I was about to give you some rather absurd butterfly-effect scenarios so I appreciate you narrowing this to a more active discussion.
First you point out the practical consequences of the power to enforce private morality: it can enforce other arbitrary rules as well. Therefore we balance the inherent interest to be nosy into private business with the practical problems.
(as an aside: we have sufficiently answered why anyone else cares about private intimate lives here, and now it's merely a practical question of how much to enforce)
People gather and enforce laws about things that plausible worry them, and other's can call them fascist regardless of whether they control the flow of commerce or not. Nosiness seems an inherent problem.
When Orwell writes that fascism restricts sexuality, it seems like he means that these fascists believe there is a link between unregulated sexuality and danger to the public. And he thinks they go to far in practically enforcing it because he disagrees with the magnitude of the danger. If he became convinced it was as dangerous as they he would enforce the same laws? Or does he believe there is never a possible danger to 'public interest' from sexuality.
Second, as to the question of what the point of "advancing" a nation without sex, it seems like the fascists have a notion of what a nation is supposed to do and regard the pleasure of intimacy to be something to overcome. In a way it's like asking a body-builder what the point of living without glutenous eating and slothy relaxion. And then they use violence to enforce it on other people.
Fascism does seem to lead to collapse, which is a strong argument against it on it's own terms. If you claim to desire "strength" then why do you stab yourself? Sticking to the practical theme, I think it's some mix of selfish cruelty and short-sightedness and general power-seeking behavior.
Edit: For a concrete example of this stuff, I think of the arguments certain feminists make against privately viewing pornography. A private consensual sexual act that nevertheless has some arguments for (and against) it's public harm. Perhaps they are fascists.
flitter
2d ago
Asking why anyone else cares for consensual private lives is effective rhetoric against banal edicts about which holes a penis can go into, sure.
Or are you truly asking why anyone cares?
I believe there are no truly private actions. What you do in private has some effect on others in hidden ways that you cannot prevent. This means that rules of public morality have corresponding limitations on private activity.
We can explain this more clearly using some extreme examples that stretch the limits of what privacy and consensual means. But the examples I reach for are not in the spirit of your question. Like private conception of new moral patients, construction of some super-weapon to use against the world, or privately signing away natural rights.
Or we can strengthen the hypothetical by asking whether there are simple limited scope actions done in true privacy with only rational and consenting beings somehow truly sealed from the impacting anything else ever again, that are yet still themselves somehow immoral. Is this closer to your question?
She has excellent awareness of Mr Collins' character. And arguably good judgement of Mr Bingly. And same for other men in the book. So rather it's two men in particular she was wrong about?
Both of them are deliberately deceiving her. One a conman who fooled everyone in her social circle (i think?). The other is too conscious of her low social rank to correct her (she even asks him to justify and he declines).
She is fooled yes, but this cannot be a character flaw. Everyone was fooled. Who judged better than her?
flitter
19d ago
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of mid.
flitter
20d ago
I think you picked a poor example for your joke. Elizabeth was perfectly worthy and good when she first met Darcy and it was due to his flaws that they were not amicable.
He's rude to her and she believes he is a bad person because of it. Her growth in the book was learning that her first impressions of the men around here didn't see their full story. But there was never doubt about that she was worthy of their pursuit.
Here's that initial meeting from the book:
"You are dancing with the only handsome girl in the room" said Mr. Darcy, looking at the eldest Miss Bennet.
"Oh! She is the most beautiful creature I ever beheld! But there is one of her sisters sitting down just behind you, who is very pretty, and I dare say very agreeable. Do let me ask my partner to introduce you."
"Which do you mean?" and turning round he looked for a moment at Elizabeth, till catching her eye, he withdrew his own and coldly said: "She is tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me; I am in no humour at present to give consequence to young ladies who are slighted by other men. You had better return to your partner and enjoy her smiles, for you are wasting your time with me."
Mr. Bingley followed his advice. Mr. Darcy walked off; and Elizabeth remained with no very cordial feelings toward him. She told the story, however, with great spirit among her friends; for she had a lively, playful disposition, which delighted in anything ridiculous.
flitter
1mo ago
Yeah I think this piece in particular is pathologically rhetoric because he's defending the honor of bay area rationalism from 'institutional bullying'.
The bayarea+math combo is a weakness for his reporting.
His formal training is in philosophy and medicine. Probably helps him with analogies and intuition pumps, but it's also training in sophistry.
flitter
1mo ago
Well, it's as they say, everyone's a high decoupler until it's something they actually care about.
He seems to feel personal slighted by how Pinker dismisses the rationalist communities ideas. and wants to write an essay on how Pinker is completely wrong on everything. But perhaps the facts are not strong enough to do that.
But anyway you don't have to dismiss Scott's other work completely. You can rule public ideas-guys in, not out https://slatestarcodex.com/2019/02/26/rule-genius-in-not-out/.
I think about this every time I hear someone say something like “I lost all respect for Steven Pinker after he said all that stupid stuff about AI”. Your problem was thinking of “respect” as a relevant predicate to apply to Steven Pinker in the first place. Is he your father? Your youth pastor? No? Then why are you worrying about whether or not to “respect” him? Steven Pinker is a black box who occasionally spits out ideas, opinions, and arguments for you to evaluate. If some of them are arguments you wouldn’t have come up with on your own, then he’s doing you a service. If 50% of them are false, then the best-case scenario is that they’re moronically, obviously false, so that you can reject them quickly and get on with your life.
flitter
1mo ago
A stopped clock sometimes tells the truth because it is so broken it can't tell the difference.
A working yet biased clock is never right. It will always tell you a turned story, always deceive you in direction of it's aim.
No I will not help you find reputable sources of information
For any particular reason? or is that coming in part 2. I may have missed your point here
flitter
4mo ago
Would open up opportunity for players to collude: we'll tank our chances to win this game so you guys bet big, if you do the same for us.
Which might not matter much. But it's still the league's best interest to offer a full clear barrier between players and gambling. At least while the public still cares more about this than a gambling partnership can buy.
flitter
4mo ago
Necro posting that i finally read this paper, neat. Found out my copy of Pale Fire corrected the italics for "Hiding place".
flitter
7mo ago
Is comment ironic? I have a poor sarcasm tell and would like you to speak more plainly here if so. I am uninformed on the object level here I apologize.
You said "It might be another matter if [..] the Secretary of State, CIA director, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs all told him the Israelis were full of shit"
Skimming parent posts you are replying to right here it seems like other people think that is exactly the case. Do these comments meet your bar for manpliation then? Or do you think they are misrepresenting this information?
(Chairman Join Chief) General Caine replied: “Sir, this is, in my experience, standard operating procedure for the Israelis. They oversell, and their plans are not always well-developed. They know they need us, and that’s why they’re hard-selling.”
The C.I.A. director used one word to describe the Israeli prime minister’s regime change scenarios: “farcical.”
Everyone seems to be against this war now, or is leaking that they were against it. Vance was against it. General Caine was against it. The CIA was against it. The blame is getting shoved off onto Trump and Netanyahu
flitter
11mo ago
Coolness is associated with freedom and relaxation and confidence yes. So caring less about what others think is usually cool, but the neurotic person dutifully buckling seatbelts for a 5 minute pickup jaunt is not cool. (not to say they aren't cool in general, just in this specific moment. they could very well be cool to give a moving eulogy when a drunk driver ends the merry ride early for anyone not wearing a seatbelt)
I've used some adjectives to stack the deck unfairly here of course, because this pup would be cooler than a try-hard wannabe that would like to buckle seatbelt but avoids doing so because they care so much about what other people think.
There's something about the fact that the doing (seatbelt) is uncool and the actively-non-doing (unbuckling to fit in) is double-uncool and the passive-non-doing (jaunt) is the cool thing.
Additionally: consider proportionality of safety-ism. Teen wearing a helmet for a razor scooter is uncool. Neil Armstrong triple-checking industrial buckles is very cool. (source: my opinion). Whether wearing a seatbelt is cool or not depends on which reference class a car-ride feels like.
flitter
1yr ago
I think it's another "every generation feels the next is dumbner for not knowing things" paired with the fact that it's always true and we are probably consistently getting dumber year to year.
Old people made fun of me for knowing nothing about cars or the civil war generals, and now we get to make fun of them for computers.
Even our "dumb college students" stereotypes are getting dumbner. Compare this freshman of philosophy: https://youtube.com/watch?v=57vCBMqnC1Y
flitter
1yr ago
How does restricting people from using your ideas end up enabled idea sharing?
The theory is that patents protect the people that figured out the ideas to share them and get compensation if people license them, which protects inventors from copycats and allows publishing patented ideas
In a world without patents: if i come up with a brilliant steam engine design, and go to a factory and ask them to make it for me, they could simply steal the design and claim they came up with it. And then the factory would have to carefully guard the secret techniques for making this new engine from rival factories that would steal the design.
flitter
1yr ago
Reminiscent of this discussion on whether to list Lance Armstrong's objective achievements on wikipedia; https://www.themotte.org/post/3311/friday-fun-thread-for-october-10/375101
Although this thread is more about ethics outside the game (steroids are in the game) and chess. So maybe Bobby Fischer is a better comparison? His achievements aren't hidden but there's often an asterisk
flitter
1yr ago
"Bi-partisan" has those positive generally-agreed-on connotations
Non-partisan doesn't really imo
flitter
1yr ago
I was thinking that a game could present more author Text, while literary criticism can only offer alternatives through ambiguity.
I've had trouble understanding literary criticism before, so I intuitively see the additional text of a video game as more real (and therefore different) from literary implications. On reflection seems there's less difference than I thought
flitter
1yr ago
More power and game changes depending on choices is the thing I'm pointing at. Because choose-your-own-adventure books can't change the experience depending on the choices.
Dishonored is a great example too. The game offers the player all these fun powers to brutally murder enemies, which makes the decision to endure a stealth low-revenge play-though aligns the player-as-human and player-as-morality-in-game decision making. Someone playing blind might not realize that the action-fight at the end is a consequence of their actions in the game.
Dishonored also has a unique video-game feature of choices that take creativity to recognize as a choice at all. Like the mission in Dishonored where Corvo signs up to duel a party-goer, and first to death wins. But the player can use sleep-darts instead of lethal-darts to win the duel without killing the other person.
flitter
1yr ago
A notable difference I see between Pale Fire and Dark Souls is that there's a real possibility for a reader to miss the content of the underlying story as a medium.
When reading a poem like Pale Fire the reader can experience the story differently depending on order they read the poem and the footnote-narrative. But because the medium of the book presents all the story in the same up front manner there's no opportunity (at a medium level) to hide a second story underneath such that someone exploring every nook and cranny is going to find a new character that they couldn't even perceive without some skill/knowledge/exploration checks in the interactive domain.
A novice reader can simply open up page 140 of Pale Fire and plainly observe the words of Kinbote's commentary, whereas a novice Dark Souls cannot observe Gwyndolin's story or even know it's there ahead of time.
question of difficulty and slogging-through as an emotional experience [....] look at
I probably should, but cheeky answer is that I probably won't go the first-hand experience. While I enjoy the idea of it I probably won't walk the walk in this kind of thing.
branching paths, like morality choices changing the game
I full agree on changing the game itself, the way of interaction, more than the branching morality paths.
Choose-your-own-advence books have branching paths based on choice to experience, but because of the medium can't give a difference experience depending on the choice, only different words.
Is framing left-wring thoughts that way an effect from reading themotte? Bc I see the opposite a lot on reddit, which makes me think it's a bubble thing.
What kind of frames are you thinking of? Seems poor strategy; and i've seen alot of language discipline on internal leftist framing for immigration (would you say illegal alien?) and unhoused individuals.
flitter
1yr ago
Meta-gaming question I have is: what are some game stories that can only function in the form of a game. Archetypal games that were bound to happen at some point.
Games have art, music, story as components. The unique part is the interactive component with the player. A game like SpecOps:TheLine could function as a book. Spitballing a few famous tropes.
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game has no story. pure skill expression.
- tetris.
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gameplay making sure the player understands the story.
- Detective games sort-of?
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games that setup difficulty as an exclusive club:
- trophies and achievements in general. getting over it summit experience.
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games where the entire main story is a lie that the player can optionally uncover
- dark souls has a major one, and it's old enough not to be a spoiler
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morality where being evil makes the game easier
- bioshock sacrificing littler-sisters. PapersPlease sort-of. Requires interactive medium to make it Easier for the player not just the protagonist
flitter
1yr ago
Conservatives are trained not to use the language of liberals. Liberals are not so trained
Seems backwards to me? Is he distinguishing progressives from liberals. Or maybe it's a bubble thing?
I've heard a lot of conservative talking points expressed in liberal language. Needing a safe space and representation in history class. Or arguments that democrats are the real racists, or Ayn Rand quotes supporting libertarianism by saying the smallest minority is the individual.
On concrete political issues everyone seems careful to use the language of their own perspective. Would never hear an abortion argument of fascists vs babykillers
flitter
1yr ago
Similarly I suspect it's good for a kid to have something that they are better than adults at, for giving a sense of "being adult like".
They can play in competition at an adult level without being condescended in skill. And in theory learn how to gracefully win as well.
flitter
1yr ago
We've been doing detailed studies for 80 years!
And we still have this deep confusion about whats going on. Citing an old SSC post:
In 1965, some scientists locked people in a room where they could only eat nutrient sludge dispensed from a machine. Even though the volunteers had no idea how many calories the nutrient sludge was, they ate exactly enough to maintain their normal weight, proving the existence of a “sixth sense” for food caloric content.
Next, they locked morbidly obese people in the same room. They ended up eating only tiny amounts of the nutrient sludge, one or two hundred calories a day, without feeling any hunger. This proved that their bodies “wanted” to lose the excess weight and preferred to simply live off stored fat once removed from the overly-rewarding food environment. After six months on the sludge, a man who weighed 400 lbs at the start of the experiment was down to 200, without consciously trying to reduce his weight.
It really sucks to be under conformist pressure, a lot more with these personal things. Anyone posting on this forum ought to empathize.
Mass technology and authoritarianism seems very dangerous. I'm not sure what to do.
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