"I Tell Myself" Sunday drafting session 5: on fame

diff --git a/notes/i-tell-myself-notes.txt b/notes/i-tell-myself-notes.txt
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@@ -506,3 +506,9 @@ Arguing with a specific person's published words is important, because otherwise
 (I told people that my father was coming to pick me up at the end of my 72-hour (== 3 days) evaluation period, but that it wasn't fair that I couldn't rescue everyone.)
 
 blegg commentary:  https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/GEJzPwY8JedcNX2qz/blegg-mode#aAgSDZ4ddHpzj9fNN
+
+if it's objective, there is truth; if it's not-objective social construction for coordination purposes (like money or Christmas), it is at least subject to _negotiation_ (so "words don't mean anything" isn't a valid excuse)
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+http://www.paulgraham.com/marginal.html
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+If we _actually_ had the sex change technology described in "Changing Emotions", no one would be motivated to invent these category-gerrymandering mind games in the first place

diff --git a/notes/i-tell-myself-sections.md b/notes/i-tell-myself-sections.md
index e884718..9bce240 100644 (file)
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@@ -15,3 +15,13 @@ Telling the difference between fantasy and reality is kind of an important life
 It seems useful to be able to express this claim in natural language? "The trait distribution of trans women isn't identical to that of cis women" does not _convey the same meaning_.
 
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+An aside: being famous must _suck_. I haven't experienced this myself, but I'm sure it's true.
+
+Oh, sure, it's nice to see your work get read and appreciated by people—I've experienced that much. (Shout-out to my loyal fans—all three of you![^fans]) But when you're _famous_, everybody wants a piece of you. The fact that your work influences _so many_ people, makes you a _target_ for anyone who wants to indirectly wield your power for their own ends. Every new author wants you to review their book; every ideologue wants you on their side ...
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+And when someone in your robot cult thinks you've made a philosophy mistake that impinges on their interests, they might spend an _unreasonable_ amount of effort obsessively trying to argue with you about it.
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+[^fans]: I'm specifically thinking of W.E., R.S., and [Sophia](http://unremediatedgender.space/author/sophia/).
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