Re: Constructor theory paper by David

On Sun, Nov 4, 2012 at 4:59 PM, a b <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Sun, Nov 4, 2012 at 6:52 PM, Rami Rustom <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Nov 4, 2012 at 8:20 AM, a b <[email protected]> wrote:
>> > On Sun, Nov 4, 2012 at 1:04 PM, Rami Rustom <[email protected]> wrote:
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> On Sat, Nov 3, 2012 at 3:48 PM, a b <[email protected]> wrote:
>> >> > On Sat, Nov 3, 2012 at 7:11 PM, Rami Rustom <[email protected]>
>> >> > wrote:
>> >> >>
>> >> >>
>> >> >>
>> >> >> On Sat, Nov 3, 2012 at 11:50 AM, a b <[email protected]> wrote:
>> >> >> > On Sat, Nov 3, 2012 at 2:52 PM, Rami Rustom <[email protected]>
>> >> >> > wrote:
>> >> >> >>
>> >> >> >>
>> >> >> >>
>> >> >> >> On Nov 3, 2012 1:17 AM, "a b" <[email protected]> wrote:
>> >> >> >> >
>> >> >> >> > On Fri, Nov 2, 2012 at 9:42 PM, Rami Rustom <[email protected]>
>> >> >> >> > wrote:
>> >> >> >> > >
>> >> >> >> > >
>> >> >> >> > >
>> >> >> >> > > On Fri, Nov 2, 2012 at 2:43 PM, a b <[email protected]> wrote:
>> >> >>>>>>>>
>> >> > This isn't necessary
>> >> > true in more business/middle-class districts...but in poorer
>> >> > districts
>> >> > dealers are often pushers...under pressure to get new customers for
>> >> > new types of drug. It happens. There will be lots of other,
>> >> > complicated, social class relaterd, explanations.
>> >>
>> >> And in all of that you fail to mention the law.
>> >
>> > We've been talking around the idea you had rejected cannabis was a
>> > gateway drug. If that wasn't the case why didn't you just say so?
>>
>> I don't know what you're asking. You asked me questions and I answered
>> them directly. Are you again saying that I evaded?
>
> I don't remember the first time I said you were evading. I'm not aware
> of feelings like that toward you. Did I introduce that word?

Well, the joke thing you said that I did is a type of evasion.


> I'm not sure we're communicating too well....I'm happy to take
> responsibility for that. Let's give this discussion a bit longer to
> come to something and then maybe drop it.
>>
>> I reject the idea that any choice is a gateway to another choice
>
> It looks to me like you are defining 'gateway' in particular ways that
> I wouldn't and doubt any mainstream discussion would either. If as a
> consequence of buying grass, someone comes to a decision point about
> heroin that they would not otherwise have come to, then that would be
> enough to call buying grass a 'gateway' on some definition of gateway.
> There's no need to include personal responsibility in the equation
> unless that is specifically what you want to do.

I don't see any way for a gateway theory to make sense. If you do, tell us.


>
>
>>
>>
>> >>
>> >> > Suggesting the gateway theory is that
>> >> > 100% of people who try cannabis will try heroin is obviously not
>> >> > plausible at all.
>> >>
>> >> That is not a theory. That is a statement of an expected observation.
>> >> You're saying that the gateway theory *is* of the form: X% of people
>> >> who do X will do Y. That is not a theory. It doesn't explain why
>> >> anything is happening. It only *asserts* that something is happening
>> >> without explaining causality.
>> >>
>> >> And the only causality you've explained so far is stuff about drug
>> >> dealers and you didn't even mention why we have drug dealers.
>> >
>> >
>> > I actually don't know what you are talking about at this stage. We
>> > began a discussion based on the idea you had defined the concept of
>> > cannabis being a gateway drug as "100% of users will try heroin". If
>> > that wasn't your position you should have said so.
>>
>> I didn't say anything about numbers. You brought that up. All I said
>> was that the gateway theory says that A causes B. And I'm saying that
>> A and B are choices. And choices don't cause choices. People make
>> choices using their ideas.
>
>
> I thought the refutation you brought...along the lines of an example
> of someone smoking pot and not taking heroin....implied that the
> conjecture you were perceiving involved an absolute link in each and
> every instance.

If A causes B, then A *always* causes B. There is no sometimes or in
some situations.

If the gateway theory doesn't talk about causality, then what is the
point of the theory?

And if its going to talk about causality, how can anyone create a
theory which explains causality when each person that the theory
attempts to explain is different. Each person has different ideas, and
those ideas affect his choices.


>> > You are implicitly assuming Popperianism is infallible. I have said I
>> > have a criticism, one knock-on consequence of which is that Popperians
>> > aren't going to be any better than anyone else at hearing criticism
>> > they don't want to hear.
>>
>> Do you know why people don't want to hear criticism of certain ideas?
>> It means they have anti-rational memes related to those ideas. Can a
>> Popperian have anti-rational memes? Of course. I've already said this.
>> What is infallibilist about it?
>
> You haven't heard the criticism because I haven't made the decision to
> attempt to explain it. So there's no way that I can see that you can
> attach antirational memes to it.

I brought up anti-rational memes because that is the only thing that
shields ideas from creativity and criticism. By *shielding* I mean
that a person *evades* thinking about the (shielded) idea. Feeling
shame is one type of consequence of a person feeling the effects of an
anti-rational meme doing its work of shielding an idea.


>>
>>
>> > You are arguing that just to have a criticism
>> > like that implies not understanding Popperianisn ergo that aspect of
>> > Popperianism is infallible :O)
>>
>> No. I'm saying that you don't criticize people when you think they
>> evade, and that that fact means you don't understand Popperism. A
>> Popperian wants to be criticized when he evades. And a Popperian is
>> willing to criticize someone when he evades.
>
>
> you are assuming that just because popperians want to be criticized
> when evasive, other people are obliged to produce such a criticism.

I didn't say obliged.


> If
> an obligation like that does exist in the philosophy, then for sure
> that is an area I didn't know about.
>
> Also, as mentioned above, I don't recall thinking or saying that you
> were being evasivre in this particular thread.

You said that I was evading about not getting the joke. You did use
the word "evading" but its the same meaning.


> As I also mentioned, I
> can acknowledge I may have given such an impression. I think we're in
> the kind of discussion where such impressions could start to fly.
>
>>
>>
>> >> >>>>>>>> No, there's 10 types of ideas: those expressed in binary, and
>> >> >>>>>>>> those not.
>> >> >>>>>>>
>> >> >>>>>>> Uh. Is that a riddle?
>> >> >>>>>>
>> >> >>>>>> it's an old joke (the number we call "two" is written as "10" in
>> >> >>>>>> binary).
>> >> >>>>>>
>> >> >>>>>> but with a point: there are many ways to categorize
>> >> >>>>>> explanations.
>> >> >>>>>
>> >> >>>>> Ya I got the 1, 0 binary thing but didn't see the point
>> >> >
>> >> > You say you got the 1 0 thing .....that's the same as saying you
>> >> > picked up the joke. The joke was nothing other than word play on the
>> >> > 10 thing.
>> >>
>> >> And how does that explain that I felt shame and that I evaded?
>> >
>> > Because you said you got it after you appeared not to get it and had
>> > it explained to you.
>>
>> No. I said I didn't find it funny. And that I know what binary means.
>> What is the problem you see in this?
>
> The word joke is used but it isn't really about necessarily being
> funny. The expected process is like this:
>
> 1. You read the sentence as normal, so absorb that there are 10 types of ideas.
> 2. Then only two types of ideas are given, so you go 'whoa?'
> 3. Then you read the second category again "those who think in binary"
> 4. Then you realize the 10 must be in binary
> 5. Then you see how the statement now makes sense and go "ahh!"
>
> That 'ahh!' moment is "getting the joke". It doesn't have to be an
> actual 'ahhh!', that's just a placeholder for realizing the 10 must
> mean binary. And it doesn't have to be those exact steps.
>
> But if there is a moment of assuming decimal, then a moment of
> wondering why he says just two types of idea after saying 10, then a
> moment of 'getting it' then there has to be a moment of realizing you
> were probably wrongfooted deliberately?
>
> What you are saying appened only really makes sense if you parsed
> things in some completely different way that automatically went over
> to binary.
>
> What I'm suggesting is that that appears rather implausible (how often
> in life does something like that happen for it to be automated?)

I don't know what you're saying.

Either way though, the point doesn't matter. Either I did feel shame,
and so I evaded, or I didn't.

Note that I commonly don't get jokes. And, *that* I don't get them is
routine on these lists. Its not uncommon for me to tell people, "I
didn't get the joke", here and in brick-and-mortar life. So I'm used
it and I don't imagine feeling shame for something that happens a lot.


>>
>>
>> > The idea that your response was because you
>> > didn't get the underlying relevance doesn't seem to work. Because the
>> > relevance pops out of of the joke. And the joke pops out of the 1 0
>> > binary thing. So....
>>
>> So you're saying that since *you* found the joke funny, that I should
>> have found the joke funny. Unless I didn't know what binary means. So
>> you're saying that *all* people that know what binary means will find
>> that joke funny?
>>
>>
>> >
>> >>
>> >> And how is this relevant to the main discussion about your theory that
>> >> Popperians don't like to hear criticism?
>> >
>> > Well that part was about shame and admitting mistakes. I think
>> > Popperians probably find it harder to own up to this sort of thing for
>> > the simple reason they are much more heavily invested than most other
>> > people, into the idea they have risen above it, and are now among the
>> > elite thinkers of the world. E.g. a few posts ago you were claiming
>> > you had moved past all that.
>>
>> That doesn't make sense. The stuff I wrote about rationalizing is new.
>> No one before me wrote about it. I think Elliot wrote some stuff on
>> psychology, but not in one cohesive article like I did.
>>
>> So that means that Popperians before me don't know about subconscious
>> vs conscious thinking and about why people rationalize and how that is
>> linked with bad feelings like shame. So why would a Popperian who
>> doesn't know about his stuff think that he has risen above something
>> that he's not aware of? Or are you specifically talking about me?
>>
>
> I was talking about you specifically for this example, but I only did
> so because I think what you had previously said about having moved
> beyond things like shame, came out of a way of thinking that I regard
> as fairly typical of popperians..at least that I have interacted with
> on these lists.

When someone feels shame, they try to evade. Its one of the
consequences of an anti-rational meme doing its work of trying to
shield an idea from creativity and criticism.

No Popperian will say that he's absolutely sure that he doesn't have
any anti-rational memes left. So he's always on the look out for
finding his anti-rational memes. This is why a Popperian wants
external criticism. Its so that others can point out that he is
evading (which helps him discover his anti-rational memes).

I realize that my rationalizing article doesn't say this, but I
purposefully didn't mention memes so that it wasn't jargony. If you
understand that I'm saying I (and Popperians) don't have anti-rational
memes, or that its not possible that I have any memes that could cause
shame, then I need to rework that article.

-- Rami Rustom
http://ramirustom.blogspot.com