@oscredwin likes to tell me “I’m *never* arguing with you about “Sarah, pro or con?” I married you; I’m pro! If you killed someone, I’d help you hide the body!” And I know him, and this is true, and so we can go back to the *actual* issue.
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I don’t know what happens if you try leaning *into* the directions that take you to new places, rather than away from them; if you don’t try to slow down the “plot clock.” Maybe the inhibition is there for good reason! Here There Be Dragons.
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But, like, the creation of quantum physics theory would be an example of people going “well we *could* model it that way, but it would take us to some weird places” and then *not stopping* and going to the weird places.
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And quantum physics (and the Bomb) is both an example of a great human achievement and a top candidate for the thing that will ultimately destroy human life. So...beware I guess?
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EA is a great example of this. When a bunch of idealistic people try to ascertain how to do the most good, they come up with weird shit. “Actually no charities are good.” “Destroy the rainforests.” “Wirehead chickens.” “AI safety.” It’s never, like, “give to United Way.”
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Different people of course have different values for what’s good, but once you start trying to *optimize* them you leave the mainstream fast. Ecologists think in terms of saving ecosystems, not cute polar bears. Development economists think about institutions and infrastructure.
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You either get “arcane, abstract, boring” (legal details! administrative policy! spreadsheets and models!) or you get “bizarre supervillain shit” (gene drives! carbon capture! brain uploads!)
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Honest inquiry rarely leads to “just do a nice normal thing that you probably felt like you ought to do before but you never got around to.”
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If you just want your “inquiry” to reinforce what you already think, you had better put a lot of guardrails on it so it doesn’t spit out weird shit. Being scope sensitive at all leads to weird proposals.
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This doesn’t just apply to ethical questions. The way to literally make the most money is not gonna be the same as “do the most prestigious and glamorous thing that everyone associates with rich people.”
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The way to answer a scientific question is not gonna be the same as “do what proves to the world you’re the smartest and have mastered the trickiest techniques.”
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This comes back to judgment again; if you’re trying to achieve a goal you’re gonna get judged. And you’re gonna have to think about what if anything the judgment *means* or *refers to*, not just the experience of hearing it.
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Does the feedback *in fact* tell you that you should change your plan in real life? Why is the person giving that feedback? What does that tell you about the world?
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Back to judging people; I believe doing bad things is common. “So and so has this common character flaw” is not an extraordinary claim requiring extraordinary evidence.
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It doesn’t make sense to ostracize or punish the vast, vast majority of people you suspect of having character flaws.
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It also doesn’t make sense to flip the bozo bit on people just because you think they have a blind spot.
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I generally believe in being very very slow to conclude you have nothing to learn from someone. But also being quick to expect that almost everyone engage in behavior & thought patterns that harm themselves and others.
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“I can’t believe you’re accusing this lovely person of having self-flattering biases!” Well, it would be extraordinary if she didn’t!
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“Mistake vs conflict theory” is a false dichotomy. The most typical way people do harm is through subconscious motivation. There is optimization power steering towards the outcome you don’t like; but the person doesn’t have conscious control or insight into that process.
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Most people are usually wrong when we guess at others’ subconscious motivations; but it’s not a conspiracy theory or paranoia to believe most people have some disturbing subconscious motivations.
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Some particular examples: it’s not an extraordinary claim to say someone has racial, gender, or class biases towards siding with the higher-status groups in their society. Almost all people do to some degree.
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It’s not an extraordinary claim that someone stretches or spins the truth to make themselves look good. Almost everyone does to some degree.
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It’s not an extraordinary claim that most people won’t actually follow through on everything they say they care about.
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It’s not an extraordinary claim that someone has done something illegal, especially someone who runs an organization. There are a lot of laws, not all regularly enforced. It’s surprisingly easy to break one unintentionally.
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We get stuck in semantic debates of “is it really fair to use words to describe people that have negative connotations when the people in question aren’t *that* bad?”
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Trouble is, I don’t think we *have* great words to describe problems that don’t have a judgmental or condemnatory connotation.
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“Liar” is an insult and accusation; but lots of people really do stretch and spin the truth; arguing over whether it’s fair to name someone a liar is kind of a distraction from “what is this person saying, what does he believe, what do his listeners believe...
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what’s actually true, and what impact does it have that these things are different?”
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In general everyone underinvests in finding out what literally happens, what causes it, and what effects it has. We want to skip straight to reacting to it, especially socially and emotionally.
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This is why people have processes like "Five Whys" or experimental protocols or court trials with formal rules of evidence. "Ok what literally just happened here" will not usually be done well by default.
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Also, investigating "what literally just happened here" feels wasteful or "merely intellectual" if you aren't currently on board with the notion that there *is a problem worth caring about* in the first place. This is a legit disagreement! Just not usually made explicit.
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