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“A Statement with My View on Curtis Yarvin and Strange Loop”

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Re: “A Statement with My View on Curtis Yarvin and Strange Loop”

#321

Post by tptacek »

yarvin9 wrote: post #259
tptacek wrote: post #143

Isn't Urbit named for the Mencius Moldbug blog, whose writer repeatedly refers to same as "UR"? How distinct is Urbit and Yarvin from the advocacy of the Moldbug UR blog? The association between Yarvin and that blog isn't exactly cryptic; for instance, Yarvin has given somewhat recent video-recorded talks espousing many of the same ideas as the blog, purposefully and in some depth. Is it possible that the most boring…

Sorry, but no. urbit, from the Latin urbs == city, is actually a good bit older than UR. The initials are somehow very compelling - another couple of great literary UR blogs are the Unz Review (unz.com) and Uncouth Reflections (uncouthreflections.com). I will admit that urbit has very few users, as technically we're really not launched at all. We were thinking Strange Loop might be a good place for this, but I guess…

I stand corrected about the name.

Here's an honest summary of what I think:

I find it very easy to see the importance of a serious general-purpose overlay network, since I think that's the future of the Internet, so much so that I think something like Urbit will make IPv6 irrelevant. I'm philosophically inclined to appreciate that work.

I find that the programming model you've attached to it --- the Nock/Hoon stuff --- makes it easy to dismiss the work. I think you winkingly acknowledge and encourage that (for instance: the new pronunciation of ASCII characters), but don't really know why.

The combination of relentless idiosyncrasy, world-building ambition, and your many tens of thousands of words of (to me) odious philosophical writing leaves me in a place where I can empathize with the dilemma you'd post to a conference organizer. Your defenders on this thread seem to take it as an axiom that you'd just get up on stage, explain why you decided to code in line noise instead of Lisp, and talk about our beautiful overlay network future. I'd like to see that talk, too. But I don't think that's actually an axiom. It's seems just as likely that you'd use your network design as a launching point for a 5 minute digression on the evils of democracy.

Later: I just want to be clear that I'm writing for the thread, not directly to you. I don't know which if any of these points you even disagree with.

Re: “A Statement with My View on Curtis Yarvin and Strange Loop”

#322

Post by danielHanniger »

All this shows is that Moldbug and others are exactly right about the tech industry. It is a cesspool of neo-Bolshevist Prog political correctness, rather than somewhere in which people's talent is paramount.

Liberals believe that history favors them always. Within this century, we'll see if that hypothesis is correct. The geopolitical death of the West will be the end of this wretched ideology, just as the geopolitical death of the east was the death of Marxism.

Re: “A Statement with My View on Curtis Yarvin and Strange Loop”

#323

Post by danielHanniger »

sagichmal wrote: post #128
corporealist wrote: post #80

Alex Payne founded a socialist blog: https://www.jacobinmag.com/ Why is writing about certain political ideas OK, but writing about certain other political ideas not OK? Why are those certain other political ideas "not OK" enough for someone to be banned from a technology conference?

> Why is writing about certain political ideas OK, but > writing about certain other political ideas not OK? Calling socialism and racism the same thing, just a "certain political view", is about as intellectually honest as calling speeding and murder the same thing, just a "certain sort of crime".

racism has killed very few people compared to socialism.

Re: “A Statement with My View on Curtis Yarvin and Strange Loop”

#324

Post by cactusface »

tptacek wrote: post #224
dadadadadada wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When -isms start getting thrown around people stop making decisions based on their own beliefs and start doing so out of fear. That isn't the free market of ideas at work.

"Free market of ideas" seems like one of those things that means whatever the person who invokes it wants it to mean.

s/market of ideas//

Re: “A Statement with My View on Curtis Yarvin and Strange Loop”

#325

Post by devalier »

tptacek wrote: post #313
devalier wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Moldbug did in other places explicitly denounce hereditary, chattel slavery and called it evil. His actual view seems to be that it should be legal for a person to sign a permanent, life-long employment contract, mediated and regulated for abuse by the state, where the person gets a guaranteed wage in return for having to provide labor. The idea is that for the lower end of the bell curve, this is a lot more humane t…

Yarvin makes repeated references to Carlyle in multiple pieces, not just the one that's being circulated. Carlyle's position on slavery is not compatible with your summary. Carlyle's take† is distilled utilitarianism. The blacks in the West Indies are lazy and stupid. The English are not. The climate in the West Indies is such that a black person living there need not work at all; they can simply pluck their food off…

Carlyle's position on slavery is not compatible with your summary.

Agreed.

and, I'll trepidatiously infer, Yarvin's (after correcting for modernity)

Since Yarvin is on this thread, he can clarify his actual views if he so wishes.

I think it is possible to cite Carlyle, and to point out that Carlyle made better predictions than the abolitionists, without believing that all black people should be re-enslaved, without believing that chattel slavery is the optimal solution for people with an IQ under 85. I think one can draw from Carlyle while still being a good person.

I think his positive views are generally cryptic because his goal is not to produce some plan of action, his goal was to provoke and to get us to think critically about whether we are actually as moral and righteous as we think we are. We like to think of ourselves as being morally superior to Carlyle. But the counter argument is that when we try to abolish slavery in a righteousness holy war, we often end up in a worse state of general vagrancy and violence or even a worse state of exploitation (eg, share cropping) or a socialized form of slavery (eg, workfare). So rather than being holy and righteous, we should think about what kind of long-term paternalistic structures would actually work best for all involved. I don't that making this argument makes someone a bad person, or worthy of being purged.

Re: “A Statement with My View on Curtis Yarvin and Strange Loop”

#326

Post by lexcorvus »

tptacek wrote: post #319
lexcorvus wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if that's something he wants to distance himself from, he's done himself no favors by overtly nodding to white nationalism in his own writing This is incredibly misleading. Replace "overtly nodding" with explicitly disavowing : the post in question is literally called "Why I am not a white nationalist" [1]. And that's not "people have accused me of being a white nationalist, here's why I'm not", it's "here's why I do…

He clearly is not a fan of the modern racist. That's unsurprising, because (thankfully) the educated sector of our culture has turned it into a taboo, and so to be a modern racist is for most people to be the sort of yutz who writes things on Stormfront. He sure does seem to have a finely-tuned appreciation of archaic racists, though. I feel like --- maybe I've misinterpreted the whole piece, but this is what I think…

I have read it. I don't find "But Not NOT One, Either" to be an accurate characterization. Basically, Moldbug's position is that white nationalists include lots of vile racists, but that by itself doesn't mean they're wrong about everything, and we should evaluate such ideas critically if we want to actually solve the problems they identify (which in fact many progressives would identify as well, though the phrasing and emphasis usually differ substantially). Some quotes:

Of course, I am not a white nationalist. I am not arguing that you should be a white nationalist. I am just suggesting that there are many bad reasons not to be a white nationalist.

[…]

So why am I not a white nationalist?

I am not a white nationalist because I don't find white nationalism useful or effective. I don't feel it helps me accurately perceive reality. In fact, I think it distorts reality. And I believe white nationalism is a very ineffective political device for solving the very real problems about which it complains.

Re: “A Statement with My View on Curtis Yarvin and Strange Loop”

#327

Post by paxdickinson »

tptacek wrote: post #320
amcastillo wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If CY's writing on Carlyle is relevant, why is noting that SK lobbies for more programmers to integrate Marx and other left-radical writers beyond reproach? http://blog.steveklabnik.com/posts/2011-12-15-marx-anarchism...

It isn't. The manner in which it was evoked in the above comment was rude and dismissive, and that's the problem. Incidentally, I'm irritated by Klabnik's politics. But I don't find them disqualifying. I am not so sure about Yarvin's. Can I reliably articulate why I think that's fair? No, I don't think so. And I can live with that.

"Which opinions are disqualifying and should be no platformed? Don't worry, I know them when I see them."

That's comforting.

Re: “A Statement with My View on Curtis Yarvin and Strange Loop”

#328

Post by emjr »

escape_goat wrote: post #252
colinhb wrote: post #195

All I long for is logical consistency and empathy... Various comments from the discussion: > Whatever happened to "I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it."? Getting dis-invited from a tech conference is not losing the right to say anything. The state is not punishing Yarvin for his speech. Giving a talk at a private tech conferences is not a right protected by anyo…

I think your counter-arguments are very bad. I thank you for sharing them here, because I don't think they reflect uncommon opinions at all, and I think they are too easily accepted without reflection. With regards to the "defend to the death your right to say it" hyperbole, I agree that it is overstated. Furthermore, it is true that getting dis-invited from a tech conference does not involve losing the right to say…

"It is also true that these visible, physical qualities have created barriers in the tech industry."

I think it is rather clear that fixing the quoted issue is a far higher priority than minimizing the suffering of those who suffer the least of any of us. It is a roughly utilitarian ethical position to take, and a fairly reasonable one, I think. Is there a particular reason that prioritization of efforts must never occur? Why must we, at all times, be wary never to harm the status quo, while at the same time accepting that the status quo is unacceptable?

Re: “A Statement with My View on Curtis Yarvin and Strange Loop”

#329

Post by tptacek »

devalier wrote: post #325
tptacek wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yarvin makes repeated references to Carlyle in multiple pieces, not just the one that's being circulated. Carlyle's position on slavery is not compatible with your summary. Carlyle's take† is distilled utilitarianism. The blacks in the West Indies are lazy and stupid. The English are not. The climate in the West Indies is such that a black person living there need not work at all; they can simply pluck their food off…

Carlyle's position on slavery is not compatible with your summary. Agreed. and, I'll trepidatiously infer, Yarvin's (after correcting for modernity) Since Yarvin is on this thread, he can clarify his actual views if he so wishes. I think it is possible to cite Carlyle, and to point out that Carlyle made better predictions than the abolitionists, without believing that all black people should be re-enslaved, without b…

Whatever else I think about the idea that Carlyle "made better predictions than the abolitionists", I think I can object that the problem doesn't stop at the approving references to Carlyle. For instance, Yarvin's "favorite primary source on slavery" is Nehemiah Adams, which he quotes in the most cryptic way possible, leaving out the fact that the book --- particularly in the context he cites it in --- is essentially an attempt to paint slavery as a benevolent condition. Look at their clothes! Look at their happy faces! They don't seem downtrodden at all!

Maybe "approver of slavery" is a less apt description than "whatever slavery's equivalent of a holocaust denier is".

Your response to this could be informed by the knowledge that the Adams reference is one of many others I could have chosen to highlight.

Again, I could just be misreading all of this. Yarvin surely made that easy to do.

Ultimately, my argument throughout much of this thread is straightforward, so I'd like to restate it as we delve further into the weeds: Yarvin's writing isn't a case where people have worked hard to mine unsavory associations from ambiguously worded old blog posts. Yarvin is best known for his writing, and much of that writing appears frankly and straightforwardly odious.

Re: “A Statement with My View on Curtis Yarvin and Strange Loop”

#330

Post by tptacek »

lexcorvus wrote: post #326
tptacek wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He clearly is not a fan of the modern racist. That's unsurprising, because (thankfully) the educated sector of our culture has turned it into a taboo, and so to be a modern racist is for most people to be the sort of yutz who writes things on Stormfront. He sure does seem to have a finely-tuned appreciation of archaic racists, though. I feel like --- maybe I've misinterpreted the whole piece, but this is what I think…

I have read it. I don't find "But Not NOT One, Either" to be an accurate characterization. Basically, Moldbug's position is that white nationalists include lots of vile racists, but that by itself doesn't mean they're wrong about everything, and we should evaluate such ideas critically if we want to actually solve the problems they identify (which in fact many progressives would identify as well, though the phrasing…

Your choices of what to quote are telling. For instance, one of those quotes is preceded by a lengthy (and thinly veiled) Derbyshire-esque description of black people as social ill. Shortly after it, we have these cheerful grafs:

This is the trouble with white nationalism. It is strategically barren. It offers no effective political program. You can be as smart as you want and think about white nationalism forever, and you will not come up with any productive strategy for collective action, white or otherwise.

At its best, white nationalism offers a sensible description of a general problem. [em mine] This problem certainly exists, and it falls under the larger category of bad government. (If allowing the old cities of North America to be overrun and rendered largely uninhabitable by murderous racist gangs isn't bad government, really, I'm not sure what is.)

He's not a white nationalist. He's something else.

There's also the historical context of this post, which is William Saletan's idiotic Slate posts about rational IQ variation.

I think a reader of this thread can understand why I'd say that it's you who were being misleading. I feel like that was probably unintentional on your part, because if you were trying to mount a careful bad-faith defense of Yarvin's writing, you probably wouldn't write things that would beg people to further quote it.

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