Strong-downvoted this post because it doesn’t provide any evidence for what it’s arguing for, and also because it seems like a pretty safe take on LessWrong (which ups my standards for what I consider worthwhile a bit—like I’d be more sympathetic to a zero-evidence post if the take were more out there). As is, it’s firmly in the “I want to see less of this” category.
Also I live in Europe and don’t have an AC because installing one properly is expensive and portable ones are annoying, and it altogether doesn’t seem worth it.
Portable AC is not annoying in any way I can perceive? My climates have not been very hot, but I consider AC to be a major factor in my quality of life and a wonder of the modern world. It sounds like you are expressing some of the evidence you find lacking. I personally had no idea that Europeans thought this way, which makes this an informative post for me as an American.
You didn’t say if you think this post is wrong or merely that this was already obvious to you. Or perhaps you think it’s half right and obvious?
Roughly the liberal half of Americans expressed some of this attitude, including some of them forgoing AC. But most do not. The ideological climate is different than expressed in this post. So I’m curious about your impression of the European attitude.
Reporting personal impressions of attitudes is evidence of a sort. Survey responses are just about as difficult to interpret IMO.
Portable AC is not annoying in any way I can perceive? My climates have not been very hot, but I consider AC to be a major factor in my quality of life
It’s annoying for me because
it’s very loud (I bought a cheap model last time, probably expensive ones are less loud)
sealing up the window is a pain
once you seal up the window, you are limited in how much you can open it
I was still considering doing it; if I had foreseen how long the heatwave lasts, I’d have probably done it. But I don’t consider it to be a huge deal.
You didn’t say if you think this post is wrong or merely that this was already obvious to you. Or perhaps you think it’s half right and obvious?
I think the general phenomenon of people suffering unnecessarily because they feel like it makes them virtuous is almost certainly real. I don’t know how much of it applies to air conditioners. It wouldn’t surprise me if it were a big part of the story, but it also wouldn’t surprise me if it wasn’t. I don’t think it’s that rare to have a general phenomenon and expect it to apply in a specific case, but then when you look at the data, that’s not really born out, for whatever reason. I feel like I’ve seen this pattern a few times, where someone takes popular rationalist idea and asserts that it applies to situation X, and then someone else looks at the actual evidence and it turns out it doesn’t really check out. (Arguably that was the case with the other air conditioner debate, although people still debated how much the data bore out the original take after the fact iirc. (To be clear, john used air conditioners to make a different point about consumer stupidity, not the principle of self-harm that’s articulated here.))
Reporting personal impressions of attitudes is evidence of a sort. Survey responses are just about as difficult to interpret IMO.
I agree, but here I come back to, this is just not new at all. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen this general principle articulated somewhere in the sequences. Like if I had never heard of this principle, then it would be different. but if you’re not saying anything new, and you’re not being quantitative, what’s the point? Especially on a topic where there is lots of relevant data you could dig up, it would just be a lot more effort.
Strong-downvoted this post because it doesn’t provide any evidence for what it’s arguing for, and also because it seems like a pretty safe take on LessWrong (which ups my standards for what I consider worthwhile a bit—like I’d be more sympathetic to a zero-evidence post if the take were more out there). As is, it’s firmly in the “I want to see less of this” category.
Also I live in Europe and don’t have an AC because installing one properly is expensive and portable ones are annoying, and it altogether doesn’t seem worth it.
Portable AC is not annoying in any way I can perceive? My climates have not been very hot, but I consider AC to be a major factor in my quality of life and a wonder of the modern world. It sounds like you are expressing some of the evidence you find lacking. I personally had no idea that Europeans thought this way, which makes this an informative post for me as an American.
You didn’t say if you think this post is wrong or merely that this was already obvious to you. Or perhaps you think it’s half right and obvious?
Roughly the liberal half of Americans expressed some of this attitude, including some of them forgoing AC. But most do not. The ideological climate is different than expressed in this post. So I’m curious about your impression of the European attitude.
Reporting personal impressions of attitudes is evidence of a sort. Survey responses are just about as difficult to interpret IMO.
It’s annoying for me because
it’s very loud (I bought a cheap model last time, probably expensive ones are less loud)
sealing up the window is a pain
once you seal up the window, you are limited in how much you can open it
I was still considering doing it; if I had foreseen how long the heatwave lasts, I’d have probably done it. But I don’t consider it to be a huge deal.
I think the general phenomenon of people suffering unnecessarily because they feel like it makes them virtuous is almost certainly real. I don’t know how much of it applies to air conditioners. It wouldn’t surprise me if it were a big part of the story, but it also wouldn’t surprise me if it wasn’t. I don’t think it’s that rare to have a general phenomenon and expect it to apply in a specific case, but then when you look at the data, that’s not really born out, for whatever reason. I feel like I’ve seen this pattern a few times, where someone takes popular rationalist idea and asserts that it applies to situation X, and then someone else looks at the actual evidence and it turns out it doesn’t really check out. (Arguably that was the case with the other air conditioner debate, although people still debated how much the data bore out the original take after the fact iirc. (To be clear, john used air conditioners to make a different point about consumer stupidity, not the principle of self-harm that’s articulated here.))
I agree, but here I come back to, this is just not new at all. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen this general principle articulated somewhere in the sequences. Like if I had never heard of this principle, then it would be different. but if you’re not saying anything new, and you’re not being quantitative, what’s the point? Especially on a topic where there is lots of relevant data you could dig up, it would just be a lot more effort.