My friend Steve

I was recently talking with some friends about the funny way that celebrities and public figures lose their own existence and become basically current-event-shaped cutouts for us to project our opinions onto. I think the video This is Phil Fish does a great job of making this point for a public figure in indie gaming.

To my mind, anything that is important because someone famous said it is probably not that important. Most of the time it's just a cheap way to signal identification with a particular group or latch on to that person's halo effect in some way. So I'd like to introduce a technique I came up with to help, I call it my friend Steve. You simply replace the name of the important public figure with "my friend Steve".

"Donald Trump just said that Mexicans can't count" is a classic opening to a long session of political chest-beating. However, "my friend Steve just said that mexicans can't count" is just... well, okay, your friend Steve is an idiot, but why are you telling me? "My friend Steve says that if you can't handle him at his worst, you don't deserve him at his best". Right. "You won't believe what my friend Steve just said about feminism on Twitter!" I bet I will believe it, and also that it won't matter very much.

On the other hand, my friend Steve says that theoretical science is inherently religious, though not in the sense of a particular god. He reckons that the level of effort and devotion that scientists put into seeking the truth can't be explained any other way. They often have to work hard for a long time, facing failures and setbacks, with little outside validation and sometimes outright hostility for their ideas. What are they holding onto that entire time? Surely if there's anything that deserves to be called religion, it's that.

That friend's name, of course... Albert Einstein. But you didn't need to know that; the idea was interesting enough without a celebrity behind it. Thanks, Steve!