I don’t know about majority, but I suspect at least some people will say that (the contemporary sort of) feminism is good, which I disagree with.
Not so much in sentiment, because I have reasonable-ish consequentialist ethics, which ends up at most kinds of equality (and pretty much every kind of equality of opportunity). I just find feminism as much of a mindkiller as any other kind of politics. Reading feminist websites makes my brain go ARGH in the “why can’t you see how little sense you are making?!” way, so I try not to. There have also been instances on LW where gender discussions just turned into a mess of irrationality.
I wish we could discuss everything in the sensible, factual, case-by-case way that LW recommends. So much of feminism’s concerns are easily dissolved, and really not worth turning into a soldiers on one side or the other thing. -Isms are the mind killer, I guess?
(disclaimer: Less Wrong does gender discussions better than a lot of places. I just wish we were better.)
I find death aesthetically pleasing as part of the great circle of life, and I also feel that the earth is overpopulated enough as it is. I bring this topic up because it’s been noted that females, even rational ones, are often opposed to cryonics. I’m female, and I’m opposed to cryonics.
I wouldn’t call myself “opposed” to cryonics (the concept of medical suspended animation strikes me as mostly a convenience if you can get it to work, and interesting for potential social implications), but I do tend to think it’s overly-boosted here. After a thorough review of the actual work done by the major players in the field (a concise history of which reads like the script to a Coen Brothers movie), and looking over the biological x-factors involved vs the typical understanding of those x-factors here, I just don’t find the case compelling. The idea’s neat, but it seems like the cryo-boosters here are settling for a business/cultural model rife with consistent bad decisionmaking, built-in overconfidence (including in their messaging), a severe professionalism deficit, and not incidentally a long and sordid history of laziness, incompetence, and actual fraud.
“Overpopulated” seems to already reply to the reversal test (i.e. yes, the population should be reduced). The reversal test might apply to a different claim that the current population is all right and shouldn’t be increased further.
In the grandparent comment, the reversal test might apply to lifespan (the relation of lifespan to population is not completely straightforward if we control other parameters such as birth rate).
I should have elaborated more. The reversal test I was thinking of was “if the problem is overpopulation and death’s a good solution to it, should we be killing people?”
Except that most people have a deontological objection to actually killing people, so even if lucidian didn’t think we should be killing people, it wouldn’t necessarily imply contradictory beliefs (or rather, the contradiction comes from contradictions in deontology, not anything related to cryonics).
It is fair to observe that when somebody claims that their utility function says one thing but their deontology prevents them from following up, that is at least suspicious for one or the other being not-fully-motivating, not-fully-thought-out, etc.
I agree, but deontology is well-known to be a problematic but widely-held philosophy, which should explain away the observed inconsistency (e.g. desires could be consistent but deontology prevents the desires from being acted upon). I think that the proposed alternate test of asking about slowing down longevity research should reveal whether there is a further inconsistency within the desires themselves.
(e.g. desires could be consistent but deontology prevents the desires from being acted upon)
The question is why the deontological concerns are motivating. If they are motivating though a desire to fulfill deontological concern, then they belong in the utility function. And if not through desire, then how? An endorsed deontological principle might say ‘X!’ or ‘Don’t X’, but why obey it? Deontological principles aren’t obviously intrinsically motivating (in the way anything desired is).
Right. I was thinking of “death” as having status quo (“natural”) death as the intended interpretation, which seems to exclude this possibility as stated, but allows a version where we prevent future attacks of status quo death by e.g. stopping all medical research (not just anti-aging research).
In this instance, I don’t think the reversal test will establish much. I imagine that most who hold a belief similar to lucidian believe that there is a population homeostasis, or at least upper bound, which is determined by Earth’s resources’ ability to accommodate human existence.
If this homeostasis or upper bound is exceeded, either Earth’s resources’ ability to accommodate human existence must be improved, or humans must be killed. I imagine those I previously identified would favor the former.
The former could be achieved by ceasing pollution, disbanding mass cattle and feces pits, and investing in research investigating ways to remove airbourne methane as well reducing existing environmental damage. This route may prove more laborious than genocide or random en masse killings, but preferable nonetheless.
Errrrrr… I think Athrelon was referring to gender related issues, actually. I don’t mind terribly much that you commented here, except that no one else has answered Athrelon’s question with that relevant stuff.
Remembering Asch’s conformity experiment:
What statement would you expect the majority of responders to say, that you disagree with?
I don’t know about majority, but I suspect at least some people will say that (the contemporary sort of) feminism is good, which I disagree with.
Not so much in sentiment, because I have reasonable-ish consequentialist ethics, which ends up at most kinds of equality (and pretty much every kind of equality of opportunity). I just find feminism as much of a mindkiller as any other kind of politics. Reading feminist websites makes my brain go ARGH in the “why can’t you see how little sense you are making?!” way, so I try not to. There have also been instances on LW where gender discussions just turned into a mess of irrationality.
I wish we could discuss everything in the sensible, factual, case-by-case way that LW recommends. So much of feminism’s concerns are easily dissolved, and really not worth turning into a soldiers on one side or the other thing. -Isms are the mind killer, I guess?
(disclaimer: Less Wrong does gender discussions better than a lot of places. I just wish we were better.)
“Death is a bad thing.”
I find death aesthetically pleasing as part of the great circle of life, and I also feel that the earth is overpopulated enough as it is. I bring this topic up because it’s been noted that females, even rational ones, are often opposed to cryonics. I’m female, and I’m opposed to cryonics.
I wouldn’t call myself “opposed” to cryonics (the concept of medical suspended animation strikes me as mostly a convenience if you can get it to work, and interesting for potential social implications), but I do tend to think it’s overly-boosted here. After a thorough review of the actual work done by the major players in the field (a concise history of which reads like the script to a Coen Brothers movie), and looking over the biological x-factors involved vs the typical understanding of those x-factors here, I just don’t find the case compelling. The idea’s neat, but it seems like the cryo-boosters here are settling for a business/cultural model rife with consistent bad decisionmaking, built-in overconfidence (including in their messaging), a severe professionalism deficit, and not incidentally a long and sordid history of laziness, incompetence, and actual fraud.
The standard reply to this is a reversal test. What’s your reply to that?
“Overpopulated” seems to already reply to the reversal test (i.e. yes, the population should be reduced). The reversal test might apply to a different claim that the current population is all right and shouldn’t be increased further.
In the grandparent comment, the reversal test might apply to lifespan (the relation of lifespan to population is not completely straightforward if we control other parameters such as birth rate).
I should have elaborated more. The reversal test I was thinking of was “if the problem is overpopulation and death’s a good solution to it, should we be killing people?”
Except that most people have a deontological objection to actually killing people, so even if lucidian didn’t think we should be killing people, it wouldn’t necessarily imply contradictory beliefs (or rather, the contradiction comes from contradictions in deontology, not anything related to cryonics).
It is fair to observe that when somebody claims that their utility function says one thing but their deontology prevents them from following up, that is at least suspicious for one or the other being not-fully-motivating, not-fully-thought-out, etc.
I agree, but deontology is well-known to be a problematic but widely-held philosophy, which should explain away the observed inconsistency (e.g. desires could be consistent but deontology prevents the desires from being acted upon). I think that the proposed alternate test of asking about slowing down longevity research should reveal whether there is a further inconsistency within the desires themselves.
The question is why the deontological concerns are motivating. If they are motivating though a desire to fulfill deontological concern, then they belong in the utility function. And if not through desire, then how? An endorsed deontological principle might say ‘X!’ or ‘Don’t X’, but why obey it? Deontological principles aren’t obviously intrinsically motivating (in the way anything desired is).
Following deontological concerns can be instrumentally useful for biased finite agents: http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Ethical_injunction
Right. I was thinking of “death” as having status quo (“natural”) death as the intended interpretation, which seems to exclude this possibility as stated, but allows a version where we prevent future attacks of status quo death by e.g. stopping all medical research (not just anti-aging research).
In this instance, I don’t think the reversal test will establish much. I imagine that most who hold a belief similar to lucidian believe that there is a population homeostasis, or at least upper bound, which is determined by Earth’s resources’ ability to accommodate human existence.
If this homeostasis or upper bound is exceeded, either Earth’s resources’ ability to accommodate human existence must be improved, or humans must be killed. I imagine those I previously identified would favor the former.
The former could be achieved by ceasing pollution, disbanding mass cattle and feces pits, and investing in research investigating ways to remove airbourne methane as well reducing existing environmental damage. This route may prove more laborious than genocide or random en masse killings, but preferable nonetheless.
Errrrrr… I think Athrelon was referring to gender related issues, actually. I don’t mind terribly much that you commented here, except that no one else has answered Athrelon’s question with that relevant stuff.