posted
This test is why its better to have people check the box of the statement that best represents their thinking.
Posts: 4112 | Registered: May 2001
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No, see, you're southwest of center, which is different.
I didn't mean for this quiz to be the authority. I agree that it has very biased presumptions.
I did mean to illustrate that a "conservative" is not neccessarily a "conservative." We have conservatives with results like Dag's and we have conservatives with results like Jay's.
The very format of this test introduces the concept of a 2-dimensional political spectrum rather than the traditional concept of one dimension. I would hazard that in actuality, people's beliefs are so complex that they would be appropriately plotted as 3-dimensional or more.
Whoever formulates a test like that gets my undying admiration. Posts: 8504 | Registered: Aug 1999
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posted
Yes, somehow Tony Blair leans to the right. (The Labour party? Pshaw, we all know he's a Torrie in disguise.)
Posts: 3564 | Registered: Sep 2001
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posted
Bah, this all assumes a perfectly Euclidian space, I bet if you plotted the number of entries versus distance to center you wouldn't get a value that increased at aplha r^2. Obviously this is a curved surface, and you can throw their numbers out the window.
posted
OK, my point again was that this test doesn't matter. I was merely using it as an illustration of the concept that politics is not one-dimensional.
Posts: 8504 | Registered: Aug 1999
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posted
I do *not* like that test. So many of the statements are "loaded" so that while they are near the mark, I cannot "agree" with them. There needs to be something in between "agree" and "disagree".
Posts: 7050 | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
Economic Left/Right: -5.38 Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.13
I think this test generalizes its questions a little too much to really get me, but it put me at almost the right place, I suppose.
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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quote:"rom each according to his ability, to each according to his need is a fundamentally good idea." Basically a socialist idea of "take from the rich to support the poor""
ERm, actually, thats not at all what it means. Thats what anti-marxists WANT you to think it means, but its not what Marx meant when he coined the phrase, and its not what socialist or communist thinkers mean when its still used.
The idea is that each person works according to his ability to work, and each person is compensated for his work based on his need. Which, you'll note, says nothing about redistribution of wealth.
Right, under that scenario the only people that have the wealth are those that get to decide what defines 'need'.
Farmgirl's answer is adequate to the question which was: Is this an idea that we should govern by, here and now--not mind you in the idyllic green fields of the perfect society.
Posts: 1621 | Registered: Oct 2001
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posted
Thanks. Though not so much since it ate up like a minute and a half of my time trying to remember French and then giving in and using Babel Fish.
posted
Economic Left/Right: -3.75 Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -2.77
This really surprised me. Last time I took this test I was much closer to the center. Though I think several of the questions could have been worded differently, or they should have offered a neutral choice of some kind.
Posts: 4089 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
3.75 economic; -4.something or other authoritarian libertarian.
The questions were silly. Just because I think sex outside of marriage is usually immoral does not mean I think it should be regulated. The question about buying and selling land is one I have not answered for myself. I also doubt that there are really that many people on Hatrack who are more libertarian than I am.
Posts: 281 | Registered: Aug 2004
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posted
Hobbes, I had to consciously decide not to spend a minute and a half checking the spelling in my French dictionary. So really, we're in the same bateau.Posts: 144 | Registered: Apr 2003
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quote:OK, my point again was that this test doesn't matter. I was merely using it as an illustration of the concept that politics is not one-dimensional.
I agree with that point. However, this test can be used to reinforce another point--namely, that it is nearly impossible to write ANYTHING without showing your inherent bias. I'm pretty sure the authors did not intend for any of their questions to be biased, or for the results to therefore skew to the "left," even for people who have no business on the "left." I'm pretty sure they intended to actually have a meaningful way for people to determine where their beliefs stand on the two dimensional political spectrum. But they failed.
Oh, by the way, I'm Economic -2.38, and Socially almost dead center. Not exactly the way I'd characterize my beliefs, but since the questions were so laughably loaded, I didn't "Strongly Agree/Disagree" with but about 3 statements.
Posts: 786 | Registered: Jun 2003
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posted
Economic Left/Right: -6.63 Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -0.82
I must say, I'm somewhat surprised. I expected to be somewhere in the opposite quadrant. Oh well. I'm still voting Conservative. Posts: 1996 | Registered: Feb 2004
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quote:Economic Left/Right: -4.25 Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.77
Hmm. Looks like I'm with the majority here. I guess this is a big gay liberal forum.
Seriously, that test needs some serious rewriting and recalibration. Like a "how much does this matter to you?" field for each question. And an option for neutrality, as beverly suggested.
Posts: 1810 | Registered: Jan 1999
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I guess I'm not much a centrist afterall. How liberating!
Hey, Bob, what about me?
And I always knew you weren't a centrist - your ideas were too much like mine, and heaven knows, I've never been centrist. Posts: 5771 | Registered: Nov 2000
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