I really liked the series. He should make a discussion post on LW linking to these with some commentary. I he doesn’t I think I will. What he shouldn’t do is make a neutered special needs padded “safe for LessWrong” version.
I don’t think the example with the beggars in India provided the same insight to me that it did to Yvain. Mainly because tourists—consistently, articulably—don’t want anyone to ask them for money, while women (I think?) do want (some) men to approach them with romantic overtures, and ostensibly filter them by certain characteristics.
Tourist: don’t ever ask me for money. So don’t do things that make it harder for me to turn you down for money and then ask for money.
Women[1]: don’t ask me for romantic interaction unless I like you (or will like you), and if you get a false positive you’re a f\**ing terrorist who did a thousand things wrong that I would have found charming if I liked you*.
In other words, once you accept that some approaches of a certain type are desired, you have to accept that some will make that type of approach without it being desired, and therefore not regard such instances as atrocities.
The tourist doesn’t have this problem: s/he doesn’t want begging at all. If there were a tourist that actually wanted to be panhandled but only from “awesome enough” people, and gave such people money I would expect that they’d have the insight to recognize that, “Well, some people will panhandle me without being awesome enough, and that doesn’t mean they violated any rules. Here’s a clear list of things that I regard as awesome, and here’s what I do to mean that you should really stop revealing awesomeness and go away.”
[1] of the type who are most vocal in the creepiness threads
Edit: I spoke too soon. Yvain addresses the above in the second meditation, but in the (more insightful) comparison to how “some tourists want their fortunes told”. And indeed, some people want to be telemarketed to, and some want to be spammed. So what exactly makes some advances wanted and others not? I tried to address that issue here a while back, but all I got was resentment at the comparison to salesmen and telemarketers (oh, and a “you don’t have the right to respond to my arguments here”). Go fig.
I found them very interesting, though some of his statements and implications are naive or disingenuous. (As for Hanlon’s razor, I assign a higher prior for the former and I’m not sure which way the evidence points overall. EDIT: after reading the ninth post of the series, it was definitely the former—or that guy deserves an Academy Award.)
While I didn’t think much of the discussion in the recent creepy thread, I’m very much enjoying a series on a related subject written by Yvain.
The First Meditation on Privilege (A beggar and a tourist in India)
The Second Meditation on Privilege
The Third Meditation on Privilege (Sex and spiders)
The Fourth Meditation On Creepiness (Current standards and why they don’t work)
The Fifth Meditation on Creepiness (True Love)
The Sixth Meditation on Superweapons
The Seventh Meditation on The War On Applause Lights
The Eighth Meditation on Superweapons and Bingo
The Ninth Meta-tation on Meta
I strongly recommend the whole blog—that guy should post on LessWrong or something!
Those posts are followed by:
The Sixth Meditation on Superweapons
Jackdaws love my big sphinx of quartz—The Seventh Meditation on The War On Applause Lights
I really liked the series. He should make a discussion post on LW linking to these with some commentary. I he doesn’t I think I will. What he shouldn’t do is make a neutered special needs padded “safe for LessWrong” version.
I think it would be better if some of the emotional appeals and personal elements were removed.
Maybe he should make a steroid-injected high-tier cutting-edge “too controversial for LiveJournal” version.
If it’s safe enough for LiveJournal, I expect it to be safe enough for Less Wrong.
He does a nice Eliezerish job of slowly easing people into ideas that they otherwise might not agree with.
Eighth is up.
Nine is here.
I don’t think the example with the beggars in India provided the same insight to me that it did to Yvain. Mainly because tourists—consistently, articulably—don’t want anyone to ask them for money, while women (I think?) do want (some) men to approach them with romantic overtures, and ostensibly filter them by certain characteristics.
Tourist: don’t ever ask me for money. So don’t do things that make it harder for me to turn you down for money and then ask for money.
Women[1]: don’t ask me for romantic interaction unless I like you (or will like you), and if you get a false positive you’re a f\**ing terrorist who did a thousand things wrong that I would have found charming if I liked you*.
In other words, once you accept that some approaches of a certain type are desired, you have to accept that some will make that type of approach without it being desired, and therefore not regard such instances as atrocities.
The tourist doesn’t have this problem: s/he doesn’t want begging at all. If there were a tourist that actually wanted to be panhandled but only from “awesome enough” people, and gave such people money I would expect that they’d have the insight to recognize that, “Well, some people will panhandle me without being awesome enough, and that doesn’t mean they violated any rules. Here’s a clear list of things that I regard as awesome, and here’s what I do to mean that you should really stop revealing awesomeness and go away.”
[1] of the type who are most vocal in the creepiness threads
Edit: I spoke too soon. Yvain addresses the above in the second meditation, but in the (more insightful) comparison to how “some tourists want their fortunes told”. And indeed, some people want to be telemarketed to, and some want to be spammed. So what exactly makes some advances wanted and others not? I tried to address that issue here a while back, but all I got was resentment at the comparison to salesmen and telemarketers (oh, and a “you don’t have the right to respond to my arguments here”). Go fig.
I found them very interesting, though some of his statements and implications are naive or disingenuous. (As for Hanlon’s razor, I assign a higher prior for the former and I’m not sure which way the evidence points overall. EDIT: after reading the ninth post of the series, it was definitely the former—or that guy deserves an Academy Award.)
Awesome. Yvain should post these here. Or if he doesn’t, he should at least appear here so we can upvote him for these...