I think I thought of one: "Most children enjoy genital stimulation." I'm not 100% sure that is true, but I think it is true. At least, I know I did and I believe that many children engage in a fair amount of self-stimulation. I can't think of any situation where I would be comfortable discussing the positives of giving sexual pleasure to children.
Most Western people don't want to allow sexuality even to post-puberty teenagers, at least before the ages of 15-16. Some people are even opposed to any sort of sexual education.
The issue is more socially complex than the (true) fact it's taboo. Most people are not guided by "what would be best / most enjoyable for the children", but rather "what would be proper" or "what would build the kind of society we want when the children grow up".
I realize not everyone is familiar with or has witnessed or has even heard of the kind of interactions that are described when children are compared to pets, but it still baffles and surprises me on a gut level whenever someone asks about it.
Here's a few contrasting examples as a (weak) attempt to McGuyver an intuition pump:
To Roommate: "Your music's bothering me, I need to concentrate / have calm for XYZ reasons, could you please turn it down a bit?" (justification usually given or implicit)
To Pet: "Your meowing's loud, shut the fuck up." (optional addition: *gives a cookie to shut it up*)
To Child: "Turn down your music! It's loud!" (No justification given, usually even upon request)
To Roommate: "Could you wash the dishes? I'm really tired and I still have to do XYZ. (or insert X'Y'Z' reason)"
To Pet: ... (pet eats in dirty dishes, or at best rinsed with flowing tapwater)
To Child: "Do the dishes before 5 PM." "Come do the dishes NOW or I'm unplugging your computer / gaming console / (insert other arbitrary unrelated top-down punishment)"
To Roommate: "I'll take care of cleaning my room/space, I don't care about ...
From Farewell to Alms; Asia:
In Asia, as Malthus knew, the norm for women was early and nearly universal marriage. Recent studies of family lineages and local population registers suggest that first marriage for Chinese women around 1800 took place on average at age 19. A full 99 percent of women in the general population married.9 Men also married young, first marriage occurring on average at 21. But the share of men marrying was much lower, perhaps as low as 84 percent. Chinese males were no more likely to marry than their northwestern European counterparts. This was because female infanticide created a surplus of males, and men were more likely than women to remarry after the death of a spouse.10
Egypt:
...The one even earlier society for which we have demographic data is Roman Egypt in the first three centuries AD. As in preindustrial China and Japan female marriage was early and universal. The estimated mean age at first marriage for Egyptian women was even lower, at 17.5.15 Marital fertility rates, however, were lower than in northwestern Europe, but higher than in China and Japan: about two-thirds the Hutterite standard. This early and universal marriage, and relatively high
Hrm? I'm not sure why you think I disagree with your comment. Taking a step meta is generally acceptable. People claim the Holocaust never happened is not taboo, even if The Holocaust never happened is taboo in many contexts.
I think the ancestor is a +12 because it is a great example of what the OP requested - a true, probably taboo sentence.
We're only allowed to talk about the fact that we are almost universally demonstrably evil by the standards of our own professed moral systems in a joking context.
It's fine until you change a vague statement about "most" relationships (which obviously means outgroup-people's relationships) into a specific one about people in the conversation, or friends of people in the conversation, or other ingroup members. At which point, I'd say it's just offensive, not taboo. Offensive, hard to justify, based on the outside view when people with inside view information are around... yeah, probably instrumentally unwise to say most of the time, too.
Agreed. Although if you include the cost of searching, satisficing is the optimal solution.
In my experience, these are not actually taboo
Then I think your experience is atypical. If you can say things like this in front of your peer group without being ostracized, you have an atypical peer group. I have an atypical peer group and I still think I would lose friends for saying some of these things.
My peer groups have ranged from good ol' boys to academics to leftwing activists. I don't think my experience is atypical for somebody who knows how to carefully introduce taboo topics. If my experience is atypical, it's due to the thought I've put into communicating such topics.
Edit: Changed "good topics" to "taboo topics."
Do you think that the position that Larry Summers was in is atypical, or do you think that he was bad at carefully introducing good topics?
In my experience, these are not actually taboo, and I think my experience is generalizable.
Who are the twenty people you interact with most often? Make a list.
Meet with each of those people in person. Work each of those three observations that you think are obvious and not taboo into the conversation. Notice whether or not you feel any reluctance to bring up the topic. Pay close attention to their reaction, and where they try to steer the conversation.
I strongly suspect your experience will be that these topics are actually costly to discuss (i.e. there actually is a taboo).
Notice here that I sought to counteract selection effects. Yes, there are lots of people I can talk to who think those things are reasonable beliefs. But there are also lots of people who, if I mention the quantitative implications of the black-white IQ gap, will not see it as a good idea to be friends with me anymore. Correspondingly, I don't discuss that topic with them.
We can recognize that statements like these correlate with certain false beliefs and nasty sentiments of the sort that actually are taboo.
This is, of course, a very destructive self-fulfilling prophecy. If pointing out the negative side ...
I think anti-Semitism a form of mental illness
This is an extreme claim that I would dismiss without strong evidence.
It seems that you only make it as an applause light. I doubt you have real evidence that anti-Semitism is a mental illness, rather than a normal mental state which is common in certain societies and is not harmful to those who possess it.
You have to profess this belief to allow you to discuss taboo claims that seem anti-Semitic without letting people think you're an actual anti-Semite. The fact you are forced to make this claim, which is probably irrelevant to the discussion at hand (e.g. what exactly happened in the Holocaust), is evidence that you are discussing a taboo subject.
I think that anti-Semitism is a qualitatively distinct form of racism which ought to be considered on the borderline of mental illness. I'll admit fault for calling it a mental illness without qualification.
Let's be clear we're talking about the same thing here. The definitions for mental illness that I'm familiar with say that mental illness must be something that is not widespread in the person's culture, a beliefs or behavior that others consider weird or irrational. People imitate and conform to other's beliefs and actions so much, that anything that is common to a large segment of the population (e.g. religious belief) cannot be usefully called a mental illness. Anti-Semitism clearly fails this test.
Anti-Semitism is not only racial but also religious and nationalist, and it can happen anywhere.
Hating outgroups based on religious and nationalist lines, is just as normal and widespread as on racial lines. Almost every multi-religious society has or had in the past a large degree of segregation, distrust, and perhaps sectarian violence. The same goes for populations of "mixed nationalities".
Since the Jews historically lived among people where they were at once ...
It's sound inference.
I agree that it's sound inference, given the hypotheses "racist" and "not racist."
What is more important is the importance given to those hypotheses. I think you're mistaken about what taboos are: they're signals of "not my tribe." Someone who supports Palestine over Israel is against the 'tribe of Israel,' in the way that a measured discussion of the Holocaust after professing love for the tribe isn't. It may be socially or instrumentally rational to yield to such politics, but never mistake it for epistemic rationality. (That is, the phrase "politically correct" is literally true.)
Are we really not allowed to do a reasonable, thoughtful cost-benefit analysis of immigration?
What do you mean by "we," "really," and "allowed"? No one will throw you in jail if you do such analysis and post it on your blog, but don't be surprised when the SPLC puts you on hatewatch. The more important question is, "are the people who actually decide immigration laws doing a reasonable, thoughtful cost-benefit analysis?"
What Bill said is criminal in Germany, and so is your account of what Bill said. Criticism of Islam is criminal in some Muslim countries. Without exaggeration, to convert from Islam to Christianity carries the death penalty in some Muslim nations. In the USA it is sometimes illegal to not sell your goods and services to whoever asks (ie you must sell flowers to a gay couple's wedding even if that is against your morals). People in prison have profound restrictions on their free speech .
Holocaust denial is criminal in Germany, but I was not aware that correct revisions of the Holocaust-as-popularly-understood were. I obviously wouldn't have trouble thinking of tabooed truths in Muslim countries. And restrictions on trade and discrimination in business are not about tabooing factual statements.
Almost the entirety of my post concentrated on what I wasn't looking for.
It wasn't merely marginalized, it was almost entirely outlawed after the Revolution.
Yes, and that outlawing worked. Orthodoxy fell from holding near-universal adherence and being a pillar of state power to a fragmented, hated patchwork, which was re-allowed to exist during World War II as a submissive state organ.
While the state lasted, Russians really did become atheists and Marxists, though as Bertrand Russell footnotes his History of Western Philosophy, this practically meant replacing Tsar-worship with Stalin-worship. Criminalization led to marginalization. Similar things happened to "infantile leftist" communists and "factionalists," and with the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, militant anti-fascism.
These are just particularly dramatic examples. Unfortunately, not all censorship and oppression has the Streisand Effect. I think regimes would act at least a little differently if it did.
Is there really anything true that we simply cannot say?
...
what highly probable or effectively certain truths are genuinely taboo?
Edolo sat ignore quidnis memere qui vertorum fugit.
A caret tibusdam sit altus docet: nonamus quor ultus exeati nec mensus essit biscripta.
In hero me digno neque abuntum et cupitersum obos caris femina vitabique? Prae? Tetimeo Dausa iam aud longistio ventis!
Hic volunt quod absenere linera dat revertas.
Or to put that another way, if there were, then by definition we could not say it.
I've found that the most frequently given examples don't hold water.
Well, if they're given, in public, they wouldn't be taboo. What are you really asking here?
Reading this post and the comments to it, I think that "Fake Bold Iconoclasm" may actually be a more important category than taboo truths.
As to taboo truths, I think that most would be along the lines of futility of discourse, and maybe some as to failures of ethics/meta-ethics, such as possibly 'a huge amount of what we consider absolutely bad and universally traumatizing is actually socially constructed'.
Honestly I think that one of the main factors is what you imply from your statements. If talking about statistical truths, there's a tendency, even among rationalists, to implicitly speak as though correlation implies causation. Or rather, there is rarely an explicit statement to the contrary and since humans are naturally biased, we parse the sentence as implying direct causation.
For example: yes, crime rates are higher among certain genetic subgroups of people. That statement is true. If you stop there, it implies that you believe that to be an innate property of their genes, rather than due to other intermediate factors: mainly demographics and social factors such as how those people are treated and what cultural norms/scripts they're given.
And I believe there's a taboo regarding genetic supremacism. I believe that given phenomena like stereotype threat and self-fulfilling prophecies, that's a valuable taboo to have. See another comment of mine on the subject.
As long as you talk about the statistics as being manifest through external factors, though (which they largely are) I think most people are mostly fine about this.
For example: yes, crime rates are higher among certain genetic subgroups of people. That statement is true. If you stop there, it implies that you believe that to be an innate property of their genes,
I believe that genes that have a strong influence on the prevalence of violent criminality exist, and are likely distributed differently in different populations. Given that intelligence, self-control, personality, and so on all feed into propensity for violent crime, and all of those are known to be at least partly heritable, it seems odd to believe otherwise.
rather than due to other intermediate factors
Emphasis mine. I don't know of a single hereditarian who disavows the influence of other intermediate factors. The debate is always over how much they explain- is heredity 40% of IQ, or 80%, or somewhere in the middle? But there are many people who want heredity to explain 0% of IQ, or criminality, or so on, which seems like an odd hypothesis to privilege.
Being able to delicately bring up certain topics with close friends after a few drinks is different from being able to bring them in your public life. But I would also suspect that Less Wrong posters, contrarians in general and the less neurotypical among us are likely to have difficulty approaching taboo topics with tact. I would subsequently expect those with better social skills (perhaps like yourself) to feel like such topics aren't as taboo as other's think they are.
I agree that social skills would help a lot in stating taboo opinions safely. On the other hand, social skills consist in some measure of not stating taboo opinions, and in general, opinions your listeners won't like.
Bill thinks the war was avoidable. Bill thinks the Holocaust would not have happened were it not for the war, and that some of the Holocaust was a reaction to actual Jewish subterfuge and abuse.
Here's the problem: everything Bill has said is either true, a matter of serious debate, or otherwise a matter of high likelihood and reasonableness.
I wouldn't classify the above statements as either true or likely/reasonable. As to the statements being seriously debated, please provide a link or something.
It is taboo to talk about your personal monetary benefits of the recent death of an (innocent) person even if you really benefited and are just stating it and it is taboo especially around the close friends and family of the deceased.
Here's the problem: everything Bill has said is either true, a matter of serious debate, or otherwise a matter of high likelihood and reasonableness. Yet you feel nervous. Perhaps you're upset. That's the power of taboo, right? Society is punishing truth-telling! First they came for the realists... Rationalists, to arms!
You might find this post interesting.
When the server asks if the meal was good, it usually wasn't good. Most meals are satisfactory or poor.
That's not taboo. If you go ahead and do it, you won't face ostracism. Your feeling awkward about it doesn't count. Otherwise, asking someone out on a date would be taboo.
I do feel a little upset, but it's not the power of taboo. It's the prospect of dealing with a crazy person.
Most (but not all) of the individual examples of your Bill are things that could be "either true, a matter of serious debate, or otherwise a matter of high likelihood and reasonableness." But pack them all into one paragraph, with the loaded language and I become very doubtful that Bill is interested in a reasonable discussion. I'm heading for the door. Maybe it's a bad example?
I do have conversations about some of these issues, but only wi...
...That's the paradox: "taboo" statements like black crime statistics are to some extent "taboo" for sound, rationalist reasons. But "taboo" is not taboo: it's about context. People who think that such statements are taboo are probably bad at communicating, and people often think they're racists and misogynists because they probably are on good rationalist grounds. If you want to talk about statistical representatives on the topic of race, be ready to understand that those who are listening will have background knowledge abo
Yes, but they agree in different ways. As Dara O Briain says, "Science knows it doesn't know everything; otherwise, it'd stop." But the phrase "science doesn't know everything" in common usage has more to do with filling the gap with whatever fairy tale the speaker is fond of.
If the Celestial Psychopath is also a Utility Monster and gets a lot of utility from your torture, why not?
EDIT: This is more or less the official theological explanation. God's utility function is infinitely bigger than human's, therefore torturing a human eternally even for the smallest offense against God is fair. Of course there are some applause lights on the top of that.
What Bill said is criminal in Germany, and so is your account of what Bill said. Criticism of Islam is criminal in some Muslim countries. Without exaggeration, to convert from Islam to Christianity carries the death penalty in some Muslim nations.
In contemporay America, it is generally forbidden to publically criticize or defame Muhammad or Islam, particularly on public media. Compare/contrast treatment of Christianity/Catholicism/Jesus on comedy shows, particuarlly on Comedy Central. The debacle with South Park is the most notable.
The South Park debacle is a great example of media cowardice, but it's not hard to criticize Islam on public television. Hitchens had no trouble, and I don't think anybody in the right wing press has trouble. The left-wing press is semi-censorious about it.
There's one I can think of but I'm not sure I want to post it publicly (so it must be real :P).
Also, there are things (which can be rephrased as what I think are high-probability factual statements) which have explicitly been made taboo on Less Wrong itself.
"Taboo" also has a different meaning in local jargon. It appears at first that you are referencing the local use "taboo [phrase]", meaning "instead of using [phrase], explain what you mean by [phrase]". (Example: Taboo "True Scotsman")
Then you go into the common language understand of taboo: Violation of local customs.
So controversial that no credible people will go on record (in non-insane states)? Not indisputably true.
Facts (and predictions) that are hard to obtain or verify, that are essentially answering "is controversial public policy X a good idea?" may earn you scorn or reprisal, so you keep quiet if you're not looking for a career in political gang-warfare. Anyway there's so much noise in that department that it's hard to justify searching for or disseminating such truths.
If I'm wrong, though, feel free to PM / irc / email me any awesome truths. I keep confidences.
It is taboo to talk in what ways has the recent death of someone (innocent) benefited you, especially in regards to monetary benefits and around his close friends and family.
One of the bonuses of a first amendment it that people are free to say what they think is true, and other people are free to hear them. Under those circumstances, it will be hard to find something that is universally taboo.
This comment is missing the point of either the first amendment or taboo topics.
The first amendment deals with what powers the government has with respect to free speech. Taboo topics are ones that other people will punish you for bringing up. Your peers are not the US government.
You're free to say anything, and your peers are free to shun you for saying anything.
LessWrong has been having fun lately with posts about sexism, racism, and academic openness. And here just like everywhere else, somebody inevitably claims taboo status for any number of entirely obvious truths, e.g. "top level mathematicians and physicists are almost invariably male," "black people have lower IQ scores than white people," and "black people are statistically more criminal than whites." In my experience, these are not actually taboo, and I think my experience is generalizable. I'll illustrate.
You're at a bar and you meet a fellow named Bill. Bill's a nice guy, but somehow the conversation strayed Hitler-game style to World War II. Bill thinks the war was avoidable. Bill thinks the Holocaust would not have happened were it not for the war, and that some of the Holocaust was a reaction to actual Jewish subterfuge and abuse. Bill thinks that the Holocaust was not an essential, early plan of the Nazis, because it only happened after the war began. Bill thinks that the number of casualties has been overestimated. Bill claims that Allied abuses, e.g. the bombing of Dresden, have been glossed over and ignored, while fantastic lies about Jews being systematically turned into soap have propagated. Bill thinks that the Holocaust has become a sort of national religion, abused by self-interested Jews and defenders of Zionist foreign policy, and that the freedom of those who doubt it is under serious attack. Bill starts listing other things he's not allowed to say. Bill doesn't think that the end of slavery was all that good for "the blacks," and that the negatives of busing and forced integration have often outweighed the positives. Bill has personally been the victim of black-on-white crimes and racism. Bill is a hereditarian. Bill doesn't think that dropping an n-bomb should ruin a public career.
Here's the problem: everything Bill has said is either true, a matter of serious debate, or otherwise a matter of high likelihood and reasonableness. Yet you feel nervous. Perhaps you're upset. That's the power of taboo, right? Society is punishing truth-telling! First they came for the realists... Rationalists, to arms!
Or.
We can recognize that statements like these correlate with certain false beliefs and nasty sentiments of the sort that actually are taboo. It's just like when somebody says, "well science doesn't know everything." To this, I think, "duh, and you're probably a creationist or medical quack or something similarly credible." Or when somebody says, "the government lies to us." To this, I think, "obviously, and you're likely a Truther or something." Bill is probably an anti-Semite, but Bill doesn't just say, "I'm an anti-Semite," because that really is taboo. He might even believe that he shouldn't be considered something awful like an anti-Semite. Bill probably doesn't think Bill so unpleasant.
That's the paradox: "taboo" statements like black crime statistics are to some extent "taboo" for sound, rationalist reasons. But "taboo" is not taboo: it's about context. People who think that such statements are taboo are probably bad at communicating, and people often think they're racists and misogynists because they probably are on good rationalist grounds. If you want to talk about statistical representatives on the topic of race, be ready to understand that those who are listening will have background knowledge about the other views you might hold.
All this is the leadup to my question: what highly probable or effectively certain truths are genuinely taboo? I'm trying to avoid answers like "there are fewer women in mathematics" or "the size of my penis," since these are context sensitive, but not really taboo within a reasonable range of circumstances. I'm also not particularly interested in value commitments or ideologies. Yes, employers will punish labor organizers and radical political views can get you filtered. But these aren't clear matters of fact. I also don't mean sensitive topics like abortion or religion, nor do I mean "taboo within a political party."
Is there really anything true that we simply cannot say? I have the US in mind especially, but I'm interested in other countries as well. I'm sure there are things that deserve the label, but I've found that the most frequently given examples don't hold water. I think hereditarianism is a close contender, but it's not an "obvious truth." Rather, my understanding is that it is a serious position. It's also only contextually taboo. If it were a definitive finding, it could perhaps become taboo, though I think it more likely that it would be somewhat reluctantly accepted.
Any suggestions? If we find some really serious examples, we might figure out a way to talk about them.