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Peel posted:Q: I'm aware of the general criticisms of Scott Alexander in this thread (has spent so long bending over backwards to be generous and keep talking to NRx that he's adopted a bunch of their tropes, lack of equivalent charity to the left and their '30% of sane feminists', is not actually a very astute thinker), but is there a particular criticism of the his Anti-Reactionary FAQ beyond this? I'm aware it has some eyerolling praise of reactionary thinkers in the introduction, but are there known problems with the content or approach? The big problem is that he assumes all neoreactionary thinkers are friendly, nice, fellow travelers who have come by their views based on their understanding of data like crime rates in Victorian London vs Modern New York and that correcting these views via a different understanding of the data is all they need. And you said it, but he never, ever, applies this level of charity to the left. Whenever he wants to make one of his patented "left things and right things are actually exactly the same" he tends to rely on anonymous Tumblr asks and news comments sections as his representative of the Left.
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Jul 7, 2016 16:51
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The Vosgian Beast posted:The big problem is that he assumes all neoreactionary thinkers are friendly, nice, fellow travelers who have come by their views based on their understanding of data like crime rates in Victorian London vs Modern New York and that correcting these views via a different understanding of the data is all they need. Even when he's talking about relatively inconsequential things like Victorian crime rates, I was amazed at how historically ignorant Scott is. Like the thought ever seems to have occured to him that there might be books written by academics that discuss Victorian crime or something like that. I read his FAQ years ago, well before I had really heard anything about him or the alt-right in general, but even then I thought the way he discusses these things was pretty off.
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Jul 7, 2016 17:24
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I mean, in fairness to his methodology, he was dealing with a bunch of bullshit artist political cranks on the Internet making wild-rear end truthy assertions. I think actually hitting the books is in excess of what NRx really merited for the FAQ.
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Jul 7, 2016 17:38
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Grenrow posted:Even when he's talking about relatively inconsequential things like Victorian crime rates, I was amazed at how historically ignorant Scott is. Like the thought ever seems to have occured to him that there might be books written by academics that discuss Victorian crime or something like that. I read his FAQ years ago, well before I had really heard anything about him or the alt-right in general, but even then I thought the way he discusses these things was pretty off. He's more or less just accepted the far-right/Steven Pinker party line that all social science is an attempt to prove Marx right and nothing else
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Jul 7, 2016 19:38
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The Vosgian Beast posted:He's more or less just accepted the far-right/Steven Pinker party line that all social science is an attempt to prove Marx right and nothing else He did independently reinvent historical materialism only 150 years after Marx, though it's unlikely he realises that's what he did.
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Jul 7, 2016 22:40
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divabot posted:He did independently reinvent historical materialism only 150 years after Marx, though it's unlikely he realises that's what he did. quote:The new movement might have differed from Communism in minor details – maybe their color would have been blue instead of red – lol
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Jul 7, 2016 23:20
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The Vosgian Beast posted:The big problem is that he assumes all neoreactionary thinkers are friendly, nice, fellow travelers who have come by their views based on their understanding of data like crime rates in Victorian London vs Modern New York and that correcting these views via a different understanding of the data is all they need. Section 5 of the neoreactionary FAQ stands out to me, much more than the others. For most of the other sections, he used refutations from history. They're not necessarily deep enough or well researched enough, but he make some effort to understand what real scholars have argued. When it comes to sections 1 through 4, he refutes neoreactionary thought because it's absurd. But the ideas in section 5 are absurd and shared across people all over the right, not just this particular slice of it. Because these beliefs are part of the political dialogue in Scott's social circle, he has to take them all somewhat seriously. This is why section 5 is full of reductio ad absurdium logic, much more so than the others. They're more complex subjects, and since Scott doesn't have the right kind of academic training and believes he should be able to learn academics' ideas from first principles instead of, you know, studying, he has no idea how to refute them in an academic manner. And since they're often just more extreme versions of ideas that are fairly mainstream, he can't just snidely brush them aside, like he does with the claim that progressives' beliefs are rooted in religion.
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Jul 8, 2016 00:44
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The Vosgian Beast posted:Update: Usually MMS gets a few comments from the same handful of people who tend to go "Right on!" or "Preach, brother!" but this time all he got was this comment Someone mentioned Poe's law, and he threw a hilarious hissy fit quote:Poe’s Law is the contention that it is impossible to tell the difference between a parody and the genuine article. In reality, “Poe’s Law” is one of these internet assertions that looks profound to the ignorant, but actually says nothing. If you can’t make a distinction between a fake and the factual, that says more about the reader than it does about the text itself.
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Jul 8, 2016 04:06
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The Vosgian Beast posted:Someone mentioned Poe's law, and he threw a hilarious hissy fit Those are totally the words of a person who has been thrown into a frothing rage after misinterpreting an Onion article as fact in the past. Probably more than once.
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Jul 8, 2016 04:16
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Goon Danton posted:This also went through a thousand investigations, and the [bfinal[/b] report on those recently dropped and said she did nothing wrong. Hah, right. Like there isn't going to be another investigation. The Lone Badger has a new favorite as of 05:11 on Jul 8, 2016 |
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Jul 8, 2016 04:58
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I didn't know Xenoveritas posted on reddit.
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Jul 8, 2016 06:23
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GunnerJ posted:I mean, in fairness to his methodology, he was dealing with a bunch of bullshit artist political cranks on the Internet making wild-rear end truthy assertions. I think actually hitting the books is in excess of what NRx really merited for the FAQ. If that's true then it's amazing just how quickly he came around to neoreactionaries and accepted them as part of his grey tribe. He's also a sloppy writer and a sloppier sociologist. His analysis of the different tribes that he claims to make up the American social fabric is probably the best proof of why he was - from the beginning - fundamentally ill-equipped to refute NRx, and it's no surprise that as a fan of lovely sociology (as basically all grey tribe STEMlords are wont to do) he would be drawn to many NRx concepts.
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Jul 8, 2016 07:02
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He was always sympathetic to them. In hindsight, I think he wrote the whole thing not because he opposed NRx but because he wanted to improve it. Like I remember a number of point in the FAQ where he acts like they have a good point that they could constructively work to resolve if only X thing were fixed.
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Jul 8, 2016 12:38
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When you get right down to it, his objections to NRx are based on the movement not being rational enough, goshdarnit. Not a revulsion deriving from empathy. Folks like him don't consider empathy (or any other emotion) as a valid underpinning for any beliefs or reactions to ideology.
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Jul 8, 2016 13:19
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Personally I am always amused by people telling me my approach to GGers and the rest of the Alt-Right is "irrational." Opposing a group whose ideology inherently includes your extermination or subjugation is extremely rational.
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Jul 8, 2016 15:29
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Small Frozen Thing posted:Personally I am always amused by people telling me my approach to GGers and the rest of the Alt-Right is "irrational." Opposing a group whose ideology inherently includes your extermination or subjugation is extremely rational. That sounds like you just feel like not being exterminated you dirty feeler, true rational vulcans base their consideration entirely on raw logic that isn't allowed to incorporate ethical considerations beyond "which option is the most efficient and will get me my cool robot brain / cyber feudalism / whatever faster"
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Jul 8, 2016 18:34
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You know that episode of DS9 where Bashir and his nerd buddies predict with absolute certainty that they can't beat the dominion so it would be better objectively to just give up now and wait like 300 years for there to be an eventual revolution? Basically that.
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Jul 8, 2016 18:36
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Parallel Paraplegic posted:You know that episode of DS9 where Bashir and his nerd buddies predict with absolute certainty that they can't beat the dominion so it would be better objectively to just give up now and wait like 300 years for there to be an eventual revolution? Basically that. My favorite part of that is that they think that Earth will be the center of the revolution and in a later episode the Dominion say they are going to xenocide the entire Earth because of that possibility. They sure got their predictions right.
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Jul 8, 2016 19:42
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Oh yeah, Episode 59: "Feels vs. Reals"
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Jul 8, 2016 19:44
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Small Frozen Thing posted:Personally I am always amused by people telling me my approach to GGers and the rest of the Alt-Right is "irrational." Opposing a group whose ideology inherently includes your extermination or subjugation is extremely rational. But you see, individual lives and experiences have no inherent meaning or value except ours so opposing your own destruction is irrational. You will be removed for the greater good of  The fact that the species will almost entirely consist of lightly-pigmented male individuals after the rationalization is, of course, entirely coincidental.
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Jul 8, 2016 19:51
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Part of Scott Alexander's refutation of scientific racism in the FAQ is literally "by 2100 we will all be genetically-perfect space cyborgs anyway"
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Jul 8, 2016 20:12
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The Vosgian Beast posted:Part of Scott Alexander's refutation of scientific racism in the FAQ is literally "by 2100 we will all be genetically-perfect space cyborgs anyway" So he needs soemthing in the future to retroactively remove a premise that he doesn't believe in.
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Jul 8, 2016 20:25
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Parallel Paraplegic posted:You know that episode of DS9 where Bashir and his nerd buddies predict with absolute certainty that they can't beat the dominion so it would be better objectively to just give up now and wait like 300 years for there to be an eventual revolution? Basically that. They were right, weren't they? If the Bajoran gods hadn't erased the invasion fleet, the Federation would have lost the war
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Jul 8, 2016 21:59
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hackbunny posted:They were right, weren't they? If the Bajoran gods hadn't erased the invasion fleet, the Federation would have lost the war Yeah, but god-like beings are a dime a dozen in Star Trek, you can't ignore them.
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Jul 9, 2016 02:31
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Parallel Paraplegic posted:You know that episode of DS9 where Bashir and his nerd buddies predict with absolute certainty that they can't beat the dominion so it would be better objectively to just give up now and wait like 300 years for there to be an eventual revolution? Basically that. There was another part later on in the same episode where, having settled the Dominion problem, they get to work on solving the eventual heat death of the universe. The one talkative nerd guy gets angry at Bashir for not understanding why this would be important. I'm always reminded of that scene whenever I read about Yud's future AI thing.
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Jul 9, 2016 03:28
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Matt Forney realizes that, in a trump-saturated world, the hateclick ad revenue is not bringing in what it used to, and makes a desperate bid for infamous relevance
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Jul 9, 2016 20:25
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The Vosgian Beast posted:Matt Forney realizes that, in a trump-saturated world, the hateclick ad revenue is not bringing in what it used to, and makes a desperate bid for infamous relevance Something that trivially false is a pretty piss-poor attempt even for Matt Forney
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Jul 9, 2016 21:41
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Parallel Paraplegic posted:Something that trivially false is a pretty piss-poor attempt even for Matt Forney Reminder that the nationalist’s derisive response to Scholasticism is how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, while the religionist’s best derisive response to nationalism is probably Chesterton’s “democracy of the dead” and a reductio ad absurdum of biological determinism like necessarily broadly accepted ideologies which I guess would be historical materialism, and to assert tradition as the only way to preserve the existence of our people and a future for White children. Reminder that tradition consists of either looking at a woman with lust is morally equivalent to cheating on your wife, or looking at your wife with lust is morally equivalent to forcing her to have sex. Reminder that either your personal relationship with ((Jesus)) is the the most important thing, or preserving the existence of our people and a future for White children is.
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Jul 9, 2016 22:11
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Lottery of Babylon posted:Reminder that the nationalist’s derisive response to Scholasticism is how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, while the religionist’s best derisive response to nationalism is probably Chesterton’s “democracy of the dead” and a reductio ad absurdum of biological determinism like necessarily broadly accepted ideologies which I guess would be historical materialism, and to assert tradition as the only way to preserve the existence of our people and a future for White children. what the hell does this word salad even mean
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Jul 9, 2016 22:22
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President Ark posted:what the hell does this word salad even mean Form don’t real. There’s a bunch of points with locations that are contingently related to each other. (Caveat: definitions.) However, we can see points&space perform the philosophical function that Aristotle’s ‘form’ did, and he would likely be delighted at the correction.
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Jul 9, 2016 22:25
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is this what having a stroke is like yes i know LOB is a gimmick poster
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Jul 9, 2016 22:27
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So... I decided to go to a futurism meetup. Didn't last long until the words "blockchain" and "singularity" made an appearance and the idea of progress was turned into a single variable with "exponential" increase. Still, these were real people and I didn't want to treat them with the same scorn I reserve for internet hugbox people doing the same thing.
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Jul 10, 2016 00:31
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Parallel Paraplegic posted:Something that trivially false is a pretty piss-poor attempt even for Matt Forney He's the guy who was described on jezebel by a woman who knew him in high school as a fat weirdo who smelled like piss and ran from girls who tried to talk to him, right?
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Jul 10, 2016 00:41
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Jack Gladney posted:He's the guy who was described on jezebel by a woman who knew him in high school as a fat weirdo who smelled like piss and ran from girls who tried to talk to him, right? More or less Note: He doxxed one of the women in that conversation, who turned out to be a 60 something community college professor, for the heinous crime of feeling bad for him.
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Jul 10, 2016 01:12
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ikanreed posted:So... I decided to go to a futurism meetup. Did they at least have nice art? The Italian Futurists were protofascist dickbags, but some of the stuff they came up with was hella rad.
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Jul 10, 2016 01:20
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Wtf is with the whole blockchain obsession? How does a blockchain not devolve inevitably into one body of traders monopolizing the clearing capabilities and basically re-inventing the standard financial system?
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Jul 10, 2016 01:24
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neonnoodle posted:Wtf is with the whole blockchain obsession? How does a blockchain not devolve inevitably into one body of traders monopolizing the clearing capabilities and basically re-inventing the standard financial system?
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Jul 10, 2016 02:45
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neonnoodle posted:Wtf is with the whole blockchain obsession? How does a blockchain not devolve inevitably into one body of traders monopolizing the clearing capabilities and basically re-inventing the standard financial system? Nerds holding a hammer, looking around at all those amazing nails in society.
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Jul 10, 2016 03:26
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neonnoodle posted:Wtf is with the whole blockchain obsession? How does a blockchain not devolve inevitably into one body of traders monopolizing the clearing capabilities and basically re-inventing the standard financial system? Futurism nerds suffer from a case of reductio ad technology where everything can be neatly shoved into a technological box, where somehow, in the future, some guy is going to go "Whoa, this complex social problem can totally be solved with just a little coding!". Currency, voting, stocks, yes sir we can reduce really complex and intricate systems into neat clearly defined boxes, never mind that every one of the above examples has been a comical dumpsterfire.
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Jul 10, 2016 03:44
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I was talking to my DE-believing-in, /pol/-posting yet gay and genderfluid "friend" earlier today and pointed out that if the DE gets their way he'd probably be up against the wall first with the rest of the "degenerates" and he came back with "actually there's probably more gays and transpeople (and weebs and neets) in the alt-right than in most other internet subcultures" and all I had as a comeback was "the only ones I know are terrible people like Milo and Justine Tunny" and then it just devolved into a weird "would you do Justine Tunny" thing (he would, I wouldn't because I find despicable views a major turn-off, for the record). Anyway that got me thinking about two things - one, is there any good quotes from DE types laying out anti-LGBT opinions? All I have is people saying wishy-washy things like Milo does. The other is whether or not there's any actual data on how many
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Jul 10, 2016 04:42
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