Mm for instance, I think in some contexts markets are pretty powerful, like prediction markets are pretty good at predicting things. (Not saying they’re flawless – polymarket likely overpredicted Trump’s victory). Or that benign-looking regulation is frequently detrimental to the public – while not libertarians at all, Abundance makes a good case for repealing a lot of regulation related to construction. Such regulation is often motivated by people who want to preserve the value of their homes, even though on the surface it appears to be about environmental concerns. (Obviously, I think the environment is important, so we shouldn’t just repeal everything. Just that we should be more critical of such regulation.) Another example is how the U.S. banned civilian supersonic aviation in its airspace because of disruptive sonic booms; apparently the technology now exists to keep such booms very quiet, but the regulation persists, because it’s not booms which were banned but instead supersonic speed as a proxy for booms.

the conventional wisdom checks out to me. Sometimes bullies happen to be right.

Probability of nuclear war rises with number of states having nukes. It’s best to keep that number as low as possible, so I would not think it wise for Greenland to have nukes. It would not be a sin for Iran to have them, though, given Iran’s allies aren’t exactly offering a nuclear umbrella.

Apparently it’s not communicating it well, but your response doesn’t really clear up why for me. I appreciate your trying though. I am left with the lingering feeling that it’s not connecting because it’s hard to picture a right-wing zinger landing well, and not because I’m fundamentally wrong about the symmetry of these scenarios. I’ll concede I could be missing the point.

It doesn’t matter that we’re correct that right-wingers are fascists while they’re wrong that we’re pedophiles. The rhetoric works exactly the same in either case.

As I responded to the other commenter, right-wingers are obviously well aware that left-wingers will call them fascists, even if they do not consider themselves fascist and hold a negative perspective of fascism. I consider pedophiles bad but I’m aware that right-wing people are going to call me one just because I’m gay.

In a flipped conversation, where the third commenter is a right-winger who says “look, you didn’t deny being a pedophile!,” I’m sure they would take a screenshot of the conversation and post it to twitter and get lots of upvotes since that looks like such an own. They’d probably even say they can tell by my disappointment that I was implicitly acknowledging I’m a pedophile.

If your clever comeback sounds exactly as smooth coming out of the enemy’s mouth, it’s not a very good comeback.

When talking with libertarians you should keep in mind they have completely different axiomatic values. It is often the case that they understand a certain policy would be on net bad for everyone, they simply don’t care. They are rarely utilitarian about those issues.

I get along much better with libertarians who justify libertarianism with values extrinsic to just “muh freedom” – they are usually much more willing to yield ground in places where I can convince them that a libertarian policy would be net negative, and they have also moved me to be more open minded about some things I thought I would never agree with.

Well yeah, obviously. The right wing, regardless of whether they consider themselves fascist or not, are obviously aware that left is going to call them out for being fascists. Just as I’m aware that when right-wing people say “pedophiles” they likely are talking about queer people. It’s not going to go over anyone’s head.

And I cast that wish at level 9

Well no duh. It’s a level 9 spell. Can’t cast it lower than that.

Riegel could have done better here; his comeback isn’t really that smart. See, this same script works exactly the same in reverse:

• right winger: “Down with pedophiles!”
• left winger: “Down with JK rowling and <insert right-wing anti-lgbt nonsense>”
• right winger: “I just said down with pedophiles. Telling that you took that as an insult to your politics.”

A million americans died of COVID (yes, some of them would have died without); but half a million would still be very bad.

they would say the same thing about liberals.

The important thing is that they can tune this to attempt to hold false negatives constant while decreasing false positive rate.

“beautiful and up for anything” is incredibly suggestive phrasing. It’s an exercise in mental creativity to make it sound not creepy. But I can imagine a pleasant grandma (always the peak of moral virtue in any thought experiment) saying this about her granddaughter. I don’t mean to say I have heard this, only that I can imagine it. Barely.

Good point. On the other hand, Canada didn’t fare any better even without firing its pandemic response team. I suspect project warp speed would have been welcomed either way, even if it was more important in this timeline.

Yeah, good point. I’m with you.

revolt.

there’s plausible denia… nah i got nothin. That’s messed up. Even for the most mundane, non-gross use case imaginable, why the fuck would anybody need a creepy digital facsimile of a child?

Headline writers believe there are two genders: pilots and female pilots.

can you explain the problem?

it’s beyond me how people can feel bad for one but not the other. Feeling bad for neither or both, that I can understand.