4 ms·

I view this as a political constraint, cf. https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/lifeboat-games-and-backscratchers https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/lifeboat-games-an

I view this as a political constraint, cf. https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/lifeboat-games-and-backscratchers https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/lifeboat-games-and-backscra.... One's identity as Academic, Democrat, Zionist and so on demands certain sacrifices of you, sometimes of rationality. The worse the failure of empathy and rationality, the better a test of loyalty it is. For epistemic rationality, it would be best to https://paulgraham.com/identity.html https://paulgraham.com/identity.html, but for instrumental rationality it is not. Consequently, many people are reasonable only until certain topics come up, and it's generally worked around by steering the discussion to other topics.

voidhorse 1y ago
[flagged]
- tome 1y ago
  I'm curious how you assess, relatively speaking, the shittiness of defence of genocide versus false claims of genocide.
  - voidhorse 1y ago
    [flagged]
    - tome 1y ago
      But that's not my question. My question was between defence of genocide and false accusations of genocide. (Of course actual genocide is "shittier" -- in fact that's a breathtaking understatement!)
      - kombine 1y ago
        We have concrete examples of defence of genocide, such as by Scott Aaronson. Can you provide the examples of "false accusations of genocide", otherwise this is a hypothetical conversation.
        tome 1y ago
        I can certainly agree we have a concrete example of defence of purported genocide and a concrete example of an accusation of purported genocide. Beyond that I'd be happy to discuss further (although it's probably off topic).
        Ar-Curunir 1y ago
        [flagged]
        tome 1y ago
        Interesting presumption. Would you like it if I said "Did you find anything else helpful in your marriage, or was it just choosing to stop beating your wife?"? And yes, I have some. One is that false claims of genocide are equally reprehensible to denying true genocide. But I'm not sure why my beliefs are particularly relevant. I'm not the one sitting publicly in judgement of a semi-public figure. That was voidhorse. Did you want to discuss in more detail? I'm happy to, but currently I interpret your comment as an attempt at sniping me with snark. Please do correct me if I've misinterpreted.
      - noworriesnate 1y ago
        Wouldn’t it be better to spend the time understanding the reality of the situation in Gaza from multiple angles rather than philosophizing on abstract concepts? I.e. there are different degrees of genocide, but that doesn’t matter in this context because what’s happening in Gaza is not abstract or theoretical. In other words, your question ignores so much nuance that it’s a red herring IMO.
        tome 1y ago
        [flagged]
        SantalBlush 1y ago
        If you suggest an answer to your own question, it could be disputed. Better to make a coy comment and expect others to take that risk.
        tome 1y ago
        I'm not the one making pronouncements about the "shittiness" of forms of human behaviour.
        SantalBlush 1y ago
        God forbid.
        tome 1y ago
        Sorry, I'm not sure what you mean. Could you explain what you mean by "god forbid" in this context?
      - voidhorse 1y ago
        Assuming you do believe that genocide is extremely shitty, wouldn't that imply that defense of (actual) genocide, or the principle of it, is in all likelihood shitter than a false accusation of genocide? Otherwise I think you'd have to claim that a false accusation is somehow worse than the actuality or possibility of mass murder, which seems preposterous if you have even a mote of empathy for your fellow human beings. As others have pointed out, the fact that you would like to make light of cities being decimated and innocent civilians being murdered at scale in itself suggests a lot about your inability to concretize the reality of human existence beyond yourself (lack of empathy). It's this kind of outright callousness toward actual human beings that I think many of these so called "rationalists" share. I can't fault them too much. After all, when your approach to social problems is highly if not strictly quantitative you are already primed to nullify your own aptitude for empathy, since you view other human beings as nothing more than numerical quantities whenever you attempt to address their problems. I have seen no defense for what's happening in gaza that anyone who actually values human life, for all humans, would find rational. Recall the root of the word ratio—in proportion. What is happening in this case is quite blatantly a matter of an inproportinate response.
        tome 1y ago
        > Assuming you do believe that genocide is extremely shitty, wouldn't that imply that defense of (actual) genocide, or the principle of it, is in all likelihood shitter than a false accusation of genocide? Otherwise I think you'd have to claim that a false accusation is somehow worse than the actuality or possibility of mass murder I'm struggling to follow, sorry. I certainly agree with you that a false accusation is not worse than the actuality (I don't know why you brought up "possibility") of mass murder. Very far from it. But why does that imply that it's better than the defence of mass murder? After all, the "defence" here is not engaging in the practice, it's just saying something like "I condone that". Or did you think that by "defence" I actually mean committing the mass murder? The reason that emotive false accusations are very, very harmful is that they can cause mobs to murder in (supposed) retaliation. Here's a story about someone in the UK who was killed by a riled-up mob, due to a false accusation: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3535839/Father-42-killed-lured-vigilante-gang-kicked-punched-stabbed-death-mistakenly-thought-paedophile.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3535839/Father-42-k... One ought to be very, very cautious about making accusations that can rile up mobs. Regarding your other comments directed at me personally, such as "you would like to make light of cities being decimated and innocent civilians being murdered at scale", "inability to concretize the reality of human existence beyond yourself", "outright callousness", "approach to social problems is highly if not strictly quantitative", "you view other human beings as nothing more than numerical quantities", they are completely unfounded speculation on your part. They are rude and completely inappropriate for a reasoned discussion. Regarding proportion, do you believe the actions of the UK and USA against Nazi Germany were "proportionate"? Proportionate to what? What did Nazi Germany ever to do the USA?
  - Ar-Curunir 1y ago
    [flagged]
    - tome 1y ago
      Interesting conclusion, since I didn't make a claim either way. Still, for the record, other independent observers have documented the practices and explained why they don't meet the definition of genocide, John Spencer and Natasha Hausdorff to name two examples. It seems by no means clear that it's valid to make a claim of genocide. I certainly wouldn't unless I was really, really certain of my claim, because to get such a claim wrong is equally egregious to denying a true genocide, in my opinion.
      - SantalBlush 1y ago
        [flagged]
        tome 1y ago
        I'm happy to answer that. No I wouldn't. The Holocaust is probably the most studied subject in human history. It's not as though there is much uncertainty about the major events of it. In any case, this is really going off topic. All I am interested in is in voidhorse's answer to my simple question. That doesn't require retreading many of the the dark corners of human history.
        SantalBlush 1y ago
        If you wouldn't deny the holocaust based on the same evidence you just gave for denying the Palestinian genocide, that suggests the evidence you gave was never valid for denying a genocide in the first place. Your reasoning is arbitrary.
        tome 1y ago
        But it's not the same evidence. It's a completely different situation. Completely different events have occurred, completely different amounts of time have elapsed since and they have been subjected to completely different amounts of scrutiny. There's just no comparison.
Fraterkes 1y ago
I don’t really buy this at all: I am more emotionally invested in things that I know more about (and vice versa). If Rationalism breaks down at that point it is essentially never useful.
- lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 1y ago
  > I don’t really buy this at all For what it’s worth, you seem to be agreeing with the person you replied to. Their main point is that this break down happens primarily because people identify as Rationalists (or whatever else). Taken from that angle, Rationalism as an identity does not appear to be useful.
  - Fraterkes 1y ago
    My reading of the comment was that there was only a small subset of contentious topics that rationalism is unsuited for. But I think you are correct

voidhorse 1y ago

[flagged]

tome 1y ago
I'm curious how you assess, relatively speaking, the shittiness of defence of genocide versus false claims of genocide.
- voidhorse 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - tome 1y ago
    But that's not my question. My question was between defence of genocide and false accusations of genocide. (Of course actual genocide is "shittier" -- in fact that's a breathtaking understatement!)
    - kombine 1y ago
      We have concrete examples of defence of genocide, such as by Scott Aaronson. Can you provide the examples of "false accusations of genocide", otherwise this is a hypothetical conversation.
      - tome 1y ago
        I can certainly agree we have a concrete example of defence of purported genocide and a concrete example of an accusation of purported genocide. Beyond that I'd be happy to discuss further (although it's probably off topic).
        Ar-Curunir 1y ago
        [flagged]
        tome 1y ago
        Interesting presumption. Would you like it if I said "Did you find anything else helpful in your marriage, or was it just choosing to stop beating your wife?"? And yes, I have some. One is that false claims of genocide are equally reprehensible to denying true genocide. But I'm not sure why my beliefs are particularly relevant. I'm not the one sitting publicly in judgement of a semi-public figure. That was voidhorse. Did you want to discuss in more detail? I'm happy to, but currently I interpret your comment as an attempt at sniping me with snark. Please do correct me if I've misinterpreted.
    - noworriesnate 1y ago
      Wouldn’t it be better to spend the time understanding the reality of the situation in Gaza from multiple angles rather than philosophizing on abstract concepts? I.e. there are different degrees of genocide, but that doesn’t matter in this context because what’s happening in Gaza is not abstract or theoretical. In other words, your question ignores so much nuance that it’s a red herring IMO.
      - tome 1y ago
        [flagged]
        SantalBlush 1y ago
        If you suggest an answer to your own question, it could be disputed. Better to make a coy comment and expect others to take that risk.
        tome 1y ago
        I'm not the one making pronouncements about the "shittiness" of forms of human behaviour.
        SantalBlush 1y ago
        God forbid.
        tome 1y ago
        Sorry, I'm not sure what you mean. Could you explain what you mean by "god forbid" in this context?
    - voidhorse 1y ago
      Assuming you do believe that genocide is extremely shitty, wouldn't that imply that defense of (actual) genocide, or the principle of it, is in all likelihood shitter than a false accusation of genocide? Otherwise I think you'd have to claim that a false accusation is somehow worse than the actuality or possibility of mass murder, which seems preposterous if you have even a mote of empathy for your fellow human beings. As others have pointed out, the fact that you would like to make light of cities being decimated and innocent civilians being murdered at scale in itself suggests a lot about your inability to concretize the reality of human existence beyond yourself (lack of empathy). It's this kind of outright callousness toward actual human beings that I think many of these so called "rationalists" share. I can't fault them too much. After all, when your approach to social problems is highly if not strictly quantitative you are already primed to nullify your own aptitude for empathy, since you view other human beings as nothing more than numerical quantities whenever you attempt to address their problems. I have seen no defense for what's happening in gaza that anyone who actually values human life, for all humans, would find rational. Recall the root of the word ratio—in proportion. What is happening in this case is quite blatantly a matter of an inproportinate response.
      - tome 1y ago
        > Assuming you do believe that genocide is extremely shitty, wouldn't that imply that defense of (actual) genocide, or the principle of it, is in all likelihood shitter than a false accusation of genocide? Otherwise I think you'd have to claim that a false accusation is somehow worse than the actuality or possibility of mass murder I'm struggling to follow, sorry. I certainly agree with you that a false accusation is not worse than the actuality (I don't know why you brought up "possibility") of mass murder. Very far from it. But why does that imply that it's better than the defence of mass murder? After all, the "defence" here is not engaging in the practice, it's just saying something like "I condone that". Or did you think that by "defence" I actually mean committing the mass murder? The reason that emotive false accusations are very, very harmful is that they can cause mobs to murder in (supposed) retaliation. Here's a story about someone in the UK who was killed by a riled-up mob, due to a false accusation: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3535839/Father-42-killed-lured-vigilante-gang-kicked-punched-stabbed-death-mistakenly-thought-paedophile.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3535839/Father-42-k... One ought to be very, very cautious about making accusations that can rile up mobs. Regarding your other comments directed at me personally, such as "you would like to make light of cities being decimated and innocent civilians being murdered at scale", "inability to concretize the reality of human existence beyond yourself", "outright callousness", "approach to social problems is highly if not strictly quantitative", "you view other human beings as nothing more than numerical quantities", they are completely unfounded speculation on your part. They are rude and completely inappropriate for a reasoned discussion. Regarding proportion, do you believe the actions of the UK and USA against Nazi Germany were "proportionate"? Proportionate to what? What did Nazi Germany ever to do the USA?
- Ar-Curunir 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - tome 1y ago
    Interesting conclusion, since I didn't make a claim either way. Still, for the record, other independent observers have documented the practices and explained why they don't meet the definition of genocide, John Spencer and Natasha Hausdorff to name two examples. It seems by no means clear that it's valid to make a claim of genocide. I certainly wouldn't unless I was really, really certain of my claim, because to get such a claim wrong is equally egregious to denying a true genocide, in my opinion.
    - SantalBlush 1y ago
      [flagged]
      - tome 1y ago
        I'm happy to answer that. No I wouldn't. The Holocaust is probably the most studied subject in human history. It's not as though there is much uncertainty about the major events of it. In any case, this is really going off topic. All I am interested in is in voidhorse's answer to my simple question. That doesn't require retreading many of the the dark corners of human history.
        SantalBlush 1y ago
        If you wouldn't deny the holocaust based on the same evidence you just gave for denying the Palestinian genocide, that suggests the evidence you gave was never valid for denying a genocide in the first place. Your reasoning is arbitrary.
        tome 1y ago
        But it's not the same evidence. It's a completely different situation. Completely different events have occurred, completely different amounts of time have elapsed since and they have been subjected to completely different amounts of scrutiny. There's just no comparison.

Fraterkes 1y ago

I don’t really buy this at all: I am more emotionally invested in things that I know more about (and vice versa). If Rationalism breaks down at that point it is essentially never useful.

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 1y ago
> I don’t really buy this at all For what it’s worth, you seem to be agreeing with the person you replied to. Their main point is that this break down happens primarily because people identify as Rationalists (or whatever else). Taken from that angle, Rationalism as an identity does not appear to be useful.
- Fraterkes 1y ago
  My reading of the comment was that there was only a small subset of contentious topics that rationalism is unsuited for. But I think you are correct