I don’t think prosecutorial charge inflation is a substantially politicized issue in the US; at least, it’s never come up in an election I remember. Is it in Germany?
In Germany it’s not the job of a prosecutor to get the maximum possible sentence, so no the problem doesn’t exist in the same way in Germany. If someone in Germany commits a crime that gets 3 years and another that’s 4 years that doesn’t simply add up to 7 years. Our system is much more well designed.
Being tough on crime happens to be a politicized topic in the US and there are many people who do hold the opinion that the US incarnates a percentage of it’s population that’s significantly to high.
It’s no Republican vs. Democratic issues but that doesn’t mean it’s not political in nature.
In this case I’m not sure whether blackmail is really the right term. Wikipedia defines blackmail as “Blackmail is an act, often a crime, involving unjustified threats to make a gain or cause loss to another unless a demand is met.”
Is using a valid law for charge inflation an unjustified thread?
That depends a lot on your political beliefs.
That example seems significantly more politicized. It definitely is, in a US context; the “Death Panels” political meme grew out of attempts to deal with that problem.
Perhaps you’re right. Dealing with all the nonsense just doesn’t feel like politics from the inside :)
The death panel myth seems to be a separate issue. I’m talking about discharging patients that don’t need further medical care nor nursing home care because they’re healthy enough to go home. The same rules would apply to younger patients. The concept of futile care is another problem entirely, and definitely a more political issue, especially in religious countries like the US.
Tests and treatments on the other hand can be pointless for many other reasons than patients being so sick that everything is futile.
Can you find an example that’s less political to make the same point?
Why? Are you arguing the example is wrong? Are you saying that you disagree with it personally? Because “don’t talk about this general fact because someone else might think it has (weak) political implications” seems a heuristic to be avoided.
No. We do have research on how people get mindkilled. It’s not about implications. Certain classes of claims for example lead to most people stop being able to use Bayes Rule when you ask them to analyse a problem. I’m claiming that the example is in that class.
Are you saying that you disagree with it personally?
A core question in this case is: “What do we gain from defining blackmail in a way that this example is covered? What do we gain from defining it in a way that this isn’t covered?”
Given that most people here disapprove of the action of those persecutors politically they feel the desire to punish them by using a negative label. That makes it harder to have the discussion based on the merits.
Because “don’t talk about this general fact because someone else might think it has (weak) political implications” seems a heuristic to be avoided.
That’s not the heuristic brought forward in “Politics is the mindkiller”. The heuristic is: You have a set A of examples (X_1, Y_1. X_2, Y_2, Y_3 …). The X examples are political and fire up a bunch of mental biases in your reader. Most of your readers will suddenly start to flunk Bayesian calculation if you make one of those X_i examples. The Y_i examples on the other hand allow your readers to reason normally. If you want to choose an example for A, to speak about A don’t choose one of the X_i but one of the Y_i.
A core question in this case is: “What do we gain from defining blackmail in a way that this example is covered? What do we gain from defining it in a way that this isn’t covered?”
The way the opening post is written it doesn’t ask the question: “Should we consider this behavior blackmail?” but takes it for granted that the answer to that question is “Yes”.
Shutting off questions like that is quite typical for how politics mindkilling works. “Boo, evil prosecutors”
That’s the point of formalizing intuitions. He has a preexisting category, and he’s trying to find the rule which formally describes what goes in the category. In order to do that you have to take for granted that certain things are and aren’t in the category. If you didn’t have a preexisting caregory there would be no reason to do it.
Politics is the mindkiller.
Can you find an example that’s less political to make the same point?
I don’t think prosecutorial charge inflation is a substantially politicized issue in the US; at least, it’s never come up in an election I remember. Is it in Germany?
In Germany it’s not the job of a prosecutor to get the maximum possible sentence, so no the problem doesn’t exist in the same way in Germany. If someone in Germany commits a crime that gets 3 years and another that’s 4 years that doesn’t simply add up to 7 years. Our system is much more well designed.
Being tough on crime happens to be a politicized topic in the US and there are many people who do hold the opinion that the US incarnates a percentage of it’s population that’s significantly to high. It’s no Republican vs. Democratic issues but that doesn’t mean it’s not political in nature.
In this case I’m not sure whether blackmail is really the right term. Wikipedia defines blackmail as “Blackmail is an act, often a crime, involving unjustified threats to make a gain or cause loss to another unless a demand is met.” Is using a valid law for charge inflation an unjustified thread? That depends a lot on your political beliefs.
Maybe a less political example.
That example seems significantly more politicized. It definitely is, in a US context; the “Death Panels” political meme grew out of attempts to deal with that problem.
Perhaps you’re right. Dealing with all the nonsense just doesn’t feel like politics from the inside :)
The death panel myth seems to be a separate issue. I’m talking about discharging patients that don’t need further medical care nor nursing home care because they’re healthy enough to go home. The same rules would apply to younger patients. The concept of futile care is another problem entirely, and definitely a more political issue, especially in religious countries like the US.
Tests and treatments on the other hand can be pointless for many other reasons than patients being so sick that everything is futile.
Why? Are you arguing the example is wrong? Are you saying that you disagree with it personally? Because “don’t talk about this general fact because someone else might think it has (weak) political implications” seems a heuristic to be avoided.
No. We do have research on how people get mindkilled. It’s not about implications. Certain classes of claims for example lead to most people stop being able to use Bayes Rule when you ask them to analyse a problem. I’m claiming that the example is in that class.
A core question in this case is: “What do we gain from defining blackmail in a way that this example is covered? What do we gain from defining it in a way that this isn’t covered?”
Given that most people here disapprove of the action of those persecutors politically they feel the desire to punish them by using a negative label. That makes it harder to have the discussion based on the merits.
That’s not the heuristic brought forward in “Politics is the mindkiller”. The heuristic is: You have a set A of examples (X_1, Y_1. X_2, Y_2, Y_3 …). The X examples are political and fire up a bunch of mental biases in your reader. Most of your readers will suddenly start to flunk Bayesian calculation if you make one of those X_i examples. The Y_i examples on the other hand allow your readers to reason normally. If you want to choose an example for A, to speak about A don’t choose one of the X_i but one of the Y_i.
We’re trying to formalize our intuitions.
The way the opening post is written it doesn’t ask the question: “Should we consider this behavior blackmail?” but takes it for granted that the answer to that question is “Yes”.
Shutting off questions like that is quite typical for how politics mindkilling works. “Boo, evil prosecutors”
That’s the point of formalizing intuitions. He has a preexisting category, and he’s trying to find the rule which formally describes what goes in the category. In order to do that you have to take for granted that certain things are and aren’t in the category. If you didn’t have a preexisting caregory there would be no reason to do it.
Most people are unable to use Bayes’ rule anyway, regardless of the class of claims.