From 68e1db6923d5fbf8c6c72b93a53da999b9d77711 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: "M. Taylor Saotome-Westlake" Date: Sat, 19 Jan 2019 15:16:30 -0800 Subject: [PATCH] post facto edits to metablogging --- content/2018/untitled-metablogging-26-december-2018.md | 8 +++----- 1 file changed, 3 insertions(+), 5 deletions(-) diff --git a/content/2018/untitled-metablogging-26-december-2018.md b/content/2018/untitled-metablogging-26-december-2018.md index 2795530..bc6f99b 100644 --- a/content/2018/untitled-metablogging-26-december-2018.md +++ b/content/2018/untitled-metablogging-26-december-2018.md @@ -22,7 +22,7 @@ I guess I haven't made any new posts here in almost two months?—which is not g * a technical post about how imperfect measurements are subject to [regression to the mean](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regression_toward_the_mean), which (unfortunately! _really genuinely_ unfortunately!) quantitatively weakens the standard reassurance of, "Oh, no one should feel threatened by discussion of group differences, because the statistics obviously don't apply to any one individual" * I haven't done any serious math in a while and I'm afraid that learning and explaining the details here could take me _many_ hours * a technical post about using [naïve Bayes models](http://lesswrong.com/lw/o8/conditional_independence_and_naive_bayes/) for sex categorization - * I never got very far into [_Daphne Koller and the Methods of Rationality_](https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/probabilistic-graphical-models), but I'd like to dig into it again if I can somehow find the time + * I never got very far into [_Daphne Koller and the Methods of Rationality_](https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/probabilistic-graphical-models) (I know; I like my title better), but I'd like to dig into it again if I can somehow find the time * a post about how I'm nervous about Codes of Conduct in the open-source world being used as an ideological-conformity enforcement mechanism, in contrast to their laudable ostensible purpose of preventing harrassment, _&c._ (working title: "Codes of Convergence; Or, [Smile More](https://genius.com/7888863)") * a critical appraisal of the social phenomenon of self-declared non-binary gender identities (working title: "'But I'm Not Quite Sure What That Means': Costs of Nonbinary Gender as a Social Technology") * a post about the mechanisms of social change and how there might be a role for a _very narrowly-targeted_ form of political activism where you try to give people more accurate factual information, rather than lobbying for any particular concrete policy (working title: "An Infovist's Advisory; Or, Standing Athwart History Yelling, 'Wait! I Like the Idea, but the Execution Needs Work!'") @@ -54,7 +54,7 @@ I'm not perfect, but I think I'm _pretty good_. Even if I don't agree with someo And somehow it _doesn't land_. It's like talking to a tape recorder that just endlessly repeats, "Ha-ha! [I can define a word any way I want](http://lesswrong.com/lw/od/37_ways_that_words_can_be_wrong/)! You can't use that concept unless you can provide explicit necessary-and-sufficient conditions to classify a series of ever-more obscure and contrived edge cases!" -Although I do have a couple favorite edge cases of my own. I prefer not to involve named individuals in arguments, even public figures: it's unclassy. But having nothing left, I pull out a [photograph of Danielle Muscato](http://daniellemuscato.startlogic.com/uploads/3/4/9/3/34938114/2249042_orig.jpg). "Look," I say. "This is a photograph of a man. You can see it, too, right? Right?" +Although I do have a couple favorite edge cases of my own. I generally prefer not to involve named individuals in arguments, even public figures: it's unclassy. But having nothing left, I pull out a [photograph of Danielle Muscato](http://daniellemuscato.startlogic.com/uploads/3/4/9/3/34938114/2249042_orig.jpg). "Look," I say. "This is a photograph of a man. You can see it, too, right? Right?" And they say, "It's possible to be mistaken about cis people's genders, too." @@ -72,6 +72,4 @@ I don't know. I'm just venting here because I've been _very upset_. My venting i Maybe with more time and more effort I could find _exactly_ the right words to cover every possible caveat and nitpick and _finally_ be able to communicate the thing— -But maybe I just need to relax. Not take it so seriously. Forget about the topic for a few days or a few months. Wash the goddamned dishes, write some goddamned code. _Maybe_ it's not the end of civilization if someone is Wrong on the Internet. - -Maybe. +But maybe I just need to relax. Not take it so seriously. Forget about the topic for a few days or a few months. Wash the goddamned dishes, write some goddamned code. _Maybe_ it's not [the end of the world](http://unremediatedgender.space/2017/Jan/from-what-ive-tasted-of-desire/) if someone is Wrong on the Internet. -- 2.17.1