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PutAHelmetOn

Recovering Quokka

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joined 2022 September 06 21:20:34 UTC 

				
User ID: 890


				
				
				

			

		

	














	


		


			



	

		

			

			

				

					

						

							
						

						

							
							

								
PutAHelmetOn


								
								
									
								
								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				
Recovering Quokka

				
				
				

				

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					joined 2022 September 06 21:20:34 UTC
				


				
					

					
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User ID: 890


					
					
					
				

			




		

	

 











			
			

			
			

			




	


		

			
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				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
It sounds like you're saying: it has some amazingly funny artifacts of counter-culture that moral busybodies would find OK? Could you give some examples?


If moral busybodies find these amazingly funny artifacts of counter-culture problematic (like all the mean words), then arguments about subconscious immune systems or cultural defense mechanisms wouldn't convince moral busybodies would they? Moral busybodies want to end 4chan culture, in this branch of the hypothetical.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I don't think this is really an important difference.


Couldn't American white southerners (circa 1850) say their culture is about enslaving black people? Abolitionists wouldn't go, "huh you're right I didn't notice that. We wouldn't want to culturally genocide you, so carry on!" they just say: your culture is not worth preserving. Maybe more realistically, abolitionists would say: You can keep your southern food and your southern hospitality, but you don't need to keep slaves.


To the extent that 4chan's culture is dependent on saying mean words, why would "it's a defense mechanism!" convince anyone? Also, what exactly is "that culture" and can it be separated from saying mean words?


    

  • 

    If it can be separated, then this is what a lot of people are asking for
    

    • 

  • 

    It it can't be separated, then 4chan has enemies
    

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				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Why wait for a wave of people to link NSFW without warning before making it a rule? If one person did it and its objectionable, isn't that enough to just make it a rule?


I suppose that "having a rule for NSFW warnings in the sidebar" contributes to a mood or culture that TheMotte doesn't want (i.e. is a bad look), which is why it seems your ideal world is where no such rule is listed on the sidebar, but also people somehow know not to post NSFW content without warning.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Is this falsifiable? How would you check for so-called "perceived ability"? Ask them how many fights they've been in?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
What does it mean for them to succeed? People say that a lot of the draw of twitter is that it lets the common person talk with celebrities. If enough of a coordinated media effort happened like, the kayfabe will definitely look as if Buzz Buzz won, and there will be a bunch of the usual suspects declaring victory over racism.


Even if Buzzbuzz amassed only one-tenth the users of twitter (in real people, not bots), who's won? Keep in mind that knowing the true statistics and trying to publish them would probably be hatefacts. How would normies learn the user statistics? There are a lot of people who think /r/The_Donald's subscriber and active user counts were throttled and generally subreddit population numbers were astroturfed back then. These people also anticipate that Buzzbuzz's user counts would be inflated.


In short, wouldn't a world where barely anyone migrated to BuzzBuzz look very similar to a world where most people did?


Maybe I'm just a cynical biased culture warrior, but Elon's acquisition doesn't seem like it changes any culture- or Truth- producing institutions, so does it really matter which social media sites have more active users?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
All of those are basically engineering to serve a purpose. Picture engineering exists, which is why AI art is even used. Picture engineering is how you obtain company logos and silly images for ads and presentations.


Art is a status competition. It sounds like what you're saying is art is dumb.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
First, cultural differences are just as much an accidental difference between people as genetics. I do agree that history can influence culture, though.


The framing is important though. If we say culture is the cause, the solutions that come to mind are "socializing black people to act differently." If we say discrimination is the cause, the solutions that come to mind are reparations or something.


I agree the exact cause and effect is largely the same, so I will reiterate that the whole debate is largely a proxy argument for who is an agent. Feminism being also woke adjacent treats men as the only agents, too.


E: typo


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I agree that promptmancy is the appropriate analogy to photography.


But I can't imagine prompt engineering is subjective though. Translating human intent into a prompt to make an image feels like a skill in a way that photography feels like art


But this just might be sloppy thinking on my part, or an opinion I've been socialized to hold


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
The invention of the crane reduced the reach of the powerlifter status market, because when people look at buildings, they're assumed to all be made by cranes, but you can still watch real people lift weights and they're obviously not a crane.


AI Art will reduce the reach of artists and their monopoly on making pictures. Maybe in the future, people will assume most logos and the like are made by computers. That's all well and fine. But how can you prevent imposters from submitting AI art to museums and competitions? It would be as if a bodybuilder could hide a hydraulic arm under his clothes (or take steroids!) and compete without working.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Cranes, like the cotton gin, manufacturing plants or programming language compilers, are engineering tools used to serve a purpose. That is, an actual purpose. Whereas things we consider art tend to be done because it is fun or for status.


The difference is, that the existence of a crane doesn't affect the status of powerlifters. You can still appreciate a power lifter because you know he's not a crane. To the extent that Stable Diffusion etc. mimic art, you can't really tell.


Now, there are a lot of good reasons to have AI-art generators. Like cranes, they can help us engineer and build things faster. People here have mentioned that AI art is probably already being used for generic business presentations for when a slide needs to be livened up and it doesn't need to be too precise or fancy for the audience to get the point.


Fine, artists no longer get their money ripping off people making powerpoints, but AI art still threatens the status market they're engaged in, which as far as I know, has no analogue.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I'd like to echo your sentiment and add another example to the mix, although not exactly analogous: I've worked for a few years on a programming project trying to compete with a closed-source service that has a monopoly. If, for whatever reason (it probably won't happen) they decide to open-source their work, I would be livid. To me, the wasted time wouldn't just be about a sunk cost and "no reason to finish," it's because the current WIP is itself pretty impressive, but it wouldn't seem impressive because for all everyone knows I just ripped off the open source version.


I can't really think of anything perfectly analogous to AI art, with how it retroactively invalidates past human effort:


    

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    engineering advances cheapen ancient wonders, but you can still appreciate how epic the Pyramids are because they didn't have a crane
    

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  • 

    things that used to be art (custom tribal weapons) can be manufactured when they have an actual purpose outside of just being art, but you can't mistake an heirloom for a mass-produced widget (Unless you're Anakin Skywalker building a protocol droid)
    

    • 

  • 

    photography helped artists pivot to non-objective art, but it's unclear how a visual artist is supposed to distinguish their future work from AI-generated pictures, apart from only showing them in physical media.
    

    • 



EDIT: Would like to explicitly distinguish between some things here:


Motte: It's bad that you can't distinguish between AI art and human art.


Bailey: It's bad that AI art reduces the total status of artists.


The invention of cranes probably did reduce the status of powerlifters. In fact, I've heard theories about how technology is making brute strength obsolete in favor of knowledge work and symbol manipulators. That is, when the tribesmen saw big rocks on top of one another they thought, "how wondrous are our power lifters" and after the invention of cranes, they shrug and go, "yeah we can put rocks on top of each other."


If the future of seeing the average logo or image is "yeah our computers are pretty cool i guess" instead of marveling at how beautiful the art is, so what? As long as we can still run powerlifting competitions (where they aren't cranes) and also have curated museums and DeviantArts where somehow we could verify it was human created, isn't that all we need? Granted, that tagging technology might not be feasible.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Most people read into social subtext, so if you say, "blacks underperform for reasons other than discrimination" what most people hear is "blacks are bad, or somehow inferior." Although you didn't say the cause was genetic (in fact you explicitly gave other possibilities too!), it comes off to most people as being about genetics, just because lots of americans learned in school about scientific racism and how genetic arguments were used to justify slavery or discrimination. It doesn't matter if that's ahistorical, school gave many of us that impression anyways.


Also, in some spaces it's not acceptable to attack black culture. The argument goes that: why build society where it's acceptable to act a certain way by fiat, when you could rebuild it so it's acceptable to act a different way instead? Or to accept both ways of acting. So, "believing black people should change" is problematic to many people.


At the end of the day, explaining black outcomes by discrimination is done in order to place agency, blame, and the responsibility to fix; on society at large instead of on black people in particular.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
There's also the progressive aesthetic that ugly is actually beautiful


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Complicating this is that both facial claims are probably always at least a little true.




I was assuming that this was uncontroversial enough that most real people would agree with it, and so nobody would be a true blank slatist. In this way, "blank slatism" would be a spectrum of belief. Someone who thinks that nurture is most of things, and nature is very little would be highly blank slatist.


Still, my post was bad because it assumed that a world without disparate nurture impacts would still look more or less like ours, whereas it might look very different. In that world, all differences really are nature, but maybe those differences are very small. In that case, highly blank slatists are vindicated.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
This would predict more spectators for e.g. male sports than female sports which as far as I know checks out.


Who's greater, heavyweight fighters or mediumweight fighters? My instinct says "heavy" because the number is bigger but I might be wrong.


The conclusion I've been under for awhile has always been that these competitions are segregated like this out of a sense of fun (to participate or to watch); it's boring to watch men beat Serena Williams or watch a heavy guy sit on a toothpick.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				What is your favorite Motte post ever?
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I will likely never divorce my wife




This confused me for a little bit since I recognized your name: "Aren't you the guy who posts about his girl troubles?"


Then I realized that you meant your future-wife, or did something happen and I'm not aware of it?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
No, it means that when activists tear down pro-white activism they can't use the reasoning "but white is the default!" which is the lens that you originally brought up.


An honest (and I hope more frequent) reason to reject pro-white activism is "white people already have it good":


    

  1. 

    It is falsifiable once the ideal future is obtained, if in case white people no longer have it good.
    

    2. 

  2. 

    It is falsifiable today, if in case white people currently do not have it good.
    

    3. 

  3. 

    It treats white people as a legitimate coalition instead of the default.
    

    4. 



I did not spring a logical trap, I'm just pointing out dishonesty. The thing activists do currently is not (a) changing what the default is, the thing they are doing is (b) diverting resources and no amount of doing (b) will ever lead to (a).


We can totally treat white people as a legitimate coalition while simultaneously noticing that they don't need activism, but few argue this, because it would require data.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Some tests are meant to distinguish object-level ability. Take for instance, becoming a fireman or infantryman. It would be sexist to deny a qualified woman these positions because she's a woman. Furthermore, mumbling something about oppression or double standards is stupid, because you want your positions staffed by qualified applicants.


Whether or not something should be test or a competition can be contentious. For example, those college orientations where they say, "look to your left and to your right. One/two of you won't pass." Those always angered me because I figured a certification should be a test and not a competition.


Competitions are a little different than tests because it's not really about object-level ability. If it was, you would never have weight classes in boxing. After all, being heavy is simply part of the ability in boxing. And I think this is the primary argument for sex-segregating sports. But it's unclear what to do about a female (XX) who happens to somehow be naturally stronger. Why reward her, because she was born stronger than her peers? (I'm trying to sidestep any trans issues, that's a different issue).


As far as I can tell, the entire idea of rewarding winners in a competition has to do with spiritual merit, like determination, or how hard someone practiced.


Or something else I had issue with is how a lot of online games use "time played" as a kind of bonus, and let players grind up more powerful equipment to offset differences in mechanical ability.


Do people construct competitions that they'd be good at in a bid to win status for being good at them? Does TheMotte try to push "effortposting" as a spirtual virtue so that society rewards us?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
What's worse is, "What percent of a thing is environmentally/genetically determined" is itself environmentally determined. In an environment where not everyone is well-fed, height isn't completely genetic, because there are people who are short because they've been malnourished. Once you feed everyone, the environment is no longer determining who is short, it's just genetics.


(Unless I've made a mistake here) This paradox is pretty contentious though because it seemingly undermines many revolutionaries. If something is even a little bit genetic, the revolutionary seems to be steering the future where it becomes more and more genetic. Since revolutionaries aren't out there measuring how genetic and meritocratic society is, I suspect "there is some nurture to it!" is basically said in bad faith, by people who are salty.


That is to say, being short sucks whether its because of your genetics or because you're not well-fed. The Short Revolution uses the nature/nurture argument to justify the guillotine.


The honest blank slatist is then resigned to argue that genetics and biology is unfair. Is he even wrong?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
What I didn't explain explicitly, and maybe I should have, is that if someone wants "white is the default" to change, surely the best way to do that is to stop treating white like a default, and start treating it like a coalition just like Blacks and asians, which would mean letting explicitly pro-White groups perform their activism. After all, a future where "white is not the default" is a future with explicit pro-white interest groups.


Since what we see in real life is people saying, "but whites are the default! You can't perform pro-white activism!" it shows that "but whites are the default" is said with this face.


The current setup of minority-focused interest groups seem to be mostly about changing the distribution of resources, not about changing "the idea of default."


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
This thread contains deleted comments so it might be hard to follow. You might find it interesting and relevant


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Whenever antiracist academics write papers about white being the default (I've heard this idea before), I get the feeling that this fact stings them and they don't like it and wish it to change.


Either I am wrong, and they're perfectly happy that white should be the default, or they are malicious and "you are a default so you don't need privileges" is not meant in good-faith.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
You're right, my brain was thinking "those the state decided were victims" and I ignored the shades of nuance within the state.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Yes, if I had read closely I maybe would have figured it out.


Discussing "the case" though, I had already read victim descriptively, meaning simply "those the court decided were victims" because that's how the word is used. (You allude to this when you note a different, objective-morals sense of victim).


Thanks for the clarification


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	




	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
What good is the right's subtle dog whistles (according to you) if they still get called out on them? Think anti-Trumpers talking about how Trump dogwhistled to white supremists or the white working class during his 2016 campaign. How would you argue to someone that one side actually does it differently?


I'm not asking to explain why This Dogwhistle is different than That Dogwhistle, I'm asking to explain why we see the same calling out on both sides. (Actually, do we see the same calling out on both sides?)