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This song is fantastic if I imagine that it's from a post-apocalyptic universe where Yahweh returned to punish free-thought and established the "Kingdom of God".
That seems a little selfish to me.
Or a memory of them?
Slightly. Of course, the word has been used by many.
Actually not even him, but he was usually extremely rational and rigorous in his approach - more than any other economist I know of - albeit often poorly communicated.
Interestingly, this is pretty much what I used to say about Marx when I was a Marxist.
Statements of the "obvious" contribute plenty to the conversation. Putting the silent consensus into words is useful. Condescending snark is not.
WARNING: the below is arational.
Trigger warnings on Less Wrong, I never thought I'd see the day.
Civility and topicality of a discussion isn't a measure of how mind-killed that discussion is. I personally very much doubt that I could have discussed Krugman rationally, had I entered the discussion, though I certainly would have been polite about it.
This has no consequence on whether politics is genuinely a mind-killer. I include this disclaimer because it has just occurred to me that (ironically) perhaps the "politics is a mind-killer" issue might be becoming LW's first really political issue, and prompt all the standard arguments-as-soldiers failures of rationality.
This kind of drama is an incredible waste of time, and absolutely should not be allowed to cross over into Less Wrong proper. Still, since this post exists, I guess I'll contribute my position.
Whether the kick and ban was warranted should be the question for discussion. Not the concept of moderation itself. Moderation policy is and should be established by precedent and discussion, not operator fiat.
The discussion going on between Burninate and Anubhav C, as cited by Jach, was not spam, was mildly interesting, and certainly should not have warranted kicks for either of them. Anubhav_C insulting Peacebringer was even less deserving of any operator activity, especially because the entire point of having an anonymous mod-bot is presumably to prevent the interference of ego and reputation! I believe that will be the consensus position. If such a consensus is established, I suggest that the operator who kicked them back down, admit an error, and stop this whole set of nonsense before it gets any worse. If the opposite consensus is reached, I suggest Anubhav back down, and likewise stop this ridiculous affair.
So, technology is getting more powerful over time, right? That is, as time goes on, it gets easier and easier to do more and more. If we extrapolate that to its logical extreme, and obviously there are some issues there but let's just pretend, eventually we should be able to press a button and recreate the entire world however we want.
This is a little too utopian-sounding, and would probably provoke automatic reactions along the lines of Malthusianism and environmentalism and such. Perhaps if it's made a little more vague, it could get past any filters along the lines of "Uncontrolled progress will cause a disaster!" that your audience might have.
I wonder what the ratio of "people who plan to become millionaires through tech entrepreneurship" to "people who become millionaires through tech entrepreneurship" is. Really, I wonder what it is. I would assume it's rather low, but then, a million dollars isn't really that much. Can moderately successfully start-ups provide a million dollars (in short order), or is it win/lose?
Perhaps a different name? A good idea under any name, though, so don't let that hold you back, it can always be changed later.
I'm mildly frightened by the prospect, because I'm mildly frightened by the possibility that my political beliefs so far might be built entirely on my ability to mindkill other people with clever argument. So, yes, I think this is a good if not vital idea.
I do wish we could discourage the attitude displayed here by gwern. It's pure ego to respond in this way to someone you deem a "troll". It certainly won't change their mind, and it will only spur them to comment more. Either ignore them completely after downvoting, or be polite in your reply. One might justify these posts as important to make sure that 911truther knows why he's being downvoted, but the aggression in them is entirely counter-productive and, frankly, is quite rude.
For the record, I do think people are a little over-eager to accuse someone of being a "troll" (I think it is much more probable that 911truther is simply ignorant) although I think moderation is warranted in this case.
I find it deeply unsettling that this is the only really critical comment. I was enthused about this idea, as are most of the other commentators, before reading your comment. The obviousness of this criticism (it's something that I've said to Catholics before, for goodness' sake) combined with the fact that it didn't occur to anyone else, including me, has rather put me off the idea. Certainly this points only to my own vulnerability, but I don't know what to suggest that would salvage this idea from the rather sinister position it now occupies in my mind.