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Encountering Thomas Sowell

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Re: Encountering Thomas Sowell

#261

Every discussion of Sowell online seems to attract fans of his declaring how brilliant he is. It's a bit strange the sort of hero worship he attracts. Personally, I've never seen it; while he seems like a reasonably smart person, his ideas are simply a mix of standard conservatism and condemnation of the intellectual establishment as he sees it. His views on immigration are uninspiring, the reasons he believes the U.…

Every thread I’ve seen on him has a comment such as yours to complement the the fanboy comments. This is common. Discussions of almost any author here draw the same set of responses.

Thinking about it, almost all discussions online have the same pattern. People who feel strongly about something comment on it, and then people respond to those initial comments.

Re: Encountering Thomas Sowell

#262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason I don't interpret it in that innocuous way is because the founders of Black Lives Matter are self-described "trained Marxists" ( https://www.city-journal.org/marxist-revolutionaries-black-l... ), are follows of the ideologies of various Marxist theorists like Lenin and Mao ( https://time.com/5171270/black-lives-matter-patrisse-cullors... ), and therefore know full well that a core tactic of socialist/commu…

That's an amazing inference. IIRC, The Occupy Movement heavily influenced BLM. David Graeber talks about the origins of Occupy in The Democracy Project. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Democracy_Project Sure Anarchists like Graeber are adjacent to Socialists, Marxists, and other groups. But Anarchists are for participatory democracy, against government. The left-wing version of libertarians. So Anarchists oppose So…

> I couldn't say if Occupy or BLM are Marxist, Socialist, or whatever.

You can say, at least regarding the founders of BLM: https://therealnews.com/pcullors0722blacklives

"BALL: ...he was concerned or is concerned that there’s a lack of perhaps ideological direction in Black Lives Matter that would allow it to be, to fizzle out in, as he said, in comparison to Occupy Wall Street. As you advance in your own organization, as you all are headed to Cleveland to participate in this Black Lives Movement conference, how do you respond to that particular critique?... CULLORS: Um, I think that the criticism is helpful. I also think that it might–. I think of a lot of things. The first thing, I think, is that we actually do have an ideological frame. Myself and Alicia in particular are trained organizers. We are trained Marxists. We are super-versed on, sort of, ideological theories. And I think that what we really tried to do is build a movement that could be utilized by many, many black folk. We don’t necessarily want to be the vanguard of this movement. I think we’ve tried to put out a political frame that’s about centering who we think are the most vulnerable amongst the black community, to really fight for all of our lives. And I do think that we have some clear direction around where we want to take this movement. I don’t believe it’s going to fizzle out. It just gets stronger, and we see it, right. We’ve seen after Sandra Bland. We’re seeing it now with the interruption of the Netroots Nation presidential forum. What I do think, though, is folks–especially folks who have been trained in a particular way want to hear certain things from us, that we’re not sort of framing it in the same ways that maybe another generation have, has. But I think it’s important that people know that we are, the Black Lives Matter movement doesn’t just live online, although there’s many people who utilize it online. We’re in a different set of circumstances, a different generation that–social media may feel like it’s diluting the larger ideological frame. But I argue that it’s not. "

Re: Encountering Thomas Sowell

#263
post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cop restrained a black man using a standard technique, while the balck man had overdose levels of fentanyl in his system. The cop has not been found guilty of strangling Floyd so far, and I believe the system in the US means innocent until proven guilty.

"Two autopsies — one by a county medical examiner and another by a private medical examiner hired by Floyd’s family — as well as a review by military experts conducted for the federal government, reached the conclusion that Floyd died of cardiopulmonary arrest as the officers subduing him compressed his neck and chest."[1] 1. https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/george-floyd-fentanyl/...

Do you believe the story about Epstein hanging himself? Because its the same examiner that was hired by Floyds family. Didn't have access to the body.

Re: Encountering Thomas Sowell

#264

I began studying sociology in my mid 20s. That's what threw me off the left most than anything else. I remember I discovered Sowell about that time, and it was challenging and refreshing. I'm still a strange flavor of a utilitarian social democrat, but he's the reason why I picked up this routine of reading libertarians and conservatives. I dismissed some controversial right-wing figures in my country and reading the…

Despite considering myself very politically aware, I first learned of him just in the last few years. I'm perpetually amazed that more people are not familiar with Sowell's work over many decades. It makes me wonder whether he was ignored because he was a black man challenging many of the left's dogmas.

More than being black, which I'm sure it contributes, I think he was a bit of an outsider in academia. Typically you would make friends and connections so your work gets more spread out. It seems that sowell was a bit on his own.

There's a lot of nepotism in academia, only the filter of time seems counterbalance it.

Re: Encountering Thomas Sowell

#265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hughes can do that if anyone can. I know among the right, Ben Shapiro is often viewed as the great argument destroyer but I think Hughes could give him a run for his money.

Shapiro is nearly universally reviled by the left and right. It's hard even for an open minded person to not see him as openly racist and misogynistic.

I'm not so sure about that. If that were the case then he wouldn't consistently have a top ranking podcast.

Re: Encountering Thomas Sowell

#266
post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Two autopsies — one by a county medical examiner and another by a private medical examiner hired by Floyd’s family — as well as a review by military experts conducted for the federal government, reached the conclusion that Floyd died of cardiopulmonary arrest as the officers subduing him compressed his neck and chest."[1] 1. https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/george-floyd-fentanyl/...

Do you believe the story about Epstein hanging himself? Because its the same examiner that was hired by Floyds family. Didn't have access to the body.

Three independent investigators came to the same conclusion, but we're supposed to believe you know better from your armchair?

Re: Encountering Thomas Sowell

#267
post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does. This text picks it apart concisely. https://www.peoplespolicyproject.org/2021/03/01/the-success-...

That text doesn’t actually dismantle anything (and ignores mountains of other evidence) and doesn’t defend its own alternative either. Put simply, if redistribution worked, we’d see poverty rates decrease rather than stagnate or increase. In contrast, single parent households drastically reduce the chances of success in life along a ton of metrics. Those kids get worse grades, drop out early, suffer learning and ment…

> Put simply, if redistribution worked, we’d see poverty rates decrease rather than stagnate or increase.

That is what we see, in other countries with more robust (and more redistributive) welfare state systems than the US.

Re: Encountering Thomas Sowell

#268
post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have in the past read a few short pieces by Sowell. Impression: weak normative reasoning, shaky empirical claims. I'd be happy if you steelman Sowell for me. Point to at most 10 pages of text where you think he is at his best, giving an argument for something supported by sound reasoning and strong empirical evidence. It might update my view of him.

> I'd be happy if you steelman Sowell for me. That's not at all how a steel man argument works. You're supposed to commit to building the best form of your opponent's argument and verify that they themselves agree with it. You don't ask someone to do it for you.

> That's not at all how a steel man argument works

With steelmanning I mean "the act of taking a view, or opinion, or argument and constructing the strongest possible version of it."[1] If you dispute that definition[2] then mentally swap the term to one you think better fits what I proposed.

[1] https://www.lesswrong.com/tag/steelmanning

[2] https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/7X2j8HAkWdmMoS8PE/disputing-...

Re: Encountering Thomas Sowell

#269
post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you believe the story about Epstein hanging himself? Because its the same examiner that was hired by Floyds family. Didn't have access to the body.

Three independent investigators came to the same conclusion, but we're supposed to believe you know better from your armchair?

So you do believe the person that claimed Epstein hanged himself?

Re: Encountering Thomas Sowell

#270
post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Black males seem to disproportionately die at the hands of police. But BLM is about much more than just death. Death is just a catalyst that makes people notice. Lots of Black people deal with disrespect and abuse from police on a regular basis. A lot of the seemingly flippant behavior from Black people towards police that we sometimes see during recorded interactions is well earned by years of subtle, and not so sub…

It's more complex than that because not every black person is equally likely to have an encounter with the police. There are studies that suggest that if you control for encounters with the police, blacks are just as likely as whites to be killed by the police. Half of violent crimes in the US are also committed by blacks. This is definitely one of the consequences of the history of slavery and segregation. Neverthel…

https://twitter.com/samswey/status/1371481061620781061 Blacks are not only more likely to be killed by the police but also are more likely to be unarmed. Blacks are likely not committing 50% of violent crimes, but are rather convicted for 48% of the crimes which if you've looked into studies on community targeting seem to have to do more with police officer bias.
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