I think the actual situation is something like this.
Eugine believes that there are systematic (statistical) mental differences between men and women, between black people and white people, etc.
I think the LW consensus on this, in so far as there is one, is that there probably are such differences.
I suspect most LW participants would estimate smaller differences than Eugine would.
Eugine seems to love to talk about these differences and to trot them out as his preferred explanation for anything anyone might otherwise explain as racism, sexism, etc. Most LW participants do not have that preference.
Eugine believes that departures from traditional norms of sexuality and gender are Bad: boo to homosexuality, boo squared to transgenderism, etc.
I think the LW consensus on this is squarely against him.
And those are pretty much all the issues that Eugine posts a lot about. He may well have strong and/or interesting opinions on many other topics, but it seems that what he mostly wants to talk about is the inferiority of black people and the contemptibility of transgender people. (This wasn’t always true. Compare the first page of The_Lion’s user overview with that of, say, Eugine_Nier’s.)
To echo OrphanWilde, Eugine’s views on empirics are typically well-supported by the facts, and you’ll find people like me making similar points in similar places. He’s also been around a long time, and has made a large number of good comments, and is a good source of rationality quotes.
The trouble is almost entirely the vote manipulation.
It seems to me that he often makes a huge generalization (of something that in the non-generalized form is a useful insight), and often makes the comment unnecessarily rude.
Simply, there is a difference between saying “when judging a population’s share in e.g. Nobel prizes, you should consider that some of them may be politically motivated, especially when we don’t talk hard science” and saying “black people contribute nothing; even all their Nobel prizes are political”. Eugine always chooses the latter form.
Rudeness is sometimes necessary, otherwise the Overton window of what can be mentioned in a polite society shifts:
There are facts that were once known, sometimes generally known, that are now known to but a few. Some of this information loss is caused by changes in occupational patterns – farmers automatically know something about heritability, clerks and workers in dark satanic mills, not so much.
But mostly these facts are unpleasant, at least to some ears. People who mention such facts are punished – generally in terms of their careers, not being invited to parties, etc. That’s enough to cause a 10 or 20-fold drop in visibility, which ought to tell you something about how brave people are. Many people assume that everyone is secretly aware of those unpleasant facts, but that is not the case. A generation that has grown up never hearing those facts will be almost entirely unaware of them, in part because their personal life experiences don’t impinge on those patterns much. This means that they can and sometimes do make serious mistakes that those ‘secretly aware’ types never would.
I submit that if Viliam hadn’t understood that he wouldn’t have felt the need to say ”… unnecessarily rude”.
Do you think it is at all likely that by writing the way he does Eugine is keeping LW’s Overton window in a better place than it would be if he stated equivalent opinions without going out of his way to offend?
“Unnecessarily rude” is like “excessive force” or “inadequate approach”, if you accept the expression you accept that the subject is wrong by definition.
I think that politeness is not an unalloyed virtue and that being rude can be useful. I am, of course, not saying that every time you have the opportunity to be rude, you should.
if you accept the expression you accept that the subject is wrong by definition
I don’t agree. There is such a thing as being unnecessarily pedantic, but there are situations where pedantry is very much called for (say, reviewing the specifications for a communications protocol to be used in nuclear reactor software). There is such a thing as being unnecessarily sexually explicit, but there are situations where being sexually explicit is very much called for (say, while having sex).
I do agree that saying “unnecessarily X” carries a suggestion that X is usually not a good thing in ordinary circumstances. Personally I’m quite comfortable saying that about rudeness (while vigorously agreeing that there are situations in which rudeness is called for); do you disagree?
that politeness is not an unalloyed virtue and that being rude can be useful
I very much agree. I would guess that Viliam does too. (We may not agree on how often being rude is useful.)
Greg Cochran
Yeah, I’d classify that as needless obnoxiousness, and it certainly doesn’t make me think better of Cochran, think worse of his opponents, or think him more likely to be right. More specifically, if I compare my mental models of (1) someone who holds Cochran’s opinions as the result of impartial scientific investigation and (2) someone who holds Cochran’s opinions partly because he’s always been inclined towards white supremacism and is glad to have some scientific-looking backup for it, #2 seems distinctly more likely to write that sort of thing than #1, so I update Pr(Cochran’s opinions are not substantially influenced by prior prejudice) down just a little.
I doubt Cochran cares what I think of him, and he may well have sufficient reasons of his own for being obnoxious in that fashion. (E.g., I expect it helps to stir up enthusiasm in readers who are already convinced he’s right.) But in so far as Cochran cares about persuading those who are not yet fully convinced members of Team Cochran, I guess that that sort of rudeness is counterproductive.
We may not agree on how often being rude is useful.
That is probable. I like to sharpen the point till it gets to be very very sharp. Can lead to bleeding.
in so far as Cochran cares about persuading those who are not yet fully convinced members of Team Cochran, I guess that that sort of rudeness is counterproductive
I don’t think he’s running a marketing campaign or is attempting to jumpstart a grassroots movement. He’s more likely to be raising a flag to see who rallies to it. Or maybe he just likes to grumble and snark :-)
Social norms of politeness vary. By the usual ’net norms the discussion on LW (including Eugine) is very polite.
Pointing out that black people don’t get Nobels in hard sciences because the right tail of their IQ distribution doesn’t reach that far is highly politically incorrect and might well be rude in the sense of making participants in the conversation uncomfortable, but that’s precisely the valuable sense of which West Hunter speaks.
Some of us are -very- opposed to his views, and for reasons which probably to some extent come down to politics, we tend to fight him a little harder than those who are merely opposed to his tactics.
Hm. I understood otherwise.
I think the actual situation is something like this.
Eugine believes that there are systematic (statistical) mental differences between men and women, between black people and white people, etc.
I think the LW consensus on this, in so far as there is one, is that there probably are such differences.
I suspect most LW participants would estimate smaller differences than Eugine would.
Eugine seems to love to talk about these differences and to trot them out as his preferred explanation for anything anyone might otherwise explain as racism, sexism, etc. Most LW participants do not have that preference.
Eugine believes that departures from traditional norms of sexuality and gender are Bad: boo to homosexuality, boo squared to transgenderism, etc.
I think the LW consensus on this is squarely against him.
And those are pretty much all the issues that Eugine posts a lot about. He may well have strong and/or interesting opinions on many other topics, but it seems that what he mostly wants to talk about is the inferiority of black people and the contemptibility of transgender people. (This wasn’t always true. Compare the first page of The_Lion’s user overview with that of, say, Eugine_Nier’s.)
To echo OrphanWilde, Eugine’s views on empirics are typically well-supported by the facts, and you’ll find people like me making similar points in similar places. He’s also been around a long time, and has made a large number of good comments, and is a good source of rationality quotes.
The trouble is almost entirely the vote manipulation.
It seems to me that he often makes a huge generalization (of something that in the non-generalized form is a useful insight), and often makes the comment unnecessarily rude.
Simply, there is a difference between saying “when judging a population’s share in e.g. Nobel prizes, you should consider that some of them may be politically motivated, especially when we don’t talk hard science” and saying “black people contribute nothing; even all their Nobel prizes are political”. Eugine always chooses the latter form.
Rudeness is sometimes necessary, otherwise the Overton window of what can be mentioned in a polite society shifts:
(West Hunter)
Greg Cochran, by the way, tends to be rude.
I submit that if Viliam hadn’t understood that he wouldn’t have felt the need to say ”… unnecessarily rude”.
Do you think it is at all likely that by writing the way he does Eugine is keeping LW’s Overton window in a better place than it would be if he stated equivalent opinions without going out of his way to offend?
“Unnecessarily rude” is like “excessive force” or “inadequate approach”, if you accept the expression you accept that the subject is wrong by definition.
I think that politeness is not an unalloyed virtue and that being rude can be useful. I am, of course, not saying that every time you have the opportunity to be rude, you should.
Since I’m quoting Greg Cochran, here’s more on the topic.
“”Maelcum a rude boy, Case.” X-)
I don’t agree. There is such a thing as being unnecessarily pedantic, but there are situations where pedantry is very much called for (say, reviewing the specifications for a communications protocol to be used in nuclear reactor software). There is such a thing as being unnecessarily sexually explicit, but there are situations where being sexually explicit is very much called for (say, while having sex).
I do agree that saying “unnecessarily X” carries a suggestion that X is usually not a good thing in ordinary circumstances. Personally I’m quite comfortable saying that about rudeness (while vigorously agreeing that there are situations in which rudeness is called for); do you disagree?
I very much agree. I would guess that Viliam does too. (We may not agree on how often being rude is useful.)
Yeah, I’d classify that as needless obnoxiousness, and it certainly doesn’t make me think better of Cochran, think worse of his opponents, or think him more likely to be right. More specifically, if I compare my mental models of (1) someone who holds Cochran’s opinions as the result of impartial scientific investigation and (2) someone who holds Cochran’s opinions partly because he’s always been inclined towards white supremacism and is glad to have some scientific-looking backup for it, #2 seems distinctly more likely to write that sort of thing than #1, so I update Pr(Cochran’s opinions are not substantially influenced by prior prejudice) down just a little.
I doubt Cochran cares what I think of him, and he may well have sufficient reasons of his own for being obnoxious in that fashion. (E.g., I expect it helps to stir up enthusiasm in readers who are already convinced he’s right.) But in so far as Cochran cares about persuading those who are not yet fully convinced members of Team Cochran, I guess that that sort of rudeness is counterproductive.
That is probable. I like to sharpen the point till it gets to be very very sharp. Can lead to bleeding.
I don’t think he’s running a marketing campaign or is attempting to jumpstart a grassroots movement. He’s more likely to be raising a flag to see who rallies to it. Or maybe he just likes to grumble and snark :-)
there is a rudeness beyond mentioning facts
Social norms of politeness vary. By the usual ’net norms the discussion on LW (including Eugine) is very polite.
Pointing out that black people don’t get Nobels in hard sciences because the right tail of their IQ distribution doesn’t reach that far is highly politically incorrect and might well be rude in the sense of making participants in the conversation uncomfortable, but that’s precisely the valuable sense of which West Hunter speaks.
I thought we don’t follow the usual net norms here.
Some of us are -very- opposed to his views, and for reasons which probably to some extent come down to politics, we tend to fight him a little harder than those who are merely opposed to his tactics.
I agree with OrphanWilde, it’s not about the views, it’s about the methods he’s using.