4 ms·

> Yes, the need to downregulate dangerously absurd voices is in tension with free speech. Yes, it is still a necessary practice. What is dangerous about his th

by nverno 4y ago

> Yes, the need to downregulate dangerously absurd voices is in tension with free speech. Yes, it is still a necessary practice. What is dangerous about his theories? Every culture I've heard of has their own origin myths, what is so dangerous about this man creating one of his own? I don't see astronomers raging against flat-earthers. People having different beliefs might be cumbersome or annoying, but it's rarely dangerous.

1attice 4y ago
Astronomers can and do rage against flat-earthers; https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8132700/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8132700/ What is dangerous is not that a harmless old man is tenuously attached to reality, but rather that a corporation with global reach has discovered how lucrative falsehood can be when slickly produced & released at scale. That is dangerous, because not only is it harmful in the immediate term, but because it strongly implies that they will do so again. Whatever checks-and-balances used to exist at Netflix on what they disingenously call "creative freedom" are simply no match for a contracting market.
- SpicyLemonZest 4y ago
  I guess I'm not sure what you're demonstrating with this link. I watched Behind the Curve, and it generally treated flat-earth proponents as nice, well-meaning people who've just gotten themselves stuck in a rut where no evidence will convince them. That seems like the right attitude towards this kind of theory to me. Perhaps some of the scientists in the movie were exasperated by how obviously false flat earth is, but I can't imagine any of them writing a letter like the one in the source article, saying that flat earth theory is harmful and you're racist if you believe in it.
  - 1attice 4y ago
    Yes, the flat-earthers are indeed shown as relatable, flawed, silly human beings, but the show is still driven by scientists. Imagine how _Behind the Curve_ would have played if it had instead shown those astronomers as being part of a secretive conspiracy to conceal the real geometry of the world. That's what Netflix is playing now.
    - SpicyLemonZest 4y ago
      I expect it would have played a lot like What the Health, a similarly buzzy documentary from 2017 making ridiculous false claims about the health benefits of a vegan diet. It got a lot of attention, and people talked passionately in major outlets about how wrong it was, but as far as I can recall (and as far as I can tell from a Google search) the idea that Netflix had some responsibility to downrank it or attach a "fiction" tag was never part of the conversation.
      - 1attice 4y ago
        I've never heard of this documentary, but if it makes false claims, then, yes, it should be labelled fiction, and possibly downranked. This seems so morally obvious to me, and the converse so plainly wicked, that I'm going to assume I've hit one of those issues where there is some deep-seated worldview-differences that say as much about me as they do about my interlocutor. If I'd hazard a guess, it would be that I believe that there is some sort of fact of the matter, and that people -- even large groups of people -- can be actually very wrong, in fact, and this wrongness counts again listening to them in the future, or valuing their opinions the same as those which are not wrong. This is a belief I hold and I know it is unpopular ;) The alternative, often expressed on the right as a 'marketplace of ideas' and on the left as 'values-alignment', is that there are multiple competing ways of assessing the worth of an idea, and an idea's wrongness might (say) be counterbalanced by its congeniality, its convenience, or its usefulness, and therefore that it's mean or base of me or anyone else to complain about someone pumping falsehood into the ears and eyes of the planet. But at the risk of being melodramatic, I say: this is a hill I'm ready to die on. Or not; but definitely not both at once.
- nverno 4y ago
  > because not only is it harmful in the immediate term How is it harmful? I'd never heard of most of the megalithic sites he visited. He just goes around to these sites and points out things he finds amazing, and presents some of his theories on their origins. Whether a viewer chooses to believe his theories or not, really all he's doing is stimulating the viewer's imagination. Nothing he discusses will have any immediate physical effect on anyone's lives. > discovered how lucrative falsehood They are in the entertainment business, not the education business. They sell stories and fantasies. You're holding TV to a standard that might make sense for government sources.
  - 1attice 4y ago
    It's harmful because it means that it presents things which are known with near-certainty to be falsehoods as truths or potential truths. This is being done by Netflix for profit, which ought to be bad enough to end the conversation right there. But the deeper context is even worse: it's being done in an era where reality is routinely contested by quasi-LARP-like political actions that depend on keeping their userbase afraid, absurd, and feeling unheard. Giving them yet another reason to feel epistemically isolated in order to boost ratings is like taking the water out of a nuclear reactor to heat your home -- it makes a great deal of sense to today's bottom line, but none at all for tomorrow's. Our civ is not sustainable without a steady, heartfelt, and broadly-distributed grasp on truth.
    - nverno 4y ago
      > it presents things which are known with near-certainty to be falsehoods as truths or potential truths I didn't get that from the show at all. There aren't many fundamental 'truth's in this realm, afaict, and I don't recall him debating things like carbon dating. Instead, there are theories with varying amounts of archaeological evidence to support them. Does he display every bit of evidence people have discovered? Obviously not, but over time, everyone's theories on ancient civilization will change. There shouldn't be anything negative/isolating for people if they choose to entertain different theories about the past, and it's sad that people would ostracize someone for that. The world is a richer place because of it imho- this is largely a realm of fantasy, imagining life in the past, trying to infer the ancient's motivations/capabilities from scraps of long-lost cultures.
- npc12345 4y ago

by nverno 4y ago

1attice 4y ago

Astronomers can and do rage against flat-earthers; https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8132700/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8132700/ What is dangerous is not that a harmless old man is tenuously attached to reality, but rather that a corporation with global reach has discovered how lucrative falsehood can be when slickly produced & released at scale. That is dangerous, because not only is it harmful in the immediate term, but because it strongly implies that they will do so again. Whatever checks-and-balances used to exist at Netflix on what they disingenously call "creative freedom" are simply no match for a contracting market.

SpicyLemonZest 4y ago
I guess I'm not sure what you're demonstrating with this link. I watched Behind the Curve, and it generally treated flat-earth proponents as nice, well-meaning people who've just gotten themselves stuck in a rut where no evidence will convince them. That seems like the right attitude towards this kind of theory to me. Perhaps some of the scientists in the movie were exasperated by how obviously false flat earth is, but I can't imagine any of them writing a letter like the one in the source article, saying that flat earth theory is harmful and you're racist if you believe in it.
- 1attice 4y ago
  Yes, the flat-earthers are indeed shown as relatable, flawed, silly human beings, but the show is still driven by scientists. Imagine how _Behind the Curve_ would have played if it had instead shown those astronomers as being part of a secretive conspiracy to conceal the real geometry of the world. That's what Netflix is playing now.
  - SpicyLemonZest 4y ago
    I expect it would have played a lot like What the Health, a similarly buzzy documentary from 2017 making ridiculous false claims about the health benefits of a vegan diet. It got a lot of attention, and people talked passionately in major outlets about how wrong it was, but as far as I can recall (and as far as I can tell from a Google search) the idea that Netflix had some responsibility to downrank it or attach a "fiction" tag was never part of the conversation.
    - 1attice 4y ago
      I've never heard of this documentary, but if it makes false claims, then, yes, it should be labelled fiction, and possibly downranked. This seems so morally obvious to me, and the converse so plainly wicked, that I'm going to assume I've hit one of those issues where there is some deep-seated worldview-differences that say as much about me as they do about my interlocutor. If I'd hazard a guess, it would be that I believe that there is some sort of fact of the matter, and that people -- even large groups of people -- can be actually very wrong, in fact, and this wrongness counts again listening to them in the future, or valuing their opinions the same as those which are not wrong. This is a belief I hold and I know it is unpopular ;) The alternative, often expressed on the right as a 'marketplace of ideas' and on the left as 'values-alignment', is that there are multiple competing ways of assessing the worth of an idea, and an idea's wrongness might (say) be counterbalanced by its congeniality, its convenience, or its usefulness, and therefore that it's mean or base of me or anyone else to complain about someone pumping falsehood into the ears and eyes of the planet. But at the risk of being melodramatic, I say: this is a hill I'm ready to die on. Or not; but definitely not both at once.
nverno 4y ago
> because not only is it harmful in the immediate term How is it harmful? I'd never heard of most of the megalithic sites he visited. He just goes around to these sites and points out things he finds amazing, and presents some of his theories on their origins. Whether a viewer chooses to believe his theories or not, really all he's doing is stimulating the viewer's imagination. Nothing he discusses will have any immediate physical effect on anyone's lives. > discovered how lucrative falsehood They are in the entertainment business, not the education business. They sell stories and fantasies. You're holding TV to a standard that might make sense for government sources.
- 1attice 4y ago
  It's harmful because it means that it presents things which are known with near-certainty to be falsehoods as truths or potential truths. This is being done by Netflix for profit, which ought to be bad enough to end the conversation right there. But the deeper context is even worse: it's being done in an era where reality is routinely contested by quasi-LARP-like political actions that depend on keeping their userbase afraid, absurd, and feeling unheard. Giving them yet another reason to feel epistemically isolated in order to boost ratings is like taking the water out of a nuclear reactor to heat your home -- it makes a great deal of sense to today's bottom line, but none at all for tomorrow's. Our civ is not sustainable without a steady, heartfelt, and broadly-distributed grasp on truth.
  - nverno 4y ago
    > it presents things which are known with near-certainty to be falsehoods as truths or potential truths I didn't get that from the show at all. There aren't many fundamental 'truth's in this realm, afaict, and I don't recall him debating things like carbon dating. Instead, there are theories with varying amounts of archaeological evidence to support them. Does he display every bit of evidence people have discovered? Obviously not, but over time, everyone's theories on ancient civilization will change. There shouldn't be anything negative/isolating for people if they choose to entertain different theories about the past, and it's sad that people would ostracize someone for that. The world is a richer place because of it imho- this is largely a realm of fantasy, imagining life in the past, trying to infer the ancient's motivations/capabilities from scraps of long-lost cultures.
npc12345 4y ago