May I be the only one who thinks this sounds straight out of a subset of naughty Japanese manga...
Now that that's out of the way: As a genuine admirer of yours, and especially because of your gift for clearly explaining, as much as anyone can, complicated stuff generally over the heads of people like me--please don't let yourself devolve into a sort of Alex Berenson who can't let go when others have been nasty to him.
I perceive you as a genuinely nice, remarkably talented young man with an authentic passion for truth-seeking and a great deal of mature self-restraint during this dungfest that The Plague Era has been from the start, and I'll bet, for once, I'm holding a majority position. Scott's worth no more of your time.
I do hope to move on. I do tend to linger on topics a bit more than people like, but I do genuinely learn from all this and the drama is not the point. At least I hope so.
"don't become like Berenson" is a pretty helpful and effective reminder, thank you.
These same people deny the possibility of (exquisitely safe and cheap) IVM efficacy for Covid, while conspicuously jumping up and down, lobbing insults and begging for expensive medical adventurism via more experimental vaxxes and a heaping side of Paxlovid and Molnupiravir, without the self awareness to see they're continuously dodging their moving goalposts. The insults are the giveaway that they're not serious. They hold us in contempt. Honestly, why bother?
The vibe I’m getting from Scott Alexander is defensive. Defensive in the face of the fact that your opinion is more likely right than his own and your actions are more likely more ethical than his.
As mentioned by someone else, forget about him (and G M-K) and focus on evidence based rational thinking. They’re dragging you into an emotional tug of war that’s not worth getting involved with.
If you want another project then a rational analysis of this study is worth your while
At the very least, Avi Bitterman and Scott Alexander have indentified a role for Ivermectin in countries with parasites/strongyloides.
They should have been shouting this from the rooftops for all such countries.
They haven’t.
If they’ve got it wrong, then it works for Covid. As such, as a fail safe given its extraordinary safety record is that AB and SA should have recommended its use for Covid, certainly would have not resulted in net harm.
They haven’t and it’s on their consciences.
You’ve have it all over them, don’t let the psychological word play affect your mental health
I was thinking of that as well. You spent so much time reviewing that fucker's articles. I was on the fence whether I should write you a message about it. As far as I am concerned, he is a human being, you tried to point out his mistakes in the articles, but at one point you have to stop even though he continues to do it over and over again. In the end it is also the readers' responsibility to sort the wheat from the chaff. I always keep in mind that we are up against a machinery that invested a lot of money in studying the human behaviour in different contexts. You might think these guys have the same drive as you do to find out the truth, and present it, and correct their mistakes publicly on record. Maybe he's not that smart, or maybe he's obeying his masters that dictated a certain narrative.
It's allright. It was always the most likely outcome, but I hope the precise details of how this went down are as instructive to others as they were to me.
Thank you for writing on this topic. I get tired of getting wrapped up in "debates" on-line with people who disagree with with what I've written. We go back and forth but they won't listen to facts. Instead of getting tangled up in the details, sometimes I point out the big picture which shows that it is irrelevant if, for eg ivermectin helps or not 'cos the ones pulling the strings can make their own reality. So if they don't want it to work, it won't. Even if it does. Quoting a study on its effectiveness led to me being banned from Twitter and they won't let me back on. Ever. That says something.
As I mentioned, I am not fully seriously suggesting depression as the explanation. I'm bringing it up as the obvious issue one has to grapple with if they claim to believe worms explain ivermectin efficacy on covid.
Ever-since Scott tongue-in-cheek misrepresented someone's points and then summed it up with "whatever", I'm \0_0/ about this. I think this is probably a case of "everyone disappoints if they live long enough"?
That said, I do agree with your last paragraph, dramatic as it may sound: I'm sad that it's coming to that, and that "the rationalist community" has so little grip on their biases. Actually, I feel resigned about that. These people genuinely set out to overcome this kind of thinking, and there they are, plunging head-first into the same traps that they set out to avoid.
If our best and brightest and most rational minds don't stand a chance, what does that spell for the rest of humanity, who aren't even trying?
Oof, if I had a working memory instead of an overcaffeinated sponge...
I remember that it was in a reaction piece within the last year, but I don't know what about. I _think_ it didn't explicitly deal with the person's point, and they were only added as an aside/introduction.
It was in the first 500 (70% sure) to 1500 (99% sure) words of the article, and the person he reacted to had a male name. I remember their point was about being charitable and kind - to the point where it might be naive and unreasonable (which I think was why Scott disregarded them? I'm not sure).
I recall that I sort of vibed with the represented position, skewed as it was, because I too am starmanning to the point where I get burned, and then understanding the cognitive biases that led to my own ostracism. For me, it was the first red flag, and ever-since I'm reading Scott with a lot more salt than I used to (understanding the psychological patterns he's falling victim to, mourning the loss of yet another bit of innocence. /hyp).
Ever since writing this I've been told by someone I trust that Scott's portrayal of Flavio Cadegianni is incredibly bad, and in this person's opinion, slander. Which is not hard to believe when the section describing him starts with "a crazy person". I'm pretty sure Scott doesn't see this, but he finds it easy to reduce people to props and yet is hypersensitive about his own portrayal by others.
Maybe it was that one, yeah (I have next to no memory for names, sorry).
Anyhow, I empathize with him a lot and wish he'd get to the place where he says that he's trying to get. I'm not sure if I've become more aware or if he's slipping away from it, and I don't feel up to throwing him any pointers. (Disclaimer: I don't know him in person, but am extremely fond of his writing and enjoy it a lot.)
I very much like your wit, intellect and ability to explain the matter rationally. Does IVM work? yes, when used in combination with the other components of the protocol. This is what needs to be analysed. Only tonight, I spoke to a diabetic in her late 50's, who contracted Omicron. She immediately started her course of IVM, Quercetin, Vits D3 and C , Zinc and NAC, with the result that her symptoms were short lived and no worse than a mild cold. Her 70 year old husband, the same, though he is not a diabetic.
> Scott: "I don't think Alexandros is engaging in good faith, and I urge people not to take anything he says about me, my opinions, or my actions at face value."
> it should probably be haram in rationalist circles to tell others what to think, never mind unilaterally and immediately declaring your interlocutor as “bad faith,” as a response to criticism.
He urged people not to take what you say at face value. That is not even close to telling others what to think.
It means not to immediately trust what you say "about Scott, his opinions, or his actions" without double checking. Being a better skeptic. Kind of the opposite of telling people what to think.
The ability to interpret “I don't think Alexandros is engaging in good faith, and I urge people not to take anything he says about me, my opinions, or my actions at face value”
Scott called people not to blindly trust Alexandros on all things Scott. 'Better skeptics' was about not blindly trusting Brett on all things covid. With the reference I just wanted to remind that being skeptical doesn't have to be done the bad way. I didn't mean that Scott was explicitly urging people to be the good kind of skeptic with Alexandros. But if you think most of his readers take it as a call to be the bad kind, and shun him etc, I just disagree and wonder if you are generalizing from other bubbles of the internet. And if you think it wasn't even a call to be skeptical but a call to think something specific that wasn't even mentioned, I just don't see where your coming from.
You're misrepresenting better skeptics. Better Skeptics was about us, ourselves, being better with the critiques we formulate and propagate. If you thought it was a project about mistrusting Bret (or anyone) you may need to revise your understanding. Scott urged people to assume that when I said something about him, to consider it suspect, even without being able to pinpoint why. That is the kind of cynical skepticism Better Skeptics reacted against.
Even if Scott had urged people "not to trust Alexandros on all things Scott", it's at best a stretch to call an urge to not trust a source as "telling people what to think" (and even more weird to frame it as an "edict that Alexandros is to be shunned"; hard to square with e.g. https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/open-thread-227/comment/6961090 )
Dr. Alexander starts his response with his annoyance that:
> Instead of waiting to see if I'd post it, or asking me about it like I suggested, he published this post implying that I'm trying to hide it.
Do you have a response to that?
Relatedly, in one of your posts, you wrote:
> On some level, I understand the cognitive dissonance of having to correct perhaps your most popular article ever (hell, it even made it to The Economist the next day). It might have been read by millions.
I'm sure it's extremely frustrating that Dr. Alexander is seemingly not giving this the attention it deserves; however, it's not surprising that accusations of "cognitive dissonance" and the like are making Dr. Alexander combative.
What I was interested in was seeing the nature of the correction. I had already waited over a month trying to get him to agree this was an issue. I do not think I am bound to follow Scott's schedule. Whether he posts this in an open thread or not is not really something that concerns me.
Besides, I did not accuse him of trying to hide anything as he claims, so I'm not sure why I have to check in with him once I know he posted a correction that he knew I would not be happy with. He does not owe me to do as I please of course, but neither am I bound to wait around any longer than I have to.
Correcting errors is not a favor to me. It is me doing a favor to him. If he leaves his article uncorrected because he doesn't like how I try to empathize, that will have to be between him and his readers who trust him to try to get it right.
You're actually doing exactly the thing I described. Finding some unrelated issue with the critique and using it to excuse Scott not getting it addressed.
There are no perfect critics. There will always be a "yes but".
> I do not think I am bound to follow Scott's schedule. Whether he posts this in an open thread or not is not really something that concerns me.
I agree you're not beholden to Scott's schedule. My only point is that his reaction is not surprising given that he asked to just wait a week(ish) but you couldn't. If your goal is to try to build bridges and keep Scott involved, then these sorts of things won't help. If your point of view is that, "Well, I don't want to wait one week and it's up to Scott to regulate his emotions" then that is a totally reasonable point of view, but it's unlikely to help with this current rift. I think it's always valuable to look at the first things people say in a discussion, so the fact that Scott made this his first point in his response suggests to me that he is upset. Again, it's not necessarily your job to deal with Scott's emotions; however, it might be helpful to try and empathize with Scott and his personal preferences.
> Besides, I did not accuse him of trying to hide anything as he claims
I think that would have been useful to emphasize and explore because clearly Scott disagrees.
> I'm not sure why I have to check in with him once I know he posted a correction that he knew I would not be happy with
I'm not suggesting you have to check in with him on anything. I was only suggesting that there's some meta-argumentation value in trying to empathize with him and try to understand why he is feeling attacked. In my opinion, being accused of "cognitive dissonance" is certainly a personal attack.
> You're actually doing exactly the thing I described. Finding some unrelated issue with the critique and using it to excuse Scott not getting it addressed.
Please quote where I "excused" Scott. This seems like a strawman and might be a good microcosm of the sorts of attacks Scott is feeling.
Perhaps your argument is that I'm going off on a tangent. That is not my goal. The goal of my comment is that if we just take Scott at his words, it seems that he is disengaging from you, emotionally, and it might be helpful to try to engage at that level to recover this relationship and this argument and build bridges in the community. If your argument is that such meta issues are irrelevant and we should just stick to the facts, then that is fine, but then I recommend you also avoid bringing emotional accusations into it yourself such as accusing someone of cognitive dissonance, for example.
Yes, you're right, sorry, I'm not versed in the minutiae of the facts here. But the basic point is that Scott wrote, "[...] he published this post implying that I'm trying to hide it", so Scott thinks that your recent post implied that he was avoiding the discussion. Scott didn't actually quote anything, so that's not helpful, but my point was that if your goal is to get Scott back to the table, then it would be helpful to respond to his accusation.
> You see this is where you're assuming I did not try my absolute best to do that for months already.
I'm not assuming anything about you. I'm observing that Scott is clearly peeved, and I think it would be useful to explore that to get him back to the "negotiating table" so to speak.
I must say that I'm personally offended that you just accused me of a strawman, and yet did not respond to that accusation. Personally, i would appreciate an apology.
These are the sorts of meta-argumentation issues that the rationalist community will have to confront at some point. By the way, I'm not at all saying Scott is any better at this. But sometimes, we have to stand up and be the bigger man.
That's a fair point. I think it would have been completely reasonable to respond with a request for him to substantiate his claim. My argument is that not responding to it at all - especially since it was Scott's first claim in his response - is not going to help build bridges.
However, Alexandros has some work to do here too. What is his evidence that Scott had "cognitive dissonance"?
He just accused me of "excusing" Scott's behavior without any evidence.
I think the meta-point here is that all of these attacks on both sides are not helpful. It's valuable to come "back to the negotiating table" and that means, first, re-evaluating the claims one has made about the other person, and apologizing where needed. Scott might not reciprocate, but then Alexandros will be the bigger man and that will show in the community.
You see, it didn't use to be that way. But like every revolution that becomes establishment, the good stuff becomes commonplace and all you have left is the bad habits.
" isolated demands for rigor"
May I be the only one who thinks this sounds straight out of a subset of naughty Japanese manga...
Now that that's out of the way: As a genuine admirer of yours, and especially because of your gift for clearly explaining, as much as anyone can, complicated stuff generally over the heads of people like me--please don't let yourself devolve into a sort of Alex Berenson who can't let go when others have been nasty to him.
I perceive you as a genuinely nice, remarkably talented young man with an authentic passion for truth-seeking and a great deal of mature self-restraint during this dungfest that The Plague Era has been from the start, and I'll bet, for once, I'm holding a majority position. Scott's worth no more of your time.
I do hope to move on. I do tend to linger on topics a bit more than people like, but I do genuinely learn from all this and the drama is not the point. At least I hope so.
"don't become like Berenson" is a pretty helpful and effective reminder, thank you.
These same people deny the possibility of (exquisitely safe and cheap) IVM efficacy for Covid, while conspicuously jumping up and down, lobbing insults and begging for expensive medical adventurism via more experimental vaxxes and a heaping side of Paxlovid and Molnupiravir, without the self awareness to see they're continuously dodging their moving goalposts. The insults are the giveaway that they're not serious. They hold us in contempt. Honestly, why bother?
The vibe I’m getting from Scott Alexander is defensive. Defensive in the face of the fact that your opinion is more likely right than his own and your actions are more likely more ethical than his.
As mentioned by someone else, forget about him (and G M-K) and focus on evidence based rational thinking. They’re dragging you into an emotional tug of war that’s not worth getting involved with.
If you want another project then a rational analysis of this study is worth your while
https://www.cureus.com/articles/82162-ivermectin-prophylaxis-used-for-covid-19-a-citywide-prospective-observational-study-of-223128-subjects-using-propensity-score-matching
A really good approach would be to adopt an “anti-IVM” starting point and try to prove that the paper is flawed beyond all doubt.
It's an interesting idea. I don't know if I have another cycle like this in me but I won't rule it out.
Don’t buy in to the minutiae Alexandros.
At the very least, Avi Bitterman and Scott Alexander have indentified a role for Ivermectin in countries with parasites/strongyloides.
They should have been shouting this from the rooftops for all such countries.
They haven’t.
If they’ve got it wrong, then it works for Covid. As such, as a fail safe given its extraordinary safety record is that AB and SA should have recommended its use for Covid, certainly would have not resulted in net harm.
They haven’t and it’s on their consciences.
You’ve have it all over them, don’t let the psychological word play affect your mental health
I was thinking of that as well. You spent so much time reviewing that fucker's articles. I was on the fence whether I should write you a message about it. As far as I am concerned, he is a human being, you tried to point out his mistakes in the articles, but at one point you have to stop even though he continues to do it over and over again. In the end it is also the readers' responsibility to sort the wheat from the chaff. I always keep in mind that we are up against a machinery that invested a lot of money in studying the human behaviour in different contexts. You might think these guys have the same drive as you do to find out the truth, and present it, and correct their mistakes publicly on record. Maybe he's not that smart, or maybe he's obeying his masters that dictated a certain narrative.
It's allright. It was always the most likely outcome, but I hope the precise details of how this went down are as instructive to others as they were to me.
Yes, the details are important and thank you for spending the time to write them!
Have you ever come across this: https://www.statementanalysis.com/? It would be a fun exercise to analyse his articles from this perspective.
Skeptical, but would be interesting to see what comes up.
"disagreement is over the cause"
One cause I have not seen mentioned often is suppression of IgE by ivermectin.
https://vinuarumugham.substack.com/p/pharma-conflicted-washington-post?s=w
Woah.
Thank you for writing on this topic. I get tired of getting wrapped up in "debates" on-line with people who disagree with with what I've written. We go back and forth but they won't listen to facts. Instead of getting tangled up in the details, sometimes I point out the big picture which shows that it is irrelevant if, for eg ivermectin helps or not 'cos the ones pulling the strings can make their own reality. So if they don't want it to work, it won't. Even if it does. Quoting a study on its effectiveness led to me being banned from Twitter and they won't let me back on. Ever. That says something.
"fluvoxamine is only effective in depressed patients"
Fluvoxamine and other SSRIs are mast cell stabilizers.
https://vinuarumugham.substack.com/p/covid-19-severity-is-a-result-of
As I mentioned, I am not fully seriously suggesting depression as the explanation. I'm bringing it up as the obvious issue one has to grapple with if they claim to believe worms explain ivermectin efficacy on covid.
I was not implying that. May be I should have quoted more context.
Just wanted to comment that SSRI mechanism in severe COVID was understood.
Does it explain the massive gender differences?
It's possible, I have not studied it in depth.
Gender-Related Effects of Sex Steroids on Histamine Release and FcεRI Expression in Rat Peritoneal Mast Cells
https://www.hindawi.com/journals/jir/2015/351829/
They were both unvaccinated, like myself.
Hey, thank you for this.
Ever-since Scott tongue-in-cheek misrepresented someone's points and then summed it up with "whatever", I'm \0_0/ about this. I think this is probably a case of "everyone disappoints if they live long enough"?
That said, I do agree with your last paragraph, dramatic as it may sound: I'm sad that it's coming to that, and that "the rationalist community" has so little grip on their biases. Actually, I feel resigned about that. These people genuinely set out to overcome this kind of thinking, and there they are, plunging head-first into the same traps that they set out to avoid.
If our best and brightest and most rational minds don't stand a chance, what does that spell for the rest of humanity, who aren't even trying?
Can you say more about the "whatever" case you are referring to?
Oof, if I had a working memory instead of an overcaffeinated sponge...
I remember that it was in a reaction piece within the last year, but I don't know what about. I _think_ it didn't explicitly deal with the person's point, and they were only added as an aside/introduction.
It was in the first 500 (70% sure) to 1500 (99% sure) words of the article, and the person he reacted to had a male name. I remember their point was about being charitable and kind - to the point where it might be naive and unreasonable (which I think was why Scott disregarded them? I'm not sure).
I recall that I sort of vibed with the represented position, skewed as it was, because I too am starmanning to the point where I get burned, and then understanding the cognitive biases that led to my own ostracism. For me, it was the first red flag, and ever-since I'm reading Scott with a lot more salt than I used to (understanding the psychological patterns he's falling victim to, mourning the loss of yet another bit of innocence. /hyp).
Ever since writing this I've been told by someone I trust that Scott's portrayal of Flavio Cadegianni is incredibly bad, and in this person's opinion, slander. Which is not hard to believe when the section describing him starts with "a crazy person". I'm pretty sure Scott doesn't see this, but he finds it easy to reduce people to props and yet is hypersensitive about his own portrayal by others.
Maybe it was that one, yeah (I have next to no memory for names, sorry).
Anyhow, I empathize with him a lot and wish he'd get to the place where he says that he's trying to get. I'm not sure if I've become more aware or if he's slipping away from it, and I don't feel up to throwing him any pointers. (Disclaimer: I don't know him in person, but am extremely fond of his writing and enjoy it a lot.)
I very much like your wit, intellect and ability to explain the matter rationally. Does IVM work? yes, when used in combination with the other components of the protocol. This is what needs to be analysed. Only tonight, I spoke to a diabetic in her late 50's, who contracted Omicron. She immediately started her course of IVM, Quercetin, Vits D3 and C , Zinc and NAC, with the result that her symptoms were short lived and no worse than a mild cold. Her 70 year old husband, the same, though he is not a diabetic.
They were both unvaccinated.
> Scott: "I don't think Alexandros is engaging in good faith, and I urge people not to take anything he says about me, my opinions, or my actions at face value."
> it should probably be haram in rationalist circles to tell others what to think, never mind unilaterally and immediately declaring your interlocutor as “bad faith,” as a response to criticism.
He urged people not to take what you say at face value. That is not even close to telling others what to think.
What does that mean "not taking what I say at face value" exactly?
It means not to immediately trust what you say "about Scott, his opinions, or his actions" without double checking. Being a better skeptic. Kind of the opposite of telling people what to think.
You're free to interpret that as you prefer. That's why I always link to primary sources, so people can draw their own conclusions.
It's not how I prefer to interpret it. It's how I interpreted it when I read it. You are free to not believe me, immediately and unilaterally even.
I believe you.
Sridhar, you nailed it.
The ability to interpret “I don't think Alexandros is engaging in good faith, and I urge people not to take anything he says about me, my opinions, or my actions at face value”
as saying “be a better skeptic” is incredible.
That’s not something i will forget.
Scott called people not to blindly trust Alexandros on all things Scott. 'Better skeptics' was about not blindly trusting Brett on all things covid. With the reference I just wanted to remind that being skeptical doesn't have to be done the bad way. I didn't mean that Scott was explicitly urging people to be the good kind of skeptic with Alexandros. But if you think most of his readers take it as a call to be the bad kind, and shun him etc, I just disagree and wonder if you are generalizing from other bubbles of the internet. And if you think it wasn't even a call to be skeptical but a call to think something specific that wasn't even mentioned, I just don't see where your coming from.
You're misrepresenting better skeptics. Better Skeptics was about us, ourselves, being better with the critiques we formulate and propagate. If you thought it was a project about mistrusting Bret (or anyone) you may need to revise your understanding. Scott urged people to assume that when I said something about him, to consider it suspect, even without being able to pinpoint why. That is the kind of cynical skepticism Better Skeptics reacted against.
Even if Scott had urged people "not to trust Alexandros on all things Scott", it's at best a stretch to call an urge to not trust a source as "telling people what to think" (and even more weird to frame it as an "edict that Alexandros is to be shunned"; hard to square with e.g. https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/open-thread-227/comment/6961090 )
Indeed.
And Alexandros reinforces Scott's point by (unintentionally or otherwise) mis-characterizing what Scott said.
And why the issue of "trust" seems so important anyway, I don't really understand. None of this should be about "trust."
It should be about considering someone's reasoning.
Dr. Alexander starts his response with his annoyance that:
> Instead of waiting to see if I'd post it, or asking me about it like I suggested, he published this post implying that I'm trying to hide it.
Do you have a response to that?
Relatedly, in one of your posts, you wrote:
> On some level, I understand the cognitive dissonance of having to correct perhaps your most popular article ever (hell, it even made it to The Economist the next day). It might have been read by millions.
I'm sure it's extremely frustrating that Dr. Alexander is seemingly not giving this the attention it deserves; however, it's not surprising that accusations of "cognitive dissonance" and the like are making Dr. Alexander combative.
What I was interested in was seeing the nature of the correction. I had already waited over a month trying to get him to agree this was an issue. I do not think I am bound to follow Scott's schedule. Whether he posts this in an open thread or not is not really something that concerns me.
Besides, I did not accuse him of trying to hide anything as he claims, so I'm not sure why I have to check in with him once I know he posted a correction that he knew I would not be happy with. He does not owe me to do as I please of course, but neither am I bound to wait around any longer than I have to.
Correcting errors is not a favor to me. It is me doing a favor to him. If he leaves his article uncorrected because he doesn't like how I try to empathize, that will have to be between him and his readers who trust him to try to get it right.
You're actually doing exactly the thing I described. Finding some unrelated issue with the critique and using it to excuse Scott not getting it addressed.
There are no perfect critics. There will always be a "yes but".
> I do not think I am bound to follow Scott's schedule. Whether he posts this in an open thread or not is not really something that concerns me.
I agree you're not beholden to Scott's schedule. My only point is that his reaction is not surprising given that he asked to just wait a week(ish) but you couldn't. If your goal is to try to build bridges and keep Scott involved, then these sorts of things won't help. If your point of view is that, "Well, I don't want to wait one week and it's up to Scott to regulate his emotions" then that is a totally reasonable point of view, but it's unlikely to help with this current rift. I think it's always valuable to look at the first things people say in a discussion, so the fact that Scott made this his first point in his response suggests to me that he is upset. Again, it's not necessarily your job to deal with Scott's emotions; however, it might be helpful to try and empathize with Scott and his personal preferences.
> Besides, I did not accuse him of trying to hide anything as he claims
I think that would have been useful to emphasize and explore because clearly Scott disagrees.
> I'm not sure why I have to check in with him once I know he posted a correction that he knew I would not be happy with
I'm not suggesting you have to check in with him on anything. I was only suggesting that there's some meta-argumentation value in trying to empathize with him and try to understand why he is feeling attacked. In my opinion, being accused of "cognitive dissonance" is certainly a personal attack.
> You're actually doing exactly the thing I described. Finding some unrelated issue with the critique and using it to excuse Scott not getting it addressed.
Please quote where I "excused" Scott. This seems like a strawman and might be a good microcosm of the sorts of attacks Scott is feeling.
Perhaps your argument is that I'm going off on a tangent. That is not my goal. The goal of my comment is that if we just take Scott at his words, it seems that he is disengaging from you, emotionally, and it might be helpful to try to engage at that level to recover this relationship and this argument and build bridges in the community. If your argument is that such meta issues are irrelevant and we should just stick to the facts, then that is fine, but then I recommend you also avoid bringing emotional accusations into it yourself such as accusing someone of cognitive dissonance, for example.
He didn't ask me to wait for anything. He said he would post a correction at some point. I saw the correction, and it was all I needed to see.
To be super clear, he did not request, and I did not agree to, wait for anything in particular.
> however, it might be helpful to try and empathize with Scott and his personal preferences.
You see this is where you're assuming I did not try my absolute best to do that for months already.
Yes, you're right, sorry, I'm not versed in the minutiae of the facts here. But the basic point is that Scott wrote, "[...] he published this post implying that I'm trying to hide it", so Scott thinks that your recent post implied that he was avoiding the discussion. Scott didn't actually quote anything, so that's not helpful, but my point was that if your goal is to get Scott back to the table, then it would be helpful to respond to his accusation.
> You see this is where you're assuming I did not try my absolute best to do that for months already.
I'm not assuming anything about you. I'm observing that Scott is clearly peeved, and I think it would be useful to explore that to get him back to the "negotiating table" so to speak.
I must say that I'm personally offended that you just accused me of a strawman, and yet did not respond to that accusation. Personally, i would appreciate an apology.
These are the sorts of meta-argumentation issues that the rationalist community will have to confront at some point. By the way, I'm not at all saying Scott is any better at this. But sometimes, we have to stand up and be the bigger man.
Here's where I tried discussing simular issues with Alexandros (I don't typically comment on reddit - not sure why it assigned a pseudonym to me)
https://www.reddit.com/r/TheMotte/comments/v3ljan/scott_alexander_corrects_error_ivermectin/iba0pho?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share&context=3
That's a fair point. I think it would have been completely reasonable to respond with a request for him to substantiate his claim. My argument is that not responding to it at all - especially since it was Scott's first claim in his response - is not going to help build bridges.
However, Alexandros has some work to do here too. What is his evidence that Scott had "cognitive dissonance"?
He just accused me of "excusing" Scott's behavior without any evidence.
I think the meta-point here is that all of these attacks on both sides are not helpful. It's valuable to come "back to the negotiating table" and that means, first, re-evaluating the claims one has made about the other person, and apologizing where needed. Scott might not reciprocate, but then Alexandros will be the bigger man and that will show in the community.
I brought up the idea of cognitive empathy with Alexandros. He didn't seem particularly receptive.
Perhaps you were not sufficiently cognitively empathetic?
Of course that's a possibility. In fact a probability.
But tu quoque doesn't get anywhere.
I'm just trying to help you understand, don't take it out on me.
You see, it didn't use to be that way. But like every revolution that becomes establishment, the good stuff becomes commonplace and all you have left is the bad habits.