distic
1yr ago
When you say it achieves nothing, it is not a subjective statement. It si objective: either it changes something, or it doesn't. As a matter of fact it makes it more difficult to propagate such thesis so it achieves something. You might think it isn't worth it but that is a subjective claim. Anyway defamation is forbidden in most countries and holocaust denial is a defamation against victims and witnesses.
distic
1yr ago
I still dont get to know what is important or not. I'm not sure anyway that the difference between XXth century France and Russia are were bigger than between XVIIIth century and XXIst century USA...
distic
1yr ago
Your post is very interesting, yet I don't fully understand what you mean. It is true that you can learn almost everything there is to know in theory about any religious rite, but it seems to me the most important part is that you cannot live it without taking part of the spiritual journey. You spoke about the catholic communion : you can partake the catholic communion without being a catholic, at least superficially. The catholic church won't allow it, but it's not as if they were asking for your administrative records during the communion. It is not that hard to queue after everyone else and to do as if you were one of them. However, would you really live the catholic communion experience? It seems to me the most important part of it is the faith, the fact that you believe, up to some point, that you are eating the body of God after he sacrificed himself for you. Without this faith, it is just untasteful bread eating and nothing more. It's not really the same experience.
That is the same thing about the wedding. You can make a fake wedding with a girl you met yesterday but the point of the wedding experience is that you really mean that you want to live with this person. For example it is only a catholic wedding if you swear before your friends and family that you will live with your spouse and love him/her for all of your life, and if you mean it. If you don't you didn't get the experience even if you imitated perfectly every step of the rite. It's not about the secrecy of it, but about your commitment to it.
distic
1yr ago
Rejecting the claim that a god exists is not the same as claim a god doesn't exist: it doesn't require a burden of proof because it's the default position. Agnosticism is the default position. The burden of proof is on the people making the claim.
It seems to me you did not prove that. The default position is that I do not know if the default position is theism, atheism, agnosticism or something else.
By the way, if you argue that it is not proven that god exists, it means that you also argue that it is at least possible that he does not exist. So you are actually arguing (a bit) in favor of atheism.
distic
1yr ago
Expected value is not everything. For example, if you play the following game: you can choose a value n, then you will have a probability 1/n to get n^2 dollars and 1-(1/n^2) to give the other guy n/2 dollars. Your expected gain is approximately n/2 when n is large enough. You are playing with a billionaire. Is it really more rational to choose n=10000 than say n=1000 or n=2? More generally, does it makes sense to choose n=2^256 even though the other player can afford to pay if you win?
distic
1yr ago
Are you arguing that what he writes is false? For comparison, that is what is promised by the Culture War thread:
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time
Look at the discussions there are right now.
https://www.themotte.org/post/329/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/57553?context=8#context
Quality post, but not very culture war-y. Anyway, right now, no one really disagrees.
https://www.themotte.org/post/329/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/57543?context=8#context
A post criticizing a labour MP for his anti-incels politics (anti Labour so we might assume right wing). No one really disagrees.
Are The Global Elites Coordinating to Push LGBT Acceptance And Gender Theory? (https://www.themotte.org/post/329/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/57433?context=8#context )
Obviously right-wing, but there I have to admit there are some people arguing the other way. But the post was quite extreme by itself.
https://www.themotte.org/post/329/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/57424?context=8#context
A post about liberals using AI to push their views. Pretty right wing. Everyone agrees. More or less.
I stop there. I don't think the CW thread delivers on its promise to challenge your beliefs, especially if they are right wing or libertarians.
distic
1yr ago
It's not that there are right wing discussions, it's that there are almost only unchallenged right wing posts in the CW thread. The CW thread used to be a place where the culture war takes place, it is now a place where you can comment about the culture war taking place somewhere else.
distic
1yr ago
This helpful article from Wikipedia may explain it all to you, it certainly opened my eyes:
Far-right politics, also referred to as the extreme right or right-wing extremism, are political beliefs and actions further to the right of the left–right political spectrum than the standard political right, particularly in terms of being radically conservative, ultra-nationalist, and authoritarian, as well as having nativist ideologies and tendencies.
Historically, "far-right politics" has been used to describe the experiences of fascism, Nazism, and Falangism. Contemporary definitions now include neo-fascism, neo-Nazism, the Third Position, the alt-right, racial supremacism, National Bolshevism and other ideologies or organizations that feature aspects of authoritarian, ultra-nationalist, chauvinist, xenophobic, theocratic, racist, homophobic, transphobic, and/or reactionary views.
If Sanderson believes his church's teachings, and his church teaches that gay acts are sinful, then his church is homophobic. And being homophobic means you are far-right, which means you're the same thing as a Nazi. Doesn't matter if he never personally burned a gay or trans person at the stake, until and unless he denounces Mormonism and acknowledges his guilt and accepts he was wrong all along, he's a Nazi. And you don't tolerate Nazis, now do you?
You are drawing so much conclusions from a factual wikipedia article.
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It is a fact that the nazis were homophobic. It is also a fact that the nazis were far right, and also a fact that homophobia is a view held by a lot of far-right people. Are you challenging any one of these facts? It does not mean that if you are homophobic you are far right or a nazi. You know, most people have two legs but birds aren't people. By the way, you should have noted the "and/or" in the list, which suggests that far right people hold several of those views, not just one.
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"Doesn't matter if he never personally burned a gay or trans person at the stake, [...] he's a Nazi." When you do this comment, it seems to me you are saying that anyone who did not personally burned anyone cannot be a Nazi. In this case, there have been very few nazis. Hitler, for example, did not burn anyone "personally", as far as I know. At the end, the holocaust was organized in such a way that almost no one had to kill anyone directly. Not every nazi is a war criminal. Most nazis were just people like you and me that lived their lives peacefully. They just happened to vote for some nazi guy once, and to help the regime once in a while.
distic
1yr ago
It means nothing because there is no control group. Replace "prayer" with a drug, and you get a shitty observational study that does not mean anything. I wouldn't take this drug.
distic
1yr ago
It's not so much about the faith ("the structure of beliefs") as about your personal journey and your community. You can have a muslim wedding if you are from a christian background, but you won't live it the same way as someone from a muslim family. His family will know the rite and be a part of it, while yours will be just spectators (if they are comfortable attending at all). At the end that is not the same experience.
distic
1yr ago
like the framework of being a revolutionary ideology to remake all society in their own image
The libertarians are the same, so they are some kind of socialists?
If just being racist and homophobic is enough, then Marx, Engels and Guevera are "far-right"
Racism and homophobia weren't particularly important in their politics. That is what matters.
If we're going to ignore the distinctions and categories enough to group Brandon Sanderson with the Nazis
I never said you should group Brandon Sanderson with the nazis because I don't know him and I'm not interested in fantasy authors anyway. That is not my point, and that is certainly not the point of the wikipedia article either.
distic
1yr ago
I will comply, but should I really report someone that is arguing like that? It seems to me that he broke no rule apart from those of logic.
distic
1yr ago
That seems like a very isolated standard that I have never seen applied to anyone before, and doesn't hold besides.
The fact that you have seen it applied or not is not very relevant. You can write an abstract of Marx writings without ever mentionning race or homosexuality and you wouldn't miss much. The same cannot be said about far right leaders or thinkers. On guevara, you are probably right, I don't know. Anyway as I stated before those things cannot be taken in isolation. Just because you are homophobic does not mean you are far right. For example, I don't think the distinction between gender and sex makes any sense (at least not as it is applied in liberal ideology). Some people would call me transphobic. But as I'm not racist and homophobic, I don't think I would qualify as far right by any reasonable standard.
What did you think the point of the wiki article was, if not offering institutional support to a wildly expansive definition of "far right"?
As it is an article about the far right, I'd say its purpose is to inform people about what is called far right by most people in our society. I'd be very interested to read your version of a definition of the far right...
distic
1yr ago
Racists are far-right, homophobes are far-right, and homophobia means not being enthusiastic about everything you are told to be enthusiastic about.
I'm sorry, where do you read this in the wikipedia article? Especially the part in bold?
distic
1yr ago
Atheism answers the question of belief, and agnosticism the question of knowledge: they are orthogonal.
Sorry, what do you mean by that? Are you saying you can believe something you know to be false? because it is a consequence of the orthogonality.
distic
1yr ago
Far left do focus on economy because that is what far left is about. Das Kapital speaks a lot about economy, Mein Kampf not so much. It's precisely the nature of the far left ideologies to think that everything is about making the rich richer.
distic
1yr ago
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As you are claiming that the effect of prayer come from the truth of your faith (and not just on some psychological phenomenon) you cannot count the other religion as "the same medicine" as those religions believe yours to be false.
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Anyway, the fact that people "claim to benefit" from something does not mean they really benefit from it. A lot of atheists also claim to benefit from atheism, don't they?
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Religion increases longevity, it does not mean that prayer does. There is no proof that a religion without prayer would not also increase longevity as long as it promotes a healthy lifestyle.
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Religion might increase the longevity of religious people, but religious countries are poorer and have a worse longevity than not-so-religious countries. So it seems religion increases the longevity of the religious people at the expense of the average longevity of the country. It's a bit as if religious people were vampires, killing everyone else to extend their own life. But as religious people show less altruism (see https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/children-with-a-religious-upbringing-show-less-altruism/ ), they probably don't care.
distic
1yr ago
I can give you some historical data. The initial message spoke about "decades past the last French monarch actually was on throne", and yours about "quickly revert[ing] to a [monarchy] in all but name".
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It should be noted that before the French Revolution, some french women had a right to vote in some circumstances: those that were declared heads of a noble family, because they were widows or single, or some religious women, were called to vote in the Etat Généraux. It is irrelevant to the discussion.
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The last french monarchy died in 1848. It is also in 1848 that all french men got the right to vote (before that, the right to vote was limited to a few rich men).
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The Second Empire lasted from 1952 to 1870.
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After 1870, France was a Republic, except for 4 years during Second World War.
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Women got the right to vote in France in 1944 (so right after second world war) and voted for the first time in 1945.
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Some people on the left argue that France is still some kind of monarchy (a "republican monarchy") since 1958 (Fifth Republic) as the president is very powerful. However, as the president is elected for a finite amount of time, I suppose that is not what you could call "a monarchy in all but name".
So I think "decades past the last French monarch actually was on throne" meant from 1870 to 1944.
But to what degree do we know that women were actually more royalist decades after the revolution?
It is a difficult question to answer, but the question was not only that they were royalist, but that they were supposed to be more religious than men. It is difficult to know if it is true, but it is certain that it was one of the main arguments advanced by the anticlerical Parti Radical, which was a strong centrist party under the Third Republic.
distic
1yr ago
But when you say you are transgender, you at least believe in the theory that gender and sex are not the same thing, right? Certainly, if you claim you are a unicorn, you believe unicorns do exist? Do you think that the hatred toward a cisgender white man claiming he believes in this theory would be any different from the hatred toward a transgender man?
distic
1yr ago
You might be on something. In another message in this CW thread, someone implies that companies want their sector to be as lightly regulated as possible. However, it seems to me it is not always true. Think about children toys: if the regulations remain light, then there is no or less incentive to buy new toys compared to re-use older ones. If the regulations become heavier, then old children toys become dangerous. You should not re-use them. You should buy new ones. Why would the toy industry oppose it? In this case, it might be a win-win situation (children get safer toys, and toy companies get more money).
But you can also have the exact same phenomenon with "social regulation" or with authorship. It might be expensive to compete with the best works of the past. You have to hire talented people, to give them money, and even then you have a high failure risk. So what about lowering the bar? Just use whatever social trend to make the older works worse, out of fashion. And if it makes you free of the authors and their IP, even better, right?
The problem with those claims is that they are non falsifiable. "Surface level" does not mean anything. I can prove that there is a huge difference and you can still claim it to be on surface level only. Actually your theory is really like marxism "anything non surface level can be explained by the class strugle". I am quite sure Marx would have loved your theory.
France, and a lot of other european countries, resist the american version of capitalism in some ways, and imitate it in other ways. If I say that all modern science is french because it uses the metric system excepted on a surface level, it is a ridiculous claim yet you can hardly disprove it as I did never explain what a surface level is. The french unions, the number of companies where the gouvernement has stocks (eg car companies, the train transportation company SNCF 100% state owned...), and the relationship of the people with the government are examples of things that are very different between french capitalism and american capitalism.
And hiding insults behind loosely related theories won't prove your point.
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