This statement is roughly equivalent to “My opinions on topic X are soundly arrived at”.
Perhaps, but I set forth the basis of my reasoning in a blog post elsewhere. So I did more than simply assert a conclusion.
Since this branch of the discussion has fallen below the comment threshhold, I am happy to discuss things here.
In any event, would you apply the same criticism to cupholder’s atheism?
to a first approximation, zero useful or interesting content at this time
If you believe that what I stated was not useful or interesting, then you should not mind stipulating for the sake of argument that the facts I state there are correct. Agreed?
Meanwhile you have wasted the time and attention of many LW readers as you submitted cupholder to an interrogation that would have tried anyone’s patience.
Unfortunately cupholder was rather evasive in our discussion. That’s his fault not mine.
If you felt my answers to your questions were unsatisfactory, it would have been more helpful to have made that more explicit at the time, instead of working through your long-winded Socratic dialogue and taking an unsubstantiated potshot at me.
Me: Sure; also there is hearsay documentary evidence (the Bible) and apparently even some scientific studies which supposedly demonstrate the power of prayer.
But by what standard do you reject such evidence?
You: Rejecting an interpretation of the evidence != rejecting evidence
Me: :shrug: By what standard do you evaluate this evidence so as to reach your atheistic conclusion notwithstanding this evidence for the existence of God?
It’s pretty obvious in this context what it means to “reject evidence,” but you chose an interpretation which let you avoid the question. i.e. you were evasive.
Anyway, I didn’t make an issue out of your evasiveness until somebody made an issue out of the length of our exchange.
It’s pretty obvious in this context what it means to “reject evidence,”
Indeed, and that context happens to include this question preceding the first one you quoted there:
And do you agree that there exists weak evidence for the existence of God?
which implies that you thought there was a significant chance that I didn’t believe there was evidence of God. (Otherwise, why would you have bothered asking?) So when you subsequently implied that I ‘reject such evidence’ of God, it was quite reasonable to interpret it as literally just that—rejecting the evidence qua evidence—because you had just implied that you were open to the possibility that I denied evidence of God in general.
Anyway, I didn’t make an issue out of your evasiveness until somebody made an issue out of the length of our exchange.
which implies that you thought there was a significant chance that I didn’t believe there was evidence of God. (Otherwise, why would you have bothered asking?) So when you subsequently implied that I ‘reject such evidence’ of God, it was quite reasonable to interpret it as literally just that—rejecting the evidence qua evidence—because you had just implied that you were open to the possibility that I denied evidence of God in general.
Lol, you are being silly. We had both agreed that the evidence exists and then I asked why you rejected it. It was completely obvious what I meant.
Lol, you are being silly. We had both agreed that the evidence exists and then I asked why you rejected it.
You seem to be writing as if acknowledging the existence of evidence and rejecting evidence are mutually exclusive. Perhaps that is how you understand acknowledging that evidence exists v. rejecting evidence, but that’s a new understanding to me.
I’m not asserting that you asked me if I believed there was no evidence of God (which is the ~X you have in mind, as far as I can tell). I’m asserting that you asked me whether I rejected evidence of God.
A second thing. It’s plain to me that at this point this argument is capable of going around in circles forever (if it hasn’t gone into a full-on death spiral already), and I’m not interested in engaging you on this point indefinitely. I’m not going to continue this subthread after this comment.
I’m not asserting that you asked me if I believed there was no evidence of God (which is the ~X you have in mind, as far as I can tell). I’m asserting that you asked me whether I rejected evidence of God.
But according to you, I implied that rejecting evidence of God excludes the possibility of acknowledging the existence of that evidence.
However I made no such implication.
and I’m not interested in engaging you on this point indefinitely. I’m not going to continue this subthread after this comment.
That’s fine . . . I don’t engage with people who strawman me.
I’m not. This style of argumentation is ineffective and wasteful of people’s time, and I’m unhappy, bordering on angry, that it has gone on that long. I prefer to let this emotion find a productive outlet, namely a top-level post to put a name to the pattern I prefer, so as to encourage more useful discussions in future.
Unfortunately cupholder was rather evasive in our discussion
Would you like to see some evidence? I’m happy to provide it.
Blame. Irrelevant to truth-seeking.
If blame is irrelevant to truth-seeking, then why are you accusing me (and not cupholder) of “wasting time and attention”?
Anyway, please answer my questions:
(1) Would you apply the same criticism to cupholder’s atheism?
(2) If you believe that what I stated was not useful or interesting, then you should not mind stipulating for the sake of argument that the facts I state there are correct. Agreed?
If you actually have evidence, simply lay it out as soon as it might be relevant.
I disagree with this. It takes time and energy to gather evidence. I don’t care to spend my time and energy digging up evidence unless somebody seriously throws down the gauntlet. Just stating “Claim. Unsupported by evidence” -- without indicating an interest in engaging—is not enough for me. Besides, it would have been easy enough for the poster to come back and say “yes, show me a quote please.”
I would say that you are presenting what’s known as a “false dilemma,” i.e. your statement assumes that there are only two possibilities: either (1) I have the evidence in which case it costs me nothing to present it; or (2) I don’t in which case it is dishonest for me to offer to present evidence.
Of course there is another possibility, which is that I am reasonably confident I can present the evidence, but it will take me time and energy to gather and present it.
For example, suppose I bought a toaster a month ago; it breaks; I call up the store to get it fixed; and the store manager says “We can’t help you since you aren’t the original purchaser.” Before I spend 20 minutes finding the credit card receipt, I’m going to ask the guy “Would you like to see proof that I bought the toaster?”
If you don’t yet have evidence, it’s not dishonest to offer to find and present it, but it is dishonest to claim that you already have it, since by making that claim you’re claiming something that’s not true—namely that you have already confirmed that the evidence exists.
Is it dishonest to offer to present evidence when you are confident you can gather it?
For example, in the toaster scenario, is it dishonest to offer to produce proof that you bought the toaster? (Assume for the sake of argument that you save all of your receipts religiously and you are quite confident that you can produce the receipt if you are willing to take 20 minutes to rummage through your old receipts.)
Is it dishonest to offer to present evidence when you are confident you can gather it?
If you offer it in such a way as to assert that you already have it, yes.
If I know that someone has a certain amount of evidence for a certain thing, then seeing that evidence myself doesn’t tell me much—knowing that the evidence exists is almost as good as gathering it myself. (This is what makes scientific studies work, so that people don’t have to test every theory by themselves.) But knowing that someone thinks that a certain amount of evidence exists for a certain thing is much weaker, and actually seeing the evidence in this case tells me much more, because it’s not particularly unusual for people to be wrong about this kind of thing, even when they claim to be certain. (Ironically, while I remember seeing a post on here that mentioned that when people were asked to give several 90%-likely predictions most of them managed to do no better than 30% correct, I can’t find it, so, case in point, I guess.)
toaster scenario
I don’t think this is an accurate metaphor; human brains don’t work well enough for us to be that confident in most situations.
If you offer it in such a way as to assert that you already have it, yes
I don’t understand what you mean by “already have it.” If I know that I can pull the evidence up on my computer screen with about 60 seconds of work, do I “have” it? If the evidence is stored my hard drive, do I “have” it? If the evidence is on a web site which is publicly accessible, do I “have” it?
I don’t think this is an accurate metaphor; human brains don’t work well enough for us to be that confident in most situations
It sounds like your answer to my question is “no,” i.e. it would not be dishonest to offer to produce a receipt but that the example I described is extremely rare and non-representative. Do I understand you correctly?
If I know that I can pull the evidence up on my computer screen with about 60 seconds of work, do I “have” it?
If you spend more time arguing about definitions than it would take to present your facts and settle the original point, that constitutes evidence that your motive has little or nothing to do with the pursuit of mutual understanding.
Please either present the evidence you originally offered w/r/t the correlation between race and IQ, or desist in your protestations.
If you spend more time arguing about definitions than it would take to present your facts and settle the original point, that constitutes evidence that your motive has little or nothing to do with the pursuit of mutual understanding.
Before you go attacking my motives, maybe it would make sense to you to explain why you took us into meta-debate territory. You could have easily said something like this:
Brazil84, I think you are unreasonably standing on ceremony by offering to produce evidence rather than just doing it. However, rather than debate over whether that was appropriate or not, please just produce the evidence you offered to produce.
And yet you chose not to, instead launching a meta debate (actually a meta-meta debate). If anyone’s motives are suspect, it’s yours.
Please either present the evidence you originally offered w/r/t the correlation between race and IQ, or desist in your protestations.
Lol, the evidence I offered to produce was that a certain poster was being evasive. Yes, that’s right—you started a meta-meta-debate.
As far as race and IQ goes, I laid out my case on my blog post. You are free read it carefully and then come back if you want evidence or other support for any aspect of it.
I have read the post in question. The heart of your argument seems to be
In other words, you see it pretty much everywhere in the United States and the rest of the world; further, various attempts to eliminate this gap have failed. This is exactly what one would expect to happen if the difference were largely genetic in origin.
Could you please provide some citations, with actual numbers, for “pretty much everywhere” and “various attempts,” including at least one study more recent than… let’s say 1987?
I am seriously skeptical that there is such a difference “pretty much everywhere,” that is, without variance along geographical, political, and economic lines.
“Various attempts have failed” taken literally means almost nothing; I am seriously skeptical that the gap has never been reduced as the result of any deliberate intervention.
I am seriously skeptical that there is such a difference “pretty much everywhere,” that is, without variance along geographical, political, and economic lines.
I don’t understand what you mean by this. Of course there is variance in cognitive abilities (as well as differences in the size of the black/white gap) along geographical, political, and economic lines. And I am not claiming otherwise.
I am seriously skeptical that the gap has never been reduced as the result of any deliberate intervention
Well are you seriously skeptical that the gap has never been substantially eliminated?
An attempt to eliminate the gap could be considered successful in the long term if it resulted in consistent, cumulative reductions in the gap over time, without (yet) eliminating the gap outright. It’s cold comfort, like a cancer patient considered ‘cured’ because they died of something else first, but still worthy of recognition.
And I am not claiming otherwise.
Then please either concede the point that the intelligence gap might be entirely explained by such factors, or provide a more detailed analysis of why it cannot be. For example, how much of the gap is due to differing economic opportunities, and corresponding issues of early childhood nutrition and education, resulting from discriminatory policies that were still legally enforced as of less than fifty years ago?
An attempt to eliminate the gap could be considered successful in the long term if it resulted in consistent, cumulative reductions in the gap over time, without (yet) eliminating the gap outright. It’s cold comfort, like a cancer patient considered ‘cured’ because they died of something else first, but still worthy of recognition.
Well maybe so, but the question is what exactly you are seriously skeptical of. It sounds like you are not seriously skeptical of the claim that the black/white gap has never been substantially eliminated. Do I understand you correctly?
Then please either concede the point that the intelligence gap might be entirely explained by such factors, or provide a more detailed analysis of why it cannot be.
I address that in my blog post. And it sounds like you are not seriously skeptical of the claim that the black/white gap exists pretty much everywhere, you just dispute that it’s the same everywhere and you assert that other factors besides race have a general impact on cognitive abilities. Did I understand you correctly?
I disagree with you on points of fact (namely the causal mechanism behind a difference in intelligence between two subgroups of H. sapiens) about which you claim to have as-yet-unrevealed evidence. I will reply to you no further until you provide that evidence, preferably in the form of a peer-reviewed study published more recently than 1987 Q 4 conclusively supporting your hypothesis.
Furthermore, if you persist in dodging the question and playing games with ‘obviousness,’ I will take that as a sign of bad faith on your part, an attempt to manipulate me into saying something embarrassing.
:shrug: All I did was ask you simple questions so that I could understand exactly what it is you claim to be skeptical of.
I’m not going to waste time digging up citations for things which you don’t seriously dispute.
Furthermore, if you persist in dodging the question and playing games with ’obviousness,
You are the one who is dodging questions.
I asked you two simple, reasonable yes or no questions in good faith so that I could understand your position. You ignored both of them.
Debating with me is not about playing “hide the ball” Before I gather evidence, I want to know exactly where we agree and disagree. You refuse to tell me. So be it.
ETA: By the way, it’s possible to be reasonably confident of various generalizations about human groups even without formal, peer-reviewed studies. I think this is pretty obvious, but I can give examples if anyone wants.
Lol, the evidence I offered to produce was that a certain poster was being evasive. Yes, that’s right—you started a meta-meta-debate.
If the readers can’t understand what you’re referring to, the burden is on you to write more clearly. Furthermore, I object to your use of the word “Lol” in this context.
If the readers can’t understand what you’re referring to, the burden is on you to write more clearly.
I see you cannot resist meta-debate.
Anyway, I would say it depends on how much effort and care those readers put into understanding. To any reasonable person, it was clear what I was referring to.
If you have already gathered the necessary evidence, present it without this teasing preamble; if not, admit your ignorance and lay out the probable search costs.
I think that when I asked “would you like to see some evidence,” the reasonable interpretation is that I can gather and present the evidence with a small but non-zero amount of effort.
However, if you did not understand my comment that way, that’s what I meant.
And again, it would have been easy enough for the other poster to say “Yes, I am skeptical of your claim and would like to see the evidence.” Since he didn’t do it, I infer that he doesn’t want to invest any further energy in the interaction. Which is fine, but if he doesn’t want to invest further energy, I don’t want to either.
Unfortunately cupholder was rather evasive in our discussion. That’s his fault not mine.
No, you were aggressive and rude in the discussion. You have demanded a detailed answer while your questions weren’t clear, and in repeated queries you didn’t even try to explain what sort of answer you want. That all only to allow yourself to reply “well, I use the same standards”.
Your debating style resembles more an interrogation than a friendly discussion, and this I consider rude, but it may be only my personal feeling.
More importantly, you deliberately derailed the debate about racial differences in IQ asking about cupholder’s religious beliefs, while being apparently not interested in the question. It seemed to me that the purpose of the long debate was only to prepare positions for your final argument again about racial differences in IQ. This is also on my list of rude behaviour. I don’t like people asking questions in order to show that the opponent can’t answer appropriately.
If I ask a question and am not satisfied with the answer, the default is to suppose that the other person didn’t understood properly the question and my job is to explain it, or possibly give some motivation for it. Repeating the same question with only minimal alterations I consider aggresive. Want a quote?
But by what standard do you reject such evidence? 09:04:15AM
By what standard do you evaluate this evidence so as to reach your atheistic conclusion notwithstanding this evidence for the existence of God? 12:21:53PM
And by what standard would you decide whether the evidence is sufficiently strong? 04:21:39PM
I understand that you interpret it as a result of evasiveness of your opponent, but I simply disagree here. Cupholder has given two answers
Namely, can I fit the idea of God existing/homeopathy working/alien abduction into my broader understanding of the world, or would it require overturning practically my whole understanding of how reality works?
It is just that the evidence would have to be strong enough to go head-to-head with basic physics.
which I find quite appropriate given your question. If you don’t, you should explain the question in more detail, because it is unclear. You have basically asked “what’s your epistemology”, itself a fine question, but full answer could fill a book. So either you wanted some specific answer, and the question was not clear—you should have asked more specifically. Or you didn’t want a specific answer, and since I don’t think you expected cupholder to explain his rationality in full detail, I must conclude that the question was merely rhetorical, which brings me back to rudeness.
More importantly, you deliberately derailed the debate about racial differences in IQ asking about cupholder’s religious beliefs, while being apparently not interested in the question. It seemed to me that the purpose of the long debate was only to prepare positions for your final argument again about racial differences in IQ.
Well, the atheism/theism issue is a decent example of a situation where it’s possible to be reasonably confident in a position without exhaustive scientific studies of the matter. And indeed, even if there are scientific studies going against your position.
I understand that you interpret it as a result of evasiveness of your opponent, but I simply disagree here.
As noted above, cupholder clearly chose an unreasonable interpretation of my question.
If you don’t, you should explain the question in more detail, because it is unclear.
What exactly is the question I asked which is unclear?
Well, the atheism/theism issue is a decent example of a situation where it’s possible to be reasonably confident in a position without exhaustive scientific studies of the matter. And indeed, even if there are scientific studies going against your position.
Agreed, but I don’t understand the relevance.
As noted above, cupholder clearly chose an unreasonable interpretation of my question.
I found all his interpretations (or what I think to be his interpretations) quite natural. Clearly we have conflicting intuitions. What interpretation did you have in mind, i.e. what type of answer you have expected?
What exactly is the question I asked which is unclear?
It is too general to be answered in a concise comment. Therefore, when replying one has to either choose one particular aspect or be very vague.
As I recall, that’s one of the issues which was under discussion.
I found all his interpretations (or what I think to be his interpretations) quite natural. Clearly we have conflicting intuitions. What interpretation did you have in mind,
I claim that the two questions I quoted myself asking are essentially the same question:
So “reject the evidence” can mean 1) deny that the evidence exists and 2) not consider the evidence convincing. You find the interpretation 2) obvious and 1) unreasonable in the given context. Am I right? If so, well, after thinking about it for a while I admit that 2) is a lot better interpretation, but nevertheless I wouldn’t call the other one unreasonable, nor I suspect cupholder of deliberate misinterpretation; people sometimes interpret others wrongly.
Which question are you talking about?
The question by what standard you reject the evidence for the existence of God?
So “reject the evidence” can mean 1) deny that the evidence exists and 2) not consider the evidence convincing. You find the interpretation 2) obvious and 1) unreasonable in the given context. Am I right?
Pretty much yes.
If so, well, after thinking about it for a while I admit that 2) is a lot better interpretation, but nevertheless I wouldn’t call the other one unreasonable, nor I suspect cupholder of deliberate misinterpretation; people sometimes interpret others wrongly.
I disagree, but at a minimum, it was hardly unreasonable for me to rephrase the question.
the atheism/theism issue is a decent example of a situation where it’s possible to be reasonably confident in a position without exhaustive scientific studies
On the contrary; many people consider the issue settled because all major scientific debates in history, bar none, have ended up weighing against the notion of a personal God who takes an interest in and intervenes in human affairs.
(It is, rather, the persistence of the myth, and its influence on public affairs, that seems to demand scientific scrutiny!)
Yes. They are a) necessary and b) already done. (The “question” I have in mind is a specific one, that of a personal God who, etc. as stated above.)
Prior to, say, the invention of writing, it would perhaps have been legitimate to consider the existence of a personal God (or gods) an open question, susceptible of being settled by investigation. In fact under a hypothesis like Julian Jaynes’ humans about 3000 years ago might have had overwhelming evidence that Gods existed… yet they’d still have been mistaken about that.
In fact under a hypothesis like Julian Jaynes’ humans about 3000 years ago might have had overwhelming evidence that Gods existed… yet they’d still have been mistaken about that.
Discovering this hypothesis makes reading this thread worthwhile. I’m shocked I hadn’t heard of it before. Maybe the coolest, most bizarre yet plausible idea I have heard in the last two years. Just hearing it (not even believing it) modifies my worldview. Have you or anyone else read the book? Recommended?
I’ve read the book, which was mentioned favorably in Dennett’s Consciousness Explained and forms part of the backstory to Stephenson’s Snow Crash. Curiosity compelled me to look further.
My level of understanding of the book’s thesis is mostly level-0, i.e. there is a “bicamerality” password but I’d have to reread the book to reacquaint myself with its precise predictions, and I’d be hard pressed to reconstruct the theory myself.
I do have a few pieces of understanding which seem level-2-ish; for instance, the hypothesis accounts for the feeling that a lot of my thinking is internal soliloquy. Also, the idea that consciousness, like love, could in large part be a “memetic” and collective construct (I use the term “meme” evocatively rather than rigorously) somehow appeals to me.
I’d recommend you read it if only for the pleasure of having one more person to discuss it with. I may have to reread it in that case.
It would be futile to try and pinpoint the first chronologically, but for the one that most pointedly refuted a previously established truth, namely that “God made Man in His image”, I’d start with Darwin’s Origin of Species.
Though, actually, Dennett’s Darwin’s Dangerous Idea is probably a better starting point, for being a gloss on Darwin.
You should know, before you ask your next pseudo-Socratic question: given that you seem intent on sticking to that style of “argumentation”, I’m going to take your advice and not engage you anymore.
It would be futile to try and pinpoint the first chronologically,
Ok, then how about an early one then.
but for the one that most pointedly refuted a previously established truth, namely that “God made Man in His image”, I’d start with Darwin’s Origin of Species.
So before the 19th century a rationalist could not reasonably conclude that the atheistic position is correct?
Do you really take this to be a reasonable interpretation / inference based on what Morendil said?
Absolutely. The other poster claimed, in essence, that scientific studies are necessary to reach the atheistic conclusion. The implication is that before such studies were done, one could not reach that conclusion.
To be honest, before Darwin, the Argument from Design was a pretty good reason to be a theist. (And I got this from the aforementioned Darwin’s Dangerous Idea.)
Yes, that’s a problem, but I don’t think it’s enough to make Deism ridiculous. Darwin was fortunate enough to find a “designer” that can exist without requiring a designer of its own, basically settling the question.
Perhaps, but I set forth the basis of my reasoning in a blog post elsewhere. So I did more than simply assert a conclusion.
Since this branch of the discussion has fallen below the comment threshhold, I am happy to discuss things here.
In any event, would you apply the same criticism to cupholder’s atheism?
If you believe that what I stated was not useful or interesting, then you should not mind stipulating for the sake of argument that the facts I state there are correct. Agreed?
Unfortunately cupholder was rather evasive in our discussion. That’s his fault not mine.
Evidence please.
I see one answer to one of your questions in this atheism discussion that I answered in a cutesy way—though I still think my implication there was quite clear. For your other questions in this subthread I either replied in enough detail to answer your questions, where they were relevant (1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8), or pointed out that your question was underspecified or had a false premise.
If you felt my answers to your questions were unsatisfactory, it would have been more helpful to have made that more explicit at the time, instead of working through your long-winded Socratic dialogue and taking an unsubstantiated potshot at me.
For example, consider this exchange:
Me: Sure; also there is hearsay documentary evidence (the Bible) and apparently even some scientific studies which supposedly demonstrate the power of prayer.
But by what standard do you reject such evidence?
You: Rejecting an interpretation of the evidence != rejecting evidence
Me: :shrug: By what standard do you evaluate this evidence so as to reach your atheistic conclusion notwithstanding this evidence for the existence of God?
It’s pretty obvious in this context what it means to “reject evidence,” but you chose an interpretation which let you avoid the question. i.e. you were evasive.
Anyway, I didn’t make an issue out of your evasiveness until somebody made an issue out of the length of our exchange.
Indeed, and that context happens to include this question preceding the first one you quoted there:
which implies that you thought there was a significant chance that I didn’t believe there was evidence of God. (Otherwise, why would you have bothered asking?) So when you subsequently implied that I ‘reject such evidence’ of God, it was quite reasonable to interpret it as literally just that—rejecting the evidence qua evidence—because you had just implied that you were open to the possibility that I denied evidence of God in general.
That’s nice.
Lol, you are being silly. We had both agreed that the evidence exists and then I asked why you rejected it. It was completely obvious what I meant.
You seem to be writing as if acknowledging the existence of evidence and rejecting evidence are mutually exclusive. Perhaps that is how you understand acknowledging that evidence exists v. rejecting evidence, but that’s a new understanding to me.
Apparently not.
Please either show me where I made such an implication by QUOTING me or admit I implied no such thing. Thank you.
I could be mistaken, but I think I already did.
Yes you are mistaken. If we both agree to X, it would make no sense for me to ask, in essence, why you believe in ~X.
I’m not asserting that you asked me if I believed there was no evidence of God (which is the ~X you have in mind, as far as I can tell). I’m asserting that you asked me whether I rejected evidence of God.
A second thing. It’s plain to me that at this point this argument is capable of going around in circles forever (if it hasn’t gone into a full-on death spiral already), and I’m not interested in engaging you on this point indefinitely. I’m not going to continue this subthread after this comment.
But according to you, I implied that rejecting evidence of God excludes the possibility of acknowledging the existence of that evidence.
However I made no such implication.
That’s fine . . . I don’t engage with people who strawman me.
Goodbye.
I’m not. This style of argumentation is ineffective and wasteful of people’s time, and I’m unhappy, bordering on angry, that it has gone on that long. I prefer to let this emotion find a productive outlet, namely a top-level post to put a name to the pattern I prefer, so as to encourage more useful discussions in future.
Claim. Unsupported by evidence.
Blame. Irrelevant to truth-seeking.
:shrug: Then don’t engage with me.
Would you like to see some evidence? I’m happy to provide it.
If blame is irrelevant to truth-seeking, then why are you accusing me (and not cupholder) of “wasting time and attention”?
Anyway, please answer my questions:
(1) Would you apply the same criticism to cupholder’s atheism?
(2) If you believe that what I stated was not useful or interesting, then you should not mind stipulating for the sake of argument that the facts I state there are correct. Agreed?
Never say this again. It’s a cheap, time-wasting dodge.
If you actually have evidence, simply lay it out as soon as it might be relevant.
I disagree with this. It takes time and energy to gather evidence. I don’t care to spend my time and energy digging up evidence unless somebody seriously throws down the gauntlet. Just stating “Claim. Unsupported by evidence” -- without indicating an interest in engaging—is not enough for me. Besides, it would have been easy enough for the poster to come back and say “yes, show me a quote please.”
This seems to imply that you already have the evidence, and are only waiting for confirmation that it’s wanted to provide it.
If this is relevant, it implies that you don’t have the evidence yet.
Please don’t imply that you have evidence when you don’t.
I would say that you are presenting what’s known as a “false dilemma,” i.e. your statement assumes that there are only two possibilities: either (1) I have the evidence in which case it costs me nothing to present it; or (2) I don’t in which case it is dishonest for me to offer to present evidence.
Of course there is another possibility, which is that I am reasonably confident I can present the evidence, but it will take me time and energy to gather and present it.
For example, suppose I bought a toaster a month ago; it breaks; I call up the store to get it fixed; and the store manager says “We can’t help you since you aren’t the original purchaser.” Before I spend 20 minutes finding the credit card receipt, I’m going to ask the guy “Would you like to see proof that I bought the toaster?”
If you don’t yet have evidence, it’s not dishonest to offer to find and present it, but it is dishonest to claim that you already have it, since by making that claim you’re claiming something that’s not true—namely that you have already confirmed that the evidence exists.
I don’t understand your point.
Is it dishonest to offer to present evidence when you are confident you can gather it?
For example, in the toaster scenario, is it dishonest to offer to produce proof that you bought the toaster? (Assume for the sake of argument that you save all of your receipts religiously and you are quite confident that you can produce the receipt if you are willing to take 20 minutes to rummage through your old receipts.)
If you offer it in such a way as to assert that you already have it, yes.
If I know that someone has a certain amount of evidence for a certain thing, then seeing that evidence myself doesn’t tell me much—knowing that the evidence exists is almost as good as gathering it myself. (This is what makes scientific studies work, so that people don’t have to test every theory by themselves.) But knowing that someone thinks that a certain amount of evidence exists for a certain thing is much weaker, and actually seeing the evidence in this case tells me much more, because it’s not particularly unusual for people to be wrong about this kind of thing, even when they claim to be certain. (Ironically, while I remember seeing a post on here that mentioned that when people were asked to give several 90%-likely predictions most of them managed to do no better than 30% correct, I can’t find it, so, case in point, I guess.)
I don’t think this is an accurate metaphor; human brains don’t work well enough for us to be that confident in most situations.
I don’t understand what you mean by “already have it.” If I know that I can pull the evidence up on my computer screen with about 60 seconds of work, do I “have” it? If the evidence is stored my hard drive, do I “have” it? If the evidence is on a web site which is publicly accessible, do I “have” it?
It sounds like your answer to my question is “no,” i.e. it would not be dishonest to offer to produce a receipt but that the example I described is extremely rare and non-representative. Do I understand you correctly?
If you spend more time arguing about definitions than it would take to present your facts and settle the original point, that constitutes evidence that your motive has little or nothing to do with the pursuit of mutual understanding.
Please either present the evidence you originally offered w/r/t the correlation between race and IQ, or desist in your protestations.
Before you go attacking my motives, maybe it would make sense to you to explain why you took us into meta-debate territory. You could have easily said something like this:
And yet you chose not to, instead launching a meta debate (actually a meta-meta debate). If anyone’s motives are suspect, it’s yours.
Lol, the evidence I offered to produce was that a certain poster was being evasive. Yes, that’s right—you started a meta-meta-debate.
As far as race and IQ goes, I laid out my case on my blog post. You are free read it carefully and then come back if you want evidence or other support for any aspect of it.
http://fortaleza84.wordpress.com/2010/03/16/the-race-and-iq-question/
I have read the post in question. The heart of your argument seems to be
Could you please provide some citations, with actual numbers, for “pretty much everywhere” and “various attempts,” including at least one study more recent than… let’s say 1987?
I could try to, but first you must comply with Rule 4 of my rules of debate.
First tell me that you are seriously skeptical that there is a black/white difference in cognitive abilities pretty much everywhere in the world.
Then tell me that you are seriously skeptical that various attempts to eliminate this gap have failed.
I am seriously skeptical that there is such a difference “pretty much everywhere,” that is, without variance along geographical, political, and economic lines.
“Various attempts have failed” taken literally means almost nothing; I am seriously skeptical that the gap has never been reduced as the result of any deliberate intervention.
I don’t understand what you mean by this. Of course there is variance in cognitive abilities (as well as differences in the size of the black/white gap) along geographical, political, and economic lines. And I am not claiming otherwise.
Well are you seriously skeptical that the gap has never been substantially eliminated?
An attempt to eliminate the gap could be considered successful in the long term if it resulted in consistent, cumulative reductions in the gap over time, without (yet) eliminating the gap outright. It’s cold comfort, like a cancer patient considered ‘cured’ because they died of something else first, but still worthy of recognition.
Then please either concede the point that the intelligence gap might be entirely explained by such factors, or provide a more detailed analysis of why it cannot be. For example, how much of the gap is due to differing economic opportunities, and corresponding issues of early childhood nutrition and education, resulting from discriminatory policies that were still legally enforced as of less than fifty years ago?
Well maybe so, but the question is what exactly you are seriously skeptical of. It sounds like you are not seriously skeptical of the claim that the black/white gap has never been substantially eliminated. Do I understand you correctly?
I address that in my blog post. And it sounds like you are not seriously skeptical of the claim that the black/white gap exists pretty much everywhere, you just dispute that it’s the same everywhere and you assert that other factors besides race have a general impact on cognitive abilities. Did I understand you correctly?
I disagree with you on points of fact (namely the causal mechanism behind a difference in intelligence between two subgroups of H. sapiens) about which you claim to have as-yet-unrevealed evidence. I will reply to you no further until you provide that evidence, preferably in the form of a peer-reviewed study published more recently than 1987 Q 4 conclusively supporting your hypothesis.
Furthermore, if you persist in dodging the question and playing games with ‘obviousness,’ I will take that as a sign of bad faith on your part, an attempt to manipulate me into saying something embarrassing.
:shrug: All I did was ask you simple questions so that I could understand exactly what it is you claim to be skeptical of.
I’m not going to waste time digging up citations for things which you don’t seriously dispute.
You are the one who is dodging questions.
I asked you two simple, reasonable yes or no questions in good faith so that I could understand your position. You ignored both of them.
Debating with me is not about playing “hide the ball” Before I gather evidence, I want to know exactly where we agree and disagree. You refuse to tell me. So be it.
ETA: By the way, it’s possible to be reasonably confident of various generalizations about human groups even without formal, peer-reviewed studies. I think this is pretty obvious, but I can give examples if anyone wants.
If the readers can’t understand what you’re referring to, the burden is on you to write more clearly. Furthermore, I object to your use of the word “Lol” in this context.
I see you cannot resist meta-debate.
Anyway, I would say it depends on how much effort and care those readers put into understanding. To any reasonable person, it was clear what I was referring to.
By the way, if you do want to debate this with me, you should know that I have my own rules of debate. You can find them here:
http://brazil84.wordpress.com/my-rules-of-debate/
In particular, you should pay attention to Rule 4.
Irrelevant obfuscation.
If you have already gathered the necessary evidence, present it without this teasing preamble; if not, admit your ignorance and lay out the probable search costs.
I think that when I asked “would you like to see some evidence,” the reasonable interpretation is that I can gather and present the evidence with a small but non-zero amount of effort.
However, if you did not understand my comment that way, that’s what I meant.
And again, it would have been easy enough for the other poster to say “Yes, I am skeptical of your claim and would like to see the evidence.” Since he didn’t do it, I infer that he doesn’t want to invest any further energy in the interaction. Which is fine, but if he doesn’t want to invest further energy, I don’t want to either.
No, you were aggressive and rude in the discussion. You have demanded a detailed answer while your questions weren’t clear, and in repeated queries you didn’t even try to explain what sort of answer you want. That all only to allow yourself to reply “well, I use the same standards”.
Can you please QUOTE me where I was aggressive and rude?
Can you please QUOTE a question I asked which was not clear?
Actually I said something like “similar” not “same.” But so what?
Your debating style resembles more an interrogation than a friendly discussion, and this I consider rude, but it may be only my personal feeling.
More importantly, you deliberately derailed the debate about racial differences in IQ asking about cupholder’s religious beliefs, while being apparently not interested in the question. It seemed to me that the purpose of the long debate was only to prepare positions for your final argument again about racial differences in IQ. This is also on my list of rude behaviour. I don’t like people asking questions in order to show that the opponent can’t answer appropriately.
If I ask a question and am not satisfied with the answer, the default is to suppose that the other person didn’t understood properly the question and my job is to explain it, or possibly give some motivation for it. Repeating the same question with only minimal alterations I consider aggresive. Want a quote?
I understand that you interpret it as a result of evasiveness of your opponent, but I simply disagree here. Cupholder has given two answers
which I find quite appropriate given your question. If you don’t, you should explain the question in more detail, because it is unclear. You have basically asked “what’s your epistemology”, itself a fine question, but full answer could fill a book. So either you wanted some specific answer, and the question was not clear—you should have asked more specifically. Or you didn’t want a specific answer, and since I don’t think you expected cupholder to explain his rationality in full detail, I must conclude that the question was merely rhetorical, which brings me back to rudeness.
Well, the atheism/theism issue is a decent example of a situation where it’s possible to be reasonably confident in a position without exhaustive scientific studies of the matter. And indeed, even if there are scientific studies going against your position.
As noted above, cupholder clearly chose an unreasonable interpretation of my question.
What exactly is the question I asked which is unclear?
Agreed, but I don’t understand the relevance.
I found all his interpretations (or what I think to be his interpretations) quite natural. Clearly we have conflicting intuitions. What interpretation did you have in mind, i.e. what type of answer you have expected?
It is too general to be answered in a concise comment. Therefore, when replying one has to either choose one particular aspect or be very vague.
As I recall, that’s one of the issues which was under discussion.
I claim that the two questions I quoted myself asking are essentially the same question:
http://lesswrong.com/lw/1ww/undiscriminating_skepticism/1t48
Which question are you talking about?
So “reject the evidence” can mean 1) deny that the evidence exists and 2) not consider the evidence convincing. You find the interpretation 2) obvious and 1) unreasonable in the given context. Am I right? If so, well, after thinking about it for a while I admit that 2) is a lot better interpretation, but nevertheless I wouldn’t call the other one unreasonable, nor I suspect cupholder of deliberate misinterpretation; people sometimes interpret others wrongly.
The question by what standard you reject the evidence for the existence of God?
Pretty much yes.
I disagree, but at a minimum, it was hardly unreasonable for me to rephrase the question.
On the contrary; many people consider the issue settled because all major scientific debates in history, bar none, have ended up weighing against the notion of a personal God who takes an interest in and intervenes in human affairs.
(It is, rather, the persistence of the myth, and its influence on public affairs, that seems to demand scientific scrutiny!)
I don’t understand your point. Are you saying that scientific studies are necessary to resolve the theism/atheism question?
Yes. They are a) necessary and b) already done. (The “question” I have in mind is a specific one, that of a personal God who, etc. as stated above.)
Prior to, say, the invention of writing, it would perhaps have been legitimate to consider the existence of a personal God (or gods) an open question, susceptible of being settled by investigation. In fact under a hypothesis like Julian Jaynes’ humans about 3000 years ago might have had overwhelming evidence that Gods existed… yet they’d still have been mistaken about that.
Discovering this hypothesis makes reading this thread worthwhile. I’m shocked I hadn’t heard of it before. Maybe the coolest, most bizarre yet plausible idea I have heard in the last two years. Just hearing it (not even believing it) modifies my worldview. Have you or anyone else read the book? Recommended?
I’ve read the book, which was mentioned favorably in Dennett’s Consciousness Explained and forms part of the backstory to Stephenson’s Snow Crash. Curiosity compelled me to look further.
My level of understanding of the book’s thesis is mostly level-0, i.e. there is a “bicamerality” password but I’d have to reread the book to reacquaint myself with its precise predictions, and I’d be hard pressed to reconstruct the theory myself.
I do have a few pieces of understanding which seem level-2-ish; for instance, the hypothesis accounts for the feeling that a lot of my thinking is internal soliloquy. Also, the idea that consciousness, like love, could in large part be a “memetic” and collective construct (I use the term “meme” evocatively rather than rigorously) somehow appeals to me.
I’d recommend you read it if only for the pleasure of having one more person to discuss it with. I may have to reread it in that case.
Would you mind pointing me in the direction of the first such scientific study? Thanks in advance.
It would be futile to try and pinpoint the first chronologically, but for the one that most pointedly refuted a previously established truth, namely that “God made Man in His image”, I’d start with Darwin’s Origin of Species.
Though, actually, Dennett’s Darwin’s Dangerous Idea is probably a better starting point, for being a gloss on Darwin.
You should know, before you ask your next pseudo-Socratic question: given that you seem intent on sticking to that style of “argumentation”, I’m going to take your advice and not engage you anymore.
Ok, then how about an early one then.
So before the 19th century a rationalist could not reasonably conclude that the atheistic position is correct?
Do you really take this to be a reasonable interpretation / inference based on what Morendil said?
I think we might just have to stop feeding the troll.
Absolutely. The other poster claimed, in essence, that scientific studies are necessary to reach the atheistic conclusion. The implication is that before such studies were done, one could not reach that conclusion.
To be honest, before Darwin, the Argument from Design was a pretty good reason to be a theist. (And I got this from the aforementioned Darwin’s Dangerous Idea.)
Eh. The “who designed the designer” problem still makes theism a mistake. Hume even argued this before Darwin was born.
Yes, that’s a problem, but I don’t think it’s enough to make Deism ridiculous. Darwin was fortunate enough to find a “designer” that can exist without requiring a designer of its own, basically settling the question.