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Taboo Your Words (2008)

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Re: Taboo Your Words (2008)

#21

Post by emhs »

cm2012 wrote: post #19
npsimons wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is very true, and I can't believe some religions that people think are the same. As an atheist, superstitions have no relevance to me. That is to say, as an outsider, I don't care what it's called - and that goes for all religions/superstitions. Because they all are based on belief without evidence, they all look the same to me (ie, irrational). That being said, I'd appreciate if people didn't use weasel words t…

Believe me, I have no skin in the game, but that's not exactly true. Creationism, as it is most often used, is the belief that the Earth was created 6,000 years ago according to Genesis. Intelligent Design most often refers to God being the one who guided/created evolution, gravity, etc. which had the purpose of leading to humanity.

As far as Intelligent Design, Yudkowsky has another useful post [1]. It's part of his sequence "The simple math of evolution", and provides some interesting perspective on the subject.

[1] http://lesswrong.com/lw/kr/an_alien_god/

Re: Taboo Your Words (2008)

#22

Post by emhs »

gabemart wrote: post #7
throwaway12989 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The theory "A tree falling in a deserted forest does not generate pressure waves in the air" is a theory that makes falsifiable predictions. I do not think anyone seriously believes it. If they did, you'd soon be able to convince them that the theory is false. If you ever encounter someone proposing that theory, they're liable to be anticipating-as-if a tree falling in a deserted forest DOES generate pressure waves,…

>The theory "A tree falling in a deserted forest does not generate pressure waves in the air" is a theory that makes falsifiable predictions I do not believe that the theory "A completely unobserved and unrecorded tree does not generate pressure waves in the air when it falls" is falsifiable. How would you falsify it? I do agree that no-one seriously believes it.

This is where the Less Wrong post on Occam's Razor [1] comes in handy. It helps make clear how to respond to someone who argues that backward perspective.

[1] http://lesswrong.com/lw/jp/occams_razor/

Re: Taboo Your Words (2008)

#23

Post by Symmetry »

scythe wrote: post #16

The very rigid picture of language described here and used in this and many other lesswrong essays might be compared to early Wittgenstein ( Tractatus ), to be contrasted with later Wittgenstein ( Philosophical Investigations ), alongside Derrida and a litany of less famous philosophers. Of course, the reason Wittgenstein ultimately rejected this picture, as in rejected describing the meaning of words by formal defin…

I think the author agrees with you about language (see [1] for example), but it seems to work pedagogically in this case.

[1]http://lesswrong.com/lw/nn/neural_categories/

Re: Taboo Your Words (2008)

#24

Post by cgore »

jarrett wrote: post #17
B-Con wrote: post #15

One of my personal rules for communication is that high-level language is a killer. Whenever conflict or confusion arises, high-level words need to be abandoned in favor of precision if the communication is to go anywhere. This is very similar to the article's examples of replacing a word with it's definition. I believe that high-level language is the root of many philosophical/political disagreements because people…

> This is very true, and I can't believe some religions that people think are the same. They happen to use the same words, like "God", "heaven", etc, but the concepts are completely different and incredibly incompatible. What's more, the definitions of the religions themselves are so slippery, we can barely begin to compare religions. For example, suppose we take the author's advice and try to dereference the term "a…

It isn't intractable but it can be quite complicated. This is true of theology in specific and philosophy in general. It isn't ever going to be an easy top-down hierarchy.

As for "defining Christianity", this is a problem that is actually addressed in most churches, and their answer can range from as restricted to "just their church" to as open as "anything vaguely resembling trinitarianism".

As a specific example, I go to an ELCA Lutheran Church, and they are a lot more on the open side of things. http://elca.org/en/Faith/Ecumenical-and-Inter-Religious-Rela...

Re: Taboo Your Words (2008)

#25

Post by [deleted] »

scythe wrote: post #16

The very rigid picture of language described here and used in this and many other lesswrong essays might be compared to early Wittgenstein ( Tractatus ), to be contrasted with later Wittgenstein ( Philosophical Investigations ), alongside Derrida and a litany of less famous philosophers. Of course, the reason Wittgenstein ultimately rejected this picture, as in rejected describing the meaning of words by formal defin…

[deleted]

Re: Taboo Your Words (2008)

#26

Post by TylerJay »

scythe wrote: post #16

The very rigid picture of language described here and used in this and many other lesswrong essays might be compared to early Wittgenstein ( Tractatus ), to be contrasted with later Wittgenstein ( Philosophical Investigations ), alongside Derrida and a litany of less famous philosophers. Of course, the reason Wittgenstein ultimately rejected this picture, as in rejected describing the meaning of words by formal defin…

> Of course, the reason Wittgenstein ultimately rejected this picture, as in rejected describing the meaning of words by formal definition, is that it doesn't accurately describe the way language is used in practice, and leads us to misunderstand situations.

I don't think the author is really trying to give a "formal definition" of the meaning of words. The point he is trying to make is that while people may claim to disagree about a high level sentence like "when a tree falls and nobody is around to hear it, does it still makes a sound?", they actually don't expect there to be any real difference in the physical state of the world after the tree falls.

If you taboo the word "sound", then the question becomes either "when a tree falls and nobody is around to hear it, are there still vibrations in the air?" or "when a tree falls and nobody is around to hear it, is there still an auditory experience for anyone?" If two people were to disagree on either of THESE statements, then they actually have an important difference in their models of the world.

The idea is that words are just convenient ways of referring to a collection of objects that are similar in some ways. Words used in everyday conversation generally do not have strict definitions. They just refer to a cluster of things. This post helps explain that idea:

http://lesswrong.com/lw/nl/the_cluster_structure_of_thingspa...

Re: Taboo Your Words (2008)

#27

Post by gizmo686 »

B-Con wrote: post #15

One of my personal rules for communication is that high-level language is a killer. Whenever conflict or confusion arises, high-level words need to be abandoned in favor of precision if the communication is to go anywhere. This is very similar to the article's examples of replacing a word with it's definition. I believe that high-level language is the root of many philosophical/political disagreements because people…

I don't think we should completely abandon high-level words when conflict arises. Instead, we should focus on isolating where our disagreement lies. In this way, we will identify when a particular word is being used differently and can de-reference that. This allows us to continue to get the benefits of high level language, and continues to work when 'medium level' language causes disagreement.

Also, I have found that it is often easier to first describe an idea using high level language, then clarify what you mean. For example, even if we disagree on exactly what 'fair' means, by first describing my idea using the word 'fair', I give you a rough outline of my idea that provides context when I describe it using lower level language.

Re: Taboo Your Words (2008)

#28

Post by gizmo686 »

npsimons wrote: post #18
B-Con wrote: post #15

One of my personal rules for communication is that high-level language is a killer. Whenever conflict or confusion arises, high-level words need to be abandoned in favor of precision if the communication is to go anywhere. This is very similar to the article's examples of replacing a word with it's definition. I believe that high-level language is the root of many philosophical/political disagreements because people…

This is very true, and I can't believe some religions that people think are the same. As an atheist, superstitions have no relevance to me. That is to say, as an outsider, I don't care what it's called - and that goes for all religions/superstitions. Because they all are based on belief without evidence, they all look the same to me (ie, irrational). That being said, I'd appreciate if people didn't use weasel words t…

Most atheist I know acknowledge the existence of religions. Based on your comment, I assume that you do not find the topic of religion interesting. However, religion is still a very rich subject with a lot of potential for research. However, in order to do good research, you will likely need a way of classifying and differentiating different religions in the same way we classify different species.

B-Con's comment raises a very interesting question for research. Namely, how is it that so many people think such vastly different belief systems are the same?

Of course, I suppose one's views on religion would be different if one grew up or lives with it being a significant part of one's life. As someone who has grown up with relatively little religion, I am in a position to look at it and be interested in religion as a phenomena.

To use your example, is 'intelligent design' really just another word for 'creationism'. Or, our these two different ideas being supported by different groups of people. If you say that all religion and irrational beliefs are the same, then the answer is a pretty clear yes, they are the same. However, you may find that 'creationism' represents the belief in a Genesis like account of creation, while 'intelligent design' is the remains of the creationism battle, and is founded on the idea that evolution is a non-nonsensical concept and that and that existence is the result of a deliberate conscious action by an intelligent agent. Assuming these are characterizations are true (which they likely aren't), you can then look into how these ideas came about, and look at how influence intelligent design is from creationism. Is it actually being proposed by the same people? Have there beliefs actually changed? Is intelligent design being supported by the children of creationist, because the children can see that biblical creation does not work but still believe that an intelligence is necessary for creation?

On an unrelated note, writing this comment made me curious about the intelligent design/creationism divide. Does anyone here have an insight into what is going on there?

Re: Taboo Your Words (2008)

#29

Post by eruditely »

JackFr wrote: post #6

Very similar to if-by-whiskey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/If-by-whiskey If when you say whiskey you mean the devil's brew, the poison scourge, the bloody monster, that defiles innocence, dethrones reason, destroys the home, creates misery and poverty, yea, literally takes the bread from the mouths of little children; if you mean the evil drink that topples the Christian man and woman from the pinnacle of righteous,…

Honestly even if this manipulative speak I still love reading this every time.

Disclaimer: obviously manipulative speak is generally bad if not always

Re: Taboo Your Words (2008)

#30

Post by eruditely »

B-Con wrote: post #15

One of my personal rules for communication is that high-level language is a killer. Whenever conflict or confusion arises, high-level words need to be abandoned in favor of precision if the communication is to go anywhere. This is very similar to the article's examples of replacing a word with it's definition. I believe that high-level language is the root of many philosophical/political disagreements because people…

High level language usage requires context and a good amount of history between the communicating parties, and when the uninitiated jump into a conversation without such pretext, it can lead to bad things very quickly, or quite literally misunderstanding.

This is also why people who constantly talk about 'logical fallacies' and are quick to use it and point it out everywhere do not understand that it betrays the entire context of dialogue the conversers have.

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