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I'm a huge critic of the "small number of people did something bad so everyone tangentially related is responsible or guilty" sort of arguments, but I do at least appreciate that the conspiracy theories formed after bad events are logically consistent with that. After all if you do truly believe in the concept then you're forced to deny that anyone tangentially related to you could do bad or else you're admitting that you are bad.
So of course then people have to go with "This Trump shooting was staged" or "the people who beat up cops and planted bombs during Jan 6th were secret fed antifa" or whatever because it can't simply be "oh that guy was nuts, but I'm not that guy so it doesn't impact me or my beliefs". Not that false flag attempts don't exist at all, but the question really should be, so what?
What does it matter if the guy who shot a police station was actually a boogaloo boy false flagging instead of a BLM protestor? No one is accountable for his actions except for him. To me it didn't make BLM look bad beforehand and it didn't make right wing groups look bad afterwards just cause this individual sucks. I appreciate the consistency but it's still really stupid.
I'm a critic of "My movement is only the good people, and the bad ones are unrelated." Sorry, but if you lie down with dogs, you wake up with fleas. Your stance would give zero consequences for extremism.
As an example, imagine that there was a gas attack on a public place. The police arrest the perpetrators, and discover that they were all members of the California Chemistry Club. Shortly thereafter, there's another gas attack and the perpetrators are also members of the CCC. And again, and again, and again. It's weird that it keeps happening, but it's not like the Club has any relation to the attacks. No one is accountable for the the perpetrators' actions except themselves. Under your framing, people couldn't even think that the organization might be promoting or benefiting from those actions, because only a small number of their members are carrying out attacks.
If Boogaloo Boys are shooting up police stations, then it's evidence that they're a violent group and should be (formally or informally) punished for that. The alternative is playing whack-a-mole after the fact.
Take half a second and think about this with your brain. "My movement is only good people and bad ones are unrelated" is the conclusion someone would have if they also believe "small number of people did something bad so everyone tangentially related is responsible or guilty"". You're not arguing against me, you're agreeing with me in pointing out the flaws of this logic.
Actually my stance gives full consequences for bad things to the people who do bad things, instead of trying to absolve them. As Reagan once said
Ok in your own framing only a small number did it, so why haven't most other members done anything bad? Maybe the club is so big there are niche insider clubs inside of it that they can't control. Like how the "rationalists" had the niche cult of "zizians" who murdered people. But would you blame someone like Scott Alexander or Yudkowsky for those murders? Do you blame the EA community? Would you blame them for the attempted assassination of Sam Altman? That Yud can claim all he wants that he doesn't want houses firebombed, but his anti AI rhetoric lead to this so he's guilty too.
I don't, I say "wow those individuals who did something bad are bad individuals, I blame them for their own choices and not society". But your logic says Yud is a threat.
And as a member of TheMotte, a rationalist adjacent site, do you accept responsibility for how the fleas you apparently laid down with tried to firebomb Sam Altman's house? I'm going to assume no and that you agree with my argument of "that guy is just that guy, he's not me" once you're being asked to account for bad people of "your group". I'll believe you are sincere in your "personal responsibility for other people being bad" stance when I see you apply it to yourself and accept personal responsibility for bad people existing in your own groups.
What? Maybe if they're a hypocrite.
Simple example: A large group contains a small number of baddies. Does it affect their reputation? I say: Yes, they are one group and share a reputation. You say: No, the large group's reputation is not impacted by the bad individuals.
How are those identical?
Guilt doesn't diffuse to nothing, it multiplies. A hitman can't get off from a murder charge because he was just doing a job. Instead both the hitman and the purchaser are guilty.
Similarly, the rioters throwing molotovs, the protesters giving them cover, and the pundits encouraging them all carry blame for the damage in the BLM riots.
They split from the group, CFAR kicked them out, they had the cops called on them, and had (at least one) callout post against them. This is the appropriate reaction. They weren't members in good standing, so the blame is very heavily dampened.
He does claim that he doesn't want houses (or data centers) firebombed. Repeatedly and consistently, both before and after the fact(s). Again, this is as it should be.
Yes, a shadow of a shadow of a shadow of a shadow of the responsibility falls on me. I don't really worry about it, because at that far of a remove it's just the cost of being alive in society.
I'm not writing an autobiography for you, so I guess you'll never believe me. Darn.
Ok I think you misunderstand me or vice versa.
If a person believes
A: Some bad people in a group reflects poorly on a group
Then that person not wanting their own group to look bad is incentivized to do
B: Claim that any and all bad people in their group aren't really their group, and are actually secretly a disliked group.
These two ideas go in hand and hand. A belief in collective responsibility leads to denial of someone in your own collective ever doing any wrong. A Scotsman who believes in collective responsibility will have to say "That murderer isn't a real Scotsman!" because admitting he is a Scotsman = Scotsmen are murderers in that logic.
Whereas if I was a Scotsman, I could say "that murderer is a scotsman too, but he's not me, so I'm not responsible".
So what? If collective responsibility is resolved by saying "I don't support that" or not doing the thing in question, then collective responsibility doesn't make sense to begin with. Besides they didn't do [insert imaginary way to control other people that collective punishment theory assumes exists] to stop the violence.
Sure you can kick them out of a specific rationalist group, but you can't kick them out of "rationalist".
As I've wrote elsewhere, this is incredibly easy and simple to dismiss by anyone motivated to put down the anti AI movement that this is just plausible deniability of stochastic terrorism. I could argue that no one could seriously say "this will end humanity" and not expect the possibility of violence as a result. After all, if you saw a mad scientist about to press the nuke everyone button would you not shoot him? I could post on Twitter a satirical remark like "Guys don't kill the people ending humanity wink wink, I don't endorse violence wink wink" implying that he's just covering his ass.
I as a pretty major pro tech pro AI optimist would be able to do this quite easily, if I wasn't principled in my "don't blame people for other's actions" stance and my disagreement in the very concept of stochastic terrorism.
I'm not asking you to, but I will say I've never really seen a person go "I believe in collective responsibility, someone in an adjacent group of mine did something bad, I am responsible". Maybe people like that exist, maybe you're the exception, but I've never seen it. It's always blatant hypocrisy or no true scotsmanning.
You're missing a step: They have to claim that they're a bad group, then actually kick them out so that they aren't a part of the larger group anymore. Cut them off from funding, stop inviting them to events, denounce them, etc.
You have to bite the bullet and accept it, otherwise you're a hypocrite. I'd say "It's a tragedy that brings shame on us all". Now, if the murderer was a recently-deported immigrant, I could say that the murderer isn't a scotsman because he isn't.
It's resolved by actually not supporting it, and by opposing it. Simply saying something might not be enough.
Yeah, "The left as a whole" has a lot less control than "Democrats", and that causes less responsibility to fall on the broad movement than the specific organization. In the absence of new evidence, I'd draw less of a connection to the Left for this assassin than I do to the Democrats for Sam Brinton.
Yeah, motivated reasoning can get you pretty much any result you'd like. If someone's dedicated to being wrong, I certainly can't stop them.
I've never seen it cash out like that, but the general theme isn't uncommon in my experience. It's usually more like "I won't join that group because I would be supporting their bad actions" or "I regret joining that group...". People don't share their personal failings very openly.
I'll give one personal story, with all the serial numbers filed off. I was playing sports with an aggressive teammate, and he injured an opponent. I felt bad, the coach felt bad, my teammates felt bad. We accepted collective responsibility, the coach pulled him from the rest of the match, and all of us increased our focus on sportsmanship and fair play in the next few practices and the rest of the season.
We could've partially dealt with our responsibilities by kicking him out of the team, but it turned out to be unnecessary.
Sure you can cut them out of the things you control, but you can't stop them from making their own groups and get people who don't even know about the controversy. And wait this ignores something important, most of these people don't show obvious signs beforehand. You can't kick someone out for something like murder before they murder obviously, this isn't Minority Report.
And if there was some reliable way to know, then why aren't we blaming their family, friends, teachers, coworkers, and other people in their life who should be even more aware?
What bullet am I biting by acknowledging that some other scotsman could be be criminal?
Why does it bring shame on every Scotsman?
Then it's not collective responsibility if you allow all the people who aren't responsible and don't actively support bad things to dodge blame! You agree with me then to not blame others.
Yes exactly, and all what I've given is motivated reasoning I've seen people engaged in! For example, the "you're just lying about your opposition and covering it up" thing I could accuse of Yud can be seen here in the replies to Mamdani
That might be true, but it's generally related to their own personal experiences feeling uncomfortable and not the actual thing in question "I'm responsible for what someone else did". I doubt you'll find many examples of someone pleading guilty as an accomplice to murder cause just because they were in a shared group.
Yes, this dynamic changes in particular highly organized situations where you actually can kick people in a meaningful way.
The example I typically give is of police. A bad city A cop not getting fired is the responsibility of their city A police chief, but it's not the responsibility of a city B police chief, because the latter can't meaningfully do anything. He can say "we are against bad cops in city B", but he can't remove city A cop. Responsibility comes from actual ability to control others, and most of the time you don't actually have that at all.
If you're the head of the "Dog Lovers club" and kick someone out, they can just go make their own "Dog Likers" club. You can not remove them from representing themselves as a dog enthusiast, and newbies (and even many vet dog enthusiasts who don't pay attention) won't really know the difference so they can often gain influence no matter what you do. And that's if you even know ahead of time, which you probably won't (refer back to the first part of how we don't blame others close in their life).
Yes you can! The Zizians were kicked out for pre-crime. No superhuman precogs required.
Sorry, wrong subject for that sentence. I have to bite the bullet and accept collective responsibility for my countryman's actions if I want to be consistent. You have already set yourself apart.
I know that there's an incentive to give myself a pass by claiming he isn't part of my group, but that would be a lie. He's a scotsman, and scotsmen murder.
That's tautological. The people who aren't responsible aren't responsible while the people who are, are. We simply set different boundaries. People can dodge blame by genuinely not being blameworthy.
They're wrong. There's not much more to add to that.
I've seen variations of "We failed at..." and "I wish I could have done something about..." alongside other implicit claims of responsibility. "I'm responsible for..." isn't a common saying in any part of society (unless it's something boring like a task at work), so I'm not surprised it isn't explicit here either.
Consider Autism Speaks. They are roundly and consistently criticized by other autism advocacy organizations for their stances. If they do something, it doesn't reflect on those other organizations because they have been kicked out of the cool kids club.
Were they "kicked out"? Seems like they were still going around as rationalists after. And was it actually for pre-crime? If so, how did they know and why did no one report their evidence of upcoming murders to the police?
Wait, but don't these contradict? Aren't you, a Scotsman, genuinely not blameworthy of another random Scotsman commiting murder?
You're saying there's collective responsibility of Scotsmen, while also saying that Scotsmen are able to dodge blame and not be responsible.
Ok it's possible. Genuinely can't contest what people might actually mean even when they don't say it cause you are right that people don't admit their mistakes often. I don't think it's common regardless but we can't test it well either way then.
Seems like an awful example, autism speaks is still the largest autism related advocacy group around and one of the only groups anyone knows about. If they were "kicked out of the cool kids club", it didn't seem to actually matter. Autism Speaks for most of the population not deeply immersed into the autism community is autism advocacy, and they don't even know there is a rift.
If there's any lesson here in that example, it's that kicking people out doesn't work.
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