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What bad actors? Since when is "argument" not effective? Who drowns the media in misinformation: normal people, or organizations? Are you calling for an end to

What bad actors? Since when is "argument" not effective? Who drowns the media in misinformation: normal people, or organizations? Are you calling for an end to argumentation, and instead a resort to force? Are you saying Joe Rogan is a politically motivated misinformation source, intentionally trying to destabilize our society?

PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
> Are you calling for an end to argumentation I am pointing out a paradox. Since you seem particularly motivated by the misinformation context, I'll just point more the paradox of tolerance. I believe that is good to be tolerant, even of intolerance. But there's also no doubt in my mind that if you are too tolerant of intolerance, you can end up allowing the destruction of a tolerant society. So what should one do? Clearly the answer is not "Don't be tolerant". But how can you know where the line is, or should be? The point is that certain stances toward the world, such as tolerance, have an inherent weak spot that can exploited by people who want to do so, and that AFAIK there is no way of defending that weak spot without risking violating those positions. So it's a paradox. So to repeat: I'm not calling for anything, I'm pointing out that things are not as simple as "defeat bad speech with more speech".
- prohobo 5y ago
  Tolerance is not a weakness, what you're referring to is an inept government and broken society. A strong culture and society has no issue with creating reasonable rules to live by that work for the majority of people. Misinformation is an artifact of our decaying society, so what exactly is the "paradox" here? The paradox of suppressing discussion that tries to deal with societal rot? To what end? Why not actually fix the problem? This problem should be easy to solve, but isn't because someone is getting in the way.
  - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
    > A strong culture and society has no issue with creating reasonable rules to live by that work for the majority of people. That must explain why people have written about the paradox of tolerance for hundreds of years, across many different cultures. Clearly, the authors must all have come from weak cultures, since it's so fucking obvious that there's no issue with this all. Misinformation can be in part an artifact of a decaying society, it can also be be the result of deliberate attempts to undermine part of, or even the entirety of, an existing social order. The paradox is that "the only (acceptable) way to defeat bad speech is with more speech that explains why the bad speech is wrong" is that simply by flooding a culture with bad speech, you can completely jam things up as everyone tries to respond to the flood of bullshit. This is a documented strategy for both intra- and inter-national actors.
    - prohobo 5y ago
      > Misinformation can be in part an artifact of a decaying society, it can also be be the result of deliberate attempts to undermine part of, or even the entirety of, an existing social order. So who do you think is spreading said misinformation? Again, are you saying fucking Joe Rogan is trying to destroy social order? Think about this for one god damn second.
      - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
        I think that the Russian state is quite interested in spreading (and encouraging the spread of) misinformation. The US has certainly done way more than its fair share of covert operations in other nations, but the playbook has tended to be different. Do I think that Rogan is trying to destroy the social order? No, of course not. Do I think that Rogan doesn't see any downside to long extended chitchats, stoned or otherwise, about any random idea that is floating in the cultural ether? No, I don't think he does. Do I think that there are downsides to the "every POV is legitimate, lets just put it all out there" model of contemporary discourse? Yes, I do.
        prohobo 5y ago
        No, sorry. That's your opinion, and it doesn't have anything particularly "better" about it than anyone else's. You'll have to engage in explaining why you think other people aren't allowed to have one, and until you get your way you'll have to deal with their opinions.

PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago

> Are you calling for an end to argumentation I am pointing out a paradox. Since you seem particularly motivated by the misinformation context, I'll just point more the paradox of tolerance. I believe that is good to be tolerant, even of intolerance. But there's also no doubt in my mind that if you are too tolerant of intolerance, you can end up allowing the destruction of a tolerant society. So what should one do? Clearly the answer is not "Don't be tolerant". But how can you know where the line is, or should be? The point is that certain stances toward the world, such as tolerance, have an inherent weak spot that can exploited by people who want to do so, and that AFAIK there is no way of defending that weak spot without risking violating those positions. So it's a paradox. So to repeat: I'm not calling for anything, I'm pointing out that things are not as simple as "defeat bad speech with more speech".

prohobo 5y ago
Tolerance is not a weakness, what you're referring to is an inept government and broken society. A strong culture and society has no issue with creating reasonable rules to live by that work for the majority of people. Misinformation is an artifact of our decaying society, so what exactly is the "paradox" here? The paradox of suppressing discussion that tries to deal with societal rot? To what end? Why not actually fix the problem? This problem should be easy to solve, but isn't because someone is getting in the way.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
  > A strong culture and society has no issue with creating reasonable rules to live by that work for the majority of people. That must explain why people have written about the paradox of tolerance for hundreds of years, across many different cultures. Clearly, the authors must all have come from weak cultures, since it's so fucking obvious that there's no issue with this all. Misinformation can be in part an artifact of a decaying society, it can also be be the result of deliberate attempts to undermine part of, or even the entirety of, an existing social order. The paradox is that "the only (acceptable) way to defeat bad speech is with more speech that explains why the bad speech is wrong" is that simply by flooding a culture with bad speech, you can completely jam things up as everyone tries to respond to the flood of bullshit. This is a documented strategy for both intra- and inter-national actors.
  - prohobo 5y ago
    > Misinformation can be in part an artifact of a decaying society, it can also be be the result of deliberate attempts to undermine part of, or even the entirety of, an existing social order. So who do you think is spreading said misinformation? Again, are you saying fucking Joe Rogan is trying to destroy social order? Think about this for one god damn second.
    - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
      I think that the Russian state is quite interested in spreading (and encouraging the spread of) misinformation. The US has certainly done way more than its fair share of covert operations in other nations, but the playbook has tended to be different. Do I think that Rogan is trying to destroy the social order? No, of course not. Do I think that Rogan doesn't see any downside to long extended chitchats, stoned or otherwise, about any random idea that is floating in the cultural ether? No, I don't think he does. Do I think that there are downsides to the "every POV is legitimate, lets just put it all out there" model of contemporary discourse? Yes, I do.
      - prohobo 5y ago
        No, sorry. That's your opinion, and it doesn't have anything particularly "better" about it than anyone else's. You'll have to engage in explaining why you think other people aren't allowed to have one, and until you get your way you'll have to deal with their opinions.