I believe ebrodey’s post fails to meet the epistemic standards we expect of writing here on Less Wrong.
The post makes many different claims. Some of them make sense. Others don’t. None are carefully investigated in detail. It ends with a call for outrage.
This post is indistinguishable from Russian propaganda. It’s a Gish Gallop.
Last week the U.S. and its allies enacted sanctions which should for all intents and purposes be understood as a war crime.
Imposing economic sanctions on a country is not a war crime. It is not even an act of war. If there was an actual direct conflict between NATO and Russia, failure to impose sanctions would be ludicrous.
Will destroying Russia’s economy hurt their war effort? Perhaps on the margin, but the economic destruction also necessitates that Putin achieve his maximalist political goals in order to justify the cost.
The Russian economy is imploding. It is unambiguously true that sanctions will damage the Russian war effort. Ebrodey’s writing is propaganda-level bullshit.
Strongly downvoted for falling into the same trap as the OP, only worse. The OP has a bunch of really good points about sanctions not working generally and being poorly structured in this specific case. You have some excellent posts and comments, but this one does not meet your own epistemic standards.
After this post of yours, I did notice a disturbing characteristic set of symptoms. In another comment, Bezzy finds a number more, including that there is no question about alternatives at the end of the post, which seems to encourage us to just do nothing, setting a precedent of unpunished war in Europe. This also makes me want to ask, how is the situation with bots on lesswrong in general, including specifically Russian ones? Before that, I had the impression that here you can discuss things constructively without them, unlike the dominance of bots in other places. On the other hand, I think the general idea of the effectiveness of sanctions is worth discussing. And I’m concerned about the style in which you yourself write, and the answers to you too, it seems to be becoming too politic-mind-killing.
I would not be surprised if this is the most clearly false bit of everything in the OP plus comment section. I have been subscribed to his posts since the games he ran and I don’t think there’s any way at least half of his posts could possibly be described as making vastly less sense than the OP.
Hmm. Let me rethink. Okay, possibly? If you think fiction makes no sense? That would do it, maybe. Otherwise nah.
I agree that the post makes several good points, but it offers no viable alternative policy to sanctions. Without any named alternatives, what’s the actual thesis?
I believe ebrodey’s post fails to meet the epistemic standards we expect of writing here on Less Wrong.
The post makes many different claims. Some of them make sense. Others don’t. None are carefully investigated in detail. It ends with a call for outrage.
This post is indistinguishable from Russian propaganda. It’s a Gish Gallop.
Imposing economic sanctions on a country is not a war crime. It is not even an act of war. If there was an actual direct conflict between NATO and Russia, failure to impose sanctions would be ludicrous.
The Russian economy is imploding. It is unambiguously true that sanctions will damage the Russian war effort. Ebrodey’s writing is propaganda-level bullshit.
Strongly downvoted for falling into the same trap as the OP, only worse. The OP has a bunch of really good points about sanctions not working generally and being poorly structured in this specific case. You have some excellent posts and comments, but this one does not meet your own epistemic standards.
After this post of yours, I did notice a disturbing characteristic set of symptoms. In another comment, Bezzy finds a number more, including that there is no question about alternatives at the end of the post, which seems to encourage us to just do nothing, setting a precedent of unpunished war in Europe. This also makes me want to ask, how is the situation with bots on lesswrong in general, including specifically Russian ones? Before that, I had the impression that here you can discuss things constructively without them, unlike the dominance of bots in other places. On the other hand, I think the general idea of the effectiveness of sanctions is worth discussing. And I’m concerned about the style in which you yourself write, and the answers to you too, it seems to be becoming too politic-mind-killing.
The OP makes vastly more sense than at least half of all the posts you’ve ever made to Less Wrong.
Is the OP true? Do I agree with it? Maybe, maybe not. But it’s perfectly coherent, and makes several fairly clearly stated points.
Downvoted for manifestly untrue accusations of low epistemic quality; upgraded to strong downvote for blatant hypocrisy.
I would not be surprised if this is the most clearly false bit of everything in the OP plus comment section. I have been subscribed to his posts since the games he ran and I don’t think there’s any way at least half of his posts could possibly be described as making vastly less sense than the OP.
Hmm. Let me rethink. Okay, possibly? If you think fiction makes no sense? That would do it, maybe. Otherwise nah.
I stand by my claim. (Fiction excluded.)
I agree that the post makes several good points, but it offers no viable alternative policy to sanctions. Without any named alternatives, what’s the actual thesis?
I do not agree that a lack of named alternatives makes the post any less relevant (if we accept that its points are, indeed, good ones).
Offering alternatives would be (even) better, but I agree a post can be perfectly fine without them.
If three are no alternatives that are a really better, then no other course of action is indicated...The thesis is true, but useless.
“Do nothing” is an alternative. It is in fact an alternative chosen by China for example.
What about “better”? Just permitting aggressive warfare hurts ordinary people disprortionately, etc, etc.