site banner
PaperclipPerfector  2yr ago (text post)   39587 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 5, 2023

This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.

Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.

We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:

  • Shaming.

  • Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.

  • Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.

  • Recruiting for a cause.

  • Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.

In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:

  • Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.

  • Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.

  • Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.

  • Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.

On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.

8
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

If I had two sons, and one son got drunk and punched someone at a bar while another got drunk and was punched by someone at a bar. I would not want to live in a world where the former was killed and the latter killed their assaulter. I'd much rather live in the alternative world where no one died. Which would you rather live in?

This argument proves too much. If most people had a son and their son tried to kill someone, they would prefer that the son not be killed in self-defense at all. If you're taking this argument seriously, it doesn't actually matter how high the chance of death from the lethal attack is, killing in self-defense is wrong, period.

Also, you should consider it from behind the veil of ignorance (not the actual version of veil of ignorance, the popular version): If A is lethally attacking B and you don't know whether A or B is your son, would you prefer that B be able to kill A in self-defense even if the lethality isn't too high? I would, and I think most people would.

Why? Remember, we're assuming self-defense. If B shoots A and A is your son, your son is a murderer who was shot in self-defense. If B doesn't shoot A and B is your son, then your son is a murder victim, with some probability. Surely you'd be more concerned for your son's survival if he's innocent than if he's a murderer, so if you don't know whether he's A or B, you'd prefer the scenarion where B shoots.

Unless you're saying that you don't want B to shoot A because your only concern is reducing the chance of death, and it doesn't matter who started it. Then this proves too much and implies that you oppose lethal self-defense, period. Do you?

A lethal confrontation is inherently a situation where you have no time to make a considered, reasoned, conclusion about exactly what actions are appropriate in response.

Requiring a balancing test is essentially saying "either no self-defense at all, or take the risk of going to jail". I find it unacceptable to judge people in a sudden lethal confrontation based on factors that no victim could actually take into account when they are thrust into a lethal confrontation.

If I had two sons, and one son got drunk and punched someone at a bar while another got drunk and was punched by someone at a bar. I would not want to live in a world where the former was killed and the latter killed their assaulter. I'd much rather live in the alternative world where no one died. Which would you rather live in?

I think this is an instance of causal decision theory in the wild, in that you're holding the punch stable when there's no reason to expect that to be the case. What if it being "the sort of world where people who throw punches are killed" means that instead you get to pick between the world where your sons punch and are punched, and the world where nobody is even punched? Then the question would be to what extent punch-kill actually allows acausal flow, right? Ie. we may imagine a world where some people just, out of the blue, are struck by the urge to punch and otherwise-agentically seek out a target to punch. In that case, the kill-branch obviously would only worsen the situation. So the question comes down to if the punch urge is such that the kill branch can successfully shift the incentives enough to suppress the punch branch enough to make up for the QALY loss.

Because at the end of the day, we'd at least somewhat prefer that the least people die. Right?

I think this crucially depends on the death rates from punching vs shoot-to-fist ratio. Also I don't think fistfights are rational, but getting into a situation where a fistfight may ensue is absolutely rational. If you look at for instance duels, IMO a society where getting shot is at risk can develop alternate ways of mediating the sorts of situations that otherwise become fistfights. This is becoming really hard to model - but I don't think that guns are limited to having a 50% reduction on fistfights. If they were, they'd probably be a bad trade on utilitarian grounds alone, though there may still be other cases for them.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats