X-Git-Url: http://unremediatedgender.space/source?a=blobdiff_plain;f=notes%2Fi-tell-myself-sections.md;h=eb0db9251a5af49cf7ba1673079a449635bd141d;hb=d44b7c515eaa6554399baff873ec71a5dedc4bbe;hp=7fbd40bf9b43322137a95df5e80faf3a2b63124d;hpb=d6c7f3ea75d38dfe1e4b257a0db0e4f213768455;p=Ultimately_Untrue_Thought.git diff --git a/notes/i-tell-myself-sections.md b/notes/i-tell-myself-sections.md index 7fbd40b..eb0db92 100644 --- a/notes/i-tell-myself-sections.md +++ b/notes/i-tell-myself-sections.md @@ -18,7 +18,7 @@ Why not just say "cis" women? I do, often, depending on the audience and the con The fact that I can't _talk about the world I see_ in the simple language that comes naturally to me without it inevitably being construed as a reactionary political statement is a _problem_. And it's a _rationality_ problem insofar as the world I see is potentially a more accurate model of the real world, than the world I'm allowed to talk about. -I can be polite in most circumstances, as the price of keeping the peace in Society. But it is a price, a cost—and it's a _cognitive_ cost, the cost of _destroying information_ that would make people uncomfortable. Systematically correct reasoners needn't _mention_ the cost in most circumstances (that would not be polite), but we should at least be able to refrain from indulging in clever not-technically-lying sophistry that tries to _make it look like there's no cost_. +I can be polite in most circumstances, as the price of keeping the peace in Society. But it is a price, a cost—and it's a _cognitive_ cost, the cost of _destroying information_ that would make people uncomfortable. Systematically correct reasoners needn't _mention_ the cost in most circumstances (that would not be polite), but we should at least be able to refrain from indulging in clever [not-technically-lying](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/PrXR66hQcaJXsgWsa/not-technically-lying) sophistry that tries to _make it look like there's no cost_. ----- @@ -35,7 +35,7 @@ Not because I like my voice, but because I definitely don't want to call (say) my friend Irene a man. That would be crazy! Because **her transition _actually worked_.** Because it actually worked _on the merits_. _Not_ because I'm _redefining concepts in order to be nice to her_. When I look at her, whatever algorithm my brain _ordinarily_ uses to sort people into "woman"/"man"/"not sure" buckets, returns "woman." -**If it looks like a duck, and it quacks like a duck, and you can model it as a duck without making any grevious prediction errors, then it makes sense to call it a "duck" in the range of circumstances that your model continues to be useful**, even if a pedant might point out that it's really an [Anatid](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatidae)-[oid](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/-oid#Suffix) robot, or that that species is technically a goose. +**If it looks like a duck, and it quacks like a duck, and you can model it as a duck without making any grevious prediction errors, then it makes sense to call it a "duck" in the range of circumstances that your model continues to be useful**, even if a pedant might point out that it's really ("really") an [Anatid](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatidae)-[oid](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/-oid#Suffix) robot, or that that species is technically a goose. ----- @@ -99,6 +99,10 @@ Someone asked me: "Wouldn't it be embarrassing if the community solved Friendly But the _reason_ it seemed _at all_ remotely plausible that our little robot cult could be pivotal in creating Utopia forever was _not_ "[Because we're us](http://benjaminrosshoffman.com/effective-altruism-is-self-recommending/), the world-saving good guys", but rather _because_ we were going to discover and refine the methods of _systematically correct reasoning_. +If you're doing systematically correct reasoning, you should be able to get the right answer even when the question _doesn't matter_. Obviously, the safety of the world does not directly depend on being able to think clearly about trans issues. In the same way, the safety of a coal mine for humans does not _directly_ depend on [whether it's safe for canaries](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/canary_in_a_coal_mine). + +The "discourse algorithm" (the collective generalization of "cognitive algorithm") that can't just _get this shit right_ in 2019 (because being out of step with the reigning Bay Area ideological fashion is deemed too expensive by a consequentialist algorithm that counts unpopularity as a cost), also can't get heliocentrism right in 1632 _for the same reason_—and I really doubt it can get AI alignment theory right in 2039. + If the people _marketing themselves_ as the good guys who are going to save the world using systematically correct reasoning are _not actually interested in doing systematically correct reasoning_ (because systematically correct reasoning leads to two or three conclusions that are politically "impossible" to state clearly in public, and no one has the guts to [_not_ shut up and thereby do the politically impossible](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/nCvvhFBaayaXyuBiD/shut-up-and-do-the-impossible)), that's arguably _worse_ than the situation where the community doesn't exist at all. ----- @@ -119,10 +123,6 @@ _Literally_ all I'm asking for is for the branded systematically-correct-reasoni Note, **(3) is _entirely compatible_ with trans women being women**. The point is that if you want to claim that trans women are women, you need some sort of _argument_ for why that categorization makes sense in the context you want to use the word—why that map usefully reflects some relevant aspect of the territory. If you want to _argue_ that hormone replacement therapy constitutes an effective sex change, or that trans is a brain-intersex condition and the brain is the true referent of "gender", or that [coordination constraints on _shared_ categories](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/edEXi4SpkXfvaX42j/schelling-categories-and-simple-membership-tests) [support the self-identification criterion](/2019/Oct/self-identity-is-a-schelling-point/), that's fine, because those are _arguments_ that someone who initially disagreed with your categorization could _engage with on the merits_. In contrast, "I can define a word any way I want" can't be engaged with in the same way because it's a denial of the possibility of merits. ----- - -[trade arrangments: if that's the world we live in, fine] - ------ [happy price, symmetry-breaking] @@ -139,6 +139,12 @@ The Popular Author [lightning post assumes invicibility] +https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/10/23/kolmogorov-complicity-and-the-parable-of-lightning/ + +> And the more perceptive and truth-seeking these people are, the more likely they’ll speak, say “Hey, I think we’ve got the lightning thing wrong” and not shut up about it, and society will have to destroy them. + +Have to?! + The Popular Author obviously never wanted to be the center of a personality cult; it just happened to him anyway because he's better at writing than everyone else. ----- @@ -179,8 +185,24 @@ I don't doubt Serano's report of her own _experiences_. But "it became obvious t ----- -["delusional perverts", no one understands me] +If I sound angry, it's because I actually do feel a lot of anger, but I wish I knew how to more reliably convey its target. Some trans women I know + +[think I'm collaborating with the cis] [nor, by my own principles can I say they're wrong about me by self-declaration] [agree that scapegoating is real] + +acknowleding my complicity: +/2017/Mar/interlude-ii/ +/2019/Feb/interlude-xviii/ + +"notice when I succumb to anti-gender-variance social pressure in real life." /2019/Aug/a-love-that-is-out-of-anyones-control/ ----- [You "can't" define a word any way you want, or you "can"—what actually matters is the math] + +---- + +[leaning on "Travis" for social proof] + +---- + +[on Failed-Utopia 4-2: lesiban trans women are essentially this in real life] \ No newline at end of file