GBRK
7hr ago
Violating sanctions seems like a deportable offense, so that's where I would draw the line. I defend the speech, and the recruitment video itself-- but not the transacting with covered individuals.
GBRK
7hr ago
The incredible irony of your statement is that I'm a 2nd generation immigrant-- one of the foreigners you're afraid of-- and yet I've thoroughly assimilated to a belief system you attribute to long tradition and the founding father(s). It's clear to me that the venerable liberalism our nation was founding on is perfectly durable under its own terms. The same might not be true of whatever ideology you yourself hold to... but at least darwinistially, liberalism has no need to perpetuate any ideologies except itself. Some ideologies are parasitic-- communism can't exist without a larger capitalist society, for example-- but it's not clear to me that describes the vaguely neoliberal capitalism that endows all the richest nations of the western world.
GBRK
8hr ago
I'm in agreement on you there, but...
What's your position on Citizen's United? Because it seems to me that either money is speech, or it isn't.
GBRK
8hr ago
Because words imply things that are not mentioned in the dictionary as being implied by them.
"rather" can be used to imply objective preference, but that connotation isn't implicit in the word. Compare a much more charged word, like "good" which by default has the implication of both moral goodness and suitability for purpose. Therefore assuming a negative implication to the word requires assuming negative intent from it's user-- and if the person you are arguing with is arguing in bad faith, then you might as well assume that they can twist any question-- and consequently that the question itself isn't actually the problem. In particular, you bring up--
The implication depends on context
But that's exactly what I'm addressing! Neither the cow question nor the wife-beating question have ambiguous contexts. The cow question is legitimate specifically because, in context, there is no implication of preference and the only reason you would humiliate yourself is because whatever internal reason you have for choosing one answer or another is socially unacceptable. The wife-beating question is not legitimate, because to answer it you necessarily either need to lie or muddy the context, which would decrease your social status in a matter independent from whether you are actually a wife beater.
GBRK
8hr ago
I understand that he was mocking the question, and that's exactly what I was trying to test: whether he was willing to discuss whether hypothetical questions were useful or whether he would dodge that discussion in favor of the quick gotcha. This should have been obvious from the fact that I even bothered asking the question: obviously, I couldn't think he was actually stupid enough to fail the question or I wouldn't be trying to have a debate. Rather, I was hoping for a counter-move where he called out the implication that avoiding hypothetical questions was stupid because of [whatever argument he wanted to make.]
GBRK
1d ago
I support ukraine so I hate to say this, but... Providing purely rhetorical support for an enemy country is perfectly and reasonably within the bounds of free speech. Yes, I know we have the alien & sedition act, but we shouldn't. While it may or may not be technically legal to deport him for this, I feel like as a moral stance we shouldn't.
GBRK
2d ago
The quick test was to see whether you would interact with me on the object level of the question being asked or on the level of the rhetorical point I was making by asking you the question. Since you did the first, and furthermore ignored all the other points I made, I realized that you had neither the interest nor the capability to discuss in general whether provocative hypothetical questions are useful or interesting. That's essentially isomorphic to getting you to answer the cow question anyway, since it implies your answer wouldn't have any interesting reasoning behind in. Consequently I lost interest in our conversation.
Likewise, although the question about cows doesn't literally mean that you enjoy one of the two options, by implicature it does.
Are you speaking a completely foreign dialect of english than me? I checked merriam webster and none of the definitions for "rather" imply that you must objectively enjoy the subject being discussed-- merely that you must prefer it against an alternative. Yes, the person you're speaking to could then make the argument that if you prefer A to B the only possible reason must be that you like A, but that argument would be obviously fallacious unless they can prove that you like B.
Meanwhile, the overt meaning of "stop" is that you are ending an action that would otherwise continue. Given the context of the conversation, the only continuing action that could possibly be referenced would be "beating your wife." You can't just think up another continuing action in your head to reference and then answer "no" to that instead. That would be a falsehood within the context of the conversation. Imagine a polygamist and domestic abuser on trail for beating his first wife, who when asked that question decides it refers to his second wife and then answers "no." He could construct an imaginary context in which that answer was truthful, but that would not be the context of the conversation.
I can imagine a modified variant of the cow question designed to imply that the person answering must be a pervert... "Which one would you love more, fucking a dead cow or a live one?" for example. But the exact formulation of the question by Aella was, "If you had to have sex with a cow would you rather it be dead or alive? Why?” and that seems like a fair framing to me. Especially since it is explicitly not a yes/no question.
Look, all this should be obvious from first principles simply by changing the incriminating word. If you switch "beating" to "building" or "reanimating" or "electing" on any other valid word that implies an ongoing action that isn't ongoing, the question is just as incomprehensible. That remains true even if the word is positive, like "petting." Meanwhile, the cow question still makes perfect sense with "have sex with" modified to anything else you can do to a cow. "pet," "eat," "build" elect," "beat," etcetera.
The reason that some people who ask the cow question don't mind answering it themselves is because they are weirdos who like transgressing against society by implying that they like nasty things. They are still aware that other people don't like doing this.
It sounds like the reason you think the cow question is a trap is because you're exactly the kind of person who would fallaciously use it as a trap. That says more about you than it does about Aella.
GBRK
3d ago
They are not asked in good faith.
What??? Are you so low-decoupling you consider any discussion about an unpleasant topic a personal attack? I am genuinely baffled by your perspective. Do you sincerely think that people who ask the trolley question want to "gotcha!" you? You can trivially disprove this by just asking the question back. Nobody who would ask the wife-beating question would reply to it, but I can guarantee you that virtually anyone who asks the trolley question (or the cow question) is just dying to talk about the philosophy that underpins their own answers. I'm not speaking in the abstract here-- my friend group plays Aella's Askhole game as an icebreaker at parties and the cow question (well, in the askhole formulation it's "would your rather fuck a dog or your own mother") always starts interesting spirited discussions.
Actually, let me administer a quick test about your ability to deal in hypotheticals... "How would you feel right now if you hadn't had breakfast this morning?"
GBRK
3d ago
"would you rather" questions are not at all the same as questions that smuggle in unsupported assumptions. The cow question doesn't force you to say you enjoy either dead or living cows, it merely asks you to decide what you prefer-- with the goal of getting you to examine what your moral rules and foundational assumptions about the universe are. Not being able to answer the cow question is a red flag in the same way as not being able answer the trolley question. It's entirely reasonable to distrust people who either refuse to analyze their own system of morality and apply it in self-consistent ways or else refuse to describe and stand by their morals for fear of social sanction.
Based on this
...it seems like your test for permitting gross hypothetical questions is whether they force the person being asked to consider deeper questions of genuine weight. That seems fair enough-- I wouldn't support gross questions for the sake of gross questions. But I think you're missing the point of the cow question specifically, and the point of grossness in moral dilemmas in general.
The question I have actually heard asked several times-- the dog/mother question-- is empirically successful at getting people to consider questions of:
...and it also reinforces group bonds by showing each other that we can discuss contentious topics without attacking someone for saying the wrong thing. It is my opinion that these topics are neccessary and proper discussion material, not just as a matter of public policy, but as a matter of identifying what sort of values the people you're among hold. I would argue that the cow question, seriously pondered, would serve a similar function.
Now, that alone doesn't justify making the question gross. I can forsee your counterargument that if you want to discuss those topics, it's possible to just discuss them instead of posing a hypothetical. But the purpose of the grossness is additionally to determine whether people will change their answer based on the salience of the question (as opposed to the fundamental moral rules being queried.) We can ask the trolley question with famous pieces of artwork, or even other people's pokemon cards, instead of humans. In theory people should reason about the question purely based on whether they're utilitarians or deontologists... but in practice, many people will change their answer because their moral principles are inconsistent or nonexistent. Elevating the emotional impact of the scenario while keeping the fundamentals the same is a way of catching out those people.
More options
Context Copy link