Articles on these "rationalist" sites often tend towards a mix of smug superiority about one's ability to analyze other people's supposed biases, and lots of references to pet concepts. I posted this one because it does such an excellent job of analyzing the issue in clear, objective terms.
Articles on these "rationalist" sites often tend towards a mix of smug superiority about one's ability to analyze other people's supposed biases, and lots of references to pet concepts. I posted this one because it does such an excellent job of analyzing the issue in clear, objective terms.
I think the article you linked is an excellent example of smug superiority with lots of references to pet concepts while deficient in regard to the core subjects under discussion. The author demonstrates little practical experience with or research into the actual science around obesity, the actual medical practices related to obese patients, the reality of being an obese person, or the linguistic meaning of the word disease.
It seems you haven't read much else there, and have missed the point; it's not about the scientific details of obesity. And what exactly would be the "linguistic meaning" of the word disease?
I think I've missed the point because there isn't really a point.
The author talks about a hypothetical Doctor but doesn't really seem to know much about medicine. The author asks "what is disease" but doesn't bother to do any real work to answer that question.
To answer your second question, a linguistic analysis of the word disease would look vaguely like the author's "What is a disease?" section, except it would involve real observation about how the word is used and in what contexts. The result is that rather than throwing your hands up in the air saying "it's meaningless to talk about whether something deserves to be a disease" you can say something like: "In a medical context, disease means this' in a research context, disease means this, in a casual context, there are two broad groups of people for whom disease means two different things" Armed with this more accurate language, you can start talking about actual concrete examples and explore more detailed and relevant hypothetical examples.
Articles on these "rationalist" sites often tend towards a mix of smug superiority about one's ability to analyze other people's supposed biases, and lots of references to pet concepts.
There should be a name for the 1st phenomenon, so that websites can use it as a tag. The latter would be too hard to distinguish from citation, however.
The fact that people get a rush from picking things apart should be encouraged, not made explicit to be, perhaps, the target of ostracism—because it means that more people will pick more things apart. There is the egocentric impulse toward social status at the root of even the scientific method: that just proves the amorality of egocentricity, not the immorality of science.
Picking things apart is good. Using a good thing as a justification for smug is usually bad.
It's often been noted that the best way to discredit something good is to espouse it badly. How about: The best way to discredit something good is to be a jerk about it. (Disclosure: I'm at least as guilty of this as anyone here!)
It's not so much a justification for smug; "justifiable smug" is the goal and the positive acts are the means to achieve it. It's a reward intrinsic (a term from game design), usually known as "gamism" under GNS and the people seeking it "Artisans" under the famous MUD paper on the subject: they seek reward by rebalancing power structures in their favor, and by visceral experience.
Combined, these are quite often thought of as "bullying" or "trolling", but not necessarily so—it can also be felt, as the name suggests, while using tools with finesse or performing authoritative power exchanges; surgeons are a good example of someone who has routed gamist reward intrinsics to positive acts. I would interpret the posts you refer to as another.
That is all to say, this is the reverse of a fundamental attribution error: this is just how these people are, not something they can change. It's part of their utility function to "satisfy" their urge to smug, just as one would satisfy hunger or sexual arousal. And, if we want these people in our society, we should learn to accept that as long as it's not actively hurting anyone.
I'm not sure how our positions are really all that different, though I wouldn't trust a surgeon who exploited her ability and reputation to engage in emotional agression. Bringing out the fight response in others isn't generally conducive to open, honest, and creative discussion.
Smug emotional agression might not be a big sin in the grand scheme, but it is an annoyance. It can be a signal of immaturity or lack of certain kinds of awareness. It's like a musician who plays out of tune, or someone farting at a gathering of gourmets. I'd much rather spend time with people who aren't willfully or unconsciously annoying.
I think we have different definitions of "smug" here (to be expected, because it was mostly made up on the spot.) the surgeon gets their thrill not by acting out some form of agression, but rather by directly holding someone's life in their hands—it is not the cut that is made that excites, but the manifold opportunities for mistaken, fatal cuts that aren't made. The pilot and the police officer get the same thrill: the ability to say afterward (even if only internally), that "I could have killed you—in fact, I would have killed you, by default, if I wasn't just so damn good at this."
That's what I mean by "smug." It's not aggression—it's dominance demonstrated via acts of mastery over the world, and thus its inhabitants. Bullying—actual emotional aggression—is the frustrated refuge of the gamist who has no mastery to show off.
