OT: I don't particularly see anything factually incorrect with the video. It probably is the case that countries like the US and Britain (and probably France) are the most important countries historically by virtue of their influence, and their positive impact on the world politically, institutionally, culturally and economically is difficult to understate. . .

We are also responsible for some of the greatest atrocities in history. The British rule over both India and Palestine was a disaster, although the extent to which the British Raj is directly responsible for the former is debatable. The racism seen in the European colonies in Africa was also obviously abhorrent, although not at all unexpected if you understand even the slightest degree of human nature and its parochial leanings. America has tarnished its record with things like Abu Ghraib, pulling out of Iraq and leaving a power vacuum, having a mental health crisis precipitated by the "greatest" conservative president ever, it's foreign policy in South America under Roosevelt etc.

But you know who else has done abhorrent things? Literally everybody. The problem is that you don't get to ship slaves across the ocean when you don't have a culture or an economy advanced enough for the construction of ships to survive transatlantic haulage. Yet Africans still sold slaves and dominated one another--the ethnic divisions continue to today--but it rarely gets talked about. Why? Because it's much more dramatic to have the advanced white man come over in his ship and whisk away a few helpless niggers who will be forced into servitude. The Native Americans were actually really fucking wasteful, chopping down more trees and killing more buffalos than they could consume. Why is it never mentioned? Because when you don't have a culture or an economy geared towards the production of advanced materials like swords or flintlocks, your ability to kill things is rather undermined.

And just look at the horrible things we see in the Middle East, which are readily talked about but never quite put up to the same moral standard we Westerners are and why? Islamo-Arabic societies are not as culturally or economically advanced as us; they don't have the same capacity as us.

The fact that we've done a lot of horrible things that need to be recognised and corrected is an unfortunate offshoot of our superiority. We only manage to make such fuck-ups because we've advanced so far ahead of everybody else in the first place. On this account, despite our mistakes . . . Yes, the United Kingdom and our brother-in-arms the United States are a force for good in the world.

YouTube

this tbh

I fucking hate that video, it's such a perfect display of typical, weasel-y Hollywood progressivism.

No, I was more so wondering who would have said it, and why you were generalizing an entire political party.

Better?

This is a propaganda piece, so the linguistics of it is incredibly important: The phrase "I believe Israel acts in accordance with certain standards and is therefore decent" and "Israel is decent" give two very different impressions and are not the same statement.

See, this is where you fall down in your own pedantry. It's blindingly obvious that the video is a persuasion piece--or, if you really want to use such an inappropriate word, propaganda. Pretty much everything is in this day and age. You're using such a wide definition of "propaganda" that you can literally discard anything said without offering any kind of substantive rebuttal.

The speaker is claiming that Israel and it's actions are inherently good because it is a "country with Western values and democratic principles"

Pedantry x2.

The speaker is saying Israel is a good country because it is based on Western values and democratic principles; this is not an outrageous claim to make, given the relative success and prosperity countries based on such ideas have enjoyed. He's not saying, and nor am I, that Israel can do no wrong.

The fact is that what he said isn't a compliment or an insult but a statement of fact, being a democracy isn't inherently good or inherently bad (though I would consider it to be inherently flawed) yet he is twisting that statement to make it carry an emotional approval because this is propaganda. And I never claimed all systems were equal.

Pedantry x1,000,000.

This makes no sense.

Democracy is inherently flawed, but not inherently bad? Not all systems are equal, yet you cannot say any system is inherently superior to the other? This are contradictory statements, the latter especially so.

Democracy, insofar as a country has inclusive institutions and a civil society, is positive for human well-being. We can reasonably call this arrangement good relative to the other options without being propagandists. You're bordering on proposing a system where we cannot saying anything is good or bad without being jackbooted shills for one side or another.

Because having your country founded on conquest and taking land sets a precedent for continuing to do so, and they're still doing so. http://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-settlement-expansion-ongoing-but-best-to-keep-it-under-wraps/

Just to put it out there, I don't support the construction of civilian settlements in the West Bank, and PragerU has previously had another speaker talking about Israel who expressed the same opinion.

The speaker was talking as if Israel had done nothing wrong at all and that the the surrounding states wanted to destroy them just for the hell of it, that Israel are the victims here, when in fact the surrounding states quite clearly have a historical justification for wanting their land back.

Except it's not their land. A Palestinian State has never existed, and to be honest the land was never stolen. The Palestine region passed from the Ottomans to the British to Israel--with numerous border changes since then. Transjordan is now Jordan. The surrounding countries had no land taken from them by the Jews, yet attacked their newly founded country anyway the day after the British left. . .

They have no justification at all for wanting to wipe Israel off the map. The Palestinians had no identity under the Ottomans or the British, yet Israel lets them vote, sit in the Knesset and, fuck, there's even one on the Supreme Court. . . And yet Hamas and the surrounding nations have it in for Israel because of their sick ideology, not any historical grievance.

As for that, if you willingly try to live in a place where everyone hates you, you're an idiot.

Would you say the same to Muslims moving to incredibly xenophobic regions of Western countries?

Not to mention, as I've already said, the region was previously administered by the Ottomans and then the British. Compared to Europe, this offered a fairly good--although not ideal--climate for Jewish emigrants.

Or are you telling me you didn't bat an eye at that line?

I'm not telling you anything, I'm asking you to expand on your rather brief outburst.

Killing civilians is a war crime.

Intentionally killing civilians is a war crime; do Israel know civilians will die? Of course, but that doesn't prove intention.

I'm saying that fighting terrorists does not justify committing acts of terror among other atrocities.

So is Israel meant to sit back and do nothing, just relying on its Iron Dome and never retaliating to blatant attacks even when civilians die? Can you imagine how insane it would be for any Western country to limit itself in this manner?

Especially considering the direction of causality is Israel casualties leading to Palestinian casualties, not vice versa.

I just thought the phrase was funny, "terror tunnels" sounds like an amusement park ride, sort of makes the propaganda less effective.

I commend you to sticking to your tactic of ignoring the substance and simply brushing it off as propaganda.

But I'm going to be honest and say I'm not impressed by your flippant reaction to a terrorist organisation working 160 children to death in the construction of tunnels to use in the terrorisation of civilians.

Yes, 18000 homes were all storing weapons

Ahem.

Also offtopic: Fagcicle told me to talk to you about "why outsourcing is good and how immigrants are necessary.", any comments or resources you'd like to share?

Outsourcing is good due to comparative advantage; it allows economies to specialise and devote their resources/productivity to the production of X, while the country that has temporarily lost jobs due to outsourcing can now focus on the production of Y which is usually a higher-cost, higher-wage service. Standard go-to is Krugman's "In Praise of Cheap Labor".

Immigration literature is a bit more disparate, though, I'll have to look through my databanks.

>Negative female societal expectations for sex juxtaposed with a positive male societal expectation for sex
>Social stigmatism against sexuality, often equated as worse than violence
>Little acknowledgement of asexuality, virginity being held as something bad to have to men and bad to lose for women
>The entire concept of physical virginity in women
>Expectations to have kids
>Disapproval of casual sex
>Disapproval of group sex
>Disapproval of polyamory from both a sexual and romantic standpoint

Pls go and stay go

You know traditions are basically social technologies, right? They're ways of adapting a culture to be effective in the world around us; they are inter-generational pools of knowledge. So what gives you the authority to make such sweeping proclamations?

Israel being a decent country is an opinion not a fact.

There are well established cultural mores determining whether or not a country is behaving in a "decent" manner; if you're going to dispute this on the basis that this is an opinion then you're just being fucking pedantic.

Israel being in the style of Western democracy is a neutral statement not a compliment.

Because when it comes to different cultures and political systems, they're all equal! Right? The wealth of evidence on the importance of inclusive political institutions for human well-being is irrelevant! RIGHT?

Israel's existence is built on stolen land, of course it has an interest in war.

As if the Jews stole it? The British Empire is who put them there, why would this automatically make their interest in war any greater other than for self-preservation?

And nobody would want to destroy it if it wasn't built on stolen land.

This is literally the dumbest thing you could say. Who cares? Who cares if the land is stolen? How does that help us now? Are you going to walk through the streets of Tel Aviv with a sign saying "You are on stolen land" and hope they all go "Well fuck me, I'd better move". Historical arguments absolutely do not help us in remedying the present situation, because the fact that the land is "stolen" has no practical implications for us at this point in time.

It's also categorically untrue that they would not be killing Jews if the land weren't stolen; Jews have emigrated to the region since the 1880s and Palestinians have been spontaneously violent to them on several occasions since at least as early as 1920.

"Judaism, with it's unsurpassed moral standards" Is this a fucking joke?

What's the problem?

If you want peace then leave the region instead of causing more conflict.

Lol.

"Don't like it, just leave".

Yes, killing civilians is clearly the pinnacle of National Defense.

It is when the people trying to murder you are storing their weapons besides residential areas, schools, hospitals, orphanages and use fucking human shields.

At this point the propaganda is getting pretty blatant; TERRORISTS!

Are you trying to say Hamas aren't terrorists?

I can't have much sympathy for Israel being shot at when they have their iron dome system.

Great, I'm going to go to Texas and mug everybody since they have concealed carry laws there.

Precision strikes precisely targeting schools and hospitals.

BECAUSE THAT'S WHERE THEY KEEP THE FUCKING WEAPONS, YOU TWAT.

"terror tunnels"

That, at least in one case, 160 Palestinian kids died building.

to point at something and say "see, we're not the bad guys, we did this much to help the Palestinians"; eating your cake and still wanting to have it afterwards.

Except this is exactly what Hamas does by provoking attacks in areas which will inevitably have a high civilian death toll. . . So they can point at Israel and say "Look how evil the Jews are, we're just an oppressed group!".

How the fuck are you so blind to such an obvious double standard?

Also, how are those phone calls even commendable? "Hey Ahmed i'm gonna bomb your house in a bit try not to die, bye bye now"

Because, unfortunately for Ahmed, his government is waging war on a neighbouring country while storing weapons in the vicinity of Ahmed's house. I don't know about you, but I'd be pretty fucking grateful for some warning.

Because half the front page space wasn't fucking wasted already.

Shit content is still content.

This post doesn't even qualify as content; this is pretty much proven by the fact that the most discussion value it has is in discussing whether it has value.

And I swear to God if you give me thirty paragraphs I will fly to Canada and rape a kitten in front of you.

Quote from: Metty Christmas on December 15, 2015, 05:12:58 PM

Well, it potentially happened last night. Too early to know the ramifications though, so I'll have to sit around and wait and see.

But fuck me, I'm dumb.

No condom/weak pull out game???

No, I was the rebound. I think.

What a joke.

WHAT A CONSTRUCTIVE COMMENT

YOU'VE DEFINITELY GIVEN ME THE IMPRESSION THAT YOU ARE A VALUABLE CONTRIBUTOR TO THIS FORUM, AND I LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING OTHER WELL-THOUGHT-OUT POSTS IN THE FUTURE.

Why do you link the article, and then just copy paste the whole thing in a quote? We can click it and read it, just offer your opinions on it instead.

Whether or not I offer up my opinions is a matter of personal discretion. My main concern here is the spreading of information, and observing any resulting discussion.

According to the Norwegian police.

Hundreds of asylum seekers entering Norway have been discovered with images of “Isis flags” and “executions” on their mobile phones, Norwegian police have said.

The Police Immigration (PU) in Norway have reportedly been working under severe strain to register increasing numbers of refugees hoping to seek asylum in the country.

Police told the Norwegian newspaper Nettavisen “hundreds” of examples of “photos and videos of executions and brutal punishments, such as images of people holding up severed heads or hands” have been found after searching the luggage and phones of new arrivals.

Authorities also discovered numerous examples of Isis flags and symbols belonging to other terrorist organisations, according to reports.

The discoveries come amid concerns Isis may be utilising the refugee crisis in order to smuggle extremists into Europe, following the string of terror attacks in Paris last month, which killed 130 people.

Last month the French Prime Minister, Manuel Valls, announced some of the Paris attackers “took advantage of the refugee crisis” to slip into Europe.

Mr Valls was among a number of leaders calling for tighter security at the Schengen area’s external borders after Greek authorities confirmed one of the suicide bombers at the Stade de France used a fake Syrian passport to enter the EU as an asylum seeker.

Reports of concerning images being found in the possession of refugees' surfaced earlier this year.

A director of the Norwegian government asylum division told Norwegian newspaper Dagsavisen in March: “It can be very demanding to find out who these people are and what they have done.

“We have to detect whether they have taken part in terrorist operations, deserted a terrorist operation or defected from a terrorist organization, and that’s critical for our evaluation of their application”.

Hanne Jendal at the Immigration Directorate said asylum seekers found to have participated in criminal acts would be denied refugee status, The Local reports.

Since 2008, between 90 and 100 people have been denied asylum due to past participation in terrorism.

The number of asylum seekers making first-time applications in Norway has been steadily rising throughout this year, Eurostat figures show.

In January the number stood at just 570 but in October, the most recent month recorded, the total hit 8,575.

The Norwegian government is paying asylum seekers to return to their home countries as the refugee crisis continues.

The immigration department’s return unit (UDI) figures show more than 900 people have applied to take financial support to leave Norway so far.

ITT: "Foreign invasions have had no effect on local militias rising to fight said foreign invaders"

Seriously, do you people even listen to yourselves when you talk?

Actually, I can. In Palestine, the effect of Palestinian deaths on support for Hamas is statistically insignificant, and the number of Palestinians supporting strikes against Israel has fallen dramatically since the Gaza War. And, at least in the case of Palestine, causality is strongly heading in the direction of Israeli casualties leading to Palestinian casualties, and not vice versa.

In Yemen specifically, there has never been a year since 2009 in which civilian casualties outnumber and, with the exception of 2010, none of them have civilian deaths as high as 50pc of insurgent deaths.

In Iraq, just 12pc of the 92,000 civilian deaths were caused by Coalition forces.

To come onto drones specifically though, it seems they have the opposite effect to what you claim: being associated with decreases in the frequencies of terrorist attacks, specifically with decreases in IEDs and suicide bombings. Even unsuccessful drone strikes are associated with these effects, demonstrating a rather effective deterrent channel.

Of course, I'm not saying it has no effect. . . It's just a fucking weak argument.

The Future Primaeval

An argument for traditions:

The space of possible human cultural practices is large.

The subspace of 1 which is well tuned, robust, compatible with human flourishing, and generally good is small.

Humans generally have limited ability to distinguish between good cultural practices and bad ones without direct experience.

Therefore, by 1, 2, and 3, cultural practices constructed ex-nihilo are not likely to be good.

Given experience with a specific bad cultural practice, humans are generally able to critique it and improve upon it.

Given experience with a specific good cultural practice, humans will generally believe it to be good.

Barring cultural shocks, humans will mostly successfully pass on to their descendants those cultural practices which they believe to be good.

Therefore, by 5, 6, and 7, barring cultural shocks, bad cultural practices that cause specific bad experience will tend to wipe themselves out across generations.

Therefore, by 3, 4, and 8, a mature and established cultural practice is likely to be better than a new one, in ways that are not obvious before experience.

Therefore, by 9, we should bias our lifestyles towards mature cultural practices, and away from newly invented ones, even sometimes against our own judgement. QED

This is a structured argument. The premises and inferences are all made explicit, labeled, and stripped of confusing rhetorical device. This lends an appearance of formality, but we have to be careful to not mistake this kind of argument for a formal proof. It's not. Any one of the premises might be nonsense, and any of the inferences may not follow. Arguments cast in this form are often presented as being inescapable logic, when they are just as often incoherent nonsense. The above argument is not inherently all that different from the more compact "traditions have proved themselves over the generations, so are more likely to be good than newly made up practices", just taken apart and labeled for easy reference and analysis.

For example, instead of a vague sense of "that doesn't quite make sense", the structured form invites the criticism that "#3 was true in the past, but the modern intellectual environment makes us more able to design cultural practices than our predecessors". We may then proceed to restructure the argument to see what that actually implies, or to argue whether that is actually true. I don't think it is true, but at least we have a more specific disagreement.

Note that if we disbelieve #3, that does not imply a simple "humans are naturally good at cultural design", but includes all statements that contradict the premise as given, including the above more nuanced objection, and "that whole way of framing it is stupid or otherwise misguided". This is again something to watch out for; the implicit frame of the premises is part of the argument that needs to be justified like the rest. This is often ignored or papered over by people trying to convince you of something.

The other thing to note is that you should not (and won't) find the above structured argument fully convincing on its own. It's deceptively phrased as a proof, but even if sound, it's not a proof. It's only one argument and one line of evidence of what should be many. It should cause a small update, possibly inspire some other lines of reasoning, and help contextualize later evidence in this direction, but not much more.

With a few caveats like the above, I think structured arguments like this are a valuable way to communicate arguments among sincere collaborators, though obviously most useful for disagreements and uncertainty. When you share most of your models, the compact form usually communicates the new idea more efficiently. But if you're going to argue about it, or check your work in more detail to make sure it makes real sense, a structured argument like the above is helpful. A structured argument is for when extra clarity is required.

The example argument above is the culmination of arguments I've about tradition with rationalists of the constructivist "but I don't see any reason not to tear down the Patriarchy and eliminate gender" variety. I hope the structured argument helps them to understand part of my reasoning. In future posts, we will explore the other empirical and theoretical justifications for specific traditions, and tradition in general.

I remember having depression and coming home from college.

I'd just lie in my bed for several hours and stare at the ceiling. My record was around eight hours straight staring at the ceiling. I could no longer tell the time, for some reason, and my internal clock was broken. I wondered about killing myself. Then I tried. Twice. Obviously, I failed.

I'm glad I failed.

There is no "one" answer to why terrorism happens over there.

This is just as bad as the people who rhetorically claim it's entirely about foreign policy, or people hating us for our freedom or whatever.

The fact that no single factor will ever be the only cause of Islamic extremism is a totally uninteresting and unenlightening observation to make; pretty much nobody would substantially argue against that. The question is to what extent do factors like foreign policy, culture, domestic issues etc. affect the prevalence of Islamic terrorism.

The answer, at least for the first, is "not a lot".