I think the law of prevalence is correct, but the question really is how much. How much more prevalent than you perceive? And how much of the increased prevalence we see is explained by people who would otherwise have the thing to hide and hide it, versus people who don’t have the thing to hide and now have it because it is more acceptable or there’s even some pressure in the opposite direction.
To me, left-handedness seems a clear example of the former—no one became left handed because it is now accepted. While trans and queer is a good example of some people becoming trans or queer, who otherwise wouldn’t have been, because it is now more acceptable and even prevalent. Nazism in 1930s Germany is an extreme example of something that would otherwise be hidden flipping to having pressure in the opposite direction (which made not-being-a-nazi social dark matter).
Basically what I’m saying is that real-prevalence isn’t a constant, it’s a variable like perceived-prevalence, and both are affected by acceptability and pressure, not just the latter. And also that the extent to which each of them is affected by acceptability and pressure changes from phenomenon to phenomenon.
The law of extremity seems to be affected a lot of the changing of definitions. If you tabooed “Autistic” and tried to just describe it to someone from the 1988, I think you would find much less disagreement about the prevalence (Though definitely not none!). The same if you asked that person for his tabooed description and asked modern people about its prevalence. The reason is that our conception of autism has widened to include far more traits and people.
To give another example, I think it’s partially true for sexual assault as well. We consider more things sexual assault today than in the 1950s. So if you asked about specific incidents or actions, you would get different answers than if you would ask about “Sexual Assault”.
When you talk about people who people don’t want to confide in having less information to go on, you’re correct in a sense, but it also feels like a fully general argument that “If you think something is bad, you’ll know less about it, which means you’re probably wrong, so you shouldn’t think it’s bad” and the reciprocal “If you think something is acceptable or good, you’ll know more about it, which means you’re probably right, so you shouldn’t think it’s bad”. The conclusion of which is “If you think things are unacceptable you’re probably wrong, so you should accept them instead”.
It applies even to Nazis—“maybe because all of us believe Nazism is wrong, real Nazis never reveal themselves to us and so we don’t discover that actually Nazism isn’t that bad? Therefore we should be skeptical of conclusions and be more open to Nazism.”
No. I completely reject that. Nazism is definitely bad and the reason I believe that isn’t because believing it prevented me from encountering counter-evidence. And I’m not willing to tolerate Nazism because I believe how tolerated it is directly influences how prevalent it is. And again, I believe it not because believing it deprives me of counter-evidence.
To be clear—I don’t think this is what you’re doing. Your policy prescriptions are much more “Figure out if you’re actually right” than “Be more accepting and tolerating”, but this idea can be wrongly used that way, because it provides a fully general argument.
So I think Social Dark Matter is a nice concept, but it’s not that useful, because there’s a lot of variation, and as a result of that, it’s not clear what one should do about it, except think more.
no one became left handed because it is now accepted
Well, a fair number of left-handed people in history BECAME right-handed due to cruelty and intolerance. When this stopped, there were more ACTUAL left-handed people in the population than previously.
In all of these cases, both stories (one: the trait is purely immutable and cannot be changed over one’s lifetime; two: the trait is a preference that can be encouraged or suppressed with effort) have some truth to them, and in most individuals I’ve talked with deeply enough, it seems to be a mix of the two (though strong enough preferences are often considered identifying, and story #1 is the stronger explanation when discussing things)).
It’s simultaneously true that being open and accepting is kinder and more fair to those who have a very strong belief that it’s necessary for them, AND that being open and accepting will encourage some of those who are borderline or less-controlled in their needs.
My preference is for a world where it just doesn’t matter WHY someone wants/needs to do something. If that thing is harmless (or even mostly harmless), it’s allowed. If it’s harmful, it’s disallowed. The problem comes in defining “harmful” or “unpleasant”. Belief in fascism and individual superiority that exempts the holder of the belief from social cooperation with the less-worthy is harmful, but it’s VERY hard to draw the line at which behaviors to punish.
I think the law of prevalence is correct, but the question really is how much. How much more prevalent than you perceive? And how much of the increased prevalence we see is explained by people who would otherwise have the thing to hide and hide it, versus people who don’t have the thing to hide and now have it because it is more acceptable or there’s even some pressure in the opposite direction.
To me, left-handedness seems a clear example of the former—no one became left handed because it is now accepted. While trans and queer is a good example of some people becoming trans or queer, who otherwise wouldn’t have been, because it is now more acceptable and even prevalent. Nazism in 1930s Germany is an extreme example of something that would otherwise be hidden flipping to having pressure in the opposite direction (which made not-being-a-nazi social dark matter).
Basically what I’m saying is that real-prevalence isn’t a constant, it’s a variable like perceived-prevalence, and both are affected by acceptability and pressure, not just the latter. And also that the extent to which each of them is affected by acceptability and pressure changes from phenomenon to phenomenon.
The law of extremity seems to be affected a lot of the changing of definitions. If you tabooed “Autistic” and tried to just describe it to someone from the 1988, I think you would find much less disagreement about the prevalence (Though definitely not none!). The same if you asked that person for his tabooed description and asked modern people about its prevalence. The reason is that our conception of autism has widened to include far more traits and people.
To give another example, I think it’s partially true for sexual assault as well. We consider more things sexual assault today than in the 1950s. So if you asked about specific incidents or actions, you would get different answers than if you would ask about “Sexual Assault”.
When you talk about people who people don’t want to confide in having less information to go on, you’re correct in a sense, but it also feels like a fully general argument that “If you think something is bad, you’ll know less about it, which means you’re probably wrong, so you shouldn’t think it’s bad” and the reciprocal “If you think something is acceptable or good, you’ll know more about it, which means you’re probably right, so you shouldn’t think it’s bad”. The conclusion of which is “If you think things are unacceptable you’re probably wrong, so you should accept them instead”.
It applies even to Nazis—“maybe because all of us believe Nazism is wrong, real Nazis never reveal themselves to us and so we don’t discover that actually Nazism isn’t that bad? Therefore we should be skeptical of conclusions and be more open to Nazism.”
No. I completely reject that. Nazism is definitely bad and the reason I believe that isn’t because believing it prevented me from encountering counter-evidence. And I’m not willing to tolerate Nazism because I believe how tolerated it is directly influences how prevalent it is. And again, I believe it not because believing it deprives me of counter-evidence.
To be clear—I don’t think this is what you’re doing. Your policy prescriptions are much more “Figure out if you’re actually right” than “Be more accepting and tolerating”, but this idea can be wrongly used that way, because it provides a fully general argument.
So I think Social Dark Matter is a nice concept, but it’s not that useful, because there’s a lot of variation, and as a result of that, it’s not clear what one should do about it, except think more.
Well, a fair number of left-handed people in history BECAME right-handed due to cruelty and intolerance. When this stopped, there were more ACTUAL left-handed people in the population than previously.
In all of these cases, both stories (one: the trait is purely immutable and cannot be changed over one’s lifetime; two: the trait is a preference that can be encouraged or suppressed with effort) have some truth to them, and in most individuals I’ve talked with deeply enough, it seems to be a mix of the two (though strong enough preferences are often considered identifying, and story #1 is the stronger explanation when discussing things)).
It’s simultaneously true that being open and accepting is kinder and more fair to those who have a very strong belief that it’s necessary for them, AND that being open and accepting will encourage some of those who are borderline or less-controlled in their needs.
My preference is for a world where it just doesn’t matter WHY someone wants/needs to do something. If that thing is harmless (or even mostly harmless), it’s allowed. If it’s harmful, it’s disallowed. The problem comes in defining “harmful” or “unpleasant”. Belief in fascism and individual superiority that exempts the holder of the belief from social cooperation with the less-worthy is harmful, but it’s VERY hard to draw the line at which behaviors to punish.