The Political Compass Thread (Part 4+)!

[dmille]

It's time for the latest round of the Political Compass (http://www.politicalcompass.org/) game. Is Dyntheos still Gandhi's alter ego? Is Soul really an a 10.0 on the authoritarian scale?

We can discuss whether or not this test means something (it probably doesn't), whether or not its questions accurately reflect the decisions that should be used for judging these issues (they don't) and the like, but the fact of the matter that this is an amusing RB tradition.

There are also better tests out there (I'm trying to re-find a link to the best of them, which is primarily US-centric) but, in the meantime, let's use the internet wide standard.

Without further ado:

Economic Left/Right: 3.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 0.56

I don't think the authoritarian scale is an accurate reflection of my beliefs, but this is what we're going with.

Enjoy!

[Rent-a-Zilla]

Heh - here we go again!

I've taken this test several times, but my economic/govt. score still varies a lot (which reflects my constantly changing views about the role/extent of govt. and business ethics etc.) My social score is relatively constant though:

Economic Left/Right: -3.38
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.85

Hmmm - my economic score is usu. further to the right... bah...

[NovaBurn]

Economic Left/Right: -3.50
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -2.82

I AM GHANDI

[Starfisher]

I think the fact that I got bored on page 4 of 6 says more about our society and my political leaning than any ultimately meaningless floating point number.

[Chrysophylax]

Your political compass
Economic Left/Right: -4.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -2.77

Somewhere between Nelson Mandela and the Dalai Lama

[Langy]

Your political compass
Economic Left/Right: -5.62
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -7.18

I'm hyper-ghandi.

EDIT: Oh, and my social libertarian score is right-on. I'm extremely socially liberal. I also think the government needs to keep tabs on the companies, but I don't believe too much in a welfare state. Meaning, I don't believe in giving money to people without giving them work. Have the government provide jobs for the unemployed while it also searches for jobs for other people - possibly even pay them to search for their own job, or something. I don't know. Just get them out there doing something rather than just sending 'em a check twice a month.

[Yuryu]

Same for me.
Ecomic Left/Right:-5.77
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.00

So thats why I'm such a big fan of dear old Mandela.

[Ash]

Economic Left/Right: -6.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -6.41

makes sense

[Numenor]

Your political compass
Economic Left/Right: -3.62
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.23

[Chimera]

Economic Left/Right: -1.50
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.38

[Noir]

Economic Left/Right: 0.38
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.64

I seriously think that this test would have been better with the addition of the choice "Undecided",not to mention that some of the questions were oddly worded :\

[Hangfire]

Economic Left/Right: -3.25
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.74

[MajorFreak]

ehhh...*shudder* Don't like the very premise behind the majority of the "questions" since the answers are biased from the get go...some are even blatantly racist (and play upon the "oh, it's just objectivity here and gauging reactions, not making a statement of truth" red herring BS)needless to say, i've looked long and hard for some sort of 'test' that is balanced, but have failed to find anything as brazen and daring as this one :p

[dmille]

Freak, you fool. We're aware of the fact that this test is inherently useless - don't come in here and ruin a longstanding tradition of fun and discovery of the fact that I'm the only guy in the positive numbers.

Blah, it's racist, blah.

[Stealth]

Economic Left/Right: -5.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.77

[Mnementh]

Economic Left/Right: -1.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 0.82

[Reignfire]

Economic Left/Right: -5.50
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -2.46

[Dragon Lord]

Economic Left/Right: -2.75
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.15

hmm last time I was about -2 in the Libertarian/Authoritarian which kinda figures because of all the "everything to stop terrorism" calls which I think are pretty stupid

[Langy]

Wow. Someone that's more positive than dmille in one of the issues. Amazing.

EDIT: I'm kinda surprised I'm the guy with the highest negative values, though. I never expected to be the *most* liberal person here. Though I am basically a complete social liberal.

[bluevorlon]

I have to admit. The function of this useless test as a tradition has somewhat grown on me. I wonder if, dredging up the old thread, we can see if our positions have changed?

Economic Left/Right: -8.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -7.95

I'm an extremist baby.

[Langy]

Oh, and there goes blu ruining my edit by showing that he, in fact, is more liberal than I.

[Zeenith]

Economic Left/Right: -4.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -2.26

strange, I thought I be more center of the graph if anything.

[Capella]

Economic Left/Right: -0.75
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -0.56

well well a moderate after all

Of course the first thing you do is kill all the moderates, I'm going to hide now...

[Atreides]

Economic Left/Right: 3.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 1.69

Click the link 2004 election

Im a tad to the left of JOHN KERRY?

[SquidDNA]

Economic Left/Right: -1.88
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -2.56

It's still kind of moderate when you look at the graph. It's just that there isn't a leader up there like Blu.

[A176]

http://www3.sympatico.ca/a176/compass.gif

Economic Left/Right: -4.75
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -1.18

Another Ghandi wannabe.

[Magus]

Economic Left/Right: -7.12
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.13

Pretty damned close to Ghandi... weird...
And Atredies, if you ever needed proof that both canidates are exploded a bit, I think you got it there...

[The Reflection]

Economic Left/Right: -3.12
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -7.64

My social libertarianess continues to grow without bound!
http://www.personal.psu.edu/users/b/c/bcl141/Political/CompassTrends.gif

Here you can see how the Relic Boards did as a whole in the past threads. Some of those on the periphery are marked:
http://www.personal.psu.edu/users/b/c/bcl141/Political/RBPolitics.gif

And where I stand with respect to the candidates I may soon be voting for (slightly old, but should be roughly correct):
http://www.personal.psu.edu/users/b/c/bcl141/Political/CompassElection2004.gif
Edit: Ha! I'm even more libertarian than the Libertarian party candidate, Badnarik, at least on the social issues.

[General Nuke Em]

Economic Left/Right: 2.88
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 1.13

Too bad this one wasn't on militarism.

[Zepherian]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v369/Zepherian/polcump.jpg

For comparison:

http://www.digitalronin.f2s.com/politicalcompass/images/internationalchart.jpg


I would say its just about right, slightly socialist more libertarian than authoritarian, ma non troppo. However, I must state that my political views are based on the world we live in and are based on what I can reasnably expect humanity to achieve...

For utopia I would be further to the left and a bit more libertarian.

[Cleron]

Ghandi wannabe, but some of the question were ugh.

[Bonnet]

Still about the same, though i have moved a little more left thanks to you guys :( :P

[Pleiades]

oi stop nicking my job

Reflection that is awesome , how did you find all the old stuff

[Zurgnoff]

Economic Left/Right: -5.50
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.95

pretty much what I expected my results to be

[Firelance]

Economic Left/Right: -3.25
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 2.31

I'm kinda close to Pope John Paul II.

[Captain Taco]

My political compass:

Economic Left/Right: 2.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -2.97

Pretty much what I expected. I'm fiscally conservative and socially liberal. Too bad there aren't any world leaders out there with me in the second quadrant. Life would be a lot better.

[Pleiades]

I suppose I should show how I haven't changed much

Economics -7.5
Liberal -4.51

[Gyokuran]

Economic Left/Right: -4.12
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.49

One question on that test which always bothers me is "Abstract art that doesn't represent anything shouldn't be considered art at all." Because I've always assumed the definition of art is that it represents something the artist was trying to show others, instead of a random collection of objects or lines on a paper.

[Captain Pierce]

Economic Left/Right: -3.38
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.08

putting me squarely into Nelson Mandela/Dalai Lama territory, apparently. :D

I'd expected to be closer to the middle than that... :)

And I've just realized that this is also Ralph Nader territory. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! :weep:

[Kovac]

Economic Left/Right: -5.38
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -1.69

[El Russo]

The following questions severely pissed me off:

A significant advantage of a one-party state is that it avoids all the arguments that delay progress in a democratic political system.
WTF??? Of course that's true, you can't agree or disagree with that statement. The question isn't the same as asking if one supports one-party states.

It is a waste of time to try to rehabilitate some criminals.
Again, true. Some cannot be rehabilitated. The question is not whether we should try to, or not. I know the point of these questions, but their intent is far different from their meaning.

Anyhow, this is mine:

Economic Left/Right: -2.75
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.38

[edit: seems that I've moved more central (from the scores I roughly remember from last time at least), especially in the economics area]

[edit2: Rent-a-Zilla appears to be most like me (in terms of filling out those questions at any rate), of the people that I know here]

[jetfx]

How often is this thing going to be reincarnated?

I've moved closer to the centre since I last checked.
Economic Left/Right: -2.12
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.30

[The Reflection]

The updated chart, with data from everyone who provided numbers, up to Captain Pierce.
http://www.personal.psu.edu/users/b/c/bcl141/Political/RBPoliticsOct2004.gif
The old data is probably still on the board, dozens of pages back in the GD.

I know the point of these questions, but their intent is far different from their meaning.
Think of it this way - the test is supposed to measure how much one is a conservative/liberal and how much one is an authoritarian/ libertarian. Now suppose these bad questions tended to be interpreted one way by liberals, and another by conservatives, for example. Then it doesn't matter whether the question makes any sense, the reaction is all that matters since it's correlated with your political stance. As long as there is a high enough correlation between the response and the political stance of the respondent, then the question has succeeded in its goal: measuring the political stance of the respondent.

For example, suppose that we presented the population with a bunch of math problems, and asked the people to estimate the answer. Suppose it turned out that conservatives would give guesses lower than the correct one, and liberals would give guesses higher than the correct one, for all kinds of math problems. Then the Political Compass website gave the following question:

What is the square root of 3?
A.) 1.209
B.) 1.711
C.) 1.756
D.) 1.973

The correct answer, 1.732... is not even on the quiz. But conservatives will, in general, tend to guess A or B, while liberals will tend to answer C or D. It doesn't matter that the correct answer does not appear, since for most cases, the test will correctly judge that the respondent is conservative if they chose A or B, and that they are liberal if they chose C or D. In a few cases, this judgement will be incorrect (for example, a liberal might know that the correct answer is 1.732... and since B is closer than C to the correct answer, he/she will chose B), but that's to be expected, since there are always statistical errors.

Or, if it was found that when someone shouts "Ooga Booga!", authoritarians will usually scream "Ai!" and libertarians will usually scream "Eee!", then you could find out whether someone is authoritarian or libertarian by shouting "Ooga Booga!" at them. It doesn't matter what "Ooga Booga!" means, or why authoritarians will choose "Ai!" over "Eee!", or libertarians "Eee!" over "Ai!", it simply works as an empirical test.

[jetfx]

How odd, my freind aftermath, who was on here all of a few months appears on the grpah, yet I don't.

[El Russo]

Two points; firstly, you should be able to synchronise intent and meaning; secondly, I knew how each answer would effect my rating, and thus chose on the basis of what I thought would most correctly correlate me with my political persuasion. The test should tell me what persuasion I am, not the other way around.

[Langy]

I redid the test and made sure I chose the answers I believed in - I think I accidentally selected 'strongly agree' for the luck answer when I meant disagree. Here's the updated stats:

Your political compass
Economic Left/Right: -6.12
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -8.00

Puts me firmly in the place of most socially liberal and one of the most economically liberal on the boards.

[Yoshi]

hmmm middle of the road almost
Economic Left/Right: -0.12
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 1.95

[SquidDNA]

Yoshi, the quote in your sig is attributable to Louis Pasteur, which is remarkable because it's the only English he ever spoke in his life.

[Pleiades]

Still about the same, though i have moved a little more left thanks to you guys :( :PI have not completely failed then

Workers of the world unite

My next target is ............... :dmille:

[Handarazuur]

Economic Left/Right: -3.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -0.41

[Dan Van Crone]

Economic Left/Right: -5.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.21

While not moderate its still more moderate than I would have expected. I'm not quite a Mahatma.

[The_Assimilator]

Economic Left/Right: -5.38
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 0.26

I'm (apparently) more a lefty than anything else, which is a surprise because I'm generally pro-war and pro-Bush and pro-death penalty. Since I answered the questions as truthfully as I was able, I don't think that test is a fair reflection of my views. Especially considering that there were quite a few questions on religion/faith - since when does being an agnostic equate to being a lefty?

Reflection, you have way too much time on yer hands.

[Ash]

My next target is ...............:dmille:

Look at the graph. He's pulling to the left as well.

[Thalasion]

Economic Left/Right: -3.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.00


Right next to Gandhi.

[Rent-a-Zilla]

Yep, I often wonder what the people who made that test are smoking. The class versus nationality question is an odd one; I think society is more stratified by wealth than by borders, but wtf has that got to do with my political outlook?

I don't like faith-based schools, but I don't want them to be outlawed; however, I think the poll assumes the latter from the former, which is daft.

There aren't enough fiscal questions either. I don't believe that business is capable of regulating itself (i.e. we need govt. to make laws and enforce individual/consumer rights etc.), but I don't believe in punitive taxes, unnecessary/bureaucratic govt., and I believe that govt. provided anything is inherently inefficient. I think that puts me in economic right/neo-liberal territory (albeit not as much as devout libertarians/neo-liberals), but this poll always lumps me in with the economic left.

Consequently, I only take the social aspect of this poll seriously.

[Aruthra]

Wow, this must be about the 5th time I've taken this test.

Economic Left/Right: -6.50
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.49

But then, I am quite probably guilty of a lot of ivory tower intellectualism.

[Void]

Your political compass
Economic Left/Right: -1.38
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -1.79

[dmille]

Look at the graph. He's pulling to the left as well.I have a few more scores based on differences between strongly agree / agree, etc. I'm not pulling left - sorry kiddos.

[Capella]

As to the test, note that there are varying levels of agreement and disagreement, a moderate would tend to choose the center two choices, and not be so absolute and friigging sure of themselves.

Some of the questions as pointed out are just true statements asking if you agree. So in fact they are trick questions basically seeing if you read them correctly before shooting your mouth off by answering what you thought they said.

I find this to be well designed, assuming these were the intents of the authors.

c

[Dimension]

Economic Left/Right: -3.50
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.15

this is my score from the last time:
Economic Left/Right: -4.25
Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.95

I'm a bit more left and a bit more authoritarian than I used to be. Is it because of age? /me ponders

[Pleiades]

But of course people will tend to answer questions so that they appear to be nicer than they are.
Good questionaires build in traps for this and also ask questions in a not very obvious way or several times with different wording. Which is what everyone complains about on this one.

I have been trapped this way . One Psychological test I did came up with the result that I "Fake Good"
My real personality is therefore obviously different from my avatar here.

I have a very bad vindictive, vengefull temper.

[jetfx]

Where is this psychological test? Or is it actually a real one that one has to see a psychologist to take?

[Pleiades]

Where is this psychological test? Or is it actually a real one that one has to see a psychologist to take?
I was applying for a Job and the Managment consultants ran real tests on you ...IQ retc etec

[jetfx]

Psychological profiling your employees. How unsettling, and they actually told you afterward what you were? And did you get the job?

[Pleiades]

Yep.. it was for a promotion
But I got my results by breaking into the bosses filing cabinet one night.
As I said I am not what I pretend to be.

[Ash]

Don't worry folks, Plei is just an old man trying to keep us on our toes.

[jetfx]

Perhaps he's a young man masquerading as an old one...

Pfft. He wishes!

[ShivaArchon]

Meh, what the hell, I'll take it again. Trying to figure out what they're asking is a problem half the time, since they like to mix positive and negative questions.

Economic Left/Right: 4.12
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 0.82

[Agdune]

Economic Left/Right: -5.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.56

I'M A NOBODY :p