somedude
1mo ago
The sole form of refutation that has ever and likely can ever be offered is noticing that Science has successfully done a lot. And that's a rhetorically powerful but formally extremely weak argument. Especially when you consider irrational belief systems have also done a lot.
Science accomplishes things that directly relate to its claims about the world and which would be physically impossible if those claims weren't true. By comparison, whenever the accomplishments of irrational belief systems religion come up they inevitably boil down to social engineering and fan art that don't actually hinge on the related beliefs being true at all.
If being able to produce functional, repeatable, documentable magic that lets you actually cure diseases, communicate across vast distances, etc. etc. etc. doesn't count for anything in your system of formal argumentation, then that system doesn't seem terribly credible or useful to me.
As I've said elsewhere, I've literally never seen these kinds of arguments come up in any context other than "believer wants to argue with atheists but doesn't want to defend any religious beliefs" and at this point I don't think I ever will.
somedude
1mo ago
if you talk to people walking down the street, they think we are in the business of discovering natural laws that are actually true.
That's because the difference between one-hundred percent philosophical certainty and something merely being true enough that you can put a satellite into orbit with it isn't a meaningful distinction to most people.
I'll be honest, it's not a terribly meaningful distinction to me either. Like I wasn't aware that scientific laws were supposed to be "the source code of the universe" and not just really rigorous descriptions of nature that might get updated if we learn something new.
This all just seems like the usual "uncertainty exists, therefore god" routine that you sometimes get from Christians who want to tell those smug atheists what for, but who know better than to make any real claims.
somedude
1mo ago
If you look at it like this, you have two axes: complacency vs revolutionary; and traditional vs utopian.
Now add the traditional left/right division as a Z-axis and you've got a cube. We can call it the Corvos Cube and develop an insular and baffling lingo surrounding it.
So I would be a revolutionary traditionalist; @2rafa's political friends would be complacent traditionalists, and Walt is a revolutionary utopian.
Entirely too legible. I'd rather say that someone is "in the upper lefthand back corner of the purple sector of the Corvos Cube."
somedude
1mo ago
Because the assertion that I am endorsing is that the appropriate way to group ideologies is not by position statements, which observably change with some frequency, but rather on core axioms and values, which do not.
I won't comment upon this assertion except to point out that this was absolutely not what Hlynka was doing. Hlynka would just tell people they were lying about their positions, make up some of his own to attribute to them, and then strut off as if he hadn't just made a fool of himself.
His bullshit system of categorization wasn't leading him to some deeper insight others failed to understand, it was leading him to make stupid nonsensical posts where he attempted to call people out for failing to defend arguments they had never made.
Did you make a point against his IQ skepticism that he doesn't want to answer? Prepare to have him ask you how your point is supposed to invalidate colorblind meritocracy. Have you ever posted about meritocracy before? Doesn't matter if you haven't. Are you actually in favor of it? Fuck you, Hlynka can read your mind and knows you really aren't.
somedude
2mo ago
Didn't they lose and then troll the Vulcan team into oblivion anyway? I remember their victory being that they successfully pissed off a bunch of guys who aren't supposed to show emotions.
somedude
2mo ago
I feel like this video pretty much sums up how that would go.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Yy4oURBLo98
Tell me I'm wrong.
somedude
2mo ago
I think what you are referring to is the inferential gap, not malice.
No, I'm not referring to an inferential gap. Dude literally sees fit to tell you that you're lying about your own opinions and then make some up for you. Check Prima's example, there are others. Thanks for the twee little lecture, but you'd have been well-served to acquaint yourself with the discussions in question before delivering it.
somedude
2mo ago
Listen, once you reserve the right to disregard the other guy's actual post and respond to the one you imagined him making, you're not participating in a forum in good faith. If you're going to respond to someone with "How does this prove X?" like it's some kind of comeback then X can't be something the other person has never posted about.
You can suspect whatever you want about what kind of autistic power level hiding fatlords everyone is, but you have to respond to posts that exist. You have to participate in the conversation people are actually having.
somedude
2mo ago
Oh get out of here with this. Dude routinely reserved the right to ignore others actual posts and try to call them out over arguments they never made, and would sit there fantasizing about what they "really" thought and what bad people it made them. There's never been a version of this place where that was tolerable, other than in the case of Hlynka himself and the "999 strikes and you're out" rule he was allowed to live and die by. It's absurd that he lasted this long.
somedude
2mo ago
I'll consider worrying about the other mechanisms as soon as I see them come up in any context other than atheists dragging religion and someone wanting to chastise them without having to actually defend it. In a quarter-century of internet, so far that's literally never happened. Everyone seems perfectly content with logic and reason under every other set of circumstances.
somedude
2mo ago
Listen, people who want me to believe X need to be able to put forth something outside of their own skull that points toward X being true. Anyone who wishes otherwise is either a charlatan, or needs to understand that they are indistinguishable from one.
somedude
2mo ago
Actual positions dismissed with a single unelaborated word, followed by yet another tedious little fantasy vignette about what unflattering things the other poster "actually" thinks. Really breaking the mold here.
somedude
2mo ago
The only crowd I've ever known to take an interest in this sort of thing, outside of academic philosophers, are internet theists who've given up on ever winning an argument anyone else cares about. Imagine busting this out because you saw someone chortling at the idea that Star Wars lore is real, and you'll understand how it looks from the outside. The part where everyone gains so much epistemic humility that they quit snorting whenever someone brings up the will of the Force in a serious conversation just isn't coming.
somedude
2mo ago
Yes, I do.
Furthermore, if someone wishes to disagree, they can make an actual claim to the contrary and then defend it with something outside of their own head. Empty metaphysical non-arguments are deeply unimpressive.
somedude
2mo ago
No my schtick is literally "I don't think the facts as presented are either A) complete, or B) particularly supportive of the sweeping conclusions that certain individuals want to draw from them." because we're not talking about IQ or SAT scores in isolation here. We're talking about lowering the requirements for the combat arms across the board, spatial, cognitive, physical, training, the whole kit-and-kaboodle.
So are you trying to say that actually their problem was physical ability and training rather than their deficient cognitize abilities? Is that the argument I've finally compelled you to stand on? If so, I'll just say that is really, really, really not the impression created by anything I can find to read on the subject. I mean they weren't called McNamara's Meeklings, something else was at the top of everyone's mind
Nonetheless, this is a post that directly intersects with the content of my own, rather than some "nigurs r dum also I hate meritocracy" post you imagine me making, so congratulations.
...you get away with it because the Mods let you get away with it.
Hey, show some gratitude. Anyone else would get slapped on the pecker immediately for that "niggers r dum" thing.
somedude
2mo ago
Paul, aware of some of this from the way the time nexus boiled, understood at last why he had never seen Fenring along the webs of prescience. Fenring was one of the might-have-beens, an almost Kwisatz Haderach, crippled by a flaw in the genetic pattern -- a eunuch, his talent concentrated into furtiveness and inner seclusion. A deep compassion for the Count flowed through Paul, the first sense of brotherhood he'd ever experienced. Fenring, reading Paul's emotion, said, "Majesty, I must refuse."
Okay, but this is unfilmable without dubbing in everyone's thought balloons, and everyone craps on the Lynch movie for resorting to that. Visually it's just two guys looking at each other and maybe making a face.
somedude
2mo ago
I hope you can see the problem there
I see several, but the one I'll call attention to is number three.
3: Ergo those who argue that racial differences outweigh individual differences are lying when they claim to support a colorblind meritocracy
I genuinely and sincerely have absolutely no idea how a fully sane and functional human being could possibly come to the conclusion that "I think you're lying about your position, now defend this position that I've decided on for you!" is some kind of valid debate tactic.
It's flat-out bugfuck insane. You can suspect whatever you want, but you have to respond to the posts that actually exist. The idea that anyone else is supposed to care about your personal fantasies concerning what they believe is completely laughable.
somedude
2mo ago
Search results were already sort of an issue from SEO slop-factories gaming the system so aggressively. Chatbots will lower the price of that stuff a bit so we'll probably see a bit more, but I doubt it's going to be that much more of an issue compared to what could be done a few years ago by paying some ESL third-worlder rock bottom prices to produce the stuff.
I dunno, the LLM can churn out slop faster, at a higher quality, and it's only going to get better and faster and cheaper as time goes by. Especially once the people shoveling slop have had time to come up with their own models optimized for what they want to do, ones that don't necessarily talk in the same stilted way as the current high-profile commercial products that can't afford to accidentally say anything offensive.
somedude
2mo ago
I don't think the facts as presented are either A) complete, or B) particularly supportive of the sweeping conclusions that bay area rationalists in general and certain "dark enlightenment" thinkers in particular want to draw from them.
We know, it's getting you to explain why in the form of anything resembling a cogent argument that's proven to be impossible. Reams of irrelevant musing about McNamara's beliefs aren't it.
I don't see how Macnamara displaying a callous disregard for both military tradition and human life is supposed to prove that "niggers r dum" unless the specific tradition being disregarded is the one about equality before God.
Your schtick boils down to "I don't see how someone lowering test requirements to disastrous result is supposed to prove that tests measure anything important" but hey if you pretend the other guy spelled everything wrong and sprinkled in some ethnic slurs then you can still imagine that you came off looking like a winner.
In the mean time @somedude is by thier own admission an account created for the specific purpose of picking a fight with me
And I've been getting away with it because you consistently make such dogshit arguments that there's no sane way to mod me for it. Like what are they going to do, tell me it's against the rules to expect you to provide reasoning for your statements? Order me not to notice when you try to call me out over subjects I have literally never posted upon?
They could try getting in my ass over my tone, but barely-obscured contempt is pretty much your entire gig, and frankly I do an infinitely better job of turning mine into posts that at least comprehensibly intersect with the other guy's actual statements. It'd be pretty ridiculous for anyone to jump to your defense over that while you stand around paraphrasing my arguments as "niggers r dum" at the exact same time.
Basically, cope with it. I treat you with exactly as much respect as you insist on treating the other side with, but at least I don't literally make up my own imaginary version of your posts and then tell you to defend arguments you've never made.
somedude
2mo ago
Bit of a tangent, but what disastrous effects have been caused by having a bottle deposit?
somedude
2mo ago
you still haven't havent explained how McNamara displaying an attitude towards the lives of his nation's troops that would be more at home in a 19th century Tzarist Army than a 20th Century Western one is supposed to prove that generalizations about group differences in IQ are more predictive of future success than say living in a household with both parents present, or disprove the utility of colorblind policies.
That's probably because I've literally never said anything about what the number of parents in a household does or does not predict, nor anything about the effectiveness of colorblind policy. This is absolutely some of the worst argumentation I've ever seen in this community. Seriously, what kind of response are you actually expecting when you try to call someone out for failing to defend arguments they've never made?
You consistently attempt to have these arguments in a fantasy land of your own creation, where progressive Democrats are supposedly HBD advocates, where everyone who argues with you is a supposedly a progressive even if they're actually some kind of right wing shitlord, and where everyone supposedly hates meritocracy regardless of anything they say about it, or whether they've ever said anything about it at all. It's absolutely complete bad faith and I refuse to humor it.
Especially since, again, you've already answered the question once, and all I'm doing is trying to squeeze your reasoning for it out of you. Let's harken back yet again to the first time I'm aware of that someone (not me) brought this subject up to you.
Them: "Wouldn't that suggest that people who think IQ measures something real and useful in real life might have a point? Guy comes up with idea of lowering the threshold on a mental aptitude test to fill a manpower shortage, and now his name is considered cursed for generations. This sure seems consistent with mental aptitude tests mattering in real life."
You: "No. If anything Robert McNamara illustrates my point that it is possible for someone with a high iq to be a complete moron."
See, at this point it hadn't yet occurred to you to just completely disengage on this subject and deflect by asking the questioner to defend some strawman argument, rather you just went ahead and said no. To which I can only say, cool, why not? You must have had some sort of reasoning behind your answer, right? So why are you working so hard to keep it a secret? I mean it's one thing to just lose an argument and stop posting on a given topic, there wouldn't be any reason to follow up in that case, but you insist on running around in circles perpetually banging this exact same drum. If you're going to do that, then I'm going to keep bringing up this extremely relevant historical example and asking for your reasoning on an opinion you've already expressed and continue to advertise.
And I am going to keep bringing it up. Not more than once per thread, ain't nobody got time for that, and I won't be the one starting any of the conversations, but each time someone else does and you wade in with the same old opinions? Yeah I'm pretty sure there's no rule against asking Hlynka to provide reasoning for his own statements on a subject he insists on talking about, so get used to looking at it. Don't worry, I'll make sure to rewrite it each time, maybe start including some highlights of other users asking you to stop shamelessly ducking, so that it doesn't just turn into copypasta.
If you insist on performing this ridiculous show of dodging and calling out strawmen, well I can't stop you, so instead I'm going to have you do it over and over again. Unless you give up entirely and stop responding, in which case I'm going to keep doing it anyway, for everyone else to see.
somedude
2mo ago
I've met too many 60th percentile ASVABs who were demonstrably capable of organizing/supervising complex evolutions involving hundreds of people and dozens of moving parts
This seems to be a great time to bring up one of my favorite subjects when it comes to this debate. You know it, you love it, it's McNamara's Morons.
For those of you who might have missed this little tangent, during the Vietnam War, Secretary McNamara decided to lower the required score on the Armed Forces Qualification Test to as low as the tenth percentile in order to raise a bunch of cannon fodder for the Army. Shockingly, this experiment was a catastrophe. You can read the Wikipedia article here.
Now this particular instance, of someone coming into a complex field that actually intersects with reality and lowering the required scores on standardized intelligence tests, causing disaster to ensue, would seem to be a significant data point when it comes to the relevance of standardized intelligence testing.
I mean, you'd think so, right? Nonetheless I have been chasing this dude around the forum like the Terminator trying to get him to make a post that engages with the example in any meaningful way, to absolutely no avail, all while he continues to bang his drum about how meaningless standardized tests are.
If you happen to click, make sure you expand the comments on that second link. Look at where he goes "How is this an argument against individual merit?" out of literally nowhere, just completely arguing with someone who only exists in his imagination.
At this point I don't really expect any kind of worthwhile response, but I may as well throw this out there if he's going to continue to post about the subject and expect to be taken seriously.
somedude
2mo ago
Oh, so you just call everything you disagree with on the subject of race "HBD" whether the stated reasoning has anything to do with genetics or not. Brilliant. Let me guess, you read their minds and decided you could disregard everything they were saying in favor of your own imagined "real" version of their arguments.
No, progressive Democrats are not HBD advocates. They generally get really agitated whenever anyone brings up HBD as an explanation for anything. Stop posting like anyone else knows or gives a shit about your personal imaginary versions of what everyone thinks.
Okay well in that case it's also hypocritical to criticize Cthulhu and Star Wars lore for not being literally true. Hooray, solipsism. This entire line of argument advances absolutely nothing.
It essentially amounts to a theist's special request for their beliefs to be treated as intellectually serious even though they can't point to any justification for them that exists outside of their own skull, because hey after all, nothing is really certain, right?
Bluntly, request denied until one of these arguments successfully and meaningfully distinguishes Christianity, theism, whatever, from an infinite number of bullshit things I could make up on the spot.
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