The post was likely downvoted because it conflicts with principles of empathy, cooperation, and intellectual rigor. Defending bullying, even provocatively, clashes with commonly held beliefs. The zero-sum framing of status is overly simplistic, ignoring positive-sum approaches. The provocative style comes off as antagonistic. Reframing the argument around prosocial accountability might get more positive responses.
Getting down-voted to −27 is an achievement. Most things judged ‘bad AI takes’ only go to −11 or so, even that recent P=NP proof only got to −25. Of course, if the author is right, then downvoting further is providing helpful incentives to him.
I think that bullying is quite distinct from status hierarchies. The latter are unavoidable. There will always be some clique of cool kids in the class who will not invite the non-cool kids to their parties. This is ok. Sometimes, status is correlated with behaviors which are pro-social (kids not smoking; donating to EA), sometimes it is correlated with behaviors which are net-negative (kids smoking; serving in the SS). I was not part of the cool kids circle, and I was fine with that. Live and let live and all that.
‘Bullying’ has a distinct negative connotation. The central example is someone who is targeted for sport for being different from the others. The bullies don’t want the victims to change their ways, they just like to make their life miserable for thrills. I am sure that sometimes it unintentionally helps their victim, if you push enough people, at some point you are bound to push someone out of the path of a car or bullet. In the grand scheme of things, the bullies are however net negative for their victims and society overall.
The post was likely downvoted because it conflicts with principles of empathy, cooperation, and intellectual rigor. Defending bullying, even provocatively, clashes with commonly held beliefs. The zero-sum framing of status is overly simplistic, ignoring positive-sum approaches. The provocative style comes off as antagonistic. Reframing the argument around prosocial accountability might get more positive responses.
Getting down-voted to −27 is an achievement. Most things judged ‘bad AI takes’ only go to −11 or so, even that recent P=NP proof only got to −25. Of course, if the author is right, then downvoting further is providing helpful incentives to him.
I think that bullying is quite distinct from status hierarchies. The latter are unavoidable. There will always be some clique of cool kids in the class who will not invite the non-cool kids to their parties. This is ok. Sometimes, status is correlated with behaviors which are pro-social (kids not smoking; donating to EA), sometimes it is correlated with behaviors which are net-negative (kids smoking; serving in the SS). I was not part of the cool kids circle, and I was fine with that. Live and let live and all that.
‘Bullying’ has a distinct negative connotation. The central example is someone who is targeted for sport for being different from the others. The bullies don’t want the victims to change their ways, they just like to make their life miserable for thrills. I am sure that sometimes it unintentionally helps their victim, if you push enough people, at some point you are bound to push someone out of the path of a car or bullet. In the grand scheme of things, the bullies are however net negative for their victims and society overall.
“Bullying has distinct negative connotation”
I mention the concept of Russell Conjugation multiple times in my article. Did you read it?
“Bullies have bad intentions”
Intentions don’t matter, results do. That’s why capitalism works