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advancedatheist comments on More "Stupid" Questions - Less Wrong Discussion
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Transhumanists shouldn't dismiss traditionalist views of women just because they conflict with current notions of political correctness. You could interpret tradition as a consensus vote of the democracy of our ancestors.
You can't call something a democratic decision when those women literally couldn't vote. That's aside from the fact that many traditionalist views were tied into or justified by religious belief systems which are empirically wrong. Transhumanism is to a large extent about individuals having the ability to make their lives what they want, and that shouldn't change whether that's being able to live a long time, having wings and other non-natural extensions, getting uploaded, or not following traditional gender roles.
How much of that tradition was really created by a vote? If it wasn't, why should I treat it like one?
Just because people did something in the past, it does not mean they all thought it was a good idea. (It could actually be one of the reasons why they later stopped doing it.) Also, people in the past didn't have some of the information we do -- why should I expect that given that information, their votes would remain the same?
See Nick Szabo about intersubjective truth, and Chesterton's fence.
On the other hand, just because something was a good idea in the past doesn't mean it's still a good idea now if things have changed.
Yes, but there are differences between the times when the traditionalist views developed and now: many more women in the work force, cheap convenient availability of reliable contraceptives, the Flynn effect, etc.
It would most likely be an awful idea for me to adopt the same attitude towards my girlfriend as my grandfather has towards his wife when, among dozens of other things, my girlfriend has IQ probably around 130 and makes more money than me whereas my grandma has IQ probably around 90 and has never worked.
The Flynn Effect is somewhere in the neighborhood of 1/3 IQ point per year. So unless your girlfriend is 120 years younger than your grandmother...
Also the Flynn Effect is observed in similar magnitudes in men and women. IQyou/IQyourgirlfriend is predicted to be the same as IQgrandpa/IQgrandma, at least the part of that ratio attributable to the Flynn effect.
(You should escape underscores with backslashes, or they get converted to italics; also, it makes little sense to use ratios rather than differences as the zero of the modern scale is more or less arbitrary.)
He didn't actually mention the Flynn effect in the above post.
OK you've got me freaked out. I'm staring at army1987's comment that I replied to and it says "...contraceptives, the Flynn effect, etc."
What am I missing?
I have no idea how I managed to miss that.
Poetic phrasing, although to answer the other arguments to the parent comment, it may be better phrased as "one set of features/behaviors proven sucessfully adaptive to conditions previously." Traditions universally adopted should indeed be dismissed very reluctantly, as it implies that the variation in adapative behavior is likely quite small.