New Testingstan

starku wrote:Who cares about things like effective enforcement or social benefit or community policing or not shooting people

that freakonomics thing alyrium linked said community policing has no effect on crime

RedImperator wrote:I like his style, but I'm not as impressed by the substance.

i liek it cuz its something fairly new

i can see the common sense responses easily enough but the real argument would prolly be fun

Red, could you explain since I'm one of those laymen and from my perspective a lot of his stuff (mind-body distinction, animals not feeling pain, etc) seem so incomprehensibly stupid I can only respond with incredulity.

Just from skimming his posts legault sounds like a long-winded gasbag.

Keeping in mind that this is stuff I've picked up via osmosis from Meta:

Descartes (famously) wrote about the difference between the actual really real world and our subjective experience of it. It's the "what if I'm really a brain in a tank or a simulation or something God happens to be imagining and the physical universe and everything I think is in it is an illusion?" question. This is where "I think, therefore I am" comes from: Descartes deduces that if nothing else, he must exist because his subjective impressions exist; a subjective impression that doesn't belong to an entity is a nonsensical concept. So even if the entire world is an illusion, there must be some first person "I" that exists to experience the illusion (for the record, Descartes didn't actually hold such an absurdly reductionist position; he built back out from "I think therefoe I am" to "the physical world exists"; Alyrium is completely wrong when he accuses Descartes of believing this). This ties into mind/body dualism--is the conscious "mind" a distinct entity from the physical and chemical state of the brain that houses it. Descartes thought it was, and identified "mind" as a property of the immortal soul. And then he concluded, since animals do not have souls, they don't have "minds" like we do--they're like clockwork automata, who may react as if they're in pain, but they have no meaningful internal life. It's like smashing a robot with a hammer--the robot may be able to detect "I AM DAMAGED" and even take programmed action to avoid further damage, but it's not subjectively experiencing pain the way humans do.

Now, dualism has been out of fashion pretty much since neutrology started identifiying distinct brain structures and connecting them to specific behaviors, memories, functions, etc. Multiple people in the thread have brought this up. But they've been missing the target--Legault is not arguing that the physical brains of animals don't respond in the same way that physical human brains do to similar stimuli. He's making an epistomological argument that we can't know if animals share the same subjective experience of pain. If I built a robotic chicken that squaked and tried to get away when it detected that I was stabbing it, most people would probably agree that the robot was not experiencing "pain", just detecting a stimulus and reacting in a programmed way.

Anyway, Legault is arguing that every conscious being has a distinct, subjective "I" and that it's impossible by definition for any other entity to know what that "I"'s true subjective experiences are (Descartes would have said God can, but I don't think Legault is making a theistic argument, and even if he is a Christian, he would argue none of us are God anyway so it doesn't matter). Even through telepathy or direct brain-to-brain linkage or we've been turned into computer programs that can interact with each other in some way that lets us experience each others thoughts directly, everything we experience is filtered through our own subjective selves. It's the old "how do I know your 'blue' isn't like my 'red'?" question. What he's doing is extending that to "pain"--how do I know your "pain" isn't my "orgasm"? Which is, I guess, a potentially interesting question, but his approach is utterly fucked because he's using it to dismiss objectively observable actions on the part of whatever is being tortured, and in such a way that you could justify torturing literally anything and anyone (Zablorg caught this; he stripped all the philosophical minutae out and challenged him directly on this approach, which is relevant because he's using it to make a practical ethical argument--battery farming is ethical because the chickens aren't experiencing pain in the same way humans do; Legault responded in a way that's pretty much insane). He's also being pretty dishonest by citing Descartes to justify the belief that animals don't experience pain without explaining Descarte's reasoning (immortal souls), which everybody missed.

Now since I don't think Legault is an idiot, I'm sure if he were challenged on these points, he'd have an answer and it wouldn't be completely stupid (though some of them would be pretty lame--"I was only bringing up Descartes as one possible approach to the problem"). This is why I haven't directly engaged--I'm fairly confident that he has a better philosophical education than I do, and I don't bring knives to gunfights, even if the other guy is a lousy shot. The real rebuttal is that it isn't actually ethically relevant or necessary to 100% know a chicken's internal subjective experience of pain to conclude that inflicting needless pain on one is almost certainly seriously wrong. I'm not sure exactly how to construct this argument in a sensible way, at least not in one that someone with a real philosophy education couldn't easily deflect, but it's a better track than just squawking about MRIs over and over.

PS: Dualism has been making a bit of a comeback ever since computers have become sophisticated enough that "uploading" hasn't seemed completely crazy. Call it "information dualism", maybe. You can apply it to computer programs, too--is there an object in the world called "Microsoft Word" that exists separately and independently from a collection of electronic bits in a machine. Intellectual property law thinks there is, but IP law was written in order to address economic concerns, not philosophical ones. I don't think anyone has a completely satisfying answer to this yet.

PPS: I haven't read the secular morality thread carefully, but it appears Mike et al are dismissing metaphysics because it's not empirical, and Legault is responding that their attempts to construct an "empirical morality" are doomed to sink into a mire of contradictory axioms and are ultimately nonsensical. On that point I think he's correct, though I'm sure he's wrong on the subtleties.

i like the wongian definition of instinctual behaviour: "non intra-species uniform behaviour that can have a range of expressions, with diffuse genetics, and is moulded by environment and history to produce various results"

so

it's just like any other behaviour then?

haha stop making shit up, people going "ya of course you are right" is just ridiculous at this point


ps the real (ie. non-freudian or whatever) definition is hilariously the opposite: intra-species uniform automatic behaviour, with a clear genetic link, that is NOT moulded by environmental factors to any large degree but triggered in response to specific stimuli

i'm trying to think about how i want to respond to the free will stuff next

on one hand its irrelevant; my position is in a world without free will, you have no morality

whether its there or not doesn't attack that logic. (the definitions matter tho.)


on the other hand deterministic free will is kinda interesting to think about


------

so one thing i kinda want to say is wong et. al. really are like legoauldtd is saying with a religion of science


seriously take these arguments and find/replace "god" with "universe"


q. who created the universe?
a. god

q. who created god?
a. he just is

q. what is morality?
a. a series of things god incentivies you to do

q. why should i believe the bible?
a. because it is the word of god

====


q. who created the universe?
a. the universe just us

<snip since it is repetition>

q. what is morality?
a. a series of things the universe incentivies you to do (mike's governing system thing)

q. why should i believe empiricism
a. because it is the reality of the universe

=====


it tickles me but i'm not sure how to best answer it

I haven't read the thread, but are they seriously arguing that Morale, the social construct to end all social constructs, can be scientifically deduced from the laws of the Universe ?

...

Well, if it's their position, you could always troll them by saying that as long as we don't know ALL the laws of the universe (and I don't think we ever will, but that's another debate...), this project is ultimately doomed to fail - it would be like trying to build a clockwork with missing gears and unknown springs.



It boggle my mind that these people are always trying to bring SCIENCE! and LOGIC! to a matter that is, fundamentally, humane and illogic in nature.
And it's the same people who like to mock Trans- and Post-humanist wankers for their own worship of SCIENCE! and LOGIC!, right ?

@ adr - it sort of stops being similar when you realize the universe isn't a sentient being with any sort of final goal in mind

RedImperator wrote:The real rebuttal is that it isn't actually ethically relevant or necessary to 100% know a chicken's internal subjective experience of pain to conclude that inflicting needless pain on one is almost certainly seriously wrong. I'm not sure exactly how to construct this argument in a sensible way, at least not in one that someone with a real philosophy education couldn't easily deflect, but it's a better track than just squawking about MRIs over and over.

that's yet another beauty of the system i've been shifting toward in recent months

subjective pain doesn't really matter since that's now the key to ascribing moral relevance

simply existing means you matter

you shouldn't do these things just because you shouldn't

PS: Dualism has been making a bit of a comeback ever since computers have become sophisticated enough that "uploading" hasn't seemed completely crazy.

yes indeed i was tempted to say this myself

here's an exchange from my fanfiction that shows the concept:

"i trust my wife implicitly and completely"

"what would you do if your wife was evil"

"i'm sure she would have some good reason for it that i simply didn't know at the time"

"no i mean what if she was actually evil would you still back her"

"that question is kinda ridiculous cuz now you aren't talking about her. you're talking about someone who looks like her, knows things she knows, and so on, but isn't really her anymore"



so basically if you can determine someone is acting out of character, then to make that determination some definition of what is in character must exist independently from the physical form

the abstract idea of a person is eternal

i think plato called this "forms" but if you ask me play-doh is some stuff you can mold not some boring book so dont take my word for it


the physical person is like a manifestation of that idea and they can grow and change together


so i don't say they are separate entirely

but they are separable


if that makes any sense





now comes the beauty of my new moral plan

all of that has relevance

it is wrong to destroy the abstract idea but that's impossible so who cares

it is also wrong to destroy the physical body if you can help it

but it is double wrong because destroying the physical body also destroys the manifestation of that (changing) abstract person which is also bad




we can apply this to the computer upload. is it wrong to delete a person.exe process? you aren't destroying anything physical so it isn't murder in a traditional sense

you you did just wipe out the manifestation of the abstract so that's a no go (as a general rule)



it is similarly wrong to overwrite a person's brain with another personality, like that one guy did in that early tng episode to data. he didn't physically harm data but he did destroy that personality




now you could say doesn't this make it wrong to, say, close your browser window? well, yeah, maybe. that seems nonsensical but this is all kinda new in my mind i'm sure there's an answer somewhere. i'm leaning toward saying you haven't really destroyed the thing there since it can come back so easily and still be the same. abstracting an abstraction

i feel like a regular enterprise software architect


well hey it aint perfect but it seems to be a lot better to me than any system that has arbitrary categories based on subjective perceptions which is just all kinds of weird stuff

Zod wrote:@ adr - it sort of stops being similar when you realize the universe isn't a sentient being with any sort of final goal in mind

mike's "social benefit" that the system is self-correcting for is that final goal

at least metaphorically

i like thinking of god as a metaphor tho anyway regardless of physical truths just cuz its convenient

there's a mouse in my house

i heard it yesterday under my television but didn't see it

one of my cookie bags had a hole in it pretty well confirming it


but today i saw the little guy run across the room and slip into the wall

he tunneled through the carpet - there's a portion chewed out of the edge by a gap in the wall molding



i hope i don't have to pay for that, it's kinda serious looking damage. not huge huge but big enough for the animal to slip through

amazing what those fucking mice can do so quickly




after he went in the wall i sealed his exit into the rest of the house

hopefully he'll just go back outside


but i doubt this struggle is over


i might have to actually catch him (or her, i don't actually know) to do a

forced relocation

adopt a cat

i used science once to deduce that a rat had relocated itself through the toilet and shit all over the bathroom floor

and also that a mouse has died behind a cupboard cause it smells like dead mouse in there

adr wrote: i might have to actually catch him (or her, i don't actually know) to do a

forced relocation

Capt picard is very dissappointed in you. he would find a better way. have you tried using a deflector dish on the mouse?

Get some rat poison pellets, cover it in peanut buttet and when the mouse dies you won't have to worry about the smell.

Just make sure its worfrian(sp?)

Losonti Tokash wrote:adopt a cat

but cats do their own thing to the carpet and bring their own messes

when i had letia's cats living with me one of them spotted a mouse once (in almost hte same location this one came in)

the cat just stared at it

sometimes tried to slap it through the wall but hte mouse could pull back fast enough

then the mouse sticks his nose out of the (at the time) tiny gap

and the cat stares




after i watched it for a while i eventually decided to break it up myself since i didn't see it ending well

either that stupid cat would get stressed as the mouse taunts her

or the cat would torture and murder that mouse like cats do

(probably leaving a mess for me in the carpet too, ugh.)




i kinda like cats but they are strange animals

Aaron wrote:Get some rat poison pellets, cover it in peanut buttet and when the mouse dies you won't have to worry about the smell.

i really dont want to kill the poor thing

he's just looking for a place to live. i'd feel really bad about killing him


if sealing the hole doesn't work my next move will probably be setting up a box trap. i'll then take him up to the park woods or the big field by the old school or something and release him there. winter is almost over and there's plenty of things to eat there so he'd have pretty good odds of making a living i think

also far enough away from my house that he won't just come back

but that way he's not my problem any more, not someone else's problem, and i wouldn't be giving him a death sentence so i wouldn't feel too bad about it.

Crazedwraith wrote:Capt picard is very dissappointed in you. he would find a better way. have you tried using a deflector dish on the mouse?

i have indeed tried rotating the frequency modulations into the upper duct tape band while engineering works on a proper solution

cats are pretty strange, this is true

when i was little we had a litter of kittens born, and of the 6 only one would kill and eat mice, so she got fat as hell

the big male just poked them and picked them up to carry them around if he caught it like a fucking kitten

Zod wrote:@ adr - it sort of stops being similar when you realize the universe isn't a sentient being with any sort of final goal in mind

The universe works in mysterious ways.

Losonti Tokash wrote:the big male just poked them and picked them up to carry them around if he caught it like a fucking kitten

letia's cat was friendly toward her hamster. she had a chance to kill and devour that hamster more than once but never acted liek she wanted to

when the hamster died the cat acted sad for a few days



but now they are back at her parents house, two cats now (w/ the hamster it was just one cat)

they have a guinea pig there

and the newer cat, a male, loves harassing that pig

not unlike the other cat did to that mouse as i watched


but sometimes the pig is trying to drink

and the cat goes up and slaps the cage


it is like he does it just for the lulz

christ this sore wrist is killing me

and before anyone jabs at it i am the master of my domain (i love television so much)

its just this work shit


and when i dont work i bitch about it



must


stop


typing



but cant

Zod wrote:Just from skimming his posts legault sounds like a long-winded gasbag.

He's a guy with an education on a topic which SDN largely eschews. If he didn't pick that up from lurking or whatever he probably picked it up pretty quickly and is just constructing arguments to make people run around in circles. To be honest it's not like I got that these are lazy arguments, and I wouldn't have even if I'd followed the discussion more closely, but I got the impression he was 'messing around', so to speak.

F.J. Prefect, Esq wrote:

Zod wrote:Just from skimming his posts legault sounds like a long-winded gasbag.

He's a guy with an education on a topic which SDN largely eschews. If he didn't pick that up from lurking or whatever he probably picked it up pretty quickly and is just constructing arguments to make people run around in circles. To be honest it's not like I got that these are lazy arguments, and I wouldn't have even if I'd followed the discussion more closely, but I got the impression he was 'messing around', so to speak.

i think it's just the fact that his posts use a lot of jargon

my kneejerk reaction is that whenever someone uses a lot of jargon they're trying to cover up a terrible argument

Man that is just a fascinating position to hold.

I don't ban people to win arguments, but I do ban people for lying.

idk there seems to be a really strong correlation between the two


of the people banned from sdn

how many believed in the board orthodoxy?



in death penalty debates we can call it a racist policy b/c "being black" ties into the "aggravating factors" that the law wants way way way more than it should


i betcha you could say the same thing about teo