What You Can't Say (2004) • Hacker News Board

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#161

Post by siruncledrew » Sat, Oct 12, 2019, 7:20 AM UTC

kristianc wrote: post #4

The inverse of this seems to be taking hold now: that it’s socially acceptable to say things which are unreasonable, outlandish or downright factually incorrect, if they’re considered to be in service of a cause that ‘our side’ believes in. But yes, this has also been discussed a lot here before.

Good quality debates are becoming much rarer among websites and social media with larger pools of users.

Here’s a very old debate: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1860_Oxford_evolution_debate

There’s a good quote inside:

”Let us ever apply ourselves to the task, feeling assured that the more we thus exercise, and by exercising improve our intellectual faculties, the more worthy shall we be, the better shall we be fitted to come nearer to our God.”

The gist I get from it (not saying it’s 100% right) is that we enrich ourselves by exercising our mental state, which means challenging ourselves, exploring new intellectual points, and having the fortitude to go through with it (and hopefully find meaning).

Instead, the easy way is to forgo such “intellectual exercise” and simply regurgitate the same sentiments back to ‘the group’ and drown out the ‘other side’ with self-serving, dribbling retorts.

With respect to “What can’t be said”, this reinforces conditioned thinking that is black or white with no gray area in between to formally discuss. Instead, the ethos is “You’re either with us or against us”, and challenging that classification is violating Rule #1.

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#162

Post by BurningFrog » Sat, Oct 12, 2019, 7:29 AM UTC

lone_haxx0r wrote: post #101

Jarwain wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that if one were to draw the line between tolerant and intolerant ideologies, that line shouldn't be drawn based on the content of the ideology but rather how that ideology spreads. Specifically, based on this quote > they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive,…

1. That line would still be hard to draw 2. I know many ideologies that most people would consider "intolerant" but would fall under the "tolerant" umbrella because there's a rationalization for its intolerance. In fact, any ideology, as violent as it might be, can be rationalized. While it is also technically possible to discover the underlying, hidden 'intolerance' of an ideology, society at large is not capable of…

> 1. That line would still be hard to draw

Perhaps I'm unusually gifted, but I find the line between violence and non violence quite easy to raw. One of the easiest of all lines, really.

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#163

Post by username90 » Sat, Oct 12, 2019, 7:38 AM UTC

Tronno wrote: post #45

malandrew wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither conservatism nor progressivism is necessarily correct or better. Sometimes conservatism is worse because it preserves things that we should change for the better. Sometimes progressivism is worse because it doesn't fully understand why society arrived at a solution so progressives try to change things in a way they think is better but then there are all sorts of unintended consequences that turn out to be wor…

"Now progressives are trying to reinstitute segregation and promoting the idea that people should be judged on skin color and not content of character while conservatives fight them on these changes." That's quite a statement. Could you go into more detail?

Progressives used to be pro blind hiring and objective criteria like tests. But after it turned out that blind hiring and objective criteria gets even less diversity than our current methods it flipped, and now conservatives wants blind hiring and objective criteria while progressives wants to pick people by gender and race.

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#164

Post by Udik » Sat, Oct 12, 2019, 7:42 AM UTC

ixtli wrote: post #136

knzhou wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I promise I've met worse racists than you have, and if you ask why they believe what they do, they talk in terms of self-defence. That they were minding their own business until group X took their jobs or killed their kin or stole their culture or broke their laws or left them destitute or insulted their people or took over their government. There is always a self-defence reason, and even more inconveniently, the one…

I certainly hope you haven't. But yes I know what you're talking about: that is certainly a behavior of a certain type of racist I've encountered. I find quite often that people with reactionary beliefs feel that they are personally under attack, or at least its important that they nurture a certain type of victimhood. I must insist, though, that there is another type that comes from a belief that your perceived "gen…

> there is another type that comes from a belief that your perceived "genetic" [...] inheritance make you in some way implicitly superior...

On the other hand, I am pretty convinced that my genetic inheritance makes me "superior" (in some vague, but obvious way) to a cat- and yet I've never harmed or desired harm for cats- I actually like them. Or, to make a different example, while we consider it unacceptable to think of race X to be "superior" to race Y, we have no particular issues in admitting that the individual Albert Einstein was "superior" (again, in some vague way) to many other individuals (us included)- and yet from that doesn't follow we mean those individuals any harm or disrespect.

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#165

Post by buboard » Sat, Oct 12, 2019, 7:46 AM UTC

TL;dr Progress only happens at the borders.

This long piece of wrongthink is such a great handbook for the 2010s

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#166

Post by buboard » Sat, Oct 12, 2019, 7:47 AM UTC

kaens wrote: post #64

> Less well known is the paradox of tolerance: Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them. > In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress th…

intolerance guarantees stagnation. tolerance has more optionality

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#167

Post by buboard » Sat, Oct 12, 2019, 7:49 AM UTC

kristianc wrote: post #4

The inverse of this seems to be taking hold now: that it’s socially acceptable to say things which are unreasonable, outlandish or downright factually incorrect, if they’re considered to be in service of a cause that ‘our side’ believes in. But yes, this has also been discussed a lot here before.

It's not the inverse , but a corrolary: With heretical ideas being purged from each Church, the churches have doubled down on absurdness

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#168

Post by blub » Sat, Oct 12, 2019, 8:01 AM UTC

lone_haxx0r wrote: post #71

kaens wrote: post #64

> Less well known is the paradox of tolerance: Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them. > In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress th…

Embracing Popper's thesis implies the existence of a line separating "tolerant ideologies" from "intolerant ideologies". Who is going to define that line? Knowing how the world works, I don't suspect, but I know it will be used to suppress things that the mob doesn't agree with, while that same mob preaches ideologies more violent and intolerant than the ones they suppress. Popper's opinion only makes sense when the…

How can fighting intolerance "suppress things the mob does not agree with", if that is in itself intolerance?

The whole point is to allow different ideas to exist.

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#169

Post by username90 » Sat, Oct 12, 2019, 8:14 AM UTC

BurningFrog wrote: post #162

lone_haxx0r wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. That line would still be hard to draw 2. I know many ideologies that most people would consider "intolerant" but would fall under the "tolerant" umbrella because there's a rationalization for its intolerance. In fact, any ideology, as violent as it might be, can be rationalized. While it is also technically possible to discover the underlying, hidden 'intolerance' of an ideology, society at large is not capable of…

> 1. That line would still be hard to draw Perhaps I'm unusually gifted, but I find the line between violence and non violence quite easy to raw. One of the easiest of all lines, really.

Karl Popper argued that we need to use violence to cull intolerant ideas even if they aren't violent. If you think that it is wrong to do that then you are on the pacifists side and not the "We shouldn't tolerate intolerance" side.

Re: What You Can't Say (2004)

#170

Post by Gormisdomai » Sat, Oct 12, 2019, 8:19 AM UTC

lone_haxx0r wrote: post #71

kaens wrote: post #64

> Less well known is the paradox of tolerance: Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them. > In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress th…

Embracing Popper's thesis implies the existence of a line separating "tolerant ideologies" from "intolerant ideologies". Who is going to define that line? Knowing how the world works, I don't suspect, but I know it will be used to suppress things that the mob doesn't agree with, while that same mob preaches ideologies more violent and intolerant than the ones they suppress. Popper's opinion only makes sense when the…

> Popper's opinion only makes sense when the person in power (or the mob) is never wrong, and that never happens.

I don't think this is true. The person in power can be wrong (e.g.) 10% of the time and you'd still have a mostly stable and tolerant system.