Post #1362119

A rationalist made a top post where they (poorly) argue against political "violence" (scare quotes because they lump in property damage): https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/Sih2sFHEgusDEuxtZ/you-can-t-trust-violence Highlights include a shallow half-assed defense of dear leader Eliezer's calls for violence: > True, Eliezer Yudkowsky’s TIME article called on the state to use violence to enforce AI policies required to prevent AI from destroying humanity. But it’s hard to think of a more legitimate use of violence than the government preventing the deaths of everyone alive. Eliezer called for drone strikes against data centers *even if it would start a nuclear war* and even *against countries that aren't signatories* to whatever hypothetical international agreement against AI there is. That is extremely irregular by the standards of international law and diplomacy, and this lesswronger just elides over those little details > Violence is not a realistic way to stop AI. (Except for drone strikes and starting a nuclear war.) They treat a Molotov thrown at Sam Altman's house as if it were thrown directly at Sam himself: > as critics blamed the AI Safety community for the attacker who threw a Molotov cocktail at Sam Altman This is a pretty blatant misrepresentation of the action which makes it sound much more violent. They continue on with minimizing right-wing violence: > Even if there are occasional acts of political violence like the murders of Democratic Minnesota legislators or Conservative pundit Charlie Kirk, we don’t generally view them as indicting entire movements, but as the acts of deranged individuals. Actually, outside of right-wing bubbles (and right-wing sources masking themselves as centrist), lots of people actually do blame Trump and the leaders of entire right wing movement as at fault for a lot of recent political violence. Of course, this is lesswrong, which has a pretty cooked Overton window, so it figures the lesswronger would be wrong about this. Following that, the lesswronger acknowledges it is kind of questionable and a conflation of terms to label property damage violence, but then press right on ahead with some pretty weak arguments that don't acknowledge why some people want to make the distinction. So in conclusion: - drone strikes that start nuclear wars: legitimate violence that is totally logical and reasonable - throw a single incendiary at someone's home that doesn't hurt anybody or even light the home on fire: illegitimate violence that must be absolutely condemned without exception - (bonus) recent right-wing violence: lone deranged individuals and not the fault of Trump or anyone like that. Everyone is saying it.