popocatepetl
I'm the guy who edits every comment I write at least four times. Sorry.
User ID: 215
Yes, as someone with lower achievement than most twigs in my extended family tree, attending family functions is like spending an afternoon poking myself with the sharp end of paperclip. (Interacting with groups of equal status doesn't feel this way.) I imagine the effect must be much stronger for total fuckups, who are inferior to everyone. This can easily start a vicious cycle, where people with below average prudentia end up plummeting because they need extreme prudentia to break out of the trap.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
Incidentally, this also suggests the lazy assumption that "as America gets more diverse it will invariably get more liberal" could potentially not come to pass.
Oh, I think the opposite was always more likely. The Democratic party is a coalition of social progressives and minority groups who agree with social progressives mostly about themselves. This arrangement is possible because WASPs are still a plurality of the country. As soon as WASPs become just another sliver in the pie chart, the minority groups will no longer see any reason to caucus with social progressives. Humanitarianism eventually gets taken advantage of and outcompeted by ethnocentrism.
If the breakdown occurs in my lifetime, I'll enjoy a lot of useless schadenfreude.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
Out of curiosity, where are you getting your figures? Google and DDG are not especially friendly to these queries anymore.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
The questions are, are they nepotistic? Do they agitate as a class? I think they do. I think they behave the exact way wokes claim whites do (but whites don't).
I'd be open to evidence for this, but I've never seen it. The argument that jews are "parasite ethnicity" that silently coordinates to weaken its host country is cogent. (So is Critical Race Theory's description of systematic racism.) And it seems to match history the demographics of power. (So does Critical Race Theory.)
I need evidence — for example, some study showing off-the-charts Jewish ingroup bias — to take it more seriously than other just-so stories about the world.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
Yes, but jews are significantly smarter than anglos. You would expect them to be overrepresented compared to anglos, just as anglos are overepresented compared to blacks. The IQ gaps between the three groups are roughly equidistant.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
Ashkenazim seem pretty similar, group IQ-wise, to Japanese. Are they similarly overrepresented among powerful positions, or moreso?
Japan's National IQ is about 105; European jews are 115. Additionally, there are five times as many jews as japanese in the US, and European jews had a dramatically lower cultural and linquistic hurdle to clear on immigrating.
I'd say those factors can plausibly explain the gap.
My thoughts on this: Much words, little heat, little light. I suspect you'll be modded for "phalanx against the marauding hordes spilling across the Sahara and the Darien Gap."
Why do you think these "concentric circles" of whiteness are categories worth maintaining and considering morally relevant? I'm sympathetic to The Great Replacement hand-wringing because a group of people (both white and not) are going extinct. This process is, as far as I can tell, being defended because addressing it would gore sacred cows. As for other downsides, it's possible that the nature of replacement will cause institutions and culture to change unpleasantly.
Besides those two issues, why do you care if natives are being replaced by slavs or mestizos or han chinese or sikhs? They're being replaced, the same. The human organisms who live in the West (I mean by broad definition, including Japan) are endangered one way or another. And their culture, if you care about that.
To wit, you want to form an alliance with the "fourth circlers" to prevent "nineteenth circlers" from taking over. Why was it worth fighting with fourth circlers to begin with?
I'm imagining an alternate universe where you are posting about how people with Type I Diabetes must not burn bridges with people with Hypothyroidism to defend themselves from the rising Type II Diabetes menace.
the overwhelming stance of the hard Right is that the JQ has not only been answered in the negative, but is one of the most important questions - if not the single most important question - that one must answer when considering geopolitics today.
I've never seen any coherent evidence that the over-representation of jews in powerful positions compared to anglos/germans/latins/slavs is any different from the whites being over-represented compared to blacks. The far-right, in a way, forms a carnival mirror to BLM. They search for a conspiracy, ingroup bias, or systematic oppression to answer what boils down to simple capacity.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
I feel you've missed my point. I'm taking -5 posts up to -4. These posts are no worse than right-wing comments that are scored +10. In fact, the downvoted posts may be better, and I only think they're illogical or uninsightful because of my bias.
No one is bringing a bad post up to +50 as a participation trophy. My intent is only to balance out the obvious bias of our electorate.
VPN wants quality, and quality will go away in proportion to this forum becoming a pure right-wing crank self-congratulation society.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
Martyring yourself doesn't do anyone any favors. If getting fired compromises your ability to implement your principle, then you should avoid getting fired and work to optimize the implementation of your principle instead.
And note that Jack Dorsey was instrumental in persuading Elon to buy Twitter in the first place.
I like how Scott phrased it in his WebM post (actually not a WebM post but stealth bombing another topic, as he is wont to do): "Everyone has to make their own compromise between morally-pure-but-useless and tainted-but-useful".
On the other hand, consider that everyone else is doing that same rationalization in their head. How does that work in the end? Whoever manages to rationalize away the most principles tends to win the competition and rule the world. That's the way Moloch works.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
Thanks for the update. I think you're reading him optimistically, though. "Twitter obviously cannot become a free-for-all hellscape, where anything can said with no consequences [...] our platform must be warm and welcoming to all" doesn't read as meaningfully different from the 2022 establishment line on free speech.
It's early but I'm feeling good about my predictions, where I guessed a modest pullback from the censorship spike of 2020 but not root-and-branch reform. We're already hearing rumblings of threats from EU officials, too, though it could be just one guy spouting off.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
I don't like that I can't see the vote counts on my own comments. I'd like a way to know if my comments are being read by anyone; my short comments rarely illicit responses from the users here.
You can still see the votes after 24 hours. Maybe this period should be waived for your own comments.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
Did you leave out a word or two here?
One word:
'IMO a large part of the reason social media platforms outmoded message boards is that [they] provided lurkers and semi-lurkers a "no effort" way of showing content creators that people were seeing and appreciating them.'
So the verb "provided" corresponds to "social media platforms", not "message boards". The meaning is backwards from what you thought I was so saying. Reddit and Twitter provide an easy engagement buttons for lurkers. Old forums did not.
Some of them provide an upvote feature or even upvote/downvote, but many don't.
Some forums have added upvotes nowadays, yes. Around the time Digg and then Reddit were on the rise, though, phpBB forums usually had nothing. Some had a karma system where you left messages for other users, but critically, these features were karma-gated. So lurkers could not "commend" or "upkarma" a post they found interesting. This was supposed to encourage quality participation. In practice, content creators would get less reaction for their effort. You could post on a social media platform and see the number +30 next to your comment, or on a forum and get no reaction.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
Let's say these are for April 1, 2023.
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99%: Trumps Twitter ban has been lifted
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95%: At least one case of Twitter moderation has happened for which the NY Times or WaPO has written a story highlighting hypocrisy
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90%: Hate speech rules for protected classes remain, neither being retracted nor expanded to cover everyone
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70%: Misgendering and deadnaming no longer fall under this category, however
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70%: Payment processors, cloud service providers, banks, and the US government have NOT taken measures to leverage or punish Twitter for content policies. (This one is tricky to adjudicate so I'll leave it to you.)
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70%: The EU HAS taken measures to leverage or punish Twitter for content policies. (Same.)
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60%: Twitter's medical misinformation rules have been modified.
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60%: Twitter's election misinformation rules have been modified.
But see, that's the popularity contest element! You're not upvoting because "I think this is a good comment", you're upvoting because "Uh-oh, the other lot downvoted it, I need to restore balance".
I tend to give out upvote subsidies when there are visible scores to try to preserve a friendly atmosphere here. I don't believe that anyone engaging politely according to the rules should get a scarlet letter fixed to their post saying "We all hate you. We think your ideas are stupid". I'll do this even when the comment isn't particularly logical or insightful.
I would prefer to do away with voting altogether, since this kind of "I must carefully comb through the thread and make sure to upvote X and downvote Y" activity is breaking the entire system.
IMO a large part of the reason social media platforms outmoded message boards is that they provided lurkers and semi-lurkers a "no effort" way of showing content creators that people were seeing and appreciating them. There are obvious downsides but messing with the DNA is dangerous.
(It really was a coincidence, I hadn't even seen this comment before accepting the pull request.)
Seeing the question marks was a surprise this morning. Maybe I should voice feature requests more often.
I really wish www.themotte.org had an uncensored search engine with results as good as 2010 Google.
I guess we just straight up differ here. I see it mostly in the context of what it costs (practically nothing) and what it achieves (some nonzero decrease in the chance that people get sick.) If you only care about the signaling you can always get vaccinated and not tell anyone.
Is there a way to vaccinate without being statistically logged as having done so? I would consider it if another 2020 Covid situation comes around.
As for getting a booster in late 2022, I see the new updated vaccines as having an unclear cost/benefit ratio (EDIT: for me and for transmission), which I did not believe in 2021. Probably not worth the $110 they apparently cost the government. I guess I'll donate another buck to the Red Cross this year, or incur the equivalent moral debt by not doing so.
You may see that as a ridiculous moral framing, which leads me to:
If you're willing to stretch to see me as morally culpable for mandates, would you permit me to see the antivax movement as morally culpable for the FDA's extremely slow, fatally cautious rollout of the vaccines, leading to excess deaths including people I really would have preferred to remain alive?
Yes, clearly. You can see our decision as woefully morally incorrect. On the other hand, you're not morally entitled to suspend imaginative empathy and micharacterize the intent of our decision.
Imagine were I to say "@evincio wants to create a police state because he'd rather not get a cold". That is a twin of "@Southkraut doesn't want to experience less than a second of pain to avoid killing my relatives". The statements assume that the subject accepts a premise of the speaker's — that Covid measures are a slippery slope to a police state, that not vaccinating will lead to @Southkraut killing people — and frame the subject's decision in the most uncharitable way possible.
@Southkraut may not be able to articulate the principle behind his actions. Those principles may be dead wrong. And yet it is clear from his resistance that it was not out being miserly with his time (thirty seconds walking to the pharmacy counter the last time he swung through CVS) or unwilling to endure the pinch in the arm. This is obvious enough that I feel failing to see it is willful, which is what I'm responding against.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
The decision to take a vaccine can only be understood in context of (what I see as) the authoritarian push that surrounded it. I got vaccinated but would have unvaccinated myself in 2021 if I could.
From my perspective you were party to a crime in lending emotional support to a push for mandatory medical procedures. Nevertheless, I do not see you as wearing a 'dystopian social credit system and human domestication for @popocatepetl and all future humans' on your forehead. I understand that you do not believe what I believe and have a different moral ecology between your ears, and so I don't jump to assuming malice or cruel indifference on your part. I do consider it a moral failing that you do not extend the same charity to us.
During the height of the War on Terror, I remember people demonizing the tiny number of Americans who did not extend the "simple courtesy" of standing for the pledge. It's "the least" they could do. As if they were resisting the overpowering wave of social pressure out of simple desire to rest their legs.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
I've always thought the distinction between religion and ideology was a crock. Both make claims about the objective world which may or may not be true, and normative claims which are unfalsifiable. If Confucius was born today we'd call Confucianism an ideology; if Hitler lived in ancient Assyria, we'd call him a prophet and Aryanism his religion.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
Please tell me: do you believe my art teacher telling me I should come to school in women's underwear to get in touch with my true self qualifies as grooming? [...] I've brought this up twice now, and nobody in the "groomer is a slur" camp has deigned to state their opinion on it.
A teacher who independently "goes rogue" and talks to a student about their underwear should be reprimanded and the incident should be investigated. But that is also the case for a teacher playing a multiplayer videogame with a student, or driving the student home, being alone in a closed room with them, etc. Those actions are not intrinsically evil. Whether they are "grooming" depends on the intent which is unknowable. So schools have protocols to regulate student/teacher interaction to make sure teachers never do anything that gives the appearance of foul play. When teachers break protocols, they (should) get investigated, disciplined, and possibly fired.
My problem with "groomer" is that it is motte-baileying. It is equating secretive intimate behavior like you're describing with (a) a trans activist teacher talking about transgenderism informally with students, (b) school psychologists helping transition a child through formal channels with the full knowledge of school admins and their colleagues, and (c) generally, encouraging children to abandon their birth gender or addressing the child as their non-birth gender, in general.
For the record, I do not support (b) and only partially support (c). However, activities (a), (b), and (c) cannot reasonably be called "grooming" and calling them that is using an intentionally inflammatory insult IMO.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
Anybody else concerned about the amount of downvotes people are throwing around on the site?
Yeah, I don't know what's going on. If I didn't know better, I'd think we gained lurkers changing ships... could it be rdrama? Are they even interested in huge textwalls? Or does the visibility of downvotes encourage spite voting? Or is there a hostile actor with alts? Has JuliusBranson somehow returned?
popocatepetl
2yr ago
The strength of this forum lies in people from both sides of the political aisle being able to systematically lay out their views.
Then the forum is not very strong TBH.
My defense of The Motte as it exists (rather than The Motte in theory) is that, even if the full political spectrum were proportionally represented here, it would be a tiny fraction of possible political opinion. It would still not be an even bout of ideas. Where are the physiocrats and free silverers and anti-internet luddites and zoroastrian fundamentalists?
If physiocrats and free silverers and anti-internet luddites and zoroastrian fundamentalists are not here because we are persecuting them and not living up to our ideals, that's bad. If they're not here because other reasons, like not existing or not wanting to come here, that's just unfortunate.
Lively and useful debate can still happen within a constrained or biased idea space.... we'll see how it goes. I just wish we had invisible comment scores again, it feels like boo lights flashing above leftists.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
You calling someone a racist out of the blue to discredit their post about a Muslim politician's corruption is quite different from nara trying to define "groomer", which was the topic of conversation itself.
popocatepetl
2yr ago
"Yes-men tripping over themselves to fellate [FC]" is more inflammatory than the actual idea it expresses. As is groomer. So both are inappropriate for regular usage IMO.
But there is a slight special dispensation here. The subthread was about conservative usage of the word as a topic. Attempts to define "groomer" or who deserves the label are understandable, because the word itself is the item of conversation. This is different from someone calling people groomers in some random transgender topic. "But it's okay, I'm defining it to mean XYZ..."
Yeah, I'm torn on this one. I think @naraburns crossed the line slightly with "Do you honestly advocate for distributing such things to children? If so, you're a groomer, too..." to a "Less of this, please" extent. I don't want to put him on trial or anything. It's generally a good idea to err on the side of supporting your mods.
At the same time, PMCM acts like individual users defining a word minutely and then matching a specific, delineated group to the word to explain their beliefs is The Motte committing "blood libel" while wearing the skinsuit of decorum. Is there a double standard going on? Maybe a bit. We can debate the point. But the level of meanness is so dramatically lower than what I see everywhere else, the reaction is startling.
Hardly unprecedented, though it be.
Here's where I see a flaw:
Most of us agree it's iffy to anthropomorphize AI, but it's equally shaky to "biologize" it. Animals evolved in a Darwinian competition to prioritize self-replication and survival. Those that didn't evolve and retain these traits went extinct. So all biological intelligences, from earthworms to humans, recoil from danger and seek resources for themselves.
Because all existing intelligences have been biologically evolved, we assume artificial intelligence will do that too. But why? Obviously, if AGI emerges from a simulated competitive ecosystem, where AIs battle each other in a sort of sophistication tournament bracket, what comes out the other side will be competitive and try to do things like cheat and sabotage its opponents. But if AGI develops from a neural network like DALL-E or GPT-3? There's no reason to assume those AI will "care" if humans are going unplug them after their task. Sentience and self-preservation instinct are not a package deal. We can tell this because the vast majority of things that have a self-preservation instinct are not sentient.
The danger of AGI IMO comes from poorly considered directives. For example, AGI might accidentally turn us into paperclips en route to solving whatever problem we set it to.
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