I think it would be useful to be able to rate a horoscope “confusing.” This wouldn’t be a numerical rating that got averaged in, but a separate tally. Then now and then you could look at what is most frequently rated “confusing” and see if it’s an issue of jargon or if it’s just too vague. They need to be vague enough to apply to a broad scale of people but not so vague that they stop applying.
For example, today I rated yesterday’s horoscope as “not useful” because I spent the entire day trying to figure out what it meant, how I could apply it to my life and interactions with the universe and never came up with an answer. (It was “Are you asking the right things?” which I guess isn’t the right thing to ask me. I wasn’t really sure what ‘things’ meant in this context, or ‘asking’ or ‘right’ but I don’t think it’s a jargon problem.
Most questions I ask myself are ones that I go on to find answers to. The most recent one was “Hungarian used to have a lot more grammatical tenses than it currently does. I’ve seen them enough in old texts that I have a vague sense for their meaning but I wonder how they were differentiated from each other.” so I googled and bookmarked a few pages and if I read through it a few more times I should be able to communicate effectively the next time I travel to 16th century Hungary, for all the good it’ll do me. Most of my questions are of this type: how does x work? what is y like? and then i do research and find out.
One question that puzzled me for weeks was “how can I get the cat to stop pooing on the chair?” The answer ended up being “by putting some paper trash in a corner for the cat to poo on instead.” (Keeping the litter box clean was my first hypothesis, but the cat disproved it.)
I think it would be useful to be able to rate a horoscope “confusing.” Then now and then you could look at what is most frequently rated “confusing” and see if it’s an issue of jargon or if it’s just too vague.
This might be worth implementing. Even if it is an issue of jargon or some other situation where explaining the idea within the horoscope would take too long, it’s possible to include links to external resources in the horoscopes, so external explanations can be written and linked to.
For example, today I rated yesterday’s horoscope as “not useful” because I spent the entire day trying to figure out what it meant … It was “Are you asking the right things?” which I guess isn’t the right thing to ask me.
The assumption there is that most people ask questions and pursue answers to them as part of trying to reach larger goals, and that it’s common for people to skip steps in figuring out what strategies to pursue, often without noticing that they’ve done so. For example, in your cat situation, if you’d unintentionally assumed that it had to be a litterbox cleanliness issue, and only asked ‘how often do I have to clean the litterbox to get the cat to use it’, you might have missed the less traditional but easier solution altogether. In that case, being reminded to back up and ask whether ‘how often do I need to clean the litterbox’ was a good question would hopefully be useful. (I should probably re-word that one anyway to mention goals, though.)
I think using hyperlinks in some of the horoscopes would be useful.
Thanks for explanation about the one I didn’t understand. You’re right that I could’ve easily missed it. I did originally assume it was a litterbox cleanliness problem, but I very early on I noticed that I’d clean the litter box, and then within an hour, the cat would go in it, pee, bury it, hop onto the chair, and poo right in front of me. I’ve been reinforcing “not on the chair” with a fan pointed at the chair. The cat hates the fan, but apparently there are too many other places she’s willing to poo if the chair is too windy. So she went on the floor, and then I cleaned it and put some trash down on the spot she’d went on, and now at least we’ve got the trash solution. Maybe she just doesn’t like the location the litter box. I could try moving it.
I think “Are you asking the right questions to accomplish your goals?” would be a suitable rewording.
I think it would be useful to be able to rate a horoscope “confusing.” This wouldn’t be a numerical rating that got averaged in, but a separate tally. Then now and then you could look at what is most frequently rated “confusing” and see if it’s an issue of jargon or if it’s just too vague. They need to be vague enough to apply to a broad scale of people but not so vague that they stop applying.
For example, today I rated yesterday’s horoscope as “not useful” because I spent the entire day trying to figure out what it meant, how I could apply it to my life and interactions with the universe and never came up with an answer. (It was “Are you asking the right things?” which I guess isn’t the right thing to ask me. I wasn’t really sure what ‘things’ meant in this context, or ‘asking’ or ‘right’ but I don’t think it’s a jargon problem.
Most questions I ask myself are ones that I go on to find answers to. The most recent one was “Hungarian used to have a lot more grammatical tenses than it currently does. I’ve seen them enough in old texts that I have a vague sense for their meaning but I wonder how they were differentiated from each other.” so I googled and bookmarked a few pages and if I read through it a few more times I should be able to communicate effectively the next time I travel to 16th century Hungary, for all the good it’ll do me. Most of my questions are of this type: how does x work? what is y like? and then i do research and find out.
One question that puzzled me for weeks was “how can I get the cat to stop pooing on the chair?” The answer ended up being “by putting some paper trash in a corner for the cat to poo on instead.” (Keeping the litter box clean was my first hypothesis, but the cat disproved it.)
This might be worth implementing. Even if it is an issue of jargon or some other situation where explaining the idea within the horoscope would take too long, it’s possible to include links to external resources in the horoscopes, so external explanations can be written and linked to.
The assumption there is that most people ask questions and pursue answers to them as part of trying to reach larger goals, and that it’s common for people to skip steps in figuring out what strategies to pursue, often without noticing that they’ve done so. For example, in your cat situation, if you’d unintentionally assumed that it had to be a litterbox cleanliness issue, and only asked ‘how often do I have to clean the litterbox to get the cat to use it’, you might have missed the less traditional but easier solution altogether. In that case, being reminded to back up and ask whether ‘how often do I need to clean the litterbox’ was a good question would hopefully be useful. (I should probably re-word that one anyway to mention goals, though.)
I think using hyperlinks in some of the horoscopes would be useful.
Thanks for explanation about the one I didn’t understand. You’re right that I could’ve easily missed it. I did originally assume it was a litterbox cleanliness problem, but I very early on I noticed that I’d clean the litter box, and then within an hour, the cat would go in it, pee, bury it, hop onto the chair, and poo right in front of me. I’ve been reinforcing “not on the chair” with a fan pointed at the chair. The cat hates the fan, but apparently there are too many other places she’s willing to poo if the chair is too windy. So she went on the floor, and then I cleaned it and put some trash down on the spot she’d went on, and now at least we’ve got the trash solution. Maybe she just doesn’t like the location the litter box. I could try moving it.
I think “Are you asking the right questions to accomplish your goals?” would be a suitable rewording.