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Heresy

paulgraham.com

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Re: Heresy

#471

Post by marricks »

c1b wrote: post #455
marricks wrote: post #444

He really needs examples provided. Which group do you think is on his mind? - Palestine and how many academics have been fired or silenced for supporting them l? Nathan J Robinson was let go form The Guardian for a joke about Palestinian treatment. - The score of labor organizers fired in the tech and food service industry for expressing their right to organize? - Tech workers getting fired for what could be claimed…

So you just gave three examples off the top of your head but you need to make sure he picked the right one..?

Sorry, I thought it’d be obvious to everyone reading he clearly isn’t talking about:

- labor organizers getting fired

- Palestine

- Folks getting sexually harassed

Re: Heresy

#472

Post by nitrogen »

shadowgovt wrote: post #9

Graham has forgotten his own essays if he thinks that this is a rebirth. "What you can't say" [ http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html ] is one of the first of his essays I ever read. It eventually directed me to this site. At the time, I thought it was brilliant. 18 years on, I think it's a good piece of writing but he's only got half the story. Sadly, today's essay suggest to me he hasn't found the other half in the in…

smartest person in the room ... falling right into the consequence that taboo was intended to protect against.

I think you've made an interesting argument, but isn't this evidence that the taboo mechanism is failing at its job and needs to be replaced with something better?

Re: Heresy

#473

Post by convolvatron »

solatic wrote: post #435
teakettle42 wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have invented a “harm principle” to be used when evaluating truth , and the fact that you think this is a cogent argument is scarier than anything Paul Graham might have said. One’s right to say something isn’t curtailed just because their saying it might intrude on your dogma more strongly than if it was said by someone with less social power.

You're equivocating between rational and emotional truths. Rationally, only one thing can be true. This is what's most useful when applying the scientific method. Scientifically, there isn't such a thing as heresy - only rejecting the null hypothesis, or failing to reject it. But people are not rational beings . The same message, delivered in the same way, can upset some people and not others. People do not react rat…

no one should dispute that people might react emotionally to statements.

that doesn't necessarily imply that all speakers should accept the burden to be so inoffensive that _no_ listener would react negatively.

Re: Heresy

#474

Post by [deleted] »

stareatgoats wrote: post #449

The way this post gets flagged repeatedly seems to underline the point pg is making. But the repeated unflagging also signifies something: that there is strong opposition to branding things as heresy in the current landscape. This is a fault line that roughly follows the main party-lines in the US as far as I can see. And so pg can also be interpreted to be dog-whistling which side he is on. Which can also be the rea…

[deleted]

Re: Heresy

#475

Post by dragonwriter »

pfortuny wrote: post #466
Osmose wrote: post #416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I'm following you correctly, you're implying that in order to debate with others to determine what truth is, you must have the freedom to say things without being bound by how the act of saying them would affect other people, right? And I'm disagreeing and saying that, unless you have some sort of prior agreement with the people involved (which social media/the internet/readers of your blog don't have), you don't…

Pain is not harm. Suffering is not necessarily bad. One can live a full life in the midst of hurting. The fact that Santa does not exist angers a lot of people each year…

> Pain is not harm

Yes, pain = experienced disutility = harm.

> Suffering is not necessarily bad.

Suffering is itself bad, but may be an acceptable cost for some greater good, sure.

> One can live a full life in the midst of hurting.

Sure, it's possible to do one despite the other, but that doesn't negate that the latter is bad compared to it's absence, all other things being equal.

Re: Heresy

#476

Post by zozbot234 »

Osmose wrote: post #258

The behavior he's calling "heresy" here cannot be evaluated in a vacuum; these kinds of statements are all contextual, ESPECIALLY hinging on who is saying them. And the reason that is the case is because the consequences of saying something are different depending on who says them. Paul Graham is wealthy and influential, and actively tries to influence folks with essays like this. So when he says something, it is jud…

James Damore was a lowly software engineer and that did not save him from being canceled by the mob and losing his job. All the more outrageous because his working paper was an honest and forthright - and broadly accurate - response to an express request for feedback about how to improve working conditions. Shades of "let a thousand flowers bloom".

Re: Heresy

#477

Post by galaxyLogic »

woodruffw wrote: post #362
1970-01-01 wrote: post #243

Great essay as always, however the deliberate withholding of examples is irritating me. I'm not looking for witches to burn, but names or examples of "grumpy, censorious people in a group — the ones who are always first to complain when something violates the current rules of propriety." would be helpful to identify the described mentality.

Vaguely gesticulating at your stated enemy instead of identifying them is a time-honored rhetorical technique: it allows the reader to insert their individual grievances into the shape of the argument rather than reflecting on whether their grievances are actually well-founded. Edit: And to be absolutely clear: it's a lame technique. It works because it's emotive, not because it reveals any particular amount of truth…

I find it illuminating how he ends his blog-post:

     "All we have to do is keep pushing back, and the wave collapses"
Sounds like a political rallying cry. A rallying cry for those on the ramparts. The line assumes the reader knows they are part of the "we" and calls them to action. Who are they? Stop the steal?

Re: Heresy

#478

Post by leephillips »

tlogan wrote: post #440
leephillips wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(1) The concept of an inherent “gender” makes no biological nor logical sense. You can’t have been born in the “wrong body.” (2) Socrates was mostly right about democracy. (3) Seriously violent criminals, once convicted, should never bet let out of prison. (4) The US (and all nations) should have essentially open borders. (5) The US should make health insurance illegal and provide health care as a function of governm…

The first one is problematic and it needs have some context. Do you think that person can define its own gender which is different that genitalia which define sex? The other ones are opinions and I’m not aware of anybody being canceled or fired for saying those.

Can you try to reformulate your question? I can’t parse it.

Re: Heresy

#479

Post by lc9er »

teakettle42 wrote: post #391
Osmose wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, I agree that practically PG will never feel any serious repercussions for saying whatever he wants _because_ of his wealth and influence. I don't think that's healthy (as wealth and influence are often afforded to people due to privilege or luck instead of ability, wisdom, or empathy) but it is how the world is currently. The cancel culture boogeyman generally doesn't destroy lives, which makes one wonder why…

> The cancel culture boogeyman generally doesn't destroy lives, which makes one wonder why people like PG feel it so important that they need to write essays decrying it. Since only people with wealth and privilege are in a position to denounce it, they must have questionable ulterior motives? You argue dishonestly and incoherently.

Or more likely, they can’t believe mere mortals would dare push back against them.

Re: Heresy

#480

Post by pkulak »

skellington wrote: post #423
pkulak wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not any definitions I can find: > belief or opinion contrary to orthodox religious (especially Christian) doctrine.

It doesn't require a great intellectual jump to see how the word 'heresy' which has a tradition of being applied towards organized religion is an appropriate description of people that behave in a religious way in general. Religion is just a belief system. So is Marxism. Libertarianism. Etc.

> Religion is just a belief system.

Hard disagree. I see this idea a lot, and it drives me nuts. This is how you get to silly takes like "atheism is just another religion", "science is just another religion", and all that. I get that religion can be hard to nail down (belief without evidence maybe?), but it's no use just giving up and defining it so broadly that it means nothing.

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