Reasonably fun to watch the presenter is kind of likeable, if a bit nerdy. However it is darkartsy and I disagree with a few minor points.
I disagreed with the bit at 27:40 about the supposed unique badness of religion since any free floating that’s basically a tribal marker is similarly insulated, especially anything that’s extensively used by a professional class who basically make a living of reinterpreting it and do so from a position of authority. To take the most extreme case, there is no reason North Korean ideology needs ever show any results or proof in favour of its tenets, all that one needs for it to persist is to be self-sustaining. She does partially address this later at 29:40, but I don’t think she’s ever been faced with the best possible version of that argument.
I disagreed with the bit at 27:40 about the supposed unique badness of religion since any free floating that’s basically a tribal marker is similarly insulated, especially anything that’s extensively used by a professional class who basically make a living of reinterpreting it and do so from a position of authority. [...] She does partially address this later at 29:40, but I don’t think she’s ever been faced with the best possible version of that argument.
I think you’re being much too charitable here. The critical assumption in her argument is that ideological delusions can normally be successfully confronted by pointing to empirical evidence of their practical failures. However, this is completely wrong. In practice, it is very rare that we have clear enough natural experiments that enable us to present such evidence in a clear and convincing form. Even when such natural experiments exist in a striking form, as it was in the case of communism, ideological partisans usually have little difficulty rationalizing them away in practice.
When they don’t exist, as is typically the case, it is normally impossible to move the public opinion towards greater accuracy with empirical evidence of failure, since any such evidence can be discounted by disputing the counterfactual. For example, disasters brought by irresponsible government guided by crackpot economic theories are easily excused by arguing that things would have been even worse without the enlightened guidance of these theories, and the cause of the problems is the insufficient purity of our sticking to them (perhaps along with some regrettable mistakes in execution).
The speaker herself confirms this with her concrete examples. To me it seems pretty clear that she responds to some evident failures of ideology in recent times by (pretty much) doubling down on the ideology, and she’s nowhere close to examining its problematic fundamental tenets—such examination being simply unthinkable for her.
(I understand that this last statement is controversial, and normally I would not open such topics here, but I think it’s justified given that this talk has already been made the subject of discussion.)
(I understand that this last statement is controversial, and normally I would not open such topics here, but I think it’s justified given that this talk has already been made the subject of discussion.)
Which statement? That she doesn’t examine the most fundamental downsides of ideological thinking?
My claim is stronger than that. Take for example her views on economics. She presents the current economic crisis (as well as longer-term negative economic trends) as an example where ideology is evidently conflicting with reality, so that more and more people are now rejecting these ideological falsities and adopting more accurate views. She gives the OWS movement as a concrete example of such people, and from that and her other more vague statements, it’s pretty clear which positions in general she sees as a step away from ideological biases and towards greater accuracy on economic issues. (Looking at her blog confirms this.)
Yet in my (controversial) opinion, she completely fails to understand the actual ideological delusions and pseudoscience that are rampant in modern economics, both in hands-on government policy and in the academia (and everywhere in-between). What’s more, the views that she sees as getting closer to reality in fact represent an amplification of some of the worst of these delusions. Thus, she provides a counterexample for her own thesis: the ongoing clash between ideology and reality leads to a vicious circle of doubling down on the ideology, not a rejection of it.
And contrary to her thesis, in practice this tailspin of almost monotonically worsening ideological delusions usually ends up with utter, and often violent, disaster. (Which I think indeed threatens us unless technological progress and the surprising resilience of various informal institutions keep saving the day.) Such disasters are, by any reasonable metric, certainly no better than the worst historical disasters she can bill on traditional religion.
Do you think this is controversial (within LW)? Given the average karma gain of similar comments and general lack of expressed disagreement, controversiality doesn’t seem to be a reasonable hypothesis. Personally I wouldn’t like you being less controversial; but I certainly would like you being more specific.
(This comment of yours was more specific than the grand-parent, but still: what are the actual delusions and pseudoscience in modern economics, what are GC’s ideological delusions, what sort of disaster is likely to result from them? Of course I can imagine plausible answers, but not unique answers. Being a bit vague in order to not offend anyone, or not introduce explicit political debate is useful, but a bit dark-artish.)
Do you think this is controversial (within LW)? Given the average karma gain of similar comments and general lack of expressed disagreement, controversiality doesn’t seem to be a reasonable hypothesis.
By “controversial,” I don’t mean that it will provoke hostility, or even widespread disagreement here. I’m just making it known that I’m aware that this opinion is a matter of significant disagreement in the general public, with otherwise smart and reasonable people taking different sides. Also that I don’t expect people to accept my claims based on a comment that provides no supporting arguments and uses them only for illustrative purposes.
(The above also holds for the text below.)
This comment of yours was more specific than the grand-parent, but still: what are the actual delusions and pseudoscience in modern economics, what are GC’s ideological delusions, what sort of disaster is likely to result from them? Of course I can imagine plausible answers, but not unique answers.
Clearly, these would be topics suitable for long books, not short blog comments!
But to give you some idea of what I’m talking about, my criticism of economics would be roughly along the lines of Hayek’s “Pretence of Knowledge” speech. (My criticism would likely be harsher—to me the pseudoscience seems even more scandalous, the damage done even more extensive, and the threats for the future even more severe.) I also think that the intellectual standards are abysmal, and ideological biases rampant, even in areas that don’t fall under this general criticism.
(Also, to avoid potential confusion due to citing Hayek, I am not a principled libertarian in any way. My concern is with irresponsible, corrupt, and destructive government, and with all the ideology and pseudoscience that motivate and excuse it.)
Reasonably fun to watch the presenter is kind of likeable, if a bit nerdy. However it is darkartsy and I disagree with a few minor points.
I disagreed with the bit at 27:40 about the supposed unique badness of religion since any free floating that’s basically a tribal marker is similarly insulated, especially anything that’s extensively used by a professional class who basically make a living of reinterpreting it and do so from a position of authority. To take the most extreme case, there is no reason North Korean ideology needs ever show any results or proof in favour of its tenets, all that one needs for it to persist is to be self-sustaining. She does partially address this later at 29:40, but I don’t think she’s ever been faced with the best possible version of that argument.
I think you’re being much too charitable here. The critical assumption in her argument is that ideological delusions can normally be successfully confronted by pointing to empirical evidence of their practical failures. However, this is completely wrong. In practice, it is very rare that we have clear enough natural experiments that enable us to present such evidence in a clear and convincing form. Even when such natural experiments exist in a striking form, as it was in the case of communism, ideological partisans usually have little difficulty rationalizing them away in practice.
When they don’t exist, as is typically the case, it is normally impossible to move the public opinion towards greater accuracy with empirical evidence of failure, since any such evidence can be discounted by disputing the counterfactual. For example, disasters brought by irresponsible government guided by crackpot economic theories are easily excused by arguing that things would have been even worse without the enlightened guidance of these theories, and the cause of the problems is the insufficient purity of our sticking to them (perhaps along with some regrettable mistakes in execution).
The speaker herself confirms this with her concrete examples. To me it seems pretty clear that she responds to some evident failures of ideology in recent times by (pretty much) doubling down on the ideology, and she’s nowhere close to examining its problematic fundamental tenets—such examination being simply unthinkable for her.
(I understand that this last statement is controversial, and normally I would not open such topics here, but I think it’s justified given that this talk has already been made the subject of discussion.)
Which statement? That she doesn’t examine the most fundamental downsides of ideological thinking?
My claim is stronger than that. Take for example her views on economics. She presents the current economic crisis (as well as longer-term negative economic trends) as an example where ideology is evidently conflicting with reality, so that more and more people are now rejecting these ideological falsities and adopting more accurate views. She gives the OWS movement as a concrete example of such people, and from that and her other more vague statements, it’s pretty clear which positions in general she sees as a step away from ideological biases and towards greater accuracy on economic issues. (Looking at her blog confirms this.)
Yet in my (controversial) opinion, she completely fails to understand the actual ideological delusions and pseudoscience that are rampant in modern economics, both in hands-on government policy and in the academia (and everywhere in-between). What’s more, the views that she sees as getting closer to reality in fact represent an amplification of some of the worst of these delusions. Thus, she provides a counterexample for her own thesis: the ongoing clash between ideology and reality leads to a vicious circle of doubling down on the ideology, not a rejection of it.
And contrary to her thesis, in practice this tailspin of almost monotonically worsening ideological delusions usually ends up with utter, and often violent, disaster. (Which I think indeed threatens us unless technological progress and the surprising resilience of various informal institutions keep saving the day.) Such disasters are, by any reasonable metric, certainly no better than the worst historical disasters she can bill on traditional religion.
Do you think this is controversial (within LW)? Given the average karma gain of similar comments and general lack of expressed disagreement, controversiality doesn’t seem to be a reasonable hypothesis. Personally I wouldn’t like you being less controversial; but I certainly would like you being more specific.
(This comment of yours was more specific than the grand-parent, but still: what are the actual delusions and pseudoscience in modern economics, what are GC’s ideological delusions, what sort of disaster is likely to result from them? Of course I can imagine plausible answers, but not unique answers. Being a bit vague in order to not offend anyone, or not introduce explicit political debate is useful, but a bit dark-artish.)
By “controversial,” I don’t mean that it will provoke hostility, or even widespread disagreement here. I’m just making it known that I’m aware that this opinion is a matter of significant disagreement in the general public, with otherwise smart and reasonable people taking different sides. Also that I don’t expect people to accept my claims based on a comment that provides no supporting arguments and uses them only for illustrative purposes.
(The above also holds for the text below.)
Clearly, these would be topics suitable for long books, not short blog comments!
But to give you some idea of what I’m talking about, my criticism of economics would be roughly along the lines of Hayek’s “Pretence of Knowledge” speech. (My criticism would likely be harsher—to me the pseudoscience seems even more scandalous, the damage done even more extensive, and the threats for the future even more severe.) I also think that the intellectual standards are abysmal, and ideological biases rampant, even in areas that don’t fall under this general criticism.
(Also, to avoid potential confusion due to citing Hayek, I am not a principled libertarian in any way. My concern is with irresponsible, corrupt, and destructive government, and with all the ideology and pseudoscience that motivate and excuse it.)