Several years ago, the excellent Philosophy Bear made a valiant effort at smuggling fragments of a leftist worldview past the rationalists’ Anti-Progressiver Schutzwall.
...at which point I'm ready to give Scott a full benefit of the doubt. He just honestly, genuinely didn't get it. A tool that we take for granted was just completely missing from his conceptual toolbox. No matter how clumsy (and necessarily biased) his early attempts to acquire it were, they did eventually lead him to flawlessly pass an ideological Turing test where he previously couldn't. This is a success story.
(Of one uniquely open-minded individual. It did not generalize, the terminology encountered randomly in a wild is, admittedly, a reliable red flag, not of the labor variety.)
(This should be a sober reminder of how freakishly difficult it is to communicate across ideological bubbles. Also, of Hanlon's razor.)
> This should be a sober reminder of how freakishly difficult it is to communicate across ideological bubbles
I've spent a lot of time agonizing about why the two Scotts (Aaronson being the other) whose words I have read more of than probably any other writers, and who were so influential on my personal philosophy and eventual turn to the left, are so hostile to leftists. In the end my working theory doesn't involve ideology. I think it just boils down to the fact that some leftists were really mean to them once, they felt, understandably, that this was extremely unfair, and yada yada, we end up with an entire forum of leftists (of a different sort) devoted to making fun of them. Probably a micro version of this has played out with a lot of liberals. As I pointed out in another comment there are plenty of people we'll right if center who can more or less pass the left turing test. Not that it isn't hard to communicate across ideologies, but spite can make it rather impossible.
Yes, I think it's essentially just a severe wokeness allergy combined with immersion in an intellectual bubble that refuses to engage with the left long enough to realize we're not just turboliberals.
It's funny, I hadn't read conflict vs mistake since it was published, probably because it was so influencial in the discourse on the ssc sub and the ideas ended up being fleshed out and transformed somewhat. I don't actually recall being particularly offended by the essay, but going back and skimming, your "compression" and the other descriptions of the post are indeed accurate, I should have been offended.
But, on the other hand, it may have had a positive influence anyway. Many people in the sub, including some of the right wingers, understand the left a lot better than Scott does, and they did heavily criticize his description as caricature, and we ended up essentially with a gateway through which some of bear's actually useful insights could enter, the valiant effort was a partial success!
So you are not Scott's description of a conflict theorist, few people are, but might you be one anyway? If not, why?
> So you are not Scott's description of a conflict theorist, few people are, but might you be one anyway? If not, why?
Yes and no. Material interest is the ultimate motive force, but the ways in which it's understood and expressed are historically contingent and subject to all sorts of serious mistaken beliefs.
For example, there was a point in history when the Tories were, in a very limited and relative sense, acting in the interests of the British working class: they were responsible for many early laws regulating working conditions in mines and factories. This is the origin of the split between high Tories and paternalistic conservatives in the UK, and a clear case of a conflict between different interests. But today's one nation conservatives are not at all serving the interests of the working class vis a vis Labour. Their working class supporters are making a mistake. Their wealthy supporters, on the other hand, are engaged in straightforward class conflict.
> Mistake theorists think that free speech and open debate are vital, the most important things. Imagine if your doctor said you needed a medication from Pfizer – but later you learned that Pfizer owned the hospital, and fired doctors who prescribed other companies’ drugs, and that the local medical school refused to teach anything about non-Pfizer medications, and studies claiming Pfizer medications had side effects were ruthlessly suppressed. It would be a total farce, and you’d get out of that hospital as soon as possible into one that allowed all viewpoints.
> Conflict theorists think of free speech and open debate about the same way a 1950s Bircher would treat avowed Soviet agents coming into neighborhoods and trying to convince people of the merits of Communism. Or the way the average infantryman would think of enemy planes dropping pamphlets saying “YOU CANNOT WIN, SURRENDER NOW”. Anybody who says it’s good to let the enemy walk in and promote enemy ideas is probably an enemy agent.
Let me offer my own perspective
Mistake theorist think that government control over speech is essential. There are after all many ideas that could be very harmful when spread. And that are attractive to great numbers of people because they are so persuasive, even when they are wrong. Other ideas are extremely valuable, but would be ignored if some coercion didn't help them along. People should of course be free to think up new thoughts to some extend, but the benevolent government should set strict limits. Of course they are much better equipped to do this than the general public (especially when it comes to political opinions). After all, their entire lives are spend thinking about governance. And they will hire people that have expertise in distinguishing good ideas from bad ones. Much more so than the ordinary citizen, who often knows very little about politics.
Conflict theorist say that you should never let anyone restrict your speech. They think that the interest of governments is fundamentally at odds with the public. The governments wants to make themselves look better than they are, and opponents worse. If you let a small minority control speech, they will use their power to serve their own ends. The only way to ensure that the public debate reflects everyone's interest is to enshrine everyone's right to participate in the debate, and to deny anyone the opportunity to hide truth or perspectives inconvenient for themselves. The "free market place of ideas" will not always let the best ideas win, but that is a price worth paying to deny the powerful from a tool of repression.
I concur that the original Conflict vs. Mistake post was uniquely bad, for the reasons you name.
But later on, this happened: https://slatestarcodex.com/2020/02/14/addendum-to-targeting-meritocracy/
...at which point I'm ready to give Scott a full benefit of the doubt. He just honestly, genuinely didn't get it. A tool that we take for granted was just completely missing from his conceptual toolbox. No matter how clumsy (and necessarily biased) his early attempts to acquire it were, they did eventually lead him to flawlessly pass an ideological Turing test where he previously couldn't. This is a success story.
(Of one uniquely open-minded individual. It did not generalize, the terminology encountered randomly in a wild is, admittedly, a reliable red flag, not of the labor variety.)
(This should be a sober reminder of how freakishly difficult it is to communicate across ideological bubbles. Also, of Hanlon's razor.)
> It did not generalize
Understatement of the year
> This should be a sober reminder of how freakishly difficult it is to communicate across ideological bubbles
I've spent a lot of time agonizing about why the two Scotts (Aaronson being the other) whose words I have read more of than probably any other writers, and who were so influential on my personal philosophy and eventual turn to the left, are so hostile to leftists. In the end my working theory doesn't involve ideology. I think it just boils down to the fact that some leftists were really mean to them once, they felt, understandably, that this was extremely unfair, and yada yada, we end up with an entire forum of leftists (of a different sort) devoted to making fun of them. Probably a micro version of this has played out with a lot of liberals. As I pointed out in another comment there are plenty of people we'll right if center who can more or less pass the left turing test. Not that it isn't hard to communicate across ideologies, but spite can make it rather impossible.
Yes, I think it's essentially just a severe wokeness allergy combined with immersion in an intellectual bubble that refuses to engage with the left long enough to realize we're not just turboliberals.
It's funny, I hadn't read conflict vs mistake since it was published, probably because it was so influencial in the discourse on the ssc sub and the ideas ended up being fleshed out and transformed somewhat. I don't actually recall being particularly offended by the essay, but going back and skimming, your "compression" and the other descriptions of the post are indeed accurate, I should have been offended.
But, on the other hand, it may have had a positive influence anyway. Many people in the sub, including some of the right wingers, understand the left a lot better than Scott does, and they did heavily criticize his description as caricature, and we ended up essentially with a gateway through which some of bear's actually useful insights could enter, the valiant effort was a partial success!
So you are not Scott's description of a conflict theorist, few people are, but might you be one anyway? If not, why?
[Edited to remove stray words]
> So you are not Scott's description of a conflict theorist, few people are, but might you be one anyway? If not, why?
Yes and no. Material interest is the ultimate motive force, but the ways in which it's understood and expressed are historically contingent and subject to all sorts of serious mistaken beliefs.
For example, there was a point in history when the Tories were, in a very limited and relative sense, acting in the interests of the British working class: they were responsible for many early laws regulating working conditions in mines and factories. This is the origin of the split between high Tories and paternalistic conservatives in the UK, and a clear case of a conflict between different interests. But today's one nation conservatives are not at all serving the interests of the working class vis a vis Labour. Their working class supporters are making a mistake. Their wealthy supporters, on the other hand, are engaged in straightforward class conflict.
Your comment got cut off
I think was the beginning of an aborted version of the last paragraph, probably I was about to get long winded and thought better of it
According to Scott:
> Mistake theorists think that free speech and open debate are vital, the most important things. Imagine if your doctor said you needed a medication from Pfizer – but later you learned that Pfizer owned the hospital, and fired doctors who prescribed other companies’ drugs, and that the local medical school refused to teach anything about non-Pfizer medications, and studies claiming Pfizer medications had side effects were ruthlessly suppressed. It would be a total farce, and you’d get out of that hospital as soon as possible into one that allowed all viewpoints.
> Conflict theorists think of free speech and open debate about the same way a 1950s Bircher would treat avowed Soviet agents coming into neighborhoods and trying to convince people of the merits of Communism. Or the way the average infantryman would think of enemy planes dropping pamphlets saying “YOU CANNOT WIN, SURRENDER NOW”. Anybody who says it’s good to let the enemy walk in and promote enemy ideas is probably an enemy agent.
Let me offer my own perspective
Mistake theorist think that government control over speech is essential. There are after all many ideas that could be very harmful when spread. And that are attractive to great numbers of people because they are so persuasive, even when they are wrong. Other ideas are extremely valuable, but would be ignored if some coercion didn't help them along. People should of course be free to think up new thoughts to some extend, but the benevolent government should set strict limits. Of course they are much better equipped to do this than the general public (especially when it comes to political opinions). After all, their entire lives are spend thinking about governance. And they will hire people that have expertise in distinguishing good ideas from bad ones. Much more so than the ordinary citizen, who often knows very little about politics.
Conflict theorist say that you should never let anyone restrict your speech. They think that the interest of governments is fundamentally at odds with the public. The governments wants to make themselves look better than they are, and opponents worse. If you let a small minority control speech, they will use their power to serve their own ends. The only way to ensure that the public debate reflects everyone's interest is to enshrine everyone's right to participate in the debate, and to deny anyone the opportunity to hide truth or perspectives inconvenient for themselves. The "free market place of ideas" will not always let the best ideas win, but that is a price worth paying to deny the powerful from a tool of repression.