What Makes A Terrible Question? (Episode #145 - Questions)

What are the differences between terrible, bad, stupid and good questions? In this themed episode Juan and I discuss the topic of 'Questions'. We start of with a definition and a little bit of history from Thomas Babington Macaulay before getting onto the topic of terrible questions. We mostly agreed that intent and context play a large part of the equation, rather than the actual words themselves. This can take the form of trolling, insincere, loaded and rhetorical questions, in which there is no real way to win except to not answer.

The second half of the convo focuses upon good questions and how we think about the internal questions that occur inside our own mind. There is also some fascinating knowledge to be gained from how different languages engage in the process of asking questions. In particular there is an obscure language in Mexico called Chalcatongo Mixtec that doesn't have the grammar structure or intonation to allow the classic format of questions.

As always, we hope you enjoy, Mere Mortals out!

Timeline:

0:00 - Intro

1:05 - Definition

3:10 - Terrible questions

4:54 - If you were a tree, what kind of tree would you be?

7:22 - Bad questions vs stupid questions

11:59 - Insincere, loaded and rhetorical questions

15:13 - What makes a good question

20:50 - Internal questions we ask ourselves

27:26 - Brangelina and magazines

32:48 - Languages without questions

35:00 - Chalcatongo Mixtec

37:45 - A good question: are you listening to enough Mere Mortals?

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