Perspective and Cars

"Casper" (casperiv) 02/12/2014 at 12:45 • Filed to: None

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I apologize in advance. I started writing this as a simple observation and analysis in order to help people understand the importance of perspective differences, but it got away from me. It is very long and delves into far more detail that I had originally intended and maybe mostly rambling trying to explain things that were floating around in my brain.

Perspective is a powerful factor that is often overlooked when making determinations about cars. Everyone has different perspectives and these differences drive differences of opinions about the quality of cars or what qualifies as a "fast car", "good car", "best car" or even "acceptable car".

One simple perspective difference is scale. Individuals may have very different scales for which they use to classify vehicle or individual vehicle attributes. For example, one person may see the world as absolute black and white, vehicles are "good" or "bad". In that perspective, a vehicle that is not good is bad. Another person may see three possible classifications of "good", "ok", "bad". These two perspectives will always conflict as the scales do not overlap. If yet a third perspective of "acceptable" or "unacceptable" is added, there is no common ground to be had. An "ok" vehicle for the second perspective maybe a "bad" vehicle for the first, but an "acceptable" for the third. The simple fact the person operating with first perspective declared the vehicle "bad" because it was not what they considered "good" will cause turmoil and irrational dispute between the other two perspectives. This is why common scales are critical and conveying a personal scale is important. It is also important to isolate similar criteria for scales, for instance focusing on acceleration, braking, or fuel economy and avoiding an overall summary. Unfortunately, even if a scale is shared, the perspective maybe different based on prior experience and what previously experience vehicle is the benchmark for the scale. This is just such the case with performance.

When considering the performance of a car a raw number may mean different things to different people. For example, a 13.5 second quarter mile is different depending on the context. If a person has no drag racing experience and only has experience with 16 second FWD economy cars, but they believe their car is fast, then they may say a car that is 2.5 seconds faster is not a significant difference and thus the car is only "kinda fast". Swap that person for someone driving the same 16 second FWD economy car, but with drag racing experience and they will realize that 2.5 seconds in the quarter miles is a massive difference and consider the same car "very fast". Bring yet a third person out, but this time they daily ride a Kawasaki ZX10R and they will consider 13.5 seconds quite slow. The car in question never changed in performance, only the perspective of those considering it's performance numbers changed. These perspectives are different, but each is quantifiable and relatable. The lack of understanding of the metric differences in the example of the first person is easily understood as are the increased understanding of the other two examples. This makes experience perspectives somewhat easily related to other parties, so long as the individuals prior experience is conveyed.

This same phenomenon applies to all areas of cars. For example, a car that is priced at $25,000 means different things from different perspectives. If someone earns $30,000 a year, a $25,000 car might be considered expensive where as someone earning $200,000 a year may consider a $25,000 car more or less disposable. This is a matter of perspective based on means, which is different than performance which was due to experience. This same concept of "means" may also apply to space constrictions. For example having a dedicated sports car and a dedicated daily driver sedan may make much more sense from the perspective of a person who has excess parking/garage space but make little to no sense to someone who has only space for a single vehicle. In this situation the former may consider a Porsche 911 a fantastic purchase whereas the latter may only see logic in a Porsche Panamera.

Experience and means are large factors in perspectives in regards to cars, but perhaps the greatest overall is personal preference. Personal preference is a perspective not based on a measurable or quantifiable quality, but rather a multitude of potentially rational or irrational factors jumbled together to form a preference. For instance, a preference factor maybe available interior space. One person may consider this from a rational vantage point of "I am x feet tall, I need a car that fits x feet tall comfortably". Another person may look at the same factor of interior space from a completely irrational point of "cars smaller than x make me feel nervous or claustrophobic". One is actually based on a comparable measurement, the other is based on a fear, personal insecurity, or other irrational consideration.

Irrational preferences can overlap with other obvious perspectives and even cause a person to ignore the logical conclusions used to form an established perspective. For example, a person may irrationally like a car simply because of style. If another car comes along that is measurably better in xyz characteristics, they will often attack the other car with illogical comparisons to justify the irrational attraction to the previous vehicle. This may be due to an underlying irrational insecurity bubbling to the surface as a justification for their preference or the inability to quantify their interest in the prior car. In that instance, the perspective has been skewed away from both experience and means in order to accommodate a psychological characteristic or flaw.

Insecurities drive many preferences without the person even knowing it. As an example, assume a person has little to no confidence in their own driving ability. They may feel insecure in both their ability as well as in the way others perceive them. Rather than being able to rationally process this and understand this is driving a personal preference, they may lash out. They may see a car that they consider too fast for them personally to handle and declare that no one would ever need such a car or that anyone wanting such a car is doing so to compensate for xyz short coming. This is actually a defense mechanism that has gone on the offensive, skewing the personal preference of that person, but also now attempting to skew the personal preferences of other people as well. These irrational decisions by their nature defend themselves with irrational "logic", which is simply a collection of potentially logical justifications processed with a bias of supporting the original irrational determination. If they are able to either convince others to agree or badger them into submission, they gain confidence and reassurance in their initial irrationality. These insecurities could just as easily be the reverse of that previously mentioned, directed at the size of a vehicle, the environmental impact of a vehicle, or a myriad of other attributes that can not be logically supported, yet maybe one of the most powerful in forming the overall perspective of the individual.

Understanding these factors in establishing perspective allows individuals to better understand individual opinions on vehicles. Unfortunately, some of the underlying factors maybe completely unrelatable, especially if the factors are driven by personal irrationality or emotions. In that situation, the key to reaching understanding is the irrational party having introspection to understand their illogical conclusions and either set them aside for the sake of a balanced evaluation or convey them in a logical manner to help others gain an understanding of their irrationally unique perspective. If any any point in evaluating your perspective you realize that your opinion will be impacted by an irrational consideration such as an emotional determination, conveying this will help both you and the other parties discussing the vehicle find common ground and better relate to your perspective.

Brian Silvestro > Casper 02/12/2014 at 12:57

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You need to go on a talk show, and write a book or something.

Casper > Brian Silvestro 02/12/2014 at 13:00

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I was annoyed by an argument over a car I was reading in the comments and tried to write a quite explanation for people to consider about perspective... that was the word vomit that resulted. I didn't have a chance to reread it, so hopefully it's not terrible to read.

Brian Silvestro > Casper 02/12/2014 at 13:03

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I'll use myself as an example. The fastest car I've ever driven is a Boxster. So if were to be given a V8 Vantage, I'd think it's REALLY fast, when in reality, it's not that fast compared to others. People with different experiences with cars might consider that car slow when driving it.

DatASSun > Casper 02/12/2014 at 13:04

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Casper .. Good read buddy but you seriously need to go wrench on the Z the next time you feel one of these episodes coming on . or like what he said right a book .. I dont read but my GF does and I could have her read it to me like a bed time story lol

Casper > DatASSun 02/12/2014 at 13:05

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LOL. It was just a few minutes of word vomit. Seemed better than dealing with people at work while I was drinking yet another coffee.

davesaddiction @ opposite-lock.com > Casper 02/12/2014 at 13:51

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Moral of the story: don't be a dick.

Casper > davesaddiction @ opposite-lock.com 02/12/2014 at 13:52

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Don't be a dick, and don't assume it's the other person being a dick... it might just be you being very bad at self analysis ;)

davesaddiction @ opposite-lock.com > Casper 02/12/2014 at 13:57

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It's amazing how much it can change your life if you go from assuming that most people are jerks to giving everyone the benefit of the doubt, and assume that they're nice.

Korea Miéville > Casper 02/12/2014 at 14:50

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Our culture privileges logic and reason and denigrates thinking that is irrational — not rational — or emotion-based. The problem is, we're not Vulcans, so we are in fact greatly driven by emotions and non-logical motivations, but to admit to this is to automatically lose credibility.

That lends most of our perspectives on the world an undercurrent of insecurity. So we — men especially, I think — go through some truly convoluted contortions to try to rationalize our choices and opinions. It's not enough for us to like or not like a thing — we must satisfy ourselves and others that it is objectively good or bad.

Which puts us into a difficult place in life where the inevitable existence of other, conflicting opinions constitutes an existential threat to our own opinions. After all, there cannot be two objectively correct opposing views on a thing. If I admit the existence of a differing opinion, what does that say about my reasoning capabilities and basic competence — about my grip on reality itself?

No wonder people on the Internet treat the most minor conflicts as if they're life-or-death struggles. In a sense, they are. If I believe in the supremacy of reason, and that my opinions are totally rational and objectively true, then my opinions carry the weight of my entire world view. If your view conflicts with mine, you threaten to negate the validity of my entire perspective. On some level, when I argue against you I am fighting for my very legitimacy as a person.

I'm not saying we are conscious of this when debating others, but I think this is the underlying psychology at work in many conflicts, affecting people to different degrees depending on how much their mindset and sense of self is reliant on the supremacy of logic and reason. That's why some of the most combative and close-minded people are found in the hard sciences and technical fields, where the internal conflict between our rational and irrational minds is most extreme and heightened.

Casper > Korea Miéville 02/12/2014 at 15:02

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I think a lot of online fighting is for the fun, just as physical sparring takes the form of many sports/games. The critical component, I believe, is ones personal ability to tell the difference between having a friendly argument for fun without real investment in who is right or wrong and someone arguing because they are attempting to validate an emotion.

People often fail to realize/miss the fact it's perfectly fine to like or dislike something purely on an emotional basis, but that it will never be correct as it is not provable. This is why simply having an opinion is not automatically defensible. An opinion can be right or wrong depending on how it was established: logical analysis vs emotion.

It is very possible to separate logic from emotion and process them individually. The real problem is that people have not had to learn this ability in modern life. They live extremely sheltered lives and are allowed to delay maturity as long as possible. A large part of what was considered "growing up" in the past was the concept of being able to process an emotional response logically, determining if it is something justified or not.

Korea Miéville > Casper 02/12/2014 at 15:21

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Good point re: maturity. Have you ever seen the "Reasons My Son Is Crying" Tumblr? It's hilarious because of the ridiculous things the kids are upset about, and the fact that kids take things so utterly seriously that (most) adults would consider trivial. For a child, the fact that your ice cream cone is minutely smaller than your sibling's can take on earth-shattering significance!

With-a-G is back to not having anything written after his username > Korea Miéville 02/12/2014 at 16:08

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Gizmo - The Only Good Gremlin, but don't feed me after Midnight > Casper 02/12/2014 at 20:35

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TL;DR ........

maybe later