Left or Right of me.

[Lexicus]

In my defense...
1. I was a member of the Communist Party of Australia.
(a) My only vote on a substantial issue was to close the party down.
(b) My original application to join in 1972 (when I was 16) was rejected because I was too aligned with the Yippie movement and their attitudes.
(c) I never resigned from the party.

2. I named my son's toy panda, Mao, his toy dog, Lackey, and I had a Vietnamese fighting fish named Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Finh.
(Dare to struggle, dare to swim!)

3. I sold programs to the Australian and US Navies I wrote under research grants, and then gave the code away for free to everyone else, including Chinese and Iranian students.

4. I think that Alexandra Elbakyan deserves a Nobel prize for Physics, at the least.

In my defense, I make no pretense to rating anything other than the posters' activity on this site

 

[cardgame]

3. I sold programs to the Australian and US Navies I wrote under research grants, and then gave the code away for free to everyone else, including Chinese and Iranian students.

Now this is praxis

 

[Timsup2nothin]

3. I sold programs to the Australian and US Navies I wrote under research grants, and then gave the code away for free to everyone else, including Chinese and Iranian students.

Praxis, maybe...had to look that up, BTW...but...as a self confessed member of the criminal not-elite I think this might be something I would be more circumspect about announcing.

 

[Synobun]

Depending on the grant there might have been a grace period of exclusivity that expired.

 

[stfoskey12]

It's actually more annoying because it's somewhat close to the right order than it would be if it was totally out of order.

Here's my list:

inthesomeday
Lexicus
Owen Glyndwr
Hygro
Ajidica
Cardgame
Ferocitus
Hrothbern
shadowplay
AmazonQueen
Synsensa
tjs282
Bootstoots
Estebonrober
Timsup2nothin
El_Mac
UlyssesSgrant
Zardnaar
Catharsis
Truthy
BenitoChavez
rah
Bernie14
onejayhawk

I'm mostly a lurker, but I think I'm somewhere between El_Mac and Bernie 14.
I get about a -3 on both social and economic on the political compass test.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Praxis, maybe...had to look that up, BTW

Oh, I thought it was that Klingon Moon.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

Economic Left/Right: -6.0
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -0.72

Ooh. Most right-wing result I've ever had. It's been about 3 and a half years since I've taken it so maybe it's genuine change rather than noise. Still think it's very America-centric though. I have no idea what the whole section 5 about religion is meant to prove outside of America.

 

[Traitorfish]

The thing about the political compass test is, we did this a few years ago, and it told GhostWriter that he basically a fascist. He kept retaking it until it gave him the "correct" answer, that he was a libertarian. I haven't really been able to take it seriously since.

 

[Lexicus]

The thing about the political compass test is, we did this a few years ago, and it told GhostWriter that he basically a fascist. He kept retaking it until it gave him the "correct" answer, that he was a libertarian. I haven't really been able to take it seriously since.

It's not difficult to figure out how to make the dot move around.

 

[rah]

Which is why most of the time, if you work for a market/survey research firm, they screen you out of taking a lot of them.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

Or... you could just answer it honestly to see what you get.

It's certainly not more susceptible to manipulation than, for example, asking people to place themselves in a list wherever they see fit.

 

[Hrothbern]

I do such tests just as fast as I can, to minimise the risk of thinking.

 

[Akka]

The thing about the political compass test is, we did this a few years ago, and it told GhostWriter that he basically a fascist. He kept retaking it until it gave him the "correct" answer, that he was a libertarian. I haven't really been able to take it seriously since.

I don't really see how it's the fault of the test that a guy switched his answers around until he got the answer he was fishing for.

Political Compass is certainly not perfect, it's certainly slanted, it's certainly much too US-centric, but your argument that it's not serious because someone was able to fine-tune his answers does not make sense.

 

[rah]

Or... you could just answer it honestly to see what you get.

It's certainly not more susceptible to manipulation than, for example, asking people to place themselves in a list wherever they see fit.

People can unconsciously answer questions.

And I expected manipulations asking people to place themselves.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

I'm pretty sure I was conscious when I answered mine.

 

[rah]

Funny man. Sometimes we'll throw a question in to see if we can detect when someone answers a question like they think we want them to answer it. Needless to say, it's not an exact science.

 

[Lexicus]

Political Compass is certainly not perfect, it's certainly slanted, it's certainly much too US-centric, but your argument that it's not serious because someone was able to fine-tune his answers does not make sense.

It absolutely does. If someone is able to make the test spit out a result that matches their preconceived notion of their political beliefs then it isn't a real test at all, more like a game.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

Funny man. Sometimes we'll throw a question in to see if we can detect when someone answers a question like they think we want them to answer it. Needless to say, it's not an exact science.

Who's "we"?

It absolutely does. If someone is able to make the test spit out a result that matches their preconceived notion of their political beliefs then it isn't a real test at all, more like a game.

Aside from some sort of mind probe device, what's the alternative for a case like this?

 

[rah]

I work for a global market research company, and 'WE' do a lot of work on questionnaire design and analysis.

 

[Lexicus]

Aside from some sort of mind probe device, what's the alternative for a case like this?

There are methods of constructing tests that make it much harder to do this. Tests that are actually used for scientific or technical purposes (or like what rah does where investments and money are riding on the line) will use those methods.