Don’t Buy a Full Frame Mirrorless Camera, You Dolt

Nearly nobody needs a full frame DSLR or mirrorless digital camera. Still, many people at all levels of photographic skill and experience buy one anyway. Consumers get taken in by the quasi-mythical reputations of 35mm CMOS sensors, and they feel - nay, they know - that this is the pinnacle of digital imaging, the goal towards which any serious photographer must steadfastly advance.

Except that it isn’t.

There must be some secret cabal of full frame conspirators clandestinely orchestrating global PR campaigns, because everyone knows the virtues of the large imaging sensor: the shallow depth of field, the dynamic range, the resolution, the high ISO noise performance! There are only two types of photographers, surely: those who shoot full frame and those who can’t afford it yet.

That’s a half-truth. In fact, there really are only two types of photographers: those who shoot full frame and those who haven’t been punked by their own irrational gear-lust. There are serious downsides to shooting full frame, and consequently serious advantages to shooting with APS-C or MFT cameras.

Here’s the dirt on full frame cameras that the government Sony doesn’t want you to know!

1. Cost and Weight

Bigger sensors mean bigger cameras. Bigger sensors also mean bigger lenses. Bigger lenses mean bigger filters. Bigger cameras, lenses, and filters mean bigger camera bags. Bigger cameras, lenses, filters, and camera bags mean bigger price tags.

There are several prices to pay for having a big sensor, and the steepest one is literal. At the time of writing, the cheapest available full frame digital camera is the Sony α7 at $798, which is inexplicably still for sale despite being released in 2013. The latest version of that same camera, i.e. the one you’d actually want to buy right now, the α7 III, costs $1,998. The α7 III, however, is not Sony’s newest or most full-featured camera body; that honor goes to the new α9 at a decidedly not-affordable $4,498. The most expensive mirrorless camera without a full frame sensor is currently the Panasonic GH5S at $2,498. (*I’m excluding Leica here because, well, all of their stuff is hilariously expensive and not in direct competition with Sony or Olympus.)

The differences in cost and size for full frame and APS-C/MFT mirrorless bodies aren’t drastic, on the whole. But let’s talk about lenses for a moment. Here are a few lens comparisons between Sony full frame and Olympus MFT for the gear most photographers would have in their kit:

(Note: images not to scale! The MFT lenses are considerably smaller. See weight figures.)

A fast standard zoom

Sony FE 24-70mm f/2.8 GM	Olympus 12-40mm f/2.8
1.95 lbs.	0.84 lbs.
$2,198	$999

A fast wide zoom

Sony FE 16-35mm f/2.8 GM	Olympus 7-14mm f/2.8
1.5 lbs.	1.18 lbs.
$2,198	$1,299

A fast telephoto zoom

Sony FE 70-200mm f/2.8 GM	Olympus 40-150mm f/2.8
3.26 lbs.	1.94 lbs.
$2,598	$1,499

A fast telephoto prime

Sony FE 85mm f/1.4 GM	Olympus 45mm f/1.2
1.81 lbs.	0.9 lbs.
$1,798	$1,099

Total cost and weight of these 4 lenses

Sony full frame	Olympus MFT
8.52 lbs.	4.86 lbs.
$8,792	$4,896

The MFT kit costs and weighs roughly half of the Sony full frame kit and covers the same effective field of view at the same constant maximum aperture. This is a fair comparison in that these lenses are as similar as offered currently by Sony and Olympus (remember that MFT has a 2x crop factor). That said, there are some noteworthy differences. For example, the Olympus wide zoom is wider than the Sony; the Olympus standard zoom is longer on the telephoto end; the Olympus tele-zoom is considerably longer on the telephoto end, such that it isn’t even a fair comparison, but there is no 70-300mm f/2.8 zoom available for Sony (nor will there likely ever be - see #6 below for more on that); the Olympus telephoto prime has a faster maximum aperture. So in all cases the Sony full frame equipment is nearly twice as expensive, twice as heavy to lug around, and generally not as useful as the MFT equivalents.

You might complain that this is a worst-case-scenario - there are cheaper lenses available than these top-tier professional offerings. That argument doesn’t work either, because of full-frame-dirty-little-secret number 2.

2. Soft Corners, Vignetting, Distortion

One unpleasant surprise awaiting photographers who upgrade their crop sensor gear to full frame is how noticeably worse the corners and edges of the frame now look. This is because lenses are best at their centers and worst at their edges. Crop sensors conveniently eliminate this problem by only capturing the light projected onto the middle 50-60% of the image circle:

This changes the effective field of view (the so-called “crop factor”) but also hides the optical shortcomings of large lenses. If you’re using a camera lens that works on both full frame and APS-C bodies (like Canon EF, Nikon F, or Sony E-mount) on a crop body, it probably looks amazing. Mount that same lens onto a full frame body, and now you’ve got a tragedy on your hands, especially if you shoot wide open. The edges of a full frame image will look considerably softer, darker, and more distorted than those of a cropped image. Womp womp. Yes, that massive, high-resolution sensor you’ve got will capture even the smallest detail - including the flaws of that consumer-grade lens you bought so that you could afford to spend a couple thousand dollars on that big dumb sensor. But wait, there’s more!

3. Shallow Depth of Field

Wait a minute - this is one of the good things about full frame sensors! All of that dreamy out-of-focus area, those spherical highlights, that background separation! Here’s the problem you never thought your full frame camera would give you: not enough depth of field. Yes, when you have a fast lens and shoot wide open on a 35mm body, you get really shallow depth of field. Like, too shallow. So shallow that there’s barely anything in focus at all in your photo.

Lemme drop a hypothetical on you right quick. Let’s say you’ve got a Sony α9 with the Sony FE 55mm f/1.8 T* prime lens, and you’re in a dimly lit bar with a big group of friends and family members - maybe it’s a wedding weekend or college graduation or something. You’re walking around pretty damn proud of yourself with your $5,500 worth of photo gear, and you’re taking pictures of everybody. You grab two nearby friends and tell them to stand together for a nice photo with some pimp-ass background blur (you know they’re gonna make this their FB profile pic when they see it and tag you for the credit). You stand about 3 feet away and shoot wide open at f/1.8. You turn the camera around and give them a glimpse of the shot, and from a few feet away everybody loves it. Then you get home and open it in Lightroom only to see that one of your friend’s faces is in sharp focus, while the other poor sap is blurry as shit. That’s because with a 55mm focal length at a distance of 3 feet and an aperture of f/1.8, you have 1.09 inches of depth of field. Some guy next to you took the same shot with an Olympus E-PL8 and a 25mm f/1.7 ($850) wide open and got both faces in focus.

So what could you have done to get the shot? Well, stop your lens down for more depth of field, obviously. But now you’re losing light gathering power, which means shutter speeds have to go down or ISO has to go up. More risk of motion blur or more noise, while the crop sensor shooters can shoot at similar apertures without worrying about these problems. Everyone wants a full frame camera and a fast prime, nobody realizes that you can’t actually shoot wide open most of the time. Want to shoot at f/1.4 in broad daylight? You’ll be shelling out another chunk of change for a neutral density filter to screw onto the front of your 77 or 82mm filter thread.

4. The Telephoto Blues

Another nasty surprise awaiting the new full frame user is the complete lack of reach from the telephoto lens that was doing a fine job on an APS-C body. It can be downright disheartening to realize just how little you get from 200mm on a full frame camera - it’s scarcely long enough to do any serious wildlife or sports photography. Add to that disappointment the large cost and cumbersome size and weight of something like a 70-200mm f/2.8 zoom lens, and it’s enough to trigger instant buyer’s remorse. We all like those 70-200mm zooms when they’re really more like 112-320mm on a crop body. Even that standard zoom lens you were walking around with barely seems as useful now. If there’s a thing far away and you’ve got a full frame camera, you are not taking a photo of that far away thing.

5. Sorry to Burst your Bubble

That was a terrible pun and I apologize profusely for it. But your full frame camera is woefully slow when it comes to continuous shooting, and you should feel bad about it. The new α7 III can manage 10fps with its mechanical shutter, which isn’t totally embarrassing compared to older models. The MFT Olympus OM-D E-M1 mark II, of course, shoots 15fps with its mechanical shutter and up to 60fps (!) with its electronic shutter. If you want to take pictures of stuff that moves, full frame is not your best friend.

6. Limitations on Lenses

Big full frame sensors create a problem for lens designers: they need to make an image circle large enough to illuminate all 35mm of the sensor, and physics gets in the way quickly. With their considerably smaller sensors, crop cameras have fewer limitations on lens design, and as a result, there are lenses that exist for crop body cameras that do not (and practically cannot) exist for full frame cameras. These otherwise unthinkable lenses are bridging the gap between the capabilities of the two camera types and rendering full frame systems less and less attractive by the day. Some notable examples:

• Panasonic Leica DG Elmarit 200mm f/2.8. This effective 400mm f/2.8 prime lens for MFT does now have a Sony full frame equivalent, but it costs $12,000.

• Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 300mm f/4 IS. This effective 600mm f/4 prime lens has no Sony counterpart. Canon makes one, though: it costs $11,500.

• Handevision IBELUX 40mm f/0.85. This manual focus prime lens only exists for mirrorless cameras. f/0.85!

• Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12-100mm f/4 IS PRO. This effective24-200mm f/4 standard zoom lens has no full frame counterpart on any system.

• Olympus 17mm, 25mm, 45mm f/1.2 PRO. These autofocus prime lenses are faster than any autofocus lens available for Sony.

Biased Conclusions

No, Olympus hasn’t paid me to write this (although if anyone from Olympus would like to offer me cash retroactively, please contact me). The truth is that I shot full frame Canon DSLRs for several years (the original 5D and then the 5D mark II) before selling all of my gear for MFT, and I haven’t looked back. My collection of lenses is smaller, lighter, and more capable than my old Canon L glass, and I shoot more because of it. Is there a difference in image quality between Sony alpha full frame cameras and Olympus MFT cameras? Not one that matters to most photographers. 20MP photos already well exceed the resolution of any device I’ll ever view a photo on, and they’re big enough to print (even though I never do that.) I don’t believe there’s really any type of photography that can’t be done as well on a MFT camera as a full frame camera, and the differences between them are only going to get less and less pronounced as the imaging technology improves. My E-M1 mark II, for example, has a higher overall DXO benchmark score than my old Canon 5D mark II. Yes, the 5DII is a much older camera, but it’s the same resolution as the E-M1 II and the sensor is four times larger. There was a time when there was a difference between full frame and crop cameras that actually mattered, but those days are gone.

Every Season of The Simpsons Ranked

The Simpsons was an animated American sitcom that aired between October, 1990 and May, 1999.* Although it only lasted for 9 memorable seasons, The Simpsons still easily managed to become the greatest television show in the history of the universe and perhaps even the single greatest achievement of homo sapiens. While it is widely understood that these 9 seasons of The Simpsons are outstanding practically beyond description, it is not widely understood which of those 9 seasons is the best. This is an important question, as determining which season of The Simpsons is the best will consequently determine which year was the best for the human race, as the people who were alive at that time had the opportunity to experience the unparalleled joy of the 20+ episodes of the show for the first time. This would have been, it follows, the most joyous time to have been a denizen of our planet.

*Note: The television program discussed in this article is not to be confused with "The Simpsons," which aired between 1989 and 1990, or "The Simpsons," which began in 1999 and continues through the present and features the same nominal cast of characters.

Understanding the task of ranking the 9 seasons of The Simpsons to be a gravely serious and important one, I did not enter into the commitment lightly and without due reverence, for I comprehended my task to be one of the most consequential ever undertaken by any person who has yet lived. Thus I resolved to be thorough and rigorous in my method, which was generally the following: First, I illegally downloaded all 9 seasons of the show (I don't have TV or a DVD player, ok?) and put them into individual folders. Then, in an attempt to remove any preexisting biases about which seasons were superior to others, I renamed the folders with random strings of letters and then sorted them alphabetically to randomize the order. From there I began to watch the episodes from season beginning to end and rate each one (with the exception of clip shows, which I did not include) on a scale of 1-10. (In hindsight I can see that this was an absurd idea, as it implies that it is possible for an episode of The Simpsons to score something less than, say, a 6 or 7. That is obviously not possible. Irregardless!) I kept a fastidious spreadsheet of the randomized season names and the ratings of each individual episode of each season, which I then averaged for comparison. After tallying the average scores for each season, I was able to compare the averages and determine when mankind's greatest achievement occurred.

So, without further Apu, here is how the 9 seasons stack up, from least to most awesome.

9th Place: Season 9 (average: 7.46/10)

By the lofty standards of The Simpsons, season 9 is rather mediocre. The writing is already in noticeable decline at this point, and the characters are beginning to become less lovable, less recognizable as their iconic selves from previous seasons. Although this season scored just one perfect 10 with "The Last Temptation of Krusty," there are still some gems here, most notably "The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson," "Bart Star," and "Girlie Edition."

The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson		9		The Principal and the Pauper		8
Lisa's Sax		8		Treehouse of Horror VIII		7
The Cartridge Family		7		Bart Star		9
The Two Mrs. Nahasapeemapetilons		8		Lisa the Skeptic		8
Reality Bites		7		Miracle on Evergreen Terrace		8
Bart Carny		7		The Joy of Sect		8
Das Bus		8		The Last Temptation of Krusty		10
Dumbbell Indemnity		8		Lisa the Simpson		8
This Little Wiggy		7		Simpson Tide		8
The Trouble With Trillions		7		Girlie Edition		9
Trash of the Titans		7		King of the Hill		7
Lost Our Lisa		7		Natural Born Kissers		7

8th Place: Season 2 (average: 7.54/10)

Season 2, which is confusingly the first season of The Simpsons, depicts a show still in its infancy and finding its singular comedic voice. As is characteristic of the first few seasons, the show is much more sentimental than it is outright funny; some of the most memorable episodes deal with important moments for the characters, like Marge and Homer's high school prom night, Bart's surprisingly genuine disappointment at failing a test (and subsequent elation at eventually passing it), Lisa's attachment to her substitute teacher Mr. Bergstrom, or Homer believing he was going to die after eating improperly prepared blowfish. Season 2 also contains the first "Treehouse of Horror" episode, a tradition continued by every subsequent season.

Bart Gets an 'F'		7		Simpson and Delilah		9
Treehouse of Horror		9		Two Cars in Every Garage and Three Eyes on Every Fish		7
Dancin' Homer		7		Dead Putting Society		8
Bart vs. Thanksgiving		7		Bart the Daredevil		9
Itchy and Scratchy and Marge		8		Bart Gets Hit by a Car		7
One Fish, Two Fish, Blowfish, Bluefish		8		The Way We Was		9
Homer vs. Lisa and the Eighth Commandment		7		Principal Charming		6
Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?		8		Bart's Dog Gets an 'F'		7
Old Money		7		Brush With Greatness		7
Lisa's Substitute		7		The War of The Simpsons		8
Three Men and a Comic Book		7		Blood Feud		7

7th Place: Season 10 (average: 7.65/10)



The 9th and final season of the show, Season 10 is firmly situated within the decline towards the program's end. There are some disappointingly mediocre episodes here, like the generally forgettable "Make Room for Lisa" and "The Old Man and the C-Student," but there are thankfully a few brilliant episodes to prop up the average. Stephen Hawking still stands out as one of the best "celebrity" cameos ever in "They Saved Lisa's Brain." This season's "Treehouse of Horror" episode is particularly memorable, and "Thirty Minutes over Tokyo" is easily one of the best episodes in any of the last few seasons.

Lard of the Dance		7		The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace		8
Bart the Mother		7		Treehouse of Horror IX		9
When You Dish upon a Star		7		D'oh-in in the Wind		8
Lisa Gets an 'A'		8		Homer Simpson in Kidney Trouble		8
Mayored to the Mob		7		Viva Ned Flanders		7
Wild Barts Can't Be Broken		7		Sunday, Cruddy Sunday		8
Homer to the Max		8		I'm With Cupid		7
Marge Simpson in "Screaming Yellow Honkers"		7		Make Room for Lisa		6
Maximum Homerdrive		7		Simpsons Bible Stories		9
Mom and Pop Art		8		The Old Man and the C-Student		6
Monty Can't Buy Love		8		They Saved Lisa's Brain		9
Thirty Minutes over Tokyo		10

6th Place: Season 3 (average: 8.14/10)

The average score gap between 7th and 6th place is the largest between any two seasons on the list; from here to the top, there really are no bad episodes. Every season from those remaining (3-8) should be widely celebrated as the "golden age" of The Simpsons. Season 3 only scores one perfect 10, but it's one of my all-time favorite Simpsons episodes: "Homer at the Bat." Sentimentality and moral tales abound in this season as well, but the trademark Simpsons humor clearly shines through every episode. Season 3 brought us the "Flaming Moe," the fabricated tragic story of "Timmy O'Toole," and the folksy country stylings of Lurleen Lumpkin. All that's left to say is, "Goodnight, Springden. There will be no encores."

Stark Raving Dad		9		Mr. Lisa Goes to Washington		8
When Flanders Failed		8		Bart the Murderer		9
Homer Defined		8		Like Father Like Clown		8
Treehouse of Horror II		9		Lisa's Pony		7
Saturdays of Thunder		8		Flaming Moe's		8
Burns Verkaufen der Kraftwerk		7		I Married Marge		9
Radio Bart		8		Lisa the Greek		8
Homer Alone		7		Bart the Lover		9
Homer at the Bat		10		Separate Vocations		7
Dog of Death		7		Colonel Homer		9
Black Widower		7		The Otto Show		9
Brother Can You Spare Two Dimes		8		Bart's Friend Falls in Love		8

5th Place: Season 5 (average: 8.32/10)

Season 5 of The Simpsons, or as it was known briefly, The Thompsons, ("...I think he's talking to you") only contains one perfect episode in my estimation, but it's an iconic one: Homer's Barbershop Quartet. 8 other episodes, however, come damn close at 9/10, giving season 5 the most classic Simpsons episodes of any season so far. Homer blasts into space, Marge is involved in a high-speed police chase in a stolen car, Lisa strikes a blow for equality with the Lisa Lionheart doll, Bart wins an elephant from a local radio station, and Sideshow Bob performs Gilbert and Sullivan's  H.M.S. Pinafore. "We'll take the Spruce Moose! Hop in! ...I said, hop in."

Bart Gets an Elephant		9		Bart Gets Famous		8
Bart's Inner Child		8		Boy-Scoutz 'N the Hood		7
Burns' Heir		8		Cape Feare		8
Deep Space Homer		9		Homer and Apu		8
Homer Goes to College		9		Homer Loves Flanders		8
Homer the Vigilante		8		Homer's Barbershop Quartet		10
Lady Bouvier's Lover		7		Lisa vs. Malibu Stacy		9
Marge on the Lam		9		Rosebud		8
Secrets of a Successful Marriage		8		Springfield		9
Sweet Seymour Skinner's Badass Song		8		The Boy Who Knew Too Much		7
The Last Temptation of Homer		9		Treehouse of Horror IV		9

4th Place: Season 6 (average: 8.33/10)

Even with 5 perfect episodes ("Bart vs. Australia," "Itchy & Scratchy Land," "Lemon of Troy," "Who Shot Mr. Burns? (Part I)," and "Treehouse of Horror V"), Season 6 is still just the 4th best season of The Simpsons. That speaks more to the brilliance of the seasons ahead of it than to the inadequacy of this one, because some of the show's most iconic moments are found here, including what is probably the best "Treehouse of Horror" episode of any season. Season 6 has left its mark if the phrase "purple monkey dishwasher" means anything to you, or if you know all of the words to Mr. Burns' epic "See My Vest" song-and-dance number. "Now let's all celebrate with a cool glass of turnip juice."

A Star is Burns		9		And Maggie Makes Three		9
Bart of Darkness		8		Bart vs. Australia		10
Bart's Comet		9		Bart's Girlfriend		8
Fear of Flying		8		Grandpa vs. Sexual Inadequacy		9
Homer Badman		9		Homer the Great		8
Homer vs. Patty and Selma		8		Homie the Clown		9
Itchy & Scratchy Land		10		Lemon of Troy		10
Lisa on Ice		8		Lisa's Rival		8
Lisa's Wedding		8		'Round Springfield		8
Sideshow Bob Roberts		7		The PTA Disbands!		9
The Springfield Connection		8		Treehouse of Horror V		10
Two Dozen and One Greyhounds		9		Who Shot Mr. Burns? (Part I)		10

3rd Place: Season 8 (average: 8.48/10)

It's difficult to look at the episode list for season 8 and understand how it isn't the best season of The Simpsons. It certainly contains some of the single greatest episodes the show has ever done, including "Bart After Dark," which is my personal all-time favorite episode. Add in Frank Grimes, Shary Bobbins, Rex Banner, and Hank Scorpio, and season 8 seems like the undisputed champion. While the highs are astronomical, though, there are too many episodes that are simply ok, and they drag the average down enough to be bested overall by two other seasons. Any top 10 list of episodes, however, would certainly have more selections from season 8 than any other. The periodic brilliance of season 8 makes the general mediocrity of season 9 even more baffling. "In your face, space coyote!"

Bart After Dark		10		A Milhouse Divided		8
Burns, Baby, Burns		7		El Viaje Misterioso de Nuestro Jomer		10
Grade School Confidential		8		Homer vs. The Eighteenth Amendment		9
Homer's Enemy		10		Homer's Phobia		9
Hurricane Neddy		8		In Marge We Trust		10
Lisa's Date with Destiny		8		Mountain of Madness		7
My Sister, My Sitter		7		Simpsoncalifragilisticexpiala(Annoyed Grunt)cious		9
The Brother from Another Series		8		The Canine Mutiny		8
The Homer they Fall		8		The Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie Show		10
The Old Man and the Lisa		7		The Secret War of Lisa Simpson		8
The Simpsons Spinoff Showcase		9		The Springfield Files		9
The Twisted World of Marge Simpson		7		Treehouse of Horror VII		9
You Only Move Twice		9

2nd Place: Season 4 (average: 8.52/10)

Season 4's brilliance is the complete inverse of season 8's. If season 8 is a smattering of supernovae against relatively cold background radiation, season 4 is a sky full of shimmering constellations. There are only a few perfect episodes here - "Marge vs. The Monorail," "Selma's Choice," and "Treehouse of Horror III" - but the rest of them are damn close. You won't find the best known Simpsons moments in season 4, but you will find a consistent comedic voice that's constantly firing on all cylinders, and it is glorious. Choose any episode from this season and sit back and enjoy the perfect mix of soul and silliness. "Duff Gardens... Hurrah!"

Kamp Krusty		9		A Streetcar Named Marge		9
Homer the Heretic		9		Lisa the Beauty Queen		9
Treehouse of Horror III		10		Itchy and Scratchy the Movie		8
Marge Gets a Job		8		New Kid on the Block		8
Mr. Plow		9		Lisa's First Word		9
Homer's Triple Bypass		9		Marge vs. the Monorail		10
Selma's Choice		10		Brother from the Same Planet		7
I Love Lisa		8		Duffless		8
Last Exit to Springfield		7		The Front		8
Whacking Day		8		Marge in Chains		7
Krusty Gets Kancelled		9

1st Place: Season 7 (average: 8.87/10)

Not only does season 7 have the most perfect episodes (6), but it also is the only season in which every single episode scored 8 or higher. There isn't really even a mediocre episode in season 7, let alone a bad one. It's the season that gave us "embiggen" and "cromulent." The season of Marge's Chanel dress, Homer's predictably disastrous stint as Mr. Burns' assistant, Lisa's controversial investigation into the real Jebediah Springfield, and Bart's search for his soul (after selling it to Milhouse). The season of "Up and AT THEM!" and "My eyes! The goggles do nothing!" The season of "Billy Corgan, Smashing Pumpkins. Homer Simpson, smiling politely." and "Buy me Bonestorm or go to hell!" The season of this, from "Homer the Smithers":

"Here are your messages."

"You have 30 minutes to move your car."

"You have ten minutes."
"Your car has been impounded."
"Your car has been crushed into a cube."
"You have 30 minutes to move your cube."
(phone rings)
"Is it about my cube?"

Who Shot Mr. Burns? (Part II)		10		Radioactive Man		9
Home Sweet Homediddily-Dum-Doodily		8		Bart Sells His Soul		9
Lisa the Vegetarian		10		Treehouse of Horror VI		10
King-Size Homer		10		Mother Simpson		8
Sideshow Bob's Last Gleaming		9		Marge Be Not Proud		8
Team Homer		9		Two Bad Neighbors		9
Scenes from the Class Struggle in Springfield		8		Bart the Fink		9
Lisa the Iconoclast		9		Homer the Smithers		8
The Day the Violence Died		8		A Fish Called Selma		8
Bart on the Road		9		22 Short Films about Springfield		10
Raging Abe Simpson and his Grumbling Grandson in the Curse of the Flying Hellfish		8		Much Apu about Nothing		8
Homerpalooza		10		Summer of 4 ft. 2		9

It is reasonable to conclude that The Simpsons achieved perfection in season 7, and therefore humanity did as well. Thus, the peak of human civilization and the best possible time to have been alive was between September, 1995, and May, 1996. I have spoken.

The Elevator Problem, or Why There is No Hope for Humanity

As a resident of the most vertical city in the world, I spend a lot of time in elevators. I live on the 12th floor of a 22 story building, which means that elevators are part of my daily commute. Besides their obvious practical functionality, elevators also sometimes accidentally provide a window into human psychology - the awkwardness of long, silent rides with strangers too close for comfort, the futility of pushing the door close button, the compulsion of pushing the call button when it's already activated. But I've noticed a particular problem in my building of residence, a disturbing observation of inexplicable human behavior that I'll simply refer to as "The Elevator Problem."

One of many crime scenes in my building

No, this is not some logical/mathematical conundrum like the Monty Hall Problem, which also coincidentally involves three doors. This is a much more insidious indictment of human cognition. Allow me to elaborate: In my apartment building, there are 3 elevators, as shown in the image above. There are two call buttons: one between the left and center elevators and another between the center and right elevators. For some reason that I cannot in any way descry, these two call buttons are completely dissevered from each other. That is, pushing one of the call buttons does not automatically light the other one; they can only be operated individually. This explains the difference visible in the image: the left call button only operates the elevator on the left; the right call button operates both the center and right elevators. As I said, I have tried in vain to theorize as to why these elevators were designed in this way. The three elevators are functionally identical: they are all exactly the same size and capacity, and each one stops on the same floors, G and 3-22. It makes no difference whatsoever which one you use, no matter what floor you're on or to what floor you're going.

The Elevator Problem

Perhaps you can anticipate what I deem to be the problem: residents of the building routinely press both elevator call buttons. This guarantees that two elevators will be called to that floor, the one on the left and either the center or right elevator. If this doesn't seem like such a big deal, let me point out the practical consequences of this behavior. Pushing both call buttons means that up to 50% of all elevator stops are unnecessary. In my most recent trip down from the 12th floor, for example, the elevator stopped twice, on the 7th and 6th floors, and both times the doors opened to reveal an empty void where a thoughtless individual had stood before one of the other elevators collected her. I can only hope there's a special place in hell for the offenders on the 22nd floor; when one of those oblivious oafs presses both call buttons, the rest of us have to wait while one elevator makes a completely pointless trip to the top of the building where nobody will enter it. When I see two elevators going to the highest floors I want to run up the stairs and start mashing the call button on every floor in between so that it takes 10 minutes for those moronic top-dwellers to reach the earth.

The only thing I'm really struggling with here is whom to blame for this needless frustration, the elevator designers or the hapless passengers. I can only assume that this was an intentional design choice by the manufacturer - it's too big an oversight to have happened accidentally. As you might also be able to see in the image, each button is beneath an LED display that indicates which floor the elevator is currently on and which direction it's headed if it's been called. There is no practical reason to give this information to prospective passengers except to aid in determining which button to press. If I've reasoned correctly, then the engineers at OTIS have grossly overestimated the capacity of the average elevator user in what I can only assume is an honest attempt to build a maximally efficient transportation system. Still, I have a difficult time envisioning how this independently operating design could ever be better than linking the buttons together and having a disinterested computer making the decisions because, as I'll unpack next, people are on the whole terrible and useless.

Carefully Measured Analysis

So all that's left to analyze is why people (literally every person in the building but me, as far as I can tell) push both buttons. There are many possible reasons; none of them bodes well for the future of the human race:

 IGNORANCE

The first possible explanation is that some people simply do not realize the correlation between their multiple-button-pushing behavior and the disruption in travel that it causes. It's hard for me to believe this, since it is obvious when pushing one button that the other one does not light up, and every single resident routinely experiences the irritation of elevators stopping for absolutely nobody on the way down. Still, I can't completely rule it out, because most people are genuinely stupid, and having considered the alternatives, this is actually the most innocuous explanation.

SELFISHNESS

The second possible explanation is that people are generally aware that pushing both buttons calls two elevators, but they simply don't give a shit. They want to get where they're going as quickly as possible, and if that means inconveniencing other people, no big deal. The horrible irony is that it doesn't work - when everyone does this, as everyone does, it actually takes longer for us all to get where we're going, because the overzealous button-pressing of each person affects the travel time of every other person. The worst thing about this theory is that the perceived advantage of it doesn't even actually exist.

HERD MENTALITY

The third and only other possible explanation, as far as I can reason, is that people press both buttons because everybody else presses both buttons. Maybe they haven't actually paused to consider how these elevators operate and just do what everyone else does, which is push both buttons. Maybe they've witnessed someone with some perceived authority press both buttons, like the doorman at the desk on the ground floor or a smartly dressed banker. Maybe they've all just accepted that this is the way the elevators work in this building; we all just press both buttons and then live with the consequences.

Irresponsible Extrapolations for Comedic Effect

This is just one small glimpse into human behavior, but I think it's a grimly telling one. I feel the number and diversity of the subjects of this ongoing failed experiment give me confidence to state plainly that we as a species have no hope of progress. I've seen the young and the old, the rich and the poor, the affable and the apathetic unfailingly push both buttons. We clearly cannot be trusted to manage something as utterly quotidian as pushing elevator buttons; entrusting us with any task of greater significance would be the daftest folly.

I'll leave you with an anecdote, but a poignant one, as I believe it was the moment when I fully and permanently lost all hope for homo sapiens. I was standing alone before the three elevators on the 12th floor. I had already carefully studied the information on the LED panels above the call buttons and concluded that either the center or right elevator would likely reach me first. I had pressed the right call button, and only the right call button, and one of the two elevators operated by it was dutifully in transit. In the interim, a darling old Chinese lady shimmied up to the elevators, her little shopping trolley in tow. The scene before her was unambiguous: someone had already arrived and taken the initiative of calling an elevator to our floor. Someone was already patiently waiting for an elevator that had clearly already begun its journey to us. She saw all of this. She saw all of this, and she waddled over to the elevator on the left, and you already know what she did. She pushed the other button. She pushed the other fucking button, and I knew it was all over. My hope for the human race shattered unceremoniously as I fantasized about beating an elderly Chinese woman to death with her own shopping trolley. We can't have nice things, friends. We can't have nice things because we can't even solve The Elevator Problem.

Stop Identifying with Political Parties

Are you a Democrat or a Republican? A Libertarian? Independent? A fiscal conservative? A democratic socialist? No you’re not. You’re none of these things, because no one is actually any of these things.

Identifying with a political party (and, generally, labeling oneself or others in almost any way) is an exercise in the application of broken reasoning.  Thanks to our ill-conceived first-past-the-post voting system, the political landscape has been bifurcated into the falsest of false dichotomies: Democrat vs. Republican. In order to have any hope of making our political voice heard, we Americans must align with or at the least vote for a candidate from one of these two factions. A vote for a third-party candidate is often in practical terms indistinguishable from not voting, so the options on that first Tuesday after the first Monday in November will be, as usual, Red, Blue, or stay home.

Few people are satisfied with these choices, yet they persist in being the only two of consequence available to us every time we turn up at our polling places. Contributing to this perennial misery are the many people who bafflingly continue to identify as Democrats and Republicans. Here are five reasons why you need to stop self-identifying with these labels:

1. They are utterly devoid of nuance.

What does it even mean to be a Republican or a Democrat? Of course you can just go to the two parties’ respective official websites and read their platforms, but does that mean that everyone using the label “Republican,” for example, holds the same views? Of course not. In fact we just witnessed a Democratic National Convention in which Bernie Sanders was summarily pilloried for endorsing Hillary Clinton, the nominal candidate of choice for the party, and a Republican National Convention in which Ted Cruz was likewise heckled for not endorsing Donald Trump, the nominal candidate of choice for the party. There is little concord even within the parties themselves these days, which ironically now reflects the views of the voting public more than ever. What is the use, then, in identifying as a Democrat or a Republican? Does it really make sense to refer to a fundamentalist Christian in Alabama and an openly-gay fiscal conservative in Connecticut by the same label, as if these two people will find themselves in agreement on most issues? What about a socially liberal Catholic in New York and an irreligious democratic socialist in California? What is the utility in applying a label to yourself that can be applied to another person with whom you would disagree on important issues?

2. They are laden with negative connotations.

Identifying as a Democrat or a Republican carries baggage with it similar in quantity to that accommodated by a Boeing 747. You may announce in conversation “I am a Republican” and hear in your head “I support small government and a strong free-market economy” while others around you will have clearly heard “I’m a jingoistic, small-minded xenophobe with a 7^th-grade education and several assault rifles to keep my family safe from the Muslims.” Or perhaps you might mention in passing “I’m a Democrat” and fancy yourself “committed to civil rights and saving the environment” while others will distinctly recall you saying “Meat is murder! War is murder! Everyone is a homo/trans/Islamo/xeno -phobe!”  People will hear what they think you mean when you use these labels, not what you actually mean.

3. They stop important conversations from happening.

This is the single biggest problem with identifying with a political party: it gives other people an excuse not to talk to you about important issues. Expressing your actual view on a politically divisive topic is nearly impossible once someone assumes he knows what you think. Epictetus figured this out almost 2,000 years ago and sagely remarked, “It is impossible to begin to learn that which you think you already know.” It doesn’t even matter whether the other person also identifies with the same label you do - the result is still no conversation, either because of perceived agreement, in which case why bother, or perceived irreconcilable disagreement, in which case why bother? Calling yourself a Democrat or a Republican lets other people decide that they agree or disagree with you before you’ve even uttered a word.

4. They don’t actually represent anyone.

Back to false dichotomies – the suggestion that there are only two sides to a proposition when in reality there are more – as in “you’re either with us or you’re with the terrorists” or “you’re either a feminist or you’re a bigot.” No person is entirely a Republican or entirely a Democrat, even if those labels could be defined in satisfactorily uncontroversial terms. To demonstrate this, go to I Side With, answer as many questions as you have a cogent view on, and then look at the results. Here’s what happens when I do it, for example:

Everyone’s results are going to be different, because no two people in human history have ever agreed about everything. Whatever your results are, the important thing is that the percentages don’t add up to 100%. Nobody, not even the political candidates themselves, would take the test and get a result that looks something like this:

That’s because there are not only two sides to every public policy issue, and the two political parties have not staked out wholly oppositional stances on opposite ends of the spectrum. To be a Republican is, at least in some measure, to be a Democrat, and vice versa. Everyone’s views are some particular mixture of liberal and conservative, of libertarian and authoritarian.

5. They adumbrate the myriad views people actually hold.

Probably the best reason not to identify as a Democrat or a Republican is that it implies that the whole of your political worldview can be expressed adequately in a single word. That’s not even something you should want to be true. It intimates that you’re either incapable of or unwilling to derive your own personal set of views on political questions and would rather have them prefabricated and handed to you. This is shameful – an abdication of responsibility unbecoming of any able-minded adult living in civilized society.

So, stop calling yourself a Republican or a Democrat. Stop sharing divisive partisan write-ups from news sites on social media. Stop generalizing about political candidates as if they’re mere proxies for their parties rather than individuals with ideas for the direction of public policy. Develop your own views purposefully rather than perfunctorily, and don’t be concerned that they all fit neatly into one of two boxes placed before you. Admit that you might not have enough information to have a strong opinion on a complex issue like welfare or immigration. Consider that your views on some issues might require explanation and not fit on a bumper sticker or in 140 characters. Encourage others to ask about a specific issue if they want to know your view rather than probe for a party affiliation. If you lament the state of two-party politics in the US in any way, don't allow yourself to be defined through it.

An Encomium of Milo Yiannopoulos

Milo Yiannopoulos. He is many things to many people: darling to the alt-right, scourge to SJWs, receptacle to black wangs. Transcendently polarizing, he is adored and vituperated in seemingly equal measure.

Nearly everything that Milo says and does is, by careful design, outlandishly offensive. He has elevated online trolling to an art form, so successfully so that Twitter has found it necessary on now two occasions to single him out for draconian and undeserved punishment. All of this only to discover that Milo is the Hydra, and Twitter is no Hercules: after he was stripped of his verification credential, his popularity soared on social media; after a permanent ban, he's now practically a household name. Since the ban, anyone literate enough to string words together has either rushed to his aid or gleefully celebrated his demise.

Yet whatever you think of Milo Yiannopoulos, he is necessary.

If you hadn't heard his name before this week and all you know about him is that he was banned from Twitter for a spat with actress Leslie Jones, take a moment to explore the rich tapestry that is his journalistic body of work before writing him off as an insensitive, misogynistic, fat-shaming xenophobe. For, you see, behind the bleach-blonde facade of targeted abuse and flame-fanning, Milo exudes an indispensable commodity: well-argued unpopular opinion.

I don't agree with Milo about very much. I'll admit to being endlessly entertained by his outrageous slanders and take-downs of feminism, for example, but our views are decidedly more divergent than concordant. I need only point to our respective views on the candidacy of Donald Trump (or "Daddy," as Milo disturbingly refers to him) as a case in point. Yet it is this dissenting worldview, this contradiction of many of my intuitions and values (he famously enjoys trolling atheists) that earns my attention. Milo Yiannopoulos is what so many people on the liberal (and regressive) left desperately need - an echo-chamber-shattering contrarian - though few seem to realize it.

We all benefit from a fecund and cosmopolitan marketplace of ideas. There is no societal progress without discussion, without disagreement. There is no personal growth without exploring the possibility that our most deeply-held and strongly-believed views are categorically mistaken. Yet in our online communities we stake out little agreeable enclaves of safe space and populate them exclusively with others amenable to our worldviews. We slap labels onto other people as an excuse not to have to interact with them intellectually or consider any viewpoints diametrically opposed to our own.

A glance around any social media platform will reveal the grim consequences of this behavior - a world in which narrative has supplanted reality.

This is a world that needs Milo Yiannopoulos. A world that needs someone who will embark on a "Most Dangerous Faggot" tour and go to college campuses and declare confidently that "feminism harms women," or "Black Lives Matter is a terrorist organization," or "being gay is a choice," or "the gender wage gap is a myth," or "Angela Merkel's immigration policy is a disaster," or "free speech is under assault on college campuses." Not because these statements are necessarily true, but because you'll never even consider whether they're true unless someone forces you to. Is the gender wage gap real? How do you know? Have you ever really looked into it? Could you hold your own in a discussion with someone in possession of a mountain of facts and figures, or would you end up sounding like an imbecile?

There are three ways to handle Milo Yiannopoulos. The first is to ban him from voicing his opinions. This is what many college campuses have done and what Twitter has most recently and most famously done. This generally results in a massive increase in his visibility and popularity, which is precisely what happens whenever anyone bans anything. The second is to dismiss his views outright without consideration or to ignore him. This is a possible option, although Milo is not easily ignored. The third (and in my view the most productive) is to engage with him and his ideas. If you think he's entirely backwards about something, try to prove him wrong. He has even done you the favor of articulating exactly how to beat him. It's not easy - it requires remaining calm, removing emotions from the discussion, waiting for your turn to speak, and doing your homework. This is how discussion takes place in civilized society, and if Milo Yiannopoulos is the only person left who understands this, then we need to let him speak.

Besides, just look at him. #FreeMilo