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Cognitive ability is related to supporting freedom of speech (2020)

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Re: Cognitive ability is related to supporting freedom of speech (2020)

#61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you really want to scramble your noodle, look at the recent spate of state laws placing restrictions on speech and notice the lean of the parties that control those states.

Can you give some examples? Is it actually speech that's being restricted, or actions, or access to certain types of speech/content (e.g. age restrictions)?

Well, for awhile there was lots of talk about CRT. https://www.texastribune.org/2021/12/02/texas-critical-race-...

Re: Cognitive ability is related to supporting freedom of speech (2020)

#62
post #4

There appears to be a recent shift on HackerNews no longer support freedom of speech. I don't know that its just HackerNews either - it seems like its 'internet residents no longer support freedom of speech.' I'm not sure how to interpret this.

according to the study, a valid hypothesis is that hn became more stupid more seriously, the shift is not just HN it is everywhere. We have generations of people who have been grown up to self-censor at every step, so by natural extension freedom of speech is not a priority. Urbanization and the evergreen/growth/globalist agenda that comes with it is also in favor of restrictions that maintain the cohesion of large c…

I don’t think it’s urbanisation. In the west, the twentieth century had urbanisation and was far more open to free speech while many parts on the world didn’t and were more censorship prone. In fact, in the middle east for example, one could argue in the middle of the twentieth century there was less urbanisation but more openness to western ideas and less religious oppression than it is now.

I think the shift away from free speech we are seeing is the result of decades of indoctrination and people being goaded into emotional reactions via social media.

I genuinely don’t see any functional difference between so called “social justice activists” railing people up and fanatical preachers delivering fire and brimstone sermons. It’s the same phenomenon manifested in different forms.

I will also add, most censorship prone people tend to accuse their opponents of lacking “critical thinking”. While at the same time, missing the point that is precisely what opposition does. You look at the other side, you criticise it’s premises, you criticise it’s assumptions, you criticise it’s goals, you look if the stated goals align with the actual results and criticise the discrepancy. You really can’t have critical thinking if you can’t, you know, criticise.

I think we had more free speech, and more critical thinking in the past because criticism was allowed. Nowadays, if you criticise anything that goes against what some would term The Cathedral, you will suffer severe consequences.

Re: Cognitive ability is related to supporting freedom of speech (2020)

#63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cognitive Ability Is Related to How Seriously You Take Studies Like This

Trust the science (unless it's science I disagree with)

Unless science has shown that much of the "Science" in this field of study is garbage

Re: Cognitive ability is related to supporting freedom of speech (2020)

#64
post #55

I grew up in the US being told that freedom of speech was a virtue, something that our country did very well and I always thought that it was a shared value. It's very surprising to me to see that change in such a short span, or possibly it was not as popular or widespread as I thought it was growing up and I just never noticed. Is it the internet that has caused this uptick in the number of people who think free spe…

How many immigrants do you think grew up the same way? Hint: almost none, as the United States is the only country that enshrines true freedom of speech as an unalienable and fundamental right.

This is probably considered "hate-speech" in this day and age, but immigration, shockingly, has cons as well.

Re: Cognitive ability is related to supporting freedom of speech (2020)

#65

I can see how their conclusions play out in real life. One of the common threads I've noticed across many people when trying to explain why defending freedom of speech, and the free and open exchange of ideas in general, is that they're not just defending some "right-wing" person's rights, they're actually defending their own rights. Because the same tactics and rationales that are being used to suppress and silence…

A common thread I see is a lot is people conflating freedom of speech and having a platform (more specifically an online one). Forcing private entities to host speech they don't want to goes against what I define as freedom of speech. Everyone should be entitled to speak and have their own ideas, no individual or company should be force to spread them.

Re: Cognitive ability is related to supporting freedom of speech (2020)

#66
Grain of Salt Warning:

Even in engineering, where the problems are much easier, most published papers are ... not valuable. "The literature" is a very mixed bag, and it takes years to learn how to find the relatively few papers that are good for anything at all.

Those problems can't get easier as the subject of study becomes human beings rather than EM waves (or whatever).

Re: Cognitive ability is related to supporting freedom of speech (2020)

#67
It's worth digging into the methodology here: the study participants were found through Mechanical Turk, and the proxy for cognitive ability is a vocabulary quiz. You can just as well use this study to show that the kind of highly educated people whose circumstances are dire enough they have to work for pennies an hour have been socialized into giving correct answers about questions pertaining to freedom of speech.

Re: Cognitive ability is related to supporting freedom of speech (2020)

#68
post #55

I grew up in the US being told that freedom of speech was a virtue, something that our country did very well and I always thought that it was a shared value. It's very surprising to me to see that change in such a short span, or possibly it was not as popular or widespread as I thought it was growing up and I just never noticed. Is it the internet that has caused this uptick in the number of people who think free spe…

I think the internet has caused an uptick in people who make free speech seem like a bad idea tbh

Re: Cognitive ability is related to supporting freedom of speech (2020)

#69

There appears to be a recent shift on HackerNews no longer support freedom of speech. I don't know that its just HackerNews either - it seems like its 'internet residents no longer support freedom of speech.' I'm not sure how to interpret this.

Not sure when you think this shift happened. HN intellectuals migrated from here almost 10 years ago. I don’t think the atmosphere has changed it’s always been a young loudmouth group. Dang is a recent entry in the compendium.

HN has never really been a highly intellectual place simply because a number of key subjects, viewpoints are off limits. Inability to at will gracefully discuss sensitive subjects basically means we are all pretending to believe what we say. I don’t know what cognitive ability research says about people being able to separate their identity and worldview from what they say, but there you have it.

Re: Cognitive ability is related to supporting freedom of speech (2020)

#70
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With laws.

That’s exactly my point. Laws restricting speech. Free speech is a utopian nonsense, there are always restrictions (just ask the SEC). It’s just a question of where a society thinks the line should be drawn.

Only one of things you listed (revenge porn) is actually illegal. Republishing publicly available info nor calling someone a bad word is illegal.
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