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Lumifer comments on Open thread for December 9 - 16, 2013 - Less Wrong Discussion
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Interesting. So, living in Soviet Russia a rational person would treat knowledge about GULAG, etc. as a basilisk? Or a rational person in Nazi Germany would actively avoid information about the Holocaust?
It depends on one's own risk factors. It's REALLY important to know about the holocaust if you're jewish or have jewish ancestry, but arguably safer or at least more pleasant not to if you don't.
I think the moral question (as opposed to the practical safety question) of "is it better to know a dark truth or not" will come down to whether or not you can effectively influence the world after knowing it. You can categorize bad things into avoidable/changeable and unavoidable/unchangeable, and (depending on how much you value truth in general) knowing about unavoidable bad thing will only make you less happy without making the world a better place.
unfortunately it's pretty hard to tell whether you can do anything about a bad thing without learning about what it is.
First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out--
because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out--
because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out--
because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out--
because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me--
and there was no one left to speak out for me.
Martin Niemöller
speaking out would've gotten you killed.
This is a poem about poor bayesian updating: This person should've moved away.
To quote you
This person, a German Protestant minister, followed your advice, did he not?
good point. I totally covered every base with that one line of advice, and meant it to apply to all people in all situations.
More seriously, my advice very clearly was a subset of the more general advice: Be fucking wary of angering powerful entities. He clearly did NOT follow that advice.
The poem is about the importance of speaking out when it's still safe (or relatively safe) to do so.
If anything, my impression is that knowing about the Holocaust has made my mother significantly less realistic with respect to assessing potential threats faced by Jews in the present day.
On the other hand, to the extent that it represents a general lesson about human behavior, that understanding might end up being valuable for anyone. Being non-Jewish may actually make it easier to properly generalize the principles rather than thinking of it in terms of unique identity politics.
It's worth knowing that societies can just start targeting people for no reason. It can be hard to have a sense of proportion about risks.
I suspect the best strategy is to become such a distinguished person that more than one country will welcome you, but the details are left as an exercise for the student.
this is possible but I meant knowing about the holocaust as it's ongoing, like lumifer's example of knowing about gulags while living in soviet russia.