All of rkdj's Comments + Replies

rkdj50

Makes sense, although the parent comment seems to be cheering NRx and booing feminism, is at only -2 in comparison.

6RowanE
The difference is that the parent is a relevant opinion to the discussion wrapped up in an NRx cheer, while polymathwannabe's response has no underlying substance besides "boo NRx".
rkdj10

help me understand, why is this downvoted to -6?

5RowanE
We have community norms against political discussion that are especially harsh towards comments that simply cheer for one side and/or boo another.
rkdj40

Do you or would you secretly invade your child's privacy for their own protection?

0James_Miller
For a young child, of course it's not even close since the kid probably doesn't even value privacy.
2imuli
No. Aside from the don't do things to other people without other their consent angle (which is hard with a child), my two year old is ascribing motives to my actions, and when privacy comes into being I doubt I'll be able to use any information that I do acquire without them noticing.
3someonewrongonthenet
Corollary - would you secretly invade an adult's privacy for their own protection? I have more trouble answering that one. The answer to the "children" question begins somewhere on "estimate what they might think about the situation as adults"...now if I only knew where the line could be drawn for an adult, this would be simple...
2Anatoly_Vorobey
Yes, I would. (Have two small children, haven't needed to).
2passive_fist
Depends on age. If they were teenagers, not secretly. For the simple reason that it could backfire (they find out their privacy has been invaded, then in the future hide things even more strongly). I would, however, expect them to tell me whatever information about their lives I wanted to know. For full disclosure: I'm in my late 20's and have no children.
CBHacking140

TL;DR because this turned into a lot of looking back on my relationship with my parents: I'd make sure they knew I had the capability, and then, if I saw a need to use it, I would. I wouldn't give an expectation of privacy and then violate it.

First, let me state that I'm in my late 20s, and have no children.

Secretly? No. Or rather, I would never hide that I have the capability, though I wouldn't necessarily tell them when I was using it. If I had reason to suspect them hiding things from me, I might even hide the mechanism, but I'd let them know that I cou... (read more)

Salemicus110

I don't have children. But my answer is that, potentially, I would, but it would depend on the situation.

Firstly, I think the level of privacy that a child can reasonably expect to have from his parents is age and context-dependent. A thirty-year-old who has left the home has a far greater legitimate expectation of privacy than a fifteen-year-old living at home, who in turn can legitimately expect far more than a 5-year-old. I don't think most people have any problem with, say, using a baby-monitor on a young child, even though this could be viewed as a gr... (read more)

rkdj190

whereas it reacts with actual disgust and lack of philosophical charity to feminism, social justice, Tumblr, etc

http://slatestarcodex.com/2013/04/20/social-justice-for-the-highly-demanding-of-rigor/

rkdj10

What does it mean to optimize the world, assuming the Many Worlds theory is true?

4lmm
Increase the probability-weighted average of your utility function over Everett branches.
rkdj30

Robbing people of effective means to die doesn't make suicidal people stop being suicidal. It just forces them to endure whatever unbearable and possibly untreatable pain they are in.

7VAuroch
5DanielLC
Replace "suicidal" with "suicidally depressed" and I'll agree. Depression isn't always chronic, and when it is, you aren't depressed the whole time. It doesn't seem clear to me if a depressed person committing suicide is on average a net loss or a net gain. I suppose I should have made my position more clear in my earlier comment, and said that that could just as well be a cost to gun control.
6Gunnar_Zarncke
I don't think suicidality (is there such a word?) is a condition one has or doesn't have. If thoughts of suicide can be induced by literature and communities (see e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copycat_suicide ) then the opposite should also be possible at least in principle. Taking away one means of simple suicide at least provides a trivial incenvenience for boundary cases.
rkdj40

have you noticed people adopting the lesswrong terminology and inaccurately priding themselves on being "sane"?

3Vulture
I haven't noticed anyone doing that, but it does sound like the sort of thing people would do. This can hardly be avoided, though, unless we were to entirely decouple status from all superficial characteristics.
1hyporational
Have you? If you have, would this tell us more about LW or human psychology? If the latter, then what's the news? Sanity isn't binary and YMMV.