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.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
A couple of points.
This puts to lie “trust the experts.” If the experts are willing to lie even if for supposedly noble reasons, then you cannot trust what they are telling you is accurate. No, you need to trust that what they are telling you is for the common good but why would those so called experts be more of an expert of what is the common good compared to you? It also wouldn’t be entirely surprising if they believed that the common good is consistent with what they do (eg I am trying to prevent a future pandemic and therefore what I do is good and anything that gets in the way is bad). But that’s largely self deceit.
If we know what the institutional pressures are within this area, then it is entirely reasonable to assume publications would skew towards not a lab leak. The fact that people publish evidence supporting not a leak is consistent with the incentive structure people in this field clearly possess. It is akin to being SHOCKED that Phillip Morris’s research indicated no cancer due to smoking. That doesn’t mean they are wrong, but we aren’t looking at honest open science.
I really think there should be a nice, pithy word that describes this kind of behavior - where you aren't strictly lying, but are using and presenting facts in a deceptive way in order to trick people.
Intellectual dishonesty?
More options
Context Copy link
deleted
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link