Talk:2071: Indirect Detection

Genius reference in the title text to 'throwing shade', linking modern slang with something 2,400 years earlier! --OliReading (talk) 13:33, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Should I be concerned that I got the Plato reference from >2K years ago, but had to look up what "throwing shade" is? I feel so old now.Daemonik (talk) 15:26, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

You're not the only one, if that makes you feel better!162.158.94.32 16:51, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Sorry, first time entry editor, turned out I really couldn't add that much but I just really wanted to at least put this. I mean, what an awesome joke! Lheticus (talk) 13:50, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Remember that other comic strip where he was imagining a bad opinion, looked up to see if other people had it, and then preemptively writing online about how horrible an opinion it is? This could be a callback to it, except as viewed from somebody who is friends with the person writing about it. I'd mention this in the explanation part of this strip, except I can't remember which comic that comes from. Does anybody remember? Or even what the title was so I can search the title? Jeudi Violist (talk) 17:31, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

"Bad Opinions" (https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/2051:_Bad_Opinions). I did a site search on the word "Opinions" to find it. -boB (talk) 18:49, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I dunno if it's such a terrible opinion. Sounds like a perfectly reasonable use of the animals -- make them productive (albeit for a limited time) rather than a (lengthy) drain on resources. 172.68.58.209 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

You must have some awful friends! 172.68.58.53 10:19, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

The post in the comic reminds me of some of the "straw man" arguments I've seen over the years - make up a horrific argument for the purposes of shooting it down, in an effort to create support for the opposite argument. It's a deplorable, but regrettably common, social media tactic these days. In the comic, this would imply (falsely) that the poster's other friends support the awful argument. 162.158.78.10 12:20, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

This comment was given by someone Randall presumably knows and trusts; no evidence is given his friend is not responding to genuine comments others have made. And given some of the trolling that happens, it would not surprise me if trolls did make the exact comments Randall's friend's "friends" made, for their own humor's sake. So I'd say this is likely more an example of someone taking the troll's bait hook, line, and sinker rather than someone trying to make up a straw man argument. -boB (talk) 16:51, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

I edited a sentence to try to make the tone a little more neutral. It's notable that some people think animals have feelings, and some people simply don't believe they do, and could naturally compare them to rocks or pencils but still be very caring people. Personally, I believe animals feel suffering as strongly as we do, but I've never had the opportunity to argue this to exhaustion. This is an age-old argument, studied regularly by college students, that I suppose could bear reference in the explanation. 162.158.78.166 13:17, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Changed it to be significantly less neutral. The comic explicitly uses the phrases "terrible opinions" and "awful people", so it's pretty clear that the comic, at least, is not supposed to be neutral. 108.162.241.232 16:49, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

Is "everyone on here" correct English? 172.69.186.52 10:30, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

I would say "everyone on here" is fine; I might also say "everyone in here" if I were thinking of this wiki as a room, which sometimes seems to fit . . . . 108.162.216.46 10:50, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

This is supposed to be a post from social media. A user is "on" Facebook, a user is "on" Twitter, a user is only "in" Facebook if they have used an experimental TRON-type laser to enter the servers. 162.158.158.63 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Trying to eventually get a 0 incomplete wiki, and this explanation seems fine. Unless anyone has specific complaints, I’ll take it down later. If anyone does, I’ll fix it. “That Guy from the Netherlands” (talk) 13:03, 27 March 2019 (UTC)

Just because you want a 0 incomplete wiki isn't cause for removing an incomplete, this explanation is not finished and needs editing, it includes far too much information and it's difficult to parse Lackadaisical (talk) 17:09, 27 March 2019 (UTC)

The understanding of the Plato's cave allegory here is fundamentally wrong. Plato's Cave does not serve "as an allegory for our limited understanding of phenomena that occur primarily or entirely outside direct perception by our natural senses." Plato's cave serves to point out to us that our understanding of reality is limited by what we are able to perceive, that the real world is much more than what we can detect. As the prisoners, shackled to the wall perceived the shadows as the only reality, so do we, shackled to our metaphorical wall, perceive only what we can see as "real". 172.68.174.112 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

"Sometimes, one of my friends posts an angry response to some terrible opinion I've never heard before" I find a youtube comment "I don’t like the theory that the Horror-terrors are god-tiered squiddles"

There is a possible interpretation that I haven't seen here. It is alluded that the author of the post has awful friends with terrible opinions. Thus, it might be possible that the person reacting to the post is one of those awful friends with terrible opinions. What seems to support this interpretation is the reference to Plato. Plato's cave is a symbol of ignorance. The joke here would be that the person who reacts to the post could be ignorant of the fact he is part of the problem. This could be a form of self-deprecating humour. --thym 19 June 2022 (UTC)