Dear Linus, re: the arbiter of truth

[YellowJersey]

So I was watching last week's WAN Show (actually, still watching it, just paused to write this up while it's still fresh in my brain) and was kind of amused when Linus and Luke got into it regarding precisely how online platforms are supposed to curb things like hate speech, psudo-science, and so on. I was amused because this is the problem I've had churning in the depths of my brain for years now and I can only know this: no solution is going to be perfect. I think that much is obvious. However, I'm doubtful that any solution is going even reach the "very good" level.

The obvious examples are easy. Adventure Time: fine. Dude goosestepping around with swastikas tattooed all over his body while calling for ethnic cleansing: not fine. These are the extremes and they're easy to identify. It's when you start getting away from the obvious that things get tricky in a hurry because some people are going to find X ban-worthy or offensive and others aren't and there's no objective way to test how reasonable it was for a person to be offended. (I'm sure we've all come across a headline claiming something is racist or sexist that caused us to raise a doubtful eyebrow).

 

 Ultimately, it's going to come down to a subjective judgment call made by an actual person who will sometimes make the right call and sometimes won't. Trying to have objective rules to cover every situation is impossible. That "where do you draw the line?" question is impossible to answer with any consistency. If there's one thing I've learned, it's that the only absolute is that there are no absolutes; there is an exception to every rule and an exception to every exception branching off fractally forever.

 Linus had the "I know what I want" but Luke had the "but how do you actually achieve that?" back-and-forth.

I have an LLM specialising in international public and natural resources law and this is the kind of problem that countries and the UN face when trying to draft a treaty governing pretty much anything: we know what we want, but don't know how to write it or express it in a way that makes it clear and doesn't leave it open to abuse. It's f***ing impossible (hence why international environmental law is so weak)

[GenericFanboy]

There's already plenty of features for it IMO, Look at Valorant. It has an easy mute chat and mute voice chat function. Isnt that enough? Or am i dumb and missing the point?

[mr moose]

1 minute ago, GenericFanboy said:

There's already plenty of features for it IMO, Look at Valorant. It has an easy mute chat and mute voice chat function. Isnt that enough? Or am i dumb and missing the point?

When they say online platforms they mean websites like facebook, youtube, twitch etc.  Places where people can soapbox and present any content they want with virtually no moderation or care for consequences at all.  Now many would argue we shouldn't moderate that because freespeech,  however everything in life has an effect on something, sometimes it's mild and easy to shrug off like an insult or offensive joke, but other times it becomes more dangerous where the content is starting to bend the truth and motivate people to rally for discriminatory outcomes.

 

There is one problem with humans, we can't educate the stupid so we have to protect them from themselves and us from them.   We as a society have to carry them because they cannot carry themselves.  They aren't smart enough to know when to turn of the drivel.  Once we accept this rock bottom truth,  it is easier to see why SOME censorship and decency codes being observed have their merits.

 

 

[GenericFanboy]

1 minute ago, mr moose said:

When they say online platforms they mean websites like facebook, youtube, twitch etc.  Places where people can soapbox and present any content they want with virtually no moderation or care for consequences at all.  Now many would argue we shouldn't moderate that because freespeech,  however everything in life has an effect on something, sometimes it's mild and easy to shrug off like an insult or offensive joke, but other times it becomes more dangerous where the content is starting to bend the truth and motivate people to rally for discriminatory outcomes.

 

There is one problem with humans, we can't educate the stupid so we have to protect them from themselves and us from them.   We as a society have to carry them because they cannot carry themselves.  They aren't smart enough to know when to turn of the drivel.  Once we accept this rock bottom truth,  it is easier to see why SOME censorship and decency codes being observed have their merits.

 

 

Hmmmm, I guess thats fair. But then again, isnt it a bit of common sense to not talk with people you have no knowledge of. And report people and block them? I dont really think its possible to do much else.

[YellowJersey]

Linus hit the nail on the head: it's complicated. Really complicated.

 

 Nothing you come up with will please everyone; it will always be imperfect. But you have to at least try.

Where's the line? You've got to pick a spot and go from there.

Who decides? You've got to pick someone and go from there.

 There will always be some degree of arbitrary decision making.

 One of the many problems is that tech companies like google and facebook is that the idea of having actual people doing this stuff is like sunlight to a vampire; they're all about algorithms that don't perform well.

[mr moose]

2 hours ago, GenericFanboy said:

Hmmmm, I guess thats fair. But then again, isnt it a bit of common sense to not talk with people you have no knowledge of. And report people and block them? I dont really think its possible to do much else.

It is common sense, but the problem with common sense is that it isn't really that common at all.

 

 

[GenericFanboy]

1 minute ago, mr moose said:

It is common sense, but the problem with common sense is that it isn't really that common at all.

 

 

This doesnt make any sense. But it also does. Lets just not make chatting avaiable at all. Problem solved.

[dalekphalm]

6 hours ago, GenericFanboy said:

This doesnt make any sense. But it also does. Lets just not make chatting avaiable at all. Problem solved.

Common sense was never common. People have always done stupid or irrational things, often against their own interests. 

[GumblesGrambles]

12 hours ago, mr moose said:

There is one problem with humans, we can't educate the stupid so we have to protect them from themselves and us from them.  

 

No, quite the opposite, we have people educated in stupidity now,  The cult like double speak now flows from the tongues of the new elites which have been over produced thanks to lowered standards and massive levels of debt.  Intersectionality alone is pure sophistry, Orwellian redefinition's to apply every double standard possible.

 

Linus doesn't know what he's asking for when he asks for more.  Being from Canada where his news is second hand CNN no doubt there is plenty he has not seen. What is truth?  Which religion is true?  Facebook has been wiping out legitimate political parties Facebook pages.  Even skeptics aren't safe, notably anti Islam groups who can cite chapter and verse of contradiction in their fact checks, but these fact checks are "hate speech" to Facebook, you see how that works.  What's true doesn't actually matter, and no silly examples of hippy crystals really deals with this reality.  Clearly Linus leans a bit left, and most of the cherished unquestioned presuppositions of that ideology do not survive fact checks.  Evolution implies inequality, diversity entrenches this inequality into reality, any questions, any science is simply suppressed.

 

One can really sum up "hate speech" as blasphemy, everything makes sense after that, so the there is no answer for Linus, let alone one one he can just demand "more" of.

 

As for who is doing the subjective calls, lets just say they aren't hiring phd's from philosophy departments

 

 

[mr moose]

12 hours ago, GenericFanboy said:

This doesnt make any sense. But it also does. Lets just not make chatting avaiable at all. Problem solved.

It's not about chat.  It's about all content.   and common sense as it was conventionally considered is not common, very few people have enough sense to innately know when to switch of something because it is poorly founded or dangerous.

 

4 hours ago, GumblesGrambles said:

 

No, quite the opposite, we have people educated in stupidity now,  The cult like double speak now flows from the tongues of the new elites which have been over produced thanks to lowered standards and massive levels of debt.  Intersectionality alone is pure sophistry, Orwellian redefinition's to apply every double standard possible.

 

 

There is a reason a certain number of people will abjectly dismiss rational or evidential realities, it's because they either don't like that reality or they aren't smart enough to be able to comprehend said issue/condition.   Either way they are displaying a distinct lack of common sense or are idiots.    If you can find evidence of being able to educate idiots then please post it, other wise I'm going to refer you to Jordan Peterson and his explanation of the US armies studies into IQ.

 

 

Armed forces reference from 7 Minutes.