Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by ravar 1482 days ago
If I heard that on the first day I would have left the classroom before the professor had time to correct the statement.
2 comments

I almost did this in a literature class. I think it was the second day of the class, and we'd read James Joyce's "An Encounter". The prof read aloud sections of a published analysis of the story -- out of some big tome -- and asked us to discuss it. The analysis was so vacuous and absurd that I came inches from simply walking out, which would have been awkward because there were only like 8 students in the class. Mentally, I mapped out my path to the registrar so that I could drop the class and began checking out.

After a bit of classroom discussion, from which I abstained, the professor threw the book in the trash (clang! it was a metal trashcan) and gave a speech about how the analysis was gibberish, and how you can't just make up stuff about what a story says. He then walked us through how you might actually obtain useful insights about what the story means to say. It was apparent he gave that spiel every semester.

I'm glad I stayed; it was a good class.

If only there were a saying about not jumping to conclusions based on a small amount of information that was somehow related to books!
Good god "deep thinkers" extrapolating ridiculous meaning from art/literature is a huge pet peeve of mine. Not too long ago I heard an art curator pull statements out of thin air about the political atmosphere of the time(400yrs ago) based on the angle the picture was drawn from. Incredible what a waste of time an art degree is.
Good Will Hunting?
Sounds more like Dead Poets Society with the tearing out of the introduction to the book of poems.
The social effort required to leave into a 15 s statement is so high that you would not have done that. Why make grandiose claims about things you won't do? Like, you're telling me no one has ever said anything absurd to you and you've stayed? Bullshit.
Chill dude it’s Friday. Touch some grass
Can't. The only reason I'm so active on HN is that I can do two things:

- write code

- lie in bed from my motorcycle accident

And my code is currently compiling.

For your consideration: play through Red Dead 2, if you haven’t already.
Or play Factorio, except you won't want to get out of bed when healed. Or mod Factorio if you never want to get out of bed again.
Haha terrific tip. Thank you :)