//The point has already been made, that if you wish to truly be honest, it is not enough to speak the truth.
I generally don't tell people I'm an atheist (I describe my beliefs without using any common labels). Why? I know that if I say the words "I am an atheist," that they will hear the following concepts:
- I positively believe there is no God
- I cannot be persuaded by evidence any more than most believers can be persuaded by evidence, ie, I have a kind of faith in my atheism
- I wish to distance myself from members of religious tribes
As I said, the point has already been made; If I know that they will hear those false ideas when I say a certain phrase, how can I say I am honest in speaking it, knowing that I will cause them to have false beliefs? Hence the saying, if you wish to protect yourself, speak the truth. If you wish to be honest, speak so that truth will be heard.
Many a politician convincingly lies with truths by saying things that they know will be interpreted in a certain positive (and false) way, but which they can always defend as having been intended to convey some other meaning.
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The New
There is a counterpart to this insight, come to me as I've begun to pay more attention to the flow of implicit social communication. If speaking the truth in a way you know will deceive is a lie, then perhaps telling a lie in a way that you know will communicate a true concept is not a lie.
I've relaxed my standards of truth-telling as I've come to understand this. "You're the best" and "You can do this" statements have been opened to me, no qualifiers needed. If I know that everyone in a group has to say "I have XYZ qualification," but I also know that no one actually believes anybody when they say it, I can comfortably recite those words, knowing that I'm not actually leading anybody to believe false things, and thus, am not being dishonest.
Politicians use this method, too, and I think I'm more or less okay with it. You see, we have a certain problem that arises from intellectual inequality. There are certain truths which literally cannot be spoken to some people. If someone has an IQ of 85, you literally cannot tell them the truth about a great number of things (or they cannot receive it). And there are a great many more people who have the raw potential to understand certain difficult truths, but whom you cannot reasonably tell these truths (they'd have to want to learn, put in effort, receive extensive teaching, etc).
What if some of these truths are pertinent to policy? What do you do, say a bunch of phrases that are "true" in a way you will interpret them, but which will only be heard as...
As what? What do people hear when you explain concepts they cannot understand? If I had to guess, very often they interpret this as an attack on their social standing, as an attempt by the speaker to establish themselves as a figure of superior ability, to whom they should defer. You sound uppity, cold, out-of-touch, maybe nerdy or socially inept.
So, then...if you're socially capable, you don't say those things. You give up. You can't speak the truth, you literally cannot make a great many people hear the real reasons why policy Z is a good idea; they have limited the vocabulary of the dialogue by their ability and willingness to engage.
Your remaining moves are to limit yourself to their vocabulary, or say something outside of that vocabulary, all the nuance of which will evaporate en route to their ears, and which will be heard as a monochromatic "I think I'm better than you."
The details of this dynamic at play go on and on, but for now, I'll just say that this is the kind of thing Scott Adams is referring to when he says that what Trump has said is "emotionally true" even if it "doesn't pass the fact checks" (see dialogue with Sam Harris).
In a world of inequality, you pick your poison. Communicate what truths can be received by your audience, or...be a nerd, and stay out of elections.
This is really cool stuff and I think you're hitting on some important things. I think you're basically right in most of it, and yes, this is what Scott Adams is talking about when he says that trump says things that are "emotionally true" even if it "doesn't pass the fact checks".
I have a few minor quibbles though.
Yes, they take it as an attack on their social standing. It is very hard to communicate new concepts without positioning yourself as someone who might have something to teach, and that requires your audience to position themselves as someone who might have something to learn. This gets ten times harder when the thing you have to teach isn’t just something about a topic they’ve never thought about before, but something they feel confident about and would feel dumb being wrong on. Notice, for example, how people refer to Scott Adams as the “sex hypnotism guy”, try to twist his words and ask why he’s supporting a “master liar”, and do other things in attempts to sleazily discredit him instead of just letting people laugh at him for being an idiot that believes in voodoo hypnotism or beating him on the object level and giving more persuasive arguments. You’re absolutely right when you suggest that people might take it as a threat to their status.
Here’s where I think you go wrong:
You don’t come off as “socially inept” unless you also come across like you’re unaware of what you’re doing or are doing it on accident. When it is clear that you understand what you’re doing and are doing it intentionally, it comes off as intimidating, and if you do the rest of it right, not in a bad way.
In the cases that count, what you do is use their (limited) vocabulary to build a picture that they cannot comprehend/violates the beliefs they’re attached to, and leave them with it to do what they want. Yes, they will still often take it as an assault on their status and a claim of “I am better than you”, so you want to make really really sure that you aren’t motivated in part by an attempt to make them look bad, but rather to teach them/to give them a chance to teach you (which requires you putting out your model so that they can show you what’s wrong with it). Since, if you’re doing this right, you aren’t claiming to be better than them, any “I’m better than you” feelings will be entirely internally generated and they’ll know this. That’s why it will feel intimidating to them, but not in a bad way. When they are the ones saying “I think he’s better than me” and you are the one saying “no, really, I’m not. I just know this one thing and I’m telling you so that you can know this one thing too” (and meaning it), then that is a very good outcome given the situation. That’s not to say some people won’t try to pin their feelings on you anyway, but they don’t have to stick, and not everyone will.
Basically, the trick is to use their vocabulary to point out contradictions and keep inviting them into that cognitive dissonance while not at all pushing them in or actively implying that you’re better than them. If you do it right, they’ll realize that you’re right, that you know something they don’t, and that you won’t think any less of them for saying “huh, never thought of that” nor that you think it’s your position to be giving out approval or disapproval. I really do admire people who can put their ego aside and learn things, and I aspire to be that way myself. When that comes across correctly, I generally don’t have problems explaining weird/potentially threatening concepts to people.
Yes, even when you do a good job people will react hostilely to you, try to misrepresent you, and try to paint you as someone who thinks they’re better than everyone else. And yes, if you don’t have the time/energy/ability to deal with this, the right answer is to not do this. Personally, while I understand the justification for saying things like “you’re the best!” and while this insight you conveyed has also caused me to move in that direction, I would still be very cautious about how you do that kind of thing. For one, I really value the ability to say “no, that dress doesn’t make your ass look far” and for it to be taken at face value and remove all anxiety, and for compliments to be undiluted in meaning when they come from me. More relevant to the point at hand though, if you aren’t careful you might end up telling them that you can’t threaten their status, and that would be a harmful lie. To speak metaphorically, if you can come off like clifford the big red dog, that’s a really good thing. It means people can feel safe around you because the idea of you turning on them just doesn’t occur to them in the first place. However, if you can’t pull off “I am a ridiculously oversized predator with fangs the size of your head, and you’re not afraid of me because you trust me”, it is not a worthwhile compromise to defang yourself, let your muscles atrophy, and let them keep you in a cage so that they no longer fear you.
If that is the choice at hand, I think it’s better to be fairly quiet and just not really engage with those types, because at least then there’s the option for them to ask why you’re so quiet and you can give them the honest answer that you didn’t think they wanted to hear what you would have to say - and that gives them the chance to decide that they do.
When you do have the time/energy/ability to deal with it, that hostility is a feature, not a bug. It’s peacocking and inviting shit tests, in PUA terms. Heck, look at how much that hostility “got in the way of” Trump’s political campaign so far.
We're mostly on the same page, really.
Much of what I've said applies to politics with large electorates, where the default case is that you can't effectively teach new concepts and people don't want to learn them, anyway.
In small groups, by all means, there are times when it's a very powerful move to try and teach people. There are even times, in all arenas, where saying "I'm better than you" is a useful move, you just don't want to be limited to that one move.
I also strongly value being honest and known to be honest. I find "you're the best... (read more)