My Presidential Platform - by Scott Alexander (astralcodexten.com) latest post was very funny. Stock should be going up.

@evergreenemily what do you have against Scott?

@TimothyCurrie Not a fan of his position on race and intelligence, as seen in this Twitter thread. TL;DR he holds some pretty questionable views and outright says he "likes eugenics" (quote not better in context.)

Some direct quotes from Scott Alexander (in italics, my commentary in parentheses):

"HBD is probably partially correct or at least very non-provably not-correct."

(HBD here refers to "human biodiversity," which is the latest rebranding of "scientific racism," "race realism," etc.)

"[Reactionaries are] correct about the superiority of corporal punishment to our current punishment system..."

"I occasionally learn new and important things (like the crime stuff, or the WWII history, or the HBD) from the Reactionaries."

"Second is goodwill to the Reactionary community. I want to improve their thinking so that they can become stronger and keep what is correct while throwing out the garbage...the correct criticisms of class and social justice...I want to spread the good parts of Reactionary thought."

"[Reactionaries] tend to be extremely unusual and very smart people..."

(In response to a comment from someone advertising Project Prevention, a charity that pays addicts to be sterilized; the comment also went full ableist and eugenicist against autistic people): "I...actually think I am going to donate to [Project Prevention] next time I get money. Though I'd feel better if it were something more reversible."

"Even though I like both basic income guarantees and eugenics, I don't think these are two things that go well together..."

(Emphasis mine): "The only public figure I can think of in the southeast quadrant with me is Charles Murray. Neither he nor I would dare reduce ALL class differences to heredity, and he has some very sophisticated theories about class and culture."

(Charles Murray is most well-known for the book "The Bell Curve," in which he falsely argues that race and intelligence are genetically correlated.)

"[Vox's] article basically admits [Charles Murray] was right about four out of five things...on fifth thing, I agree Vox found ppl who disagree with him, but he represents majority scientific position."

(In response to a comment from an HBD blogger; the context is that the "hatchet job" is an article debunking any link between race and intelligence): "[I know the science] Better than I would reading race-denialist hatchet jobs like these."

"not really interested in debating the moral good or evil of eugenics here"

(Context: at the end of a Livejournal post in which he eagerly asks for advice on designing a eugenics system for a fictional society that he wants to be "interesting and sympathetic, and not to immediately pattern-match to a dystopia..." He asks for "something that gives eugenics the same kind of "Huh, didn't expect that would work" factor that prediction markets give decision-making..." including "monetary incentives for 'undersirables' to get sterilized" which is something he actually supported in real life. "I want this to look like 'Huh, these people are really socially progressive, aside from the whole eugenics thing'")

That last quote - socially progressive except for the "eugenics thing" - is exactly what I think Scott Alexander is. I think supporting eugenics is crossing a moral line and will continue to short Scott's stock unless he convincingly backpedals on this. I have yet to see that backpedaling. I'm not trying to "cancel" him or anything, I'm just trying to use mana to express my belief that he's spreading harmful, racist misinformation and pro-eugenics BS. I feel like his comments aren't discussed enough and this is a quick way to bring attention to it. (Also, I think bigots and eugenicists shouldn't have high stock prices.)

(I also find him somewhat irritatingly smug and I'm not a fan of hyper-rationalists or hyper-rationalist communities in general, but that's not the sort of thing that makes me bet down a stock this aggressively. If I just think someone is annoying, I'm probably not gonna bother shorting their stock at all, and certainly not by THIS much.)

@evergreenemily Which of these beliefs does he currently hold? Also, did you read his most recent post?

@derikk I tend to think that people's ideologies follow the law of inertia; if I see no evidence that someone's beliefs have changed, I don't see a reason to expect their beliefs to have changed. If you can find examples of Scott arguing that HBD and other "race realist" theories are wrong, then please show them to me. I would like to be proven wrong on this.

Having read through that post, it's not entirely clear to me what his stance on eugenics is in the present day (which I suspect is intentional on his part). I do think he's certainly moderated his views - the tone of the post suggests he would no longer be on board with Project Prevention, for example - but he also says in one of the footnotes that arguments that eugenics wouldn't work are "not defensible" regardless of one's moral stance, which is dubious. He also says he agrees with Beroe's final paragraph, the gist of which is "just because eugenics was used for evil in the past doesn't mean everything associated with eugenics is evil." While I think that's a reasonable stance philosophically, I agree with Adraste that a slippery slope is a major concern in this case.

@evergreenemily I think one can draw a distinction between non-coercive, purely voluntary actions (e.g. free contraception, Nobel sperm bank) and oppressive government policies, so slipping from one to the other feels far from inevitable. My impression is Scott is a supporter of the former type of "eugenics", and has come to see Project Prevention as a form of coercion.

@derikk I think you absolutely have a point (and are correct about where Scott's views are as well), but I also think that the ideology underpinning eugenics is, in and of itself, potentially harmful. Fundamentally, it relies on deciding who is "fit" to have children and who is not, and there's no world in which that decision can be fully neutral or impartial. It also doesn't take nurture into account, and the effect of environmental conditions and early childhood experiences (among other things) can influence a person's development at least as much as their genetics, if not more so. As such, I have a strong moral opposition to eugenics. My opposition is also partially informed by the fact that many eugenicists would rather I not have children (I'm autistic, among other things) and the idea of strangers deciding whether or not I ought to have kids makes me pretty uncomfortable.

FWIW, free contraception offered to everyone in the population isn't eugenics in my view - fundamentally, it's about allowing people to choose how many children they have (and of course, that number can be zero). I don't know any statistics off the top of my head, but I'm pretty sure that most straight couples in countries with easy access to contraception still have at least one child on average.

@evergreenemily I guess I’m arguing that one can believe that some genotypes are better than others without thinking this justifies restricting anyone’s reproduction. (One could instead support measures like genetic screening and embryo selection.) Just because some people might use this to support limits on who can have kids doesn’t mean we should ban discussion on whether certain genes are good or bad. Since people generally want their kids to be genetically healthy, there is substantial overlap between eugenics and individual choice, and this area should not be considered off-limits. @Aella refers to it as “epilogenics”.

I think everyone is in support of children having nurturing upbringings, but that’s clearly not the whole picture.

@evergreenemily You should read/listen to Unsong if you haven't. No matter his views on anything I'd buy his stock because the book is so good.