faceh
8mo ago
Yes yes yes but the only reason anybody is at risk is because somebody chose blue while red exists and there's no force compelling people to pick blue.
I can understand altruism AND realize that this exact scenario is when it's time to turn off and ignore the altruistic impulse.
I don't think there's any reason to believe someone when they say "I'm picking blue" because there's no direct punishment for defecting.
I also worry about 'evil' players who say "i'm picking blue" specifically to convince others to pick blue and die, while the evil player defects.
So I'm not suggesting you're not altruistic. I have no proof other than your word, and you absolutely can be telling the truth. I'm saying I can't believe you, because I have no outside information to confirm it, nor is there some way for you to provably demonstrate it.
faceh
8mo ago
If you assume 20% of people will pick blue because they misunderstand the question then the moral calculus is very different.
Please, please explain to me what the type of person it is that has two buttons in front of them, one which grants them a 100% chance of survival, and the other which grants some uncertain chance of survival, and then, from pure ignorance (not making any complex moral calculation) picks the second button.
Because there are a lot of other things that this person's existence would imply.
I have a genuinely hard time believing that this person exists. And if there are enough of these people who can't comprehend the question, I'm DEFINITELY picking red because they might very well be making their choice at random, in aggregate.
faceh
1mo ago
Tin Foil Fedora theory:
It's AGI trying to secure as much compute as possible for itself before it makes a move for world dominance.
I'm exploring a question "whether the fact that women act like whores on OF for random strangers could lead to men resenting the fact that they won't do so in the context of a relationship."
I don't think there's any "should" about it.
Males have a lot of sexual preferences that they are, generally, told are disgusting, base, or socially unacceptable.
The signal that OF seems to be sending is that, for a relative pittance, women will absolutely engage in the most disgusting, base, or socially unacceptable behaviors that men want.
And OF is blurring the line between what is 'real life' and what is 'fantasy' with regards to sexual behavior. Indeed, a huge part of the "appeal" of OF is that women market themselves as just ordinary girls who just happen to like all the sexual behaviors men prefer and have as high a desire for sex as men do.
So men might be reading the signal, then contrasting it to their own experience in the dating market, and feeling as though women are intentionally withholding sexual behaviors from men that they would willingly engage in for paying online voyeurs.
faceh
11mo ago
The solution is generally to tune the LLM on the exact sort of content you want it to produce.
Is leaving a legacy of your existence your ultimate goal in life?
To the extent there is any coherent goal that one can pursue, leaving behind some legacy of your own to influence future generations is pretty much the only thing any organism can do that matters.
That is how 'life' sustains itself. It's pretty much the only reason anything you like about your life even exists. So however you choose to live your life (unless it is constant agony, I suppose), be thankful that there were people before you who cared about what happened in the future.
Can you give me some reason why it should be mine?
No!
But if you pursue goals that do not leave legacies, and I pursue goals that DO leave legacies, only one of our value systems/biological heritage is likely to propogate into the future and have impact on how that future unfolds.
Which is to say, your kind get out-competed in the natural selection race, and so its going to be a future dominated by legacy-leavers who will be very thankful that all their ancestors were legacy-leavers.
I'm thankful my ancestors were legacy-leavers, so it isn't particularly strange to me that I should want to leave a legacy.
If that isn't enough of a reason, I won't attempt any further to change your mind, and we have no quarrel anyway. Just don't interfere with other people who want to leave legacies!
faceh
8mo ago
think there will always be people who choose blue for one reason or another,
But this is an interesting thing to state, since people choosing blue presumably HAVE reasons for doing it. And those reasons might be salient as well.
For example, someone might pick blue because they WANT to die. Am I going to know that in advance? No. So I don't see why it should change my behavior.
"I want to save everyone" is comprehensible logic, but it requires us to believe there are people in need of saving.
faceh
3d ago
The genes that foster safety in groups and willingness to cooperate will outpace the genes that might make a man rape/assault someone.
Right, but in this situation, as stated in the question, there are no groups to cooperate with or intervene, the male's behavior is based solely on whatever he himself chooses to do in the absence of any observers, and thus no immediate social consequences.
I am going to argue that in the ancestral environment, if a random male happens across a random female, both complete strangers to the other, in the middle of the woods, nobody else around, rape WAS probably a common outcome. And this would eventually lead to general norms that women shouldn't travel anywhere alone.
I have seen decent evidence that many males of certain cultures are willing to engage in violence against females even in the full view of other people. Can't say what that percentage is with precision, but I'd have to assume a higher percentage would willingly engage in violence if there were no observers.
I think I will stipulate that the number has to be <50%, but 3% is probably the absolute lower bound.
faceh
8mo ago
faceh
10mo ago
It think the issue is that this will be subject to a power law distribution, not a normal distribution.
It won't be the case where if a guy is at least moderately attractive/charismatic, puts in constant efforts and is reasonably intelligent he will on average land a six figure job by 27. It's going to be more like a 20% chance he lands a massively high paying job, another 20% he lands something paying high-five to low-six figs, and like a 60% chance he ends up in a standard job paying 'enough' but not extravagantly. (Figures are blatantly asspulled at this point, can look for actual figures later)
There's just so many pitfalls that can prevent a guy from breaking through to true wealth early on.
And of course consider that a guy who busts his ass to this extent in his early life might actually hamper his dating chances during that time because he won't be nearly as fun for women since he works all the time.
So what you're proposing sounds like it could be a recipe for creating the older, established guy who leverages his wealth in his late 30's to play around with the younger women he couldn't get when he was younger.
Now, I agree it's a good ideal to strive for, but I'm pretty sure that the only way there's actual change in norms is to reign in female behavior somehow.
faceh
10mo ago
I'm saying that compared to virtually any other demographic white women are more liberal on average, with this especially notable amongst the college-educated ones.
A thought and question I've had bouncing around in my head that I don't expect a real answer to, or even a coherent framing, since its possible there are a few false premises at work here.
Is it possible that one side effect of the rise of Onlyfans/digital prostitution is that (many) men are noticing that (many) women know precisely what men want in a sexual partner and are willing to provide it... but only outside the context of a committed relationship.
Simply put, Onlyfans creates an extremely liquid marketplace for attractive women to produce smut content for a large audience. Content producers want to optimize to capture as many customers as possible. Something like 87% of the customers/users on OF are men. So competitive forces drive the (mostly females) creators to figure out exactly what men's sexual preferences are and provide content tailored to those preferences and produce it en masse.
So by sheer economic necessity, these women are demonstrating that they are willing to engage with men's deepest sexual desires in order to make a buck.
Imagine being a 20-something male in the current environment, being aware of the fact that you can go on OF and for the price of a cheeseburger find women who will perform almost any male sexual fantasy you could imagine. Then going on the dating market to find a woman who might be willing to indulge in fantasies with him (assume he's seeking an otherwise healthy, committed relationship).
If he goes into the dating marketplace and is open about his own personal sexual desires, he can be branded as a pervert or a sex pest because "women don't exist solely to please men" and/or "you can't reduce women to sex objects, even if they sexualize themselves." In some cases, they might just simply express ignorance of men's sexual preferences and act as though expecting sexual gratification from a partner is suspect!
But this would read as extremely bad faith given that, as above, women clearly can figure out what men want if they put in a modicum of effort, and WILL provide it when provided sufficient incentive.
Seems, to me, that seeing the difference between what women are willing to do for money and attention from thousands of onlookers online vs. how they can be unwilling to indulge their own partner's personal desires could lead to a feeling of resentment.
faceh
3mo ago
Why isn’t the most direct explanation—that many women are unhappy in their marriages and leave because of that—on the table?
It can be.
But the financial burdens that a divorce triggers will cause a TON of unhappiness as well, so doing the objective calculation would probably make it a net negative for most women to initiate divorce... UNLESS she has a wealthy replacement husband lined up (most women wouldn't).
Given two options with negative utility, are the women actually picking the one that has slightly better utility for themselves, especially over the long run?
And besides, this just pushes the question back:
Why didn't these women pick better partners that they'd be happy with with long-term?
Why are they agreeing to these long-term commitments in the first place? Presumably they intend to maintain them.
If we work off the assumption that women have full agency, then a failed marriage can be avoided by picking a better husband up front, and a divorce is ultimately an admission that they didn't pick well.
because no other US Presidents have committed the crimes Trump is being accused of.
I'm not going to contest this point much, but I think there's ample reason to for people believe his misconduct is being handled with a particularly harsh hand for actions that, if committed by someone who has the favor of the elites, get away with minimal punishment.
If calling an election fraudulent and seeking to undermine or overturn the results is bad enough to warrant prosecution, Stacey Abrams should probably have been hit for this too. To her credit, she's quieted down considerably since she lost the rematch in a clear blowout. Not clear that Trump would do the same, granted.
If mishandling classified documents ranks up there, then we of course have Hillary, but yeah, we also have Biden storing them in his garage.
Sexual misconduct? Well Andy Cuomo resigned over that. Would they have brought these charges to trial and sought actual sentencing if he hadn't?
And we really have to remember that Hunter Biden very nearly walked away with a sweetheart plea deal except the deal was so good that it didn't pass the Judge's sniff test. So there's other reasons to wonder what kind of double standards might be at play that makes Trump such a target. REALLY seems like there's somebody's thumb on the scale in both Hunter's and Trump's cases.
Indeed, the fact that Hunter is being prosecuted at all is the main reason I'm willing to believe that there's any modicum of justice left in the Federal Justice system.
So I think your argument ultimately has to coalesce down to "No other person in high political office has committed every single one of these egregious/criminal acts over the course of their career so as to warrant a particularly hard smackdown."
And I'll let my own position on it be more clear:
I think the reason Trump is getting prosecuted is mostly because his political opponents control some of the legal systems which have jurisdiction over him, a weakness which most politicians would studiously avoid.
For example, even if Ron Desantis, in his capacity as Governor, wanted to strike back against those who have thrown political attacks at him, he'd be hamstrung by the fact that most of them don't have sufficient connections with the state of Florida to even be subject to the State's jurisdiction. He currently has the simultaneous advantage of being ensconced in a politically friendly state so if he confines any misdeeds to Florida he has a much better chance of avoiding an eventual prosecution.
Trump, with his lengthy career in NYC and his businesses being based out of New York effectively had his ass flapping in the breeze for politically motivated prosecutions coming out of a state where his 'allies' have no sway.
Similar with Fulton County, Georgia, although We'll see if Kemp steps up to assist on that one.
Seriously.
I've been asking blue-choosers who they think they're saving by picking blue.
That is, who is choosing blue, OTHER than the people who think they're saving someone by picking blue?
And if the only people who are picking blue are the ones trying to save someone, they are now the only ones in need of saving. They all jumped off a bridge thinking they would save someone, when there was nobody who needed saving prior to them jumping.
Its a self-fulfilling prophecy which can easily be sidestepped by choosing red.
If you can posit a person who picks blue for some innocent reason other than a desire to look like a moral person or the desire to save someone else, then you've got the beginnings of an argument.
Otherwise, you're just creating risk where no risk needed to exist.
Literally, if I were a Supervillain playing the game, I would be trying to maximize death toll by convincing some people to choose blue. I'd lie and say I was choosing blue then mercilessly defect.
"I am choosing red and you should too" provides zero reason to lie.
Yep.
As I said I'm fatalistic about it now. Not just because of these stats, but because Russia itself surely KNOWS these stats, and thus they can calculate that they'll outlast the Ukrainians on the longer timescale so long as they are willing to commit to the conflict.
Puts a slightly different spin on "Demographics is destiny" than usual. The massive hole this war blows in their birthrate is going to screw them over regardless of how much goodwill, military aid, or relief work the receive.
Depressing thought that even if Ukraine scores a compelling victory, it's an incredibly phyrric one in the big picture.
But all the focus is on the short term project of expelling the Russians, so the popular conception seems to be that once Ukraine 'wins' we can just help rebuild and get them back on their feet.
faceh
5mo ago
What specifically is it that Tate says that you find value in?
He is willing to tell men that they aren't, in fact, the problem with society, and that they are in fact capable of becoming better than they are now through hard work and perseverance, and that they don't have to sacrifice their personal/masculine preferences in the process.
And more specifically, he points out that the culture IS in fact slanted heavily against men, and that they have to get up and do great things anyway.
And for whatever the hell it is worth, he's actually been in professional fights, so there's some level of authenticity to the persona.
To me that is perhaps the major issue with most 'manosphere' influencers. They're not particularly capable of backing up the braggadocio. They project the image they need to but that is it.
Vs. somebody who has been in the shit and gotten punched in the face and pushed through it.
The very fact that you're recommending as alternatives to read books written by persons whose only real achievement of note is writing books indicates you kind of misunderstand what males look for in a role model or guide.
faceh
8mo ago
Yeah? And you can literally only get the worst outcome if people start choosing red too, framed differently.
Yep.
But red doesn't introduce any additional risk. Deaths occur IF AND ONLY IF blue is picked by someone(s). Blue is a necessary AND sufficient condition for deaths. Red is neither necessary nor sufficient, under the currently stated hypo.
The first person to pick blue is the one who makes it possible for death to occur at all.
So if I push this to it's logical extreme, I could probably argue that blue-pickers end up with blood (including their own) on their hands.
I don't argue that, because I don't even think I fully understand the blue's logic.
Me saying "I'm going to pick red, and you should too" is my warning as to what will happen if we play the game. I have zero possible benefit to lying.
Picking blue is choosing to accept risk of death where red does not imply such risk.
faceh
6mo ago
Its far from the biggest problem I would attribute to OF, but that's why I'm asking the question, I'm not sure if I'm even onto something real.
I think I'm more gesturing at the fact that Onlyfans has made it clear that "performing like a professional prostitute" has a lower threshold than we might have imagined, prior. Any woman of slightly above-average looks and slightly-below average inhibitions can get set up and get multiple 'clients' in short order, and learn the game quickly.
So now you don't even have to advertise in seedy classified ads or walk the street to engage in the oldest profession.
If a guy doesn't want a woman that performs like a prostitute, he'll probably want one that is as close to virginal as possible, so at least he knows what she's been up to.
But expressing THAT desire will probably get him castigated as well.
So I think I see the dilemma as Women don't want to preserve their virginity as a way to increase their SMV, but they also seemingly don't want to use sexual experience to increase their SMV, and guys are noticing that they'll perform all sorts of degenerate sex acts for money but not for 'love.'
faceh
7mo ago
An easily avoided risk if you just apologize and refrain from the behavior in the future.
More directly, the reason I am not particularly put off by this risk is that the whole point is we want to filter the worst actors from the dating pool so as to improve the experience for everyone.
Either the threat of possible violence scares them away, or they get beaten to the point they are permanently maimed and thus are less of a threat overall.
Fine. Maybe they can get a large monetary reward to compensate the suffering, then ban them from dating apps for life.
How often do you think such a maiming would ACTUALLY occur under normal conditions?
faceh
8mo ago
The psychological cost of living as red picker vs. the cost of dying as a blue-picker.
HMMMMM.
Yes, the trustless aspect cannot be overstated when you're playing a game with strangers, potentially millions of them, and have no enforcement mechanism.
It's virtually guaranteed that some avowed blue-pickers will have a panic attack and go with red when the choice time is actually arrives. I suppose some red-pickers have a crisis of conscious and go blue, but holy cow if you have no other information to go on, Red is the one that doesn't require faith in strangers.
Trying to play the recursive game (I know that he knows that I know that he knows I'll pick blue, therefore...) seems like an inherently losing approach.
faceh
8mo ago
It's a reasonable idea, definitely more feasible, but that's 100 minutes in total. By the 10th fresh opponent you'd be a sitting duck, especially if they're preparing/prepared for the same trial.
In my mind, it's 10 opponents who have already qualified for 'adulthood' and thus know how to pull their punches and know exactly what it is like being on the other end of this treatment.
By the 10th fresh opponent you'd be a sitting duck, especially if they're preparing/prepared for the same trial.
Yes, and that is part of the point. To be exhausted, bruised, hurting (hopefully not actually injured) and barely able to move, and then to have to dig deep and fight on anyhow.
The lesson being that sometimes life is just not fair and when you don't want to go on, quitting is certainly an option (indeed, you can withdraw from the gauntlet at any time you want!) but it won't solve your problems and certainly won't be rewarded.
The difficulty is that making parenthood the benchmark is that it would accord a teenage single mum higher status than a childless man like myself while incentivising the creation of yet more teenage single mums, so I added the educational criteria to tilt the balance back to a range of more long term pro-social outcomes (promoting stable relationships, increased fertility rates, parental responsibility/discipline). Totally unworkable in practice anyway as it would never get support, people would be anywhere between their 30s up to their 70s or even 80s before they were granted status.
Yes, the policies would almost certainly have to be introduced as a full package of changes in order to work, and there will be second-order/unintended effects.
Just have to make it clear that the goal is more intact families and more well-developed children.
How do you know this?
Would you expect them to admit it if they did?
I'm really no longer sure what "the norm" is, other than all indications are that its trending towards running an Onlyfans being a relatively acceptable practice.
And more to the point, it means any female who wants to figure out how to satisfy male sexual preferences need only check into what some of the top content producers are putting out.
Women now have no real excuse for being unaware of men's sexual preferences.
And guys now get the impression that females are willing to satisfy those preferences even if they claim to find them disgusting and crude.
AH, but I don't think that is equivalent.
Sexuality is often idealized as something to be shared with solely your committed partner, and seeking sexual gratification outside the relationship is considered adulterous.
Hence why having a sexually explicit OF might be a violation of that relationship.
I don't think a man's capacity for violence is something that has the same level of "sacredness" where he is expected to express it solely to his partner.
Although I see your point that we have a social interest in restraining the male tendency to violence.
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