site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 24, 2025

This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.

Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.

We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:

  • Shaming.

  • Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.

  • Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.

  • Recruiting for a cause.

  • Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.

In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:

  • Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.

  • Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.

  • Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.

  • Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.

On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.

4
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Hooo buddy, have I got some news to break to you about natural science. People debate conceptual primitives and what "counts" as them all the bloody time. I presume that you pity people who genuinely believe in natural physical law or "objective" reality, too?

Ontology is a matter of convenience. All models are flawed, some models are useful. If there are two different models of reality that output the same results for all ranges of possible inputs, then choosing between them is a matter of convenience. If, for some reason, it became relevant, you could then worry about which one had the lowest Kolmogorov complexity or something.

Objective reality is a very useful concept to have, even if establishing it is likely unreachable. I can happily concede that the universe might be a cosmic dream, that this could be a simulation, that I'm perhaps a brain in a vat or a Boltzmann brain while happily acting as if this reality is shared, stable and predictable. The ability to compartmentalize or hold multiple levels of abstraction in your head when necessary can be handy.

There is certainly far more evidence for consistent and universal laws of physics than there is for objective and universal morality. Physicists can predict the outcome of systems spanning dozens of orders of magnitude within the limits of experimental error. Philosophers are lucky if they can get their buddy reading Kant in the cafeteria to agree with them.

These sentences contradict one another and result in something that is conceptually incoherent.

  1. Morality has no objective foundation, and is unavoidably subjective.
  2. I'm a subject, or at least an observer of my own moral schema.
  3. In other words, I have a subjective sense of morality. I can see no convincing reason for anyone to claim that theirs is more objective in any meaningful sense.
  4. Hence morality is always relative to an observer.
  5. I prefer my own moral system. If there was someone else's I preferred, I would adopt it. I've certainly been influenced by other people, I didn't grow up in a vacuum.
  6. I would prefer that other people adopt my sense of morality, if not wholesale, then the sections that relate to other people.
  7. Ergo, I'm a chauvinist, preferring my morals and seeking to convince others to adopt them.

1 to 4 establish the relativism. 5-7 explain why that's not a barrier for me preferring my morality over all others, as I believe that it both needs no justification beyond personal preference and that there isn't any more deep-seated justification for anyone's morality.

In other words: "Because there's no objective standard, all moralities are equally ungrounded. However, from my subjective viewpoint, I find my own morality preferable, and therefore I advocate for it." I avoid claiming objective superiority while still asserting subjective preference and a desire for propagation.

Please, do tell me me how these two concepts are impossible to reconcile. I think I just did that, so there's an existence proof for you. I would be much obliged if you also established reasons for there being an "objective" morality, or a reason why I should prefer that of someone else's over myself.

If you somehow succeed, I will either concede the point, or disappear into a gibbering mess of congealing brain matter from the cognitive dissonance I expect to experience.

Ontology is a matter of convenience. All models are flawed, some models are useful. If there are two different models of reality that output the same results for all ranges of possible inputs, then choosing between them is a matter of convenience. If, for some reason, it became relevant, you could then worry about which one had the lowest Kolmogorov complexity or something.

Objective reality is a very useful concept to have, even if establishing it is likely unreachable.

...and yet, you must pity people who actually believe it, right?

I know my values are just as valid (or not) as anyone else's.

Let's start with, "What does this sentence mean?" What does it mean for values to be "just as valid (or not)"? You seem to have not touched on this at all in your latest comment.

..and yet, you must pity people who actually believe it, right?

The same way I pity someone with a bad haircut. It's not a big deal, or a lot of pity.

Let's start with, "What does this sentence mean?" What does it mean for values to be "just as valid (or not)"? You seem to have not touched on this at all in your latest comment.

It means precisely that from any imagined objective standpoint (which I argue doesn't exist for morality), no set of values has a greater claim to inherent correctness or truth than any other. They are "equally valid" in the sense that they are all subjective constructs, arising from individuals or cultures. They are "equally (or not)" valid because the very concept of objective validation is moot here – they are all equally ungrounded in objective truth. Think of it like favourite colours: saying my favourite colour (blue) is "just as valid" as yours (red) means neither has an objective claim to being the 'correct' favourite colour; the concept doesn't apply.

This lack of objective grounding doesn't prevent me, as a subject, from having preferences. I prefer my moral framework. I find it more consistent, more conducive to the kind of world I want to live in, etc. That's the chauvinism. But it's a preference asserted without the illusion of objective backing. It's saying "I prefer blue and think others should too because I find it aesthetically superior," not "Blue is objectively the best colour according to the laws of the universe."

Not that I feel like this point requires elaboration, I strongly expect that if you had an actual way to show me up as incoherent, you'd have produced it by now.

The same way I pity someone with a bad haircut. It's not a big deal, or a lot of pity.

Why not? Why the difference?

They are "equally valid" in the sense that they are all subjective constructs

This is just restating that you think values are subjective, not telling me what you think it means for such subjective values to be "valid" or not... or multiple values to be "equally valid".

the very concept of objective validation is moot here ... the concept doesn't apply

Precisely as I expected. You have absolutely no explanation of what your own sentence meant; only what it did not mean. Your sentence lacked any semantic content and was incoherent in your view. Once one tries to include any semantic content in it, it contradicts the prior sentence. It's extremely bad form to use sentences that you sneakily think are incoherent.

[EDIT: Let's change the syntax to make it clear. Suppose you had said, "I know my values are just as blurf (or not) as everyone else's." Suppose I inquired as to what you meant by values being blurf or not, or multiple values being equally blurf. It's not really helpful to say that there is nothing objective about blurf. It still simply fails to tell me anything about what blurf actually means.]

Of course, if I proceeded with your attitude, I'd say that I strongly expect that if you had an actual way to make your own statements coherent/consistent in your view, you'd have produced it by now.

You're just wasting my time, and have been for a while.

I've explained my stance, that moral views are just as inherently subjective as opinions on favorite colors. That's it.

Precisely as expected. You do not have a way of making your own statements coherent/consistent in your view, which is why you haven't done so. Now you're just throwing a hilarious Internet Shit Fit for having gotten called out on it. (About three comments! That's "for a while"! Mucho Internet Shit Fit...)

It is actually you who has wasted all of our time, by making incoherent statements and then refusing to engage in reasoned discourse about them. All you have to do is explain the meaning of your sentences. This should be extremely easy, since your position is so simple, straightforward, and obviously true... so much so that you pity anyone who doesn't agree with you and think that they're smoking wildly crazy stuff. Why can't they understand your extremely simple position? ...perhaps it's because you can't even be bothered to make it coherent.

EDIT:

The same way I pity someone with a bad haircut. It's not a big deal, or a lot of pity.

Why not? Why the difference?

You dropped this bit.