Friday, July 10, 2009

Plotting Wingnuts

I've sometimes wondered about the best way to plot wingnuts in n-dimensional trait space. It's not trivial, because many characteristics are correlated to varying degrees, and the subjectivity of it all makes it hard. However, I think this simple example isn't far off from reality.

Dishonesty and stupidity are pretty much independent, and I think I plotted these particular wingnuts fairly. Glenn Beck is a deeply stupid person, but comes across as earnestly crazy. Bill O'Reilly, on the other hand, is just very cynical and dishonest, but not really stupid, just ignorant. Sean Hannity, of course, is both stupid and dishonest.

I think if you plotted wingnuts in the 3-dimensions of ignorance, dishonesty, and stupidity, the surface would be roughly a π/2 wedge about the origin.

All of which is just to say, "It's Friday. Open thread."