No, because no-one is really providing this specific bit of outside feedback to most of those groups. As the post says, there have been recent attacks *on longtermism*.
I second David’s comment: this reply doesn’t abide by the Forum’s norms. (Specifically “other behavior that interferes with good discourse”.)
Calling for someone to be removed from the community (as I think was appropriate in Phil’s case) isn’t the same as saying we should give the same treatment to their ideas. And that’s what you seem to be doing when you link “more credit than [the critiques] deserve” to “redressing personal slights” and “doesn’t believe what he is saying”.
If you think Phil’s vendetta or personal beliefs are relevant to the reasonableness of his critique, you should explain why — it’s not clear to me what the connection is.
I think his arguments fail as arguments, and would still fail as arguments even if he believed in them sincerely. If the arguments are solid, any hypothetical bad faith seems irrelevant.
Put another way, would “Phil believes this” be important evidence in favor of the critique? If not, why does “Phil doesn’t really believe this” serve as important counterevidence?
Without the connection between Phil’s personal life and his arguments, this comment seems like a personal attack unrelated to your point. And it’s an unfortunate contrast with your other comments, which reliably engaged with the critiques rather than the critic. (As well as a contrast with basically all the other stuff you’ve written on the Forum, which is consistently backed by lots of evidence.)
I would usually agree that we should play ball and not man, but I think the critiques would be mystifying unless you knew the background on what is actually driving him to write this stuff. I think it is relevant evidence that he doesn’t really believe what he is saying because eg it should influence what you should believe about how faithfully he reports what the people he criticises say. We could look into each specific claim that he makes and check how faithfully he quotes what people actually say. As it turns out, it is often not faithful and often very uncharitable. But if you know that someone’s motives are randomly to trash people who have crossed him, that should update us about how much we should trust all of the claims they make. It’s like ignoring the fact that a journalist has fabricated quotes when examining what they write, and instead just focusing on all of their object-level claims each time they write anything.
I agree that knowing someone’s personal motives can help you judge the likelihood of unproven claims they make, and should make you suspicious of any chance they have to e.g. selectively quote someone. But some of the language I’ve seen used around Torres seems to imply “if he said it, we should just ignore it”, even in cases where he actually links to sources, cites published literature, etc.
Of course, it’s much more difficult to evaluate someone’s arguments when they’ve proven untrustworthy, so I’d give an evaluation of Phil’s claims lower priority than I would evaluations of other critics who don’t share his background (all else being equal). But I don’t want them to be thrown out entirely.
I think the critiques would be mystifying unless you knew the background on what is actually driving him to write this stuff.
When Phil shares this material, I often see comments (on Twitter, Aeon, etc.) from people saying things like “yes, this is also how I feel” or “this experience you said someone had is similar to the experience I had”. You could argue that these people probably have false beliefs or biases of their own, but they don’t seem mystified, and they probably don’t share Phil’s personal background. He seems to represent a particular viewpoint/worldview that others also hold for non-vengeful reasons.
I understand that Phil Torres was banned for the forum, I think for good reason. But I don’t think that your reply here is acceptable given the norms on the forum for polite disagreement—especially because it’s both mean-spirited, and in parts simply incorrect.
That said, I am presenting the fact that his claims are being taken seriously by others, as the second article shows, and yes, steelmanning his view to an extent that I think is reasonable—especially since certain of his critiques are both anticipated by, and have been further extensively discussed by people in EA since. Regardless of whether Phil believes them—and it’s clear that he does—the critiques aren’t a fringe position outside of EA, and beating up the strawman while ignoring the many, many people who agree seems at best disingenuous.
Finally, global development has spent a huge amount of time and effort addressing the reasonable criticisms of colonialism, especially given the incredible damage that such movements have caused in many instances. (Even though it’s been positive on net, that doesn’t excuse avoidable damage—which seems remarkably similar to what I’m concerned about here.) In any case, saying that global development is also attacked, as if that means longtermists couldn’t be similarly guilty, seems like a very, very strange defense.
I don’t see how it is either mean-spirited or incorrect. Which part is incorrect?
The context is crucial here because it illustrates that he is not arguing in good faith, which is quite clear to anyone who knows the background to this.
On your last paragraph
you said: “no-one is really providing this specific bit of outside feedback [that they risk racism] to most of those groups”.
I said this wasn’t true because people eg say that global health is colonialist all the time.
You then characterise me as “saying that global development is also attacked, as if that means longtermists couldn’t be similarly guilty”.
Obviously, this was not what I was doing. I was arguing against the initial thing that you said (which you have now conceded). This is now the second time this has happened in this conversation, so I think we should probably draw this to a close.
You said he “clearly doesn’t believe what he is saying.” That was the place that seems obviously over the line, mean spirited, and incorrect. It was, of course, imputing motives, which is generally considered unacceptable. But more than that, you’re confused about what he’s saying, or you’re assuming that because he opposes some views longtermists hold, he must disagree with all of them. You need to very, very careful about reading what is said closely when you’re making such bold and insulting claims. He does not say anywhere in the linked article that engineered pandemics and AGI are not challenges, nor, in other forums, has he changed his mind about them as risks—but he does say that X-risk folks ignoring climate change is worrying, and that in his view, it is critical. And that’s a view that many others in EA share—just not the longtermists who are almost exclusively focused on X-risks. And his concerns about fanaticism are not exactly coming out of nowhere. The concern of fanaticism in longtermist thinking was brought up a half dozen times at the GPI conference earlier this week, and his concern about it seems far more strident, but is clearly understandable—even if you think, as I have said publicly and told him privately, that he’s misreading the most extreme philosophical arguments which have been proposed about longtermism as personal viewpoints held by people, rather than speculation.
to clarify, when I said he had applied for jobs at the organisations he criticises, I didn’t mean to be criticising him for that (I have also applied at jobs at many of those orgs and been rejected). My point was that it is a bit improbable that he has had such a genuine intellectual volte-face given this fact
In the second half of your comment, your analysis of the conversation, you claim that I’ve been doing something repeatedly. I think you are taking an excerpt and accidentally engaged in a motte-and-bailey—and given that the conversation took place over weeks, I assume that was because you didn’t go back and trace the entire thread. But I want to make this clearer, because I think my claims were misread.
Initially, you said of the criticism, “that also applies to people working on global development as well, and to pretty much all philanthropy.” I then agreed that “each [area] should be interested in outside feedback about whether it seems racist, or fail on other counts.” You replied that my criticism was “specific to longtermism… [but it] also applies to all social movements” I responded that “no-one is really providing this specific bit of outside feedback to most of those groups.” (And I will note that your claims until here are about “all philanthropy” and “all social movements,” no longer referring to just global development.) You said “there are also attacks on all global development charity for being colonialist.” (I disagree—there were, especially decades ago, but,) I responded, “global development has spent a huge amount of time and effort addressing the reasonable criticisms of colonialism… saying that global development is also attacked, as if that means longtermists couldn’t be similarly guilty, seems like a very, very strange defense.”
So I said everyone receiving the criticism should take it seriously. You said everyone (motte) in philanthropy is criticised in this was. I said *most of those groups* are not. You replied that global development (bailey) was criticised. I agreed—but again, pointed out that that was quite a while ago, and they have addressed the issues, i.e. did what I said EA should do. So I admitted that your bailey was correct—that an example which is not “all social movements” or “most groups” was criticised, and did the thing I said EA should do. And I’ll point out that you never went back and addressed the motte you first claimed, that it is a universal fact. Finally, “[I] then characterise [you] as “saying that global development is also attacked, as if that means longtermists couldn’t be similarly guilty.” And yes, that seems to encapsulate my point exactly.
No, because no-one is really providing this specific bit of outside feedback to most of those groups. As the post says, there have been recent attacks *on longtermism*.
there are also attacks on all global development charity for being colonialist.
Also, you are giving more credit to the critiques than they deserve.
I second David’s comment: this reply doesn’t abide by the Forum’s norms. (Specifically “other behavior that interferes with good discourse”.)
Calling for someone to be removed from the community (as I think was appropriate in Phil’s case) isn’t the same as saying we should give the same treatment to their ideas. And that’s what you seem to be doing when you link “more credit than [the critiques] deserve” to “redressing personal slights” and “doesn’t believe what he is saying”.
If you think Phil’s vendetta or personal beliefs are relevant to the reasonableness of his critique, you should explain why — it’s not clear to me what the connection is.
I think his arguments fail as arguments, and would still fail as arguments even if he believed in them sincerely. If the arguments are solid, any hypothetical bad faith seems irrelevant.
Put another way, would “Phil believes this” be important evidence in favor of the critique? If not, why does “Phil doesn’t really believe this” serve as important counterevidence?
Without the connection between Phil’s personal life and his arguments, this comment seems like a personal attack unrelated to your point. And it’s an unfortunate contrast with your other comments, which reliably engaged with the critiques rather than the critic. (As well as a contrast with basically all the other stuff you’ve written on the Forum, which is consistently backed by lots of evidence.)
I would usually agree that we should play ball and not man, but I think the critiques would be mystifying unless you knew the background on what is actually driving him to write this stuff. I think it is relevant evidence that he doesn’t really believe what he is saying because eg it should influence what you should believe about how faithfully he reports what the people he criticises say. We could look into each specific claim that he makes and check how faithfully he quotes what people actually say. As it turns out, it is often not faithful and often very uncharitable. But if you know that someone’s motives are randomly to trash people who have crossed him, that should update us about how much we should trust all of the claims they make. It’s like ignoring the fact that a journalist has fabricated quotes when examining what they write, and instead just focusing on all of their object-level claims each time they write anything.
I agree that knowing someone’s personal motives can help you judge the likelihood of unproven claims they make, and should make you suspicious of any chance they have to e.g. selectively quote someone. But some of the language I’ve seen used around Torres seems to imply “if he said it, we should just ignore it”, even in cases where he actually links to sources, cites published literature, etc.
Of course, it’s much more difficult to evaluate someone’s arguments when they’ve proven untrustworthy, so I’d give an evaluation of Phil’s claims lower priority than I would evaluations of other critics who don’t share his background (all else being equal). But I don’t want them to be thrown out entirely.
When Phil shares this material, I often see comments (on Twitter, Aeon, etc.) from people saying things like “yes, this is also how I feel” or “this experience you said someone had is similar to the experience I had”. You could argue that these people probably have false beliefs or biases of their own, but they don’t seem mystified, and they probably don’t share Phil’s personal background. He seems to represent a particular viewpoint/worldview that others also hold for non-vengeful reasons.
I understand that Phil Torres was banned for the forum, I think for good reason. But I don’t think that your reply here is acceptable given the norms on the forum for polite disagreement—especially because it’s both mean-spirited, and in parts simply incorrect.
That said, I am presenting the fact that his claims are being taken seriously by others, as the second article shows, and yes, steelmanning his view to an extent that I think is reasonable—especially since certain of his critiques are both anticipated by, and have been further extensively discussed by people in EA since. Regardless of whether Phil believes them—and it’s clear that he does—the critiques aren’t a fringe position outside of EA, and beating up the strawman while ignoring the many, many people who agree seems at best disingenuous.
Finally, global development has spent a huge amount of time and effort addressing the reasonable criticisms of colonialism, especially given the incredible damage that such movements have caused in many instances. (Even though it’s been positive on net, that doesn’t excuse avoidable damage—which seems remarkably similar to what I’m concerned about here.) In any case, saying that global development is also attacked, as if that means longtermists couldn’t be similarly guilty, seems like a very, very strange defense.
I don’t see how it is either mean-spirited or incorrect. Which part is incorrect?
The context is crucial here because it illustrates that he is not arguing in good faith, which is quite clear to anyone who knows the background to this.
On your last paragraph
you said: “no-one is really providing this specific bit of outside feedback [that they risk racism] to most of those groups”.
I said this wasn’t true because people eg say that global health is colonialist all the time.
You then characterise me as “saying that global development is also attacked, as if that means longtermists couldn’t be similarly guilty”.
Obviously, this was not what I was doing. I was arguing against the initial thing that you said (which you have now conceded). This is now the second time this has happened in this conversation, so I think we should probably draw this to a close.
You said he “clearly doesn’t believe what he is saying.” That was the place that seems obviously over the line, mean spirited, and incorrect. It was, of course, imputing motives, which is generally considered unacceptable. But more than that, you’re confused about what he’s saying, or you’re assuming that because he opposes some views longtermists hold, he must disagree with all of them. You need to very, very careful about reading what is said closely when you’re making such bold and insulting claims. He does not say anywhere in the linked article that engineered pandemics and AGI are not challenges, nor, in other forums, has he changed his mind about them as risks—but he does say that X-risk folks ignoring climate change is worrying, and that in his view, it is critical. And that’s a view that many others in EA share—just not the longtermists who are almost exclusively focused on X-risks.
And his concerns about fanaticism are not exactly coming out of nowhere. The concern of fanaticism in longtermist thinking was brought up a half dozen times at the GPI conference earlier this week, and his concern about it seems far more strident, but is clearly understandable—even if you think, as I have said publicly and told him privately, that he’s misreading the most extreme philosophical arguments which have been proposed about longtermism as personal viewpoints held by people, rather than speculation.
to clarify, when I said he had applied for jobs at the organisations he criticises, I didn’t mean to be criticising him for that (I have also applied at jobs at many of those orgs and been rejected). My point was that it is a bit improbable that he has had such a genuine intellectual volte-face given this fact
In the second half of your comment, your analysis of the conversation, you claim that I’ve been doing something repeatedly. I think you are taking an excerpt and accidentally engaged in a motte-and-bailey—and given that the conversation took place over weeks, I assume that was because you didn’t go back and trace the entire thread. But I want to make this clearer, because I think my claims were misread.
Initially, you said of the criticism, “that also applies to people working on global development as well, and to pretty much all philanthropy.”
I then agreed that “each [area] should be interested in outside feedback about whether it seems racist, or fail on other counts.”
You replied that my criticism was “specific to longtermism… [but it] also applies to all social movements”
I responded that “no-one is really providing this specific bit of outside feedback to most of those groups.” (And I will note that your claims until here are about “all philanthropy” and “all social movements,” no longer referring to just global development.)
You said “there are also attacks on all global development charity for being colonialist.” (I disagree—there were, especially decades ago, but,)
I responded, “global development has spent a huge amount of time and effort addressing the reasonable criticisms of colonialism… saying that global development is also attacked, as if that means longtermists couldn’t be similarly guilty, seems like a very, very strange defense.”
So I said everyone receiving the criticism should take it seriously. You said everyone (motte) in philanthropy is criticised in this was. I said *most of those groups* are not. You replied that global development (bailey) was criticised. I agreed—but again, pointed out that that was quite a while ago, and they have addressed the issues, i.e. did what I said EA should do. So I admitted that your bailey was correct—that an example which is not “all social movements” or “most groups” was criticised, and did the thing I said EA should do. And I’ll point out that you never went back and addressed the motte you first claimed, that it is a universal fact. Finally, “[I] then characterise [you] as “saying that global development is also attacked, as if that means longtermists couldn’t be similarly guilty.” And yes, that seems to encapsulate my point exactly.