libweb and libjs libraries were started to build an intependent engine behind Ladybird. An application that will be seen as a usable alternative to Firefox in daily use with no need to fall back on another browser is still far away though.

NetSurf

Another small web browser that good HTML, CSS and JS support is NewSurf. LibDOM, LibCSS and Duktape (JavaScript) are combined to create a simple and portable browser. NetSurf can be found on Atari, Haiku, Linux, RISC OS and other systems. I've also found it a few times on my journay through alternative operating systems (about which I still have to write in this blog). It's the portable, small browser.

Servo

This is one that I like a lot personally. A noval web engine written in Rust. There is currently no full-fledged browser application that uses it. But there is a GUI demo that allows to test the engine with any URL. In my experience, web sites with elaborate design that make use of different layout rules and a lot of JavaScript tend to render better with Servo than with a current Ladybird (LibWeb, LibJS). Support for CSS3 rules is also better than with the small browsers NetSurf and Dillo. The potential is more readibly visible with this one compared to other new projects. Maybe the fact that browsers based on Servo only exist for specific devices is responsible for it being less known than Ladybird. No wonder Mozilla sucks up Serve during their project to replace parts of Gecko with re-implementations in Rust. I guess eventually there will be no big difference between the two engines.

Text-based web browsers are probably not an option for most users. Most web sites are designed for a graphic layout only and even when a page is structured well and can be read with a screen reader, sighted people usually prefer a GUI to a text-based interface. But if you want or a use case requires it, text browsers like links2 or lynx are also worth checking out, of course. Another thing that I'd like to mention here because it could be considered an alternative web browser are auditory browsers. But this entry is meant to be about browser engines, not browsers. Otherwise there would be many more projects that I should mention (browsers with a small user base, forks of Firefox, browsers for quick keyboard use).

Edit: Here's an interesting chart about the live of web browser engines since the first one in 1990.

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Automatically Extracting A String For The Use Of Alt Text From An Image File's Metadata Entry created on 2024-02-14 (edited 2024-07-16) Authors: steeph (370) Categories: Dublin Core (1) IPTC (1) Image Descriptions (1) XMP (1) exiftool (1) Languages used: en (255) edit

For my web site builder SBWG I've looked into ways to store image descriptions as meta data in the image file itself so it can be used as an img tag's alt attribute. The subject is a bit of a mess. So I decided to summarise the problems that I see and suggest a way of implementing automatic image descriptions from meta tags anyway.

Problems

First of all, there is the main issue that a good image description depends on the context in which the image is shown. For the same picture one might want to name the persons depicted, what they are wearing or their facial expressions if that is relevant, or the colours and contrasts between background and clothes and visible compression artefacts. In some other context, only the types of glasses worn or the hairstyles might be relevant. For the purpose of this post, in order to look beyond this problem, I have to ignore the possibility of wrong image descriptions because of re-used files or files used in several contexts. The creator, editor or curator of a web page or blog post must be responsible to make sure no wrong image description is present or used for the alt attribute. The same is true for mis-usage of meta tags, for example when some image editing software automatically uses a description field to store its copyright notice without the user's knowledge.

A script that automatically extracts the first string it find among a list of XMP fields could just as well find an unrelated string, the string 'none', a badly written alt text, one that was written for a different context or a string that was not meant to serve as the alt text to the image. Many of the fields that are listed above are meant to store something else than an alt text. Overall it is entirely expected that this method will not extract a useful alt text from the vast majority of images, simply because hardly anybody bothers to write them. I plan to use this method anyway, as a fallback, to cover for the cases where I myself couldn't be bothered. Writing a meaningfiul alt text for the context in which the image is used is still the only way to make sure that there is one.

So looking for a string in all of those fields and inserting it as the alt text in <img> is not correct unless you know that a good alt text has been stored there. Doing so anyway makes this an experimentive feature. Using it with real image files from different sources will show if it is of much help or not even usable.

exiftool

The easiest free way of extracting meta data from image files is using exiftool. It supports more than just EXIF data and the list of supported file types is quite comprehensive in the image department. Then the main question is which tags to use. There is no widely used standard for storing image descriptions for alt attributes. IPTC defined the new tags 'Alt Text (Accessibility)' and 'Extended Description (Accessibility)' in 2024. But they seem that it is catching on slowly. Before this tag was defined, many different tags were used by different projects, editing software and people. Additionally XMP tags aren't always implemented correctly; So the name of the tags can differ between different tools and software versions. After my research into which tags are mentioned to be used for similar purposed, I've compiled the following ordered list of tags that should be checked when generating HTML code with images.

This list does not contain some tags for which I've found evidence that they are used for image descriptions, but not commonly enough (e.g. when only one not too widely used image editor writes it). It's hard to decide whto end the list. There will always be some weird tool, some conversion script or some old camera that uses yet another tag. But I think I've made a reasonable decision in the length of the list. Some of the above are not according to the respective standard or don't belong in most image file types. But I argue it's worth checking for them because there's not much cost to it and people don't always follow standards exactly, thus manually tagging images or creating software that tags images with fields in the wrong namespace or with the same fields across all image file types. Some of the tags listed (Title, Headline) aren't meant for image descriptions. But it has been suggested to use them for short descriptions in the past. Plus I argue if there is an image title, but no description or alt text whatsoever, it is still better to use the title than to not have an alt text at all. Other fields may be worthwhile to implement, too (Credit Line, Creator's Contact Info, Copyright Notice or others depending on the application). For a really extensive alt text the following format could be used, if those fields are filled: "[Image Title] by [Credit] ([Contact Email]): [ExtDescrAccessibility]"

Additionally to the tags mentioned, many XMP tags (e.g. Iptc4xmpCore:AltTextAccessibility, Iptc4xmpCore:ExtDescrAccessibility, dc:Description) can store values in different languages. Those could be respected as well if the language of the generated web page is known. Checking if any are set and use one if not empty should be simple. For those file formats that don't support XMP tags and those not supported by exiftool, I'm not aware of any meta data tags that do the job. The above list is for image files in general. Other file types may have other/additional tags that are useful for similar purposes to the img tags alt attribute. Video file formats definitely have several different additional description fields. Those would be interesting to extract and display, too.

For a clean implementation without so many different tags, only AltTextAccessibility and maybe ExtDescrAccessibility are necessary. Those are the most "official" ones and will likely become the most widely used for image descriptions.

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Consciousness Entry created on 2024-07-15 Authors: steeph (370) Categories: #100DaysToOffload (41) Consciousness (1) Philosophy (5) Science (6) Languages used: en (255) edit

Consciousness is such a heavy topic that, even if I keep clear of actually trying to address the so-called hard problem, writing anything on it feels like I'm over-stretching my copetence in both science and philosophy. But I've decided to be confident enough to type out some of my thoughts an how the subject is discussed.

The topic interests me on an academic hobby level. Consciousness in dreams especially is something that I've read and thought a lot about and experimented with over years. Really explaining the nature of the brain-tingling that a good philosophical chain of thoughts gives me would take a lot longer than I'm prepared to spend writing this entry and would probably produce enough related sentences to write a book about it. Suffice it to say I'm interested - among other things - in how experiences and thereby people's realities change when input is filtered differently by the brain that processes the input (more of less or differently consciously).

One reason why I find it hard to structure thoughts around the topic is because of the definition of consciousness. There is none that encopasses all the cases where it is regularly used with the assumption that the meaning of the word in the context it is used in is clear, or obvious. That is OK in principle. And I've decided to do thew same here and not define it in any way, for simplicity. But when discussing the topic academically, when writing a paper on a related subject or when writing a book on it (with an academic target audience or not), a definition that prefaces the presentation of any concept or theory is necessary to allow for a productive discussion. Without a definition on such a varied subject interesting things may be said on it. But it's complicated to impossible to discuss them in a structured way or to do epirical reasearch on them. In other words, they lose some very important possibilities of being useful above entertainment. That is probably why a definition usually is brought forth in such publications. But not always. Introducing a concept on most other topics doesn't require the author to first define what they think the field of research actually is about. But such a requirement inheres - in my opinion - in discussing the subject of consciousness; something that can be experienced by somebody who agrees to the fact that they are experiencing it (according to some definitions) but who at the same time argues that it (according to some definitions) may not exist as a distinguishable state. I've seen a panel discussion once where two of the participants discovered their diverging definitions of consciousness in regards of what they wanted to talk about that day halfway through the discussion, which lead them to agree to every seemingly contradicting statements based on the assumption that they each other were the expert on what they were talking about. That was a funny and useful one compared to other panel discussions that muddle ideas and thoughts on the topic by mixing concepts that are not reconcilable with each other.

I'll leave it at that for now because I don't want to actually say anything about consciousness before producing a formal definition, which, in confusion over different views on what consciousness is, I'm not prepared to do.

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The Best Movies Ever Entry created on 2024-07-10 Authors: steeph (367) Categories: #100DaysToOffload (41) Films (22) Languages used: en (254) edit

I like to recommend movies. Because I like to discover movies that serve me as a source of a good mystery, an emotional journey, or fun. But it's not easy to recommend some film to somebody with a different taste than me, which is everybody that I know. But I think it is pretty likely that you will like this recommendation - if you take the time to follow it.

Something like three years ago I've started to watch the titles on the then current IMDb Top 250 Movies list. The way I do it is to keep the next 8 to 16 titles with me, ready to watch when I like to. When I'm not in the mood for a movie, find it booring or for other reasons not worth following through, I skip to the next one but keep the skipped movie to give it at least another two chances. That way I always have at least some very good movies with me, ready to be watched, even when I'm travelling or have no access to the internet. I started this because there are some very well known and very popular movies that I had never watched and I didn't know if that's because of a preconception or not. I'm slowly going through the classics of all genres. Even the horror movies I at least watch for a while. Although I say that horror is not for me, there are some very good ones that I enjoyed in a way. I've watched Casablanca and North By Northwest and get those references now and I know that I don't need to watch them again. I get to see some Chinese and Indian movies that I would have never had the idea to check out. I've seen 12 Years a Slave and To Kill a Mockingbird for the first time and now their relevance now. So many other great movies that I had missed out on for a long time for various reasons. I've eaven discovered some movies that really are for me but I've never heard of before, like Paris, Texas and Jagten. Again, all the classics people from different generations expect others to know, like The Shawshank Redemption" and Psycho, are in the reportoir of comparisons I can make now. From some I learned pieces of history, like from Hotel Rwanda and Gandhi . Some Anime like Hotaru no haka and Kimi no na wa., I would probably have never watched if they weren't rated that highly. ANd in between all of that, I get to watch many of my favourite movies as well as very good movies that I haven't seen since I was much younger.

I don't watch all of them, by far. And that is where I'll stop naming titles in pairs, or at all. I just don't like some movie styles and others are too boring or too far outside of my reality (without any element that keeps my interest up otherwise) and so I abandon them after a couple of attempts to make me interested. I'm not through yet. There are still many classics coming up. And even now there are new titles on the current list, like Oppenheimer and Joker, that I know I'd like to watch. So either when I will be through my list, I'll look at the then current one and see if I want to catch up or start anew. Because many of these movies are worth wathing again after five years.

In my experience, watching one after one of these movies has been a great way to discover new movies of very high quality, rediscover old gems, get to know classics and re-watch favourites because it is a relatively broad list. Not one that is confined to genres, a time period or a culture that I'm familiar with and that I already know has movies that I like.

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It's possible to convince somebody of something with the right (form of) argument. Entry created on 2024-07-09 Authors: steeph (370) Categories: #100DaysToOffload (41) Beliefs (2) Communication (3) Conspiracy Narratives (1) Conversation (2) Corona (12) Opinion (9) Science (6) Thinking (3) Languages used: en (255) edit

There is this thing that I've noticed happen when I'm speaking about something I've heard or read about but don't feel like an expert on. I believe that one should not spread information unless one truely understands it as well as how the information was gathered, what knowledge it builds on, what relevance and meaning it has in the context it likely will be applied in by the person who receives the information, and a few other principles that are hardly possible to honour every time. Those principles cannot be applied to everday conversations like smalltalk, without eliminating the interaction. (That's another topic, though.) So I don't apply them in general conversations with colleagues and customers and often overlook them in conversations with friends and other peers. So it is almost inevitable that I at some point say something I'm not 99.99% sure is correct the way I present it. It happens a lot with "interesting facts" and "what most people don't know". What happens then is that I feel in the wrong to some degree - because I have not made absolutely sure that I'm neither wrong nor going to be misunderstood - while the person I'm speaking to (if they see me as a peer, take me serious and are listening to me) takes what I say as new information and fits in into what they already know and believe. They don't know about the tiny feeling of guilt that I have. So I am regularly surprised when I speak to someone and seem to influence their set of beliefs inadvertently.

How to convince somebody of something is quite a complicated question psychologically. I've read enough about it to know that and to know that I'm not interested in learning how to do it in any professional way (or with style). But there are some interesting aspects to know about how easily people can change their mind in some situations and how tough it is to make somebody change their mind in others.

There was an experiment done that is often referred to in social media sometimes as an interesting bit of knowledgle and sometimes as an argument of an almost political nature, hinting at the stubbernness or irrationality of people with different beliefs (usually beliefs that deverge from the widely accepted set of scientific knowdlege). The simplified conclusion of this study is often presented as this: Presenting a person with a firm belief evidence that their belief is factually wrong makes it even stronger (see Backfire Effect). The conclusion that people draw from this sometimes is: Arguing rationally with somebody with an irrational belief will have the opposite from the intended effect. That is not usually true, though. Not only are cases where that happened rare even in the study that is referred to, the effect could also not be replicated when several researchers tried.

Sometimes I come across a person and learn of a belief of theirs that I find problematic for some reason or another. An extremist attitude to societies basic questions, fascist ideas formulated into political demands, a conspiracy narrative that results in hostile behaviour, things like that. These are usually beliefs with a large foundation that was built over years if not decades and they are often embedded in a world view that justifies and explains anything that might appear to others to oppose ethical code or the reasoning behind the belief. But "often" is not "always". And even if those things are the case is the assumption that simple, rational arguments won't have a positive effect is an erroneous one that is made too quickly. Yes, it seems like a hard undertaking to craft responses that take the opposite of your own beliefs into account properly, not as the hallucination of the enemy camp but as an equal to your own opinion. It also feels like the work necessary to formulate a response that foresees all the expectable counter-arguments and to answer all the antagonistical follow-up questions. That's the things I expect to be confronted with after objecting to something somebody said in a conversation. Correctly so. But if forging a plan to optimally convince the opponent to abandon a belief of theirs is not what I want to do, then it's not necessary to put that much work into it. You can just respond honestly with a simple thought and even end the conversation if it becomes too cumbersome. When a topic has an emotional component, it's easy to forget that keeping this on the level of a regular conversation with no expectation that it will have any meaning to anybody other than passing time.

The insight that I keep having and intend to remember in applicable situations more often is that it is not necessary but possible to convince somebody to take on a different view on something. My mind is not short of explanations and explanation attempts from opposite viewpoints and I'm ready to share them with others to encourage a broadening of their thinking. If it's my own view, a belief based on my own experience, I'm often more reluctant to share it if it opposes somebody else's belief. But it is worth it. Provided both conversing parties bring forth the necessary trust to take other's assertions seriously, a calm, rational objection is far better than cutting the topic short. The latter can easily have the same effect as saying something like "Oh, you're one of those." Derogatory remarks should be avoided just like dismissing a concern, be it ever so irrational. Ignoring an argument for being too absurd or discrediting a source without a reason, talking down or being in any way not as respectful as you would like to be treated yourself in an emotional discussion will not get you closer to invoking insight nor to learning something useful yourself. Those aren't new ideas. The realisation that is, as a conscious insight, new to me, is that I'm far more likely to influence somebody's thinking than I assumed. If a respectful discussion can't be maintained for after small talk got out of the area of the mundane, I don't need to maintain it any longer. One sincere offer of a different view on something is better than none, and better than one with a snarky remark about anti-science belief systems appended, which will likely not make your conversational partner want to think about any of what you said. Say something positive and let it sink it. The hours and even night after you talked can do a lot for making a new idea a familiar one that can or needs to be integrated with ones world view.

I will not continue to give tips on how to convince people of anything. That's not what this entry was supposed to be about. And I'm not experienced enough to give good tips. But I want to leave a book referral here. I can't recommend it, because I haven't read it. But it appears to me that Lee McIntyre knows what he's talking about in his book "How to Talk to a Science Denier". I conclude that from what he says in book introduction (YT, IV.

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Entry created on 2024-07-05 Authors: steeph (370) Categories: #100DaysToOffload (41) Cars (1) Driving (1) Opinion (9) Stress (1) Languages used: en (255) edit

Here's a controversal conviction that I've developed over the past couple of years: Humans are not able to operate a car savely at road speeds. Ergo, humans should not be allowed to drive.

I drive a lot in my current job. I may not be the best of drivers for many reasons but I tend to accept and abide by the rules if in doubt (and in general, because that's what rules are for). I've learned to save gas and breaks by coasting just right. I've learned to adjust my speed not only to road conditions but also to amount and type of traffic. I don't use apps that warn of speed cameras or police check points because I don't have to. I drive sensibly. I'm not payed more if I get to the customer earlier. I gain quality of life if I drive calmly and defensively. By the measurements that I learned in driving school, I'm a relatively good driver. In practice, when I share a road with other drivers, in the real world, I don't think I can count as a good driver though.

Most people seem to make their own rules for the road and assume that everybody will drive by their rules. They drive 5 km/h over, 10 km/h over, 20 km/h over. They assume a right to overtake because they chose to drive 50 km/h over the limit. They expect you to jump a red light if it's been red for less than two seconds. They assume right of way if no sign reminds them of the rules. Not everybody does all of those things. Most people try to respect the rules as they are put down by law (maybe except driving 5 km/h over). But some people, sometimes, follow their own rules, which is when everybody who doesn't gets in their way. That is often argued to be aproblem of "those drivers" being selfish, stupid and/or respectless. But the truth is likely that all of the people who sometimes drive according to their own rules do so because they are convinced that it's the right thing to do. In fact sometimes drivers spend thousands of Euros to argue in court that their own rules where the right ones to follow as opposed to the ones written down in the relevant law. They get angry and frustrated at people who strictly respect the official rules as the other way around. Of course I'm simplifying a lot here to make my point. I'm not describing any particular example for that reason. But I reckon most people don't break rules and make it harder for others on purpose. Two exceptions: Some people sometimes do have the intention to harm others and try to do so by driving a car. And people sometimes spontaniously decicde to provoke other drivers after they felt provoked or feel like somebody should do something about the behaviour of another driver. I can't say anything about the first exception. That's not the topic of this entry. The second exception I'll come back to later when I talk about stress.

So, when driving intend to drive sensibly according to the rules they deem the correct set, and still clash with other drivers, as it constantly happens on busy reads, that means that either simply setting up rules and hoping that everybody will follow them as well as possible isn't enough or that people are always going to make their own rules. I think the latter is close to the trouth considering the amount of work that goes into trying to make people abide by the defined rules (teaching classes, enforcing physically, convincing by extra signs, commercials, punishment, …).

It is so common for drivers to breaks the rules that certain rules are expected to be broken by the vast majority of drivers most of the time. Driving below or at the speed limit is a very easy way to tease other traffic participants. Driving 100 or 80 km/h in the rain where that is required by law is seen as traffic obstruction by most people. Not stopping at a stop sign in a driving test will immediately revoke your chance of getting a licence. But stopping at a stop sign after you got your license tells others that you're a bad driver or an ass. Hardly anybody ever does it. Good driving doesn't only come down to following the rules like I may have made it sound just now. But the fact that despite all the investments some people see the rules as something that should be generally followed and others drive with the assumption that some rules obviously will and should not be followed creates a constant conflict that seems almost impossible to resolve. Maybe truely impossible as long as so many so different infdividuals control cars on the same road.

Another thing, probably the more important one when it comes to explaining why I believe that humans can not drive cars acceptably well, is how hostile male drivers become when driving under stress. And people are stressed. Working full while also having a life is regularly stressful and I don't need to list the range of hundrets of reason why people get overly stressed every day. It's a point that's often made: People chance character when driving a car. They are capable of atrocious thoughts when driving under stress. They are easy to develop hate at other road participants without being able to communicate much with them. It's a known problem. Men build up rage while driving unless they do some really stupid thing. Knowing about your own tendency to react that way to other drivers being on the same road you're going on doesn't prevent you from reacting with anger to repeated small inconsistancies in other drivers behaviours. And with contempt at people who make up their own rules and ignore your rule set. And with hate to manouvers that you see as an indication of a respectless attitude in other drivers. And with rage at the constant occurance of such situations.

Of course rage is not a constant state while driving. And you might say that, all in all, it does seem to work out relatively well because people aren't having accidents every other day. Accidents with injuries are rare with modern cars. But I think that tens of millions of injuries and more than a million deaths per year (WHO report) are about 100 % more than it should be. Above that though, I think that the hostility and trauma that driving under stress generates constantly, whether you are one of the agressive ones or one who swollows without externalising your anger, is enough reason to prohibit humans from driving cars at speeds abover 20 km/h. But of course that is unrealistic. Too late, after humans have been driving cars since they exist.

The common assumption seems to be that this problem will solve itself when selfdriving cars become a common reality and over the then following 20 years most cars will be replaced with ones that don't require a human driver anymore. Only poor people will drive themselves, and later only vintage car enthusiasts. But That's still science fiction. Closer than ever, yes. But not a reality that is here yet, and possibly not even on the horizon.

The solution is simple: Make driving illegal. Force people to find other ways of getting where they need to go. People have to walk more, drive bikes and if they want to ride carriages with horsed more often and for more practical reasons than nowadays. The economy will collapse from the sudden change what's possible at short notice. But the problem that people drive badly will be solved.

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