drmanhattan16
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User ID: 640
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
Publicly stated opposition, at least. In private, they tend to go for other people with above average abilities
As groups sort on IQ, they are creating their own sub-cultures, and this means they have an incentive to "go to other people" within their own group (just like all groups do). This should not be seen as evidence of a private or even implicit belief in IQ.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
How so? What criticism is dismissed simply because the underlying motivation is disgust? Disgust does not make or break an argument.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
I don't know if there's an existing discussion for it, but I want to ask if we can please remove voting entirely. My frustration with this system is immense, as it allows people to engage in blatantly partisan ways with other people - downvoting due to perceived disagreement. It bothers me when I see someone make an argument that is downvoted and not responded to. I'm not saying we have to respond to everyone, but you shouldn't be downvoting over disagreement, only if you think the post violates the rules.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
for every person who hates the voting buttons there's another who wants more visible voting and even more elaborate ways to vote and track voting.
Really? I'm fascinated by this argument. I understand that if you implement the voting system, then you want lots of ways to vote and visibility into voting. But I can't imagine why someone wants to vote in this context.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
"Hey everyone, NY Times is interviewing me for a human interest story about rationalists next week. The timing is a little weird, what with the race riots and all. Anyway she was really sweet and engaged, we talked about my petition to save Steven Hsu from cancellation!"
Who are you referring to?
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
It is me, but I was confused because you said "she was interviewing me" and unless I'm mistaken, the reporter (Cade Metz) is a man. Moreover, I don't recall the or a topic of discussion for them being the efforts to help Hsu. Also, I don't see the connection with the May/June BLM riots - an interview with a blogger seems far enough away to be unconnected. Perhaps you're speaking rhetorically, but that leaves an incorrect summarization of what happened with Scott.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
Whoops, looks like I misremembered. It was the 1600s, not the 1700s. My mistake. First, I'll quote Morrison:
Calculating Eastern [energy capture] scores is more difficult still, partly because scholars such as Cook and Smil were concerned only with the region of the world that had the highest energy capture, not with regional comparisons. We can begin, though, from the United Nations (2006) estimate that in 2000 CE the average Japanese person consumed 104,000 kilocalories per day (less than half the Western level). In 1900 the Eastern core was still largely agrarian, with Japanese oil use and even coal-powered industry in its infancy. Japanese energy capture may have been around 49,000 kcal/cap/day (again less than half of Western consumption). Across the previous five centuries coal use and agricultural output had risen steadily. In 1600 productivity was higher in the Yangzi Delta than anywhere in the West, but by 1750 Dutch and English agriculture had caught up and Eastern real wages were comparable to those in southern Europe rather than wealthy northern Europe. I have estimated energy capture in the Eastern core around 29,000 kcal/cap/day in 1400 and 36,000 in 1800, with the bulk of the increase coming in the eighteenth century.
The context here is that he's basically trying to estimate the "advanced" nature of a civilization by how much energy it uses.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
But the Foucault debate led me to think, that conservatives, or just anti-progressives, could be a lot more bold in using their own critical theory against them in a way. I think it would be a field worth studying as a way to deconstruct leftist idealism and activism in a way that, like Chomsky, would leave them looking kind of pathetic in debate.
There is, in fact, an American legal theorist whose name escapes me that argued something along the following lines: All judicial/legal decisions have no basis in reason or rationality, they are simply the product of the dominant ideology. He notes that this would mean people can do whatever they want if they are responsible for doling out legal rulings.
My apologies, I meant that he championed the idea of doling out politically desirable legal rulings under this reasoning. He was unrepentantly the kind of leftist a stereotype might be made about: that of the power-hungry kind who doesn't care what they destroy as long as it suits their political goals.
This, in my opinion, is why you will lose if you try using Critical Theory against its progressive users. They are already aware that you can use their rhetorical tools against them, and they are quite good at using their own power to ensure you can't challenge them effectively in this manner. Go ahead and publish your piece or blog post that details their own failings under Critical Theory and see how far that gets you.
The mistake in your argument, I think, is thinking that they care at all how much they are subject to Critical Criticisms. The people you are talking about have a goal in mind: install progressive thoughts about race, gender, sex, sexual relations, etc. across the minds of the population. Critical Theory is not a rationalist project seeking to be maximally truth-seeking, it was founded by activists very much trying to generate an academic "theory" for convincing people of their ideology.
Does this make them bad people? Only to the extent that people who earnestly believe in an ideology want to convert others to it are also evil.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
I didn't want to make a separate thread for this, so I'll leave it as a comment: I think we have a serious issue with diversity of opinion.
Let's be clear here, what we mean primarily is that we don't have enough people taking a stance that defends modern left-wing social activism - trying to get certain groups to higher percentages in professional settings, trying to defend race-swapping in media/having inherently diverse movies (based on physical appearance), and declaring that self-identification is the only requirement for society to be obligated to treat you as it would another of your supposed gender. As for economics, the discussions around that are infrequent and not as engaging (or should I say enraging?) for people of different views to interact.
There's a joke on the badeconomics subreddit sideboard along the lines of "Everyone has an opinion on the economy". While that's true, I'd caveat that everyone has three opinions on any social issue. No amount of discussion of inflation will generate as much discussion/heated argument as when something trans-related comes up.
My pessimistic take is there is no solution to increasing diversity of opinion here. This space is now twice removed from its original SSC community, and the evolution has selected for people willing to argue under relatively high standards who felt they couldn't get what they got elsewhere. Its founding father is a man who is critical of modern social progressivism and his audience is thus composed of people who aren't said progressives (because who else is going to stay on a blog/community if you know the main man himself think you're wrong or just outright evil?)
I'm not that right-wing, I think. I count myself among the leftward posters here. But a sense of exhaustion has set into me whenever I see another comment that isn't as charitable as it could be towards a left-wing position. Because no matter how much I argue that assuming the worst of others needs proof, there are always 10 more comments I saw but didn't have the time to respond to.
It gets old and tiresome fast.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
Hasn't the official narrative for the past couple decades been that the reason schools in the U.S. underperform is due to lack of funding?
I don't think the argument has ever been "all schools everywhere that are underperforming need funds", it's "all public schools...".
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
You're telling me, that not only is there a community successfully resisting the influence of the modern techno-dystopia, but that they're well-disciplined, vibrant, and growing... and you're telling me I'm supposed to be upset???
If ISIS were doing the same thing, would you or would you not be upset about it?
I hardly think it's a stretch of the imagination to say that most people do not believe you need to jump to the complete opposite end of the spectrum in terms of "adopting the modern secular techno lifestyle/culture" to avoid a bad outcome.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
Indeed. There's a reason we call some moves "unsportsmanlike", even if they are entirely allowed within the rules of a proverbial game.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
Yes, I understand the general form of the argument you are making. But I don't think it's nearly as contradictory as you make it out to be if you admit what I'm saying is fair. The underlying assumption is that the school is not a private religious school run by a community that refuses to work and instead leeches from welfare.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
However, I think it is completely and utterly fair to say that if a school is performing poorly, then the first step towards a solution should be examining why it is poorly run, and holding those who are in charge of it accountable. Then one should examine if the school is adequately funded and whether increasing funds would be likely to help.
No disagreement here.
In short, if we assume that the Yeshivas are failing to educate their students in important subjects, I DO NOT see why we should assume the reasons for this are somehow inherently different than if a public school likewise fails at the task.
As other commenters have mentioned, Hasidic Jews are an insular community who are politically organized to give little and take lots. They appear to actively disdain and prevent their community members from seeking employment and instead just study religion all day. They very much violate the unspoken assumption that a school is trying to make a better American citizen (loosely defined as that is) who will not take from the public more than necessary. I'd say that's deserving of higher scrutiny.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
They both want things to run smoothly, one of them obviously so they can make the most amount of money, the other one.. so they can make the most votes(money)?
The fact that they want votes at all is a sign of how much more you have to be courted under a democratic government. You may shrug and say that this influence is very small, but you don't make any exemption for population in your post. That is, you appear indifferent as to whether that government rules over you and 9 others or you and 99999 others.
Moreover, consider the fact that there is no recourse at all under the cartel's governance. If they have a shootout and you happen to be affected, who are you going to complain to? Or if they decide they want to use your property a certain way, what are you going to do? Which system would you prefer to be ruled by?
why not just legalize drugs??
Because they can ruin lives, and their nature means people cannot think rationally when partaking of them. A substance that people cannot be expected to use rationally seems like something meaningfully different than most goods.
Alright, but that's just grounds to fix all of them, not declare that what the Hasids do doesn't matter.
Edit: Also, that's an incendiary and divisive way of speaking about them. They have a different view on what makes someone a better citizen, and would describe you as trying to bring back a reactionary and bigoted government. Neither your accusation nor theirs is conducive to the discussion.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
...Because there's no religious defense being offered? For all that you want to claim hypocrisy about this, there's a big difference between "a public school that is run to spread controversial messaging to kids as truth" and "a privately run religious school which actively tells you to not do more than study religion all day".
Moreover, you seem to think that I would support the teachers unions but not the Hasidic Jews. You shouldn't assume that about me when I haven't said anything about it.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
That's irrelevant. The point I'm making, as stated in my previous post, is that just because a group rejects what the OP thinks is a dystopia doesn't mean they are somehow a good group. There are different and important reasons for rejecting both the "techno-dystopia" and the Islamic State.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
I agree that a government that tries to engage with its people beyond simply keeping the peace is going to fuck up and impose unbearable burdens on some people. But I'd gladly take a democratic government over a literal cartel, and I suspect most people would as well.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
How is that working out for Mexico? War and 100k+ missing people a year is preferable to legalizing drugs?
If you legalize it, how much is that going to cut down on the violence? Moreover, it's not as if they're only supplying domestically. I doubt the US is going to let Mexico wash its hands of efforts to prevent the export of those drugs, and this is one of those things the gangs and government fight over.
I think you are strawmanning my argument.
I'm not straw-manning the argument, I understand that your point is about perceptions of sovereignty. My point is that we should not forget that a system in which a person's vote does nothing is not the ideal for a democratic government, whereas there is no reason to think the cartels give a damn in the first place. We see real-life dictatorships which control more than the cartels do of their own countries and they don't give people real voting power either.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
Okay, but I don't only consider the perspective of outcomes, so I think it does matter. The Hasidic Jewish schools in question are not even pretending to care.
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
Interesting, does that mean you're okay with continuing to give them that money?
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
Wait, wait, wait, /r/politics is considered toxic? Isn't that place basically a left-wing-dominated subreddit? How does that figure?
drmanhattan16
1yr ago
I have to wonder if this is really how people think about it. I see it asserted, but it feels...convenient? I encountered this idea via hbomberguy, who asserted like you are that this is being done as it drums up attention via outrage. However, that means we never ask the question "Is this is just another requirement the show creators feel is necessary in the same way as they would insist on a protagonist and antagonist?"
Ian Morrison's Why the West Rules - For Now offers the following explanation
China is at the heart of East Asian civilization. At the very least, it is where civilization spreads outward from, and other nations in the area are at its periphery.
The people at the periphery tend to be fairly good at fighting the people closer to the civilizational center as they can exploit institutional weaknesses more dynamically. The adoption of better war-making technology or theories is not an easy thing to do, especially if politics is lethal.
When you conquer the center, you become it and thus start succumbing to the same flaws you exploited.
As for your question about the IR, he argues this.
Parts of China were on par with Europe's most industrialized areas even as late as the
1700s(edit: 1600s, not 1700s. My mistake).You need both willpower and the ability to industrialize. China had so many people that it could simply add reliable human power instead of capital-heavy machinery that might be unreliable. Europe, on the other hand, was caught in centuries of war which encouraged nations to and their citizens to constantly try to improve their technology. The phrase "Necessity is the mother of invention" also works in a genetic sense, as what you need influences what you make. If you don't need to industrialize, then you won't.
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