I still have very little idea what you mean by ‘objectification’ and ‘objectify people’.
I was momentarily off-put by Roko’s comment on the desire to have sex with extremely attractive women that money and status would get. This was because of:
the focus on sex, whereas I would desire a relationship.
the connotation of ‘attractive’ which in my mind usually means physical attractiveness, whereas my preferences are dominated by other features of women.
the modifier ‘extremely’ which seems to imply a large difference in utility placed on sex with extremely attractive women vs. very attractive or moderately attractive women, especially when followed by identifying this desire as a generator for desiring high social status rather than vice versa or discussing both directions of causation. (The latter would have made more sense to me in the context of Roko saying we should value social influential power.)
I had negative associations attached to Roko’s comment because I started imagining myself with my preferences adopting Roko’s suggestions. However, I wouldn’t have voiced these negative associations in any phrases along the lines of ‘objectificaton’ or ‘objectifying’, or in terms of any moral concerns. The use of the word ‘get’ by itself did not strike me as particularly out of place any more than talk of ‘getting a girlfriend/boyfriend’.
I’m sorry you don’t understand where I’m coming from. I don’t have any bright ideas about how to make it less ambiguous.
the focus on sex, whereas I would desire a relationship.
Is there some reason you are put off when others don’t share your desires? If the desire in question was something like “I desire to behave ethically” that would be okay, but there doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with wanting sex but no relationship. There are ethical ways to pursue that desire.
the connotation of ‘attractive’ which in my mind usually means physical attractiveness, whereas my preferences are dominated by other features of women.
It’s certainly nice that your attraction isn’t dominated solely by physical features, but that isn’t actually what “attractive” means on a reliable enough basis that I thought it was worth bringing up. Even if “conventionally physically attractive” was what Roko meant, there doesn’t seem to be anything obviously wrong with that in light of the focus on sex over a relationship. One person can want to have no-strings-attached sex with multiple conventionally physically attractive women and I can want to settle down in a long-term relationship with a bespectacled dark-haired person with an IQ over 120 and there is no reason to think that these desires can’t both be okay simultaneously.
the modifier ‘extremely’ which seems to imply a large difference in utility placed on sex with extremely attractive women vs. very attractive or moderately attractive women
I don’t see this as any more problematic than the mention of attractiveness in the first place. If it’s okay for me to want a spouse with an IQ over 120, presumably it’d be okay for me to want a spouse with an IQ over 140, it’d just make a person satisfying my criteria trickier to find; the same would be true if Roko or anyone else wants to have sex with women several standard deviations above the physical attractiveness mean.
The use of the word ‘get’ by itself did not strike me as particularly out of place any more than talk of ‘getting a girlfriend/boyfriend’.
Not more than, but “getting a [girl/boy]friend” isn’t unloaded language either… (I have been known to use the word “obtain” with respect to a hypothetical future spouse myself, but that’s mostly because “marry” would sound redundant.)
Not more than, but “getting a [girl/boy]friend” isn’t unloaded language either… (I have been known to use the word “obtain” with respect to a hypothetical future spouse myself, but that’s mostly because “marry” would sound redundant.)
Then why is “getting” objectionable? I (obviously) don’t “get” it, no pun intended.
Is there some reason you are put off when others don’t share your desires?
Read Roko’s comment again and you’ll realize that Wu wei is quite justified in being put off by it. Roko was implying that people who do not adopt these specific values are setting themselves up for failure at their goals due to not being motivated enough.
In my opinion, Roko’s whole argument reeks of availability bias. People who have attained more wealth and social status are certainly more salient to us, but this doesn’t make them more influential by real-world measures. Still, money makes the world go round and having more wealthy philanthropists who can look beyond warm fuzzies to actual utilons created would be a very good thing.
I had negative associations attached to Roko’s comment because I started imagining myself with my preferences adopting Roko’s suggestions.
This sentence was meant to explain why I was momentarily off-put. I did not mean to imply that I have any ethical problems with the desires mentioned (I don’t), though now that you mention it, I wouldn’t be too surprised if I do retain some knee-jerk ethical intuitions against them.
I still have very little idea what you mean by ‘objectification’ and ‘objectify people’.
I was momentarily off-put by Roko’s comment on the desire to have sex with extremely attractive women that money and status would get. This was because of:
the focus on sex, whereas I would desire a relationship.
the connotation of ‘attractive’ which in my mind usually means physical attractiveness, whereas my preferences are dominated by other features of women.
the modifier ‘extremely’ which seems to imply a large difference in utility placed on sex with extremely attractive women vs. very attractive or moderately attractive women, especially when followed by identifying this desire as a generator for desiring high social status rather than vice versa or discussing both directions of causation. (The latter would have made more sense to me in the context of Roko saying we should value social influential power.)
I had negative associations attached to Roko’s comment because I started imagining myself with my preferences adopting Roko’s suggestions. However, I wouldn’t have voiced these negative associations in any phrases along the lines of ‘objectificaton’ or ‘objectifying’, or in terms of any moral concerns. The use of the word ‘get’ by itself did not strike me as particularly out of place any more than talk of ‘getting a girlfriend/boyfriend’.
I’m sorry you don’t understand where I’m coming from. I don’t have any bright ideas about how to make it less ambiguous.
Is there some reason you are put off when others don’t share your desires? If the desire in question was something like “I desire to behave ethically” that would be okay, but there doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with wanting sex but no relationship. There are ethical ways to pursue that desire.
It’s certainly nice that your attraction isn’t dominated solely by physical features, but that isn’t actually what “attractive” means on a reliable enough basis that I thought it was worth bringing up. Even if “conventionally physically attractive” was what Roko meant, there doesn’t seem to be anything obviously wrong with that in light of the focus on sex over a relationship. One person can want to have no-strings-attached sex with multiple conventionally physically attractive women and I can want to settle down in a long-term relationship with a bespectacled dark-haired person with an IQ over 120 and there is no reason to think that these desires can’t both be okay simultaneously.
I don’t see this as any more problematic than the mention of attractiveness in the first place. If it’s okay for me to want a spouse with an IQ over 120, presumably it’d be okay for me to want a spouse with an IQ over 140, it’d just make a person satisfying my criteria trickier to find; the same would be true if Roko or anyone else wants to have sex with women several standard deviations above the physical attractiveness mean.
Not more than, but “getting a [girl/boy]friend” isn’t unloaded language either… (I have been known to use the word “obtain” with respect to a hypothetical future spouse myself, but that’s mostly because “marry” would sound redundant.)
Then why is “getting” objectionable? I (obviously) don’t “get” it, no pun intended.
Read Roko’s comment again and you’ll realize that Wu wei is quite justified in being put off by it. Roko was implying that people who do not adopt these specific values are setting themselves up for failure at their goals due to not being motivated enough.
In my opinion, Roko’s whole argument reeks of availability bias. People who have attained more wealth and social status are certainly more salient to us, but this doesn’t make them more influential by real-world measures. Still, money makes the world go round and having more wealthy philanthropists who can look beyond warm fuzzies to actual utilons created would be a very good thing.
This sentence was meant to explain why I was momentarily off-put. I did not mean to imply that I have any ethical problems with the desires mentioned (I don’t), though now that you mention it, I wouldn’t be too surprised if I do retain some knee-jerk ethical intuitions against them.