OK, now I understand the connection to doxing much more clearly. Thank you. To be clear, I do not endorse legalizing a no-doxxing rule.
I still disagree because it didn’t look like Metz had any reason to doxx Scott beyond “just because”. There were no big benifits to readers or any story about why there was no harm done to Scott in spite of his protests.
Whereas if I’m a journalist and encounter someone who says “if you release information about genetic differences in intelligence that will cause a genocide” I can give reasons for why that is unlikely. And I can give reasons for why I the associated common-bundle-of-beliefs-and-values ie. orthodoxy is not inconsequential, that there are likely, large (albeit not genocide large) harms that this orthodoxy is causing.
I mean I’m not arguing Cade Metz should have doxxed Scott Alexander, I’m just arguing that there is a tension between common rationalist ideology that one should have a strong presumption in favor of telling the truth, and that Cade Metz shouldn’t have doxxed Scott Alexander. As far as I can tell, this common rationalist ideology was a cover for spicier views that you have no issue admitting to, so I’m not exactly saying that there’s any contradiction in your vibe. More that there’s a contradiction in Scott Alexander’s (at least at the time of writing Kolmogorov Complicity).
I’m not sure what my own resolution to the paradox/contradiction is. Maybe that the root problem seems to be that people create information to bolster their side in political discourse, rather than to inform their ideology about how to address problems that they care about. In the latter case, creating information does real productive work, but in the former case, information mostly turns into a weapon, which incentivizes creating some of the most cursed pieces of information known to the world.
I’m just arguing that there is a tension between common rationalist ideology that one should have a strong presumption in favor of telling the truth, and that Cade Metz shouldn’t have doxxed Scott Alexander.
His doxing Scott was in an article that also contained lies, lies which made the doxing more harmful. He wouldn’t have just posted Scott’s real name in a context where no lies were involved.
OK, now I understand the connection to doxing much more clearly. Thank you. To be clear, I do not endorse legalizing a no-doxxing rule.
I still disagree because it didn’t look like Metz had any reason to doxx Scott beyond “just because”. There were no big benifits to readers or any story about why there was no harm done to Scott in spite of his protests.
Whereas if I’m a journalist and encounter someone who says “if you release information about genetic differences in intelligence that will cause a genocide” I can give reasons for why that is unlikely. And I can give reasons for why I the associated common-bundle-of-beliefs-and-values ie. orthodoxy is not inconsequential, that there are likely, large (albeit not genocide large) harms that this orthodoxy is causing.
I mean I’m not arguing Cade Metz should have doxxed Scott Alexander, I’m just arguing that there is a tension between common rationalist ideology that one should have a strong presumption in favor of telling the truth, and that Cade Metz shouldn’t have doxxed Scott Alexander. As far as I can tell, this common rationalist ideology was a cover for spicier views that you have no issue admitting to, so I’m not exactly saying that there’s any contradiction in your vibe. More that there’s a contradiction in Scott Alexander’s (at least at the time of writing Kolmogorov Complicity).
I’m not sure what my own resolution to the paradox/contradiction is. Maybe that the root problem seems to be that people create information to bolster their side in political discourse, rather than to inform their ideology about how to address problems that they care about. In the latter case, creating information does real productive work, but in the former case, information mostly turns into a weapon, which incentivizes creating some of the most cursed pieces of information known to the world.
His doxing Scott was in an article that also contained lies, lies which made the doxing more harmful. He wouldn’t have just posted Scott’s real name in a context where no lies were involved.