Viewing profile — fighterpilot

There was a miscommunication. I meant that one of the biggest differences between Democrats and Republicans is the level of tertiary education, and this gulf has been widening over…

That's really interesting. I would think that growing polarization specifically around education has something to do with the acceleration of conspiracy acceptance on the right tha…

Yes, there's a niche part of the left - the new age/hippie types, very high in openness and very low in conscientiousness - that is profoundly anti-science (or perhaps just ignoran…

Can you share that hypothesis? You are obviously contributing to this thread in a balanced way and in good faith and I really want to hear it. I know two anti-vaxxers. One is not p…

Unconvincing. The author ignores the most egregious examples of cancel culture in order to argue their case. See: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/06/stop-firin... ht…

The left has its fair share of growing anti-science sentiment. I agree it's quite a bit worse with Republicans but it is growing in both directions, which is a concern. People pick…

Is there a privacy/surveillance aspect to the argument? Or is the data that the IRS will collect the same either way?

Do private tax prep companies have an argument they advance about why automatic filing is a bad idea? Or is it just pure behind scenes lobbying?

Surprised I need to spell out what should be the obvious to an educated crowd, but intelligence is a spectrum with gradations of smart and gradations of stupid. The 90th percentile…

Your argument is that the cost and side effects don't matter, the war on drugs must be won no matter what. You hand wave away the negative consequences (illegal immigration can be …

You're arguing that tests for intellectual ability aren't perfect, and they're therefore useless. This is a bad argument.

The only part of that which is dumb is the ill-advised label, which can easily be changed. Everything else makes sense. Borderline intellectually disabled people and Terence Tao-le…

It's terrible branding because it makes other parents jealous and then this happens.

This is the Handicapper General playing out in real life. Stunning to see the social consequences of seething jealousy manifest politically. I will be a big supporter of the right …

Ok, you are not a hypocrite, but I still think it's objectively bad policy from a cost-benefit standpoint, and it's bad from every political perspective. Four arguments that might …

Opportunity cost of tax revenue. "Why should everything be taxed be default?" The opportunity cost point was the least important in that list. If you don't want to tax it, that's f…

Ok but what is the tail risk here. Can you outline a series of causal steps where a molten salt reactor will cause more than 100,000 to 500,000 deaths? If you're just saying that p…

Drug gangs destroying South America, tens of thousands dying due to Fentanyl-laced pills, lost tax revenue, huge taxpayer expense, petty crime used to fund overpriced drugs, are al…

You don't need to be able to discriminate well, you just need a small non-consensus signal that may not even be perceptible to humans. But you're right to be sceptical. Hedge funds…

It's not really free when I'm paying via advertising revenue. It's just indirect payment. I don't see a fundamental difference between paying $20/year and contributing $20/year in …

We need strong consumer protection laws and a body that can issue large fines in response to violations. The stick is the only thing that's going to cause change. It is not accepta…

Yep got locked out of Google for no reason and it was impossible to get in touch with a human. Extremely rage-inducing. There needs to be far better consumer protection on a govern…

What did it look like before 1950?