If I say that Harry is not going to kill people if he listens to Hufflepuff but might kill if he listens to Slytherin, would that be a strange claim for you? If I say people who always listen to Hufflepuff don’t go on killing sprees would that seem strange to you?
No and yes respectively.
Hufflepuff isn’t a natural category, Harry!Hufflepuff is an abstraction based on Harry filtering his personality through certain criteria and impulses, such as what he conceives of as loyalty and compassion. Do I think that Harry, reasoning through his conception of loyalty and compassion, would go on a killing spree? Unlikely. Do I think that there are people who, reasoning through their conceptions of loyalty and compassion, would go on killing sprees? Absolutely.
A neurological fact that may be of some relevance here. Oxytocin, the chemical associated with triggering feelings of love and affection, has also been found to trigger increases in xenophobia and ingroup/outgroup bias.
Feelings of love and loyalty are not anathema to hate and violence. Rather, they often go hand in hand; the same feelings that unite you with a group can also be those which make you feel you’re united against something else.
Lastly it’s useful to keep in mind what extraordinary claim needing extraordinary evidence can lead to. If you take it too far it shuts down people from saying what they honestly believe and instead let’s them argue beliefs that they don’t fully stand behind.
How so? I don’t take any issue with your stating your beliefs and arguing in their favor. As is, I think that they’re misguided, but that’s because I think the weight of evidence is not in their favor. If you convinced me it were, I would change my mind. I think it would be far more useful for you to defend your belief with the best evidence you think favors it than to simply assert your belief.
Hufflepuff isn’t a natural category, Harry!Hufflepuff is an abstraction based on Harry filtering his personality through certain criteria and impulses
Depends on what you mean with natural. Persona’s like that are probably as natural as beliefs are.
Both aren’t hard coded but develop over time. I would guess for most people on LW persona’s like that aren’t in their conscious awareness. That doesn’t mean they don’t influence decision making.
Especially the persona’s that represents the parents often has a strong effect on people decisions in life.
Feelings of love and loyalty are not anathema to hate and violence.
Hate is usually felt in the midriff/gut/belly/stomach area and not where the heart is.
People also don’t just go at random on killing sprees. It’s the result of a longer process. Men often fail at approaching a hot woman because they have emotions that block them from doing so. It’s necessary to process emotions first, before being able to approach a hot woman.
Simply being attracted to the woman isn’t enough to overrule those other process that prevent that behavior.
If it comes to behavior like killing another person, I would assume that the emotional barrier are even stronger.
Only 15 to 20 percent of the American riflemen in combat during World War II would fire at the enemy.
That suggest that you need a lot more than a bit oxytocin for increased ingroup/outgroup bias. I don’t think
that the US army failed at teaching it’s solider the belief that shooting at the enemy makes sense.
The modern solution to how you get soldier to fire at the enemy is to do desensitation training.
I think I observed in the last year two persons who would qualify clinically as psychopathic. Both appeared to me very absent from their own bodies (description of a qualia that I have). Magnitudes more than the other people with whom I interacted in the year.
Let’s say someone get’s dumped by his girlfriend. His heart hurts very much. Enough that he rather doesn’t listen to it to reduce the pain. He blocks out the feeling by disassociating it. The person also feel very angry in is midrif and wants to act out that anger. That person might kill his girlfriend in revenge. There are probably a bunch of other filters he has to overcome.
I think it would be far more useful for you to defend your belief with the best evidence you think favors it than to simply assert your belief.
I’m thinking you underrate the difficulty of communicating what the belief actually is and not expressing it in a way where you will think that I believe something that’s different from what I actually believe. The Jayses example shows how a word like consciousness might be interpreted opposite from how it’s meant.
I’m essentially trying to explain new phenomenological primitives. Telling someone who’s not well educated in physics that a steel ball thown at the ground bounces back because of springiness in a way that you will be understood is not easy. The idea that the steel ball changes like a spring is not easy to accept. Even for students who believe that their physics teacher tells them the truth it takes time for them to accept that idea.
Some of the literature is very pessimistic about the idea of teaching new phenomenological primitives in physics classes instead of reorganising existing ones even if you are a teacher with authority over student and have plenty of time.
Attempting to do the same thing in an online discussion is ambitious.
No and yes respectively.
Hufflepuff isn’t a natural category, Harry!Hufflepuff is an abstraction based on Harry filtering his personality through certain criteria and impulses, such as what he conceives of as loyalty and compassion. Do I think that Harry, reasoning through his conception of loyalty and compassion, would go on a killing spree? Unlikely. Do I think that there are people who, reasoning through their conceptions of loyalty and compassion, would go on killing sprees? Absolutely.
A neurological fact that may be of some relevance here. Oxytocin, the chemical associated with triggering feelings of love and affection, has also been found to trigger increases in xenophobia and ingroup/outgroup bias.
Feelings of love and loyalty are not anathema to hate and violence. Rather, they often go hand in hand; the same feelings that unite you with a group can also be those which make you feel you’re united against something else.
How so? I don’t take any issue with your stating your beliefs and arguing in their favor. As is, I think that they’re misguided, but that’s because I think the weight of evidence is not in their favor. If you convinced me it were, I would change my mind. I think it would be far more useful for you to defend your belief with the best evidence you think favors it than to simply assert your belief.
Depends on what you mean with natural. Persona’s like that are probably as natural as beliefs are. Both aren’t hard coded but develop over time. I would guess for most people on LW persona’s like that aren’t in their conscious awareness. That doesn’t mean they don’t influence decision making.
Especially the persona’s that represents the parents often has a strong effect on people decisions in life.
Hate is usually felt in the midriff/gut/belly/stomach area and not where the heart is.
People also don’t just go at random on killing sprees. It’s the result of a longer process. Men often fail at approaching a hot woman because they have emotions that block them from doing so. It’s necessary to process emotions first, before being able to approach a hot woman.
Simply being attracted to the woman isn’t enough to overrule those other process that prevent that behavior. If it comes to behavior like killing another person, I would assume that the emotional barrier are even stronger.
To seek an example about WWII:
That suggest that you need a lot more than a bit oxytocin for increased ingroup/outgroup bias. I don’t think that the US army failed at teaching it’s solider the belief that shooting at the enemy makes sense.
The modern solution to how you get soldier to fire at the enemy is to do desensitation training.
I think I observed in the last year two persons who would qualify clinically as psychopathic. Both appeared to me very absent from their own bodies (description of a qualia that I have). Magnitudes more than the other people with whom I interacted in the year.
Let’s say someone get’s dumped by his girlfriend. His heart hurts very much. Enough that he rather doesn’t listen to it to reduce the pain. He blocks out the feeling by disassociating it. The person also feel very angry in is midrif and wants to act out that anger. That person might kill his girlfriend in revenge. There are probably a bunch of other filters he has to overcome.
I’m thinking you underrate the difficulty of communicating what the belief actually is and not expressing it in a way where you will think that I believe something that’s different from what I actually believe. The Jayses example shows how a word like consciousness might be interpreted opposite from how it’s meant.
I’m essentially trying to explain new phenomenological primitives. Telling someone who’s not well educated in physics that a steel ball thown at the ground bounces back because of springiness in a way that you will be understood is not easy. The idea that the steel ball changes like a spring is not easy to accept. Even for students who believe that their physics teacher tells them the truth it takes time for them to accept that idea.
Some of the literature is very pessimistic about the idea of teaching new phenomenological primitives in physics classes instead of reorganising existing ones even if you are a teacher with authority over student and have plenty of time.
Attempting to do the same thing in an online discussion is ambitious.