This post shares recent conjectures. I’m less confident than usual. I’m confident there’s something important and irrational about social dynamics (which is not a recent or original thought), but I’m less confident about the connection with static memes in particular (which is an original idea covering specifics that David Deutsch left mostly unspecified).

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The core static memes (see Third Type of Meme: Static Companion Memes and comments, which I'm following up on) are second-handedness (see The Fountainhead) and related social orientation instead of reality orientation. The way static memes suppress critical faculties is by getting people to judge in terms of the opinions of other people, and their social status, rather than in terms of facts, logic and reality. Static memes get people to replace their connection with objective reality with a connection with social dynamics.

Static societies are similar to what Elsworth Toohey described to Peter Keating in The Fountainhead (emphasis added):

“ ... A world of obedience and of unity. A world where the thought of each man will not be his own, but an attempt to guess the thought in the brain of his neighbor who’ll have no thought of his own but an attempt to guess the thought of the next neighbor who’ll have no thought—and so on, Peter, around the globe. Since all must agree with all. A world where no man will hold a desire for himself, but will direct all his efforts to satisfy the desires of his neighbor who’ll have no desires except to satisfy the desires of the next neighbor who’ll have no desires—around the globe, Peter. Since all must serve all. A world in which man will not work for so innocent an incentive as money, but for that headless monster—prestige. The approval of his fellows—their good opinion—the opinion of men who’ll be allowed to hold no opinion.... Judgment, Peter? Not judgment, but public polls. An average drawn upon zeroes—since no individuality will be permitted.... I want power.... Let all live for all. Let all sacrifice and none profit. Let all suffer and none enjoy. Let progress stop. Let all stagnate. There’s equality in stagnation. All subjugated to the will of all. Universal slavery—without even the dignity of a master. Slavery to slavery. A great circle—and a total equality....”

Static companion memes, then, are socially calibrated behaviors – they compete to better fit into the social game instead of being useful or reality-oriented. Most of the social rules (in detail re particular things) and behaviors don’t create or cause the social game itself, they just make sense within it. An example is being passive-aggressive (or more specifically a particular insult like saying something is a “bad look” or “weird”). That’s something which is adapted to the selection pressures of social games instead of the selection pressures of dealing with reality. Wearing fashionable clothes, learning recent jargon for a subculture, trying to please others, and all sorts of social climbing are static companion memes. They’re evolved not to directly suppress thinking but to be effective in the social world created by the core static memes to shut down creative thought about reality.

Consequently, it’s informative to analyze many things in two ways: in terms of reality (facts, logic, science, literal meanings of word, etc.) and in terms of social reality (what people think of it, its meaning in social status contests). Many misunderstandings and clashes between people in our mixed society are because one person, at this time, is focusing on real reality while the other is focusing on social reality.

David Deutsch described in The Fabric of Reality how (in his experience) scientists only have a scientific mindset at certain times and use a social mindset at other times. Italics are DD’s, bolds are my emphasis:

I have sometimes found myself on the minority side of fundamental scientific controversies. But I have never come across anything like a Kuhnian situation. Of course, as I have said, the majority of the scientific community is not always quite as open to criticism as it ideally should be. Nevertheless, the extent to which it adheres to ‘proper scientific practice’ in the conduct of scientific research is nothing short of remarkable. You need only attend a research seminar in any fundamental field in the ‘hard’ sciences to see how strongly people's behaviour as researchers differs from human behaviour in general. Here we see a learned professor, acknowledged as the leading expert in the entire field, delivering a seminar. The seminar room is filled with people from every rank in the hierarchy of academic research, from graduate students who were introduced to the field only weeks ago, to other professors whose prestige rivals that of the speaker. The academic hierarchy is an intricate power structure in which people's careers, influence and reputation are continuously at stake, as much as in any cabinet room or boardroom — or more so. Yet so long as the seminar is in progress it may be quite hard for an observer to distinguish the participants’ ranks. The most junior graduate student asks a question: ‘Does your third equation really follow from the second one? Surely that term you omitted is not negligible.’ The professor is sure that the term is negligible, and that the student is making an error of judgement that someone more experienced would not have made. So what happens next?

In an analogous situation, a powerful chief executive whose business judgement was being contradicted by a brash new recruit might say, ‘Look, I've made more of these judgements than you've  had hot dinners. If I tell you it works, then it works.’ A senior politician might say in response to criticism from an obscure but ambitious party worker, ‘Whose side are you on, anyway?’ Even our professor, away from the research context (while delivering an undergraduate lecture, say) might well reply dismissively, ‘You'd better learn to walk before you can run. Read the textbook, and meanwhile don't waste your time and ours.’ But in the research seminar any such response to criticism would cause a wave of embarrassment to pass through the seminar room. People would avert their eyes and pretend to be diligently studying their notes. There would be smirks and sidelong glances. Everyone would be shocked by the sheer impropriety of such an attitude. In this situation, appeals to authority (at least, overt ones) are simply not acceptable, even when the most senior person in the entire field is addressing the most junior.

So the professor takes the student's point seriously, and responds with a concise but adequate argument in defence of the disputed equation. The professor tries hard to show no sign of being irritated by criticism from so lowly a source. Most of the questions from the floor will have the form of criticisms which, if valid, would diminish or destroy the value of the professor's life's work. But bringing vigorous and diverse criticism to bear on accepted truths is one of the very purposes of the seminar. Everyone takes it for granted that the truth is not obvious, and that the obvious need not be true; that ideas are to be accepted or rejected according to their content and not their origin; that the greatest minds can easily make mistakes; and that the most trivial-seeming objection may be the key to a great new discovery.

So the participants in the seminar, while they are engaged in science, do behave in large measure with scientific rationality. But now the seminar ends. Let us follow the group into the dining-hall. Immediately, normal human social behaviour reasserts itself. The professor is treated with deference, and sits at a table with those of equal rank. A chosen few from the lower ranks are given the privilege of being allowed to sit there too. The conversation turns to the weather, gossip or (especially) academic politics. So long as those subjects are being discussed, all the dogmatism and prejudice, the pride and loyalty, the threats and flattery of typical human interactions in similar circumstances will reappear. But if the conversation happens to revert to the subject of the seminar, the scientists instantly become scientists again. Explanations are sought, evidence and argument rule, and rank becomes irrelevant to the course of the argument. That is, at any rate, my experience in the fields in which I have worked.

DD describes a world in which social behavior is the norm, but some men temporarily set it aside to think like scientists capable of learning something about reality instead of about who thinks who has a higher social rank than who.

See also The Law of Least Effort as an example of insightful analysis of social dynamics. While some basics about social status and interaction are well known, lots of the details and rules are not well known (or there are well known myths about them).

The core static memes are things which cause this situation and create the social game in the first place, rather than the consequences and details of it. It's whatever makes people second-handed rather than the latest fashion which isn't responsible for the situation. The law of least effort is something deep enough it could be closely related to a core static meme instead of being a superficial consequence like men holding doors open for women, but it's hard to tell.

---

In response to the basic idea that social dynamics are the essence of irrationality, there's a question one should ask. What about some other candidates for major irrationality issues? For example, superstition, religion and coercive parenting. How do those things fit into this picture?

Religion is a mix of social interaction and superstition (and some useful life advice), so let's turn to superstition. When people are oriented to social reality instead of physical reality, they lose touch with facts and logic. They judge a superstition not by whether it's true but by whether high social status people believe it.

For parenting, a lot of what parents do is socialize their children. They make them learn to defer to parental authority. They make them learn the social hierarchy of society and how to get along with others. When they say "Because I said so..." they mean because a higher status person said it to a much lower status person.

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The problem I've been thinking about, which this post is in response to, is what's going on with people who won't/can't read literally, think logically, get facts right, be precise, etc. Why can't we have some common ground, as a basis for discussion, using standard dictionary English and some simple facts?

It's because they read and write sentences in terms of the loose gist for the reality meaning and focus mostly on the social meaning. While I read and write in terms of the reality meaning while paying only a little attention to the social meaning (overall, I do a lot better than random chance at e.g. not being rude – that shows some awareness of social meanings).

When I ask people to meet me, as common ground, at facts and logic – try to get some little details correct and focus on correctness and go step by step – it doesn't work because they're so oriented to the social world.

When I talk about problems like overreaching or lack of paths forward, those don't work with most people because they are reality/facts/etc oriented. They seem fundamental to me from my perspective, but they aren't designed to have the right social meanings to work for socially-focused people. Overreaching is not the fundamental problem of an overreacher. Living in social reality instead of actual reality is their fundamental problem.

There are two broad mindsets for how to deal with life: dealing with reality and dealing with social reality, social dynamics, social metaphysics, social climbing. Some people second-handedly focus on the opinions of other people, while others focus on dealing with nature, logic, facts and science. Most people do a mix of both, but many individual statements or actions are primarily related to one mindset.

I conjecture that social reality is the primary mechanism of static memes. That's how they make people irrational, prevent critical thinking, etc.

Social thinking is the primary reason people fail at being rational intellectuals. It's an ongoing cause of misunderstanding and conflict because e.g. I say something and people read it according to a non-literal, social meaning. Social thinkers aren't very connected to real reality because they're focusing on a whole separate reality.

Some of the messages I comment on in this post are from TheRat Chat.

This is from the public Fallible Ideas Discord.

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curi:

looked thru #off-topic stuff. good tries alan, GISTE, J, anne. i thot u all did fine re logic. didn't address the bad faith tho which is why that didn't work

curi:

e.g.

You should read the response above if you need a good laugh.

curi:

when ppl are saying things like that, they are basically admitting their bad faith

curi:

curi:

the basic underlying problem is 2 different approaches to life: facts/logic/physical-reality and social climber approach, social rules, social dynamics, social metapysics

curi:

is a whole separate way of thinking

curi:

it's the way of static memes

curi:

VSE is a cargo culter. his scientific logical mindset sounding statements are fakery for social posturing, which is why he can't engage with arguments, he just knows the kind of things to say but not how to understand arguments and respond substantively.

curi:

he thinks everyone is like this. doesn't know real scientists, logicians, etc., exist

curi:

this is one of the reaosns they hate meta. meta lets you call them out. if you only respond with topical statements, it actually helps them make it look like a real discussion

curi:

if you call out non sequiturs or otherwise talk about their errors, or the overall situation, that's a threat to them

curi:

if you just make statements re e.g. logic of scientific discovery, they can derail and fake forever. that's what they know how to do.

curi:

ppl ignore stuff they find socially inconvenient and then get mad about "meta" if u comment on this

curi:

and they have double standards: they make all kinds of demands that you do things, answer things, etc. which are meta comments

curi:

anyway when you see the kind of people who never give direct answers to questions, and don't read statements in a way that's very well connected to the dictionary meanings of the words, it's b/c they don't think in terms of facts and logic, they think in terms of social meanings

curi:

that's the big divide in the world which prevents ppl from engaging with FI and ruins their minds

curi:

that's the key principle of irrationality

curi:

social metaphysics doesn't do error correction.

curi:

ppl who manage to do some programming, science, engineering, math, etc., often either 1) don't get along well with ppl socially (especially common with the best ones) or 2) it's an exception which they turn off when they aren't in professional mode, like DD talking about the scientists leaving the lecturehall, going to the meal hall, and then going into social dynamics mode and not being scientists anymore.

curi:

1:18 PM] TheRat: I count it after one asks, and he refuses. For example, he has yet to explain his assertion that I don't know what progress in a conversation looks like. After I asked for an explanation he asked me for my mode. Which is irrelevant as to how he came up with the assertion himself.
[1:19 PM] TheRat: model*

curi:

that is factually false. i've already corrected him on his factual errors many times. he has an unlimited supply of them.

curi:

sometimes he changes mindset and is able to think some but right now he's in a hostile and social mode, so he loses touch with reality and its facts.

curi:

the English language is closely connected to reality, as i blogged about yest, which is why social metaphysicians won't use it right

curi:

that's why all the conflicts re words

curi:

and the misreadings which are egregious from factual pov

curi:

there isn't a proper name for the reality/facts/logic/science side

curi:

that identifies it

curi:

cuz it's the default and there is a broad assumption that everyone is on that side

curi:

scientific mindset is too narrow

curi:

i like the contrast of social reality/metaphysics vs. real reality/metaphysics

curi:

but that's custom terminology

curi:

curi:

"a fair amount" is literally a quantifier

curi:

the examples are endless

curi:

he's just cargo culting to sound like a logician

curi:

TheRat: The whole writing in a channel one can't respond to is the most bizarre behaviors I have seen him display.

calling stuff bizarre is an example of a social judgment. similar to abnormal.

curi:

the use of "whole" is social

curi:

there's a factual error too. can you spot it?

curi:

the mindset of behaviors being on display, and putting things in terms of who has seen who do what, is also socially oriented.

JustinCEO:

they can (and have) responded

curi:

indeed

curi:

it's a double pronged error. cuz he maybe meant can't respond in the channel, which is not what he said. would that be true?

JustinCEO:

well i read him as speaking of e.g. VSE and SS, who i think are locked to off-topic. so if that's what he meant (can't respond in the channel) it seems true, unless maybe TheRat was gonna serve as a go-between or they were to ask for an unmute

JustinCEO:

needed to think about that one lol

curi:

he said "one" not VSE or SS

JustinCEO:

ahhh

curi:

so consider if TheRat could reply here or not

curi:

talking about issues like discussion methodology or social vs. actual metaphysics is meta discussion. anything where you point out patterns of error instead of individual errors is meta discussion. their hostility to meta discussion is part of how they protect their racket. they have an unlimited source of errors and they don't want the pattern or source to be discussed.

curi:

also "behaviors" is an error, should be singular. and he left out the word "thing" after "respond to" to match "whole".

curi:

And i don't think the use of "most" is an honest, logical, factual thought.

JustinCEO:

i thought the complaining about channel thing was interesting cuz

JustinCEO:

in the face of the hostility level these folks have demonstrated

JustinCEO:

very standard approach would be to kick

JustinCEO:

for discord

JustinCEO:

and you figured out a way to not kick, to allow some discussion to proceed

JustinCEO:

and get flamed for it

JustinCEO:

TT

curi:

Thought: People are dishonest because (one reason, not only) honesty is related to reality and they are acting in social reality which has its own rules. They are often honest re social rules, in some sense, e.g. they will back off when 100 people say they're wrong (as SS accused me of being unwilling to do – he was calling me socially dishonest).

JustinCEO:

i thought the off-topic channel was a rather elegant/clever solution

JustinCEO:

like the server's purpose is for people interested in FI

JustinCEO:

including people who disagree, that's fine

curi:

yes tho i don't think rat was talking about OT channel and u haven't given a direct answer.

JustinCEO:

but it's not really about enabling hostile flaming, appeals to authority and active disinterest in this community's ideas...

JustinCEO:

oh re: answer you mean "4:46 PM] curi: so consider if TheRat could reply here or not"

curi:

yes

curi:

the reason i can't back off to simpler stuff and get common ground with ppl is they back off to simpler social claims while i back off to simpler facts and logic.

JustinCEO:

well he could reply to stuff said here in another channel

curi:

could he reply in #contributors ?

JustinCEO:

oh lol

JustinCEO:

i see

JustinCEO:

yes he could

curi:

it seems like you thought the answer was "no" but didn't want to disagree with me, or assumed i had some other point in mind, so were avoiding direct response

JustinCEO:

ya i was leaning no but didn't wanna respond right away

JustinCEO:

actually

JustinCEO:

yeah

curi:

so why is the answer yes? u didn't explain.

JustinCEO:

right

JustinCEO:

he could become a contributor

curi:

yes. $2 for a month is not an impenetrable barrier to replying.

curi:

he also acts like i'm talking to him but not letting him reply

curi:

but i was talking to my contributors

curi:

my messages were aimed at the audience of ppl who like my stuff

curi:

back to main theme: notice how often they accuse me of social errors

curi:

i think lots of those are real opinions involving some (social) thought and not just lying in ways they hope to get away with.

curi:

whereas their accusations of factual errors are all cargo cult stuff, skin deep, no details, no examples, no analysis (sometimes a little bit of that stuff, which is always fake cardboard cutouts and they derail if you try to look behind the curtain)

curi:

:06 PM] TheRat: nobody cares about his alleged skills at coming to a conclusion. What matters is his explanations of his conclusions

curi:

notice the social emphasis re what people care about

curi:

and the disrespect for facts. "nobody" is egregiously factually false

curi:

second-handed.

curi:

but that sort of factually false exaggeration like "nobody" is allowable in social rules. it's actually encouraged. it's like saying "you were 3 hours late" to someone who was 2 hours late. if they correct you, they have to admit to being 2 hours late and spend time focusing attention on that fact which is bad for them. so it's lose/lose for them.

curi:

ppl will be like "holy shit how are you defending being 2 hours late?"

curi:

in social rules, a lot of stuff can be taken out of context. i think the context rules are different.

curi:

the social context is stuff like how prestigious someone is, not what is the parent statement of a statement.

curi:

social stuff has so much selective attention. hypocrisy is a facts and logic concern related to consistency and general principles.

curi:

the social world has other general principles like that low status is bad and that the appearance of effort is bad (with exceptions but it has a lot of generality).

curi:

but it doesn't worry about consistency like if you say X is bad when Joe does it, then X should be deemed bad when you do it. the person who is doing it is major differentiating context in social metaphysics. what you can get away with socially is a big issue based on your social status.

JustinCEO:

i was reading about an applied example of effort is bad

curi:

in some sense they see it as not being hypocritical b/c ppl with different social status levels doing the same actions are not the same things

curi:

just like we think "ofc joe can lift that and bob can't, joe is stronger"

JustinCEO:

the idea of "sprezzatura" as applied to male fashion

curi:

what ur allowed to do or say is based on ur social status level

curi:

and that's a thing they're always taking into account as relevant, differentiating context

JustinCEO:

That's the interesting dichotomy of good style: you want to look good but you also don't want to look like you're trying too hard.

There needs to be an element of nonchalance or sprezzatura (aka artful dishevelment) to your look.

curi:

going into details like node by node analysis of discussion is high effort

curi:

so the social ppl super resist it whether they could do it or not

curi:

not b/c they are avoiding effort itself – they will sometimes e.g. put lots of effort into days of derailing and BS, and make the conversations use more resources not less – but more b/c appearance of effort (as judged in a particular way that isn't very factually accurate) is socially bad and they internalized that social rule

curi:

you have a blindspot for curi

social statement

curi:

who is allies with who

curi:

I don't want to go off topic because as we have seen that never works.

social re what the group has seen. that's how something is determined to be true

curi:

it's so ingrained they are bad at hiding it

curi:

also let him defend himself. You shouldn't fight his battles

heh, nice example simultaneous to me saying they're bad at hiding it

curi:

and he goes and openly admits he views discussion as battle

curi:

and he's talking about the sources of statements, treating the same arguments as different depending on who says them

curi:

social metaphysics is very interested in sources of ideas. it needs those to judge ideas by the social status of the speaker.

curi:

and rat is saying: you shouldn't be allies with that guy cuz he's a pariah

curi:

he wouldn't tell a marxist you shouldn't fight marx's battles for him.

curi:

he wouldn't do it with a live and high status person either, like he wouldn't tell a DD fan not to fight DD's battles for him meaning don't argue in favor of FoR and BoI.

curi:

he's hurting you by making you his proxy, you aren't thinking for yourself.

rat wants to talk about who is doing what to who

curi:

who is whose ally and what is the relative status of the ppl in the group

curi:

2:25 PM] TheRat: its not good

he thinks justin is being hurt by having a low status place in my group

curi:

he also claims i'm the actor here, the puppet master, that i'm "making" justin, which is a good example of lack of interest in physical reality and its facts

curi:

there's also the fact that i responded to rat and he ignored me

curi:

and responded to justin only

curi:

so who exactly chose that rat should be talking with J instead of me directly?

curi:

but rat is talking social facts, which don't care about facts

curi:

You've successfully derailed the conversation.

says the guy who won't answer one question, and claims to dislike meta discussion but keeps doing it

JustinCEO:

was gonna say this if Rat conceded assertions: even if curi did make explanationless assertions -- which I doubt, but let's stipulate it for the heck of it -- even if he did, and you also made assertions, @TheRat , then at the very best ya'll would be a symmetrical position re: making some assertions in the conversation. Reason doesn't say making assertions is okay cuz the other guy started it... but instead of trying to bridge the gap of (at best, for you) mistakes on both sides, Rat, you seem more into being mad, flaming people you disagree with as not thinking for themselves, etc.

JustinCEO:

writing here cuz rat didn't wanna engage

curi:

no one explains all their assertions

curi:

methodology is needed re which to explain, when, why

curi:

and there is the whole regress issue

JustinCEO:

i guess part of the issue is

curi:

when you explain one u make other assertions

curi:

is like how u can't define all the words

JustinCEO:

i view explanationless assertion as

JustinCEO:

something for which there is no explanation available

JustinCEO:

like a bluff

curi:

you need some common ground so u don't have to explain everything infinitely

curi:

and I refuse to move from that until he addresses it.

curi:

i factually already addressed it and rat just ignored me

curi:

he is making unexplained, unargued assertions

curi:

he's cargo culting what a principled stand looked like

curi:

but it's so divorced from reality

curi:

Since curi is clearly not afk but crying in his own channel,

curi:

social comment

curi:

curi:

it's all this social stuff about what people have done what actions and who the burdens should fall on, who deserves what treatment and which people should do what actions in the future

curi:

rat enjoyed sending my debate policy to ppl. did he think it was a good way to socially bully them? now when he has an issue with me he doesn't want to use it. does he think the policy is too unfair or unreasonable to use? but then why did he keep linking others to it to challenge them? more social dynamics crap going on?

curi:

enjoyed is the wrong word. i'd guess it's true but the issue is more that he seemed to think it was good and rational to do that.

curi:

Imagine if anyone thought that flew as an explanation. "Vaccines don't work." Why? "See my debate policy www.blogsmahfeels.com"

curi:

can you spot the 4+ social attacks here?

JustinCEO:

anti-blogger flaming, comparison to low status vaccine deniers, "mah feels" to claim the status of being more rational vs an emotional person

JustinCEO:

struggling to get to 4

curi:

u missed the biggest one!

JustinCEO:

😄 doh

curi:

he smeared me as a person who thinks differently than anyone else

JustinCEO:

ah

curi:

u cud phrase it other ways but he's saying ~everyone thinks i'm wrong and he put stuff blatantly in second handed terms of what ppl think

curi:

the msg has other issues like he's misrepresenting what i said

curi:

and the method of imagining a counterfactual world instead of analyzing

curi:

and the appeal to the obvious dumbness of the scenario rather than arguing why

curi:

and the not saying his conclusion: that woudl be bad

curi:

the structure is "Imagine if X."

curi:

with no conclusion statement b/c it's assumed to be so obvious it doesn't need saying

curi:

there's also no direct connection btwn the msg and what i said, and no attempt at one

curi:

that's only implied

curi:

he focused on social instead of logic

curi:

the point of it, the purpose, was the 4 social smears

curi:

@Freeze perhaps you can learn something about how and why ppl quit FI. or perhaps you can try to talk to him.

curi:

curi:

lol/sigh @ the unargued assertion (got schooled, which is also an anti-student social smear) in the msg accusing me unargued assertions

curi:

@Mingmecha you also asked re ppl quitting FI

GISTE:

I was asking SS about what he meant by one of his statements that included the word “force”, where he misused the word. After some back and forth I asked him to restate without the word “force”. He was surprised that I wanted that. He said something like that he couldn’t do it cuz force is what he meant. That made no damn sense. Like he wanted me to make sense of his statement despite it containing a word that he knew didn’t really fit. And he put so much effort in the meta, effort that he instead could have put into restating without the word “force”.

GISTE:

I was pretty surprised by that.

GISTE:

I didn’t know that people did that.

GISTE:

So that’s something I learned. And SS said shortly after that convo that he thinks I didn’t learn anything from the meta discussion.

curi:

curi:

good answer GISTE

Example of how irrational people are and how hard it is to deal with. Think you're better at reason youreslf or better able to engage with people productively? Test your skills in discussions and share transcripts for critical analysis. If you never test how good you are, and take other steps to get good, you should assume you're highly irrational. Highly irrational is the default.

This is from the public Fallible Ideas Discord.

---

TheRat:

However, I reject your summary of the discussion.

JustinCEO:

hey Rat, do you think curi puts in a fair amount of effort in general re: explaining things carefully, doing things like making discussion trees, referring people to resources relevant to the point at hand, etc?

JustinCEO:

@TheRat

TheRat:

I think he does both things. Put a lot of effort in some things, and make unargued, unexplained assertions too.

JustinCEO:

Rat has their been any instance you can point to where there was no path forward, nothing you could have done to try to address some conversational impasse? Where curi left no route for making progress in the discussion? If you answer in the affirmative, link or quote please

TheRat:

and tilts when someone even slightly presses him to explain himself

TheRat:

like yesterday

TheRat:

called it "demanding' and nonsense of the sort

curi:

rat have you ever done this? https://curi.us/2232-claiming-you-objectively-won-a-debate

curi:

or ever used my debate policy?

JustinCEO:

@TheRat I suggest you consider whether an organized attempt to demonstrate what you regard as curi's unreasonableness (with quotes, discussion tree, whatever) might be a better use of your time than venting in the chat.

JustinCEO:

make it clear as day for us all if you can. the more clearly right you are, the easier your task should be.

TheRat:

I think the situation from yesterday is quite clear

curi:

oh that reminds me, the vegan never got back to me who was reading BoI and said he would write 3 blog posts then debate me (i said i'd take 3 instead of 20 for debate policy)

JustinCEO:

TheRat: I think he does both things. Put a lot of effort in some things, and make unargued, unexplained assertions too.

JustinCEO:

do you think there might be a relationship between the effort you put into some area and what sort of things you can quickly come to a correct judgment about within that area?

TheRat:

What's the relevance?

TheRat:

nobody cares about his alleged skills at coming to a conclusion. What matters is his explanations of his conclusions

TheRat:

which he fails to do

JustinCEO:

1:34 PM] TheRat: I think the situation from yesterday is quite clear

Do you think you explained why you regard the situation as clear, Rat?

TheRat:

Don't shift it

TheRat:

He made the assertions

TheRat:

ot me

JustinCEO:

Do you concede you've made assertions?

curi:

curi:

why is rat doing meta discussion?

curi:

he says meta sux?

TheRat:

Let me put it as clear as I can, and hopefully you'll see it but you have a blindspot for curi so I don't have high hopes. Curi makes assertions he refuses to explain, what efforts he puts in other areas or how good he is at getting to conclusions etc.. is utterly irrelevant. Does he explain his assertions? No. If he asserts "You don't know how to do X" and is asked for an explanation, saying "What is your system to do X" is not an explanation. It is a dodge. He already made the assertion "You don't know how to do X" and he refuses to explain himself. This is an ongoing pattern with curi I have labelled PatternB.

JustinCEO:

Rat do you concede making assertions or not

TheRat:

Irrelevant

JustinCEO:

humor me?

TheRat:

Yes, but after we have resolved the problem of PatternB

JustinCEO:

by "humor me?" i was asking for an immediate reply on that discrete issue

JustinCEO:

Y/N?

TheRat:

I don't want to go off topic because as we have seen that never works.

JustinCEO:

one char direct reply would be lower effort than non-substantive reply alternatives!

TheRat:

also let him defend himself. You shouldn't fight his battles

JustinCEO:

this isn't a battle

TheRat:

he's hurting you by making you his proxy, you aren't thinking for yourself.

TheRat:

its not good

JustinCEO:

you're being disrespectful and offensive

TheRat:

You've successfully derailed the conversation. I'll go back to

Curi makes assertions he refuses to explain, what efforts he puts in other areas or how good he is at getting to conclusions etc.. is utterly irrelevant. Does he explain his assertions? No. If he asserts "You don't know how to do X" and is asked for an explanation, saying "What is your system to do X" is not an explanation. It is a dodge. He already made the assertion "You don't know how to do X" and he refuses to explain himself. This is an ongoing pattern with curi I have labelled PatternB.

TheRat:

and I refuse to move from that until he addresses it. Or concedes he makes unargued assertions frequently.

TheRat:

I am under no delusions that he will do either.

JustinCEO:

maybe part of the reason you won't give a one character reply to me in good faith is that you view discussion as a battle

TheRat:

Irrelevant Justin, please refer to my quote.

TheRat:

Since curi is clearly not afk but crying in his own channel, I can safely assume he is here and has read what I wrote. His inability to defend it here (this channel) I am willing to take as a concession that he is incapable of defending his assertions. And I can drop the matter of PatternB.

JustinCEO:

he tried to engage with you, just now

JustinCEO:

here

TheRat:

He failed to address the issue.

JustinCEO:

"crying in his own channel" you're being a really douchebag rat

JustinCEO:

super hostile flaming

TheRat:

Irrelevant Justin

TheRat:

please refer to my quote

JustinCEO:

You can't force a mind I guess. gl i'm afk

TheRat:

I accept your concession curi.

TheRat:

ill bbl

curi:

i wrote 2 msgs to rat and he hasn't responded yet... https://discordapp.com/channels/304082867384745994/304082867384745994/660595900346925077 [The link goes to the message "rat have you ever done this? https://curi.us/2232-claiming-you-objectively-won-a-debate"]

curi:

he's just baiting by lying

curi:

he thinks the nastier the accusations, the more social pressure he's exerting

curi:

and having them be false makes them extra annoying to facts-and-logic oriented ppl. bonus!?

curi:

and it's baiting by making it looks fairly easy to correct b/c it's simple, basic factual errors. but even this isn't actually fixable b/c he won't engage with reality.

TheRat:

I already said that asking me what I have done is not an explanation to your assertion

TheRat:

please read more carefully

curi:

if you think i've made an error, see https://elliottemple.com/debate-policy

TheRat:

Still not an explanation

TheRat:

Imagine if anyone thought that flew as an explanation. "Vaccines don't work." Why? "See my debate policy www.blogsmahfeels.com"

Shadow Starshine (SS) was already tilted before this discussion, ever since I decided we had an Inferential Distance problem and he refused to read any articles to find out what that means.

He also wouldn't discuss the concept when I and others wrote several explanations for him in chat messages. In short it means there are major differences in our background knowledge and premises, and we need to find some points of common ground to build on (but SS refused to try to do that).

For context, here is the SS discussion tree I made for part of my discussion with SS, and here is the VSE discussion tree that he was actually talking about below. I had been unable to get substantive responses to either tree, and sadly that doesn't change in this chat.

This is from the public Fallible Ideas Discord.

---

curi:

That mindmap by curi is so dishonest

SS, are you going to write down an error in it? then, step 2, explain why you think that error was made dishonestly?

Shadow Starshine:

@curi I'm not writing down an error in it. It's dishonest because of where you started it, like taking a video clip of someone talking out of context to make it seem like there's another problem.

curi:

can you point out how any node is misleading or wrong b/c of missing context? that is, an error.

Shadow Starshine:

The first node makes it look like TheRat's question should be answered or was at all the topic at hand.

Shadow Starshine:

What should be shown is how that question was an avoidance of something already being asked of him.

curi:

which mindmap are you talking about? i figured it was the one about you.

Shadow Starshine:

Negative, TheRat and VSE

curi:

ok, you think rat's question shouldn't have been answered b/c of some message(s) i didn't include in the graph. the appropriate thing for you to do is quote those messages, right? then explain how they indicate rat's question shouldn't be answered.

Shadow Starshine:

Well I don't hold a belief that this would be a fruitful use of my time in a discussion with you in particular, but if someone else wishes to understand where I stand on that and why, they may ask.

curi:

if you won't argue your case, don't make claims here

curi:

you just say over and over that i'm wrong but you never substantiate it

Shadow Starshine:

That's rich coming from you

curi:

i'm the one who makes trees, writes articles, gives details

curi:

i ask you for details when you try to make claims that i'm wrong

curi:

you don't give them

JustinCEO:

ya there's a huge effort asymmetry

curi:

if you think i fucked up in some previous part of a discussion

curi:

provide it

curi:

you just keep referring to my past bad behavior that you don't specify or argue

curi:

when i try to go thru issues with you in detail

Shadow Starshine:

The amount of fuck ups you make is simply not worth my time, especially in a discussion where I want to convince you of them. I just told you if someone else has the same questions, i'll put in the effort.

curi:

you consistently stop part way

curi:

so that they don't get resolved

curi:

you haven't established i was wrong a single time

curi:

you have never made a case i was wrong about anything

curi:

that you have even claimed was objectively adequate

Shadow Starshine:

curi your position has been noted

curi:

since you don't want to resolve disagreements or argue your flaming-adjacent claims, you're on the wrong server.

Shadow Starshine:

Yet again, I'll say this for the third time

Shadow Starshine:

I'm interested in it with other people other than you

curi:

you say i made many fuckups but haven't explained even one

JustinCEO:

so it seems spurious that someone is going to tell me that I've been doing it wrong and that they can tell me the underpinning problems.

SS fyi your ultra hostile attitude towards curi doesn't really serve you well in helping establish your case as a veteran debater to whom a certain level of respect/deference should be granted re: judging discussion issues.

Shadow Starshine:

If I'm on the wrong server specifically because of my disinterest with you in particular, fine. But you can't say my disinterest is categorical.

Shadow Starshine:

and that's one error you can note right now

curi:

his methodology for objectively establishing an error is to write a sloppy sentence or two, then assume he's done

curi:

amazing

Shadow Starshine:

@JustinCEO depends who I'm trying to convince

Shadow Starshine:

I've already established I think curi is a waste of time, far beyond the amount of effort it would take

Shadow Starshine:

just to engage with some shit tier blogger

JustinCEO:

dude wtf

JustinCEO:

so hostile jeez

JustinCEO:

i'm out

curi:

https://curi.us/2232-claiming-you-objectively-won-a-debate

This chat followed immediately after the DavetheDastard Chat. That's what my first four messages relate to.

This is from the public Fallible Ideas Discord.

---

curi:

i don't like talking with people who aren't interested and also aren't adequately literate or precise.

curi:

and who don't want to address that problem e.g. by reading my articles on how to discuss or the Inferential Distance articles

curi:

or making a serious effort to propose a way forward that works from my pov

curi:

i don't like when people say things like "my lord" instead of recognizing the large culture clash, being tolerant and curious, trying to deal with it rationally instead of assuming bad faith, etc.

footsoldier:
(pinned)
"i don't like talking with people who [...don't want to read...] my articles on how to discuss"

footsoldier:

are you aware that doesn't sound so cool curi?

curi:

i suggest that your next message do something to persuade me of your good faith interest in productive discussion.

footsoldier:

So far all I have gotten from this server is people talking meta, being arrogant and getting caught up on miscommunication and nitpicking. I'm not interested in persuading you of my good faith, I'm interested in talking to cool people. I've come in here with an open mind but you aren't doing much to convince me you aren't arrogant and annoying to talk to. So at this point my interest in being in this server has wained to close to zero. Feel free to ban me, at least it will end my umming and arring about leaving 😂

curi:

you quoted me in a misleading way to make me look bad, then didn't give any explanation of what you think is bad. neither you nor any of your friends has made a reasonable effort to objectively establish any significant error by me or in FI philosophy. there hasn't even been a claim that a particular set of messages was objectively, rationally adequate to win the debate. see e.g. https://curi.us/2232-claiming-you-objectively-won-a-debate

footsoldier:

I never claimed I won any debate

footsoldier:

I came here to debate

footsoldier:

and got meta

footsoldier:

and links to articles

curi:

you're judging me and some ideas negatively. the rational way to do that is to back up that claim with arguments and attempt to actually win the debate re whether your arguments are correct or not, rather than just arbitrarily believing it or believing it while ignoring counter-arguments, or other errors like that.

footsoldier:

what am I arguing for?

curi:

you claimed e.g.

being arrogant and getting caught up on miscommunication and nitpicking.

curi:

but you aren't arguing your negative beliefs like these

curi:

so it's unreasonable to conclude they're correct, because you might be incorrect and aren't taking adequate steps to find out if you're mistaken

curi:

establishing a negative claim in argument is one of the reasonable ways to reach a negative judgment about people. if you have some other method for reaching negative judgments that you think is rational and truth-seeking-compatible, you haven't explained it and i wasn't able to figure it out from your comments.

footsoldier:

you are proving my point

footsoldier:

I came to discuss and got meta

footsoldier:

and you are continuing meta

curi:

this is discussion of how to be rational

curi:

if that topic doesn't interest you, you're on the wrong server

footsoldier:

so the goals in this server are to discuss the meta of discussion?

footsoldier:

if so then cool but i didn't know that

footsoldier:

i thought this was a general philo server

curi:

discussing how to think, learn, judge ideas, etc – epistemology – is a common topic here

curi:

you can also discuss other things

footsoldier:

well epistemology doesn't mean talking about a conversation about epistemology

curi:

however, if your discussion methodology differs from that of others, then you may run into major problems. as has happened with e.g. SS and ppl here.

footsoldier:

for example, if I said to you, can music be judged objectively?

footsoldier:

and you said, I don't like the way you posed the question

footsoldier:

and then we argue the meta

footsoldier:

then that's meta

footsoldier:

and not the actual discussion itself

curi:

you aren't similar to the FI people. you don't seem to want to learn our ideas about how to think, learn and discuss. you want discussion to just work automatically without doing anything to bridge the gap.

curi:

it's really up to you if you're interested enough to learn something about ideas that are different than your current ideas, or not.

curi:

but if you try to ignore that this is the situation you're in when you come here, it isn't going to work well.

footsoldier:

i appreciate that you are interested in meta discussion

footsoldier:

but what if I want to discuss my previous example, whether music can be judged objectively... is that appropriate to do here? Or would we only want to discuss the way we can discuss whether music can be objective without actually discussing whether music can be objectively judged??

curi:

you can try but i expect you to run into problems like when i think you read something i say in a non-literal, biased way

curi:

then, in my understanding, you won't want to discuss or try to solve that problem

curi:

and i won't think the original discussion is productive given ongoing, unsolved problems like that

footsoldier:

ok that's a fun goal. Let us attempt to discuss whether music can be objectively judged but before we get to that, let us immediately resolve any outstanding issues

footsoldier:

please can you give the first issue to resolve?

curi:

i don't know if you're being sarcastic or what you mean

footsoldier:

what is it I have said? Are we speaking about the quote you felt I manipulated?

footsoldier:

or are there other things?

footsoldier:

is the [mis]quote the most important issue here?

curi:

my biggest concern is that i predict certain types of problems will come up and that you then won't want to continue in a way i regard as productive, as i just explained.

footsoldier:

well that is irrational

footsoldier:

both you and I can predict anything we like

footsoldier:

or are you claiming to have access to future knowledge? This is suddenly a bizarre conversation.

curi:

my take on this is that you aren't reading and understanding what i say, and that you aren't responding in a way that's good at clarifying.

footsoldier:

can you point to an example?

curi:

me: i expect ... you won't want to

you: what is it I have said?

curi:

i talked about an expectation and used future tense. your response was to ask about the past.

footsoldier:

what is your prediction based off?

footsoldier:

I must have prompted you to think that

footsoldier:

otherwise you are just being mystical

curi:

you don't understand where

then, in my understanding, you won't want to discuss or try to solve that problem

is coming from and how it relates to anything prior in the discussion?

footsoldier:

no because I am currently tying to discuss and solve problems RIGHT NOW

footsoldier:

LOL

curi:

can you point to an example?

do you accept the first example i gave?

curi:

you didn't respond

footsoldier:

could you confirm what constitutes you example? I do not feel you have given a clear example yet.

curi:

footsoldier:

You seem to be confused as to the flow of the conversation.

1. ME - let us discuss objectivity in music
2. YOU - I don't think we will get very far because I expect issues to arise
3. ME - how so? Can you give an example of previous issues which have arisen so we can resolve?
4. YOU - I am simply predicting that issues will arise - and the fact you assume I am referencing a previous example when in fact I am just predicting is an example of such an issue.

NOW - it seems that this example is derailing from the conversation. It seems your objections are prophetic. If there are no CURRENT issues preventing us from discussing objectivity in music, could we stop getting caught up in meta and move to the conversation of objectivity in music?

curi:

could you try responding more directly to what i said? e.g. do you agree that i talked about the future and you responded about the past? if so, why did you do that?

footsoldier:

i already explained this......

footsoldier:

you cannot make a prediction based upon nothing

footsoldier:

but this is derailing

curi:

i talked about an expectation and used future tense. your response was to ask about the past.

footsoldier:

what is your expectation predicated upon?

curi:

you aren't responding to me.

footsoldier:

i am

footsoldier:

is it because you think you can make predictions based upon nothing previously being observed?

curi:

why did you respond with the wrong tense?

footsoldier:

because I assumed that you weren't foolish enough to base predictions on nothing

footsoldier:

so skipped a step

footsoldier:

and went stright to asking you what your predictions were based upon

footsoldier:

so again what you are predictions based upon?

footsoldier:

because now your predictions are based upon something which occurred after the fact of you originally predicting

curi:

ok so here i am worrying about miscommunications followed by them not being fixed b/c discussing miscommunications is meta discussion and you expressed your negative opinions of meta discussion ... and what you do is skip steps which makes miscommunications more likely and larger.

footsoldier:

lol

footsoldier:

curi:

ok gl talking wtih someone else

footsoldier:

you've confirmed my opinion of you mate

footsoldier:

You assert we cannot discuss any given topic because you prophesize issues will arise - therefore we are limited to discussing how we ought to discuss but which is itself a discussion. Either you are a comedian or need to pull your head out of your ass. Leaving the server. No interesting discussion to be had here.

This is an example of how bad at thinking people are regarding facts, logic and details. I think that's because they think socially instead.

Are you better? Join some discussions and test your belief and create documented evidence of your higher quality discussions.

The key point is that I disagreeed with him about some philosophy stuff and asked if he was interested in discussing. His replies included "Hahaha what" and "I’ll be willing to have a discussion to demonstrate that you’re talking utter nonsense in an unnecessarily hostile manner". Those replies indicated that he wasn't intellectually interested in the matter. I took that, combined with no answer to my question (re interest), as a "no", and told him so. He later followed up on that initial conversation in the chat below.

After this chat, Dave came back the next day to ask if I was "actually retarded" before leaving the server.

This is from the public Fallible Ideas Discord.

---

DavetheDastard:
Freeze Today at 02:45
maybe this relates to the point you had that Dave might be wasting his career

curi Today at 02:48
it's related sure, but it isn't really what i was talking about. i think the specialization he works in is building complicated ideas on top of many layers of false premises, and that it doesn't have paths forward or engage seriously with other schools of thought which criticize it

Freeze Today at 02:49
ah

curi Today at 02:49
his response was typical: he wasn't interested and also, despite the sort of work he allegedly does, he misread what i said and didn't respond meaningfully to my question.
the sort of work he allegedly does requires being great at accurate, detail reading of words, to the point that's easy and automatic

---

Curi, could you be more specific with the following:
In your initial message, you never explained in detail how my area of study rests on false premises - could you please identify which premises my area of study rests upon, and then demonstrate them to be "false"?
In what way(s) does my field of study fail to interact with other areas of study? Could you name a few, but then clarify how and why those areas of study would be relevant; i.e., my field of study does not relate with the study of Hospitality, but we wouldn't say that that is a problem. Also, whilst we're at it, could you acknowledge the fields of study which my area does interact with?
Your second message says that I wasn't interested [in your message informing me that my career is a waste due to the area of which it focuses is based on false premises] , and that despite the work I allegedly do, I misread what you said. Further, you say that I didn't respond meaningfully to your question.
You only asked one question, and that was whether I would be willing to discuss the matter with you.
I said that I would discuss the matter with you, and I then invited you to a VC to discuss the matter directly. I had hoped that to be a meaningful answer.
curi:

In your initial message, you never explained in detail how my area of study rests on false premises - could you please identify which premises my area of study rests upon, and then demonstrate them to be "false"?

this is not responsive to what i already said to you and how our conversation went.
curi:

You only asked one question, and that was whether I would be willing to discuss the matter with you.

that is not the question i asked. you should read.

DavetheDastard:

https://discordapp.com/channels/304082867384745994/482766203983626255/658871776708919316 in my considered and professional opinion, i think your specialization is based on incorrect premises and so it's a waste of a career. is that something you're interested in discussing? @DavetheDastard

DavetheDastard:

you said that

DavetheDastard:

that is your initial message, is it not?
And is it not true that in it you have stated that my area of study rests on false (incorrect) premises?
Also, is it not the case that you asked a single question, which is what I reported?

curi:

read it.

DavetheDastard:

I have

curi:

have you read it today?

DavetheDastard:

I have just copied and pasted it to you

curi:

where?

DavetheDastard:

in what way is me asking you to identify the incorrect premises which you have asserted to exist, not responsive to what you have said?

DavetheDastard:

I have pasted it here from #slow

curi:

oic, you didn't quote it and it started wtih a link

curi:

very confusing

DavetheDastard:

the link is what you posted in your initial message.

curi:

ok well, factually, does it ask if you're willing to discuss?

DavetheDastard:

if I have failed to quote directly, then so had you

DavetheDastard:

"is that something you're interested in discussing?

curi:

when i said you didn't quote it, i meant you didn't do this:

quote

DavetheDastard:

right, would that make a notable difference to you? it would merely alter the layout

curi:

it would have prevented the confusion, but nvm

curi:

is interest in discussing something the same as willingness?

DavetheDastard:

I would have hoped you would recognise your message to me, the one which you have been referencing in other messages.
In the context which you asked it, it would be a fair reading to believe that you had asked me to interact with you, and not merely wonder if I am interested in discussing this area. One would have thought that I would be interested in discussing the field of study which I specialise in.

DavetheDastard:

Look, if you are going to be unbelievably difficult in communication, then I am not wasting my time with you.
If you do not want to actually engage and have a discussion, fine, but in that case, would you please refrain from making further comments about my field of study and specifically my engagement in it.

curi:

the belief that the other guy is difficult re communication is symmetric. you aren't offering a symmetry breaker. i am offering one: your way of communicating contradicts the dictionary.

DavetheDastard:

pardon?

curi:

which is the first word that you don't follow?

DavetheDastard:

it's just that you seem to be saying that I am contradicting the dictionary in my communication, and yet you are not capitalising your use of "I", in contrary to the dictionary.

curi:

in contrary to the dictionary.

DavetheDastard:

are you or are you not asking whether I would like to meaningfully discuss the topic of whether my area of study rests upon incorrect premises?

DavetheDastard:

sorry, is that a direct quote? Oughtn't we mark that with quotation marks?

curi:

i had in mind dictionary definitions, not minor typos or informalities like omitting trailing periods in one sentence messages

curi:

curi:

that is what a block quote indicator looks like on discord

DavetheDastard:

that isn't quotation marks

DavetheDastard:

a quotation marks appears as follows - "X is the case"

DavetheDastard:

usually accompanied with a time stamp for mutual reference

DavetheDastard:

are you not familiar with references?

curi:

do you want to try to actually resolve an issue?

DavetheDastard:

again, I am only having this discussion with you to see whether or not you want to meaningfully discuss the question of whether my area of study rests on incorrect premises. If you do not wish to have such a discussion, and perhaps it may be fair to reason that you would likely not to have this current one either, then merely tell me so, and I will leave this discussion here. In doing so, however, I ask that you refrain from asserting that I am wasting my career on a field of study due to faults of that study, until you directly inform me of those premises and the nature of their falsity.

curi:

do you want to try to actually resolve an issue?

DavetheDastard:

are you struggling to understand my previous message?

DavetheDastard:

the only issue I wish to resolve is the question of whether my field of study rests upon incorrect premises, hence me having earlier asked you to identify those premises and to explain to me how they are incorrect.

curi:

you brought up other issues which you now grant you don't wish to resolve. that was inappropriate.

DavetheDastard:

my lord.

DavetheDastard:

you have just acknowledged that I have brought up issues in order for them to be resolved, and that due to you not acknowledging or engaging them, it is I who has been inappropriate.

curi:

i refer you to https://discordapp.com/channels/304082867384745994/647276416857276426/659136940607799309

DavetheDastard:

right - to which bit in particular?
your not wanting to have a vc?

DavetheDastard:

this is a waste of time, I'm leaving; please ping me in the future if you wish to meaningfully engage on the question of whether my field of study rests upon incorrect premises.

curi:

i don't like talking with people who aren't interested and also aren't adequately literate or precise.

curi:

and who don't want to address that problem e.g. by reading my articles on how to discuss or the Inferential Distance articles

curi:

or making a serious effort to propose a way forward that works from my pov

curi:

i don't like when people say things like "my lord" instead of recognizing the large culture clash, being tolerant and curious, trying to deal with it rationally instead of assuming bad faith, etc.

VSE on Discord, lying about the reasoning for relegation (he omitted the flaming he did) and misuing the term "simpler":

Doesn't it seem like it would have been simpler to ask a follow-up question instead of relegating me to a single channel?

i did ask a followup question. they're so bad at engaging with words. i said:

are you going to answer my simple, direct question or not?

this was both 1) a followup 2) a question

there's still something amazing to me about how much they retreat from English meanings of words

i think it's related to retreat from reality in genreal and social metaphysics. standard dictionary English has strong connections to reality.

but they operate in a social reality with social metaphysics, not in real reality. so they use words in a different way that is much less tied to reality, facts, logic, dictionaries, etc, and more tied to social rules and social meanings

i think their inability and/or unwillingness to read literally or to resolve any of these factual disputes is an indication of just how second-handed and social climbing they are. that's what the basic thing at issue is. how do you approach life, do you focus on facts/etc or on social dynamics?

This discussion is a typical example of dealing with overreaching people who don't know basic stuff about how to read literally, the meanings of words, sentence grammar, simple logic, etc., and don't want to. They want to talk about complicated stuff – and never reach agreement and understanding – instead of searching for some common ground to build on. And they have very little common ground to build on because they haven't mastered some standard, generic language and logic skills. (It's common to be bad at that stuff but how are you supposed to have a conversation when you read A as B, write false dichotomies and non sequiturs, write ambiguous clarifications of your ambiguous statements, etc?)

The beginning is a discussion where talking about discussion methodology, e.g. the existence of culture clash, inferential distance gap, and differing background knowledge. That was rejected. There are various detail parts about particular basic errors in the ballpark of logic and language, stuff like reading something non-literally (that is, reading A as saying B). I suggest looking for errors. Being able to analyze this kind of thing is an important skill that will help you learn to have a productive conversation.

The later part of the log has analysis and post-mortem discussion about the prior discussion. I wrote a bunch of interesting stuff (IMO) near the end.

You can join the Discord chat here.

---

Freeze:

seems like background knowledge is important
and we should be open to being communicated about background knowledge in a discussion, not just what we think is relevant, but what they think is relevant

Freeze:
I think people assume that if their discussion partner brings up some seemingly irrelevant background knowledge, they're doing it to be evasive

curi:
http://fallibleideas.com/communication-is-hard https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Inferential_distance (3 linked blog posts + 2 external links) actually one of the links is dead here is the archive for it https://web.archive.org/web/20120523083248/http://www.greatplay.net/essays/the-sad-truth-of-inferential-distance

curi:
also http://fallibleideas.com/social-communication http://fallibleideas.com/originality

curi:
i particularly like

here's a metaphor to help understand the issue: everyone's mind has its own programming language.

curi:
explanation is in originality article but is very relevant to communication

TheRat:
@Shadow Starshine Seems like you've been debating/discussing the vegan topic a while. Do you know of Vegans that you find have thought about their positions and are not averse to reading like AY?

Shadow Starshine:
Perspective Philosophy would be my highest recommendation

Shadow Starshine:
If you're looking for people who aren't necessarily well read, but open minded, I have others I can recommend as well

TheRat:
Oh I heard of him through AY just calling hime trash, so he must be good lol.

TheRat:
him*

Shadow Starshine:
haha that's always a good litmus test

TheRat:
I want to practice debating more

TheRat:
voice or text either one.

Freeze:
a litmus test indicates if something is acidic or basic, but doesn't tell you the exact pH value right? So are you saying that if AY calls someone trash, then you know roughly that they're worth looking into further to find exact value of discussing with them?

Shadow Starshine:
yes that's the joke

TheRat:
Freeze it was probably more tongue in cheek.

Freeze:
well there's a joke part to it, which is that if AY thinks someone is bad, they might be good

Freeze:
but i'm asking about the informative part of it

Freeze:
if there was any intended

Shadow Starshine:
Nah, I wouldn't take that literally

Freeze:
ah ok

Shadow Starshine:
Some people AY doesn't like aren't worth talking to either

Freeze:
right

Freeze:
so it's mostly a misleading joke

TheRat:
It was a joke because I was joking too that PP must be good because AY called him trash. Not meant to be a misleading joke

TheRat:
just a joke

Freeze:
yeah, only misleading if taken with any level of seriousness/informative value

Shadow Starshine:
Anywho, debating can be fun, but it's good to set up good expectations

Freeze:
if taken as a joke i agree, it's not misleading

Shadow Starshine:
It's easy to get caught up trying to "win" debates

Freeze:
so your expectations aren't about conclusions necessarily, but just exchange of ideas/learning/progress, so you're rarely disappointed?

Shadow Starshine:
I'd say that's correct

Freeze:
cool

TheRat:
yeah well that's the issue I had with AY and Avi. I don't think they made any effort in understanding what I was saying. Just trying to catch me in a mistake.

TheRat:
though Avi did a little

Freeze:
I want to learn more about curi's idea of truth-seeking

Freeze:
it seems important

Shadow Starshine:
Right, they only care about "winning", which is another way of saying trying to make someone look stupid

Freeze:
certain things i do in discussions are not truth-seeking, and i can find out what they are

Freeze:
right

Freeze:
discrediting the other person without refuting their ideas is bad for you

JustinCEO:
serious truth seeking from animal rights advocates would involve written discussion and something like a list (or tree) of args they've received from ppl who disagree and the refutation of the arg (or at least their attempt at one 🙂 )

Shadow Starshine:
I also don't worry about changing my mind on the spot if I'm wrong, I've noticed that often times, a week or two later, I'll think more about it an intuition I had and change my mind then

JustinCEO:
the lack of that kinda thing and heavy emphasis on voice is very compatible with wanting to pwn people instead of truth seek

Shadow Starshine:
I think it's good to just acknowledge that human tendency

JustinCEO:
the thing about real time voice stuff is u can't think carefully about it over time and then formulate your reply

Freeze:
i think we can shorten that timespan by learning more about reason

JustinCEO:
this can lead to stuff seeming more plausible when it has errors

Freeze:
if i change my mind a week later, i can learn to do it a few days later, and eventually a few minutes later

JustinCEO:
cuz you literally don't have enough time to identify and point out the error in mid-conversation

Freeze:
what im curious about is why that human tendency exists, how it works, and how we can shape it

Freeze:
is it based on wanting to be right? is it something else?

Shadow Starshine:
Not really sure that works Freeze, in fact, I think there's certain thigns that if you changed your mind too soon, I wouldn't think you took it seriously

Freeze:
right, the idea is not to change your mind until you are fully, rationally persuaded

Freeze:
and sometimes that requires an unconscious process of thought

TheRat:
well I am not sure we can say for sure that voice > text for truth seeking. Could find good discussions and make progress via voice too. There is also a lot of inexcplicit information that is valuable from voice. I don't think one should prefer one over the other too heavily. I'd lean on text for clarity and long term discussion.

Freeze:
but most times i think that can be progressed by explicit discussion

TheRat:
but not by a lot

JustinCEO:

1.: reasoning that is superficially plausible but actually fallacious
-a definition of sophistry.

voice chat is more amenable to sophistry because it makes stuff seem more superficially plausible (to the participants or the viewers) due to the time constraints

Shadow Starshine:
Consider that, if ideas are brain states, then there would be a speed at which brain states can relate to other ideas they effect, and physically change

curi:
freeze it's cultural not a "human tendency"

Shadow Starshine:
I made the claim it's a human tendency

curi:
ok u2

Freeze:
yeah like im wondering in places like dalio's company or FI culture where people have learnt to be wrong all the time and have rational discussion without feeling bad about it, would they still take a week to change their mind on something or would that gap shorten? I think people can learn to make unconscious stuff conscious and ask questions about it. We can be more honest over time

Shadow Starshine:
Mmmm I'm unsure. On one hand, I agree that not letting your ego hinder you would speed up a process dramatically. But even if that wasn't a hinderance, certain things take time to ponder

curi:
speed limits on brain stuff would be short, don't think they're relevant. you could make the same argument re e.g. how fast a computer can update a spreadsheet.

Shadow Starshine:
I see no reason to accept that

Freeze:
the unconscious deliberation part you're referring to may not always need to be long or necessarily unconscious

curi:
you broadly don't seem to accept my mental model of what a person is, that a mind is software running on a (fast) computer, etc. do you have an alternative model specified somewhere?

Shadow Starshine:
I'm not even sure what you mean by mind. But I'm sure we could have a conversation about what a person is. But before that occurs, are you suggesting that you should be considered right unless you're proven wrong?

Freeze:
I think a model should be considered right if it doesn't have any unrefuted criticisms

JustinCEO:
i think in that particular question, he was just asking if u have a model specified somewhere

Freeze:
or competing models with also unrefuted criticisms

curi:

are you suggesting that you should be considered right unless you're proven wrong?

no

Shadow Starshine:
I'm just asking

Shadow Starshine:
It could have been meant to challenge me in that way

TheRat:

I think a model should be considered right if it doesn't have any unrefuted criticisms

TheRat:
why?

Shadow Starshine:
Well, there's some parts of what your model has that I don't see a reason to accept, whether I could refute them or not.

Shadow Starshine:
Like, if you say that it's analogous to updating a spreadsheet

Shadow Starshine:
why would I think that's rue

Shadow Starshine:
out of all possibilities

Shadow Starshine:
why should I hold to that one?

Shadow Starshine:
There's possibly hundreds of assertions I can't refute

curi:
i was saying your argument was inadequately differentiated from the spreadsheet one

curi:
there are physical limits on computation speed but in general, as in that example and many many others, they are short

Shadow Starshine:
why do you say they are short

curi:
e.g. b/c electrons move fast

Shadow Starshine:
Okay, electrons move fast, now how does that give me a full model of what's going on

JustinCEO:
that's one detail, i didn't take it as specifying the entire model

curi:
i just said that you didn't give a model that shows why it'd be slow and in lots of cases computation is fast

Shadow Starshine:
You just agreed I didn't have to give a model to doubt your claim

Shadow Starshine:
so why bring that up

curi:
i was doubting your claim re slow

Shadow Starshine:
When I talk about it, I mean phenomenologically, how it seems to us, is that people take time to deliberate

Shadow Starshine:
They stew over issues

Shadow Starshine:
before changing their mind

curi:
but you said

curi:

Consider that, if ideas are brain states, then there would be a speed at which brain states can relate to other ideas they effect, and physically change

curi:
which is about physical limits on changing of physical brain states

curi:
i disagreed with the specific thing you said there

curi:
you are welcome to make other comments about how people often slowly deliberate for weeks. they do.

curi:
but if you think that's because of physical speed limits involved, i disagree

Shadow Starshine:
Right I suppose that's true. You're right. What I think though, is that if neurologically, a brain has to change how the connections work, and different connections are different ideas, then for those physical changes to occur, it would take time

Shadow Starshine:
But I suppose what you're thinking is that brain states don't change, they just compute?

TheRat:

When I talk about it, I mean phenomenologically, how it seems to us, is that people take time to deliberate
They stew over issues
before changing their mind
That seems right.

Consider that, if ideas are brain states, then there would be a speed at which brain states can relate to other ideas they effect, and physically change

That doesn't seem right.

curi:
i don't think you know what "compute" is based on your sentence

Shadow Starshine:
What I'm taking it to mean is that the physical structure doesn't change of the neurons, it's just the electron and neurotransmitters passing data along

Shadow Starshine:
Do you have a different idea in mind?

Shadow Starshine:
You said "electrons are fast" so i'm assuming you are talking about the electrochemical signaling

curi:
there are large communication failures here. i regard you as adding a bunch of context to my statements, e.g. i wasn't specifically talking about brains when i mentioned electrons. i regard you as inadequately literal and precise about what you say, so you end up making claims that aren't really what you meant. and more broadly i think you don't have the background knowledge to discuss this effectively.

Shadow Starshine:
Right I don't care about any of that

Shadow Starshine:
Sounds like excuses no offense

Shadow Starshine:
Like unless you're willing to demonstrate any of those claims

Shadow Starshine:
I'm just gonna disregard that entire paragraph

curi:
if you want to untangle things you'll have to acknowledge the broad situation and then try to discuss where and how to begin the untangling. if you don't want to acknowledge the complexity of the problem, and make an organized and large effort to deal with it, then we can do something else like talk occassionally in generalities and hope to have partial understanding.

curi:
but you can't have it both ways and demand detailed explanations from me while ignoring issues like large inferential distance

Shadow Starshine:
I'm not ignoring anything, I'm just not accepting your assertion prima facie

TheRat:

and more broadly i think you don't have the background knowledge to discuss this effectively.

I don't much like this sentiment. But I don't quite know why. Rubs me the wrong way.

Shadow Starshine:
It just reads like posturing to me

curi:

I'm just gonna disregard that entire paragraph

I'm not ignoring anything

this is an example of the inadequate precision

Shadow Starshine:
Ignoring would imply im not reading it

Shadow Starshine:
disregarding it means I've read it and found it valueless

curi:
you don't seem to be offering value or to be curious to learn

Shadow Starshine:
Again, more assertions and posturing

TheRat:
😦

Shadow Starshine:
I don't care what you think of my personality, if you want to explain to me why you disagree

Shadow Starshine:
that's fine

curi:
you're flaming me over epistemology differences while rejecting the very concept that we have conflicting background knowledge

Shadow Starshine:
I don't think that's correct either

Shadow Starshine:
I reject your characterization of me

TheRat:
Where did this discussion get off track so hard. I thought SS was just trying to understand your position. I feel like this is Felix all over again and I'll have egg on my face about it later, but once again I find myself confused at the hostility.

Shadow Starshine:
same

curi:
what hostility (by me)?

TheRat:
Yes it seems to me you're being hostile.

curi:
we were not even close to on the same page re the original topic. i said so. he didn't want to consider it.

JustinCEO:

there are large communication failures here. i regard you as adding a bunch of context to my statements, e.g. i wasn't specifically talking about brains when i mentioned electrons.

JustinCEO:

I'm just gonna disregard that entire paragraph

Shadow Starshine:
We talked about brain speed. I claimed I was talking phenomenologically, he showed I wasn't, I agreed, but offered another thought, then he decided I was unworthy of discussion

Shadow Starshine:
and started character assassinating me

JustinCEO:
curi was offering an important clarification there

JustinCEO:
which you explicitly said you were ignoring

Freeze:
(disregarding)

curi:
i don't think believing someone lacks particular background knowledge is character assassination

JustinCEO:
disregarding ok

Shadow Starshine:
I disregarded the paragraph talking about my intentions and abilities

Freeze:
but yeah i agree, disregarding that entire paragraph also throws out that clarification

Freeze:
and eliminates discussion around why the clarification was necessary

Shadow Starshine:
If he can prove I don't have those capabilities, fine

Shadow Starshine:
But just claiming it

Shadow Starshine:
isn't useful

JustinCEO:
so SS you're saying you're gonna engage with the clarification now?

Shadow Starshine:
I\

curi:
have you read this paper? https://arxiv.org/pdf/quant-ph/0104033

Freeze:

there are large communication failures here. i regard you as adding a bunch of context to my statements, e.g. i wasn't specifically talking about brains when i mentioned electrons. i regard you as inadequately literal and precise about what you say, so you end up making claims that aren't really what you meant. and more broadly i think you don't have the background knowledge to discuss this effectively.
Did you mean you only want to disregard this part?
i regard you as inadequately literal and precise about what you say, so you end up making claims that aren't really what you meant. and more broadly i think you don't have the background knowledge to discuss this effectively.

Shadow Starshine:
Im unsure what you guys are calling "the clarification"

Freeze:
the clarification:

i regard you as adding a bunch of context to my statements, e.g. i wasn't specifically talking about brains when i mentioned electrons.

Shadow Starshine:
yes the top paragraph

TheRat:
the clarification being curi doesn't think he has what it takes to have that discussion. Which seems to me hostile and unhelpful. Doesn't seem like much of a clarification, more of a conclusion.

Freeze:
disregarding the entire paragraph also disregards the clarification

JustinCEO:
ya

Freeze:
the clarification was about the brain

JustinCEO:
right

TheRat:
oh

Shadow Starshine:
I dont see how that's a clarification about the brain

Shadow Starshine:
That's just talking about me?

TheRat:
Damn I lost the plot big time.

JustinCEO:

i wasn't specifically talking about brains when i mentioned electrons.

JustinCEO:
is that talking about you, Shadow Starshine?

Shadow Starshine:
I didn't disregard that part

Shadow Starshine:
It was that first paragraph freeze posted

Shadow Starshine:
It just talks about me as a person

TheRat:
there are large communication failures here. i regard you as adding a bunch of context to my statements, e.g. i wasn't specifically talking about brains when i mentioned electrons. i regard you as inadequately literal and precise about what you say, so you end up making claims that aren't really what you meant. and more broadly i think you don't have the background knowledge to discuss this effectively.

Freeze:
curi is pointing out an example where you added context to his statements that wasn't there in his wording, and explains that there are large communication failures.

curi:
saying a discussion has communication failures and talking about some of the discussion activities from my perspective is not focused on you as a person.

Shadow Starshine:
Well he seems to imply the communication failures are all on my part

curi:
i did not

Shadow Starshine:
The communications failure seems a conclusion, upon which the premises are my imprecision and lack of background knowledge

Shadow Starshine:
How else did you mean it?

curi:
no, that's another communication failure

curi:
i would think there was a communication failure regardless of the causes

Freeze:
the imprecision and lack of background knowledge include that example, and i think curi was saying further discussion would have to happen about that communication failure

curi:
i had other reasons to think that. your messages did not respond to me in a way where it seemed like we were understanding each other.

Shadow Starshine:
Okay, then that's fine. Then I'll only disregard the parts about my lack of background knowledge and imprecision

Shadow Starshine:
unless some demonstration shows those to be the case

curi:
what background knowledge is relevant to what claims is an important part of discussions

Shadow Starshine:
I didn't just say that background knowledge isn't relevant did I?

Shadow Starshine:
I'm saying you haven't shown ME to have a lack.

Shadow Starshine:
Yet you've claimed I have such a lack

Freeze:

i regard you as adding a bunch of context to my statements, e.g. i wasn't specifically talking about brains when i mentioned electrons.
so you don't disregard the above, but you do disregard:
i regard you as inadequately literal and precise about what you say, so you end up making claims that aren't really what you meant. and more broadly i think you don't have the background knowledge to discuss this effectively.

Shadow Starshine:
I'd rather be shown

Shadow Starshine:
then asserted at

curi:
do you really want me to show you lack some background knowledge?

curi:

have you read this paper? https://arxiv.org/pdf/quant-ph/0104033

curi:
i could go through 50 more examples

Shadow Starshine:
Yes, of course I want you to show it, why would I accept it just because you said it?

Shadow Starshine:
Do you think that's how it should work?

JustinCEO:
i defer to curi having more philosophy background knowledge

Shadow Starshine:
He doesn't even know me

Freeze:
Also, was this ever addressed/acknowledged?

i don't think you know what "compute" is based on your sentence

JustinCEO:
compared to me

TheRat:
but we're not talking about you tho Justin.

Freeze:
curi pointing out that you may not know what compute means is also relevant to background knowledge lacking

Shadow Starshine:
It could be, but I gave an example of what I meant by it

JustinCEO:
"Do you think that's how it should work?" is asking about a general principle, or i took it to be, anyways

Freeze:
J is bringing that up as an example of background knowledge mattering I think

curi:
your messages did not appear to be informed by some background knowledge that mine are informed by, and you didn't seem to be reading my messages in accordance with some of my backgorund knowledge.

Shadow Starshine:
in the context of a brain

curi:
this is a major communication issue

Shadow Starshine:
and he didn't correct it

Shadow Starshine:
or offer anything

Freeze:

What I'm taking it to mean is that the physical structure doesn't change of the neurons, it's just the electron and neurotransmitters passing data along
Do you have a different idea in mind?
You said "electrons are fast" so i'm assuming you are talking about the electrochemical signaling

Freeze:
was this your example of computing in the context of the brain?

Freeze:
im trying to find it

Shadow Starshine:
yes

Freeze:
ah ok

Shadow Starshine:
That's what I asked if he meant

Shadow Starshine:
I still don't know

curi:
understanding the large perspective gap is important to productive conversation. you have to take it into account when interpreting. i at least know that i don't know what you mean by lots of comments. you often jump to conclusions about what i'm saying that aren't what i meant.

TheRat:
This is an example of text being superior for sure though. Hard to follow as is, without quotes I can't even imagine.

Freeze:
ye

Shadow Starshine:
I don't think that's true, I spend most my time asking you what you mean by things

JustinCEO:
lol ya imagine this on voice, total chaos

Shadow Starshine:
I literally said "here's what I mean by compute, what do you mean?"

Shadow Starshine:
and you didn't answer

curi:
please don't put non-quotes in quote marks

Freeze:
SS:

What I'm taking it to mean is that the physical structure doesn't change of the neurons, it's just the electron and neurotransmitters passing data along
Do you have a different idea in mind?
You said "electrons are fast" so i'm assuming you are talking about the electrochemical signaling

Shadow Starshine:
If you want to be productive, just tell me what you mean

curi:
slow down, i'll get you an example after this example re different background knowledge re quote usage

Shadow Starshine:
what does the re mean?

Freeze:
regarding i think

curi:

{Attachments}
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/304082867384745994/658489281685487626/unknown.png

Freeze:
ah

Freeze:
about/concerning

TheRat:
so same thing basically, I always assumed as regarding.

curi:
discord seems to have prevented copy/paste with a software update, hmm

JustinCEO:
i just ran the discord plain text log maker

curi:
u can copy/paste tiny amounts but not select all and a bunch of stuff

curi:
thx j

Shadow Starshine:
I was having that issue as well I can't even post a link

JustinCEO:
lol j discord project suddenly ESSENTIAL?

JustinCEO:
what version do u guys have

JustinCEO:
of discord

TheRat:
Web

curi:
mac

JustinCEO:
o i never use web

TheRat:
No issues for me I think

Shadow Starshine:
What I'm generally frustrated about though, is when i ask someone to clarify their own position, and offer up mine, and instead of giving me their position or understanding, they just defer to talking about "the conversation going all wrong", or specific character flaws I supposedly have.

Shadow Starshine:
It doesn't seem too hard to progress the conversation instead by just offering up what you mean

curi:
we're all alike in our infinite ignorance. it's not a character flaw. the belief that it is is another difference in background knowledge leading to communication failures.

JustinCEO:
i think curi wants to progress the conversation and there was a big misunderstanding

Shadow Starshine:
You can say "No, that's not what compute means to mean(or community X), it instead means..."

JustinCEO:
and some disagreement about discussion methodology

curi:
what compute means is complicated.

Shadow Starshine:
If he wanted to continue the conversation, he made it sound like he didn't

Freeze:
I think he meant that it would need to be a more involved discussion than you might have thought, because he saw a lot of things going wrong re communication that presumably you were ok with because you kept moving forward rather than bringing those things up

Freeze:
so it might need require more patience/tolerance/discussion of background knowledge/discussion of discussion to progress than initially expected

Freeze:
i think it was a disagreement about how best to progress the discussion

TheRat:
Its interesting you see that Freeze. I thought curi was dismissing SS as not having enough background knowledge to continue. It didn't strike me as an invitation to continue in more depth.

Freeze:
hmm

Freeze:
I rarely see curi eliminate people from discussion. instead it seems like he asks for people to consider flaws in their current approach that are making it unnecessarily difficult for truth-seeking or learning

TheRat:
Maybe a link might have been more helpful? Like mention the communication gap and the potential knowledge gap, and say here read this and that might help with the gap?

Freeze:
im reading the multiverse paper rn

Freeze:
it seems to be an example of background knowledge that might be relevant

TheRat:
well yes I personally don't think he was, but I know curi. I am saying it seems. Like If I pretend I don't know curi, I would have reacted that way

Shadow Starshine:
thats how I took it TheRat. If it was like Freeze suggested, that would be fine

Freeze:
but i dont see yet how specifically it relates to this discussion

curi:
[5:59 PM] curi: understanding the large perspective gap is important to productive conversation. you have to take it into account when interpreting. i at least know that i don't know what you mean by lots of comments. you often jump to conclusions about what i'm saying that aren't what i meant.
[5:59 PM] Shadow Starshine: I don't think that's true, I spend most my time asking you what you mean by things

for example:

Shadow Starshine:
Like, if you say that it's analogous to updating a spreadsheet

Shadow Starshine:
why would I think that's rue

Shadow Starshine:
out of all possibilities

Shadow Starshine:
why should I hold to that one?

Shadow Starshine:
There's possibly hundreds of assertions I can't refute

it's hard to tell what you think i said/meant, but based on your reply i'm confident it's dissimilar to what i had in mind. e.g. you seem to think i suggested you should hold to a particular possibility out of many. that's not what i was saying. it looks like you believe i was making an analogy that i wasn't.

Shadow Starshine:
I also don't know what you mean by "I often jump to conclusions"

Shadow Starshine:
Is there examples of me doing that?

curi:
this is an example

Shadow Starshine:
You said "I often do it"

curi:
note the communication failure again

Shadow Starshine:
Are there other examples?

Shadow Starshine:
what is often?

curi:
wait, stop

Freeze:
the conclusions were: curi is asking you to hold a particular possibility, and curi is making an analogy but he wasn't

Freeze:
two conclusions/examples is enough to start a productive discussion i think

curi:

You said "I often do it"

I didn't, and i had just asked you not to put non-quotes in quotes.

Shadow Starshine:
No, it's right up there

Freeze:
proper quote:

you often jump to conclusions about what i'm saying that aren't what i meant.

Shadow Starshine:
You just quoted yourself

curi:
i regard this as a major problem. you apparently thought it was ignorable or you don't know what quotes are.

Freeze:
SS I also have a disagreement with how you used quotes here:

I literally said "here's what I mean by compute, what do you mean?"

curi:
either way there's a major difficulty due to clashing background knowledge/assumptions/etc

Freeze:
i think you were clarifying what you meant and summarizing what you had said. but to use quotes and the word literally was wrong I think

Shadow Starshine:
I get it, you guys only like quotes when its literal

JustinCEO:
ya you should never ever say literally before a paraphrase

Shadow Starshine:
and I use them as paraphrases

curi:
you don't get it, the gap in perspetive is larger than you're realizing

curi:
you're trying to downplay the perspective difference and different approach to communication

JustinCEO:
if you're trying to have a serious discussion anyyways

TheRat:
This has gone hyper meta.

Shadow Starshine:
curi, I'm getting tired of this. If you're gonna make claims like I often jump to conclusions, then I expect you to show that's the case

Shadow Starshine:
Don't just throw that out there

curi:
you just jumped to a conclusion that "I get it"

Freeze:
i think there is a substantive difference in meaning between:

You said "I often do it"

and curi's actual quote:

you often jump to conclusions about what i'm saying that aren't what i meant.
also it was about specific conclusions, conclusions about what curi is saying when that's not what he meant

TheRat:
What's the difference Freeze?

Freeze:
which is important to address for productive communication

Shadow Starshine:
How is that jumping to a conclusion, is it not what you guys are saying? Don't use literally and don't use quotes without it actually being word for word?

Shadow Starshine:
Now what other examples do you have

Shadow Starshine:
Because you said it BEFORE I said any of these things

Shadow Starshine:
you are literally only using post hoc examples

Shadow Starshine:
I want examples that occured BEFORE you made the claim

curi:
i gave you an example a minute ago, which you didn't recognize as an example, which shows the large communication problem

Freeze:

you don't get it, the gap in perspetive is larger than you're realizing
you're trying to downplay the perspective difference and different approach to communication

Shadow Starshine:
You said I often do it

curi:
re "I get it", is that a conclusion you're willing to test?

Shadow Starshine:
How am I supposed to test it, you either agree with my understanding of your desire of quotations or you dont

Freeze:
SS:

I get it, you guys only like quotes when its literal
curi, i think this "I get it" is only referring to the quote/paraphrasing issue. It may not be referring to the overall disagreement or perspective gap.

curi:
that was a yes or no question. your answer is not a yes or no. this again indicates perspective and communication gap.

Shadow Starshine:
exactly

curi:
ik that freeze

Shadow Starshine:
do you just get meta over and over again to avoid answering anything?

curi:

do you just get meta over and over again to avoid answering anything?

this is a meta comment while still not answering my direct question.

Shadow Starshine:
You dont answer anything I bring up

Shadow Starshine:
Do you think you are the sole driver of this conversation?

curi:

is that a conclusion you're willing to test?

i'm trying to demonstrate some claims to you, but you aren't being responsive.

Freeze:
how would we go about testing this specific statement?

I get it, you guys only like quotes when its literal

Shadow Starshine:
I want you to answer things I'm saying to you

curi:
if you want me to demonstrate any claims to you, you have to be responsive when i try to do so.

Shadow Starshine:
Now sure, test that claim if you can. I think you want something out of quotes, I stated what I think you want, am I right or wrong

curi:

is that a conclusion you're willing to test?

Freeze:

Now sure, test that claim if you can

Freeze:
i think his answer is yes

curi:
that is not an answer

Freeze:
although yeah it seems to carry a bunch of additional stuff

Shadow Starshine:
my god

curi:
if he meant that as "yes", it's an example of his lack of precision

JustinCEO:
curi asked if SS would be willing to test claim

Shadow Starshine:
Are you being purposesly obtuse?

JustinCEO:
SS replied that curi can test claim if he can

curi:
no, as i told you we have a perspective gap, different background knowledge, and some communication failures.

Freeze:
i dont think he is, i think he sees real communication gaps and is trying to build a mutual understanding of them

curi:
i suggest you read the inferential distance articles linked earlier

Freeze:
(in response to purposely obtuse)

Shadow Starshine:
I don't think hes trying to build anything

Shadow Starshine:
any other person would know what I'm saying

JustinCEO:
so SS specified the wrong actor in his reply

Shadow Starshine:
in fact, multiple people in this chat

Shadow Starshine:
seem to know what im saying

curi:
could you say what you mean instead of trying to rely on me guessing it? i've spent the last half hour trying to tell you that relying on guessing what each other means isn't going to work because we're too different.

Shadow Starshine:
I am saying what I mean

Shadow Starshine:
I don't agree to your framing

Freeze:
SS:

Are you being purposesly obtuse?
curi:
no, as i told you we have a perspective gap, different background knowledge, and some communication failures.
btw i see this is an example of a direct question and a direct answer happening

curi:

is that a conclusion you're willing to test?

you haven't answered this question.

Shadow Starshine:
Yes I have

curi:
quote?

Shadow Starshine:
I can't copy paste

Freeze:
i think i can find

Shadow Starshine:
I said sure

Freeze:

Now sure, test that claim if you can

Shadow Starshine:
then I asked you to confirm if what I said was accurate

Freeze:
J pointed out a mix up of actors which might be relevant

curi:
that is not a "sure" answer to my question.

Shadow Starshine:
yes it is

Shadow Starshine:
now take it as one

Shadow Starshine:
and progress

Shadow Starshine:
stop wasting time

curi:
you're jumping to the conclusion that i'm wasting time

Shadow Starshine:
I am

Freeze:
there seems to be a disagreement about whether or not this meta discussion is progress. I think it is, but you think it's a waste of time. How would we resolve this disagreement?

Shadow Starshine:
I honestly think you're wasting time

curi:
i think it could be progress if SS wanted to resolve our differences, but he doesn't

Shadow Starshine:
I think you don't

curi:
he isn't willing to actually face the gap in viewpoint and try to deal with it

Shadow Starshine:
and you just keep trying to frame the discussion

Shadow Starshine:
to make it sound like its my bad

Shadow Starshine:
and not yours

Shadow Starshine:
its incredibly obvious I answered in the affirmative

curi:
you are resisting trying to sort out our communication differences

Shadow Starshine:
no, you are

Shadow Starshine:
you aren't just taking it as a yes

Shadow Starshine:
if you did

Shadow Starshine:
we could move on

curi:
you didn't and still haven't said "yes"

JustinCEO:
SS you're the one who keeps bringing up personal dynamics while other people are focused on interpreting statements, pointing out ambiguities or errors, and explaining stuff.

TheRat:
I wish there was a way to halt meta and get back on track 😦

Shadow Starshine:
I have said yes, I told you it meant yes, this isn;t complicated

curi:
you aren't being precise enough

Freeze:
SS, did you see Justin's statements about the mix-up of actors? Quotes:
J:

curi asked if SS would be willing to test claim
SS replied that curi can test claim if he can
so SS specified the wrong actor in his reply

Shadow Starshine:
I am being precise enough

curi:
you never said "yes"

curi:
but you claim to have said "yes"

Shadow Starshine:
I don't care, I said sure

curi:
you are wrong in a literal, precise way

Shadow Starshine:
No, I said that I answered in the affirmative

Shadow Starshine:
I never said that I only said "yes"

curi:
your response to being wrong in a literal, precise way is "I don't care, I said [thing that isn't "yes"]"

Shadow Starshine:
show me where I said that

curi:

I have said yes,

Freeze:
I think SS is saying that he clarified later that his "Now sure, test that claim if you can" means yes

JustinCEO:
this is related to the questionable quotation usage earlier

Shadow Starshine:
buddy, if you think what's gonna happen

curi:
that text doesn't mean yes. it's not even coherent.

Shadow Starshine:
is that I',m gonna use the exact terminology you want in the exact format you want

Shadow Starshine:
and its either that or its my fault

Shadow Starshine:
you're deluded

Shadow Starshine:
you can either take it as a yes

Shadow Starshine:
and continue

Shadow Starshine:
or I think you're doing this to avoid

Shadow Starshine:
having to justify earlier statements

Freeze:
I think this was relevant to a potential misunderstanding:

SS, did you see Justin's statements about the mix-up of actors? Quotes:
J:
curi asked if SS would be willing to test claim
SS replied that curi can test claim if he can
so SS specified the wrong actor in his reply

curi:
i said you hadn't said "yes". you claimed that you had. now you're moving the goalposts to whether a previous comment meant yes

Shadow Starshine:
I've said my piece dude

Shadow Starshine:
I'm not interested

curi:
do you think you can estimate, with over 95% confidence, how many times i've banned or suspended someone for misquoting, or given a warning that i will do that if they do it again?

Shadow Starshine:
Take the yes or don't

TheRat:
This is why I am not a fan of meta. Look how 0 progress was made the moment we went meta. Even if curi is 100% right, this conversation to me highlights my issue with going meta. It is like a blackhole. I have never escaped a meta discussion, and I have never seen anyone escape it. 😦

Shadow Starshine:
I'm not bothering to answer such an irrelevant question

curi:
that question is a test of your claim to get it re my view of quoting.

curi:
your failure to see the relevance shows some sorta communication failure and perspective gap.

Shadow Starshine:
Buddy are you taking the yes or not

curi:
the sort that i've claimed is happening ~constantly

Freeze:
He took the yes by asking you the question that tests the claim

Shadow Starshine:
or are you going to keep saying "sure" isn't precise enough

Shadow Starshine:
I want him to acknowledge his acceptance then

Freeze:
curi is saying

do you think you can estimate, with over 95% confidence, how many times i've banned or suspended someone for misquoting, or given a warning that i will do that if they do it again?
is the test

Shadow Starshine:
not implicity

Shadow Starshine:
I want this explicit

curi:
i don't think you've said yes but i was trying a different approach anyway because i don't think you have the background knowledge to be able to speak precisely.

Shadow Starshine:
What is your different approach

Shadow Starshine:
is it accepting the affirmative?

curi:

do you think you can estimate, with over 95% confidence, how many times i've banned or suspended someone for misquoting, or given a warning that i will do that if they do it again?

Shadow Starshine:
No, before we move on, tell me you've accepted the affirmative

Shadow Starshine:
is that your different approach?

curi:
i accept that you now mean it, but i don't accept that factually you've said it.

Shadow Starshine:
great good enough

curi:
yes that quote is the different approach

Freeze:
@TheRat i think this meta discussion is progress by the way

Freeze:
I don't think meta discussion is a black hole that we can't get out of

JustinCEO:
@TheRat meta often comes up when there's already a problem and people are pointing stuff out to try to address the problem. so the universe of cases in which meta comes up is already slanted towards discussions where there's some kinda issue. so you can't judge conversational problems as necessarily being attributable to the meta itself.

Shadow Starshine:
To answer your question, i'm not making a claim about everything surrounding your usage of quotes, but merely how you like them being used. I don't care about what days you used it, how many times, and what you were wearing while you did it. Neither do I care about who you banned for not doing it. I'm merely expressing how you want quotes used. Did I get that part right or wrong?

Shadow Starshine:
That is what "I get it" meant

Freeze:

{Attachments}
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/304082867384745994/658497979493253140/unknown.png

curi:
i asked you to stop doing something and then you did it again

curi:
then you claimed to get my perpsective on the matter, and i doubt that you do

Shadow Starshine:
I want you to stop doing things as well

Freeze:
yes, although he said he gets it after the second time it happened and there was further discussion about it that clarified the issue

Shadow Starshine:
I want you to acknowledge what I'm saying

Shadow Starshine:
can you do that?

curi:
i can't read your mind as well as i believe you want me to.

Shadow Starshine:
I want you to read what I'm typing not my mind

curi:
so for example you wrote

curi:

I get it, you guys only like quotes when its literal

Shadow Starshine:
Is that a true or false statement?

curi:
i read this. by reading it, i noticed that the text "its" is an error. is that what you want?

Shadow Starshine:
Can you just answer that

Shadow Starshine:
...

Shadow Starshine:
are you serious

TheRat:
I very much disagree @Freeze There is no way you can tell me with a straight face that progress has been made. I don't think SS is any closer to understanding curi's position on computation. Hell not even progress has been made within meta yet.

Shadow Starshine:
you're bothered that "its" isn't "it's"

curi:
wanting me to guess that you meant something other than what you wrote is in the mind reading category.

curi:
i can do it some but not enough for how you're talking.

Shadow Starshine:
you're being serious right now?

curi:
i am being serious

Shadow Starshine:
wow

curi:
your correction is still wrong

Freeze:
@TheRat I think there's lots of progress. curi and SS better understand a) that there is a large perspective gap b) the perspectives of each other regarding the perspective gap
there's also lots of valuable discussion to look at, quote, make a discussion tree out of later etc.

Shadow Starshine:
Sorry, at this point I can't imagine you're worth talking to

curi:
will you read the inferential distance articles?

curi:
your attitude is irrational in a way that has been explained by quite a few ppl

Freeze:
Inferential distance articles: https://ptb.discordapp.com/channels/304082867384745994/304082867384745994/658476068436705320

Freeze:
https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Inferential_distance

Shadow Starshine:
Listen, I'll talk to Freeze and TheRat and people, but I'm done with curi

Shadow Starshine:
I don't think he's being honest

Freeze:
hmm

Freeze:
he disagrees about that, but ok

Freeze:
i dont know how we make progress on the gap in perspective about curi's honesty

curi:
see, the communication gap is bad enough that he's claiming bad faith. typical thing as explained in the articles.

Shadow Starshine:
I talk with a lot of philosophers, none of said that a conversation was too confusing to move forward because of the wrong "its"

Freeze:

{Attachments}
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/304082867384745994/658499801507168272/unknown.png

curi:
i didn't say that.

Shadow Starshine:
Either he honestly means that, in which case he speaks in a way so annoying I'd had to try and broach it

Freeze:
btw I think curi is saying he can do some mind-reading but not enough to communicate effectively based on how you have been writing

Shadow Starshine:
Or he's dishonest

Shadow Starshine:
And it's a waste of my time

Freeze:
I took the its as an example of imprecision, but in a way that curi can mindread past

JustinCEO:
ya SS you're just making stuff up now

TheRat:
FWIW, SS. I get where you're coming from but curi is not acting in bad faith. Idk a way out of this type of meta black hole tbh though. I definitely don't think progress ever gets made contra Freeze.

Freeze:
but the other examples are ones he can't mindread past, like the computation stuff

curi:
SS doesn't want to take one issue at a time and proceed carefully to reach a conclusion, but also demands repeatedly that i demonstrate my claims.

Shadow Starshine:
Are you guys honstly taking the perspective that you'd have to be a "mind reader" to understand that sentence?

curi:
no

curi:
you are misunderstanding quite badly

Shadow Starshine:
Then I'm sorry, but you're too imprecise for me to understand

Shadow Starshine:
must be a background knowledge problem

JustinCEO:
why hatefully flame?

Freeze:
he is showing systematic lack of precision in your words. some of it curi can read past, like "its", but others he can't figure out what you meant accurately. He is saying even if you fix the "its" to "it's" the sentence, the quote:

I get it, you guys only like quotes when its literal
is still a misunderstanding and needs to be addressed. That's my interpretation

Shadow Starshine:
I'm literally mimicing, and you call it flaming

JustinCEO:

To imitate or ape for sport; to attempt to excite laughter or derision by acting or speaking like another; to ridicule by imitation.

Shadow Starshine:
Who here doesn't understand what I mean with the "I get it, you guys only like quotes when its literal"

Shadow Starshine:
Someone other than curi

Shadow Starshine:
Please raise your hand

curi:
i do understand what you mean

curi:
you keep misstating my position and ignoring my corrections

Freeze:
but he sees a misunderstanding there, specifically in "I get it" i think

Shadow Starshine:
Not what I'm asking, freeze, what do you think that sentence means?

Freeze:
even "You guys only like quotes when its literal" might be misunderstood or incomplete in a meaningful way for further communication

Shadow Starshine:
Well lets find out

Shadow Starshine:
Freeze, what do you take from it

Shadow Starshine:
Anyone can take a stab at it

JustinCEO:

I'm literally mimicing, and you call it flaming

JustinCEO:
definitions of mimic commonly involve ridicule, derision

JustinCEO:
which i would consider flaming

TheRat:
I take it to mean that we don't like it, but it doesn't tell me if you agree to stop quoting in that manner.

Shadow Starshine:
Good, I didn't agree

Shadow Starshine:
But what is it I think you don't like?

JustinCEO:
the specific word you chose to bring up to exonerate yourself from flaming charge is not helpful for your case.

TheRat:
Non literal quotes

JustinCEO:
did SS block me or is he ignoring me? 🤔

Shadow Starshine:
I can't reply to everything

JustinCEO:
ok

Shadow Starshine:
so I'm chosing to narrow this

JustinCEO:
in principle that's fine but doing so without saying anything is hella confusing and ambiguous

Shadow Starshine:
It seems TheRat understood what I was trying to say

Freeze:

I get it, you guys only like quotes when its literal
I think it means:
Explicitly: I understand that you guys only like quotes that are quotes. You don't like paraphrasing dressed up as quotes. I understand that you didn't like my paraphrasing of quotes.

Implicitly a few different things I was wondering about: Is there hostility in this statement? It seems to sort of be saying... you guys use quotes this way, but most people don't and it's not actually important, but I get that that's how you want to do it. Another implicit thing seemed to be like... you guys are only discussing my paraphrasing because you can't answer my other issues and this is your way of being pedantic and stubborn.
Issues I see: You didn't address the fact that you used quotes as paraphrasing, and you didn't offer your opinion on whether it matters or not to use quotes precisely and literally. The way that misquoting relates to communication gap was also not something addressed, but I think that could happen in future discussion. Without any of this additional stuff though, we don't actually know where we agree and where we disagree about quotes.

TheRat:
Disclaimer: I suffer from ridiculous headaches. Currently in the middle of one so I am prone to miss a lot when this happens. But yeah I think I understood what you meant.

Freeze:
migraine? 😦

Shadow Starshine:
well you got the explicit message right, but the implicit part was a possibility that I purposely didn't state

Shadow Starshine:
I never agreed to your usage

TheRat:
I don't think its a migraine as I understand them. I never quite knew the difference, but I was told that migraines come with like sensitivity to light and vision impairment.

Shadow Starshine:
But I wanted to know that I had what curi wanted correct

Shadow Starshine:
first

Freeze:
yeah i think curi knows you didnt agree to our usage

Freeze:
and believed that that discussion about agreement/disagreement would be relevant to further communication

Shadow Starshine:
I didn't agree ot disagree

TheRat:
Freeze didn't say you agreed to disagree

Freeze:
so i think the misunderstanding is around whether or not you wanted to discuss further and believed there was more to learn about the role of quoting in discussions

Freeze:
@TheRat about what?

TheRat:
No i meant toward SS

Freeze:
ah

TheRat:
Ok let me take a stab at explaining. The problem with quote usage is not just that we dislike non-literal usage. It is that curi felt you were paraphrasing his ideas in the wrong manner, and responding to the wrong paraphrase. Using quotes helps mitigate that perspective gap.

curi:
ot = or

curi:
u mindread his typo wrong

curi:
as to

curi:
example of how it can be non-trivial and go wrong

TheRat:
So when you said I get it, SS, you didn't quite get it.

TheRat:
Does that help?

curi:
(i'm fairly confident re typo interpretation tho not 100%)

Shadow Starshine:
You guys are taking "I get it" as "I get everything". I think that's problematic

Shadow Starshine:
When I say "I get it" followed by a statement, that statement is what I get

TheRat:
Btw I know these discussions are quite draining. So if you're too tired to continue we can pick it up another time. (Not assuming anything just putting it out there)

Freeze:
So SS if:
You were just looking for clarification from curi on whether you understood the conclusion about quotes which is that it's important to use quotes literally, then I think curi did clarify that he believes you didn't truly understand it. People have been warned/banned for misquoting because of the background knowledge curi has around quotes and how important it is to interact with people's text in an intellectually honest way through quotation.
I think curi believed that although you said that you got that literal quotes are important to us, you would have been surprised if you discovered just how seriously we actually take quoting. Your potential surprise would indicate a gap in understanding and background knowledge, which I think curi wanted to address ahead of time and as part of making progress on the communication gap

TheRat:
Ok so the problem with that. Maybe taking I get it to mean I get everything is problematic. However, the problem is that the main reason why quotes was brought up was not addressed, not even a little bit. In this case the mis-paraphrase and response to the mis-paraphrase.

Shadow Starshine:
Right, I may not understand to the degree that quotes are important to you. I may not even care. What I wanted to establish, however, was not the degree of importance, which you're right, I am ignorant of, but the qualifications of getting it corect

Freeze:
Ok, so I think that may have been a genuine misunderstanding then

Freeze:
If for example curi replied: Yes, that is our standard for quoting, but I believe you don't understand why we have that standard, and you disagree implicitly about the value of that standard. Discussing that disagreement is important to our communication.

Shadow Starshine:
Right, that would have been a good response

TheRat:
That might have been better yes

Freeze:
Yes, but it would have required some mindreading from curi, or us

Shadow Starshine:
But I did clarify multiple times

Shadow Starshine:
and he wouldn't acknowledge it

Shadow Starshine:
Which is utterly frustrating

Shadow Starshine:
If someone is so far from any common language communication as that

Shadow Starshine:
I'm not sure it's worth building up anything

Shadow Starshine:
especially when all changes seem to be required on my end

Freeze:
the thing is individual clarifications don't address imprecision in past communication, if that imprecision is a consistent issue

TheRat:
I don't think that would require mindreading Freeze.

TheRat:
SS was clear with what he meant regarding quotes

Freeze:
like if you imprecisely communicate in the same way 3 times, then just asking what you meant each time and moving forward might be less effective than trying to figure out why the imprecise communication happened

curi:
SS didn't merely clarify multiple times. he made additional false claims, while also actually willfully refusing to give a clear answer on the basis of (false claims that he'd already given answers he hadn't). this is one of many examples of how his approach to text doesn't engage well with what ppl (he or others) literally said, which is relevant to quote usage.

TheRat:
right well I am in disagreement with freeze and curi about the value of going meta. Even if progress is slow in non meta, and clarifications are needed. I think progress happens. I haven't seen meta not just come to a screeching halt.

TheRat:
but I have a lot less discussion experience too

Shadow Starshine:
I don't mind meta discussions, I have them with other people

Shadow Starshine:
they don't go that badly

Freeze:
I might also be biased because I genuinely enjoy meta

Freeze:
I find that I learn a lot about discussion and thinking in general

Freeze:
and analysis

Freeze:
but i am kind of exhausted, which is interesting

curi:
most of what i said was not meta

Shadow Starshine:
I stand by curi just framing things rather than being clarifying

Freeze:
I'd like to discuss the inferential distance articles at some point

Shadow Starshine:
If you look at what he just wrote

Shadow Starshine:
it doesn't offer clarity

TheRat:
ok well maybe I mean meta in the wrong way then. I thought the moment you said he lacked the sufficient knowledge to continue the discussion regarding computation, I thought that was the beginning of the meta train.

Shadow Starshine:
It's just assertion

curi:
rat i mean, once ur talking about a meta topic, not every statement within that topic is meta. many are object statements re that topic.

Freeze:
well when curi says:

most of what i said was not meta
it makes me think that he means most of what he said was directly relevant/topical to the discussion

Shadow Starshine:
I will counter assert that I think curi's approach doesn't work

Freeze:

most of what i said was not meta

I will counter assert that I think curi's approach doesn't work
is this a counter assertion to the first quote from curi?

Shadow Starshine:
no

Freeze:
oh

Freeze:
ok, i think i understand

TheRat:
I wonder if maybe had an addition of something like . Maybe if you read this link you might get a better idea of what I mean by computation. And then link.

curi:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/HLqWn5LASfhhArZ7w/expecting-short-inferential-distances

A clear argument has to lay out an inferential pathway, starting from what the audience already knows or accepts. If you don’t recurse far enough, you’re just talking to yourself.

SS doesn't want to recurse enough, calls it my approach but he also disagrees with EY and many others.

Shadow Starshine:
That's also false

curi:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/sBBGxdvhKcppQWZZE/double-illusion-of-transparency

In desperation, I recursed all the way back to Bayes's Theorem, the ultimate foundation stone of -

He didn't know how to apply Bayes's Theorem to update the probability that a fruit is a banana, after it is observed to be yellow. He kept mixing up p(b|y) and p(y|b).

Shadow Starshine:
You can spend as much time framing our discussion as you like

Shadow Starshine:
if you actually want to stop doing that and just talk to me directly feel free to DM me

curi:
what is false? you want to recurse more than i think you do?

curi:
you refused to discuss further b4 we recursed enough to find common ground. said the gap btwn us was too big (after spending a lot of the conversation denying gap size)

Shadow Starshine:
Again, i don't agree with your characterization of the events

curi:
what do you disagree with?

TheRat:
Wait what do you think about what I said. A resource to help close that gap

curi:
you aren't being specific. which is just the sort of issue our way of using quotes addresses.

Freeze:
Shadow StarshineToday at 6:44 PM

Then I'm sorry, but you're too imprecise for me to understand

must be a background knowledge problem

Shadow StarshineToday at 7:12 PM
If you look at what he just wrote
it doesn't offer clarity
It's just assertion

I will counter assert that I think curi's approach doesn't work

Is this second example re counter assertion a similar process to the first example of mimicking?

Shadow Starshine:
That I had a refusal to discuss further. I had a refusal for your methods and approach.

Shadow Starshine:
Which isn't a refusal to continue

Shadow Starshine:
That's just your characterization

curi:
do you deny that i was trying to recurse further to common ground?

TheRat:
The second quote is not mimicry

Shadow Starshine:
I don't know whether you were, I have no reason to believe you were.

Shadow Starshine:
And in either case, it was a bad approach and was not based on my refusal

Shadow Starshine:
no that wasn't mimicry

curi:

Sorry, at this point I can't imagine you're worth talking to

isn't this a "refusal to discuss further"?

curi:
more refusal here and to make scrolling back up easier: https://discordapp.com/channels/304082867384745994/304082867384745994/658499339018305565

Shadow Starshine:
At that point yes. I had basically tried to continue with you multiple times and found you weren't perceptive to any approaches I had taken and I didn't think at that point you were acting in good faith

Shadow Starshine:
Nor do you seem to answer anything I put out there

curi:
so why did you deny my characterization of the conversation, on the basis of specifically denying what you now concede is true?

curi:
you doing that kind of thing, over and over, is why conversation doesn't work.

Shadow Starshine:
Because it makes it sound like I refused earlier, or that the initial problem was my refusal. If you're saying that, instead, there was a refusal later after it had broken down, that I can accept

Shadow Starshine:
No

Shadow Starshine:
the reason it doesn't work

Shadow Starshine:
is because you write sentences like "you are doing that kind of thing, over and over, is why conversation doesn't work."

Shadow Starshine:
And you do THAT over and over

JustinCEO:
that's a typo lol

JustinCEO:
in the attempted quote

Shadow Starshine:
And those sort of sentences

Shadow Starshine:
don't help any discussion

Shadow Starshine:
It's just framing

JustinCEO:
i find it kinda funny cuz like

JustinCEO:
that specific issue

JustinCEO:
on which

JustinCEO:
this community

JustinCEO:
has a serious position

JustinCEO:
has been brought up

JustinCEO:
repeatedly

JustinCEO:
and

JustinCEO:
you are offering

curi:

Because it makes it sound like I refused earlier

what is "it" here and how does it do that? this is part of a pattern where you raise new, vague claims in response to being wrong about a previous claim, which prevents anything resolving.

JustinCEO:
your reason for why discussion doesn't work

JustinCEO:
and again

JustinCEO:
you violated a norm on which there is a considered position/attitude as it relates to discussion

JustinCEO:
i think maybe u think its us just being fussy pedants

Shadow Starshine:
You aren't being specific what my refusal was about or why it occured, and your sentence makes it sound like the problem rests on my refusal, rather than that being a conclusion about what occured after there was problems

JustinCEO:
the quoting thing

JustinCEO:
but that's not it

curi:
which text wasn't specific but should have been?

Shadow Starshine:
give me a sec I can't copy paste

TheRat:
I think he means

you doing that kind of thing, over and over, is why conversation doesn't work.

curi:
copy/paste works for me for short amounts of text

curi:
mb relog

curi:
if you prefer to move to a better forum like curi website we can do that.

Shadow Starshine:
I dont know if its the laptop

Shadow Starshine:
"you refused to discuss further b4 we recursed enough to find common ground"

Shadow Starshine:
This implies that we were finding common ground, or that this recursive process was occuring or that you had intentions to do so

curi:
ok so factually you admit you refused to discuss further at a certain point in time. at that point in time, had we recursed far enough to find common ground?

Shadow Starshine:
Do you see my contention?

curi:
yes, i implied the process was occurring and/or that i had intentions for it to occur. i agree.

Shadow Starshine:
Great, I don't accept that

curi:
do you accept that we'd recursed for several levels?

Shadow Starshine:
No, I don't accept that what we were doing what recursing

Shadow Starshine:
was*

curi:
ok, so you're denying my statement based on a different concept of recursion than what i know and mean ... basically you have different background knowledge than me, interpreted my statement using your background knowledge, and jumped to the conclusion that it's false. which is the same kind of thing you wanted me to give you examples of you doing, and i was trying to.

Shadow Starshine:
If what you're implying is that you have some proprietary notion of recursion that I failed to aquire, then sure, that's a possibility. perhaps every word you're saying doesn't mean what I commonly think it means and I've jumped to conclusions that we are even communicating

Shadow Starshine:
In which case, my bad

curi:
i believe i have the standard meaning, as meant by EY in the article, but that you don't.

Shadow Starshine:
Perhaps you are just randomly stating words

Shadow Starshine:
Oh, well, I shouldn't jump to the conclusion that by article you mean what I mean by article

Shadow Starshine:
Or that when you say you, you mean me

Shadow Starshine:
I'd hate to be so presumptious

curi:
do you want to recurse on this? e.g. i could ask you to give an example of what you think recursing is.

Freeze:
this is sarcasm, right SS?

curi:
and i could give one from the conversation previously.

Shadow Starshine:
I really don't think you're honestly trying to sort anything out curi, so no, not really. If you were, you woulda just told me what you meant by compute

Shadow Starshine:
and not waste 3 hours of my time

Shadow Starshine:
or however long its been

Shadow Starshine:
2?

Perspective Philosophy:
you're bothered that "its" isn't "it's" Is that what is being argued right now?

curi:
no

Perspective Philosophy:
ive got to keep reading then

Perspective Philosophy:
brb

curi:
i told you earlier that "compute" is complicated. to use article examples, it's like a young earth creationist asking for one paragraph explanation of evolution that is convincing to him.

Shadow Starshine:
It would have been a better use of time to discuss it than any of this

Shadow Starshine:
instead, you just made assertions

Shadow Starshine:
I asked you to defend them

Shadow Starshine:
you didnt

Shadow Starshine:
and here we are, you picking at grammar and quotes

TheRat:
oh Hello PP!

curi:
i don't agree. i thought your discussion methodology was and is inadequate to make progress and that disagreement needs to be addressed.

TheRat:
Welcome

Shadow Starshine:
instead of actually addressing real issues

Freeze:
are all forms of information processing computational?

Shadow Starshine:
And I think that is of you

Shadow Starshine:
So you go ahead and think that of me

Shadow Starshine:
and I'll think it of you as well

curi:
ok well i've written at length about my discussion methodology, linked you relevant articles, etc., but you have not presented your position on the matter and, i think, don't want to

Shadow Starshine:
Why do you write about what you think I want and my intentions

Shadow Starshine:
Why not just ask

Shadow Starshine:
It's obnoxious

curi:
you want me to ask you something which i believe you've already communicated about many times, but previously you were upset with me for asking something which you believed you had already communicated about many times

Perspective Philosophy:
@TheRat Hello!

Freeze:
But when curi exposes what he thinks you want to you (or what he thinks your intentions are) it allows for better understanding of what he's thinking, and you can point out where he's wrong. We all have these thoughts in our head and if we don't put them out there to be clarified or contested, the thoughts affect the discussion in an unseen way instead of an openly attributable way

Freeze:
Like I wouldn't want to misunderstand you in a way that I don't realize and not find out until way later. I'd prefer to say what I think you mean and have you correct me

TheRat:
I do agree with SS that an attempt at explaining computation or linking to a resource that explains computation in a way curi endorses would have been a much better approach than going meta. I feel like past 2-3 hours the progress has been quite minimal if any.

Shadow Starshine:
curi if you hold that belief state that's not my fault

curi:
there were dozens of large problems in the conversation, from my perspetive, rat. i didn't think they were ignorable.

Freeze:
curi believes SS understanding computation would have required some steps of recursion though, and relevant background knowledge

curi:
if i didn't discuss discussion methodology i would have stopped discussing.

Perspective Philosophy:
I got to that point

curi:
SS, do you want to present your position on discussion methodology?

TheRat:
I don't doubt it curi. I just think that going meta seems to always end in no progress.

Shadow Starshine:
No, curi, I don't. What I wanted was for you to talk about what you mean by compute.

curi:
why did you derail by questioning my correct understanding of what you'd already communicated?

curi:
and saying i should have asked

Perspective Philosophy:
You said there are large communication failures here. i regard you as adding a bunch of context to my statements, e.g. i wasn't specifically talking about brains when i mentioned electrons. i regard you as inadequately literal and precise about what you say, so you end up making claims that aren't really what you meant. and more broadly i think you don't have the background knowledge to discuss this effectively.

Seems that the better course would have been to talk about the subject matter and alleviate any discrepancies as the conversation flows. This is how two people come to speak the same language, the meta-discussion is only going to hinder that process.

Perspective Philosophy:
@curi

Shadow Starshine:
Because I comment on multiple things, but I'm telling you what I'd REALLY like is to bypass all of it

curi:
the discrepancies were too large and complicated, and layering on each other, to do it that way PP

curi:
needed some acknowledgement of the situation and attempt to take it into account

Freeze:
Like it seems like the more relevant thing in curi's eyes than an article about computation are the articles about inferential distance: https://ptb.discordapp.com/channels/304082867384745994/304082867384745994/658476068436705320

To SS, the more relevant thing is computation itself, resources on that or discussion about computation specifically, as well as discussion about SS's example of computation:

What I'm taking it to mean is that the physical structure doesn't change of the neurons, it's just the electron and neurotransmitters passing data along
Do you have a different idea in mind?
You said "electrons are fast" so i'm assuming you are talking about the electrochemical signaling

this difference of ideas about what is most relevant to the progression of the discussion is a topical, substantive disagreement that needs to be addressed. It's not something where we should just say that curi should do what SS wants or SS should do what curi wants. If SS just concedes to curi and reads the articles (without being rationally persuaded of curi's perspective) I think that would be wrong and harmful to the discussion. Same for if curi agrees to what SS wants without being rationally persuaded as to why that is best for the discussion.

Shadow Starshine:
What am I conceding?

Perspective Philosophy:
so you had some entry level requirements, what where they? It might help the situation to understand these requirements.

Perspective Philosophy:
@curi

curi:
his epistemology, discussion methodology and approach to precision are quite different than mine, in addition to him not sharing my view of physics and computation.

Perspective Philosophy:
well you surely can talk to people who disagree?

Freeze:

What am I conceding?
Not what you're conceding, but what you shouldn't concede without being rationally persuaded of it first (if it's true), which is the idea that the inferential distance concept and application is more immediately relevant and important to the discussion than the understanding of computation.

Shadow Starshine:
What I would have wanted from the discussion is you saying "I agree with your definition" or "I disagree with that definition, and here's why (insert short snippet of where the disagreement may be)"

Freeze:
which relates to what TheRat said here:

I do agree with SS that an attempt at explaining computation or linking to a resource that explains computation in a way curi endorses would have been a much better approach than going meta. I feel like past 2-3 hours the progress has been quite minimal if any.

Shadow Starshine:
Then I would proceed to ask questions about it

curi:
sure but if he wants to understand what i think about consciousness he needs to understand some other stuff first. the direct approach was tried and wasn't close to working.

Shadow Starshine:
You already told me consciousness isn't in your lexicon

Shadow Starshine:
and was contextual

Shadow Starshine:
I'm not concerned with that word anymore

Perspective Philosophy:
okay, well why don't you try explaining it to me, perhaps in the most basic terms you can. That way all parties can hopefully gain some insight?

Shadow Starshine:
We were talking about why you think people changing their mind was analogous to an updated spreadsheet

curi:
PP i don't want to explain something to you unless you are interested, have a question. has to be a real learning process. and there are a lot of topics i'd suggest are more interesting. i don't want you to act as a go between to lure me into making statements for SS's benefit.

curi:
what particularly interests me is the problem of how to talk with someone when errors are accumulating in the discussion faster than they're being cleared up.

curi:
especially when the rate of clearing them up is very low. hardly any conversational branches seem to get resolved.

Perspective Philosophy:
What do you think of Habermas on communicative action?

Shadow Starshine:
That sounds good, but it doesn't seem to be working out for you. I'd suggest to stop making statements that involve peoples intentions.

curi:
not familiar

Shadow Starshine:
Or abilities

Shadow Starshine:
and just stick to argumentation

curi:

We were talking about why you think people changing their mind was analogous to an updated spreadsheet

that is a gross misstatement of what i said, and it's like the 20th one today.

Shadow Starshine:
Okay mr precision

Shadow Starshine:
show me 1-19

Shadow Starshine:
I want them numbered

curi:
what's in it for me?

curi:
i'll bet $10,000 on whether i can do it.

Shadow Starshine:
You're the precise one

Shadow Starshine:
How would we figure out if you actually accomplished the goal

Shadow Starshine:
or whether any of your points count

TheRat:
We've reached meta levels I didn't think were possible 😦

curi:
are you actually interested if we got terms and a referee?

Shadow Starshine:
You'll give me $10,000 if you're wrong?

curi:
and you give me 10k if i'm right.

Shadow Starshine:
then quite possibly, though I'd wager $1000

Shadow Starshine:
since 10,000 is out of my wheelhouse

curi:
no i'm not making the effort for that amount of money.

Shadow Starshine:
well you can't say I'm not willing to call it

curi:
and if you don't have the money, i don't want to take 1k from you anyway

Shadow Starshine:
I have 1k

Shadow Starshine:
And I'll gladly take another

curi:
if 10k is out of your wheelhouse, losing 1k would be a big deal for you.

Shadow Starshine:
That's a stupid statement

JustinCEO:
can you just do fewer examples of imprecision for $1k?

TheRat:
You rich mofos

curi:
that'd be way easier tho

Shadow Starshine:
1k is not a big deal to me

Shadow Starshine:
and 10k is out of my wheelhouse

Shadow Starshine:
both those are true

TheRat:
1k would ruin me If I lost it

Shadow Starshine:
I have 8k in the bank, I barely use money

Shadow Starshine:
I literally can't pay 10k, but 1k wouldn't halt anything I do

Shadow Starshine:
so that statement was false

Perspective Philosophy:
if i had 1k id still be in debt

Shadow Starshine:
so your excuse of breaking the bank on me is false, and I stand by not backing down

Shadow Starshine:
but if 1k isn't worth your time, fine

Shadow Starshine:
you're still wrong about that hypothetical

curi:
how many misstatements of my views do you think you made?

curi:
do you remember when i pointed out several when you were ignoring me?

Shadow Starshine:
you're the one who said 20, don't ask me questions about it. And just because you think they occured doesn't mean they do

Shadow Starshine:
hence why we need a referee

Shadow Starshine:
Now, do you agree you're statement that if 10k is too much, that 1k would be a big deal to me?

Shadow Starshine:
are you able to concede that?

curi:
i don't think betting 12.5% of your savings is a reasonable amount

Shadow Starshine:
I didnt ask that

curi:
i don't agree with you

Shadow Starshine:
you said it was a big deal to me

Shadow Starshine:
I showed that it wasnt

Shadow Starshine:
Do you concede

curi:
i just told you i don't.

Shadow Starshine:
No, you said reasonable amount

Freeze:

I have 8k in the bank, I barely use money
I literally can't pay 10k, but 1k wouldn't halt anything I do
Does him barely using money change your perspective on the contextual validity of betting $1k on something he's confident in being right about to an objective referee?

Shadow Starshine:
But sure, if you're saying you don't agree and that it IS a big deal to me

curi:
you seem to doubt my claim re ~20 misstatements. so i have a question for you, "how many misstatements of my views do you think you made?"

Shadow Starshine:
can you prove that

Perspective Philosophy:
okay in think this is ridiculous that being said, please tell me what is reasonable in terms of gambling? What is a reasonable risk to take?

Perspective Philosophy:
@curi

TheRat:
I think this is a silly discussion but SS could easily not find losing 12% of his money a big deal, while curi also is right that 12% of your entire bank account can be considered a big deal.

Shadow Starshine:
That question is irrelevant to the conversation, you show that it's a big deal to me

curi:
google poker bankroll management

Shadow Starshine:
right now

Shadow Starshine:
it COULD be considered a big deal

Shadow Starshine:
but it isn't by me

Freeze:
https://www.cardschat.com/poker-bankroll-management.php

Perspective Philosophy:
@curi That doesnt give me a justification as to why that is a 'Reasonable' amount

Shadow Starshine:
Now he says it is

Shadow Starshine:
I want proof

curi:
you don't think poker knowledge constitutes any kind of argument re reasonable approach to this subject?

Shadow Starshine:
I don't care about "reasonableness", what I'm asking is whether I think it is a big deal

Shadow Starshine:
You said it is

Shadow Starshine:
Prove it

Shadow Starshine:
stop asking questions

Shadow Starshine:
make an argument

Shadow Starshine:
or concede

Shadow Starshine:
that you can't make that claim

Freeze:
curi:

if 10k is out of your wheelhouse, losing 1k would be a big deal for you.
I'm trying to figure out if this is a claim about how SS would feel or if it is an objective moral/financial claim

Freeze:
SS seems to have interpreted it as the former

Freeze:
But it might be the latter

JustinCEO:
its absolutely objective

Perspective Philosophy:
First this is not poker, so I dont care about that. Second, the risk to reward ratio is an aspect of rationality and so unless you can determine the risk to be without rational justification then it very possibly could be reasonable

curi:
yeah that's meant as a statement about reality, not about his opinions

Freeze:
Like me losing my arm would be an objectively big deal even if I felt 0 emotional distress or burden intellectually or something

JustinCEO:
totally crystal clear to me

JustinCEO:
no ambiguity

Freeze:
ok so that's where the misunderstanding is

Shadow Starshine:
Then qualify the statement about reality. In what way is it a big deal to me

Shadow Starshine:
In what way does it effect me

Shadow Starshine:
Or would in any way be problematic to my life

curi:
PP there is literature about how to bet well. idk why you're rejecting it out of hand. see also Kelley criterion.

Freeze:
but SS clarifying context that he isn't spending much money might change that objective claim. The same way having a trust that kicks in a year later with $10m in it would also change the context.

Perspective Philosophy:
the bet is determined by the game is it not? Id suggest reading Macintyres critque of rawlsian maximin reasoning or even nozicks

Shadow Starshine:
Give me a criteria of "big deal", and how you plan to prove it's the case

Freeze:
expenses and savings both go into objective financial claims right? if his expenses happen to be $200 a month and will be so for the next two years (For example) then maybe $1k from an $8k savings account could be objectively fine to risk

curi:
PP do you mean that if he thinks he is a 99% favorite in the game, that changes things? b/c the actual thing i claimed is losing would be a big deal.

Shadow Starshine:
I'm saying losing it is not a big deal

Freeze:
in objective reality

Freeze:
that is an interesting discussion to be had maybe

Shadow Starshine:
Just concede the statement

Perspective Philosophy:
that doesn't make his risk unreasonable. as losing isn't guaranteed . If losing was guaranteed then all risk would be unreasonable.

TheRat:
Well SS could say, I want to set 1000 on fire now, and its not a big deal to me.

curi:
i don't think you're understanding what i said, PP. have you reread my actual message?

Freeze:
so this isn't about the risk he's taking. It's just about:
Is SS losing $1,000 today a big deal or not (objectively)

Freeze:
SS says losing it is not a big deal

Freeze:
curi says it is

Shadow Starshine:
you notice how he doesn't bother showing how it is a big deal and just gets distracted by other shit?

Perspective Philosophy:
i don't think betting 12.5% of your savings is a reasonable amount

Perspective Philosophy:
"Reasonable"

curi:
PP that statement was made in context

TheRat:
well how would curi know what is a big deal to SS or not? Isn't that a claim on his qualia of losing that money?

Shadow Starshine:
@TheRat Hes not bothering to clarify

Freeze:
relevant context:
curi:

if 10k is out of your wheelhouse, losing 1k would be a big deal for you.
SS:
I have 8k in the bank, I barely use money
I literally can't pay 10k, but 1k wouldn't halt anything I do
so that statement was false

Perspective Philosophy:
Okay, so if we talk about it being a big deal. then weve created an unfalisable statement if it doesnt relate to rationality

curi:
the context was i wouldn't want to take his 1k b/c

losing 1k would be a big deal for you.

so my position doesn't depend on the game odds.

curi:
he denied this rather than claiming the odds were favorable enough

Perspective Philosophy:
either its about reason or about shadows evaluation. which is it?

curi:
what's "it" in your message?

curi:
first one

Perspective Philosophy:
it was referring to your position and the territory of this current discussion

curi:
my position is multi-part, so that's a false dichotomy

Perspective Philosophy:
excuse me im going to shoot myself

Freeze:
SS is saying objectively that losing $1k would not be a big deal based on his context in life, since he barely spends money, and losing $1k wouldn't halt anything he does. But maybe part of curi's argument is that not halting things in life is not the only or most relevant objective measure for financial decisions.

Shadow Starshine:
curi hasn't made an argument

Shadow Starshine:
If he doesn't make an argument now

curi:
ok if making logic errors results in you not wanting to converse further instead of wanting to learn (or reach a conclusion and potentially teach), then we shouldn't talk.

Shadow Starshine:
I'm taking it as a concession

TheRat:

if 10k is out of your wheelhouse, losing 1k would be a big deal for you.

Perspective Philosophy:
well its not objective, i could agree with that. Unless he means its objectively the case that he doesnt give a shit

Freeze:
im reading this poker bankroll thing

Freeze:
that seemed to be part of curi's argument

Freeze:
as relevant knowledge

Freeze:
but im realizing first off that you and curi have different views on objective morality/objective knowledge right?

Shadow Starshine:
right, so no argument

Perspective Philosophy:
It doesnt matter because I would like to think we could talk within a general language community?

curi:
argument for what, SS?

Shadow Starshine:
why it's a big deal

curi:
what doesn't matter PP?

Shadow Starshine:
Asked like 5 times now

Shadow Starshine:
he just avoids the question

curi:
google poker bankroll management, i told you already

Shadow Starshine:
I'm not googling shit, just type your argument

curi:
that was my argument

Shadow Starshine:
it's not an argument

curi:
i disagree

Shadow Starshine:
asking someone to google

TheRat:

if 10k is out of your wheelhouse, losing 1k would be a big deal for you.

That alone is not talking about poker bankroll or anything of the sort Freeze. Without context it is a claim on SS's experience of losing 1k. Which I don't think can be made objective, he may well not care at all about setting 1k aflame.

Shadow Starshine:
is not an argument

curi:
i guess we have a perspective gap on epistemology, as i said

Freeze:
PP, do you subscribe to the justified true belief conception of epistemology?

Shadow Starshine:
Write down your argument

Shadow Starshine:
in this chat

Freeze:
PP:

That doesnt give me a justification as to why that is a 'Reasonable' amount

curi:
i didn't make any statement about his mental experiences, rat.

TheRat:
That's true.

TheRat:
Big deal could mean many things

Shadow Starshine:
Your argument at this point couldn't have anything to do with how I think of it, because it would be false. It cant be about how it negatively impacts my life, because that would be false.

Shadow Starshine:
What do you have left?

Shadow Starshine:
Write it down

Freeze:
@TheRat I asked for clarification about that here Rat, curi explained it was objective. You interpreted it as subjective but didn't ask for clarification. I asked because I wasn't sure. J interpreted it as objective. https://ptb.discordapp.com/channels/304082867384745994/304082867384745994/658521491713032202

Freeze:
Edited assumed out of the above ^

TheRat:
I was talking about the quote alone, as I said, "without context"

curi:
rat's comment is fine IMO

Freeze:
i just wasn't sure how to interpret curi's statement. it seems like he could have meant it as objective or subjective

Shadow Starshine:
I'm taking his lack of typing what he meant for the last 10 minutes

Shadow Starshine:
to just be dishonesty

Perspective Philosophy:
wait so @curi Your position on "big deal" is an esoteric notion based on backroll management

Freeze:

That alone is not talking about poker bankroll or anything of the sort Freeze. Without context it is a claim on SS's experience of losing 1k. Which I don't think can be made objective, he may well not care at all about setting 1k aflame.
I think we agree that SS can feel no emotional distress or anguish from burning 1k and for that to still be objectively a bad thing for him/big deal to his financial situation

TheRat:
that's because you know curi, and J does. I am trying to take a perspective from someone who doesn't know curi and apply it. Without context includes that too Freeze.

JustinCEO:
that losing 1/8th of your small savings would be a big deal seems really common sensical to me, not remotely esoteric

Freeze:
the poker bankroll was a later link in response to PP asking how it can be objective

Shadow Starshine:
1/8th of a savings is not a big deal if it doesn't actually impact your life

Shadow Starshine:
I don't even use half of it

Freeze:
depends on context a bit right J. Like SS had context alongside saying he had $8k in bank, which is that he barely spends money

Freeze:
that is as relevant as the $8k number imo

JustinCEO:
ya but u can have an emergency man

curi:
i don't think bankroll management is esoteric re betting

Shadow Starshine:
Anyone can have an emergency of any amount, that's a vague statement

Shadow Starshine:
stop trying to defend this nonsense

Shadow Starshine:
he isn't giving any argument

Shadow Starshine:
nor clarifying

TheRat:
What are the odds this conversation would ever return to computation?

Perspective Philosophy:
either big deal is subjective or objective. If its objective then what does it relate to?

Freeze:
right, we'd need an explanation for why $8k is significantly better for you in your savings account than $7k. Why that difference is a big deal in objective reality.

Shadow Starshine:
He made a statement, can't back it up

Shadow Starshine:
and is wasting time

Shadow Starshine:
I take this as a concession

Freeze:
@TheRat is odds the right way to think about it? I think if people ask for it to be about computation now or later, it can return to computation quite easily

curi:
my objective evaluation of the bet sizing and loss impact relates to my understanding of bankroll management and bet sizing theory

curi:
i don't see what's difficult about this

Shadow Starshine:
so write it

Shadow Starshine:
dont tell me what it relates to

Shadow Starshine:
just write it down

curi:
i'm not writing a poker blog post for you in real time

curi:
if you want to learn you can read sources

Shadow Starshine:
you're full of shit

curi:
there's no point in me repeating it

curi:
you think i'm full of shit ... as in i'm bluffing about knowing anything about poker or having read this stuff b4?

Shadow Starshine:
I think you're full of shit of having an actual argument

curi:
you think these arguments don't exist at all?

Perspective Philosophy:
Okay so your evaluation was based on an esoteric notion from which would then need to be grounded and justified. You would then also have to say that shadows unacceptance of said understanding was unreasonable.

Shadow Starshine:
I think YOU don't have an ARGUMENT about the statement IT'S A BIG DEAL

curi:
i don't see what's esoteric about gambling knowledge in context of bet sizing

TheRat:
maybe we should start our own bet Freeze lol. Does this conversation return to computation (excluding you and me) on its own.

Freeze:
i think he wants an argument for how bankroll management relates to 1k being objectively a big deal for SS's situation

Shadow Starshine:
Stop asking me these stupid tangential questions

Freeze:
@TheRat i don't predict people

curi:
SS, you think i couldn't write comments on bet sizing without lookging them up first? is that what you mean?

TheRat:
I was joking.

Freeze:
ah

Shadow Starshine:
Why are you asking me that

TheRat:
❤️ u

curi:
it's hard to figure out what you're saying

Shadow Starshine:
do you think that's what I mean?

Shadow Starshine:
I literally wrote in caps what I mean

Shadow Starshine:
how can you not understand

curi:
i told you i have an arguemnt re bet sizing

curi:
i don't know in what sense you think i don't have it?

Shadow Starshine:
I don't think you have an argument to relate it to what you said to me

JustinCEO:
Shadow Starshine, were you discussing a bet before?

Shadow Starshine:
If you do, write it

curi:
you don't think i have any argument that could relate bet sizing and bankroll management theory to a particular example of a possible bet?

Shadow Starshine:
Stop asking me questions, write an argument

Shadow Starshine:
just write it

curi:
is that what you meant?

Shadow Starshine:
write your argument

curi:
if you won't clarify what you meant, i'm not going to answer you.

Shadow Starshine:
write the argument that shows 1k loss to me is a big deal

Perspective Philosophy:
well considering that your saying he'd be wrong in his understanding of what big deal means. You would be concluding that most individuals have a wrong understanding of value and that value is independent of the individuals evaluation of the value of money.

Backroll management would have to assume a unified value of money to each individual, then assume that all risk that goes beyond its limits would be unjustified based on this assumed theory of value.

Shadow Starshine:
that has been the question for the last 15 minutes

Shadow Starshine:
write that argument

Shadow Starshine:
you made a statement

Shadow Starshine:
back it up

curi:
PP, i take it you're not familiar with bankroll management literature or kelley criterion?

curi:
you're incorrectly characterizing what it says.

Perspective Philosophy:
I don't see how that is relevant to a term that is used within general language?

Perspective Philosophy:
You are using subject specific vocabulary.

curi:
there is literature explaining how to use math to evaluate these matters

curi:
my comment was referring to that kinda math, not to ppl's arbitrary opinions

Freeze:

Okay so your evaluation was based on an esoteric notion from which would then need to be grounded and justified. You would then also have to say that shadows unacceptance of said understanding was unreasonable.
@Perspective Philosophy I disagree with grounding/justification

Freeze:
foundational epistemology differences here

Shadow Starshine:
define "big deal", use a definition that would be generally acceptable by people, then show me how a 1k loss meets that definition

Shadow Starshine:
This isn't hard

Perspective Philosophy:
are you guys trolling

TheRat:
No.

Freeze:
You've mentioned justification twice PP

Freeze:
I asked you about that here: https://ptb.discordapp.com/channels/304082867384745994/304082867384745994/658524369579933726

Perspective Philosophy:
Then why do you think there is a problem with epistemology here @Freeze

curi:
i'm not trolling and don't get how knowing some math is what gets you to accuse me

Shadow Starshine:
more dishonest framing

Freeze:
Because justification is a chimera. knowledge does not need to be justified, is not grounded, and grows through conjecture and criticism

Perspective Philosophy:
I would argue that truth is justified true belief that also doesnt contain any relevant falsehood

Freeze:
ok

Freeze:
that's an important discussion to have

Freeze:
and is why I asked you if that's what you believe

curi:
PP, that position disagrees with Critical Rationalism. have you heard of it?

Freeze:
do you know that critical rationalism has arguments against that belief?

curi:
this is a CR group FYI.

Shadow Starshine:
It's quite clear im never getting an argument

Shadow Starshine:
which is the only way this discussion would really progress

Perspective Philosophy:
but wait if we dont we require justification, then why do we need critque

Perspective Philosophy:
?

TheRat:
I don't think the argument hinges on his epistemology though. Not directly. The phrasing "justified" I think in this case PP meant unargued, unexplained. Which is fine.

curi:
have you heard of Karl Popper?

Perspective Philosophy:
I have

curi:
are you familiar with his criticism of JTB?

Perspective Philosophy:
yes if you mean his position on JTB not requiring absolute certitude

curi:
that is not his position.

curi:
where did you get that?

Perspective Philosophy:
one sec ill link a source

Perspective Philosophy:
okay, so this is taken from SEP on Popper

Perspective Philosophy:
If such conclusions are shown to be true, the theory is corroborated (but never verified). If the conclusion is shown to be false, then this is taken as a signal that the theory cannot be completely correct (logically the theory is falsified), and the scientist begins his quest for a better theory.

This is his fourth step on the growth of human knowledge. You'll see it clearly says that a statement is NEVER verified. That is because he argued absolute verification was impossible and that the scientific modal relies upon falsification to determine truth. The statement that incurs the least falsehood is closer to the truth than the statement which incurs more.

TheRat:
So verificationism is a form of justificationism but this is not his refutation of justificationism

curi:
the issue isn't whether Popper denied verification.

Perspective Philosophy:
he doesnt refute justification

Perspective Philosophy:
he refutes the need for verification

curi:

his position on JTB not requiring absolute certitude

what you wrote here implies that Popper thinks JTB is possible to acquire. he does not.

Perspective Philosophy:
He does argue that we are justified in our beliefs but that our justification is based on the removal of relevent falsehood. That is why i said earlier I would argue that truth is justified true belief that also doesnt contain any relevant falsehood

Freeze:

He does argue that we are justified in our beliefs but that our justification is based on the removal of relevent falsehood.

Freeze:
Is this based on that statement from SEP above?

curi:

Like many other philosophers I am at times inclined to classify philosophers as belonging to two main groups—those with whom I disagree, and those who agree with me. I might call them the verificationists or the justificationist philosophers of knowledge or of belief, and the falsificationists or fallibilists or critical philosophers of conjectural knowledge. I may mention in passing a third group with whom I also disagree. They may be called the disappointed justificationists—the irrationalists and sceptics.
The members of the first group—the verificationists or justificationists—hold, roughly speaking, that whatever cannot be supported by positive reasons is unworthy of being believed, or even of being taken into serious consideration.

curi:
have you read any Popper?

curi:
that's C&R

curi:

1 With Hume, knowledge is a kind of justified true belief. This whole approach clashes with mine.

RASc

Perspective Philosophy:
I have read popper and the problem was in language

curi:
which Popper have you read?

curi:

1. Humanism, Science, and the Inductive Prejudice.

There is no probabilistic induction. Human experience, in ordinary life as well as in science, is acquired by fundamentally the same procedure: the free, unjustified, and unjustifiable invention of hypotheses or anticipations or expectations, and their subsequent testing. These tests cannot make the hypothesis ‘probable’.

RASc

curi:

That we cannot give a justification-or sufficient reasons- for our guesses does not mean that we may not have guessed the truth; some of our hypotheses may well be true.[31]

OK

Perspective Philosophy:
falisifcationists also believe in JTB. On the otherhand if you understand justificationist to be synonymous with verificationist then the problem is with those terms

curi:
you're just asserting, – about the beliefs of my school of thought – while i'm giving quotes of Popper?

TheRat:
No, Like I said it is a form of, not a synonym. (re verificationism)

Perspective Philosophy:
1 sec

Perspective Philosophy:
That we cannot give a justification-or sufficient reasons- for our guesses does not mean that we may not have guessed the truth; some of our hypotheses may well be true.[31] That's not knowledge though. his point is that our statements can be true without our knowing why.

an example would be in saying without looking. It is raining outside and it is. The statement is true but it would not be classed as knowledge because it doesn't meet the epistemological criterion. once we investigate the statement and determine its truth value then it becomes knowledge.

There is no probabilistic induction. Human experience, in ordinary life as well as in science, is acquired by fundamentally the same procedure: the free, unjustified, and unjustifiable invention of hypotheses or anticipations or expectations, and their subsequent testing. These tests cannot make the hypothesis ‘probable’.

He is rejecting induction not JTB.

he goes on to say
They can only corroborate it--and this only because 'degree of corroboration' is just a label attached to a report, or an appraisal of the severity of tested passed by the hypothesis.....for there is considerable intuitive force in the assertation that the probability of a law increases with the number of its observed instances. I have attempted to explain this intuitive force but pointing out that the probability and free of corroboration have no been properly distinguished.

Perspective Philosophy:
To prove my point that he does believe in truth and knowledge here is quote from sep. What you will notice is that he doesn't believe in certitude but does accept truth as being any statement which avoids relevant falsehood and describes reality.

Popper was initially uneasy with the concept of truth, and in his earliest writings he avoided asserting that a theory which is corroborated is true—for clearly if every theory is an open-ended hypothesis, as he maintains, then ipso facto it has to be at least potentially false. For this reason Popper restricted himself to the contention that a theory which is falsified is false and is known to be such, and that a theory which replaces a falsified theory (because it has a higher empirical content than the latter, and explains what has falsified it) is a ‘better theory’ than its predecessor. However, he came to accept Tarski’s reformulation of the correspondence theory of truth, and in Conjectures and Refutations (1963) he integrated the concepts of truth and content to frame the metalogical concept of ‘truthlikeness’ or ‘verisimilitude’. A ‘good’ scientific theory, Popper thus argued, has a higher level of verisimilitude than its rivals, and he explicated this concept by reference to the logical consequences of theories. A theory’s content is the totality of its logical consequences, which can be divided into two classes: there is the ‘truth-content’ of a theory, which is the class of true propositions which may be derived from it, on the one hand, and the ‘falsity-content’ of a theory, on the other hand, which is the class of the theory’s false consequences (this latter class may of course be empty, and in the case of a theory which is true is necessarily empty).

Perspective Philosophy:
Popper offered two methods of comparing theories in terms of verisimilitude, the qualitative and quantitative definitions. On the qualitative account, Popper asserted:

``Assuming that the truth-content and the falsity-content of two theories t1 and t2 are comparable, we can say that t2 is more closely similar to the truth, or corresponds better to the facts, than t1, if and only if either:

(a) the truth-content but not the falsity-content of t2 exceeds that of t1, or

(b) the falsity-content of t1, but not its truth-content, exceeds that of t2. (Conjectures and Refutations, 233).``

curi:

He is rejecting induction not JTB.

when he says unjustified he's rejecting the J in JTB.

Human experience, in ordinary life as well as in science, is acquired by fundamentally the same procedure: the free, unjustified, and unjustifiable invention of hypotheses or anticipations or expectations, and their subsequent testing.

Perspective Philosophy:
Only if as i suggested you take Justified to mean Verified.

curi:

To prove my point that he does believe in truth and knowledge

you're getting way off topic. i said Popper rejects JTB. yes he believes in truth and conjectural knowledge.

curi:
he literally said our knowledge is "unjustified, and unjustifiable" and you think it's compatible with "justified" b/c of something about verification? what?

Perspective Philosophy:
he's arguing that when we obtain our knowledge through induction its unjustifiable.

curi:
no, he thinks all knowledge is unjustifiable

Perspective Philosophy:
hed argue verification is not justifiable methodology as it also relies upon induction as the acceptance of the immediate experience as being fundamentally true.

curi:

on my view, all views—good and bad—are in this important sense baseless, unfounded, unjustified, unsupported.)

RASc

Freeze:

Human experience, in ordinary life as well as in science, is acquired by fundamentally the same procedure: the free, unjustified, and unjustifiable invention of hypotheses or anticipations or expectations, and their subsequent testing.

curi:

In so far as my approach involves all this, my solution of the central problem of justification—as it has always been understood—is as unambiguously negative as that of any irrationalist or sceptic.

RASc

Freeze:
he's talking about the fundamental growth of knowledge

curi:
have you read Popper on episteme and doxa?

curi:
in WoP

TheRat:
Actually Popper thought induction to be impossible so I don't think that's quite the right interpretation. Indeed he is talking knowledge there. @pp

curi:

Yet I differ from both the sceptic and the irrationalist in offering an unambiguously affirmative solution of another, third, problem which, though similar to the problem of whether or not we can give valid positive reasons for holding a theory to be true, must be sharply distinguished from it. This third problem is the problem of whether one theory is preferable to another—and, if so, why. (I am speaking of a theory’s being preferable in the sense that we think or conjecture that it is a closer approximation to the truth, and that we even have reasons to think or to conjecture that it is so.)
My answer to this question is unambiguously affirmative. We can often give reasons for regarding one theory as preferable to another. They consist in pointing out that, and how, one theory has hitherto withstood criticism better than another. I will call such reasons critical reasons, in order to distinguish them from those positive reasons which are offered with the intention of justifying a theory, or, in other words, of justifying the belief in its truth.
Critical reasons do not justify a theory, for the fact that one theory has so far withstood criticism better than another is no reason whatever for supposing that it is actually true. But although critical reasons can never justify a theory, they can be used to defend (but not to justify) our preference for it: that is, our deciding to use it, rather than some, or all, of the other theories so far proposed. Such critical reasons do not of course prove that our preference is more than conjectural: we ought to give up our preference should new critical reasons speak against it, or should a promising new theory be proposed, demanding a renewal of the critical discussion.

RASc

curi:

Giving reasons for one’s preferences can of course be called a justification (in ordinary language). But it is not a justification in the sense criticized here. Our preferences are ‘justified’ only relative to the present state of our discussion.
Postponing until later the important question of the standards of preference for theories, I will now give Bartley’s view of the new problem situation which has arisen. He describes the situation very strikingly by saying that, after having given a negative solution to the classical problem of justification, I have replaced it by the new problem of criticism, a problem for which I offer an affirmative solution.
This transition from the problem of justification to the problem of criticism, Bartley suggests, is fundamental; and it gives rise to misunderstandings because almost everybody takes it implicitly for granted that everybody else (I included) accepts the problem of justification as the central problem of the theory of knowledge.
For according to Bartley all philosophies so far have been justificationist philosophies, in the sense that all assumed that it was the prima facie task of the theory of knowledge to show that, and how, we can justify our theories or beliefs.

RASc

curi:
he goes on and on

curi:

Bartley observes that my approach has usually been mistaken for some form of justificationism, though in fact it is totally different from it.

curi:
you can argue Popper was wrong but you're factually mistaken about what his views are, what positions he takes, what he thinks from his perspective

Perspective Philosophy:
@TheRat The full quote explains how he rejects the new theories of induction released everyday. what he's saying is that this theory of knowledge is inadequate.

@curi It is worth noting that early popper rejected truth whilst late popper did not and accepted the correspondence theory of truth

curi:
that is inaccurate. i don't know why you're still trying to lecture me on what Popper said.

curi:

  Language analysts regard themselves as practitioners of a method peculiar to philosophy. I think they are wrong, for I believe in the following thesis.

  Philosophers are as free as others to use any method in searching for truth. There is no method peculiar to philosophy.

LScD

curi:

  *1Not long after this was written, I had the good fortune to meet Alfred Tarski who explained to me the fundamental ideas of his theory of truth. It is a great pity that this theory—one of the two great discoveries in the field of logic made since Principia Mathematica—is still often misunderstood and misrepresented. It cannot be too strongly emphasized that Tarski's idea of truth (for whose definition with respect to formalized languages Tarski gave a method) is the same idea which Aristotle had in mind and indeed most people (except pragmatists): the idea that truth is correspondence with the facts (or with reality). But what can we possibly mean if we say of a statement that it corresponds with the facts (or with reality)? Once we realize that this correspondence cannot be one of structural similarity, the task of elucidating this correspondence seems hopeless; and as a consequence, we may become suspicious of the concept of truth, and prefer not to use it. Tarski solved (with respect to formalized languages) this apparently hopeless problem by making use of a semantic metalanguage, reducing the idea of correspondence to that of 'satisfaction' or 'fulfilment'.

  As a result of Tarski's teaching, I no longer hesitate to speak of 'truth' and 'falsity'. And like everybody else's views (unless he is a pragmatist), my views turned out, as a matter of course, to be consistent with Tarski's theory of absolute truth. Thus although my views on formal logic and its philosophy were revolutionized by Tarski's theory, my views on science and its philosophy were fundamentally unaffected, although clarified.

LScD

curi:
note LScD is early Popper

Perspective Philosophy:
Giving reasons for one’s preferences can of course be called a justification (in ordinary language). But it is not a justification in the sense criticized here

I said this point. What I said is that if we take Justification to mean verification then popper rejects it.

popper does not on the other hand reject JTB once qualified for Gettier to not contain relevant falsehood, hence he accepts truth, just not absolute certitude.

If we take a justified true belief to be mean (b) the falsity-content of t1, but not its truth-content, exceeds that of t2.

Then we only had a semantic issue.

Unless you're arguing he rejects knowledge.

Perspective Philosophy:
Anyway guys im done for tonight its 6am. perhaps we can clarify things further another time.

curi:
Popper accepts conjectural knowledge which is a different thing than JTB

curi:
the things you're saying are typical of the secondary sources which misrepresent Popper

curi:
Popper himself wrote lengthy replies to some of these myths

curi:
such as, repeating:

my approach has usually been mistaken for some form of justificationism, though in fact it is totally different from it.

which you did not respond to, nor the many other statements like it, including explanations of the differences

curi:
you also never said what you'd read nor answered the specific question re relevant parts of WoP

curi:
since you seem far less familiar with Popper, and to be an opponent, why not believe me about what I, a more familiar advocate, tell you CR says?

Vox Dialectica:
Lol

Vox Dialectica:
Nice posturing

curi:
we could be discussing whether the CR view is correct instead of him debating what it actually is

Freeze:
I need to find a replacement for quotation marks

Freeze:
for hypothetical scenarios where we want to represent hypothetical speech

Freeze:
ill use >> for now

jordancurve:
I use asterisks. John said I want lunch and James said I want to play Chess.

curi:
jkl

Freeze:
oh yeah this could work

Freeze:
this could work although people use italics for emphasis too

JustinCEO:
https://discordapp.com/channels/304082867384745994/304082867384745994/658372850515836940

I think @Kate wants to claim that she's only having problems interacting with @curi. I am one example of another person who has problems interacting with @Kate. Kate's dishonesty is to the point that I don't wanna engage with her anymore

TheRat:
What happened J?

JustinCEO:
?

TheRat:
You said you had problems interacting with Kate. What were those problems?

JustinCEO:
Big picture there is a years long pattern of evasion which never gets resolved. This makes discussions difficult to have and also seem pointless.

JustinCEO:
See "Evadin' Kate" series on FI for various examples

JustinCEO:
I compiled many

JustinCEO:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/8228kqdt0vtn5uo/fmapp%252Fprint.pdf?dl=0

JustinCEO:
Perma link to post would be better but busy atm

JustinCEO:
and on phone

JustinCEO:
Kate basically won't actually concede having ongoing moral problems that are live issues right now and causing problems.
She'll concede stuff in the past tense or as theoretical possibilities

Also , I do reserve the right to challenge anyone criticizing me about a particular example of irrationality. You are irrational, too, as well as fallible. I'm not going to concede irrationality unless I see it for myself. And you shouldn't want me to.

I have problems I'll actually concede right now. But with Kate, for every claim she's doing something wrong and it's causing problems, she wants a full trial each time, without explaining how the past problems were resolved and with no evidence of bad past character admissible

TheRat:
Hmm. Hard to gather anything from that post other than assertions that she has a pattern of evasions. Her attempts at introspection you deemed insufficient. I see for example she said that reliving the mistakes is not helping her figure out what to do next but it is making her upset. Which is fine, rumination is not a good thing, no Psychologist would recommend that type of introspection.

Is the problem with you J that she didn't agree to your way of introspection?

JustinCEO:
TheRat

JustinCEO:
Look up Evadin Kate series

JustinCEO:
If you want more details

JustinCEO:
The post has that series as background and explicitly mentions it

JustinCEO:
It's unfair of you to characterize something as doing mere assertions when u haven't read relevant background material

TheRat:
I said based on that link

JustinCEO:
You're taking a position on whether it's assertions based on insufficient knowledge. You should be more neutral if you haven't read enough yet rather than coming to jumping-the-gun judgments

JustinCEO:
Based on a link to Chinese language material I could say it just looks like a bunch of meaningless characters to me cuz I can't read Chinese. I don't think that'd be a very interesting or useful statement in general

TheRat:
Its fine to make assessments within bounded scenarios. As long as you don't take it outside the bounded scenario

TheRat:
I am now curious on what you find a sufficient introspection

TheRat:
not necessarily tied to Kate

TheRat:
but like in general

TheRat:
what is your criteria for sufficient introspection about mistakes

JustinCEO:

A suggestion: try writing 10k words of introspection on the topic of your PATTERN OF EVASION. Connect what you write to the details of concrete examples of this PATTERN OF EVASION. If you manage to do that successfully, maybe you could say that you’ve begun to start to address the PATTERN OF EVASION issue meaningfully.

JustinCEO:
That would be a start

JustinCEO:
And yes, I've written 10k words of introspection about a mistake

TheRat:

Based on a link to Chinese language material I could say it just looks like a bunch of meaningless characters to me cuz I can't read Chinese. I don't think that'd be a very interesting or useful statement in general

TheRat:
Not a fair comparsion I don't think. I asked about your problems with Kate and you linked that which presumably you thought would answer my question.

TheRat:
So its not like a bunch of meaningless symbols

JustinCEO:
I linked it to give some brief indication of some issues, not as a self-contained and complete summary you'd find persuasive with zero follow up

TheRat:
Is the introspection qualification the number of words? Probably not right I assume.

JustinCEO:
Number of words can give some indication that meaningful effort was made

TheRat:
is it like necessary but not sufficient? minimum 10K words of introspection? Is that for patterns of mistakes, I doubt you mean for mistakes made 1st time?

TheRat:
Yes that definitely shows effort.

JustinCEO:
It's hard to solve a serious issue in way less than 10k words of some kind of discussion (whether introspective self discussion or with another person)

JustinCEO:
I don't think 10k number is super significant but it's an okay ballpark figure for some purposes

TheRat:
What else do you need besides # of words? Or do you have an example of acceptable introspection to you that I can learn from?

JustinCEO:
Being willing to go back and explain why you wrote each word you did in part of some conversation that failed to make progress can be another good indicator of decent introspection. Like willingness to explain each "heh" or "lol" instead of treating your mind as a black box that just outputs random words with no explanation possible

JustinCEO:
That is a common issue that comes up which is why I mention it

JustinCEO:
People have an attitude of not wanting to take anything too seriously, including their own words, "jokes" etc

JustinCEO:
I have had that specific issue

JustinCEO:
Just so you don't think I'm up on mount Olympus pronouncing judgment on the mortals or something

JustinCEO:
http://curi.us/2095-youre-a-complex-software-project-introspection-is-auditing

TheRat:
Ty J. I am at work for the next 10 hours so I'll be off and on.

Shadow Starshine:
@JustinCEO Looking at the snippet there, what do you think consciousness is?

Shadow Starshine:
wait n/m curi wrote that

JustinCEO:
http://curi.us/2194-discussion-policy-quotes-or-youre-presumed-wrong

Shadow Starshine:
This "presumed wrong" is problematic. It reminds me of Ask Yourself trying to force every discussion into syllogisms and if you don't, then you're the unreasonable one.

Shadow Starshine:
These sorts of things are discussion tools, they shouldn't be used as barriers

Shadow Starshine:
If someone paraphrases me, and that paraphrasing seems correct, I'm not going to ask for a quote

Shadow Starshine:
Only if there was an actual dispute, if someone says I said something that I don't think I did, would I ask for a quote

Shadow Starshine:
I may also add, that being able to successfully paraphrase someone marks a level of progress

Shadow Starshine:
It shows that you've entered the way they see things

JustinCEO:
If you can't quote accurately you won't paraphrase accurately

Shadow Starshine:
I both disagree with that necessary relationship nor see its connection to what I wrote

JustinCEO:
Expecting otherwise is like expecting to do translation between two languages, one of which you're struggling in

JustinCEO:
I can't debate at length right now btw

Shadow Starshine:
np

Shadow Starshine:
That translation to me is a necessary part of the process. It's why I spend so much time just asking what people mean by certain words/phrases

Shadow Starshine:
Then I will try and repeat it back in my own way until common ground is formed

AnneB:
I find that quoting accurately helps me be correct more often. It forces me to go back and see what the person actually said, which is, more often than I like, not what I thought they said.

Shadow Starshine:
Sure, but don't take what I said as "quoting is bad"

Shadow Starshine:
I made a specific criticism

AnneB:

I may also add, that being able to successfully paraphrase someone marks a level of progress
I agree with this. I can't always do this and I'd like to be able to.

Shadow Starshine:
Well I think failing to do so is part of the process. Things like "So what I think you're saying is... X", and if they go "not quite" or "not at all", it sorta tells you how close you're getting

AnneB:
yeah

TheRat:
That seems pretty good to me too. Trying to reach understanding vs proving someone wrong or incapable.

curi:
what is "that"?

TheRat:

Well I think failing to do so is part of the process. Things like "So what I think you're saying is... X", and if they go "not quite" or "not at all", it sorta tells you how close you're getting

curi:
he got quite mad at me for me telling him how close he was getting

curi:
that isn't an honest statement about how he approaches discussion

curi:
he wouldn't accept direct feedback from me about how close he was

curi:
he'd challenge me about it

curi:
quite early in the discussion i tried to bring up that issue about how far apart we were in communication and understanding, and he spent hours resisting it, refusing to engage with the concept, and flaming me

TheRat:
What would you have done differently on your end? Do you think you made any missteps? Could there have been ways to rephrase things that maintained a mutual desire to understand each other?

curi:
that's a general comment, not specifically related to my messages today?

TheRat:
Not a comment. A question, do you think there were any misteps that made it worse or do you think the conversation was doomed no matter how you approached?

curi:
you didn't answer my question

TheRat:
I don't remember your messages today tbh curi. Probably a mistake to engage while at work as I am too distracted. I was just talking about the conversation yesterday specifically there.

curi:
i'm referring to messages from within the last 15 minutes

curi:
i said 6 things to you just now and then you asked questions, and i was trying to clarify if the questions related to those messages or not

curi:
i take it not related

TheRat:
Related only insofar that we were talking about SS's methodology but not directly related. Was a seperate question from today's messages.

curi:
ok

curi:
there could have been a solution leading to SS learning about my ideas but i don't know one, it's very hard.

curi:
it doesn't violate a law of physics though. words like "could" are very strong. idk if you really meant it. ppl use them a lot when they shouldn't.

TheRat:
I was thinking in terms of the way things were phrased specifically. Like some of the recommendations I gave. Do you think a less confrontational, with more doors open approach might have been better? Like the example I gave about computation. It went something ~ Here is a link to a book that talks about computation in a way that I endorse, but I think our perspective gap is deeper than computation and might hinder progress~ Would that not have been a better approach? if not why not?

curi:
i told you i don't have a book link to solve that problem

TheRat:
for reference this is what you wrote,

there are large communication failures here. i regard you as adding a bunch of context to my statements, e.g. i wasn't specifically talking about brains when i mentioned electrons.

i regard you as inadequately literal and precise about what you say, so you end up making claims that aren't really what you meant. and more broadly i think you don't have the background knowledge to discuss this effectively.

TheRat:
I seperated into 2 parts in that quote

TheRat:
I think the first part seems fine. The second part starting at "i regard" is what I mean could be phrased better.

curi:
what is confrontational about sharing information about my perspective?

TheRat:
give me a few, got a customer.

TheRat:
When you put it that way... but I think examples might be useful here. Perhaps instead of saying, I find you inadequately literal, you can show where he misread or misrepresented you. And how that imprecision is hindering progress. A good time to request copy paste quotes. (or a moratorium until his copy paste feature returns).

I guess just asserting that he is not precise is not quite as helpful as showing why he is not adequately precise.

Have you had more success with explanations vs assertions?

curi:

you can show where he misread or misrepresented you.

i did give an example of that.

throughout the discussion, i wasn't able to give an example of that which he accepted. he didn't want to understand one.

curi:
even though he even misquoted repeatedly and said literally before one of them

curi:
he basically thinks i'm pedantic ... which is more or less agreement that he isn't discussing at the same level of detail as i am ... but he won't consider it that way

curi:

(or a moratorium until his copy paste feature returns).

i offered him a venue switch which he didn't take. no excuses for tech issues. his responsibility for what he says.

TheRat:
Yes but I meant as a first offering. Not once the conversation got derailed and he was potentially tilted.

curi:

{Attachments}
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/304082867384745994/658805276862054572/unknown.png

curi:

Yes but I meant as a first offering.

curi:
that is not responsive

curi:

Have you had more success with explanations vs assertions?

he was understanding little of what i said, so writing something complicated wouldn't make sense.

TheRat:
Yes I agree you did explain later. But I am not sure that beginning with an explanation is necessarily more complicated than beginning with an assertion. I don't have a quote in mind atm but for example personally I've had more success when you said You're being sloppy in your answer because I didn't ask you that, I asked you this Instead of when you just asserted you're being sloppy

I feel like that leaves the door open to further understanding. I think an assertion seems more of a door getting shut, even if you do not intend it that way.

curi:

Yes I agree you did explain later.

you aren't agreeing

curi:

i regard you as adding a bunch of context to my statements, e.g. i wasn't specifically talking about brains when i mentioned electrons.

that's an example

TheRat:
Yes that's true, that was an example. Although, when you brought up electrons I remember it was fairly vague, like electrons move quickly. You were talking information processing speed in regards to computation, but is the brain assumption (connecting electrons to biochemical reactions) doesn't strike me as a conversation halter. It is quite a complicated subject.

curi:
You’re objecting to the example cuz it doesn’t demonstrate everything alone? That is a goalpost move.

TheRat:
Yes I think so.

curi:
Ok. Do you agree goalpost moves are bad? Unclear if/what you’re conceding.

TheRat:
Yes the example is insufficient for what I had in mind in regards to furthering civil discussions.

TheRat:
I am not sure what it means to move goalposts in this scenario. I am trying to figure out if there was a better way to have approached that conversation. The way it was approached clearly didn't work.

TheRat:
Btw It is unclear whether you think you approached the conversation perfectly or if you made any missteps. By missteps I mean in regards of trying to keep the conversation going in a civil manner.

curi:

Btw It is unclear whether you think you approached the conversation perfectly or if you made any missteps.

that's a false dichotomy

curi:
the thing you asked for originally was an example of my claim. i provided it. you then changed the ask (goalpost move) to something non-standard: an example that would, alone, convince someone of the claim (that i got to via multiple examples not one big one).

TheRat:
Actually, sorry you did answer.

there could have been a solution leading to SS learning about my ideas but i don't know one, it's very hard.

You don't think you made any missteps. So you think the conversation going badly was entirely on SS?

curi:
that's a bit ambiguous (relies on cultural default criteria for what reaches the level of a misstep, which takes a lot more than mere imperfection) but i think the answer is yes.

curi:
this conversation is itself a pretty typical example of an inferential distance problem. it has some of the features of the SS conversation. TheRat's comments appear to me to lack certain background knowledge i'm using, re issues like logic and language, which makes it hard to discuss. (i don't think dropping words like "you" makes things better. but the sentence starting with TheRat is an example of what it looks like. it could also be done using quotes without actually naming the author of the quotes in a context like this where the source of the quote is adequately implied.)

JustinCEO:

[10:43 AM] JustinCEO: I linked it to give some brief indication of some issues, not as a self-contained and complete summary you'd find persuasive with zero follow up

JustinCEO:

10:30 AM] JustinCEO: It's unfair of you to characterize something as doing mere assertions when u haven't read relevant background material

curi:
also i think there were some no-fault errors/problems. your question could be taken as asking if of the problems that were someone's fault, all were SS's. or of all problems. i think the first is the more typical meaning and is what i can say yes to.

TheRat:
Ok I see.

AnneB:
TheRat and curi may not agree on what the problems with the conversation were.

curi:
unclear which thing(s) you see.

TheRat:
Yes. Though I am far more fuzzy about it than he is. Like I am still not convinced that we had to go meta so soon. I have not considered the conversation as much once it did go meta. As to me at that point was a lost cause.

AnneB:
My point is that before discussing who could have done something different to make the conversation go better, you should discuss what criteria you're using to decide whether the conversation went well.

TheRat:

unclear which thing(s) you see.

I think I see your view better and how my framing was a false dichotomy, (either curi fault, or ss fault) But there were faultless problems (I don't know which ones yet) but according to curi, out of the problems that could be someone's fault, they were all SS's fault.

curi:
of the at-fault problems at the level of a misstep (rather than mere imperfection), all SS's

TheRat:

My point is that before discussing who could have done something different to make the conversation go better, you should discuss what criteria you're using to decide whether the conversation went well.
I don't think anyone would say the conversation went well. I've been just assuming it did not go well. I doubt ss or curi would say it went well.

AnneB:
People might have different reasons for saying it didn't go well, even if they agree that it didn't go well.

curi:
it went well for the purpose of clarifying what kind of person SS is and that he doesn't want to think and both can't and won't logic. roughly like that. i could have made that judgment beforehand but i mostly don't think others could have, and it had the productive purpose of double checking my judgment.

curi:
and it had the productive purpose of giving SS several opportunities for learning and a better life, of several different types

curi:
it also had the secondary purpose of providing an example for discussion with people like TheRat who are (irrationally, afaict) unwilling to have discussions about pre-existing archived examples instead.

TheRat:
I am not convinced that this was a revelation that SS can't or won't do logic.

TheRat:
There's a lot of missing background knowledge

curi:
which aspect of the dozens of logical errors did you find unconvincing?

curi:
(logic broadly. there isn't really a proper name for it. i'm including precision, reading and literalness stuff, including e.g. misquotes)

TheRat:
I considered the conversation bust once it went meta. I don't find convincing to judge people once they've tilted. Well do you consider his misuse of quotes a logical error? or a methodological hinderance to discussions.

TheRat:
oh

curi:
there's a skillset people need to read things, think about them logically, figure out what they mean, etc. it should be automated and habitual to the point it holds up to a large extent while tilted.

curi:
similar to how if you're adequately good at it, it also holds up when very tired or distracted

TheRat:
Why?

curi:
you can also see in his behavior a sort of prioritization of tilt and emotion over logic (at least if you think he had the skill to do better if not tilted), a value choice about what to put first.

curi:
basically no one can do level 90 of this skill reliably without automating level 30. roughly like you can't reliably run an obstacle course if you aren't able to walk automatically enough to walk while angry.

curi:
or like how everyone good at calculus can do basic arithmetic correctly in a really automatic way, even if tired or tilted

TheRat:
I don't have a good answer to that.

curi:
also ppl don't develop these kinda skills really far without better self-awareness about sources of error such as tilt and other emotions

curi:
if you go through a process of learning to think and converse rationally, and develop those skills, you run into your emotional problems some (if you have big ones) and you do something to manage them at least to a moderate extent.

curi:
like how all pro overwatch players manage their tilt some, not ~zero.

TheRat:
You mentioned you developed these skills by losing debates to DD for years. So did you catch yourself getting angry and did what, tell yourself to calm down, or what method specifially? Or did you never get emotional during debates.

curi:
i had a lot of these skills before that

curi:
i didn't get angry about this kind of thing

curi:
i played chess calmly from age 4 or 5

TheRat:
So it just came naturally to you to be call since age 4

TheRat:
calmI

TheRat:
calm*

curi:
not about everything, not perfectly, but about logical correctness type stuff and being wrong about ~clearly objective issues, yeah

TheRat:
It came naturally to you so you don't have a clear methodology then right?

TheRat:
(to hone a skill that came to you already)

curi:
i have lots of relevant writing and methodology

TheRat:
But these are based on what you think it would take though right? You haven't experienced this yourself. Are there success cases of people who have followed your methodology?

curi:
i have experienced emotions. i think you're getting the wrong idea just cuz i said stuff like not getting mad about specific categories of things like making the wrong chess move or a scientific fact.

TheRat:
I didn't mean to imply you don't feel emotions. I meant you have not had to hone the skill you mentioned, re not tilting and staying logical and not feeling emotional during debates.

TheRat:
You were already there at 4

curi:
i broadly don't think there are different methods for dealing with that than other emotions

curi:
http://fallibleideas.com/emotions

TheRat:
Can I assume there are no success cases following your methodology?

curi:
No

curi:
I think you’re wrong to focus on emotions. You can walk and do single digit multiplications even when super emo rit?

TheRat:
The methodology,

First, be calm. Take your time, there isn't as much rush or pressure as it feels like. Emotional reactions are often immediate. Instead, act thoughtfully and slowly; think things through; don't react until you're ready.

Second, be self-aware. Pay attention to, and keep track of, what you do and think and feel, and compare it to your values and how you want to be. Whenever it doesn't match, then think about what would match and at least form a quick guess at how to do better next time. Replay conversations and events in your head and look for things you could have done better, and things you wish you hadn't done. Look for emotions you felt, and any problems they caused. You can also look for emotions you didn't feel but would have liked to. Don't worry too much about changing; just notice everything, pay attention, and form some ideas about what'd be better and guesses at how to do it, and try imagining yourself acting in the new way.

With practice you'll learn to notice things faster. Instead of hours later while reflecting, you'll notice minutes later. You'll have ideas what to do better, and spot things you wish you didn't do or feel. Then with more skill, you'll start to notice in seconds.

If you can notice within seconds, and you act and feel slowly, you'll be able to notice before you've done or felt anything. Then you can do something else! Now you have better control over your life.

TheRat:

I think you’re wrong to focus on emotions.
Why?
You can walk and do single digit multiplications even when super emo rit?
I think so.

curi:
That’s why. There is a skills issue

curi:
He made logic errors while calm too anyway. As have you.

TheRat:
Yes.

Why should we consider skills such as doing addition the same as having emotional control?

curi:
It’s not. It shows high quality skills hold up anyway. Aren’t ruined by emotion.

TheRat:
oh.

curi:
Similarly a highly tilted OWL player still plays at GM level.

curi:
Cuz like 90% of his skill is too automatic you go away

curi:
To

TheRat:
I think I understand. If one acquires a certain level of mastery of a skill, one can still perform without significant hindrance to that skill despite being tilted.

curi:
Ya

curi:
Similarly strong chess players can keep a large part of their skill when playing moves in under 1 second while dead tired

TheRat: (pinned)
Ok so with that in mind. Let's say SS tilted and his logic mastery is not high enough that the tilt significantly affected his logic. So let's say typically hes at 60/100 and tilted hes like 10/100. Based on that conversation, I don't think even then we can say he can't do logic. We can say he has not reached a level of mastery to make tilt essentially meaningless. What am I missing here?

curi:
So if you see someone play chess at amateur level. There are no excuses. They aren’t good.

curi:
Busy atm btw

Shadow Starshine:
Is this guy still spending all his time trying to frame the discussion?

Shadow Starshine:
I feel like he just got his ego hurt

TheRat:
no I was asking him about ways to have better conversations

TheRat:
and we ended here

Shadow Starshine:
I just read the back and forth

Shadow Starshine:
It amazes me anyone is like that

Shadow Starshine:
Oh well

Shadow Starshine:
I think the best way forward in that discussion was for curi to answer my questions honestly

TheRat:
I don't know if that's fair. I asked him questions and engaged him. What is he to do? ignore me?

curi:
He’s still tilted but also partly he’s just like this

Shadow Starshine:
Give me a snippet of comparative definition of computation

Shadow Starshine:
So I can go "Ah, I see how we differ"

Shadow Starshine:
And then try and make sense of the two different views

Shadow Starshine:
curi, you're about as a good character judge as Ask Yourself

JustinCEO:
i disagree

Shadow Starshine:
You are welcome to disagree

Shadow Starshine:
But in general, from what I can tell, curi has problems relating with other people

Shadow Starshine:
where I actually find quite a bit of success shortening gaps in understanding with people

TheRat:
That's everyone brother

JustinCEO:
i have seen curi engage patiently with hostile people way beyond the point at which i would have given up

Shadow Starshine:
Does patient mean good at relating?

Shadow Starshine:
Someone can be both calm and not understanding

JustinCEO:
patience is required to understand other people when there is a gap in perspective

Shadow Starshine:
Even if it was required it wouldn't make it sufficient

TheRat:
I can sympathize with difficulties relating to others. If the dude was perfectly logical at age 4. Must make it tough to relate to others.

Shadow Starshine:
Do you buy that?

TheRat:
I think my framing is a bit misleading

JustinCEO:
@Shadow Starshine you claimed curi has problems relating to other people. I claimed that I've seen curi demonstrate tremendous patience, which I regard as relevant to relating to/understanding people. You now bring up that patience isn't a sufficient skill to enable understanding/relating to other people, but I never claimed that one skill was by itself sufficient.

TheRat:
perfectly is not what he meant

JustinCEO:
so it's unclear to me what you're arguing with/about

Shadow Starshine:
Right, so are you saying that your point about curi demonstrating patience was NOT a rebuttal to my point?

Shadow Starshine:
If it was a rebuttal, then you havent made an inferential connection, and my counter demonstrates this

TheRat:
That's interesting Justin because I would have assumed as SS did that your example of patience was meant to refute the understanding others position

Shadow Starshine:
if it wasn't then it was just some tangential thing you were saying

JustinCEO:
Right Rat, you keep expecting my single examples to be a complete self-contained case

JustinCEO:
that happened earlier too

Shadow Starshine:
That's also not what anyone is saying

Shadow Starshine:
We are expecting an inference structure from your statement to the one that I made

TheRat:
I don't think complete, but at least a major point

JustinCEO:
"refute" would be decisive

TheRat:
or why else bring it up?

Shadow Starshine:
in that its a related point

Shadow Starshine:
If "refute" is too decisive for you, then use the understanding that it was meant to in part counter what I'm saying

TheRat:
btw J I am assuming I am mistaken as I have the least amount of philosophy discussion here

Shadow Starshine:
Was it meant in part to counter what I was saying?

TheRat:
I was pointing out that I would have made the same assumption

JustinCEO:
part of the reason to bring up curi's patience is to indicate to Shadow Starshine in concrete terms that perspectives other than his exist re: curi's ability to relate to/understand other people

Freeze:

btw J I am assuming I am mistaken as I have the least amount of philosophy discussion here
Is this the right way to go about it?

Freeze:
I don't think J would want you to do that either but I'm not sure

Shadow Starshine:
So is that a yes or a no Justin

curi:

I don't think complete, but at least a major point

it was a major point. right J?

Shadow Starshine:
Was it meant to counter my statement?

Shadow Starshine:
in part?

TheRat:
Doesn't mean I agree with Justin blindly due to longer. But I am approaching it more humbly

TheRat:
nothing wrong with that Freeze I don't think

TheRat:
but I don't want to meta the meta

Freeze:
Can a point be brought up to further a discussion without being intended to refute the other side entirely?

Freeze:
Like to add more info for context or discussion

JustinCEO:
sure, major point @curi

Freeze:
I think J's point kind of does that as well as counter-argues a bit

Shadow Starshine:
Well I'm trying to establish if it was directed to me, in context, due to what I said, as the start of a counter example

Shadow Starshine:
Should be an easy yes or no question

Freeze:

part of the reason to bring up curi's patience is to indicate to Shadow Starshine in concrete terms that perspectives other than his exist re: curi's ability to relate to/understand other people

JustinCEO:

"Was it meant to counter my statement?
[9:16 PM] Shadow Starshine: in part?"

TheRat:
Yes Justin was disagreeing with SS in regards to curi's ability to relate to others, and the patience was a way to present an argument of why he disagreed. What is wrong with that?

JustinCEO:
sure, i was trying to contradict, give a different perspective

curi:
why did rat think J's point wasn't major after it came up that it wasn't complete?

Shadow Starshine:
Okay great, now we've established how it started

TheRat:
what do you mean curi?

Shadow Starshine:
My retort to that point was that it was not sufficient to be patient. Meaning, that you could have patience, and still not relate to others

Shadow Starshine:
Do you understand that point?

Freeze:
I think Rat thought it was a major point

Freeze:

I don't think complete, but at least a major point

Freeze:
After it came up that it wasn't complete, he clarified that he thought it was at least a major point

TheRat:
ah yes

TheRat:
Yes.

Freeze:
Rat was the first person to use the phrase major point

curi:
the context was what J's message wasn't

curi:
you seemed to say you thought it wasn't a major point

Freeze:
which context? im reading again

JustinCEO:
I understood what you were saying @Shadow Starshine. I understand e.g. the difference between a necessary and sufficient condition. I didn't think your statement was responsive though, cuz as I said, I wasn't saying or implying that patience by itself would be sufficient for understanding others. So it seemed irrelevant.

Freeze:
putting meta quotes in #other for later analysis

TheRat:
What would have been a proper response to that in your view J?

Shadow Starshine:
If you agree that it's not sufficient, then telling me curi is patient doesn't refute my point. So my comment was meant to show you that you needed to keep making further arguments.

Shadow Starshine:
Do you now understand the nature of my comment?

Shadow Starshine:
If it WAS sufficient, it would have stand alone been good enough

Shadow Starshine:
but since it's not, it is not good enough to refute

Shadow Starshine:
Hence the importance

JustinCEO:
so let's back up a bit

JustinCEO:

Shadow Starshine:
curi, you're about as a good character judge as Ask Yourself

JustinCEO:
that's a hostile flame

JustinCEO:

Shadow Starshine:
But in general, from what I can tell, curi has problems relating with other people

Shadow Starshine:
Justin don't derail, do you now understand the nature of my comment or not?

JustinCEO:
no no hang on please

Shadow Starshine:
Tell me if we are in agreement

Shadow Starshine:
then proceed

Shadow Starshine:
with what you think the problem is

Shadow Starshine:
Don't just ignore my comments

JustinCEO:
i'm going to reply to you after i'm finished making my point

Shadow Starshine:
Just tell me if you agree or not first

Shadow Starshine:
then do so

JustinCEO:
I've said what i'm going to do

Shadow Starshine:
This is not an unreasonable request

Shadow Starshine:
I don't want you to sidetrack

Shadow Starshine:
for no reason

curi:
rat do you think this behavior by SS is just tilt and not some kinda wrong attitudes to discussion?

Shadow Starshine:
Just say "I agree" or "I don't agree"

curi:
or missing skills and methods

curi:
btw i'll get back to ur msg later

curi:
i have stuff to say

curi:
i'll pin it

TheRat:
Seems fine to me. He is answering a specific argument presented by J.

TheRat:
Ok

curi:
he's being ridiculous right now

JustinCEO:
this statement was an assertion based on your own impressions (that's not a criticism, just a description):

Shadow Starshine:
But in general, from what I can tell, curi has problems relating with other people

curi:
we should analyze i guess

Shadow Starshine:
I wrote a bunch of lines to J, he hasn't in any way acknowledged them

curi:
Pinned a message.

JustinCEO:

he hasn't in any way acknowledged them

JustinCEO:
please don't lie

Shadow Starshine:
How am I lying

JustinCEO:
i did acknowledge them "in any way", i said i would reply after i made my point

JustinCEO:
that was an acknowledgement

Shadow Starshine:
Let me be more precise, you haven't acknowledged their content before moving on

curi:
rat does this seem to you like a logic/whatever type error J is running into right now?

JustinCEO:

JustinCEO:
i have seen curi engage patiently with hostile people way beyond the point at which i would have given up

JustinCEO:
so that's me offering my own assertion based on my own impressions

JustinCEO:
which you should not find persuasive on its own, btw!

TheRat:
I don't think I get the question.

Shadow Starshine:
we've already established this

Shadow Starshine:
are you going to address what I wrote

curi:
do you see how there is a skills issue in the "please don't lie" conversation branch?

curi:
they are having an issue b/c J has much greater skills at logic, language, precision, reading, etc, than SS

Shadow Starshine:
Justin, you said my point seemed irrelevant, I wrote to you why it was relevant

Shadow Starshine:
I'm waiting for a response to that

TheRat:
Hmm. I don't see it. I don't think he has acknowledged it yet either. Though planning to acknolwedge in teh future is acknolwedging? I think there's an inference jump we can make from SS claim he hasn't acknowledged it yet that seems reasonable to me.

curi:

I wrote a bunch of lines to J, he hasn't in any way acknowledged them

curi:
J literally acknowledged that those lines exist

curi:
i think you don't see it b/c of your own skills lack

JustinCEO:
i'm afk 5 mins

Shadow Starshine:
I wasn't asking him to acknowledge their existence, but their content

curi:
or your lack of respect for literal meanings. it's hard to tell how much is skill vs. attitude

TheRat:
Might be attitude

Shadow Starshine:
I think it's your lack of skills on understanding what people mean

TheRat:
I don't take literal too literal

TheRat:
and I try to guess what people mean more

TheRat:
than their literal exact phrasing

TheRat:
is that lack of skill or bad attitude

Shadow Starshine:
I think its a disregard for the principle of charity

curi:
being able to figure out what statements mean as written, and keeping that in mind and generally not contradicting it, is a basic starting point for being able to do more complex analysis or hold conversations

Shadow Starshine:
Right then why are you so bad at figuring out what things mean

curi:
skipping that step is one of the reasons conversations fall apart. it should be automated.

TheRat:
I feel like conversations fall apart when you take the literal meanings of what people wrote vs the spirit of what they meant

TheRat:
hmm

Shadow Starshine:
curi, I could copy paste this convo elsewhere, and I'll bet you that other people will get what I'm saying

TheRat:
That's another gap we have it seems

Shadow Starshine:
and you're gonna find yourself on the outside of understanding

Shadow Starshine:
claiming that you're the only smart and logical one

curi:
you generally need to say stuff that isn't wrong (literally) to get anywhere when ppl disagree much, when there's much culture clash, when there's much inferential distance, etc.

curi:
that should be a basic starting point to get ppl to have something in common, a shared understanding of some objective facts about reality that can be built on

Shadow Starshine:
The only reason there's so much culture clash is because you're dedicated to a style that is so foreign to what other people mean

Shadow Starshine:
I have a very easy time relating to many different language games

Shadow Starshine:
I can use words differently based on my interlocutors use

Shadow Starshine:
what do you do?

Shadow Starshine:
Bitch and complain about how other people talk

Shadow Starshine:
and then act like you have 'skills'

Shadow Starshine:
It's honestly a joke

curi:
when ppl won't or can't participate in that, then communication across much of a perspective gap mostly just doesn't work. it's hard to find good alternatives/replacements, esp generic ones, to get some other common ground.

Shadow Starshine:
It does in fact work, it works for me all the time

Shadow Starshine:
I think what you'll find is that the shit you do doesn't work

Shadow Starshine:
and you're projecting that onto others

Shadow Starshine:
then convincing yourself its everyone else's problem

curi:
it's like EY talking about recursing down to bayes' theorem in inferential distance article. but it's to something considerable more simple, basic and generic. and if you still can't find agreement on stuff like what words mean and how words fit together to form sentences and what those sentences then mean, you're pretty damn screwed.

curi:
you could go to arithmetic instead of words but that's harder to build on

Shadow Starshine:
buddy you ain't listening

curi:
plus most ppl hate math

curi:
and arithmetic would seem more pedantic, would be resisted even more by ppl like SS

TheRat:
Man philosophy is hard lol. I am so confused atm.

Shadow Starshine:
im wasting my breath here

curi:
did u read the inferential distance articles?

TheRat:
Not yet.

curi:
ok i think that'd help

TheRat:
I was thinking like in this scenario where J took what SS said literally

TheRat:
I don't think that seems like a good idea

TheRat:
you say otherwise

TheRat:
and that if you don't always take seriously the conversation falls appart

TheRat:
but J taking it seriously made the conversation fall appart anyway

curi:
SS, by not developing the skill for literal communication and/or not wanting to do it, is dealing with culture clash and inferential distance inappropriately

curi:
he's using methods that don't work

TheRat:
but what if the culture clash is of our own making

TheRat:
like he said

curi:
J is right to try to focus on more basic, simple, easier things to start with

TheRat:
like 99% of the time progress can be made

TheRat:
except in FI

Shadow Starshine:
Curi, but taking things literal and not using common understanding or the pricniple of charity, you cause shit to fall apart. Your methods are a hinderance to yourself.

curi:
if you can't agree on easier stuff, doesn't make much sense to do harder stuff

curi:
what progress elsewhere?

TheRat:
I am talking what if

TheRat:
what if the culture clash is of our own making

TheRat:
like he said

curi:
you can sometimes skip easy stuff when you have a lot in common, esp in more cooperative interations, but J/SS have major disagreements so shouldn't be skipping

curi:
i have SS blocked and haven't been reading his msgs for a while

TheRat:
oh

Shadow Starshine:
TheRat, may I ask of you, in my back and forth between J and I, what do you think I was saying?

curi:
was talking to rat + generically

curi:
i don't know what culture clash of own making means.

JustinCEO:

If you agree that it's not sufficient, then telling me curi is patient doesn't refute my point. So my comment was meant to show you that you needed to keep making further arguments.

TheRat:
Ok SS. My attempt at summary (entirely from memory). You said curi seems to have a problem relating to people. J said he disagreed because curi has demonstrated a lot of patience. You said you can be patient and still not understanding. J said patience is required for understanding. SS said even if it is required it is not sufficient. J said he never claimed it was sufficient. I have to refresh my memory on the rest

Shadow Starshine:
That seems accurate to me. Does my point on it not being sufficient seem relevant to the conversation at hand?

curi:
that kind of memory is a skill that ppl vary dramatically at

TheRat:
it does seem relevant

JustinCEO:
i said curi is patient to in part contradict your view that curi is bad at relating to other people, by bringing up a relevant skill to relating to other people that i'd seen some concrete examples of in action. this wasn't meant as a self-contained airtight logical proof. the discussion started with you indicating your perspective, and then i indicated mine, and then you tried to pretend that i was trying to do an airtight logical refutation of what you'd said. you didn't offer an airtight logical proof to begin with -- you just indicated your perspective, @Shadow Starshine.

curi:
and it's something ppl can practice and take steps to get better at

Shadow Starshine:
Okay, so I've demonstrated my efficacy of getting points across

curi:
ya i think it's relevant a lot. some ppl seem to forget msgs from a few min ago and get lost, or misremember recent wordings in ways that change the meaning.

TheRat:
I think you're right curi. I haven't looked much into the literature of memory improvement.

Shadow Starshine:
@JustinCEO I did not pretend that you were trying to do an airtight logical refutation.

Shadow Starshine:
I showed that it wasn't sufficient, and that you needed further arguments

curi:
what i've done a lot, for many years, is try to remember things then reread and test my beliefs to find errors.

Shadow Starshine:
I was not denying your ability to continue to do so

TheRat:

what i've done a lot, for many years, is try to remember things then reread and test my beliefs to find errors.

This seems like a good idea to practice. Writing it down sec.

JustinCEO:
if you wanted more arguments, why didn't you say something like "Oh, really? Well I don't find that persuasive, but could you give me some concrete examples so I can judge for myself?" is that what you really wanted?

JustinCEO:
or "i'm not interested in patience, but has curi actually convinced specific people of specific things you can point to?"

curi:
i think making discussion trees for conversations is also good practice for memory as well as understanding structure

Shadow Starshine:
Because I don't know how definitive you thought your comment was. I'm not a mind reader. I'm merely demonstrating it isn't good enough. If you thought it was, that would give you pause. If you thought it wasn't, you'd continue

JustinCEO:

{Attachments}
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/304082867384745994/658864430771077121/unknown.png

TheRat:
I think I disagree with that tree J

curi:
i think going node by node in a discussion tree is the kind of method that can work for ppl with very different background knowledge, but that ppl generally don't want to do it (and the tree method is itself background knowledge they don't have and don't wanna learn)

TheRat:
I don't think SS strawmanned you

Shadow Starshine:
there is a big problem here in that you seem to be implying that by me stating your comment is insufficient, that means that you don't know that it's insufficient, or that I'm making a claim that you think it is sufficient, neither of those necessarily follow

Shadow Starshine:
You make statement X. I say statement X lacks property Y.

You don't need to say "Are you saying that I'm saying it does have property Y?" - No.
"Are you saying that I don't know it lacks property Y?" - No.

Shadow Starshine:
It only means exactly what I said

curi:
so pending things for me are the pinned msg and waiting on explanation re creating culture clash

curi:
iirc

TheRat:
Hmm. Yeah the tree thing. I haven't quite thought about why I refuse to make trees. I feel like it would be tedious and time consuming. I think it might be similar with me and working out. explicitly it all makes sense, should work out. but I still don't do it.

curi:
in many cases, i think trees would save time. this is the same issue as how being more literal and "pedantic" would save time even tho it seems like it takes extra time. but the reduced misunderstandings makes it a large time save overall.

Freeze:
J seemed to make that tree pretty quickly and at the same time as the conversation was happening, even though he had to go afk for 5 min

TheRat:
yeah but after all that he could have just strawmmend me when you said x, and ss would have replied like dhd

curi:
or at least trees would save time if the other guy wasn't hostile to them. e.g. the vegans never engaged with my trees

Shadow Starshine:
I've already asked TheRat to paraphrase the convo, he did so successfully and understands my point. I really don't see a problem with my approach

TheRat:
I think your tree is better curi because there wasn't commentary

curi:
my vegan trees were quite opinionated

TheRat:
such as the vegans are misrepresenting me

TheRat:
you just took their argument

curi:
ya they were less parochial

curi:
semi afk

TheRat:
Something is up tho. SS agreed that my paraphrasing of what he said is accurate. So indeed his method of communicating works for at least me. But not J or curi, and I would guess Freeze. So what's going on there?

TheRat:
I wonder if this is a case of maximizing traits vs optimizing

TheRat:
like maximizing literal accuracy

TheRat:
leads to lack of understanding

TheRat:
I feel like we're doing a reverse AY by accident here

TheRat:
trying to catch him in a literal misstep instead of seeking to understand

TheRat:
like AY did to us.

curi:
rat i think SS likes your summary b/c you share some of his biases

DavetheDastard:
AY did a great deal of pain to all of us

JustinCEO:
@Shadow Starshine I read your bringing up the sufficiency stuff as trying to offer some kind of refutation of what I was saying. If you're basically saying it was an oblique request for more evidence re:curi understanding/relating to people, then i don't think that was very good request methodology but uh ok i guess. So what sort of evidence do you want? What would convince you that your perspective on curi is wrong?

curi:
or in ohter words, you're more similar to him so your thoughts are more agreeable to thim

TheRat:
so my biases made it easier for me to understand him?

TheRat:
hmm.

curi:
a lot of what happens isn't understanding, it's just saying things he's fine with

Shadow Starshine:
@JustinCEO Great, we've made progress. Do you agree that I was not necessarily saying that you didn't know that it wasn't sufficient nor making a claim that you DID say it was sufficient?

DavetheDastard:
It all depends on who said what first, the first one who said it is most valid

DavetheDastard:
Who’s oldest?

DavetheDastard:
That’ll help us find out who was right first about anything

TheRat:
Please don't do that Dave.

Shadow Starshine:
Dave I have 11 fingers

DavetheDastard:
But isn’t that how science works?

Shadow Starshine:
I think that basically concludes it

curi:

J said he disagreed because curi has demonstrated a lot of patience.

rat your paraphrase for J is wrong. J didn't say that "because"

Shadow Starshine:
unless someone is holding the jack of hearts

DavetheDastard:
You’re a mutant

TheRat:
well a paraphrase is not meant to be taken literal

TheRat:
afaik

curi:
@DavetheDastard how'd you find this server? what are your goals here?

curi:
rat you substantially changed the meaning

DavetheDastard:
I was invited

TheRat:
only if I had said something like "solely because"

DavetheDastard:
And I don’t hold any goals

Shadow Starshine:
I take the "because" as a positive reason towards disagreeing

Freeze:
Welcome Dave

Shadow Starshine:
aka "this is a premise"

Freeze:
Are you a friend of Starshine?

DavetheDastard:
IM after rational philosophy!

curi:
@DavetheDastard you seem to be being disruptive to this conversation. can you go talk in #other for now cuz this channel is busy currently.

Freeze:
Nice :D

DavetheDastard:
Yeah I’m friends with SS

Shadow Starshine:
Dave is a welsh philosopher working on his PHD.

DavetheDastard:
Yeah

Shadow Starshine:
good lack, being cheeky

Shadow Starshine:
lad*

TheRat:
maybe a better paraphrase would have been something like one reason J disagrees with SS re relating to others is that curi displays great patience.

JustinCEO:
sure @Shadow Starshine, though my current theory compatible with what you said involves a major miscommunication that was at least partially your fault

DavetheDastard:
Second year PhD, studying late wittgensteinian noncognitivism within religious language

Shadow Starshine:
@JustinCEO Since we've agreed with some things I'm not necessarily saying, what problems do you think are still left that need addressing that were my fault?

Shadow Starshine:
From my personal perspective, I think you were taking me to be saying more than I was actually saying

Shadow Starshine:
you also said it was irrelevant, but I think it turned out relevant

curi:
rat explain re creating culture clash ?

curi:
and i'm not trying to catch SS in a misstep, i found the dozens of them prevented him from understanding what i was saying

curi:
and also that he denies the problem exists and won't take steps to try to deal with it

TheRat:
Let's assume for a moment that SS is right. And we created a culture in FI, in particular around methodological discussion. And we're wrong. Then the clash that exists is of our own making, and need not exist when talking to other people. Like AY making people write in syllogism when the argument is clear, maybe meant to make things more clear but it bogs down conversations instead

TheRat:
something like that.

curi:
to deal with this kind of perspective gap we need to find some common ground but he won't acknowledge that problem, won't meet me at getting facts and basics right, and doesn't have an alternative.

JustinCEO:
SS you should have asked for more examples/arguments if you wanted them. If you didn't, and then you start bringing up whether the one example I brought up was sufficient to prove a case/refute a claim of yours, and then i guess that maybe you think that's what I was trying to do, that's totally reasonable and mostly your fault IMHO.

curi:

Let's assume for a moment that SS is right.

right about what?

TheRat:
That we're at fault for the culture clash

JustinCEO:
from my perspective, you apparently wanted something (more examples/argument) you didn't ask for (and when I asked why you didn't explicitly ask, you said, somewhat incredibly in my view, "I'm not a mind reader.")

curi:
what does that mean?

curi:
i already think i'm primarily responsible for the existence of the culture clash. i'm the one who chose to learn ideas further from the mainstream.

Shadow Starshine:
@JustinCEO I didn't make the assumption if you thought it was sufficient, from my perspective you may or may not have thought that, so my response was expected to either get agreement or disagreement. The reason I don't ask for more examples is because I don't know the nature of your argument, in so much as why it was incomplete, so rather than make assumptions of what you should do next, I merely point out the problem and let it evolve from there. Does that make sense?

Shadow Starshine:
@JustinCEO For example, if you DID think it was sufficient, then I don't want more examples. I want to address that you think that. If you don't, then I do want more examples. But I can't know what to expect before hand and would rather not assume.

JustinCEO:
stated that way, what you were trying to do makes some sense, but I disagree with the methodology. The major issue, which came up, is that in pointing out "a problem", you have to make a guess about what the argument is trying to accomplish -- what it is trying to solve. If you wanted to know the nature of my argument, you could have asked that directly, rather than bringing up criticisms based on what you thought i was maybe trying to do.

Shadow Starshine:
Well the problem is the only part I'm confident in, that it's not sufficient. But I simply don't know which way to stem from there until I get a response back. "Yes it is" would go one way. "True, but there's also X, Y, Z" would go another.

Shadow Starshine:
I could ask you the nature, sure

Shadow Starshine:
But I also don't mind things evolving more naturally

JustinCEO:
the lack of sufficiency is only a problem in a context where somebody wants it to be sufficient

JustinCEO:
criticisms are contextual

JustinCEO:
http://curi.us/1592-criticism-is-contextual

Shadow Starshine:
I don't think that's true. The lack of sufficiency can either counter that you do think its sufficient, or be a request for more arguments. I think it serves both purposes

Shadow Starshine:
And that is contextual with where you are willing to take it

Shadow Starshine:
I think me requesting more arguments pre-emptively would have been an assumption

Shadow Starshine:
perhaps you didn't think more were needed

Shadow Starshine:
I can't know

JustinCEO:
re the last point, I already said you could have just asked the nature of my argument/why i was bringing up patience. i think it's fair to assume i had some argument/point. also if u asked for examples and i was like "you don't need more, i already justified my position definitively and authoritatively" that would have also been a cheap way to get more info about my position

Shadow Starshine:
I think the only suggestion you've offered I find reasonable is "What is the nature of your argument?"

Shadow Starshine:
but I don't like the pathway of asking for more arguments

JustinCEO:
FWIW

JustinCEO:
i used to do more of your type of approach re: offering crits right off the bat. i try to ask more questions up first way more now. i think i have more of a sense of how big perspective gaps can be and that plays into my questions-up-first approach some.

JustinCEO:

I don't think that's true. The lack of sufficiency can either counter that you do think its sufficient, or be a request for more arguments. I think it serves both purposes

JustinCEO:
it failed to communicate a request for more arguments quite badly in this conversation

Shadow Starshine:
That's fair. I have nothing against the approach of asking your suggested question.

But I think the failure of communication rests on what you assumed I was saying.

Shadow Starshine:
You seemed to take me to be saying other propositions I was not saying

TheRat:
Hmm. this might be an example of being too biased toward explicit statements and neglecting the implicit that DD was taking about.

JustinCEO:
my fault was i should have asked why you were bringing it up

JustinCEO:
the sufficiency stuff

JustinCEO:
like immediately

Shadow Starshine:
Well I'm not sure I agree I should have asked your question, but I think it's a good suggestion none-the-less and would have been successful

curi:
Rat, explicit is easier. It’s the place to start seeking common ground. Add inexplicit second. Which I do a lot of but can’t communicate it very well to SS and others who misread my explicit statements

curi:
The perspective gap on inexplicit is significantly larger in general

TheRat:
I wonder if there is a point of diminishing returns though. Like I said earlier about maybe if you maximize literal accuracy, you start to hinder understanding.

TheRat:
so if you maximize explicit literal accuracy

curi:
Yes but we didn’t even get basics right let alone overiptimize

TheRat:
you throw a big baby with the bathwater

TheRat:
oh

curi:
He misread me over and over

curi:
He kept make incorrect statements that were wrong on many levels including literal and couldn’t agree with even the literal errors existing

curi:
got keyboard again briefly

curi:
it's very hard to get the gist of what someone says when you don't know much about it, disagree, and misunderstand it on a literal level

curi:
it's very hard to tell someone the implications of what they said when you disagree with them about the literal meaning and the implications are bad for them, things they want to deny. it's step skipping to tell someone that reading btwn the lines they're wrong without telling them why the lines are wrong first.

curi:
it works ok when you can ignore a few literal errors to reach a conclusion you and the other guy both agree makes sense (even if you disagree with it for some more advanced reason, but u see why it's at least semi-reasonable). that's "steelmanning" or principle of charity. but when you think something is trash and/or highly ambiguous (too hard to guess any reasonable meaning, though so vague it could mean something reasonable), and there's no way to correct the literal errors to get non-trash (as far as you know), then you can't just interpret what they meant so that they like your interpretation. they don't want you to interpret them as meaning something wrong.

curi:
it's not literally impossible but it's very hard in general and rarely an effective approach

curi:
ppl don't want you to reply to something that isn't what they literally said and prove why it's trash

curi:
that's actually unfair to them

curi:
you shouldn't put words in their mouth

curi:
they like it occassionally when they see the point but mostly it doesn't work when the perspective difference is significant

curi:
when someone is wrong and confused, it's very hard to guess which particular confusions they will consider the strongest, steeliest version of their viewpoint.

curi:
and do a better job than they did at coming up with that

curi:
you can do it somewhat when you are culturally similar to them or know a ton about their subculture. especially if you know the person really well, like years of discussion history. it's an unreasonable thing to ask for in general.

curi:
none of the analysis changes if they're right. if i think they're wrong and confused, b/c i'm wrong and confused, and then i take their statement, change it in a way that seems a little less wrong and confused to me, and try to argue with that

curi:
it's just gonna make things worse

curi:
you need stuff in common to know what corrections to ppl's errors to make. i do have enough in common with SS to correct "its" to "they're" but not for a lot of the corrections he wanted. and he managed to misunderstand that grammar point in an illogical way and correct it incorrectly (its -> it's IIRC) and never fix it. the thing that happened with that was a recurring pattern: I brought up X for purpose Y, and he responded as if I brought up X for purpose Z, where Z is normally some kinda generic typical purpose (so it's more like dropping context than inserting a different one)

curi:
the electrons thing was the same broad pattern (brought up for purpose Y, but he took in context Z)

curi:
these context errors seemed to be caused in significant part by his lack of literal understanding of words, quotes, replies, and those kinda issues

curi:
it's quite hard to guess which non-literal misreadings ppl might have and preemptively write to avoid them.

curi:
there are so many possible misreadings. even if you have a 99% success rate at avoiding, can still have tons of them happen.

curi:
when ppl will read X as Y, there are really striaghtforwardly infinitely many misreadings and nothing you can do besides guess, based on shared culture, which ones ppl might do

TheRat:
So what's the solution?

curi:
start with the easiest, most objective stuff for common ground

curi:
or like binary search backwards towards it

curi:
if you do stuff that's too simple and easy, and unnecessarily basic, you'll quickly be able to escalate

curi:
but ppl like SS don't want to back off far enough, to easy enough stuff, to actually have common ground and agree on and resolve ~anything

curi:
and the stuff he thinks is hair splitting pedantry is actually too hard for him. which is super common

curi:
so it's really hard to find anything you can talk about productively

curi:
if he had a better attitude, and tried, he might have been able to get that stuff right 95% of the time but that's too hard, that's not reliable enough for a basic building block to do complex, advanced stuff using. you can go a level or 2 past 95% reliability but not very far. every level past exponentially increases the usages of the building block, resulting in exponentially more opportunities for error, so error rate has to be VERY low to build many levels past

curi:
this is all a bit approximate for various complicated reasons, but is the gist

curi:
the main approximation is that i wrote in terms of mainstream foundationalist thinking which is actually wrong as CR says but is approximately correct for many purposes

TheRat:
Do you have examples of long term discussion with other philosophers who did this? (followed binary searched backwards toward common ground then built up).

curi:
Afk

curi:
Pinned a message.

curi:
this method has been used lots with ppl i talk with long term, e.g. justin and alisa. there was a little example on FI w/ anon re torturing kids discussion recently. stuff like that is common. you can also see longterm patterns over many discussions like e.g. justin discusses more precisely in lots of ways, including quote usage, compared to 20 years ago

curi:
it doesn't yield fast, large results with new ppl – in the sense of them e.g. being able to make expert level CR comments after 5 hours of discussion – b/c they need years of learning to be competent b/c there's a lot of human knowledge and school sux. no huge shortcuts. but you can get quick results about smaller things in individual conversations, e.g. my conversation with you where at the ~10th level of the conversation we got some common ground and then we quickly resolved a bunch of prior levels

curi:
similarly, i successfully dealt with a very difficult conversation with Andy re min wage http://curi.us/2145-open-discussion-economics he was majorly uncooperative, confused, sabotaging, etc., but i managed to get him to talk about some simple enough things that he could get them right (partly after corrections b/c it was simple enough he could actually be corrected and see why the correction was right) and then from there we built pretty quickly to conclusions re min wage as a whole.

curi:
a lot of subjects are simpler than ppl realize, and much more open to rational analysis reaching decisive conclusions. i picked min wage b/c it's like that (contrary to Andy's prior belief about how complicated it is, how their are lots of arguments on both sides, etc.). if a conversation can make progress at all, then lots of things can be accomplished. ppl overestimate difficulty of lots of stuff b/c they are used to conversations with ~zero progress. but if u can make "hyperliteral pedantic" progress, that's more than zero, and then u can quickly sort out some issues that many ppl never figure out.

curi:
ppl also used to blind leading the blind. when neither side knows the answer already, reaching conclusions is way harder.

curi:
and finding common ground or being more literal won't fix that super common problem that no1 talking actually has good ideas on the topic.

curi:
in that case they really ought to figure out how to engage with existing knowledge. (unless they are trying to invent new ideas, in which case they ought to know relevant existing knowledge and have lots of common ground that way already)

curi:
most ppl just won't do it and have a halfway reasonable conversation tho

curi:

Ok so with that in mind. Let's say SS tilted and his logic mastery is not high enough that the tilt significantly affected his logic. So let's say typically hes at 60/100 and tilted hes like 10/100. Based on that conversation, I don't think even then we can say he can't do logic. We can say he has not reached a level of mastery to make tilt essentially meaningless. What am I missing here?

the drop from tilt shouldn’t be that big cuz you ~can’t get to level 60 with only up to level 10 practiced, automated and highly reliable. you can only effectively build a few levels past the lowest level where your knowledge is shoddy.

so the further you go along, the percentage of non-automated, non-mastery type knowledge drops. at first it’s 100%. then maybe you master 5 levels and are working on 3 more so it’s 37.5%. to get to the point you can do level 60 at all, early stages of learning it, you normally want to master at least level 55. you can skip ahead a little just to explore, especially once you know that much.

conclusion: tilt doesn’t make all that much difference unless it’s actual bad faith where they are being wrong on purpose.

curi:
it’s a big difference in a competitive game like OW or LoL where you are playing other people on your level, and then if you tilt and play a bit worse you’re at a meaningful competitive disadvantage. you’d still stomp nubs (relative to u) while tilted tho. and you’d still go to the right lane in LoL and do all kinds of other stuff (unless you actually stop trying, but you’d at least know how to do that if you’re a decent player).

for this tho, if you wanna talk complicated philosophy subjects, then stuff like how to read a sentence correctly was 50 levels ago, should have mastered it ages ago. it should stick with you when tilted similar to how you can still read individual words with nearly 100% accuracy when tilted.

there were many, many signs that SS’s skill levels at all sorts of really generic discussion skills were way too low. including pre-tilt signs. but some of the errors while tilted were such low level it put a lower bound on how high his mastery skill could be than before.

(there are many different dimensions of skill, some weren’t bounded much at all pre-tilt, so another thing the tilted evidence did was fill out the picture and show low skill on a bunch more dimensions. the dimensions are partially but not fully independent btw.)

curi:
2000char limit sux

curi:
it's not just SS. for example PP's response to me pointing out he made a logical error was "excuse me im going to shoot myself" and then not to say anything else about the matter https://discordapp.com/channels/304082867384745994/304082867384745994/658523456966623242

curi:
here's PP's error:

curi:
8:15 PM] Perspective Philosophy: either its about reason or about shadows evaluation. which is it?
[8:16 PM] curi: what's "it" in your message?
[8:16 PM] curi: first one
[8:16 PM] Perspective Philosophy: it was referring to your position and the territory of this current discussion
[8:16 PM] curi: my position is multi-part, so that's a false dichotomy

curi:
he's just too irrational to make progress with. he doesn't want to work on the project of getting things right and getting his ideas to connect with reality.

curi:
this error is so basic. is the kind of thing that should have been mastered ages ago. most ppl haven't but they can't actually do philosophy in that case. or economics, or psychology, or ... which is what we see in the world :/

curi:
if someone doesn't care about false dichotomy errors, or doesn't understand them and isn't curious, you also won't be able to correct them on their misreadings of Popper even when it's reading stuff like "unjustified" as compatible with justified. there just isn't enough connection to truth and reality there and/or enough skill to understand what anything means.

curi:
where else are we going to get common ground if not some of the most objective and generically useful knowledge that humanity has?

curi:
pure math? programming? mathematicians and programmers have to get details right in a literal way to do their jobs!

curi:
words have meanings, there are rules for combining them into sentences, people who don't respect this, and don't learn the meanings and rules, are extremely hard to talk with or find common ground with for a rational discussion about ideas that are different than what they know. they just get by in life by talking with other similar people who already know what they mean a ton, saying really simple stuff, and being misunderstood (and misunderstanding others) but glossing it over and hiding the problem.]