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COVID has changed a lot because it brought into public debate how to evaluate deeply held beliefs about predicting the future. The discussion is high-strung bec

COVID has changed a lot because it brought into public debate how to evaluate deeply held beliefs about predicting the future. The discussion is high-strung because it covers a life-or-death topic, and it’s so diverse (e.g. science vs region vs conspiracy vs liberty etc) that it forced the quantization of opinions. Once you swap an opinion for a symbol, game theory takes over the conversation. What could help solve this? Real reconciliation of the different perspectives. There’s a common overlap: we all want to live, and we all have nonzero ignorance. The tragedy is that the inordinately rich like paulg continue to divide with these self-serving essays instead of helping other to grapple with the K-shaped recovery we’re in now. The place to innovate now is not in blue-sky futurism but to innovate the recovery of those who COVID hit the hardest.

seaourfreed 5y ago
Paul posted this because people are getting fired from their jobs now (directly or indirectly). See his words: "Nowadays, in civilized countries, heretics only get fired in the metaphorical sense, by losing their jobs. ... You could have spent the last ten years saving children's lives, but if you express certain opinions, you're automatically fired." People on the political right have moderate discussions and they are banded aggressively. Here are two examples: * James Woods had 137,000 subscribers removed in two days, by twitter admins * Ron Pauls' entire YouTube channel was censored and removed. This is the "Heretic hunting" point Paul Graham is making.
- tomnipotent 5y ago
  The political left using this "heretic" tactic is relatively new, and if it's effective it's because the political right honed it for decades against women, LGBT, foreigners, non-Christians, and any other group they didn't want buying property next to them.
- rudnevr 5y ago
  You're omitting the detail that Ron Pauls' channel was removed by error and reinstated, and James Woods' acct is ok too.

seaourfreed 5y ago

Paul posted this because people are getting fired from their jobs now (directly or indirectly). See his words: "Nowadays, in civilized countries, heretics only get fired in the metaphorical sense, by losing their jobs. ... You could have spent the last ten years saving children's lives, but if you express certain opinions, you're automatically fired." People on the political right have moderate discussions and they are banded aggressively. Here are two examples: * James Woods had 137,000 subscribers removed in two days, by twitter admins * Ron Pauls' entire YouTube channel was censored and removed. This is the "Heretic hunting" point Paul Graham is making.

tomnipotent 5y ago
The political left using this "heretic" tactic is relatively new, and if it's effective it's because the political right honed it for decades against women, LGBT, foreigners, non-Christians, and any other group they didn't want buying property next to them.
rudnevr 5y ago
You're omitting the detail that Ron Pauls' channel was removed by error and reinstated, and James Woods' acct is ok too.