I’m not that surprised we aren’t understanding one another, we have our own context and hang ups.
Yeah, I agree I probably didn’t get a good sense of where you were coming from. It’s interesting because, before you made the comments in this post and in the discussion here underneath, I thought you and I probably had pretty similar views. (And I still suspect that – seems like we may have talked past each other!) You said elsewhere that last year you spoke against having Hanania as a speaker. This suggested to me that even though you value truth-seeking a lot, you also seem to think there should be some other kinds of standards. I don’t think my position is that different from “truth-seeking matters a ton, but there should be some other kinds of standards.” That’s probably the primary reason I spent a bunch of time commenting on these topics: the impression that the “pro truth-seeking” faction in my view seemed to be failing to make even some pretty small/cheap concessions. (And it seemed like you were one of the few people who did make such concessions, so, I don’t know why/if it feels like we’re disagreeing a lot.)
(This is unrelated, but it’s probably good for me to separate timeless discussion about norms from an empirical discussion of “How likely is it that Hanania changed a lot compared to his former self?” I do have pessimistic-leaning intuitions about the latter, but they’re not very robust because I really haven’t looked into this topic much, and maybe I’m just prejudiced. I understand that, if someone is more informed than me and believes confidently that Hanania’s current views and personality are morally unobjectionable, it obviously wouldn’t be a “small concession” for them to disinvite or not platform someone they think is totally unobjectionable! I think that can be a defensible view depending on whether they have good reasons to be confident in these things. At the same time, the reason I thought that there were small/cheap concessions that people could make that they weirdly enough didn’t make, was that a bunch of people explicitly said things like “yeah he’s pretty racist” or “yeah he recently said things that are pretty racist” and then still proceeded to talk as though this is just normal and that excluding racists would be like excluding Peter Singer. That’s where they really lost me.)
Just as a heads-up, I’m planning to get off the EA forum for a while to avoid the time-sink issues, so I may not leave more comments here anytime soon.
It’s interesting because, before you made the comments in this post and in the discussion here underneath, I thought you and I probably had pretty similar views.
I imagine we do, though here I am sort of specifically trying to find a crux. Probably I’m being a bit grumpy about it, but all in all, I think I agree with you a lot.
This suggested to me that even though you value truth-seeking a lot, you also seem to think there should be some other kinds of standards
I agree. I’m pretty moderately of generativeness without any kinds of incentives towards kindness.
I am less sure that shaming events with unkindness is the kind of incentive we want.
seemed to be failing to make even some pretty small/cheap concessions.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I am pretty willing to make trades here. And I have done so. Though I want to know what the trades are beforehand.
I don’t really consider the “concessions” so far to be trades as such, I just think that a norm against racism is really valuable and we should allow people to break it only at much greater cost than we’ve seen. Though I take up that issue with manifest internally rather than on here.
I don’t know why/if it feels like we’re disagreeing a lot.
I am trying to figure out the underlying disagreement, which I think causes me to cut in a different direction than I normally would.
I’m planning to get off the EA forum for a while to avoid the time-sink issues, so I may not leave more comments here anytime soon.
Yeah, I agree I probably didn’t get a good sense of where you were coming from. It’s interesting because, before you made the comments in this post and in the discussion here underneath, I thought you and I probably had pretty similar views. (And I still suspect that – seems like we may have talked past each other!) You said elsewhere that last year you spoke against having Hanania as a speaker. This suggested to me that even though you value truth-seeking a lot, you also seem to think there should be some other kinds of standards. I don’t think my position is that different from “truth-seeking matters a ton, but there should be some other kinds of standards.” That’s probably the primary reason I spent a bunch of time commenting on these topics: the impression that the “pro truth-seeking” faction in my view seemed to be failing to make even some pretty small/cheap concessions. (And it seemed like you were one of the few people who did make such concessions, so, I don’t know why/if it feels like we’re disagreeing a lot.)
(This is unrelated, but it’s probably good for me to separate timeless discussion about norms from an empirical discussion of “How likely is it that Hanania changed a lot compared to his former self?” I do have pessimistic-leaning intuitions about the latter, but they’re not very robust because I really haven’t looked into this topic much, and maybe I’m just prejudiced. I understand that, if someone is more informed than me and believes confidently that Hanania’s current views and personality are morally unobjectionable, it obviously wouldn’t be a “small concession” for them to disinvite or not platform someone they think is totally unobjectionable! I think that can be a defensible view depending on whether they have good reasons to be confident in these things. At the same time, the reason I thought that there were small/cheap concessions that people could make that they weirdly enough didn’t make, was that a bunch of people explicitly said things like “yeah he’s pretty racist” or “yeah he recently said things that are pretty racist” and then still proceeded to talk as though this is just normal and that excluding racists would be like excluding Peter Singer. That’s where they really lost me.)
Just as a heads-up, I’m planning to get off the EA forum for a while to avoid the time-sink issues, so I may not leave more comments here anytime soon.
On our interactions:
I imagine we do, though here I am sort of specifically trying to find a crux. Probably I’m being a bit grumpy about it, but all in all, I think I agree with you a lot.
I agree. I’m pretty moderately of generativeness without any kinds of incentives towards kindness.
I am less sure that shaming events with unkindness is the kind of incentive we want.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I am pretty willing to make trades here. And I have done so. Though I want to know what the trades are beforehand.
I don’t really consider the “concessions” so far to be trades as such, I just think that a norm against racism is really valuable and we should allow people to break it only at much greater cost than we’ve seen. Though I take up that issue with manifest internally rather than on here.
I am trying to figure out the underlying disagreement, which I think causes me to cut in a different direction than I normally would.
Fair play.