Dennis Hackethal’s Blog
My blog about philosophy, coding, and anything else that interests me.
Tweets
An archive of my tweets and retweets through . They may be formatted slightly differently than on Twitter. API access has since gotten prohibitively expensive – I don't know whether or when I'll be able to update this archive.
But in case I will, you can subscribe via RSS – without a Twitter account. Rationale
Poverty is natural. Humanity was born into the utmost poverty of nature. It’s the default state of man. It isn’t something one can just abolish. One has to create wealth.
Rising cases don’t justify the castration of freedom. Instead, they should be used to persuade people to manage their health more wisely.
Agreed, healthcare doesn’t strike me as a Randian governmental responsibility.
“[...] visits to the homes of family and friends will no longer be allowed, and only one close contact will be allowed outside the household.”
Has there ever been this kind of tyranny in the free world? How long will it take for people to rise up against it? twitter.com/FridaGhitis/st…
@AndreaW09647358 @markusabsent @SwipeWright
I added a sun to it! https://t.co/3N6T9ECi3N
I agree that we shouldn't blindly ignore them though!
Not so—evo psych is largely false. Premonitions may well result from knowledge we develop ourselves during our lifetime.
New guest post by @ChipkinLogan about the three deepest theories of reality blog.dennishackethal.com/2020/10/27/thr…
Inwiefern das mit Ihrer zweiten Frage zusammenhängt, weiß ich nicht.
Kommt drauf an, was Sie mit „KI“ meinen. Wenn Sie eine vollwertige Simulation des menschlichen Verstands meinen, dann per definitionem „ja“, da dieser ja alles kann, was der Mensch auch kann.
@Jorgensen4POTUS
BLM is a Marxist organization. You’re not a libertarian.
On the love triangle between open borders, social-justice warriors, and murderous Islamism. twitter.com/Ayaan/status/1…
Yeah. Note her lamenting when kids "get what they want." :(
New blog post. Also, this is the new home of my blog now.
To those arguing in favor of lockdowns based on outcomes alone, will this change your mind?
And if not, what will?
“When you ask them to stay home, in many cases you’re asking them to starve.”
Translates to “those who seek freedom are selfish.” You’re making totalitarians proud.
No he didn't. He specified it's the air he considers filthy.
Evidence-based epistemology wouldn’t help with that (it’s false). Popperian epistemology would.
@DrunkenMighty @DavidDeutschOxf
Depends on my mood. If I'm interested in the machinery and stored goods I might find the warehouse more interesting.
Plus, I think people can create much more enjoyable environments than forests (and enjoyable for much longer). Homes, for example.
There is also an underlying assumption that it's a politician's job to ensure the health of people, regulate (directly or indirectly) hospital usage, etc. (It isn't.)
In some countries, people are paying (through taxes) for the enforcement of their own house arrest. It's nuts.
I agree that solutions can lead to other, better problems, and then that's progress—the lockdown doesn't seem to fall into that category.
Yes, there's definitely that. And it's possible that I'm fudging "solution" and "common preference" as defined by the TCS glossary.
That said, a lockdown might solve a politician's problem but still ruin other people's lives. So, morally problematic.
RT @ClimateWarrior7:
While Stalin went off the rails a bit, Lenin was actually responsible for no more than 3 million deaths at the most, a…
@DrunkenMighty @DavidDeutschOxf
Why should complexity afford moral significance/protection?
RT @ClimateWarrior7:
I remember when human rights were about people not being tortured or arbitrarily detained.
Fortunately that's all bee…
I’m curious, was there a penalty for not wearing masks at the time?
My criticism is that its important to know if lockdowns are solving any of the problems they’re meant to solve. If so, how? If not, why not?
For this, see my other tweets to you about coercion. Pretty much by definition, coercion does not solve problems.
And freedom granted restrictively or conditionally is not freedom at all (those aren’t my words but they’re poorly enough remembered that the source may not want to be attributed).
I agree with you modification and with your first and last points that you mentioned above.
If you agree that freedom is necessary to solve problems (which you said you did), that means freedom cannot be reduced arbitrarily to solve problems.
Ok. And yeah to be very clear, I don't want to put words in David's mouth, this is my application of what he said to a different (but imo related) topic.
My answer is to critique them in terms of how well they solve the problems they purport to solve
That’s thinking exclusively in terms of outcomes again, although you agreed that “the outcome isnt all that matters, how we get there matters as well.”
...in psychological suffering and countless more problems. Coercion steamrolls over people. A solution to a problem means everyone involved prefers the solution. It’s not a solution unless that happens.
the fact that a policy is coercive does not mean that it isnt solving the problem that it is aimed at solving
Coercion, by definition, doesn’t solve a problem, because it means there are parties affected by the coercion that do not want to be subjected to it, which results...
its common for policies to be put in place to solve certain problems that are at least somewhat coercive…
That coercion is common doesn’t mean it’s good.
Ok but if you think it's easy to vary it's best not to agree with it or think it's true. I don't think easy-to-vary explanations could possibly be true.
@MartvMegen @HeuristicAndy
Survival rates don't change my argument, but should change that of lockdown advocates. I'll make it easier: let's say the survival rate was only 1%. That would make it easier to persuade people of the necessity to stay home. I know I would. So, still no place for coercion.
@ForwardIsGood @liberty_deity @ibuildfreedom
There's no vote to end taxation. And those who don't vote aren't exempt from taxation.
The people who are working on a vaccine and other ideas are indeed working toward a solution. But politicians who are coercing us are not working on solutions because they're coercive.
takingchildrenseriously.com/node/50#Coerci… vs takingchildrenseriously.com/node/50#Common…
Bringing coercion back into the equation: "some precautions, with variable degree, are being undertaken" is a gross understatement of the amount of coercion that's being applied.
I have given the example before of forcing one's child to give up smoking. Even assuming the child will be healthier for it, it is unacceptable to coerce him. Persuasion is preferable. If people were persuaded to stay home instead of forced I wouldn't have an issue with it.
I haven't focused on coercion much because @falibilista requested to put that aside (twitter.com/falibilista/st…). But it's a huge part of the problem. Even if coercion led to a better outcome, I'd still oppose it because it is coercive.
That's a pretty good start, yeah. I'd add that lockdown effects on knowledge creation are also unpredictably bad.
What's missing is that it's not only about the outcome, but also about how one is getting there—whether it is coercive or not.
...I don't know yet if you agree with my modification of Deutsch's tweet.
...then I don't think keeping "soft" lockdown policies is an option. Even if it's true that my criticism is too easy to vary, there's no other way out. You stated that you agreed with the first and last point from my previous tweet...
In any case, if you agree that any amount of lockdown policy reduces freedom, and you agree with my modification of Deutsch's point (twitter.com/dchackethal/st…), and you agree that freedom is required to solve problems (including vaccine development)...
I then clarified more here twitter.com/dchackethal/st… and twitter.com/dchackethal/st….
I'll respond to that here: twitter.com/DorfGinger/sta…
For clarity, you asked for specificity here (twitter.com/DorfGinger/sta…)—twitter.com/dchackethal/st… and twitter.com/dchackethal/st… were my attempts to be more specific, so I believe I have done what you've asked.
Maybe that's what's going on here. To those who despise coercion, they never, ever want to use it. It's just not an option for them. To those who think that some coercion can sometimes be appropriate, that seems like overkill. Could that be the core of our disagreement?
You raise an interesting problem I have wondered about in the past, which is that sometimes an explanation can seem universally applicable to some—it has great reach to them—and to those who disagree with the explanation it can seem easy to vary externally because of that reach
@HeuristicAndy
You’re being really sneaky with this shitty argument of yours.
That’s unnecessarily hostile and derails the conversation. It’s also not the strongest move. I suggest you calm down, deescalate a bit and maybe we can continue the conversation later.
@HeuristicAndy
Bars are closed = Science is dead.
I also never said that.
@HeuristicAndy
Lockdowns don’t solve the problem. Doing nothing doesn’t solve the problem either. So we need to come up with something else.
@HeuristicAndy
People are also dying because of the shutdown. Livelihoods are being destroyed. For a virus whose survival rate is like 99%. I think that’s unacceptable. Do you not care about those people?
@HeuristicAndy
People dying = “Ok so?”
That’s a misrepresentation. By “Ok so?” I meant that I didn’t understand what you were getting at. You could have just clarified. Instead you chose the least charitable interpretation possible.
@HeuristicAndy
I am not asking for a foundation and you know it.
I don’t know that. And this wasn’t an insult, btw, but you seem to have interpreted it as one.
Any amount of restriction of any lockdown policy reduces freedom. And those stricter lockdowns you prefer would reduce freedom more (because they're stricter).
Is that the most charitable summary of my criticism that you can come up with?
Replace "holding an idea immutable" with "restricting the services industry."
Do you see how those statements conflict?
Not just any libertarian's, it turns out, but from the one and only @ChipkinLogan.
I did, but can you answer "yes" or "no" to this one?
Do I understand correctly that you're saying both that you prefer more restrictive lockdowns and you that agree that freedom and wealth are required to solve problems (which includes developing a vaccine)?
@HeuristicAndy @DorfGinger @falibilista
It is one example of millions of chains of dependencies in the economy that can lead (among other things) to serendipitous encounters that spark creativity.
This is in conflict with the Deutschian notion that wealth and freedom are required to solve problems. Do you have a refutation of that notion?
Also, do you see the moral problem with (both more and less restrictive) lockdowns?
@HeuristicAndy
A person having to work all day is artificial & arbitrary.
Not really. Why would it be?
A family losing their breadwinner to covid is arbitrary too.
Ok so?
@HeuristicAndy
You didn't ask for decisive evidence. Or insurmountable evidence. You asked for evidence. I gave you some.
"Baseless" isn't Popperian criticism, btw. Criticize the claim by showing that it can't be true, not by claiming that it has no base.
Eigentlich kein schlechter Begriff.
RT @ClimateWarrior7:
Before 1929, women were thought to be a kind of mineral or possibly a fish.
He’s doing the same thing though. What does it matter that the TA was white?
@HeuristicAndy
Well, not evidence of the "lending credence" kind you seem to be looking for.
There's always constraints on what one wants to do.
Sure, but when they are imposed artificially and arbitrarily, that makes all the difference, does it not?
I had given explanations of the effects of lockdown policies.
I don’t like lockdowns, particularly the less restrictive ones [...]
Meaning you’d prefer more restrictive ones?
@Mona99299788 @truewhitemount @paedabasics @Keksios
Ich empfehle uebrigens, bei mehreren Kommentaren auf einmal untereinander zu kommentieren, nicht nebeneinander – ist einfacher zu lesen und nachzuvollziehen.
@Mona99299788 @truewhitemount @paedabasics @Keksios
Ja, sicherlich ist das eine wundervolle Wertschaetzung. Aber sie kann natuerlich nur etwas bedeuten, wenn sie freiwillig erbracht wird.
Wenn ein Lehrer Schueler zwingt, aufzustehen, ist das wie wenn ein Diktator seine Untertanen zwingt, ihn anzubeten. Ekelhaft.
@auwsmit
That’s assuming that animals actually do suffer, which is a big if. Plus, we already don’t have a moral obligation to help other people, so we especially don’t have an obligation to help animals. Downside would be that animals don’t get as much benefit from planet as people do.
RT @MichaelKitson:
This is untrue. If you lockdown young people because of Covid-19 with little support, then you should expect that they s…
@HeuristicAndy
A single scientist showing there were things he was unable to do due to the lockdown.
But, more importantly, some explanations:
twitter.com/dchackethal/st…
twitter.com/dchackethal/st…
twitter.com/dchackethal/st…
twitter.com/dchackethal/st…
twitter.com/dchackethal/st…
Well "coerced against one's preferences" is a bit tautological.
If it's imposed on him against his will, that means his mind is being coerced to do something against his preferences. This adds a bunch of new problems for him that he otherwise would not have needed to deal with, thereby hindering his ability to develop a vaccine.
Yes, there is a difference. If he does so voluntarily, it means it's in line with his preferences, and therefore doesn't impede his growth of knowledge. His mind does not need to deal with any dissonance, and he can freely pursue his plans.
Maybe I misunderstood. From what you said, and also reading between the lines, it seems to me you dislike lockdowns somewhat, but you don't think they're a big deal in terms of outcome or anywhere near a moral catastrophe. Am I wrong about that?
@Mona99299788 @truewhitemount @paedabasics @Keksios
Das ist keine Antwort auf meine Frage. Auch Frau Weise ignoriert meine Frage.
Der Unterschied ist, dass man freiwillig ins Fitnessstudio geht, und Kinder & Jugendliche gezwungen werden, in die Schule zu gehen. Vor diesem Hintergrund wirkt die Aufstehpflicht ziemlich übel.
Well, as I alluded to, it doesn’t depend so much on that, because there are chains of dependency in the economy that are unpredictably affected by lockdowns.
In any case, this is the moment in the conversation where I have to ask: how could one change your mind?
Millions of people have been placed under house arrest in 2020. There must have been some scientists among them. And on the off chance no scientists were among them, there were people among them who could have developed tools for scientists. Or who could have helped do so. Etc.
@ks445599 @ConceptualJames @SwipeWright
So what do you mean by "social equality"?
When, say, scientists are placed under house arrest, that must hurt the development of vaccines, yes?
Developing a vaccine, like all creative endeavors, requires freedom and wealth. Regulations impede creative endeavors, reduce freedom, and destroy wealth. The stricter they are, the more they do so.
A libertarian saying goes: "You can't coerce your way to a better world."
@ks445599 @ConceptualJames @SwipeWright
I guess it depends on what you mean by "social equality"?