4 ms·

Democratic, rules based order, freedom: all words used to paint oneself in the good and others in the back. They barely have meaning in political discourse nowa

by cies 2y ago

Democratic, rules based order, freedom: all words used to paint oneself in the good and others in the back. They barely have meaning in political discourse nowadays.

llamaimperative 2y ago
Go to Qatar and strike up a conversation like the ones that are had millions of times per day in the US about how awful/incompetent/evil/illegitimate the government is. It's you who is degrading the meaning of these things. You can go experience the difference for yourself.
- mistermann 2y ago
  > Go to Qatar and strike up a conversation like the ones that are had millions of times per day in the US about how awful/incompetent/evil/illegitimate the government is. What is the point of this with respect to the comment it is replying to? Is it intended to be a disproof of some kind? And while we're at that (comparing Qatar to the US), should we also consider other metrics? Like, oh, I don't know...say Total Body Count on the International Stage? I'm fairly certain being alive is at least as important to most people as Freedom of Speech. > It's you who is degrading the meaning of these things. Appeals to the perfection of one's own cognition are getting a bit old. It's 2024 ffs. > You can go experience the difference for yourself. Realistically, most people are mostly stuck where they are, and I would rather not engage in illusory thinking about the quality of my country to make myself feel better. But of course, each to his own.
  - llamaimperative 2y ago
    Uhh yes, it's to say there are actually real, practical differences in daily life between countries on the dimension of "freedom" and that these are not merely artifacts of one's own cognition or of rhetorical gotchas. They do not "barely have meaning" and one can travel to various places on the earth and try simple experiments to prove it. Absolutely wild to be saying "go travel and try to exercise a freedom there" is seen as an appeal to cognition while "I would rather not engage in illusory thinking" is... what exactly?
    - mistermann 2y ago
      > ...and that these are not merely artifacts of one's own cognition or of rhetorical gotchas. A non-"pedantic" person might read this and accidentally form the belief that they are not often just rhetorical gotchas, or that they are not artifacts of one's own cognition (which they are....but they are not only that....and, it is fairly well known even by science how unreliable our Narrator of Reality is). The relative perfection of the US and other "democracies" is what it is, and that perfection is plausibly substantially influenced by the degree to which citizens collectively buy into the stories of how good they are ("if it ain't broke..."). Do you disagree that most people's models of the quality of various governments rest upon a bed of stories? Or another way of asking the question: do you believe that there is an accurate methodology in existence to objectively determine with high accuracy the quality of each nation in this regard (and also that most people utilize such a methodology, as opposed to believing the stories that please them)? > They do not "barely have meaning" and one can travel to various places on the earth and try simple experiments to prove it. It's a fair point, but the claim was: "They barely have meaning in political discourse nowadays". There is a difference, and the importance of the difference is very tricky. > Absolutely wild to be saying "go travel and try to exercise a freedom there" is seen as an appeal to cognition while "I would rather not engage in illusory thinking" is... what exactly? Also wild: you sidestepping the other metric I mentioned, and leading out with supreme self-confidence. But then, truthfulness and accuracy is perhaps not the game being playing here, considering the topic. https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/9weLK2AJ9JEt2Tt8f/politics-is-the-mind-killer https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/9weLK2AJ9JEt2Tt8f/politics-i...

by cies 2y ago

Democratic, rules based order, freedom: all words used to paint oneself in the good and others in the back. They barely have meaning in political discourse nowadays.

llamaimperative 2y ago

Go to Qatar and strike up a conversation like the ones that are had millions of times per day in the US about how awful/incompetent/evil/illegitimate the government is. It's you who is degrading the meaning of these things. You can go experience the difference for yourself.

mistermann 2y ago
> Go to Qatar and strike up a conversation like the ones that are had millions of times per day in the US about how awful/incompetent/evil/illegitimate the government is. What is the point of this with respect to the comment it is replying to? Is it intended to be a disproof of some kind? And while we're at that (comparing Qatar to the US), should we also consider other metrics? Like, oh, I don't know...say Total Body Count on the International Stage? I'm fairly certain being alive is at least as important to most people as Freedom of Speech. > It's you who is degrading the meaning of these things. Appeals to the perfection of one's own cognition are getting a bit old. It's 2024 ffs. > You can go experience the difference for yourself. Realistically, most people are mostly stuck where they are, and I would rather not engage in illusory thinking about the quality of my country to make myself feel better. But of course, each to his own.
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  Uhh yes, it's to say there are actually real, practical differences in daily life between countries on the dimension of "freedom" and that these are not merely artifacts of one's own cognition or of rhetorical gotchas. They do not "barely have meaning" and one can travel to various places on the earth and try simple experiments to prove it. Absolutely wild to be saying "go travel and try to exercise a freedom there" is seen as an appeal to cognition while "I would rather not engage in illusory thinking" is... what exactly?
  - mistermann 2y ago
    > ...and that these are not merely artifacts of one's own cognition or of rhetorical gotchas. A non-"pedantic" person might read this and accidentally form the belief that they are not often just rhetorical gotchas, or that they are not artifacts of one's own cognition (which they are....but they are not only that....and, it is fairly well known even by science how unreliable our Narrator of Reality is). The relative perfection of the US and other "democracies" is what it is, and that perfection is plausibly substantially influenced by the degree to which citizens collectively buy into the stories of how good they are ("if it ain't broke..."). Do you disagree that most people's models of the quality of various governments rest upon a bed of stories? Or another way of asking the question: do you believe that there is an accurate methodology in existence to objectively determine with high accuracy the quality of each nation in this regard (and also that most people utilize such a methodology, as opposed to believing the stories that please them)? > They do not "barely have meaning" and one can travel to various places on the earth and try simple experiments to prove it. It's a fair point, but the claim was: "They barely have meaning in political discourse nowadays". There is a difference, and the importance of the difference is very tricky. > Absolutely wild to be saying "go travel and try to exercise a freedom there" is seen as an appeal to cognition while "I would rather not engage in illusory thinking" is... what exactly? Also wild: you sidestepping the other metric I mentioned, and leading out with supreme self-confidence. But then, truthfulness and accuracy is perhaps not the game being playing here, considering the topic. https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/9weLK2AJ9JEt2Tt8f/politics-is-the-mind-killer https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/9weLK2AJ9JEt2Tt8f/politics-i...