https://twitter.com/juliagalef/status/782277981255237632
the weird thing about the yudkowsky rationalists is that they're preoccupied with the weirdest shit. like what the fck is wrong with calling a horny guy horny when you're writing an article attacking him for constantly talking about his penis? it's fucking weird. i see no ethical problem with it at all, and i don't see why anyone should. in terms of journalistic 'bias', it's one of the strangest things to get antsy about.
julia galef also posted a tweet a couple of weeks back about the nude donald trump statue that was erected in new york where she was like 'i'm not sure about this. how would democrats like it if the same thing was done for their candidate?' you're not allowed to mock a megalomaniacal racist misogynistic fascist because you have to always maintain absolute 'ethical consistency'. i mean, fuck. that's crazy. that's just batshit insane. and the charge that it is ethically inconsistent is itself predicated on an assumption about equality between the candidates. surely if one accepts that trump is uniquely repugnant and uniquely dangerous, then humiliating him and not humiliating hillary makes perfect sense!
also i do actually have a big problem with the idea that no-one should feel ashamed of their sexuality. this seems to be a popular idea for lesswrongers (i think i read a luke muehlhauser essay [actually it was a guy called Scott Alexander] where he argued this). but i, like most people (i believe), think it's *absolutely right* that paedophiles are made to feel shame for their sexuality, and i think that exhibitionists should be made to feel shame, and i think that sexual sadists should be made to feel shame also (this last one is controversial, but the violent, cold, inhuman emotions that motivate a sexual sadist, even if they are the kind of sexual sadist that is very strong on consent, are presumably the same that motivate actual rapists, and i don't see why people shouldn't try to suppress those darker, more animalistic and grotesque sides of themselves)
TA
10:06
i suspect derek parfit would agree with me but i'm not sure. i hope so
i know he himself wouldn't tolerate any sadistic thoughts in his own mind, and no doubt doesn't have any
HR
11:13
do you think we should shame paedophiles because doing so might lower the probability that they will sexually abuse kids, or just because they 'deserve it'?
TA
11:14
both
we should shame psychopaths
for both reasons
and it is the same with paedophiles (who may sometimes also be psychopaths)
i mean
obviously, i don't mean toxic shaming
HR
11:15
I don't think the latter reason makes any sense
right
what you mean is: make sure they are aware that their urges are abnormal and evil
TA
11:15
i don't know what you mean "makes any sense". it doesn't make any sense to a utilitarian, probably
but i'm not a utilitarian
HR
11:16
which probably involves at least inadvertently shaming them
TA
11:16
yes that's what i mean by shaming
HR
11:16
it doesn't make sense to me to excoriate someone for something beyond their control
e.g. being a paedophile
TA
11:16
i never used the word excoriate
but also this is absurd
HR
11:16
(vs. being a sex offender)
TA
11:16
this is a dumb thing to say
'beyond their control'
what is what is not beyond people's control?
do you have a principled way of drawing that line?
HR
11:17
you realise I am talking here about people in whom a paraphilic sexual attraction to children is manifest, right?
TA
11:17
(no)
HR
11:18
not people who sexually abuse children
TA
11:18
i don't think we should 'excoriate' people who haven't sexually abused any children
i believe in rehabilitation yes
i believe in trying to reform people
excoriation would not be helpful
i'm not a retributivist
i don't believe in vindictive justice
i didn't mean any of this by 'shame'
what i want to say is this: urges can be immoral
HR
11:19
no shit
TA
11:19
unclean motives are real
i'm not a consequentialist
HR
11:20
yeah
TA
11:20
and the corollary is that immoral urges should be criticised and condemned
HR
11:20
sure
TA
11:20
or at least
'looked down upon' by society
that is, sadism should be looked down upon by society
(for example)
and i think it mostly is
HR
11:21
unadulterated sadism, sure
I probably break with you on sexual sadism
TA
11:22
yes right
i think almost everyone does
i see it as a kind of stoic thing
or at least, i have for a while now
to be fully moral
one must also try to control one's emotions
as well as one's actions
emotions and desires
some desires are immoral
and even if they are not as immoral as some other things
it is better to suppress them
HR
11:25
right
TA
11:25
even if being a consent-requiring sexual sadist isn't remotely as bad as being a rapist, it still betrays a kind of immorality in the form of a switchonable contempt for human beings, a switchonable rejection of human dignity and equality
HR
11:26
so you equally condemn sexual masochism?
(since, of course, it takes two to sadomasochistically tango)
TA
11:26
well slightly less so
because it's not a violent urge
HR
11:27
and the masochist clearly also rejects "human dignity"
yeah
TA
11:27
look, stoic beliefs are extreme, right, and you need unique brain chemistry to even get close to implementing them
but it is super clear from, say, seneca's writings that he'd be on board with this
like he even says shit like 'you should try not to feel anger'
right?.
HR
11:28
sure
I am not disputing your point on Stoic grounds
TA
11:28
no i know you are not
i'm explaining
but the point i would wish to strongly defend is this
the view that there's nothing at all wrong with sadistic urges, that they're perfectly fine, is false
or wrong
well i mean
obviously consequentialists disagree with this
HR
11:30
this is where I disagree with you
(I think)
TA
11:32
i think you're more utilitarian than me then
you're not a virtue ethicist
well you could still be a virtue ethicist
more epicurean
but see, this is what i don't really get: unless you are pretty much dismissing instinctive intuitions wholesale in the utilitarian fashion, why wouldn't you value the purity of being free from violent or sadistic thoughts and desires?
or the value of trying to fight them
HR
11:36
remember, though, sexual sadism, as a pathology, is really only superficially like sadism
sadism is a lingering urge to cause physical or mental suffering, and the derivation of enjoyment from inflicting suffering on others
in fact, I imagine that /consent/ is actually a problem for a (non-sexual) sadist
whereas sexual sadism does not seem to necessitate any violation of consent
TA
11:38
right
but this is utilitarian thinking
'purity' and 'dignity' are values lost in this calculus
i'm talking religious values
HR
11:38
it involves a connection between arousal and the infliction of /mere/ physical pain on a (willing) partner (I think)
yes
TA
11:38
i'm following the ancient traditions of the eastern religions and stoiicism in teh west
HR
11:38
very odd
TA
11:38
i'm thinking like a monk
HR
11:39
a very odd thing to invoke in this case
TA
11:39
in the christian tradition
HR
11:39
because it so obviously leads you to the wrong conclusion!
TA
11:39
right but many share my intuitions
the urge for moral purity is ancient
HR
11:40
of course
TA
11:40
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDKawZWyawE
HR
11:40
very nebulous term
TA
11:40
chomsky expresses extreme moral views here
i agree with the moral sentiment he expresses, even though it is truly extreme, when you look at the behaviour of average humans (including me)
when i say 'i agree with the sentiment' i mean i find it powerful
but you know with chomsky there's a moral consistency here too
because he thinks treating humans as cogs is immoral
in general
he thinks that wage labour is immoral
and that unnecessary hierarchies are immoral
my highest moral intuitions align with these views. now, i may not think that wage labour is going anywhere, or could suddenly disappear
but my highest moral intuitions do suggest such views as well
HR
11:44
I don't think Chomsky's views in this clip are /that/ extreme, actually, at least regarding the pornography industry as it exists and has existed
TA
11:45
no but
he says anyone who gets off to this stuff has a problem
that's the vast majority of the male population
HR
11:45
well, he specifically calls it "the degradation of women"
TA
11:45
that's an EXTREME view
yeah he says a standard picture
of women in underwear is the degradation of women
HR
11:46
that is extreme
true
but obviously becomes less extreme when you consider video pornography
TA
11:47
'that's not what human beings are'
that's telling right
he's talking about human dignity
he's channeling the kinds of religious, anti-utilitarian values i was talking about
that's the key sentence
'that's not what human beings are'
HR
11:48
sure
TA
11:48
that is bound up in his rejection of wage labour
that valuation of human dignity i mean
HR
11:49
I don't think this is actually materially connected to sexual sadism, though
TA
11:49
'eliminate the conditions in which women can't get decent jobs'
ah yeah
but maybe it's another video
but chomsky says somewhere
what i just mentioned
that anyone who gets off to pornography has a problem
HR
11:51
nah I think he might say that in this video
TA
11:51
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Fu7gDyooHw
TA
11:53
oh it's not this
no matter
anyway, i don't think we really disagree that much
HR
11:54
yeah
TA
11:54
because i'm not even sure (in fact i doubt) that it would be morally right for me to preach that sexual sadism is wrong
i'm not that extreme of an anti-consequentialist
that i think it's super important that everyone become kind of pure of mind and like Stoics
i think that's manifestly highly impractical
manifestly impossible
in fact, in the virtue ethics tradition (and the buddhist and daoist tradition), it's more an individualist thing
HR
12:00
mmm
TA
12:01
but you know another thing...
i have a falsifiable hypothesis (it might be completely wrong) about (heterosexual) sexual sado-masochism which is *consequentially* significant: that it is linked, or might help reinforce, sexist biases or sexist attitudes
well this statement is too general
like a correlation wouldn't be surprising but that's boring
that's not important
the claim, to be interesting, would have to be that indulging in sadistic fantasies involving sadistic acts towards women might help reinforce sexist biases (the second part of the claim)
i'm by no means sure that it's right
HR
12:03
well, it's /possible/
TA
12:03
yes it's just a hypothesis
HR
12:04
but, once again, you have to remember that sexual sadists generally respect consent
presumably no less than people in the ordinary population respect consent
TA
12:04
oh yeah but notice that i'm talking about biases
biases are a huge topic
biases are often subconcious
HR
12:04
right, but
TA
12:04
right
like think about it this way
imagine a guy who has just watched some kind of hardcore porn video involving sadistic acts performed on some woman
and then watches the presidential debate
straight after
like this is what i worry about in terms of the phenomenology of porn
HR
12:06
mmm
TA
12:07
cya
HR
12:07
but, then again, imagine the same scenario but he has just watched a standard hardcore porn video
TA
12:15
well if by standard you mean highly vanilla, with no dominant male performer saying 'cunt' 'slut' 'whore', and no overt sadism, i don't have a problem
i don't see this as problematic
at all
HR
13:56
well, as you point out in your "formal defence" of feminism, much porn depicting vanilla sex acts still involves some kind of degradation
and, of course, pretty much all heterosexual porn presents women as merely present for the satisfaction of the male
it is fairly rare to see the man and woman presented on equal footing, with equal sexual agency
well, as you point out in your "formal defence" of feminism, much porn depicting vanilla sex acts still involves some kind of degradation
and, of course, pretty much all heterosexual porn presents women as merely present for the satisfaction of the male
it is fairly rare to see the man and woman presented on equal footing, with equal sexual agency
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