I’ll first list the top 10 most viewed posts on this blog (as of 10/24/2017). They aren’t my personal favorites, but they are popular for whatever reason.
- INFP: Most Judgmental Type?
- America’s North/South Divide (& other regional data)
- ‘Capitalist’ US vs ‘Socialist’ Germany
- ‘Capitalist’ US vs ‘Socialist’ Finland
- Columbia: Goddess of America
- Liberalism: Weaknesses & Failures
- The Vague and Ambiguous US Constitution
- Libertarians: Rich White Males of the Republican Party
- I’ve just pissed in my pants…
- Is “Narcissistic Personality Disorder” Destroying the World?
All of the above posts have received thousands of views. Among the top 50 posts that have received at least a thousand views, the following are some that are maybe worth highlighting (in order of most views). For my purposes here, I’m highlighting them partly to give examples of common topics in this blog, topics that apparently are of interest to others.
Conservative & Liberal Families: Observations & Comparison
Cold War Era: Paranoia and Oppression
White Supremacy Defeated… yet again
Orphan Trains in Context: History, Culture, and Law
Blade Runner: Rick Deckard
“Because they think they are white…”
Henry David Thoreau: Founding Father of American Libertarian Thought
“Europe, and not England, is the parent country of America.”
Criticisms of Spiral Dynamics
What Liberalism Has Become
Midwest vs Coasts: history, culture & politics
Radical & Moderate Enlightenments: Revolution & Reaction, Science & Religion
On Racialization of Crime and Violence
Heritability & Inheritance, Genetics & Epigenetics, Etc
The Desperate Acting Desperately
“What is Real?” asked the Rabbit one day…
Gangs as Civic Institutions
For the heck of it, here is some short fiction by me. I’ll list them here because they amuse me. The last one also is among the top viewed posts. But admittedly, as a blogger I’m not known for my fiction.
Mother’s Voice (fiction by Ben Steele)
The Many Rooms of Time (fiction by Ben Steele)
Sling Blade meets Naked Lunch
Christian Soul Harvest
War of the Krishnamurtis: A Tale of Magic and Horror
As for my personal favorite posts, those tend to fall into the broad category of human nature and human society, mostly involving but not limited to the social sciences: history, classical studies, comparative religion, philology, linguistic relativism, cognitive frames, memetics, consciousness studies, bundle theory of mind, bicameral theory, boundary types, personality disorders, agnotology, symbolic conflation, etc.
My writings about these topics occupy much more of my time and effort. I consider them to be far more fascinating and important. But they don’t tend to attract as many views or comments. No doubt, most people would perceive them as too narrowly intellectual or not directly relevant. I would disagree, as these topics cut to the heart of humanity and society.
Because of a request, I’ll offer a tentative list of my personal favorite posts. Or rather, let me say these are posts that, for one reason or another, I appreciate. I won’t claim they are necessarily my best posts, but they do express something of personal interest and value. And most importantly, they are posts I enjoyed writing. The chosen pieces were motivated by or a product of curiosity, many of them being a direct result of a learning process.
My choosing these particular posts is maybe somewhat random, just what came to my mind at the moment. I decided to throw in some recent posts because they capture my present mood and focus. I’ll probably revise the list as I give it more thought. Here they are in no particular order:
On Truth and Bullshit
The Art of the Lost Cause
The Gesture of Tank Man
Generations at the Age of Twelve
Deep Roots in Dark Soil
Good Liberals vs Savage Nihilists
By What Right?
A Truly Free People
Liberty, Freedom, and Fairness
Where Liberty and Freedom Converge
General American and the Particulars of Our Origins
How did American English become standardized?
Attributes of Thomas Paine
Revolution and Apocalypse
Winter Season and Holiday Spirit
Poised on a Knife Edge
Imagination: Moral, Dark, and Radical
The Violent Narcissism of Small Differences
Racism, Proto-Racism, and Social Constructs
Ancient Social Identity: The Case of Jews
Blue on Blue
Music and Dance on the Mind
“First came the temple, then the city.”
“Why are you thinking about this?”
“Beyond that, there is only awe.”
Dark Matter of the Mind
Bundle Theory: Embodied Mind, Social Nature
Trauma, Embodied and Extended
Uncomfortable Questions About Ideology
Bias About Bias
Marmalade 
Would you be so kind as to list some of your posts that are most important to you? I must say that I just realized that I just skimmed these ‘most popular’ listings above because I was hoping to get to where you listed the ones that were important to you, or important by some other metric…thanks, man.
I appreciate your asking. It took me years to clean up this page. The posts I listed here in the past, as I recall, were mostly early writings on politics, demographics, and public opinion. I knew I needed to revise the page and finally got around to it this year.
But I maybe should have given some examples of my personal favorites. I’ll have to give that some thought. Let me see about throwing up a few posts that stand out to me. As for a more careful listing, it will have to be an ongoing project. I’ve been blogging for about a decade now.
Offhand, some of my favorite posts would be those that combine my most personal interests, contemplations, and observations. I’m thinking of such things as my ongoing project in exploring symbolic conflation, a nonfalsifiable hypothesis of my own making.
Also, I’ve grown fond of my research into the bicameral mind and linguistic relativism with much crossover into the territory of symbolic conflation. Such topics utterly fascinate me, as they cut to the core of our humanity. Besides posts on those topics, I find myself being drawn back to my writings on the reactionary and the revolutionary, also related to the human mind and human nature.
I’ll link to a few initial examples hopefully by the end of the day. I shouldn’t have anything to distract me, as I’m looking after my parents’ house while they are away.
On such a quiet winter day, it is nice to remain inside ensconced within the comforting warmth. And you should see the lovely side windows my parents added to the glass doors downstairs that look out across the backyard and into the woods, providing a perfect view of the comings and goings of wildlife at the bird (and squirrel) feeders. Such a peaceful view helps keep me psychologically balanced.
For all the problems in the world, I must admit I have much to be thankful for. Few working class blokes have parents with such a nice house to hang out in. And my parents really are great people. All in all, life is decent — even with all that is going on in the world. I hope life is going well for you. And I hope the holidays have been enjoyable.
Something just occurred to me. In the above listings of posts, I started off with the most viewed. But I don’t equate that with those being the best posts. It might simply be an artifact of what gets initial attention ends up getting further attention, such as through web search algorithms.
Ignoring for the moment my personal favorites, I still can’t say what are the favorites of those who visit my blog. It’s hard for me to get into the minds of blog readers in order to figure out what they might think about my various writings. I feel confident, though, that there likely is little overlap between the most popular posts and my personal favorites.
Considering that, I was wondering if, in your mind, there are any posts here at my blog that stand out above the rest of my jabberings. I can’t say I’ve tended to write with a specific audience in mind, except in a few posts where I was directly responding to someone. But I’m always curious to know why some posts attract attention and others don’t. And I can’t help noticing, after putting up a post, when I gain or lose followers. I wish I knew what more readers were thinking, as it is a small minority of visitors who bother to leave a comment.
I’d love to be able to ascertain which specific posts both more greatly interest me and my readers. I don’t mind writing posts that might only seem significant and relevant to a minority of prospective readers. But it would be useful to know what causes some posts to attract viewings and whether or not that indicates genuine appreciation. There are posts I’ve poured my heart and soul into without necessarily getting that many viewings, as my interests can be idiosyncratic and my writing style at times obsessively overwhelming.
The purpose of this page is to help guide people to posts that likely would be of interest. The above listed posts would give a reader a general sense of what my blog is about. But there might be a more useful list that could be made.
I spent the afternoon looking through posts. I added a list of 30 posts above. Basically, they are the kind of posts I like to write, whether or not they are popular in views and comments they attract.
I’d like to know if the posts I added were what you were asking for. Or were you looking for something else. I added that list specifically for you and so I’d appreciate feedback. Of course, you don’t have to give me feedback. But I do value your opinion.
I maybe have a few genuinely favorite posts. This includes almost anything related to my own theorizing about what I call symbolic conflation. But that is because that line of thought is personally important to me, having originated from my own observations and built on decades of thought. Many other posts I added or could add simply represent what I enjoy writing about and some examples that I’m proud of having written. The latter category represents my using my intellectual skill in and of itself, even when it isn’t a topic of long term interest.
As you know, I like making connections and some posts overflow with connections, which makes me happy. I love connections more than the average person. But that means many posts I enjoy writing (and reading again later) are not likely to be favorites among the general reader. I appear to be a bit unusual in enjoying long posts and long comments, both by myself and by others. I’ve never assumed that blogging is a short form of writing. And I’ve never assumed that anyone would like what I write. I try to communicate well, to find a happy medium between my style of writing and the typical interest of readers. But obviously I don’t bend over backwards to appease mass preferences.
Anyway, do any of my ‘favorite’ posts coincide with what you may perceive as my better writing in terms of quality and enjoyment?