Relay-swimming or individual? If the latter, I wouldn't consider that a team sport in the traditional sense where you are reliant upon others to win the objective at hand.
Yes, it does. Is there something wrong with that?
Why I'm Making My Husband Miss The Super Bowl
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Relay-swimming or individual? If the latter, I wouldn't consider that a team sport in the traditional sense where you are reliant upon others to win the objective at hand.
Yes, it does. Is there something wrong with that?
This seems really simple to me. It only means something because they subjectively infuse it with meaning. Here's a simple breakdown. Let's compare special relativity to football. First, special relativity. There are two possibilities:
1) I think special relativity is boring or dumb: special relativity still works for me, and I can still use cell phones, which can only function thanks to our understanding of these principles.
2) I think special relativity is interesting and exciting; special relativity still works for me, and I can still use cell phones, which can only function thanks to our understanding of these principles.
Now football:
1) I think football is boring or dumb; football no longer works for me, and is no longer entertaining.
2) I think football is interesting and exciting: football works for me, and entertains me as advertised.
This is an extremely important distinction. If I find football boring, but love physics, while you find physics boring, but love football, my interests still help you every day, while football does not help me at all.
When I read this, I feel like I'm talking to a machine. I'm sorry, but there is no scientific equation for fun. :|
You can start at the smallest scale - is this enjoyable for me? After that, work your way up. Eventually you'll start seeing what demograph you fall into and what is common or shared between the masses. I think this is fun, we think this is fun, they think this is fun, etc.
Others have made objective arguments. Whether you speak of some of the most effective team building methods, financial ramifications, or social impact - sports is definitely meaningful.
Well said...
Almost every argument has ended with "I disagree, its meaningless". Whether we're talking about the social factor, the individual enjoyment, the greater scale where a multitude of lives are effected in many different ways - it still goes back to "I disagree, its meaningless". Would you say the Olympics are meaningless? The World Cup?
If by watching football it soothes the savage beast and he develops a cure for cancer, it has helped you just fine.
I was only able to attain state level as the Butterfly arm of a relay. I also competitively swam the 500 and 100 Freestyle.
Of course, as it's a completely non-functional definition. If everything has "meaning," then saying something is "meaningful" is absolutely worthless -- of course it's meaningful, everything is! Meaning only has any relevant denotation if we discuss topics objectively.
If you can show me that football has specific, inherent properties that make it particularly good at "soothing the savage beast," as you call it, I'm perfectly willing to agree. Otherwise, staring at a chair could "sooth the savage beast," and then he cures cancer. Would that give chairs meaning? Of course not.
So the crux of your argument is that only things that cannot be condensed to "personal whim" are meangingful? You've chased your tail of semantics into a corner, friend.
What is human society if not an amalgation of individuals' "personal whims"? Preserving life with medicine and understanding the universe around us are based upon personal whims whose genesis can be traced to our natural instinct to survive and adapt. The same natural instinct that causes us to be competitive and sporting.
But... But... I want statistics on this matter!
All I have to show is that following a hobby one enjoys has that effect, then any hobby becomes meaningful. Meaning is a personal thing, it cannot be assigned as part of some external truth.
That's likely untrue. Our understanding of neuroscience isn't particularly adept yet, however. If you are correct, however, then fun has no objective value.
Of course! Obviously they are. How could you argue otherwise? I don't believe I've resorted to simple, matter-of-fact statements at all in this thread. I've explained my position at extreme length and in great detail.
Blackace
if you see me in a fight with a bear, don't help me fool, help the bear!
How many yards did Tom Brady have today?
Good Job Bob
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What if I don't use cellphones or any of the devices that arrived thanks to our understanding of special relativity? The understanding of special relativity thus wouldn't be helpful for me.
You speak to me as if I watched. Pah!
Correct.
I'm not following this. Can you explain? What does our personal whim to follow medicine have to do with medicine's empirical efficacy? Again, whether we happen to care about medicine or not, it works. Even if we had never found a vaccine for Polio, that vaccine would have worked and would have been functional. Our personal whims -- whether we talk in singular or aggregate -- are irrelevant.
Blackace
if you see me in a fight with a bear, don't help me fool, help the bear!
STATS!
ClovingWestbrook
Banned
Good point. Vaccines don't help all humans but that doesnt lose its value for those it does help. Just as you said with American Rules Football, the population that doesn't enjoy it doesn't have an impact on those that do.
But they would still work if you ever chose to use them.
Here would be the exact analogue; if I found American Rules Football boring or actively disgusting, and then nonetheless was entertained when I watched it, that would be strong evidence that it had objective value; it entertains people whether they want to be entertained or not.
Cell phones work whether you use them or not. Vaccines would prevent disease whether you happen to get vaccinated or not. Football does not entertain you if you don't find it interesting.
Here's an important and implicit assumption underlying this discussion: do the people I'm arguing with here think some people are better than others? Because I feel strongly that they are. By what metrics do we define some people as better than others?
If you're actually trying to use EFUs (Empirical Fun Units) to measure fun's meaningfulness then.... I can't really continue this trip down the rabbit hole.
edit: I still can't wrap my mind around what you just said. Are you human? I've never seen someone try to actually measure and scientifically assign value to fun.
We were talking about being objective though, right? Even if you want to get into tangibles, sport is a huge industry in itself.
The function of football is not to be played. The function is to entertain. It does not function if I do not enjoy it.
DY_Nasty said:
Our understanding of neuroscience is incredibly nascent, but we're talking about the empirical basis for happiness in the brain. It would surely be possible to measure how it works and what triggers it in people objectively.
DY_Nasty said:
Again, argumentum ad populum. Things are not important just because they are big industries. Shoe fashion is a big industry that employs tens of thousands if not millions of people around the world, and generates billions of dollars annually. That doesn't make shoe fashion actually meaningful.
ClovingWestbrook
Banned
What?
I'd argue that your pre-conceived notions of what society should and should not be doing based on an "objective criteria" that you established ls inherently a subjective argument. You are dismissing others ideals and views based on your own subjective preferences of what they should be doing.
Arguing, for example that we should spend more to understand the laws of physics than watching sports because it helps us advance many more different aspects is and should not be an argument against sports fandom. It also does not negate the objectively measurable positive outcomes that sports fandom provides to society. Yes, the former is more important and has more objective meaning, but that does not negate the latter's objective meaning because it ranks lower on how much more or less important it is to the advancement of society.
dream
Member
From whose perspective?
Good Job Bob
Member
Their are a number of functions that football serve.
But if the sole function of football was to entertain, even if I personally didn't find it entertaining it would still be serving it's function by entertaining others.
This is an objective fact.
Holy shit
Actually, that's what your arguments sound like.
blame space
Banned
this thread is a goldmine
You don't feel that this is true? What is the function of sports, then?
Wow, I forgot about the EFUs.
From my understanding of Trey's post: personal whim lead to the discovery. Observations are key, but the pursuit of answers to the greater mystery of what causes polio is certainly a personal whim.
Either that, or someone put a gun to Salk's head and replied, "You got ten minutes."
Medicine is meaningful because we (humanity) decided living was important. Personal health was preferred to death and destruction, not because we can prune ourselves down to a science little by little. That was a conscious choice made in human history; encouraged by natural instinct. Alongside this, Human desire for glory in competition and physical excellence evolved into sports, and have become a core pillar of our society and cultural make-up. Today's sports are are science, just with much more cultural impact.
We have medicine so that we may live, learn, and enjoy things, which includes sports. As much as scientists try to understand the human body, philosophers try to understand the human condition, there are analysists and game theorists that try to understand the game theory of and about sports. About prediction and cause-and-effect. Understanding chaotic systems.
Sports are a science, produce irreplaceable commerce, and are a natural tendency of our species as a recreational outlet.
Just because you don't find Football entertaining, others still do.
Literally anything can be entertaining subjectively. You are effectively arguing that everything is meaningful, by this definition, which is obviously silly.
reilo said:
I don't understand. Can you explain?
ClovingWestbrook
Banned
Whose perspective?
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
GAH. Okay, you're just being ridiculous now. This is NOT a valid response to every fucking question.
Incorrect. Medicine is meaningful because it accomplishes its intended purpose whether we happen to know about it or not, not because we decided living is important. Your understanding of my entire premise is faulty and the conclusions based on this are therefore invalid.
Let me put this more directly: even if we had never discovered science based medicine, it would still be meaningful.
Wanderingwind said:
dream
Member
They serve a multitude of functions, from business to competition to entertainment. Focusing on one aspect and assuming it represents the whole seems a little myopic to me.
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
To who?
Opiate said:
No, it's only a discussion if you're listening. What we have here is people bashing their head against the wall that is your feigned ignorance of the human condition.
You're trying to measure enjoyment. The next step immediately after that is trying to assign values to emotion.
To you
But we're talking objectivity right? Whether you like it or not, its still going to have meaning to others. I have no significant feelings towards fashion. That doesn't mean that the fashion industry will collapse due to me not caring. In the same example you brought up earlier with gravity - the effect, the meaning, will still be there even if you don't have feelings one way or the other regarding it.
By proclaiming people that find meaning in sports "silly", you are trying to place yourself on an "objective scale" where you come out as a more "enlightened" person because you proclaim that sports should hold no meaningful value to society. Therefore you are (intending to or not) claiming that people that do find sports meaningful are somehow inferior because they should be spending their time on more "objectively meaningful" activities instead.
This is not your original statement. By this statement, football is meaningful because it provides entertainment, if, as you assert, it's goal is to entertain.
Hmmm - what about those that don't believe in medicine and would rather let their children die than take advantage of treatment?
The function of sports is first and foremost to be played. I think others in this thread have already said a main draw of watching sports is the vicarious experience of playing and being part of a team, community, etc. A sport that isn't played/performed can't entertain.
Being a part of a community, suffering hardship, achieving success, and so on is an intrinsic part of playing football, and coincidentally, being a human being. People are humans whether they care to be or not, so sports offer meaningful insights into their own nature.
mysticwhip
Banned
im 12 and wat is this
So why the term switch? Play is a very important, learning trait of many animals and sports have been a part of man's civilization from the start. Why do you use your disinterest in football to prove that all sports are meaningless? And what is this 'deeper meaning'? You seem to have a very rigid and subjective value system but have taken up this pretense to absolute objectivity. Frankly, it's really offensive and comically misinformed.
This is false. The manipulations of our body for our gains is wholly predicated upon what we want as a society. There is no meaning unless we give it one. Medicine does not exist without humans, nor humanity's whims.
"Objectively meaningful" is a human creation. For us by us.
Trent Strong
Banned
Whether or not something is meaningful is totally subjective. There can't be such a thing as objective meaning.
I'm with WanderingWind on this one...
Because you don't feel that sports are important, you're kinda doing exactly what you were just talking about. "Here's an important and implicit assumption underlying this discussion: do the people I'm arguing with here think some people are better than others? Because I feel strongly that they are. By what metrics do we define some people as better than others?"
Yeah. It sounds pretty hypocritical - especially after the whole "If I find football boring, but love physics, while you find physics boring, but love football, my interests still help you every day, while football does not help me at all." thing.
Blackace
if you see me in a fight with a bear, don't help me fool, help the bear!
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