NancyLebovitz comments on The Nanny State Didn't Show Up, You Hired It [LINK] - Less Wrong

-13 Post author: RomanDavis 18 September 2012 09:07PM

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Comment author: knb 19 September 2012 05:33:27AM *  8 points [-]

I followed the link, and wow that was a bad article. After sampling some of the structureless, self-indulgent writing, I realized I've actually read a few posts from him before. My personal favorite is this, where he takes a break from rambling about some internet celebrity to explain that we are all sheeple for not turning widescreen monitors sideways.

But what makes The Last Psychiatrist really awful is that he pretends to be wise. One very easy way to establish oneself as Wise and Profound is to baldly make some seemingly self-contradictory or obviously false statement. It's important not to actually argue for this claim, simply make it, and sneer at anyone who disagrees. A great example:

What you don't understand consciously is that your judgment of risk is based on the fact that you believe in God, and this is even more true if you think you don't believe in God. I can sense your resistance to this idea because you think you don't believe in God, but sadly for your immortal soul, you do.

Heh, you think you don't believe in god? Think again, sheeple! The Last Psychiatrist doesn't need evidence, he just makes reality up as he goes.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 19 September 2012 11:26:32AM 5 points [-]

For what it's worth, The Last Psychiatrist used to be interesting, but then he started ranting about how everyone (else) is a narcissist without giving any clue about what a non-narcissistic approach to life would be like.

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 19 September 2012 10:51:24PM 0 points [-]

For what it's worth, The Last Psychiatrist used to be interesting, but then he started ranting about how everyone (else) is a narcissist without giving any clue about what a non-narcissistic approach to life would be like.

Replace "narcissist" with "hypocrite" and that's a good description of Robin Hanson.

Comment author: gwern 20 September 2012 01:20:56AM 6 points [-]

Which raises the question - if Hanson turns out to be massively hypocritical on something, does that undermine or support his whole Homo hypocritus paradigm?

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 20 September 2012 02:57:27AM 1 point [-]

I think Hanson's been showing more variation lately.

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 20 September 2012 09:51:21PM 0 points [-]

Possible, I stopped reading him several years ago.

Comment author: taelor 20 September 2012 04:41:23PM 0 points [-]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Hanson's whole point that everyone is naturally hypocritical, and has been made that way via millions of years of evolution optimized to handle social politics in small forager bands? Wouldn't a "non-[hypocritical] approach to life" be something that Hanson's theory would predict wouldn't exist?

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 20 September 2012 09:52:13PM 1 point [-]

In that case what cluster in thing-space does the word "hypocrite" cut out?