You start by talking about the Overton window and then speak about controversial statements. A statement out of the Overton window is not only controversial but is so in a way that violates the window.
There are a lot of controversial claims that you can make about AI timelines but those claims are not out of the overturn window within the rationality community.
By the nature those statements that actually are outside of the Overton window make the person lose status by voicing them. In our community believing in the Christian god would be outside of the overturn window and there are good reasons why someone might not want to share such a belief.
Nothing in your post involves taking actions to make it safe to share those opinions.
My intuition is that there is a gradient from controversial statements to this-will-cause-unrecoverable-social-status damage. I think I might have implicitly employed a ‘softer’ definition of Overton window as ‘statements that make others or yourself uncomfortable to express/debate’, where the ‘harder’ definition would be statements you can’t socially recover from. I think intuitively I wouldn’t presume anyone wants to share the latter and I don’t see much benefit in doing so. But overall, my concept of Overton window is much more gradient than a binary, and this exercise aims to allow people to stretch through the (perceived) low range.
To add to this: Expressing belief in the Christian god will be still relatively harmless. It would cost you some professional status because people would think you are not very smart. But expressing other beliefs outside the Overton window may make people think you are actively evil or at least very immoral. As a historical example, expressing disbelief in God was once such a case. For such (supposedly) immoral beliefs you may lose a lot more status, and not just status. You might get cancelled or excluded from your social circles, lose job opportunities etc.
Pushing the Overton window is a delicate game: It is only rational to infrequently push it a little and no more. Otherwise the risks will outweigh the rewards.
Yes, agreed. The technique is only aimed at the “soft” edge of this, where people might in reality even disagree if something is still in or outside the Overton Window. I do think a gradient-type model of controversiality is a more realistic model of how people are socially penalized than a binary model. The exercise is not aimed at sharing views that would lead to heavy social penalties indeed, and I don’t think anyone would benefit from running it that way. It’s a very relevant distinction you are raising.
As I understand the Overton window it refers to mainstream opinions. Using Treviños degrees of acceptance they can be either Policy, Popular or Sensible. Outside the Overton window you have Acceptable, Radical and Unthinkable. In the general population a politician from a major party who wants to stay in office will only move within the Overton window. But not everyone is forced to stay within it, there may be quite large groups within the population that accept more controversial (e.g. “Radical”) statements, but for the time being you will be denied mainstream appeal if you voice such opinions.
One such “Acceptable/Radical” example within the Rationality community could be “AI safety is overrated”. The “Christian god” example would probably fall under “Unthinkable”.
I agree that taking action to make it safe to share even very controversial opinions would be good. Do you have a suggestion?
tl;dr My understanding of the Overton window does not imply that every opinion outside it will make you lose significant status.
Originally the Overton window is about opinions that politicians can express without losing status. Most people have a wider range of what they can express without losing status than politicians.
The concept that certain opinions are not expressible applies to any discourse community. If you speak about the Overton window of the rationality community then it’s those opinions that can’t be expressed in our community without losing status.
“AI safety is overrated” is an opinion that I have heard from people at the community weekend even without going to the Overton Gymnastics session. It’s controversial but it’s an opinion that does get argued within the existing disourse.
Are you saying that any statement outside the Overton window always makes you lose status but more normal controversial (that not everyone agrees with) statements do not make you lose status?
I’m not sure how I feel about this. On some level I think that most controversial opinion will make you lose status with some people (sometimes most of them) but at the same time gain status with others.
Also it seems like a narrower view of what the Overton window is than I have, but it’s totally possible that your view is in fact more accurate and closer to what Overton intended.
FWIW when I did this exercise at the LWCW in our small group we were discussing opinions that are outside the mainstream social western European Overton window, not outside the Rationality-community Overton window. That makes it easier, though maybe less interesting or valuable.
The word controversial implies in its nature controversy which means debate.
Overton was speaking about politicians.
If you take an example like LSD legalization, it was unthinkable for a mainstream politician to speak about it 10 years ago.
There were no controversies about mainstream politicians advocating LSD legalization. It was just something that wasn’t done. Today, I would guess LSD legalization is in the bucket of radical positions. It’s however also not a position that faces a lot of controversies.
You start by talking about the Overton window and then speak about controversial statements. A statement out of the Overton window is not only controversial but is so in a way that violates the window.
There are a lot of controversial claims that you can make about AI timelines but those claims are not out of the overturn window within the rationality community.
By the nature those statements that actually are outside of the Overton window make the person lose status by voicing them. In our community believing in the Christian god would be outside of the overturn window and there are good reasons why someone might not want to share such a belief.
Nothing in your post involves taking actions to make it safe to share those opinions.
My intuition is that there is a gradient from controversial statements to this-will-cause-unrecoverable-social-status damage. I think I might have implicitly employed a ‘softer’ definition of Overton window as ‘statements that make others or yourself uncomfortable to express/debate’, where the ‘harder’ definition would be statements you can’t socially recover from. I think intuitively I wouldn’t presume anyone wants to share the latter and I don’t see much benefit in doing so. But overall, my concept of Overton window is much more gradient than a binary, and this exercise aims to allow people to stretch through the (perceived) low range.
To add to this: Expressing belief in the Christian god will be still relatively harmless. It would cost you some professional status because people would think you are not very smart. But expressing other beliefs outside the Overton window may make people think you are actively evil or at least very immoral. As a historical example, expressing disbelief in God was once such a case. For such (supposedly) immoral beliefs you may lose a lot more status, and not just status. You might get cancelled or excluded from your social circles, lose job opportunities etc.
Pushing the Overton window is a delicate game: It is only rational to infrequently push it a little and no more. Otherwise the risks will outweigh the rewards.
Yes, agreed. The technique is only aimed at the “soft” edge of this, where people might in reality even disagree if something is still in or outside the Overton Window. I do think a gradient-type model of controversiality is a more realistic model of how people are socially penalized than a binary model. The exercise is not aimed at sharing views that would lead to heavy social penalties indeed, and I don’t think anyone would benefit from running it that way. It’s a very relevant distinction you are raising.
As I understand the Overton window it refers to mainstream opinions. Using Treviños degrees of acceptance they can be either Policy, Popular or Sensible. Outside the Overton window you have Acceptable, Radical and Unthinkable. In the general population a politician from a major party who wants to stay in office will only move within the Overton window. But not everyone is forced to stay within it, there may be quite large groups within the population that accept more controversial (e.g. “Radical”) statements, but for the time being you will be denied mainstream appeal if you voice such opinions.
One such “Acceptable/Radical” example within the Rationality community could be “AI safety is overrated”. The “Christian god” example would probably fall under “Unthinkable”.
I agree that taking action to make it safe to share even very controversial opinions would be good. Do you have a suggestion?
tl;dr My understanding of the Overton window does not imply that every opinion outside it will make you lose significant status.
The Chatham house rule is a standard way to make it more safe for people to voice controversial opinions.
Originally the Overton window is about opinions that politicians can express without losing status. Most people have a wider range of what they can express without losing status than politicians.
The concept that certain opinions are not expressible applies to any discourse community. If you speak about the Overton window of the rationality community then it’s those opinions that can’t be expressed in our community without losing status.
“AI safety is overrated” is an opinion that I have heard from people at the community weekend even without going to the Overton Gymnastics session. It’s controversial but it’s an opinion that does get argued within the existing disourse.
Are you saying that any statement outside the Overton window always makes you lose status but more normal controversial (that not everyone agrees with) statements do not make you lose status?
I’m not sure how I feel about this. On some level I think that most controversial opinion will make you lose status with some people (sometimes most of them) but at the same time gain status with others.
Also it seems like a narrower view of what the Overton window is than I have, but it’s totally possible that your view is in fact more accurate and closer to what Overton intended.
FWIW when I did this exercise at the LWCW in our small group we were discussing opinions that are outside the mainstream social western European Overton window, not outside the Rationality-community Overton window. That makes it easier, though maybe less interesting or valuable.
The word controversial implies in its nature controversy which means debate.
Overton was speaking about politicians.
If you take an example like LSD legalization, it was unthinkable for a mainstream politician to speak about it 10 years ago.
There were no controversies about mainstream politicians advocating LSD legalization. It was just something that wasn’t done. Today, I would guess LSD legalization is in the bucket of radical positions. It’s however also not a position that faces a lot of controversies.