box's recent activity

  1. Comment on If you could scrap and rewrite the Constitution, what would you do differently? What would you change, add, or remove? in ~talk

    box
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    I do wonder how representatives that are chosen proportionally instead of geographically would work out. Possibly keeping very large geographical boundaries, but within those boundaries everybody...

    I do wonder how representatives that are chosen proportionally instead of geographically would work out. Possibly keeping very large geographical boundaries, but within those boundaries everybody votes on the same candidates. I'm not sure which voting system would work out best to create a proportional system that doesn't lead to a tyranny of the majority/silencing the minority, but possible using the quota Borda count and having the top X number of politicians get a seat.

    Quick rundown of the Borda count for those who don't know from the wikipedia page

    The Borda count is a family of single-winner election methods in which voters rank options or candidates in order of preference. The Borda count determines the outcome of a debate or the winner of an election by giving each candidate, for each ballot, a number of points corresponding to the number of candidates ranked lower. Once all votes have been counted the option or candidate with the most points is the winner. Because it tends to elect broadly-acceptable options or candidates, rather than those preferred by a majority, the Borda count is often described as a consensus-based voting system rather than a majoritarian one.[1]

    The Modified Borda Count is used for decision-making. For multi-winner elections, especially when proportional representation is important, the quota Borda system is used.

    1 vote

  2. Comment on Supreme Court Justice Kennedy is retiring in ~news

    box
    Link Parent
    This is the behavior we need more of: the ability to admit their own fault in an debate. have some... tildes solarized gold...?

    This is the behavior we need more of: the ability to admit their own fault in an debate.

    have some... tildes solarized gold...?

    4 votes

  3. Comment on Supreme Court Justice Kennedy is retiring in ~news

    box
    Link Parent
    First, Deimos isn't planning on performing any action than asking the public what their opinion on what the precedence should be. Second, I kind of understand that you're not trying to provoke a...

    First, Deimos isn't planning on performing any action than asking the public what their opinion on what the precedence should be.

    Second, I kind of understand that you're not trying to provoke a reaction. I used to (and maybe still do...?) make comments that weren't created with the intent of creating a reaction, but the actual content had little value other than getting a reaction/to express my anger and opinion. Unfortunately, what matters isn't the conscious intent of the comment, but the actual consequence and the discussion it creates.

    6 votes

  4. Comment on US Supreme Court upholds Donald Trump travel ban in ~news

    box
    Link Parent
    It should be noted that one of the recent Supreme Court 5-4 decisions was upholding some Republican drawn district lines, crushing any dreams of the SC getting rid of partisan gerrymandering.

    It should be noted that one of the recent Supreme Court 5-4 decisions was upholding some Republican drawn district lines, crushing any dreams of the SC getting rid of partisan gerrymandering.

  5. Comment on US Supreme Court upholds Donald Trump travel ban in ~news

    box
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    It's been a while since I've looked into this, so I may be misremembering, but iirc the process people go through to become immigrants/refugees is extremely extensive and thorough. The amount of...

    It's been a while since I've looked into this, so I may be misremembering, but iirc the process people go through to become immigrants/refugees is extremely extensive and thorough. The amount of terrorist attacks originating from a foreign country on US soil since 9/11 has been extremely small. Those that have managed to successfully enter the country have been all/mostly arrested before causing harm.

    It may be "practically impossible", but we've done a pretty damn good job so far.

    2 votes

  6. Comment on Supreme Court Justice Kennedy is retiring in ~news

    box
    Link Parent
    From Margaret Atwood on How She Came to Write The Handmaid’s Tale

    I made a rule for myself: I would not include anything that human beings had not already done in some other place or time, or for which the technology did not already exist. I did not wish to be accused of dark, twisted inventions, or of misrepresenting the human potential for deplorable behavior. The group-activated hangings, the tearing apart of human beings, the clothing specific to castes and classes, the forced childbearing and the appropriation of the results, the children stolen by regimes and placed for upbringing with high-ranking officials, the forbidding of literacy, the denial of property rights—all had precedents, and many of these were to be found, not in other cultures and religions, but within Western society, and within the “Christian” tradition itself.

    From Margaret Atwood on How She Came to Write The Handmaid’s Tale

    4 votes

  7. Comment on Are any of your political or social views exhausting to defend? in ~talk

    box
    Link Parent
    Yeah, definitely true. I have heard it both ways at least once.

    Yeah, definitely true. I have heard it both ways at least once.

  8. Comment on Are any of your political or social views exhausting to defend? in ~talk

    box
    Link Parent
    Especially when the other person brings up the fact that women are paid less in part because they are more likely to be in jobs that pay less, and use that to blow off the idea that discrimination...

    Especially when the other person brings up the fact that women are paid less in part because they are more likely to be in jobs that pay less, and use that to blow off the idea that discrimination may exist. Even when women are in higher paying jobs, they get paid less. And there is a reason (hint hint discrimination) as to why women end up in fields that pay less.

    2 votes

  9. Comment on University of Chicago eliminates SAT/ACT requirement in ~news

    box
    Link Parent
    The short video is not mandatory, nor is it a replacement for essays. UChicago is replacing interviews with short videos, which I think is considerably more fair. Because of UChicago's extremely...

    The short video is not mandatory, nor is it a replacement for essays. UChicago is replacing interviews with short videos, which I think is considerably more fair. Because of UChicago's extremely odd essay questions, I think they value and put more weight into their essays than most other schools.

  10. Comment on University of Chicago eliminates SAT/ACT requirement in ~news

    box
    Link Parent
    The main benefit from dropping the ACT/SAT requirement (along with being able to self-report one's transcript) is that it allows lower income students (who have shown to do worse on these tests...

    The main benefit from dropping the ACT/SAT requirement (along with being able to self-report one's transcript) is that it allows lower income students (who have shown to do worse on these tests compared to their richer counterparts) who wouldn't have applied otherwise to have a chance to get into UChicago. The link below talks about how no other group's enrollment is affected except for black and Latino students, which goes up without a significant impact on completion rates.

    https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2018/06/14/university-chicago-drops-satact-requirement

    2 votes

  11. Comment on Does anybody else feel like they have trouble reading/digesting text? in ~talk

    box
    Link Parent
    I may experience something similar-ish. There are times where I find myself listening to a podcast and get stuck on understanding a short segment of speech; I do want to understand what they're...

    I may experience something similar-ish. There are times where I find myself listening to a podcast and get stuck on understanding a short segment of speech; I do want to understand what they're saying, but I'm not putting in nearly any effort into actually trying to understand.

    When my eyes seem to glaze over a sentence or paragraph, I might be doing the same thing. I'm not very sure though, but it's definitely something interesting. You might be onto something.

  12. Comment on Does anybody else feel like they have trouble reading/digesting text? in ~talk

    box
    Link Parent
    Wow, I really hadn't considered this! I know my eyes have been getting worse (mostly because I've had to sit closer to the front of class in order to actually see now), but have been putting off...

    Wow, I really hadn't considered this! I know my eyes have been getting worse (mostly because I've had to sit closer to the front of class in order to actually see now), but have been putting off getting glasses. My left eye is actually considerably more nearsighted and my right seems to do worse with closer objects, although I'm not sure if that would be considered farsighted.

    I'll definitely go to the optometrist and get a prescription!

  13. Does anybody else feel like they have trouble reading/digesting text?

    ~talk Text 137 words
    When I was younger I would spend hours reading books, Wikipedia articles, magazines, and news articles. I loved to read and do nothing else. But I've found that I now have much more trouble...

    When I was younger I would spend hours reading books, Wikipedia articles, magazines, and news articles. I loved to read and do nothing else.

    But I've found that I now have much more trouble starting and continuing to read. My eyes almost completely glaze over most pieces of text, and I almost have an aversion to focus on reading. I still enjoy reading, but ever since I've entered the world of video games, Youtube videos, and social media, I've read less and less. I don't want to say that these things are bad, but definitely easier to get into and to "enjoy".

    I still read, and continue to amass a large list of things to read, but it's been harder than it used to be to do so and to get something of substance out of it.

    23 votes

  14. Comment on What books are you reading right now? in ~talk

    box
    Link Parent
    I've read The Stranger, but that was back in my Sophomore year of high school (although as a recent high school grad, that isn't too far back). If I read it now, I think I would definitely have...

    I've read The Stranger, but that was back in my Sophomore year of high school (although as a recent high school grad, that isn't too far back). If I read it now, I think I would definitely have more insights on the book and absurdism but I still find it fascinating. What I do remember about it is how aimless the main character seemed, which led to a plot that seemed to be driven not by the main character but by the the world around him.

  15. Comment on The case for "noise" in ~tildes

    box
    Link Parent
    I would think "whisper comments" would need a failsafe built into it to prevent people from using it to make inflammatory/trollish comments. What would happen if people started using whisper...

    I would think "whisper comments" would need a failsafe built into it to prevent people from using it to make inflammatory/trollish comments. What would happen if people started using whisper comments for low-effort insults instead of small statements of affirmation. I don't know how big of a problem this might become, but I think it is worth considering (although a whisper tag that is mentioned in other comments may easily circumvent the problem).

    2 votes

  16. Comment on The case for "noise" in ~tildes

    box
    Link Parent
    I think the whisper function can be implemented similar to how StackExchange allows people to make comments on the question/answer, without being part of the main content. (If this isn't how...

    I think the whisper function can be implemented similar to how StackExchange allows people to make comments on the question/answer, without being part of the main content.

    (If this isn't how StackExchange actually works, sorry. This is just my impression of how it does from the few times I've used it.)

    2 votes

  17. Comment on What books are you reading right now? in ~talk

    box
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    Just starting The Plague by Albert Camus. I'm not sure what I'm going to get out if it, although using it to help me read the French version is a small plus I picked up a copy of History of the...

    Just starting The Plague by Albert Camus. I'm not sure what I'm going to get out if it, although using it to help me read the French version is a small plus

    I picked up a copy of History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides a while back. Although I've never finished it, I find it fascinating how different the style of writing was in a time as long ago as ancient Greece. The translation I have is also ~100 years old, so the different style of English adds another cool (in my opinion) style to it.

    5 votes

  19. Comment on Daily Tildes discussion - on civility, political content, and over-extrapolating in ~tildes.official

    box
    Link Parent
    I think this is a good idea. It prevents people from entering echo chambers and becoming polarized without even considering the other side while allowing for political discourse. If people want to...

    I think this is a good idea. It prevents people from entering echo chambers and becoming polarized without even considering the other side while allowing for political discourse. If people want to talk politics, they would have to (hopefully in a civil manner) disagree with people on the other side. If people have something to say, but aren't willing to have someone disagree with them, it is probably best they say nothing at all.

    However, prevention of groups overwhelmingly leaning one way may be a problem. I've heard many people say that r/news and r/worldnews are hostile to a particular side. I don't know how true those claims are, but I would be in what other people think about this.

    2 votes

  20. Comment on What are your favourite podcasts? in ~talk

    box
    Link Parent
    The third season is beginning to roll out for anyone not started yet!

    The third season is beginning to roll out for anyone not started yet!

    2 votes