In the “Rationalist Apologetic Overtures” skill tree we got:
- Denying wrongdoing/incorrectness (cantrip)
- Accusing the other side of bad faith (cantrip)
- Mentioning own IQ (cantrip)
- Non apology (1st level) (e.g. I’m sorry you feel that way)
- Empty apology (3rd level)
- Insincere apology (5th level)
- Acknowledgement of individual experience outside of one’s own (7th level)
- Admission of wrongdoing/incorrectness (9th level)
- Genuine guilt (11th level)
- Actual complete apology (13th level)
- Admitting the other person is right (15th level)
Normies go crazy for this one neat rationalist trick!
Their mistake is not grokking contrition. An apology ought either to be contrite or to justify why contrition is impossible.
To be explicit, contrition is the part of an apology where the apologizing party promises to change something. Without contrition, apologies are worthless, since they do not amend any social contract.
What the author proposes instead is indeed “Machiavellian” and “hacking social APIs;” we should recognize it as a form of deceit or lie. They are clearly more interested in appearing to be decent than in improving society, and should be marked as confidence scammers.
their mistake, as usual, is not grokking that genuine human interactions might be ritualised, but are not rituals.
I feel like there’s a total lack of grokking period. Using reductive phrasing like “social API” suggests that there are actual rules to human interaction we understand and can currently define. While there might be a semblance of provincial rules (take the notion of justice, imo tightly coupled with apologies, and see how it differs across the world), there’s nothing universal and certainly nothing that rises to the level of a fucking application programming interface.
And indeed, the other crucial piece is that… apologizing isn’t a protocol with an expected reward function. I can just, not accept your apology. I can just, feel or “update my priors” howmever I like.
We apologize and care about these things because of shame. Which we have to regulate, in part through our actions and perspectives.
Why people feel the way they do and act the way do makes total sense when
one finally confronts your own vulnerabilitiessorry, builds an API and RL framework.
The first footnote makes me want to give myself a lobotomy with a no. 2 pencil:
I wish to note here that Richard took this “as evidence that John would fail an intellectual turing test for people who have different views than he does about how valuable incremental empiricism is”. Of course I couldn’t just ignore an outright challenge to my honor like that, so I wrote a brief reply which Richard himself called “a pretty good ITT”.
If this guy doesn’t masturbate his successful polemicizing every 1.5 paragraphs, he’ll go into septic shock.
Finally LW blogists have perfected the apologizing API from the Scott Alexander classic, stop talking like you are a robot.
updating…
face goes slack for a few seconds then returns to a polite smile
“My bad.”
jesus. this is korvax from the “no man’s sky”. korvax are uploaded efective altruists.
I’m proud of them for independently discovering the idea of “insincere apology”. Not to brag but I discovered this idea as a preteen. While the technique per se failed to prove itself as useful as I had expected, it proved a useful intermediate step in developing a more sophisticated model of other people as actual moral and social agents who could not always be fooled by magic incantations. On the other hand, I took inspiration from my peers to mold the crude form of insincere apology into a sarcastic tool for exhibiting disrespect towards contemptible people.
Deepest apologies to any rationalists who find my deliberate and unrepentant condescension towards them objectionable. I pwomise weally hawd not to do it again. 🥺
Love how the poster frames making an apology not as “the ethically and morally right thing to do” but as “this one weird trick will increase your karma on LW”
