Someone posted fearfully to the philosophy stack exchange: http://philosophy.stackexchange.com/questions/34452/are-great-philosophers-resting-sometimes-from-study

I know it's a funny question but I wanted to post it and I hope they don't close it.

I pointed out that mods terrorizing users is a problem. Shouldn't they change something? Unpredictably blocking people from asking questions is noticed and bothers potential participants.

A mod promptly deleted my question as "trolling" and said it was unreasonable. No details or arguments. (I posted it in the "meta" section for asking questions about the site, not in the regular section.)

Meanwhile my philosophy question about how to deal with non sequiturs was blocked. So was my question seeking quality criticism of Objectivism. And some other guy's question about how to be a philosopher. And my question about what philosophy questions people should ask and don't. What a stupid site.

Edit: My post asking what is trolling (since my post was deleted for trolling) was also deleted without answering. (Again asked in the appropriate meta section for questions about the site, not on the main site.)

Edit 2: Related thought:

ppl fake being patient and reasonable initially. then then they get fed up and get really nasty. this is way worse than if they'd just be mildly nasty the whole time consistently, instead of giving a fake first impression to set the tone wrong

Edit 3: I received a 7 day ban because

I get that you like Ayn Rand and Karl Popper... but that doesn't make any and every question about them fit here. I've tried discussing it with you, but you don't seem to want to hear it...

and something about replying to people in comments (mostly I replied to him, the moderator, who kept arguing with me in comments...) which is bad because they hate discussion.

one of the notable things about the ban, in my view, is that i'm banned for nothing in particular. the moderator was unwilling to point to any specific thing and say it was a bannable offense, and yet i'm banned.

Edit 4: After discussing with the moderator:

- there are no written criteria for bans in public
- he's unable to correctly answer simple questions like whether or not there are written criteria for bans in public
- he thinks banning people who don't follow the site ethos guidelines stuff (how much? what degree of disobedience gets a ban?) is objective and clear criteria that everyone should find clear without it needing to be stated
- they ban with no warning that a ban may be incoming

Edit 5: Meanwhile on the physics stack exchange someone decided to inform me that I don't know David Deutsch personally (I do) after flaming _The Beginning of Infinity_ without reading it b/c it's popular.

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The lack of online discussion places that aren't completely awful is a big problem. There's FI and that's about it.

The Philosophy Stack Exchange features aggressive, arbitrary moderation and is hostile to discussion. The below is some of my deleted content. (One good thing about the site is at least you can still access your own writing after they delete it):

Utilitarianism doesn't make sense. What Utilitarians should do is change their mind.

They want to promote the greatest good to the greatest number, or something like that. But how do you calculate how much good any given thing is in order to make decisions? Utilitarianism doesn't offer a viable way to calculate this, so utilitarianism doesn't actually give any clear indication about which actions to take or not take.

Instead the way utilitarianism works is people want to take some action (first) and then (second) make vague appeals to it being good for lots of people.

Also, people aren't all equal. The programmers who worked on the iPhone matter more than some guy serving burgers. They make a bigger difference in the world and help way more people. They are better at thinking and learning and problem solving. They're more logical and rational. They're on average more moral people who'd be easier to cooperate productively with. Take your pick of criteria and iPhone programmers will tend to beat burger servers.

(There are many breeds of Utilitarianism. If you pick one and ask a question providing some detailed claims about how it works, then I could comment on those specific claims. I think you'd want to submit this as a new question on the site. If I don't see it you can email me [email protected] with a link to it.)

This point contains some spoilers for The Bachelor, season 14, from 2010.

curi:
i am watching the bachelor
cuz i like the show unreal
which is a scripted show about making a (fake made up) reality tv show like the bachelor
it has some interesting info about how much ppl suck and in what ways
shows lots of lies
this season one of the girls fucked a cameraman or other staff dude
he got fired and she got kicked off
well idk if fucked. mb just made out. they were vague
Friend:
on bachelor or unreal?
curi:
bachelor
real
the convo where she got kicked off was really awkward cuz of his communication style (the host dude did it)
he wouldn't just directly say stuff
it was all such defensive indirect language
stuff like we don't see how you can continue
and we take this very seriously
something interesting was
they were driving to some date and he was saying in vocieover how he really wanted to get to know her better and can't wait
he could just stop the car and talk to her now. or talk while driving
they put way more effort into things like doing activities, going places, than into actually talking
this is intentional
Friend:
yes
dating would be way cheaper if ppl just like talked to each other
and easier in like practical way
but then they’d have to like talk to each other
curi:
the show format
the rose ceremony
he names girls
but he doesn't give reasons
and he doesn't name rejects. only keepers
the rejects are just implied
the lack of reasons lets audience have more fantasies
make up what's going on
how they like it
he's on date with a divorcee right now
she said lots of ppl don't realize they have expectations about marriage
i think that's true
they just figure they will get married and it will be like how marriage is
and they want and expect all kinds of stuff
but they don't realize they are expecting stuff. they just assume it's the default
but u can take 2 conventional normal ppl and their defaults still won't match up that well
he said one of his expectations in marriage is his wife has his back 100%. like, even if he's wrong, i take it.
they drink a lot of wine
it's expected, not rly optional. would be costly not to
a girl just said she may not act or seem insecure, but she's prolly the most insecure girl there
yet somehow most of the audience didn't hear her say "i am a liar", and she doesn't think of herself as asying that
now a girl basically said her idea of what marriage should be like is the fun and excitement and energy of courtship and just don't have that die down
that's so like predictable – and predictably doesn't work
ppl plan that then don't
Friend:
@ giving reasons - also they often don’t have good reasons, or wouldn’t want to admit their reasons
curi:
yeah it's way easier to pick ppl by race, age and beauty when u aren't expected to explain anything
the notes they get about dates are cryptic and always very short
Friend:
“i saw ur boobs, and they have stretch marks”
curi:
overall there isn't much communication
ali is like gushing about how great jake is cuz they were walking down street and passed flower shop and he bought her flowers
they are fucking thrilled with everything he does for them
it's required. if she didn't like the flowers it pretty much signals pick a different girl
Friend:
u listen to taylor swift
curi:
not much
Friend:
one of her songs had lyrics about pretending to be the kind of girl he likes in the beginning of the relationship
curi:
i get music on ppl's streams i don't pick
Friend:
>Find out what you want
Be that girl for a month
the whole verse is:

Cherry lips, crystal skies
I could show you incredible things
Stolen kisses, pretty lies
You're the king baby I'm your Queen
Find out what you want
Be that girl for a month
Wait the worst is yet to come, oh no
Screaming, crying, perfect storm
I can make all the tables turn
Rose gardens filled with thorns
Keep you second guessing like
"Oh my God, who is she?"
I get drunk on jealousy
But you'll come back each time you leave
'Cause darling I'm a nightmare dressed like a daydream
curi:
the guy is trying to reassure every girl and tell them he's into them
to keep his options open
there was a single mom iwth a 7yo
he went on a solo date with her and met her kid and acted super nice
and kept her at that time. then got rid of her a little later
pretty transparent IMO. but ppl don't look at it that way. they see that he was like totally cool with the kid and nice to her, but then it just didn't work out later for some other unnamed reason
she also said don't kiss her until she wins show, no other girls left.
such a play for attention
and he bends over backwards to say he respects that and pretend it's about values
oh hey they got [person] as a guest script writer
talking about REALLY knowing someone
instead of any substance u just throw in superlatives
i'm completely into gia "right now" while on solo date with her
he loves the fact that she's smiling
gia's family is grilling him with tough questions like how he'll treat her as wife – answer: always have her back. family pleased! good answer!
>>
mom takes him aside
u fallen for 4 girls?
yes
but gia is so amazing and so different
mom agrees: she really is!
gia to mom: he does the same stuff with the other girls that he does with me
mom: ur a special person
i think he loves u
ali's mom was super duper impressed with jake cuz he said that inner beauty is mostimportant (tho obv physical beauty is important too)
such a cliche bromide
omg he said one of the things our culture demands everyone say
what a great guy!!
tenley is so relived, and it means so much to her, that jake is totally different than her ex husband cuz he makes his own decisions and wants to be a team (note those 2 things kinda contradict)
(in addition to being so cliche that i bet she thot her first husband wanted to be a team too)
so literally not a idfference
tenley did a dance for him.
1) dance part of courtship
was like a ballet-y kinda thing with some choreography
not sure what to call it. not like club. at actual dance room kinda thing
and the voice overs are saying like
how she felt confident and adored and good about the dance specifically b/c of his facial expressions while she danced
and that what facial expressions he had during dance dominated her experience and opinion of it
tenley's dad taskes jake aside to their den (big emphasis on setting and setup b4 any talking)
and asks if he's a good guy or not
and jake says he was raised to do the right thing
and he said tenley would bring a lot of joy into their home
and that was about it
falllling in love with vienna is scrary cuz it's "so real"

i wrote this for an FI email. it's important and will apply to pretty much anyone reading this, not just the person i was speaking to:

how do you get started when you don't want to think/learn, and you're bad at thinking/learning? both of those get in the way of learning to want to think or learning to think better.

so what's the solution?

it depends on your situation.

you have to find some good things in your personal circumstances and use them. there's no generic solution. there has to be something good in your life to use as a starting point to build on. you have to find some things in your life to use as leverage.

hypothetically, let's say you really truly valued freedom. then you could find some things you like which contradict freedom and use the genuine really high valuing of freedom to drop the stuff that you find contradicts it. if you valued freedom enough, maybe it could inspire some intellectual honesty to allow for dropping (instead of rationalizing) some anti-freedom ideas.

i expect any real things that would work for you would involve some more parochial details of your life, and some more concrete and simple stuff, not an abstract philosophy theme. and it'd be a bunch of little things instead of one big one.

people wanting to get back to the "main" topic they're interested in is a really common mistake i've noticed.

people are interested in X. X leads to Y which leads to Z. people are much less interested in Z than X, even though pursuing Z is the way to pursue X.

this is really broken. it gets in the way of making progress. it gets in the way of truth-seeking wherever it leads. it gets in the way of interdisciplinary learning. it means people want to learn only as long as the learning stays within certain boundaries.

here's one of my explanations of what's going on:

people want to work in particular fields rather than solve particular problems.

if your focus is purely on solving a problem (X), you'd be interested in whatever helps accomplish that goal.

but suppose instead your focus is on "i like woodworking. i want to work with wood". then you won't be interested in philosophy related to learning which could help with woodworking. cuz you want to do woodworking, not philosophy.

if your focus was on solving a really hard woodworking problem, then it'd lead you to philosophy and you'd be interested in philosophy because it helps with your problem.

i think a lot of people care more about what kind of activity they are doing – e.g. woodworking not philosophy – than they care about problem solving.

people have interests in topics (e.g. woodworking, dance, psychology, literature, architecture, programming, chemistry, politics) rather than having problem-directed interests.

---

another reason people lose interest is:

the more steps there are, and the more complicated the project gets, and the more tangents it follows ... then the more it's a big, longterm project. and they don't expect to successfully complete big, longterm projects. so what's the point?

You can discuss Ayn Rand and Objectivism here, including discussing books as you read through them. And ask questions!

our culture puts a huge amount of effort into teaching kids to dance. it's part of some static memes. dancing is related to sex and courtship. dancing is also related to emotions. and dancing is related to having "fun" and being unserious (and thoughtless).

dancing is all over TV. it's taught to kids at very young ages. it's also officially part of school curriculums.

for preschool in california there's a bunch of goals for what they want kids to do like:

http://www.cde.ca.gov/be/st/ss/daprekindergarten.asp

1.1 Move in a variety of directed ways.
1.2 Imitate the movements shown.

:/

this one stood out to me:

2.3 Respond spontaneously to different types of music and rhythms.

this whole thing is planned, and the kid is required to learn to do it in a way his teachers approve of. it's not spontaneous, it's controlled by teachers. the people writing this document are lying scum.

Where are all the smart, rational people interested in intellectual discussion?

Can anyone find some somewhere besides FI?

Or is the world just kinda full of fools?

Reply in the comments below.