From: Zack M. Davis Date: Sat, 2 Mar 2024 20:51:25 +0000 (-0800) Subject: memoir: pt. 4 Cade Metz footnote X-Git-Url: http://unremediatedgender.space/source?a=commitdiff_plain;h=ca6129350728223db399502a32a452780f1e3ef0;p=Ultimately_Untrue_Thought.git memoir: pt. 4 Cade Metz footnote --- diff --git a/content/drafts/agreeing-with-stalin-in-ways-that-exhibit-generally-rationalist-principles.md b/content/drafts/agreeing-with-stalin-in-ways-that-exhibit-generally-rationalist-principles.md index c172462..c963198 100644 --- a/content/drafts/agreeing-with-stalin-in-ways-that-exhibit-generally-rationalist-principles.md +++ b/content/drafts/agreeing-with-stalin-in-ways-that-exhibit-generally-rationalist-principles.md @@ -366,7 +366,9 @@ But if you cared about not deceiving your readers, you would want to be sure tha I think he's playing dumb here. In other contexts, he's written about ["attack[s] performed by selectively reporting true information"](https://twitter.com/ESYudkowsky/status/1634338145016909824) and ["[s]tatements which are technically true but which deceive the listener into forming further beliefs which are false"](https://hpmor.com/chapter/97). He's undoubtedly familiar with the motte-and-bailey doctrine as [described by Nicholas Shackel](https://philpapers.org/archive/SHATVO-2.pdf) and [popularized by Scott Alexander](https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/11/03/all-in-all-another-brick-in-the-motte/). I think that if he wanted to, Eliezer Yudkowsky could think of some relevant differences between "2 + 2 = 4" and "the simplest and best protocol is, "_He_ refers to the set of people who have asked us to use _he_". -If you think it's "sometimes personally prudent and not community-harmful" to go out of your way to say positive things about Republican candidates and never, ever say positive things about Democratic candidates (because you live in a red state and "don't see what the alternative is besides getting shot"), you can see why people might regard you as a Republican shill, even if each sentence you said was true. If you tried to defend yourself against the charge of being a Republican shill by pointing out that you've never told any specific individual, "You should vote Republican," that's a nice motte, but you shouldn't expect devoted rationalists to fall for it. +If you think it's "sometimes personally prudent and not community-harmful" to go out of your way to say positive things about Republican candidates and never, ever say positive things about Democratic candidates (because you live in a red state and "don't see what the alternative is besides getting shot"), you can see why people might regard you as a Republican shill, even if every sentence you said was true.[^the-wizard-metz] If you tried to defend yourself against the charge of being a Republican shill by pointing out that you've never told any specific individual, "You should vote Republican," that's a nice motte, but you shouldn't expect devoted rationalists to fall for it. + +[^the-wizard-metz]: It's instructive to consider that [Cade Metz could just as credibly offer the same excuse](https://www.greaterwrong.com/posts/MN4NRkMw7ggt9587K/firming-up-not-lying-around-its-edge-cases-is-less-broadly/comment/9YkXk43b4LC4vaCTs). Similarly, when Yudkowsky [wrote in June 2021](https://twitter.com/ESYudkowsky/status/1404697716689489921), "I have never in my own life tried to persuade anyone to go trans (or not go trans)—I don't imagine myself to understand others that much", it was a great motte. I don't doubt the literal motte stated literally.