Ethics and Science Quarantine Zone - The Bear and Badger

JRPC

OK I'm just not going to engage with all the IQ stuff. I'm barely interested in it and it's absolutely not what interests me about this Harris/Klein thing.

As for Klein having a good faith debate?

I guess it depends on what you mean by that. I think he was at least probably presenting his views honestly for the most part, with the possible exception of all that stuff about Sam coming from his own tribe, oh and that painful attempt to score cheap points on Sam's Olympic Jews analogy.

But he couldn't be more blatantly biased by his political concerns if he was writing a parody.

Vela

dynamiteReady wrote:

That relevant? If it is, contextualise it, and I'll humour you...

It's just a question. Do you have an opinion as to whether they are reliable.

In regards to what, exactly? Take differential equations for example... In engineering, the use of differential equations have been proven to be less effective than other mathematical tools in certain domains where the application of calculus was once de-rigor... But what does that mean here, beyond snoot? And which subject do you think I'm talking about?

Do you believe that quantum mechanics is valid? Does it make valid predictions? Do you think it is reliable? Or not?

Or general relativity? Do you think that theory works?
Or special relativity? Do you think that works?

Further context: you are using a computer that relies on transistors. You are breathing air from photosynthesising plants. Your GPS enabled mobile or satnav uses calculations that are corrected for via general relativity.

Do you trust these technologies?

JRPC

Actually no, because outside of the podcast and the whole reason the podcast came about is that Klein and Vox has said and implied some full on slanderous shit about Murray and Harris in those articles and Twitter.

So no, I wouldn't call that good faith at all.

Facewon

JRPC wrote:

@Face

Yeah, I did notice the Buzzfeed link. Read a bit of it too. For shame!

Although I appreciate the obvious effort there, I just can't deal a wall of text covering multiple subjects with a half dozen links to further walls of texts.

Pick a point, whatever you like, and I'll happily address it.

Its not covering multiple topics.

I'll grant threads and quotes within quotes are tricky, but I think it's clear enough I'm laying out the background and some history of IQ (with so many bits you could just quote to defend IQ I don't know why you haven't) and then stating that even conceding IQ is a useful measure, you still don't end up where Murray does.

While I think it's a light joke on your part, it'd be worth your while (just for gurt) speaking to that article from buzzfeed. Because, obviously, it's actually an open letter from a bunch of academics and to me it does a solid job of making Harris's claims of things being mainstream or uncontroversial a little tenuous. Race is murkier a term than he gives it credit for.

dynamiteReady

@Vela - Of course I believe those ideas are extremely useful, and also very much appreciate the fact the experts that champion those ideas are the very first to acknowledge and explain the complexity of those branches of science, and their inherent limitations.

hunk

Ezra Klein's preface to the podcast.

So that’s where we begin. Where we go, I think, is more important: These hypotheses about biological racial difference are now, and have always been, used to advance clear political agendas — in Murray’s case, an end to programs meant to redress racial inequality, and in Harris’s case, a counterstrike against identitarian concerns he sees as a threat to his own career. Yes, identity politics are at play in this conversation, but that includes, as it always has, white identity politics.

To Harris, and you’ll hear this explicitly, identity politics is something others do. To me, it’s something we all do, and that he and many others refuse to admit they’re doing. This is one of the advantages of being the majority group: Your concerns get coded as concerns; it’s everyone else who is playing identity politics.

Vela

dynamiteReady wrote:

@Vela - Of course I believe those ideas are extremely useful, and also very much appreciate the fact the experts that champion those ideas are the very first to acknowledge and explain the complexity of those branches of science, and their inherent limitations.

do you understand either of them? or rather, to what extent do you feel you understand them. superficially, moderately, or deeply?

JRPC

Facewon wrote:

@Face Yeah, I did notice the Buzzfeed link. Read a bit of it too. For shame! Although I appreciate the obvious effort there, I just can't deal a wall of text covering multiple subjects with a half dozen links to further walls of texts. Pick a point, whatever you like, and I'll happily address it.

Its not covering multiple topics. I'll grant threads and quotes within quotes are tricky, but I think it's clear enough I'm laying out the background and some history of IQ (with so many bits you could just quote to defend IQ I don't know why you haven't) and then stating that even conceding IQ is a useful measure, you still don't end up where Murray does. While I think it's a light joke on your part, it'd be worth your while (just for gurt) speaking to that article from buzzfeed. Because, obviously, it's actually an open letter from a bunch of academics and to me it does a solid job of making Harris's claims of things being mainstream or uncontroversial a little tenuous. Race is murkier a term than he gives it credit for.

I think to try and defend IQ here and now would be to distort or at least deflect away from what I see as the actual issues here.

Like I say, not really interested in IQ really and certainly no part of my interest in the whole Harris/Vox debate is about the meaning of IQ.

I will try and catch up on those articles at some point though, just not in this context.

dynamiteReady

Vela wrote:

@Vela - Of course I believe those ideas are extremely useful, and also very much appreciate the fact the experts that champion those ideas are the very first to acknowledge and explain the complexity of those branches of science, and their inherent limitations.

do you understand either of them?

Did you also work out which branch of engineering I was talking about?

Because I did honour your first question...

JRPC

Hang on Face I've got another one for you...

JRPC

hunk wrote:

Ezra Klein's preface to the podcast.

So that’s where we begin. Where we go, I think, is more important: These hypotheses about biological racial difference are now, and have always been, used to advance clear political agendas — in Murray’s case, an end to programs meant to redress racial inequality, and in Harris’s case, a counterstrike against identitarian concerns he sees as a threat to his own career. Yes, identity politics are at play in this conversation, but that includes, as it always has, white identity politics. To Harris, and you’ll hear this explicitly, identity politics is something others do. To me, it’s something we all do, and that he and many others refuse to admit they’re doing. This is one of the advantages of being the majority group: Your concerns get coded as concerns; it’s everyone else who is playing identity politics.

AHHH now I want to reply to this as well!

Facewon

JRPC wrote:

me about this Harris/Klein thing.

As for Klein having a good faith debate?

I guess it depends on what you mean by that. I think he was at least probably presenting his views honestly for the most part, with the possible exception of all that stuff about Sam coming from his own tribe, oh and that painful attempt to score cheap points on Sam's Olympic Jews analogy.

But he couldn't be more blatantly biased by his political concerns if he was writing a parody.

Ffs. You can't just seperate the science and the politics. This is the heart of it. Harris doesn't get to decide what's part of the debate and what's not.

You can see Klein's "political concerns" but can't see Harris's? Being staunchly anti "identity politics" isn't a political position? With its own biases? It's this inability to be self reflective about personal bias that makes Harris look silly.

Facewon

You should, because that's a great point from Klein, which I've just basically restated in my last post. But he writes good. So his is better.

Vela

dynamiteReady wrote:

Vela wrote:

@Vela - Of course I believe those ideas are extremely useful, and also very much appreciate the fact the experts that champion those ideas are the very first to acknowledge and explain the complexity of those branches of science, and their inherent limitations.

do you understand either of them?

Did you also work out which branch of engineering I was talking about? Because I did honour your first question...

I edited my post after your reply. I meant to add do you understand those theories deeply, superficially, or moderately?

As for my guess on your engineering branch, I am going to make two guesses.

Spoiler:

djchump

Facewon wrote:

Ffs. You can't just seperate the science and the politics. This is the heart of it. Harris doesn't get to decide what's part of the debate and what's not. You can see Klein's "political concerns" but can't see Harris's? Being staunchly anti "identity politics" isn't a political position? With its own biases? It's this inability to be self reflective about personal bias that makes Harris look silly.

Quis gatekeepiet ipsos gatekeepes?

AJ

So, in short and without any links, what is this "Harris/Klein thing" then?

JRPC

So my grand plans to watch The Last Jedi tonight have succumbed to the lure of the wrongness.

I'm gonna reply to your thing about Buzzfeed and then the political bias thing (although my tired brain has already forgotten the point I wanted to make), and then probably Hunk's quote. After that maybe I'll call it a day there. I think I can probably get everything I have left to say out of those things.

This will be tomorrow though coz I am now going to bed.

Quick question on that point about politics and science - do you agree that the ideal would be to have no political bias in data interpreation or are you saying it's actually important that this bias is present for context or something?

Facewon

http://www.butterfliesandwheels.org/2018/a-truly-rational-conversation-not-contaminated-by-identity-politics/

Of course Ophelia Benson has been watching. Bless her.

Points articulated so much better....
Benson:

That’s one of the things that just drives me nuts about Harris and guys like Harris – their blindness (their smug blindness, frankly) to how easy it is for people with the Approved Forms of identity to see “contamination” in the “identity politics” of people who don’t. It’s almost comical that Sam Harris thinks he has truly rational conversations that are not contaminated by identity politics. It’s less close to comical that he doesn’t even realize that his hostility to “identity politics” is “identity politics.”

So, yeah, that’s his bias, or one of them.

(first comment re one of his black guests is interesting too. His next will probably be Thomas sowell.)

http://www.butterfliesandwheels.org/2018/he-sees-himself-as-somehow-immune-to-these-impulses/

(fuck it. I think links are backwards. But this bastian dude does a good job of speaking to the Harris tribe issue. ('sup gurt and Nick))

djchump

There's never *not* bias.
Being eyes open is a first step to trying to overcome it/them.

Lord_Griff

Why is everyone ignoring my "Hot Space" theory of 2014/15 for global warming!? It's truth is incontestable.

djchump

Does it factor in all four corners of timecube?
If not, no sale.

Facewon

JRPC wrote:

Quick question on that point about politics and science - do you agree that the ideal would be to have no political bias in data interpreation or are you saying it's actually important that this bias is present for context or something?

djchump wrote:

There's never *not* bias.
Being eyes open is a first step to trying to overcome it/them.

That saved me some time.

Lord_Griff

Hmmm, maybe because this thread has moved on from anthropogenic global warming.

JRPC

Facewon wrote:

Quick question on that point about politics and science - do you agree that the ideal would be to have no political bias in data interpreation or are you saying it's actually important that this bias is present for context or something?

There's never *not* bias. Being eyes open is a first step to trying to overcome it/them.

That saved me some time.

That doesn't really answer it.

Do you agree that the ideal is no bias?

djchump

Facewon wrote:

http://www.butterfliesandwheels.org/2018/a-truly-rational-conversation-not-contaminated-by-identity-politics/ Of course Ophelia Benson has been watching. Bless her. Points articulated so much better.... Benson:

.... It’s less close to comical that he doesn’t even realize that his hostility to “identity politics” is “identity politics.” So, yeah, that’s his bias, or one of them.

...

Yeah, the endless irony of alt-right dullards endlessly moaning about "snowflake SJWs", when they themselves are even thinner-skinned reactionaries fighting for their concept of social justice is, well, completely lost on them because they're dullards.

Vela

AJ wrote:

So, in short and without any links, what is this "Harris/Klein thing" then?

Quick summary

dynamiteReady

Vela wrote:

...I meant to add do you understand those theories deeply, superficially, or moderately?

No way would I ever claim anything more than moderate knowledge at best. Perhaps not even that.

Which is why I rely on transparency in practice... Poincare is more relevant to the point you are trying to make, than your willingness to discuss quantum physics. If that knowledge was more common (Poincare's fuckup... Basically 'Chaos Theory'), many popular scientific debates would have to change their character dramatically.

I think it's starting to happen, because the other day, discussing something heartbreakingly serious with a doctor, she expressed outcomes in percentages...
People talking about hockey sticks or shaking graphs in my face is currently very far from that...

Beyond that, experts, very often, still make fucking mistakes.
Even in light of the obvious (in fact, the previous paragraph, personal as it is, is very clear evidence to me. If we ever meet for a drink, I'll tell you).

And like I've once said elsewhere, the smartest people I've ever met (and I've now met one or two) absolutely acknowledge even the most extreme margins of error.

If you want to carry on with snooty talk for the sake of snoot though, I might be willing to entertain a boring discussion about quantum computing... Because that's somewhat interesting to me (though I'm no expert).

Offline preferably.

Vela wrote:

As for my guess on your engineering branch, I am going to make two guesses.

Spoiler:

Aeronautics or you are referring to the Navier-Stokes equation in 3D

No it's not. It could be anything...

That's the point. Though the domain I had in mind was a real one.

djchump

JRPC wrote:

Facewon wrote:

Quick question on that point about politics and science - do you agree that the ideal would be to have no political bias in data interpreation or are you saying it's actually important that this bias is present for context or something?

There's never *not* bias. Being eyes open is a first step to trying to overcome it/them.

That saved me some time.

That doesn't really answer it.

It does.

JRPC wrote:

Do you agree that the ideal is no bias?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perspectivism

Your socratic method needs work.

Facewon

That also saved me some time.

If you accuse me of being a relativist I'll punch you in the fuck.

JRPC

I don't understand.

It's a simple question - why no answer?

Howdy, Stranger!

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