I think the way the battle lines are drawn in the world we live in, the battle lines typically fall in terms of ‘what are your conclusions?’ Like: are you a republican; are you a democrat; are you a libertarian; are you a socialist? And the more I think about it, this strikes me as extremely odd.
Why should the battle lines be drawn in terms of conclusions? Another way of drawing the battle lines would be, say, in terms of how people think. So if I take someone like Matt [Yglesias?], who’s one of the commenters—I read Matt’s blog all the time. Matt, I think, would agree that he and I disagree on a lot of issues. Not on everything, but we disagree a lot. We disagree every day. We sort of write back and forth to each other and to others, and even if we don’t call each other by name, we’re, like, disagreeing in public every day.
But at the same time when I read Matt I have this feeling like ‘if I were a progressive, this is the argument I would make’. I feel that way when I read Matt. There’s other writers, like when I read Paul Krugman, I don’t feel that way. I don’t think if I were progressive I would argue like Paul Krugman.
So this method of thinking in common, there’s this question, should I be emotionally, intellectually, whatever, more allied to people with whom I share conclusions, or with whom I share a certain method of thinking? And when I disagree with Matt, which is frequently, I feel like I can always figure out very quickly where we disagree. There’s something about the framework we have in common. And that, to me, seems like a powerful commonality. So in general I’m interested in getting people to explore, or re-explore, what are our true commonalities with other people?
Why should the battle lines be drawn in terms of conclusions?
Suppose I agree with someone’s conclusion, and disagree with them on the method used to reach that conclusion. Are we political allies, or enemies? That is, of course “politics” is the answer to ‘why should the battle lines be drawn this way?’
Now, for Tyler as a pundit, the answer is different. Staying in an intellectual realm where he thinks like the other people around him makes it so any disagreements are interesting and intelligible.
Now, for Tyler as a pundit, the answer is different. Staying in an intellectual realm where he thinks like the other people around him makes it so any disagreements are interesting and intelligible.
I think the reasons for Tyler’s positions are deeper than that.
Don’t think in terms of a single-round game, think in terms of a situation where you have to co-exist with the other party for a relatively long time and have some kind of a relationship with it.
The conclusions about a particular specific issue of today are not necessarily all that important compared to sharing a a general framework of approaches to things, a similar way of analyzing them...
Don’t think in terms of a single-round game, think in terms of a situation where you have to co-exist with the other party for a relatively long time and have some kind of a relationship with it.
The conclusions about a particular specific issue of today are not necessarily all that important compared to sharing a a general framework of approaches to things, a similar way of analyzing them...
As stated, this primarily matters for pundits. Notice that the methods of thinking that he’s talking about don’t reliably lead to the same conclusions; different values and different facts mean that two people who think very similarly (i.e. structure arguments in the same way) may end up with opposite policy preferences, able to look at each other and say “yes, I get what you think and why you think it, but I think the opposite.” And so a particular part of the blogosphere will discuss policies in one way, another part another way, it’ll be discussed a third way on television, and so on. But the battle lines will still be drawn in terms of conclusions, because policy conclusions are what actually get implemented, and it doesn’t seem sensible to describe the boundaries between the areas where policies are discussed as “battle lines,” when what they actually are is an absence of connections.
When dealing with someone who comes to different conclusions than I do, but whose way of thinking I understand well, it’s relatively easy for me to negotiate with them—I can predict what offers they’ll value, and roughly to what degree, and what aspects of their own negotiating position they’re likely to be OK with trading off.
Whereas negotiating with someone whose way of thinking I don’t understand is relatively hard, and I can expect a significant amount of effort to be expended overcoming the friction of the negotiation itself, and otherwise benefiting nobody.
Of course, I don’t have to negotiate with someone who agrees with me, so in the short term that’s an easy tradeoff in favor of agree-on-conclusions.
But if I’m choosing people I want to work with in the future, it’s worth asking how well agreeing on conclusions now predicts agreeing on conclusions in the future, vs. how well understanding each other now predicts understanding each other in the future. For my own part, I find mutual understanding tends to be more persistent.
That said, I’m not sure whether negotiation is more a part of what you’re calling “politics” here, or what you’re calling “punditry,” or neither, or perhaps both.
But negotiation is a huge part of what I consider politics, and not an especially significant part of what I consider punditry.
I continue to disagree. This matters a lot for people who are interested in maintaining the status quo and are very much against any drastic and revolutionary changes—which often enough come from a different way of thinking.
“Are we political allies, or enemies?” is rather orthogonal to that—your political allies are those whose actions support your goals and your political enemies are those whose actions hurt your goals.
For example, a powerful and popular extreme radical member of the “opposite” camp that has conclusions that you disagree with, uses methods you disagree with, and is generally toxic and spewing hate—that’s often a prime example of your political ally whose actions incite the moderate members of society to start supporting you and focusing on your important issues instead of something else. The existance of such a pundit is important to you, you want them to keep doing what their do and have their propaganda actions be successful up to a point. I won’t go into examples of particular politicians/parties of various countries, that gets dirty quickly, but many strictly opposed radical groups are actually allies in this sense against the majority of moderates; and sometimes they actively coordinate and cooperate despite the ideological differences.
On the other hand, a public speaker that targets the same audience as you do, shares the same goals/conslusions that you do, and the intended methods to achieve it, but simply does it consistently poorly—by using sloppy arguments that alienate part of the target audience, or by disgusting personal behavior that hurts the image of your organization. That’s a good example of a political enemy, one that you must work to silence, to get them ignored and not heard; despite being “aligned” with your conclusions.
And of course, a political competitor that does everything that you want to do but holds a chair/position that you want for yourself, is also a political enemy. Infighting inside powerful political groups is a normal situation, and when (and if) it goes to public, very interesting political arguments appear to distinguish one from their political enemy despite sharing most of the platform.
your political allies are those whose actions support your goals and your political enemies are those whose actions hurt your goals.
! That’s not how other humans interpret “alliance,” and using language like that is a recipe for social disaster. This is a description of convenience. Allies are people that you will sacrifice for and they will sacrifice for you. The NAACP may benefit from the existence of Stormfront, but imagine the fallout from a fundraising letter that called them the NAACP’s allies!
Whether or not someone is an ally or an enemy depends on the context. As the saying goes, “I against my brother, and I and my brother against my cousins, I and my brother and my cousins against the world”—the person that has the same preferences as you, and thus competes with you for the same resources, is potentially an enemy in the local scope but is an ally in broader scopes.
Allies are those who agree to cooperate with you. An alliance may be temporary, limited in scope, and subject to conditions, but in the end it’s all about cooperation. A stupid enemy who makes mistakes certainly benefits your cause and is a useful tool, but he’s no ally.
[Transcript from video, hence long and choppy]
-- Tyler Cowen from a talk on on neurodiversity
Suppose I agree with someone’s conclusion, and disagree with them on the method used to reach that conclusion. Are we political allies, or enemies? That is, of course “politics” is the answer to ‘why should the battle lines be drawn this way?’
Now, for Tyler as a pundit, the answer is different. Staying in an intellectual realm where he thinks like the other people around him makes it so any disagreements are interesting and intelligible.
This is sort of related to what Scott argues in “In Favor Of Niceness, Community, And Civilization”.
I think the reasons for Tyler’s positions are deeper than that.
Don’t think in terms of a single-round game, think in terms of a situation where you have to co-exist with the other party for a relatively long time and have some kind of a relationship with it.
The conclusions about a particular specific issue of today are not necessarily all that important compared to sharing a a general framework of approaches to things, a similar way of analyzing them...
I also had in mind this bit of wisdom from Robin.
As stated, this primarily matters for pundits. Notice that the methods of thinking that he’s talking about don’t reliably lead to the same conclusions; different values and different facts mean that two people who think very similarly (i.e. structure arguments in the same way) may end up with opposite policy preferences, able to look at each other and say “yes, I get what you think and why you think it, but I think the opposite.” And so a particular part of the blogosphere will discuss policies in one way, another part another way, it’ll be discussed a third way on television, and so on. But the battle lines will still be drawn in terms of conclusions, because policy conclusions are what actually get implemented, and it doesn’t seem sensible to describe the boundaries between the areas where policies are discussed as “battle lines,” when what they actually are is an absence of connections.
When dealing with someone who comes to different conclusions than I do, but whose way of thinking I understand well, it’s relatively easy for me to negotiate with them—I can predict what offers they’ll value, and roughly to what degree, and what aspects of their own negotiating position they’re likely to be OK with trading off.
Whereas negotiating with someone whose way of thinking I don’t understand is relatively hard, and I can expect a significant amount of effort to be expended overcoming the friction of the negotiation itself, and otherwise benefiting nobody.
Of course, I don’t have to negotiate with someone who agrees with me, so in the short term that’s an easy tradeoff in favor of agree-on-conclusions.
But if I’m choosing people I want to work with in the future, it’s worth asking how well agreeing on conclusions now predicts agreeing on conclusions in the future, vs. how well understanding each other now predicts understanding each other in the future. For my own part, I find mutual understanding tends to be more persistent.
That said, I’m not sure whether negotiation is more a part of what you’re calling “politics” here, or what you’re calling “punditry,” or neither, or perhaps both.
But negotiation is a huge part of what I consider politics, and not an especially significant part of what I consider punditry.
I continue to disagree. This matters a lot for people who are interested in maintaining the status quo and are very much against any drastic and revolutionary changes—which often enough come from a different way of thinking.
“Are we political allies, or enemies?” is rather orthogonal to that—your political allies are those whose actions support your goals and your political enemies are those whose actions hurt your goals.
For example, a powerful and popular extreme radical member of the “opposite” camp that has conclusions that you disagree with, uses methods you disagree with, and is generally toxic and spewing hate—that’s often a prime example of your political ally whose actions incite the moderate members of society to start supporting you and focusing on your important issues instead of something else. The existance of such a pundit is important to you, you want them to keep doing what their do and have their propaganda actions be successful up to a point. I won’t go into examples of particular politicians/parties of various countries, that gets dirty quickly, but many strictly opposed radical groups are actually allies in this sense against the majority of moderates; and sometimes they actively coordinate and cooperate despite the ideological differences.
On the other hand, a public speaker that targets the same audience as you do, shares the same goals/conslusions that you do, and the intended methods to achieve it, but simply does it consistently poorly—by using sloppy arguments that alienate part of the target audience, or by disgusting personal behavior that hurts the image of your organization. That’s a good example of a political enemy, one that you must work to silence, to get them ignored and not heard; despite being “aligned” with your conclusions.
And of course, a political competitor that does everything that you want to do but holds a chair/position that you want for yourself, is also a political enemy. Infighting inside powerful political groups is a normal situation, and when (and if) it goes to public, very interesting political arguments appear to distinguish one from their political enemy despite sharing most of the platform.
! That’s not how other humans interpret “alliance,” and using language like that is a recipe for social disaster. This is a description of convenience. Allies are people that you will sacrifice for and they will sacrifice for you. The NAACP may benefit from the existence of Stormfront, but imagine the fallout from a fundraising letter that called them the NAACP’s allies!
Whether or not someone is an ally or an enemy depends on the context. As the saying goes, “I against my brother, and I and my brother against my cousins, I and my brother and my cousins against the world”—the person that has the same preferences as you, and thus competes with you for the same resources, is potentially an enemy in the local scope but is an ally in broader scopes.
Allies are those who agree to cooperate with you. An alliance may be temporary, limited in scope, and subject to conditions, but in the end it’s all about cooperation. A stupid enemy who makes mistakes certainly benefits your cause and is a useful tool, but he’s no ally.