I think it, they say it

[calimac]

1. The problem with GPS is that it may tell you where to turn, but not why you're turning. They're meaningless directions followed by rote and impossible to internalize. As a spatially-oriented person who operates entirely by placing myself in a mental map, I would feel helpless outsourcing my cognitive functions this way.

2. "Mr Obama seems to me to be precisely the sort of moderate, centrist, I-understand-your-perspective type of politician that conservatives claim to be looking for; all of the energy torquing him into a figure of racial polarisation has come from the conservatives who claim to be angered by that polarisation."

Comments

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

I voted for Obama in 2008 thinking that I would be getting that sort of politician, but I've found nearly everything he's done since then disappointing. It seems to me that both parties have spent the new millennium turning to independent voters when they need to get into office, and then forgetting about them and going straight partisan once they're in.

[oursin.livejournal.com]

A London taxi-driver who has done The Knowledge and still uses it will get you where you are going more expeditiously than the one who relies on his GPS.

[danceswithwaves.livejournal.com]

Interesting about GPSs. I haven't found that using them tends to make my memory of directions worse, but maybe that's because I tend to look at the overall map and set of directions that the GPS hands me and decide whether I like it or not, and if I can follow it without seriously relying on the machine. Because GPS devices aren't perfect, and they can tell you to turn right when they've previously been telling you to stay left, and depending on traffic, may not give you enough time to change lanes. I prefer to rely on myself and a map, so I try to remember routes on my own. Also, I compulsively check the GPS so I can remember where it wants me to go next so I can look for it...that whole "GPS devices aren't perfect" thing.