site banner
naraburns  nihil supernum  19d ago (text post)   26911 thread views

U.S. Election (Day?) 2024 Megathread

With apologies to our many friends and posters outside the United States... it's time for another one of these! Culture war thread rules apply, and you are permitted to openly advocate for or against an issue or candidate on the ballot (if you clearly identify which ballot, and can do so without knocking down any strawmen along the way). "Small-scale" questions and answers are also permitted if you refrain from shitposting or being otherwise insulting to others here. Please keep the spirit of the law--this is a discussion forum!--carefully in mind.

If you're a U.S. citizen with voting rights, your polling place can reportedly be located here.

If you're still researching issues, Ballotpedia is usually reasonably helpful.

Any other reasonably neutral election resources you'd like me to add to this notification, I'm happy to add.

15
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

If academics and nonprofits don't have a presumption of moral status, how do we justify taking people's money to fund them and using their judgements to rule the people?

I mean, in the "fund" case, it's just "having people research this is diffusely positive for society, so funding it from the taxpayer internalises the externality".

Of course, there are departments whose output is negative for society (obvious nonpartisan example: marketing psychology), which that argument suggests should get no grants and should in fact have to pay the government to compensate society for their "pollution". One can question whether internalising this externality is worth the costs of implementing such a scheme, but the "axe funding" part I'm completely sold on.

how is his preference that "bad left wing ideas should gain power" at the expense of the truth

Where did he say this quote? I can't find it.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GXd0TunXoAASp0t?format=jpg one of his more famous quotes, but I forgot he said "wrong" instead of bad. It was a delightful preview of 2020.

That quote has lowered my opinion of him, although he didn't say he wanted it at the expense of the truth.

EDIT: With that said, he appears to have kinda contradicted this since, although AFAICT he hasn't specifically walked it back (besides deleting the Tweet).

I think he started walking it back with "correction: I do not want wrong left wing ideas such as 'Yglesias should be fired from Vox' to gain pow--wait no!"

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats