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What You Can't Say (2004)

paulgraham.com

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Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#181

Post by fu9ar »

incision wrote: post #167
mef wrote: post #25

Let's start with a test: Do you have any opinions that you would be reluctant to express in front of a group of your peers? If the answer is no, you might want to stop and think about that. If everything you believe is something you're supposed to believe, could that possibly be a coincidence? Odds are it isn't. Odds are you just think whatever you're told. The other alternative would be that you independently consid…

>"Is it a possibility that someone has controversial opinions but could be unafraid of expressing them to a group of peers?" Sure, but if you want to be able to do it more than once you need to be... 1.) Useful enough to someone that the people you offend or scare can't simply discard or destroy you. 2.) Content with a count of friends that hovers near and will almost certainly reach 0 repeatedly. 3.) Prepared to dea…

Friendships build on bitten tongues aren't much use anyway.

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#182

Post by jules »

gnaritas wrote: post #154
jules wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Letting your kid believe in Santa for a while is far more powerful learning experience than showing it that others believe in this nonsense: not only can't others' beliefs be trusted, your own beliefs can't be either.

There are better ways to teach that than by showing them you're a liar. Telling them Santa is real is IMHO wrong; that's not a debatable point, that's my opinion. I don't support teaching delusions to kids whether it's Santa or God.

What are those better ways?

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#183

Post by nhangen »

existencebox wrote: post #170
svantana wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I'm taking the bait. I'm sorry but this reeks of rationalization. Let's just have a look at some of your assertions: - we don't understand how nutrition affects the body. True, but there are societies that are vegetarian and have been for centuries. Apparently veggies are healthy! - You are a predator? I don't know you but I'm willing to bet it's been a while since you hunted down, killed, and ate an animal in t…

No bait intended, I honestly mean it. I just felt like "it tastes good" being a weak justification since it is by nature very subjective, so I look for a better justification. also, to answer in order: -Indeed, there are multiple approaches, and this is why I find it hard to select one vs. the other. If my body "craves" meat, there's usually a reason due to digestive peptides that the nutrition from the food I'm crav…

People crave sugar, nicotine, narcotics, and other things that aren't good for them, so your argument falls apart there.

You crave meat for a variety of psychological and physiological reasons, but not necessarily because you're missing something that meat provides.

My argument for not eating meat is simple - why kill something for food if I don't have to?

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#184

Post by technotony »

ggreer wrote: post #68

Here are some things I think future societies will condemn us for: 1. Prison. Almost every modern penal system focuses on punishment rather than rehabilitation. I think that as our understanding of the brain improves, we'll be able to find the causes of violent behavior and cure them. Punishment will become cruel and unusual. 2. Eating meat (and other animal rights issues). Even if they're not conscious, most tasty a…

I think the whole field of biotechnology and genetics. Today many people think we should not be genetically engineering plants or animals, but in the near future we are all going to see the benefit of it.

This is most extreme in the case of engineering humans. Most people are horrified at the idea, worried about eugenics or a Gattica type future. But if you really examine what this will do, ie eliminate many forms of horrible genetic diseases or propensity to cancer, then I think you are going to see that this is something we really should do.

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#185

Post by sliverstorm »

scarmig wrote: post #161
sliverstorm wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean prisons are a modern invention? Prisons/jails have been around since the dawn of history. Or are you wrapping ancient Egypt into your notion of radically modern. (Ok, maybe ancient Egypt didn't have many cells with walls and bars for windows, but they sure had prisoners chained to things)

Prisons originated in the 18th century. Before then "prisons" were more or less temporary affairs, usually just a makeshift holding chamber where people were kept before the actual punishment was meted out (death, torture, or mutilation). But the idea of a building where people are isolated and placed under permanent bodily control for months or years on end by the State (for the betterment of society, or fixing of t…

Surely chain gangs are older than the 18th century.

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#186

Post by kansface »

sdegutis wrote: post #147
ggreer wrote: post #68

Here are some things I think future societies will condemn us for: 1. Prison. Almost every modern penal system focuses on punishment rather than rehabilitation. I think that as our understanding of the brain improves, we'll be able to find the causes of violent behavior and cure them. Punishment will become cruel and unusual. 2. Eating meat (and other animal rights issues). Even if they're not conscious, most tasty a…

1. It's true they don't focus enough on rehabilitation and too much on punishment, and that sucks. 2. Eating meat is very natural. Even animals do it. 3. Nope. So completely and utterly wrong.

Can you really not think of other natural things (ie, things that animals do) which we don't?

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#187

Post by icebraining »

mantrax wrote: post #137
ggreer wrote: post #68

Here are some things I think future societies will condemn us for: 1. Prison. Almost every modern penal system focuses on punishment rather than rehabilitation. I think that as our understanding of the brain improves, we'll be able to find the causes of violent behavior and cure them. Punishment will become cruel and unusual. 2. Eating meat (and other animal rights issues). Even if they're not conscious, most tasty a…

1. Prison. The philosophy of prison as punishment is wrong, but the idea of keeping a murderer isolated from potential victims isn't. So don't throw out the baby with the bath water. 2. Animals, just like humans, die. There's no way around it. Even if the entire world decides not to eat a particular goat, that goat will die. And when an animal dies, it gets eaten - no exception. Either by microorganisms, or higher le…

2. Is true, but if you have to wait around for the goat to die of old age or sickness, that doesn't make for a particularly healthy meat business. And killing it is not justifiable simply by the fact that eventually it would die anyway.

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#188

Post by mwetzler »

lmg643 wrote: post #168
nostromo wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dude, you're not trying hard enough. :) Most unspeakable thoughts today deal with isms and phobias: sexism, racism, agism, Islamophobia, homophobia. There are others of course. For example, I am not a climate-change denier, but if I was I certainly wouldn't say so on HN! I'm gay so I'll pick on my own group: HIV is ridiculously high amongst urban gay men. To me, it's obvious why this is the case. Evolutionarily, men…

HIV transmission is a good example of a wildly controversial topic, that is actually no longer discussed. it's considered a settled issue that everyone is equally likely to get HIV. on IQ - I'm not sure that's necessarily true, or at least, the differences are complex (one group has a slightly higher average, the other a higher standard deviation, which has implications at the right-end of the bell curve). but for da…

PG really only stirs up controversy because he won't admit the fact that we're all biased to some degree. Even women in tech are biased against women in tech. It's natural because pattern matching is natural, and female developers & founders are (currently) rare.

Women _on average_ may very well be better or worse than men in all sorts of ways, but that doesn't mean some of them won't be extraordinary.

We have to be careful about our biases so we don't miss out on the extraordinary ones.

It takes extra work to do this.

For example orchestras (traditionally very male dominated) tried to remove bias from their auditions by having the musicians play behind a curtain. The curtain increased the probability that a woman would advance from preliminary rounds by 50 percent(!).

Bemoaning may be tiresome, but it can also lead to changes that really do make a difference.

I wonder if YC applications are gender neutral (names removed)?

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#189

Post by MichaelGG »

sdegutis wrote: post #147
ggreer wrote: post #68

Here are some things I think future societies will condemn us for: 1. Prison. Almost every modern penal system focuses on punishment rather than rehabilitation. I think that as our understanding of the brain improves, we'll be able to find the causes of violent behavior and cure them. Punishment will become cruel and unusual. 2. Eating meat (and other animal rights issues). Even if they're not conscious, most tasty a…

1. It's true they don't focus enough on rehabilitation and too much on punishment, and that sucks. 2. Eating meat is very natural. Even animals do it. 3. Nope. So completely and utterly wrong.

>2. Eating meat is very natural. Even animals do it.

First, we are animals. Second, "nature" isn't a good reason for anything. "You can't get an ought from an is." I still love meat, but I'm aware that animal treatment is certainly a moral issue that is not adequately addressed.

3. Any reason other than "my religion says so"?

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#190

Post by [deleted] »

existencebox wrote: post #171
scoofy wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just because you are a predator, just because it may be "natural," doesn't make our current system of meat production morally acceptable. I generally am sympathetic with what you're saying, however, I'm mostly pescatarian due to the issues you completely overlook. So, without getting into the arguments about whether or not humans ought to eat meat (for argument's sake, let's assume we were carnivores, and could not s…

In your topic about inhumane treatment, I apologize if I was unclear, I intended to make it very obvious (" Do I think we could be better? (more humane raising and slaughter) Abso-fucking-lutely. Do I think as technology grows, that we should move to more humane options? I would be more appalled if we didn't.") that this is where I stand. We should strive in all things to cause as little undue harm as possible. (and…

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