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.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
It's not the balls, it's the optimization for finding mates. Evolution only optimizes for moving through 3D spaces so long as that's a means to successful reproduction. going to a stranger's house and moving some plastic tubes around in a cramped space has at best tangentially benefitted from the primary 'goal' of evolution. If the primary 'goal' of evolution was to create the best possible plumber I'd imagine something much more like a raccoon.
For the purposes of this discussion a raccoon is not that different from a human, it's a series of minor allometric changes really. (Raccoon body plan is also affected by reproductive needs, of course). And I suspect that making a raccoon-like plumber is about as hard as making a humanoid plumber (or even harder, because sometimes you need a ton of power in this line of work, and actuators we can produce cheaply and at scale are weak per unit of mass, compared to muscles; we could make a hydraulic raccoon with external power, but...) All creatures with such capabilities will be comparably hard to make. One additional aspect is that we have already made lots of specialized tools adapted for our hand grip and arm strength; it's probably much cheaper to make a robot who can wield them than reinvent the hand and all it holds.
(In the long run though, I agree, our infrastructure will change and so will robots who serve it. Probably a lot more cramped spaces, if nothing else).
Reproductively advantageus traits tend to also be helpful for general survival and capability, or rather, beneficial traits get reinforced by sexual selection (see koinophilia); exceptions are so striking exactly because they violate our intuitions about natural selection.
Then I think we're largely in agreement. I would however say that the primary difference is not that evolution has had more time to work on the 3d space problem so much that there is a massive amount momentum in the infrastructure that physical jobs interface with that is much more difficult to replace/adapt than the fairly infrastructure light world of art. It's certainly harder to prototype, test and iterate on a buildings designed to automatically need no human maintenance than it is to prototype, test and iterate on art that needs no artist. And even if it wasn't it would still take a long time to get that design out in a world where most people are content living in multi-decade old buildings that need occasional maintenance.
I do feel like the next step is going to be claiming that, yes machines are faster, stronger, more energy efficient and have better articulation but they can't compete with humans in having all those things while being made out of meat. Technology has been driving human physical laborers into progressively tighter niches since the wheel.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link