4 ms·

So if someone advocates ethnic nationalism in a complex and multifaceted way, backed by data and statistics, You would allow it?

pixl97 8y ago
What if science and facts support a terrible conclusion? Do we ignore the science to feel better? I'm not saying that any arguments put forth do, but what does a society that prides itself on logic and rationality do in such a case?
- DuskStar 8y ago
  This sounds like Lysenkoism [0]. See, it was politically rather important for the Soviet Union to have heritability of acquired traits in humans, which necessarily implied the same in plants. So all that genetic inheritance and crop breeding? Useless quackery. Of course, in the Soviet Union, "quacks" were executed... And this contributed to ongoing crop yield deficiencies. Facts supporting a terrible conclusion (that blank slate theory is not correct in plants) is not a reason that the facts should be ignored. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysenkoism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysenkoism
  - bzbarsky 8y ago
    Amusingly enough, plants have way more heritability of acquired traits than humans do. Epigenetic effects in plants are stable across multiple generations to a much greater extent than in mammals, as far as recent studies can tell. Of course "epigenetic effects are real and persist across many generations" is very different from the blank slate theory.
pornel 8y ago
No. Immoral objective is still immoral even if backed by data supporting it. Maybe it'd be easier to parse on a less controversial example: > We should steal things instead of earning them. Here is the objective factual and irrefutable data showing that robbery is more profitable than hard work.
- mistermann 8y ago
  Japan has a rather objectively ethnically nationalist stance, do you consider Japanese people to be immoral? And when answering that question, consider the possible irony of your response.
  - geofft 8y ago
    As a Christian this argument doesn't make sense to me. "All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God." It's not super difficult (nor is it a high-information-content claim) to consider an entire nation immoral for a specific thing when you believe that everyone alive today does immoral things in their own ways. And as a student of history, entire nations have certainly been immoral. The Confederate States of America is a good example, and a significant number of northerners were also morally wrong on the subject of slavery—almost all of them, a few generations back. There's also Godwin's favorite example, of course. There are the Carthaginians who sacrificed their children. There were the Indians—probably including some of my own ancestors—who practiced sati. I'm certainly not expressing an opinion about Japan; I don't know enough to have a well-informed one. But I'm not going to ignore one possible conclusion because it would force me to say that the nation is immoral. (You switch from "Japan" to "Japanese people" without support or reasoning; of course, we are talking about an organized nation and the culture and norms in power, not about ethnicity in its own right.)
    - mistermann 8y ago
      I don't disagree, but I asked a fairly specific question of someone else who was casting judgement based on the morality of a specific behavior, I would like them to defend that insult. As for your final point, go watch some man on the street interviews on YouTube and you might be surprised, this is how they generally feel, it's just not based on any form of hatred, it just is how they think. Lots of strong opinions on these topics, very few have the ability to defend those opinions.
- nextlevelwizard 8y ago
  I don't know if you are trying to build some kind of strawman or if you truly don't understand the difference. Simply: for you to steal someone else needs to be earning, thus you premise doesn't work. Your data would show this immediately.
geofft 8y ago
If they advocate it in a way that is not abusive (and there are certainly abuses of long-form platforms, too, mostly involving a Gish gallop and the use of too much data to check each case of misuse), sure. I think then the "best cure is more speech" argument kicks in, and people can just rebut the argument on its merits. If you say the argument cannot be easily rebutted ... at some point the question turns into, "Ethnic nationalism is obviously wrong, but if someone made a coherent, logical, good-faith argument demonstrating that ethnic nationalism was definitely right, would you allow that argument despite it being obviously wrong?" which isn't very well-formed. :)

pixl97 8y ago

What if science and facts support a terrible conclusion? Do we ignore the science to feel better? I'm not saying that any arguments put forth do, but what does a society that prides itself on logic and rationality do in such a case?

DuskStar 8y ago
This sounds like Lysenkoism [0]. See, it was politically rather important for the Soviet Union to have heritability of acquired traits in humans, which necessarily implied the same in plants. So all that genetic inheritance and crop breeding? Useless quackery. Of course, in the Soviet Union, "quacks" were executed... And this contributed to ongoing crop yield deficiencies. Facts supporting a terrible conclusion (that blank slate theory is not correct in plants) is not a reason that the facts should be ignored. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysenkoism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysenkoism
- bzbarsky 8y ago
  Amusingly enough, plants have way more heritability of acquired traits than humans do. Epigenetic effects in plants are stable across multiple generations to a much greater extent than in mammals, as far as recent studies can tell. Of course "epigenetic effects are real and persist across many generations" is very different from the blank slate theory.

pornel 8y ago

No. Immoral objective is still immoral even if backed by data supporting it. Maybe it'd be easier to parse on a less controversial example: > We should steal things instead of earning them. Here is the objective factual and irrefutable data showing that robbery is more profitable than hard work.

mistermann 8y ago
Japan has a rather objectively ethnically nationalist stance, do you consider Japanese people to be immoral? And when answering that question, consider the possible irony of your response.
- geofft 8y ago
  As a Christian this argument doesn't make sense to me. "All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God." It's not super difficult (nor is it a high-information-content claim) to consider an entire nation immoral for a specific thing when you believe that everyone alive today does immoral things in their own ways. And as a student of history, entire nations have certainly been immoral. The Confederate States of America is a good example, and a significant number of northerners were also morally wrong on the subject of slavery—almost all of them, a few generations back. There's also Godwin's favorite example, of course. There are the Carthaginians who sacrificed their children. There were the Indians—probably including some of my own ancestors—who practiced sati. I'm certainly not expressing an opinion about Japan; I don't know enough to have a well-informed one. But I'm not going to ignore one possible conclusion because it would force me to say that the nation is immoral. (You switch from "Japan" to "Japanese people" without support or reasoning; of course, we are talking about an organized nation and the culture and norms in power, not about ethnicity in its own right.)
  - mistermann 8y ago
    I don't disagree, but I asked a fairly specific question of someone else who was casting judgement based on the morality of a specific behavior, I would like them to defend that insult. As for your final point, go watch some man on the street interviews on YouTube and you might be surprised, this is how they generally feel, it's just not based on any form of hatred, it just is how they think. Lots of strong opinions on these topics, very few have the ability to defend those opinions.
nextlevelwizard 8y ago
I don't know if you are trying to build some kind of strawman or if you truly don't understand the difference. Simply: for you to steal someone else needs to be earning, thus you premise doesn't work. Your data would show this immediately.

geofft 8y ago

If they advocate it in a way that is not abusive (and there are certainly abuses of long-form platforms, too, mostly involving a Gish gallop and the use of too much data to check each case of misuse), sure. I think then the "best cure is more speech" argument kicks in, and people can just rebut the argument on its merits. If you say the argument cannot be easily rebutted ... at some point the question turns into, "Ethnic nationalism is obviously wrong, but if someone made a coherent, logical, good-faith argument demonstrating that ethnic nationalism was definitely right, would you allow that argument despite it being obviously wrong?" which isn't very well-formed. :)