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astrolabia


				

				

				

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astrolabia


								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				

				
				
				

				

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					joined 2022 September 05 01:46:57 UTC
				


				
					

					
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				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 29, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
What do you mean by "ground truth"?  I personally don't make many sacrifices for privacy or civil liberty's sake, but I'm grateful when others do.


Where I live I already don't have freedom of speech or association, and the government recently froze the bank accounts of protesters whom the state-run news agency had already demonized.


Again, how do you think anyone ends up in a gas chamber?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 29, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I agree that some people were overly certain about the consequences of the PATRIOT act.  But I would still rage teary-eyed against government overreach even if I were merely worried it would lead to tyranny, because once the government is totalitarian it's very hard to come back from that.


Also, in that time there have been various counter-movements, such as Snowden's, that pushed back against mass surveillance.  But that could have easily not happened, and plus the state has presumably hardened itself against the next Snowden since then.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 29, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


To these privacy warriors in the US, I'm sure we seem a quick slide of the slippery slope away from being targeted for our Chud/Woke beliefs with no time to prepare before it's too late.




What do you think preparing looks like, if not fighting for civil liberties and maintaining our ability to coordinate politically without being targeted?  To me it looks like you'd mock anyone fighting government overreach right up until it's too late.


Do you think those murdered by their governments in the 20th century had "time to prepare", but simply chose to not to?  Do you remember the borders being closed with no warning during covid?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 22, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


the sudden flurry of "Oh, Trump wasn't that bad"-type statements from figures who previously criticized him reeks of groveling and bet-hedging




At this point I wonder how much of this is due to fashion.  If even the most uncool members of your group try to rally people by bashing trump, your only options to distinguish yourself are to be even more hysterical (which is getting kind of played out) or play the nuance card.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 15, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


If the administration of airlines, air traffic control, pilot training and so on was ruthlessly meritocratic, then I'd agree with you that there'd be no difference in skill between black or female pilots and white male pilots, since they would all have passed the same tests and be above a certain benchmark.




Nitpick - this still won't be true as long as there is noise in the tests or variability in skill above the bar.  The groups with higher average performance before the cutoff will also dominate the top percentiles after the cutoff, and be less likely to be a false positive under noisy tests.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 1, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Canada has a much larger native population than the USA, about 5% of the total population now, who have similar life outcomes to america's blacks.  They also receive a huge amount of bespoke welfare.  So I think that's some evidence against your theory.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 1, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I think I prefer the way your homeland does it.  Every time I see someone in the west complaining about or shaming others for offering well-intentioned advice, it just looks like shooting the messenger and poisoning the well.  I would happily accept 100 wrong or offensive advices in exchange for 1 that helped me.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 11, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Makes sense, I think I agree.  And AI just makes this happen faster and on a larger scale - humans will be outcompeted unless we put a stop to basically all competitive pressures.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 11, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I agree that market activity tends to reduce ideological fervor.  But as you note, that doesn't necessarily happen if the government becomes totalitarian, which you also agree is a distinct possibility.  So I'm not even sure what your claim is anymore.  "Progressivism always wins except when it doesn't"?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 11, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Yes, that's my point.  These are equally arbitrary groups, but are legally protected and officially encouraged to advocate for their own interests at all levels of legal and corporate governance.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 11, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Okay, now it sounds like you're saying "we always win, except when we lose and become a Neo-Caliphate."  How is the mellowing of Islamic countries going?  What's the mood like in Afghanistan or Somalia?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 11, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


The reason why white straight men aren't allowed to organize as a group




It sounds like you're agreeing with me?




they're not an actual cultural group




As opposed to the group "Asians and Pacific Islanders", or the group of all black people worldwide, including Pygmies and Kanye West?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 11, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
You might be right, but what does the endgame look like?  It seems like the issue of immigration in particular has the potential to undo most of the gains that progressives find important.  I'm thinking of France, where it seems inevitable that there will be a de facto Islamic party in the near future.  In that case it seems like both progressives and conservatives (except the immigrants) lose.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 11, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I agree that slave-owning and the civil war is a good example of a right that took a lot of destruction and kicking and screaming to take away.


I guess I'm thinking of basically everything that happened post-civil rights.  Straight white men, and white people more generally, now aren't allowed to form their own clubs, be praised as a group, or advocate for their own cultural traditions or interests in almost any way in the west, and I think that change happened without much serious pushback.


EDIT: Sorry, I guess I didn't address your qualifier 'people who have spent a long hard time and earning it'.  Are these individual people, the same individuals who did the fighting?  If not, does building a civilization count as earning it?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				E/acc and the political compass of AI war
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I'm not sure exactly what Dase meant, but my reading is that it evokes the totalizing, moralizing, intrusive, overbearing, over-socialized, crab-bucket, tall-poppy syndrome state of society that tends to arise in human society when there isn't a frontier to escape to.  I honestly don't understand the connection to native american governance or living arrangements, but I think it's suppose to evoke otherwise strong chiefs being effectively hen-pecked into submission due to everyone living in close enough quarters to be constantly surveilled.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 11, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Islam seems like it's in a much better position than Christianity, at least to me.  They have the highest birth rates, advocate for their own interests unapologetically, and have a long history of punishing and assassinating critics and opponents.  This causes lots of internecine strife, but I predict these traits will allow rapid expansion within the West.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 11, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


taking away rights or privileges or respect or acknowledgement or etc. from people who have spent a long hard time and earning it, and trying to do that ussually involves a lot of kicking and screaming and destruction




You would think so, but didn't we just watch this happen to straight white men, and Europeans more generally, with basically no effective pushback?  Some days it seems as simple as


    

  1. Comedians joke about it
    2. 

  2. Thinkpieces recontextualize it
    3. 

  3. Comedians mock the stupidest examples of pushback
    4. 

  4. A few people get cancelled for pushing back
    5. 



And soon after, countless formal and informal corporate, academic, personal, and government policies change to enforce the new policy.  In a way it's impressive how liberal democracies can coordinate to change which groups they marginalize without much violence or state-directed propaganda.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				E/acc and the political compass of AI war
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I expect it to become formidable because Vitalik is




I don't think d/acc holds up - it's just so unlikely that man-machine hybrids can remain competitive without a massive deliberate slowdown of development of machine intelligence.


However, I agree that d/acc will remain formidable, because ambitious smart young men need something to work on to distinguish themselves, and an excuse to work on the most economically valuable thing they can, which is AI development.  And it's plausible enough to provide such an excuse.


I think any serious proposal for pausing AI development has to be paired with a massively multiplayer, high-status, well-paying make-work plan for the hungry junior AI developers of the world.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				E/acc and the political compass of AI war
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


motivated by the same impulse of preserving their petty relevance




Guilty as charged.  But can you point me towards a higher goal?  The problem is, I just don't trust anyone else to act in the interests of my family.  Perhaps a beneficial Singleton AI God would, and I think building such a thing might be our best shot at mattering at all to the future.  But I'm afraid we'll actually build some perverted thought-policed dystopia, or of the default outcome of being priced out of existence by competitive dynamics.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				E/acc and the political compass of AI war
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


the longhouse ought to cover the entirety of the light cone




Close, but I think the argument is "if your longhouse doesn't cover the lightcone, you can expect your colonies to spawn their own universe-eating longhouses and come knocking again once they're much bigger than you."  Then the options become: Our shitty longhouse forever, or a more competitive, alien longhouse / colonizers to come back and take all our stuff.


As far as I can tell, our only hope is that at some scales the universe is defense-favored.  In which case, yes, fine, let a thousand flowers bloom.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 27, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
My p(doom) went up again when I realized how hard it is for governments to remain aligned with their citizens.  As a simple example, they can't seem to raise a finger against mass immigration no matter how unpopular it is, because it has an economic justification.  See also: WW1.  Replacing humans throughout the economy and military is going to be irresistable.  There will probably be another, equally retarded, culture war about how this second great replacement is obviously never going to happen, then not happening, then good that it happened.


TL;DR: Even if we control AIs well, humans are going to be gradually stripped of effective power once we can no longer contribute economically or militarily.  Then it's a matter of time before we can't afford or effectively advocate for our continued use of resources that could simulate millions of minds.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 20, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Yes, consequentialism are rule-following are special cases of each other.  You got me.  The usual meaning of the word refers to situations in which they differ, i.e. any rule other than "maximize utility".


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 20, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Sounds like you still agree with us doomers?  We don't expect human greed / competitive pressures to go away any time soon, which is why we're worried about exactly the kinds of money-winning scenarios you propose.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 20, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I agree it's kind of a matter of degree.  But I also think we already have so much power-seeking around that any non-power-seeking AI will quickly be turned to that end.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 20, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I agree, but I also still see most people steadfastly refuse to extrapolate from things that are already happening.  For a while, fanciful doom scenarios were all we had as an alternative to "end of history, everything will be fine" from even otherwise serious people.