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EsoterX
Personal blog · esoterx.comhistorywriting
EsoterX is a personal blog at esoterx.com about history and writing. Since 2018, 3 different Hacker News readers have linked it 3 times. The last post was in 2023, but the archive is still widely read.
Too few sampled comments (2) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
Linked to argue that math and hard science carry political and cultural biases, citing a post on 'murder by math' and institutional pushback against Gödel's incompleteness. The comments do not judge the writing.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 2 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
If Monsters Don't Exist, Why Are They Out To Get Me?
What Hacker News says?
Nearly as interesting is "why" there was a great vowel shift: Plague. While difficult to prove, it's commonly believed by linguists to have been caused, or very greatly helped along, by the bubonic plague and the extreme amount of social upheaval and migration it caused over its extended rampage through that area of the world. I was rather surprised the wikipedia entry didn't mention that factor, it was spoken of as…
Comment linking /2016/04/20/language-is-a-bacterium-the-disease-theory-of-the-great-vowel-shift/
on “Great Vowel Shift”Submitted The Conflict of the Pygmies and Cranes as a story · 1 points
HN discussionMath and hard science have political and cultural biases and inertia as well. At a minimum, hard science is still manipulated by justifying funding. And then there's this: https://esoterx.com/2014/12/03/murder-by-math-the-irrational... There was institutional pushback on Godel's incompleteness from the axiomatic mathematicians that thought they could prove everything as they reconstructed math from axioms (if I unde…
Comment linking /2014/12/03/murder-by-math-the-irrational-demise-of-hippasus/
on “Feynman’s Maze-Running Story”