Please elaborate on how, completely disregarding political realism in favor of an overarching conspiracy theory (as already mentioned above) and just ignoring the whole iceberg of neuroscience, evolutionary psychology, etc, one can arrive at a decent explanation for it all. “The leftist social sciences professor down the street is a witch, she did it” is not up to my standards of “decent”.
“The leftist social sciences professor down the street is a witch, she did it”
That is not Moldbug’s model. How much have you read?
He has decent models in my mind for many things including the genesis of the leftwards social movement for the past few decades or centuries, the genesis of modern morality, US foreign policy, the sociological aspect development of ideology ect.
I don’t think I’m that much of a outlier in my estimation here, I’ve heard many people I know from LessWrong express interest in his thought (for example gwern, or Vladimir_M). He even had a live recorded debate with Robin Hanson back in 2010 on Futarchy (though he lost, everyone looses debates to RH ;) ). Top posters like Yvian and Eliezer also seem to have read some of Moldbug since they refer to his writing occasionally, ect. People sometimes agree and other times disagree with him, but I think they generally don’t view him as a “crank” .
I really don’t have the time right now to discuss all of this but there are a few older discussions in the comment sections of various articles (just search for “Moldbug” on the site), LessWrong that may interesting you if you’d like to learn more about his stuff and why people find it interesting.
My recent thread on one of his post also had some discussion.
He has decent models in my mind for many things including the genesis of the leftwards social movement for the past few decades or centuries, the genesis of modern morality, US foreign policy, the sociological aspect development of ideology ect.
I have read all of that, at first glance expecting a fun and intriguing contrarian ride. It came across as considerably more insane (in the LW/OB sense) and less grounded in reality than the milder forms of ol’ good fascism to me.
I generally don’t see what’s so insane about WASP Blue State Protestant progressivism being the sociological, philosophical and cultural predecessor of WASP Blue State progressivism.
Or say that modern ethics aren’t the product of pure reason and moral progress but a clear descendant of older Western morality.
Or that US foreign policy is often crazy and mixed up because the US isn’t a monolithic entity and that more specifically the interests of the State department and the Pentagon diverge.
Or that in a modern parlimentary democracy power is wielded by opinion makers (academia and journalists) who create the intellectual fashion of the rich and well positioned subscribe to and with a twenty or so year lag the general population (they adopt it not just to copy the elites but because legislation and education are updated to push new beliefs on them) which then vote for representatives that are supposed to keep the unelected elites in check and working for their interests. Culturally any ethical ideas or value sets adopted by elite academia are assured long term victory.
I think that covers my examples.
I have read all of that, at first glance expecting a fun and intriguing contrarian ride. It came across as considerably more insane (in the LW/OB sense) and less grounded in reality than the milder forms of ol’ good fascism to me.
Meh, fascists are often too mystical for my tastes (try reading Julius Evola. Religious Paleocons are a bit better but their axioms are all messed up, believing in God and all that. The few irreligious ones are often lots of fun.
Please elaborate on how, completely disregarding political realism in favor of an overarching conspiracy theory (as already mentioned above) and just ignoring the whole iceberg of neuroscience, evolutionary psychology, etc, one can arrive at a decent explanation for it all. “The leftist social sciences professor down the street is a witch, she did it” is not up to my standards of “decent”.
That is not Moldbug’s model. How much have you read?
He has decent models in my mind for many things including the genesis of the leftwards social movement for the past few decades or centuries, the genesis of modern morality, US foreign policy, the sociological aspect development of ideology ect.
I don’t think I’m that much of a outlier in my estimation here, I’ve heard many people I know from LessWrong express interest in his thought (for example gwern, or Vladimir_M). He even had a live recorded debate with Robin Hanson back in 2010 on Futarchy (though he lost, everyone looses debates to RH ;) ). Top posters like Yvian and Eliezer also seem to have read some of Moldbug since they refer to his writing occasionally, ect. People sometimes agree and other times disagree with him, but I think they generally don’t view him as a “crank” .
I really don’t have the time right now to discuss all of this but there are a few older discussions in the comment sections of various articles (just search for “Moldbug” on the site), LessWrong that may interesting you if you’d like to learn more about his stuff and why people find it interesting.
My recent thread on one of his post also had some discussion.
I have read all of that, at first glance expecting a fun and intriguing contrarian ride. It came across as considerably more insane (in the LW/OB sense) and less grounded in reality than the milder forms of ol’ good fascism to me.
I generally don’t see what’s so insane about WASP Blue State Protestant progressivism being the sociological, philosophical and cultural predecessor of WASP Blue State progressivism.
Or say that modern ethics aren’t the product of pure reason and moral progress but a clear descendant of older Western morality.
Or that US foreign policy is often crazy and mixed up because the US isn’t a monolithic entity and that more specifically the interests of the State department and the Pentagon diverge.
Or that in a modern parlimentary democracy power is wielded by opinion makers (academia and journalists) who create the intellectual fashion of the rich and well positioned subscribe to and with a twenty or so year lag the general population (they adopt it not just to copy the elites but because legislation and education are updated to push new beliefs on them) which then vote for representatives that are supposed to keep the unelected elites in check and working for their interests. Culturally any ethical ideas or value sets adopted by elite academia are assured long term victory.
I think that covers my examples.
Meh, fascists are often too mystical for my tastes (try reading Julius Evola. Religious Paleocons are a bit better but their axioms are all messed up, believing in God and all that. The few irreligious ones are often lots of fun.