Wrestling With Inclusion at LambdaConf - <AUTHOR> http://degoes.net/articles/lambdaconf-inclusion <comment> norea-armozel Personally I believe there's a place for CoCs in any large organization or group but I think the content of CoCs should never include any political ideological opinions. If professionalism, respect, and separation of one's political and/or religious beliefs from a project/event is impossible for some then they shouldn't be part of it. Honestly, I wouldn't know or care if one programmer was a devout Mormon that donated to Prop 8 if all my interactions with said person (obviously mentioning Brenden Eich here) were purely within the confines of a project or convention regarding programming of some sort. Nor would that person ever have to know that I'm a Christian Gnostic, Georgist, bisexual, trans woman (the last part would probably be obvious but immaterial still) in the same context. We're two programmers coming together in common cause to produce something cool (I hope).

Yet it seems there are those on the left (and to some extent on the right) that demand ideological purity in all things. "You must be the right kind of [ideological stance/trait], lest you offend someone..." Seriously, I've seen flaps over Laura Jane Grace's book being titled Tranny (she's trans) over the last week. It's just as bad when you look at how fellow libertarians go at each other (see Jeffrey Tucker's essay on Libertarian Brutalism and the resulting fallout).

It's absurd how bad things have gotten in this regard and I honestly am concerned we'll see ideological puritanism infect various F/LOSS projects and events. Just keep the CoC to the absolute essentials (don't be a perv/jerk/stalker/etc and don't have sensitive topics in conversations...).

<comment><USER4> > Personally I believe there's a place for CoCs in any large organization or > group but I think the content of CoCs should never include any political > ideological opinions.

Which has no bearing on the conversation, as you cannot deny that the person in question is anything but a vehement and devout racist.

We're not mad he's a christian. I'm not even mad he thinks trans sexuality and non-binarism is an illness. At least there is some idea I am human there. He genuinely thinks non-white people are a sub-species.

Please, please, please don't try and equate this to a "political" view. There is no political view worth entertaining that denies people's essential humanity.

<comment><USER5> I'm late to this conversation, but your CoC is problematic.

To participate in LambdaConf, participants must pledge their allegiance to your Code of Conduct. That's fine, except for the following part of the CoC that mandates the following:

 _" That I shall embrace and celebrate the abundant diversity in the human species, and refuse to feel threatened by those different from me;"_

This is a highly problematic statement. By diversity, you mean diversity in sexuality, race, religion and politics. Why is this a problem?

Because nobody should be made to "embrace and celebrate" _all_ the diverse facets of humanity. It's patently absurd: I'm not going to celebrate and endorse the views of paedophiles, I'm not going to embrace and celebrate the views of the doomsday Aum Sum cult, nor any of dozens of even more innocuous views such as open source is a cancer on society. Nor should a gay person have to celebrate and embrace the views of those who believe marriage should only be between a man and a woman.

And in fact, you don't. You've excluded a racist, which FWIW I don't have a problem with. But you are hardly celebrating the diversity of humanity, which includes those whose views deny people's essential humanity.

There is a big difference from politely and civilly disagreeing with the opinion of another, and asking someone to embrace and celebrate the fact that there are views held by others that they find fundamentally objectionable.

All you should be asking for is that you respect their right to hold their views, but not impose them on others at a conference that is about functional programming!

This Code of Conduct goes too far. As I've said, if you applied reductio ad absurdum then it would mean that it celebrates and embraces those who - <USER2> myself and evidently the conference organisers - don't believe that you should celebrate and embrace all aspects of the abundant diversity of humanity. The reason this argument reduces to the absurd is that because of my view, I am specifically excluded from your event, which means that your own CoC doesn't embrace and celebrate all diversity within humanity.

I'd suggest you dump that clause. It's self-contradictory and a ridiculous condition you are imposing on participants. In fact, it's a straight-jacket for conference organisers because when you do exclude someone you can, unfortunately rightly, be accused of violating your own CoC!

<comment><USER6> I don't think you're reading this correctly. The CoC asks you to celebrate diversity _itself_ , not any (nor all) particular opinion that is part of this diversity.

In addition, you do realize that pedophilia is a sexual orientation, right? Nobody _chooses_ to be attracted to people they can't ever legally have sex with. And just as there's nothing wrong with being gay, there's nothing wrong with being a pedophile (keeping in mind that child molestation, i.e. rape, _is_ wrong, just as all other kinds of rape).

<comment><USER5> That's all kinds of wrong. Having sexual feelings for children is a medical disorder and people who have it are generally urged to get medical help. So I'm afraid that, yes, there is indeed something wrong with being sexually attracted to prepubescent children.

Of course, you miss my point on this anyway - there are people out there who believe that forcing themselves on children is right. There are also those who believe that rape is justifiable - just ask Daryush Valizadeh.

Furthermore, I am indeed interpreting this correctly. I am saying that if you want to force those who don't celebrate diversity from joining your organization, your are rejecting the a part of the diversity that you are celebrating. Let's restate this: if I say that I say that there are some things that humans promote and undertake are so horrendous that I cannot accept them under any circumstances, then I am implicitly rejecting the notion that diversity is to be celebrated. I am in fact rejecting diversity - <USER3> almost every single human being does to some degree.

What is basically being pushed here is a form of moral relativism, and taken to it's logical limits it's entirely self-contradictory.

1\. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roosh_V](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roosh_V)

<comment><USER6> > Having sexual feelings for children is a medical disorder and people who > have it are generally urged to get medical help. So I'm afraid that, yes, > there is indeed something wrong with being sexually attracted to > prepubescent children.

Obviously. We should chemically castrate them. Like Alan Turing. Being attracted to anything but adults of the opposite sex is wrong and sick.

/s

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This just in: preventing people to come to your conferences because of their beliefs is actually inadvisable and really, really difficult to make good on.

I don't agree with the guy's views either, but I wouldn't disinvite him just because he thinks that way.

Good on LambdaConf for letting him come anyway. Many of the quotes from this piece were shockingly powerful. I'm happy I took the time to read it.

<comment><USER4> This just in: no one says attendance has to be barred. This is about speaking roles. It's about tacit endorsement of someone with vile dehumanizing viewpoints then being put in front of large audiences as an authority figure.

That's VERY easy to make editorial decisions on. The entire purpose of the conference staff _is_ to editorialize.

<comment><USER7> No one's endorsing him by letting him speak to an interested group.

Is Hacker News endorsing you by letting you comment here?

And I'd be concerned too if this conference let him talk about his viewpoints, but that's not what he's on the stage for. If someone looked into your history deep enough, wouldn't they be able to find something distasteful too?

Imagine not being able to talk about your software development career just because something thinks something you did ( _even if entirely unrelated!_ ) was distasteful.

Do you think anyone seriously looks at Moldbug as an authority figure? Come on, you're blowing this way out of proportion. I think someone should be allowed to have their fringe views and be a member of the wonderful programming community. I don't agree with his views, but I'll defend his right to have them.

If you think it's easy to make editorial decisions on, I think you're missing some part of this.

<comment><USER4> > No one's endorsing him by letting him speak to an interested group.

If that is true, then it's also true that no one is censoring him by declining to let him speak at a conference.

> Is Hacker News endorsing you by letting you comment here?

No, but Hacker News has and will continue to make editorial decisions about who is allowed to post here. Race baiting trolls have been called "race baiting trolls" and kicked out of Hacker News right before my eyes.

> And I'd be concerned too if this conference let him talk about his > viewpoints, but that's not what he's on the stage for. If someone looked > into your history deep enough, wouldn't they be able to find something > distasteful too?

Of course! I was a hyper-right self-denying religious racist as a child. I've been very open about the environment I was raised into, and done my best to work through those issues. I no longer endorse those views, and I've paid a heavy price for them.

But you seem to pretend that just because the subject of his talk is some technological function, that this means that he will not be interacting socially or simply _being present_. Isn't the best part of conferences the "hallway tract?" Do you think his presence will not influence that?

Have you read what this person has wrote? "Racism" is not "distasteful." Racism is a vile dehumanizing view of our peers.

> Imagine not being able to talk about your software development career just > because something thinks something you did (even if entirely unrelated!) was > distasteful.

Racist viewpoints, no matter their origin or justification, _are not politics_. They're a fundamental denial of other people's humanity. These views were once common, but now are frowned upon. People who vocally and publicly espouse them can and should face societal consequences. It is not like tech conferences are some special place where humans was away the stink of the outside world and emerge as beings of pure thought.

> I think someone should be allowed to have their fringe views and be a member > of the wonderful programming community. I don't agree with his views, but > I'll defend his right to have them.

No one is mad because of a fringe view. They're mad because he vociferously promotes a view of the world that fundamentally denies the humanity of many people who are members of the tech community. These targeted members are part of a community that faces systemic violence and discrimination in many parts of the United States. We've seen this lame tactic before; people claim that any mention of feminism and the inherent biases of the programming community is "politics" and that should "stay out of tech." "Tech is neutral on this issue! All we care about is making something."

But when you take a neutral stance on someone clearly calling for oppressive action to be enacted against an entire category of humans, you are not being neutral. You're inherently supporting them, because inaction on human rights issues means not protecting human rights.

> If you think it's easy to make editorial decisions on, I think you're > missing some part of this.

How is saying, "We don't support racism" even remotely difficult in 2016? Quite the opposite. With the way that sponsors are dropping off of LambdaConf, they've chosen the expensive road. The major sponsors are pulling out, and I have backchannel info that another one will on Monday.

<comment><USER8> I'm not sure why this comment is being downvoted (perhaps because HN is [thankfully] less and less tolerant of anything it perceives as factional) but I think I agree with all of it.

The kinds of conferences we're talking about here are private events. Conferences are free to make decisions about speakers any way they'd like, just like a magazine can choose to run or not run a story about any given author.

A lot of people talk about things like StrangeLoop and Lambdaconf as if they were _academic venues_ , like USENIX. They are not; they are as different from academic conferences as The National Review is from IEEE Transactions on Networking.

<comment><USER6> Nobody is denying that conference organizers have a _right_ to censorship. We're just saying that it's _better_ if they don't exercise it! The reason why e.g. academic venues don't censor (I'm guessing this, your comment kind-of implies it) is because they strive to be better, to uphold the right kind of values!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> One thing that belonging to a political fringe has taught me, is that either you decide to live your life in constant conflict, or you learn to ignore the politics of a person when it has no direct impact on a given situation, even when it to you is utterly distasteful.

The latter leads to a far happier life. And often you'll find even people who hold views you find offensive can be perfectly nice people most of the time.

<comment><USER10> Exactly. Orgs that don't accept "diversity of tactics" lose a lot of time to infighting.

<comment><USER11> Also know as eating your own. Just wait, there's always someone slipping on narrative.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> If your conference will dis-invite / "de-platform" people based on their opinion about topic {foo}, _you are in fact hosting a conference about {foo}_ , regardless of what your name, official agenda, or spokespeople say.

Kudos to LambdaConf for actually keeping on focus in the face of dissent.

<comment><USER13> I mean, okay, maybe, but that just means that they'd be hosting a conference about "nazis suck" and hey, I'm okay with that. That's a message I can get behind.

<comment><USER14> So what you're saying is, you're cool with discrimination, so long as it's not against you.

So when someone decides to hold a dev conference but chooses to disallow any gay/lesbian developers, is that also totally okay?

<comment><USER15> Yes, I am perfectly okay with discriminating against Nazis.

Since when is ALL discrimination bad? I discriminate against shitty people all the time, and so do you. Don't even pretend you don't, no one will believe you.

<comment><USER14> >and so do you. Don't even pretend you don't, no one will believe you.

You're projecting a bit. I try hard -- consciously -- not to shut down and shut out people who need grace as much as I do (either more or less externally-visibly).

Your own code of ethics is not universal. There are people who think and operate differently from you.

Which is exactly the point of not discriminating whenever it's avoidable.

<comment><USER15> Your code of grace is also not universal and is almost certainly the minority.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I think "conduct vs beliefs" is the right metaphor by which to make these sorts of decisions. After all, we talk about a 'Code of Conduct' and not a 'Code of Belief' (the latter, in my opinion, would edge too close towards totalitarianism.)

As long as Curtis stays professional and speaks only on Urbit [0] he is doing the right thing and should be allowed to speak.

[0] [http://urbit.org/](http://urbit.org/)

<comment><USER17> At what point does someone's routine vocal endorsement of racial superiority and advocation of violence become problematic? Or are we obligated to welcome these people into our conferences (workplaces? homes?) so long as they confine their exhortations to speech and only work to encourage others to perform the actual violence?

The idea of a "Code of Belief" is a strawman -- the issue at hand is the expectation not of freedom of thought or freedom of speech, but a desire for speech without consequences (which inevitably requires that the freedom of speech of others be quashed).

<comment><USER18>
        > At what point does someone's routine vocal
        > endorsement of racial superiority and advocation of
        > violence become problematic?

The Americans have a whole load of case law around First Amendment rights, it would be worth familiarizing yourself with that for a few hundred years worth of considered thought.

        > Or are we obligated to welcome these people into
        > our conferences

Well in this case, their conferences - he's there under his own technical merit, isn't he? Do you really get to exclude him because you don't like his views, even though he may well be more qualified than you to claim a right to be there?

        > (workplaces?

Conveniently there's case law in employment too.

        > homes?)

Weird strawman.

        > the issue at hand is the expectation not of freedom of
        > thought or freedom of speech, but a desire for speech
        > without consequences

I would be curious to know what you think free speech means, if it doesn't mean speech without consequence. "We're free speech in this country, except you can go to jail for saying the wrong thing".

<comment><USER17> You have no understanding of the first amendment. It applies, of course, only to the _government 's_ response to speech.

 _I would be curious to know what you think free speech means, if it doesn 't mean speech without consequence._

You can say anything you want, and the government won't intervene. That's all free speech means. Other people, groups, and corporations are free to judge you, criticize you, exclude you from their platforms and private events, organize boycotts against you, criticize people who agree with you, criticize people who choose not to exclude you, and so forth. You may _dislike_ that they do those things, but they are free to do so without government interference, because of free speech.

You, in turn, are free to criticize and exclude them in a similar manner. This is dialogue, and a desire to promulgate your opinions but have others not promulgate their opinions (including when they're about you) is the height of hypocrisy.

<comment><USER19> > You have no understanding of the first amendment. It applies, of course, > only to the government's response to speech.

Darn it, I thought we were going to get all the way through this discussion without someone wheeling out that old nag.

Once again: Attempting to ban people from unrelated fora based on their political views is not against the _letter_ of the First Amendment to do this. But attempting to ban people from unrelated fora based on their political views is quite certainly against the _spirit_ of the First Amendment.

<comment><USER17> What?! That has no support in law, history, or the documents surrounding the creation of the bill of rights. The idea that private fora would be required to accommodate all comers is antithetical to the ideas behind the Enlightenment philosophy which engendered the first amendment.

I honestly can't believe someone could be dumb enough to think that the founders would want the government to dictate who people were required to admit to non-public settings. There's no way you're being sincere.

<comment><USER19> You think that the fundamental principle behind the First Amendment and Enlightenment philosophy was that we really needed a natural rights justification to have people whose politics we disagree with ostracized from public life and prevented from earning a living?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> The choice quote is here --

"In the end, we all converged on the same opinion: that LambdaConf should focus on the behavior of attendees, rather than their belief systems."

What you believe in, in everyday society, shouldn't matter either. It is how you treat others and if you do so with politeness and respect, you should expect the same in return.

<comment><USER21> Curtis Yarvin is a professed fascist who has written about his belief that some races are more suited to slavery than others.

That _does_ matter; it makes large swaths of the potential talk audience (and other attendees) feel unwelcome. How can you engage in polite, respectful discussion with someone who believes that you're more suited to be a slave than a free man?

<comment><USER22> > Curtis Yarvin is a professed fascist who has written about his belief that > some races are more suited to slavery than others.

Having read a good deal of his unqualified reservations, I wonder if you can source this quote for me please?

<comment><USER21> Search Google, Twitter, or send me an email. I'm not going to link to hate speech here.

<comment><USER23> This entire thread is a pretty depressing indictment of the sorts of people who hang out on HN. Seriously, nobody should care about offending Curtis Yarvin or any of his ilk.

<comment><USER19> Yarvin and his "ilk" aren't the ones complaining about being offended here.

<comment><USER23> The argument of the original post is that we shouldn't exclude Yarvin because it might make avowed racists feel unwelcome at FP conferences. To which I say: who cares? I don't want Yarvin at FP conferences, and I suspect none of the attendees particularly do either.

<comment><USER19> > I don't want Yarvin at FP conferences, and I suspect none of the attendees > particularly do either.

I'd imagine there's a solid overlap between Hacker News posters and people who might attend a functional programming conference, and judging by this comments section your position is in a distinct minority. So if it's OK to ostracize people based on their unpopular political opinions, you may find _yourself_ in the hot seat you've been preparing for Yarvin.

How about this: perhaps we should instead strive for a system of pluralism and tolerance where we don't bring our political disputes into the professional sphere.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Well today in "tech", if you openly support a republican candidate, good luck being invited at tech events or conferences as a speaker.

That's wrong of course and I say that as a non republican. The Tech industry has become so politicized positions that used to be seen as extreme are considered "normal". I mean how can an article such as this one can be deemed acceptable on a tech blog ? : [https://archive.is/elvvc](https://archive.is/elvvc)

Replace white people by black people and racism, defined as broad generalizations based on the color of skin, becomes obvious. Yes the article linked is racist period.

<comment><USER22> > Well today in "tech", if you openly support a republican candidate, good > luck being invited at tech events or conferences as a speaker.

Don't worry. Tech is currently undergoing yet another tectonic shift, with the difference that this time it goes into the right direction.

<comment><USER6> Which tectonic shift?

From my point of view, it seems like the previous (pro-feminist, pro- censhorship) tectonic shift still lasts (Brendan Eich, Gamergate, "Shirtgate", "discrimination" in tech), and IMO it's definitely going in the wrong direction (towards lies and censhorship).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Well done, John & Co. StrangeLoop caved to the threats of a vocal minority and, to my lights, made the wrong decision. Not only the wrong decision, but for the wrong reasons. Good for you for taking this principled -- and responsible -- stance.

<comment><USER26> so who who cares if minorities are offended?

that's, uh, kind of the point.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> All this childish feelings based barbage has got to stop.

No, really. People have different opinions, and are allowed to have them, even if they hurt your feelings or you disagree. Since when did this thought crime bullshit take over? Orwell would never have thought that self policing, not Big Brother and his armed henchmen, were what would do in individual thought.

<comment><USER13> Saying "People have different opinions" about nazi bullshit is kindergarten- level analysis.

Nazis are bad. Racists are bad. Claiming these "opinions" are equivalent to any other is childish and immature. Grow up and realize you live in a society with other people, and the positions you advocate for (and encourage others to advocate for) have real consequences.

<comment><USER28> Grow up and argue with people's ideas instead of banning them from conferences unrelated to said ideas. You stop bad ideas from proliferating by showing how they're wrong, not by acting like children and banning what you don't like.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> passing-through For context, the project in question is [https://github.com/urbit/urbit](https://github.com/urbit/urbit) and the speaker is [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Yarvin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Yarvin).

<comment><USER29> TIL: neoreactionary, anti-democratic blah blah blah

aka libertarian fruitopia

<comment><USER10> Pretty much the opposite of libertarian, IIRC.

<comment><USER30> There's this weird thing where libertarians go so far right they become neoreactionaries, and vice versa. It's sort of the horseshoe theory for the authoritarian-libertarian spectrum I guess. I don't really understand it.

<comment><USER10> Frustration, I'd guess. They look long and hard at one ultimate solution to the problem of human governance, finally realize it won't work, then swing to the opposite conclusion to examine it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> "Include all! White supremacists, non-white... If a few people (say non-white) feel uncomfortable and don't want to come, we're OK with that 100%!

Everyone should feel included! Racists, homophobes... Respect the beliefs of everyone, like believing there is a god, or that white people are superior, or believing you are being discriminated, or believing people will insult you or assault you at a whim for who you are, or believing you belong in a community full of racist assholes. It's OK 100%, all beliefs are equal, so we shouldn't discriminate people based on that!

That would be even worse than racism if you think about it."

I'm sad and disgusted.

<comment><USER10> Given Yarvin's Jewish, my guess is he's not a white supremacist.

<comment><USER31> Who is Yarvin? How is that relevant? I am not talking about a specific person, I am talking about the argument being made for accepting everyone no matter their "belief".

<comment><USER10> Sorry, misread. Curtis Yarvin's the conference speaker.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> > we read or skimmed nearly everything the speaker has written online (which > is no small task)

Ouch. Must've been an almost sisyphean task in Moldbug's case. Dude's the most prolix blogger I've ever come across.

</comment><comment><USER33> If you don't care about political views of presenters, there's no need to bring inclusion to the table; just consider their technical talents and call it a day.

If you actually care about inclusion, you need to think about how including backwards-views that oppose inclusion itself could affect your effort. Banning only physically violent behavior is behind the times, it's obvious there are many ways of harming someone without lifting a finger. If you're supporting inclusion for inclusions's sake, including everyone may make sense. But if you really care about people who depend on you including them, it's obvious some measures must be taken to create a safe environment for the underrepresented.

<comment> white-flame > some measures must be taken to create a safe environment for the > underrepresented.

Then it comes down to defining what "safe" means. To most people, that does mean basic physical safety, meaning you won't be physically assaulted or have your stuff damaged/stolen.

However, once you get into subjectivity of a listener's interpretation of others' words or social actions (like disinterest in their topics or cultural mismatch), calling any difference from their beliefs or expectations "unsafe", all _procedural_ sanity flies out the window. The only types of meetings that can be _rationally_ and _formally_ capable of running under such specific clauses would be particularly exclusionary meetings of only certain beliefs.

Inclusivity means exposure to difference, and if exposure to difference means "unsafe" to someone, then inclusivity itself is unsafe to them. There are those who also simply equate "socially uncomfortable" with "unsafe", and social discomfort can come from literally anything.

(Edit: I would strongly prefer responses from the downvoters. Defining some specific, actionable policy capturing subjective interpretation by attendees without becoming exclusionary is something I'd be interested in actually seeing. I'm not talking about subjective application of policy, but actual full capture within policy.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> Good job LambdaConf.

Disregarding irrelevant political views and focusing on the technical content is what _every_ conference should do. It's too bad that this is less common than it should be.

</comment><comment><USER35> That was very well done.

If I ever organize a conference (unlikely) I will return here and adopt LambdaConf's policy along with a link to this very open and thoughtful consideration as justification.

</comment><comment><USER36> What a well reasoned and thought through approach to making this decision and setting a precedent and standard - nice work.

</comment><comment><USER37> Good for John and LambdaConf. I attended last year and I'll be hosting a workshop about Shapeless this year and I still firmly intend to go.

</comment><comment><USER38> I'm pretty sure secret societies and private groups will start forming as a result of people being pushed out of their right to speak openly about what they believe for fear it will offend others and ruin their careers.

It's probably already happening.

</comment><comment><USER39> This is an odd perspective on inclusivity, but I understand where it comes from.

I would think it would be well within the mandate of the conference organisers to pick talks that reflect the material they want to see presented and the conversation they want attendees to be able to participate in. The conference is a curated collection of talks, and will necessarily reflect an active political position held by the organising committee and a passive political position shaped by systemic issues. For almost all tech conferences, even the very large ones, the politics expressed are so bland and so unfocused that no one really cares about them. Almost no tech conference has the capability to seriously address systemic issues of inclusivity.

I imagine LambdaConf's view resonantes with the audience on HackerNews, because it addresses primarily the former politics. The latter politics aren't a danger to most of the commentators here.

The inclusivity of attendance seems to be much more defensible. Even under great pressure, I can see an event being reluctant to bar attendance. I don't know that any tech conferences ask unpopular people to simply stay away (even if they promise to be on best behaviour.)

<comment><USER40> They stated that they accepted the talk on the merits during the anonymous review phase.

<comment><USER41> How anonymous can the reviews be if the subject of the talk betrays the identity of the presenter?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> How many "problematic" views will you "no-platform" until your "safe space" is a personal hugbox with n=1?

Get over yourself a little and you'll see that the above is the ultimate consequence of your choices to exclude people.

</comment><comment> atom-morgan It's a code of conduct. Not a code of thought.

<comment><USER24> > It's a code of conduct. Not a code of thought.

Given how most codes of conduct are written there is virtually no difference between the two. If a code of conduct in a community applies everywhere its members might be on the internet or in the real world, then they are not free to say what they want publicly anymore. If one can be excluded from an opensoure community because of a totally unrelated comment on some obscure forum as stated by codes like the "contributor covenant", it's pretty clear that this kind of code of conduct is a code of thought.

<comment> atom-morgan Oh absolutely. I was referring to what it _should_ be :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Great to see a conference making the adult choice, rather than accommodating zealots who feel entitled to limit people's careers for their beliefs.

</comment><comment><USER42> Embryonic CRISPR is here and humanity is not only hereditary. It's the genetics debate that needs to happen. Moldbug's racist viewpoint is now irrelevant.

How much should the State intervene? Wrath of Kahn and GATTACA were both dystopian. Roe v Wade will reopen soon on CRISPR grounds.

<comment><USER10> Genetics are powerful. Twins that grow up apart in different environments often share traits/tastes to an unnerving degree.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> You'd think that someone could just come out and say exactly which of his views are so terrible, instead of pointing at his entire multiple-book-length blog and "wow just wow"ing.

<comment><AUTHOR> The character of Moldbug (which I don't even know if it is actually what the author truly believes, it was always designed as a pen name) is a neo- reactionary. Ex: He is definitely a racist, with the belief of genetic differences in attitude that contributed to slavery. [1]

Now, I don't like those beliefs at all. I do think that LC made the right decision though. Inclusiveness is a good policy, and no matter how certain more authoritarianly inclined progressives are spinning this, that's what this is. Assuming no one is threatened, and he isn't promoting his politics, he should have a chance of going through the (anonymized!) entry process and talking about the really weird and awesome Urbit.

[1] [http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.fr/2009/07/why- carl...](http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.fr/2009/07/why-carlyle- matters.html?m=1)

edit: One of my main philosophical issues with Moldbug (besides the repugnancy), is that he is internally inconsistent. He might refute that later on. I dunno, he's spewed out literally tens of thousands of pages of text.

<comment><USER44> As a note the original article for this thread is about LambdaConf. StrangeLoop is the conference that chose to ban this particular speaker.

I assume by SL you mean LC?

<comment><AUTHOR> ahh. Now I see where the confusion is. Yes. I do mean LC.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> So uh, who was this person?

<comment> passing-through [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Yarvin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Yarvin)

<comment><USER46> And out of curiosity, who is the firing-squad person?

<comment><USER47> Mostly likely referring to Steve Klabnik [https://archive.is/BtDaA](https://archive.is/BtDaA)

<comment><USER10> Klabnik himself being influenced by Marxism and committed to overthrowing the democratic state, presumably through armed revolution:

[https://twitter.com/steveklabnik/status/514125493663436800](https://twitter.com/steveklabnik/status/514125493663436800)

Communism has killed millions and millions of people yet its advocates don't get blacklisted for wrongthink.

And despite Klabnik's efforts to police the ideas of tech speakers, his chosen software licenses don't prohibit use of his software by repressive regimes:

[https://github.com/steveklabnik/request_store/blob/master/LI...](https://github.com/steveklabnik/request_store/blob/master/LICENSE.txt)

<comment><USER48> He's an anarchist of some sort, just like many. Anarchists generally want to replace the violent top down nation-state with bottom-up democratic forms. Real democracy, not fake doublespeak democracy where no one feels like their voice matters.

Your post is horrifically misleading.

<comment><USER49> He says the single word which best describes him is small c communist, so at best this sort of anarchism is a violent tactic, and historically a very unwise one. And would be a quickly lethal one in the well armed US.

<comment><USER48> It's good to be cautious when people say they believe in "democracy" or "communism". (Does democracy mean killing people for billionaires and their 4-year king? Serious democracy proponents must say things like "bottom-up democracy." Same with communism: does it mean marxism/maoism/leninism/stalinism?)

Anyway, anarchists generally strive towards communism, if that means an advanced future society where you're free from boss-subordination, and some don't have to be "poor" to scare everyone else into obedience.

And anarchists don't bomb people, unlike adherents of every other political philosophy in the last decades. Certainly the US is always bombing people. Even Bernie Sanders supports it.

<comment><USER10> Anarchists don't generally strive towards communism because they recognize what history shows: communist states are even less accountable than modern oligarchal democracy.

<comment><USER48> Communist "state" is an oxymoron: _" the communist society, which is a socioeconomic order structured upon the common ownership of the means of production and the absence of social classes, money, and the state."_ ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communism))

Please google these basic terms before you engage in character assassination. As you did with Klabnik. (On topics like this, HN comments don't even rise to the factual rigor of YouTube comments.)

<comment><USER10> How does theoretical common ownership of the state mean a state doesn't exist? Do you have any examples of this theoretical non-state communist society? Has it ever existed at any scale?

<comment><USER48> These are among the most common anarchism 101 questions. FAQs exist; why not google for yourself? (Or speaking of capitalism, pay someone to educate you rather than expect uncompensated labor. I've done enough unpaid work resulting from your character assassination.)

<comment><USER10> "Educate yourself" seems to be a fashionable way of dodging difficult questions.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> White racists accept to mingle with non-white despite their beliefs, surely non-white can return the same curtesy?

<comment><USER22> Go to a Trump rally and tell this to a "Black Lives Matter" supporter, I dare you.

<comment><USER31> I'm sorry, did you take that at face value? I thought it was so over the top and ridiculous that people would get that it was sarcasm, but I guess I still have a lot to learn. My bad, sometimes someone's satire is just someone else's actual thoughts...

<comment><USER22> This form of "sarcasm" is best countered with following it through to its logical conclusion.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> Is there a good summary somewhere of this entire situation? Starting with strange loop?

</comment><comment><USER15> There is an extremely simple test for such arguments: would anyone make this argument if the person in question was Osama bin Laden? Suppose old Osama was a Haskell wizard. Would anyone argue he should still be at the talk? No.

But Nazis? Who make bin Laden's terrorism look like a rounding error? They're A-OK!

And people wonder about why there's a diversity problem in tech.

<comment><USER51> 1\. Bin Laden _actually killed_ thousands of people. If, instead, your example was a Muslim preacher who advocated controversial views, but was not violent himself nor the head of a violent organization, then yes - we should accept such a Muslim preacher, if he has an interesting technical talk to give.

2\. Has Moldbug actually self-identified as a Nazi? He has offensive views to many, to be sure, but Nazi is much more specific, and to me, a weird way to interpret what he writes. I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm saying that what you call "Nazi" I would call "disgusting, wrong, and troubling." The fact we don't agree on what precisely he is - even if we both dislike him - is one reason why we should not ban him. Especially since on other people we might not agree on who to ban (e.g. some consider abortion doctors to be literal murderers; should they ban such doctors from a programming conference?).

3\. About the diversity situation in tech: the article mentions how another industry, medicine, handles this kind of thing. LambdaConf's decision is the default in that industry. In fact, in practically all industries. Yes the gender difference in tech is larger than in medicine. That is inconsistent with your claim.

<comment><USER15> 1\. Do you think people like Hitler just arise out of the sea one day, like Aphrodite, completely unbidden? No. Worms like Moldbug lay the path for the actually physically dangerous people to rise up.

2\. I'm not gonna get bogged down in a nomenclature debate. We both agree he's a terrible person; that's enough for my argument to work.

3\. This would only be true if this were the ONLY factor for the diversity problem (there are others)

<comment><USER51> 1\. Sure, but trying to stamp out every person with opinions you think _might_ lead to something bad someday is, frankly, more frightening to me than Moldbug. What you advocate threatens our existence as an open society.

For social progress to happen, we need people to tolerate unlikable minorities. That's how things like gay rights happen, as 30 years ago, your arguments could have been use to ban a gay activist from a tech conference.

Yes, tolerating unlikable minorities like whatever Moldbug is has risks. But it's a risk we have to take.

<comment><USER15> It's not about "might." That's like saying the sun "might" set, or the tide "might" recede. Worms like Moldbug have a 100% historical record of mutating into terribly destructive individuals when given even the slightest leeway. On the other hand, tolerating them has a zero percent success rate. Zero! Never, not once, in history have Fascists been beaten by anything by the usual liberal, democratic means of discourse and praxis.

And again, not all opinions are equal. The opinion "we should noplatform gays" and "we should noplatform Fascists" aren't remotely in the same world just because they share the same first three words.

Imagine if we applied this argument to other facets of life! Imagine if people thought doctors were as bad as cancer because they tried to poison cancer cells. Imagine if people thought the Jews who rose up in the Warsaw ghetto and murdered Nazis were as bad as the Nazis themselves!

Also LMAO it's not a risk for everyone. It isn't a risk at all for the usually affluent/usually white liberals that usually stand in the way of noplatforming people like Moldbug. It IS a risk for people of color, women, the disenfranchised, etc. It is facile for someone to say "well that's a risk we have to take" when it's hardly a risk to you at all. Of course politicians use this logic all the time to justify the mass slaughter of civilians abroad. "Well, it might result in collateral ~~murder~~ damage, but that's just a risk we'll have to take."

<comment><USER51> > Worms like Moldbug have a 100% historical record of mutating into terribly > destructive individuals when given even the slightest leeway.

You're thinking of all the ones that you know the outcome of, like Hitler. But there are many, many idiots like Moldbug that simply do not succeed in doing anything. Many Hitlers go back to painting after failing at politics, some even after some initial promise.

Statistically, ignoring Moldbug will work. And actually banning him is counterproductive: I only heard about him through these bans, and it led me to read a bunch of his work out of curiosity. I wasn't convinced (I'm not exactly his target audience anyhow for demographic reasons), but others might be.

> not all opinions are equal.

The point is we don't know which are equal. 30 years ago, most people thought the ethical thing was to ban gay people. And 30 years from now, things you and I do now will look bad to people.

Given we might be wrong, just like all past and future generations, it's a good idea to be tolerant.

Of course, we shouldn't tolerate all behavior - if someone sexually harasses someone, we should ban them and report them to the police. But for just having a certain belief, or other personal attribute that is not part of a programming language conference, we should not ban people.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Not all views are equal. Some views are so horrendous it is our moral duty to ostracize their believers.

<comment><USER47> How right you are! Let's ostracize and noplatform all the wrongthinkers. How about we start by banning those horrendous muslims whose beliefs are homophobic, sexist, calls for the death of apostates and atheists etc. Or maybe those sexist homophobic christians?

<comment><USER15> Again, not all views are equal. Stop trying to pretend they are.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> From the article: _" Well, I believe in free-market capitalism. A well-known and popular programmer has tweeted, repeatedly, that he supports violence (real violence, e.g., the firing squad) for people who believe that."_

Well, that's a political position with sizable historical backing. The people behind the French Revolution, the Russian Revolution, and China's revolution would all have agreed.

"Let the ruling classes tremble at a communist revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win. Workingmen of all countries, unite!" \- Marx.

<comment><USER53> The KKK is a political position with sizable historical backing. I don't see how this is relevant to either side of the argument here.

<comment><USER54> No, you do. And you failed your godwin.

The relevance is that this guy isn't the only one who believes it, just the only one we're currently talking about for being honest on social media.

His speech is no more actionable (and thus no more worrying) towards any individual than "Just bomb Iraq" was in late 2001. Cough.

In lieu of threats you don't get safer for banning him because 1) bans don't actually work against criminals (not that he is, but if he was) and 2) if you're really at risk there are billions more who feel the same way he does. Better to avoid a false sense of security and just be on your toes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Nothing rattles the "diversity" warriors cages than acceptance of diverse thoughts. From my experience, all notions of acceptance and diversity goes out the window when you disagree or have a different political opinion with said warriors. It's a good way to dehumanize us for having the wrong thought.

"It's okay, you can kick him, he thinks X, Y, Z so he's practically Hitler"

</comment><comment><USER48> From one of Moldbug's many vocal supporters at a "Founders Fund-sponsored retreat": _" It was really quite lovely. Later that day, in the jeep to the ranch house where everyone was staying, he started up with the casual racism, and everyone ignored him."_ ([https://twitter.com/maradydd/status/606799534983770112](https://twitter.com/maradydd/status/606799534983770112))

The status quo: highly funded white people in a ranch house, obsessive dreams of white supremacy floating into the night...

(Unfortunately in the real world, very few "technologists" have any sort of progressive future vision. Most just chase money and perks, building bureaucratic tech. Politically regressive.)

> _we wrote the speaker and asked for a public statement clearly stating the > speaker's views on violence._

What does "violence" mean here? We're talking about Moldbug's acts of spreading white supremacy whenever he gets a platform. Including tech conferences and good ol' boy networking.

> _Social media has muddled this issue so much_

"Social media"... as in this blogpost? Twitter & HN? Techies sound suspiciously like oppressive governments, blaming "social media" when it threatens actual disruptive change.

> _Last year, StrangeLoop rescinded an invitation to a speaker because of the > controversy that erupted (nay, exploded) when his talk was announced._

People pointed out the error, and StrangeLoop promptly fixed it. This is in keeping with previous actions, like implementing dozens of tips from a highly respected diversity consultant.

There's a reason StrangeLoop is considered way ahead of the curve. Other confs aren't willing to do what it takes to be excellent. (And anyway, StrangeLoop is more than just about a single style of programming, unlike LambdaConf.)

> _Would this be the end of LambdaConf???_

How many tech conferences ended so far because they give high-profile white supremacists a platform? Just look at the racially-skewed audiences.

> _Feedback Highlights: Below are a few quotes from some of the amazing > feedback we received:_

7 in favor of giving Moldbug a platform. 1 unclear. That's all he decided to list.

<comment><USER55> Hi. That's me you're quoting.

> The status quo: highly funded white people in a ranch house, obsessive > dreams of white supremacy floating into the night...

Were you there? If not, then you're projecting. As it happens, the participants were at best plurality white. And no, the PoC weren't all Asians either.

Also, because Twitter requires short statements, there are multiple readings of "ignored" there. I see you're taking the least charitable one, i.e., "everyone let it slide." That interpretation is incorrect. People _stopped talking to him_. Isn't shunning what you progs want?

<comment><USER48> > _I see you 're taking the least charitable one, i.e., "everyone let it > slide." That interpretation is incorrect. People stopped talking to him._

Good, because I used your interpretation: silence. You silently enabled a white supremacy propagandist.

Of course, you're certainly NOT silent when it's time to support him. (Despite your own evidence of his history of "casual racism" at a professional networking event.)

So you're oddly quiet with white supremacy: you "stopped talking". But god forbid you "ignore" when a conference right next to Ferguson (StrangeLoop) declined to help promote a white supremacist's influence!

(Hell, if I mocked people's favorite programming language or text editor, I'd almost certainly get a vocal reaction. Mild rebuke at least. Says everything about techies' priorities.)

> _As it happens, the participants were at best plurality white. And no, the > PoC weren 't all Asians either._

That's interestingly vague: were these participants to Moldbug's "casual racism"? I imagined he only did this with obviously sympathetic audiences like you.

(And what does "the PoC weren't all Asians" exactly mean? For someone berating others for interpretations you don't like, you leave open a wide range of interpretations.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> > In the end, we all converged on the same opinion: that LambdaConf should > focus on the behavior of attendees, rather than their belief systems.

And that wasn't the starting point? What a joke!

> We would never allow a violent criminal to attend LambdaConf.

Yes, you would. You'd be sued if you didn't. They did their time and (presumably) got out or the question would be moot. If they (or anyone else) threatened someone, see the next point.

> There is always a line. There must be one. The question is, where do we draw > that line?

I've run conferences for years where the only policy of that sort is that we won't hesitate to call the police.

It's worked perfectly because if someone follows someone else to harass them that's illegal despite the subject matter. Harassing someone for liking the wrong pokemon is just as actionable as harassing them because they're the wrong gender. If the person isn't harassing anyone they're free to their opinion no matter how odious.

The police are very helpful in explaining "a disturbance" and how someone is creating one!

And here's the answer to threats, violence, etc. They get arrested. Not expelled. Not shamed. Arrested. Treat it like you'd treat random street crime and have them arrested.

<comment><USER56> Ok, but that's not everything. What about talks with sexist content? Remember the "Perform like a porn star" talk ([http://www.sarahmei.com/blog/2009/04/25/why-rails-is- still-a...](http://www.sarahmei.com/blog/2009/04/25/why-rails-is-still-a- ghetto/))? The person giving the talk might not be actively harassing someone, but they're clearly making the conference a place where women do not feel welcome.

<comment><USER54> That's the content they choose to sponsor (with a soapbox), and which they should curate.

<comment><USER30> You need a code of conduct to prevent that if you are not to pre-vet all slides, which is excessively bureaucratic and creates an implicit code of conduct anyway.

<comment><USER54> No, it's pretty easy. If you have a mandate you ruthlessly cull anything not on that mandate. You don't need a blacklist of banned topic, you have a whitelist of worthwhile ones and you ignore anything else.

Lambda is pretty solidly about functional programming. Maybe extending to programming/admin in general but not to politics.

Speakers should always be tweaking their talk for the audience anyways to handle different durations, venues, crowds, time of day, etc. If there's anything you don't want you can fix it here.

<comment><USER30> You don't understand what a code of conduct is, or what this debate is about.

<comment><USER54> Yes, I do. I've run both tech and "fan" conferences.

I'm absolutely within my legal right to call the police on anyone who I kick out for anything other than a tiny list of protected reasons, and I do so. (Very rarely, almost everyone leaves immediately when you show that you aren't playing some rules-lawyering game but simply calling the police.)

Both as someone familiar with human behavior and as someone who's gotten legal advice, a code of conduct never helps me or the good attendees. It only offers refuge for the spoilers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER57> "That I shall not talk or act in ways that could make minority groups feel bullied, harassed, intimidated, stalked, stereotyped, or belittled; examples of minority groups include women, people of color, lesbians, gays, and people who are disabled, bisexual, transsexual, asexual, intersex, transgender, and gender-variant;"

So as a member of the majority, I'm expressly the only person bound by these rules of behavior in this pledge. My allowed attendance would be contingent on remaining silent the entire time on premises.

<comment><USER58> No, one member of such a group is also bound to conduct themselves relative to members of another such group.

One way that one could attend is to not say offensive things. Yes, anything _could_ be offensive and you have no way of knowing a priori. But a reasonable person should be able to sort things out.

<comment><USER59> "But a reasonable person should be able to sort things out."

We have two articles on the front page condemning a two second soundbite at a keynote which was vetted by one of the most image conscious companies on the planet. I don't think your statement is true. If a code of conduct does not treat everyone as equals then it sets up a dynamic that will cause some group of people to shutdown and not participate.</comment></comment></comment>


Use Vim as a C/C++ IDE - <AUTHOR> https://spacevim.org/use-vim-as-a-c-cpp-ide/ <comment><USER2> Eugh.

Every time these vim distributions get mentioned I shiver.

Have a read of: [https://old.reddit.com/r/vim/comments/92a9y0/whats_your_hone...](https://old.reddit.com/r/vim/comments/92a9y0/whats_your_honest_opinion_of_spacevim/) for some context.

In all seriousness though they tend to cause more problems than what it's worth.

They are aimed at users who don't know anything about vim, which is also their caveat, they're not only learning vim, but also the distribution of it.

Then when a plugin doesn't work properly, there's even more work to try to figure out why. For inexperienced users this is a terrible combination.

Often the choices made by vim distributions end up getting "outdated" meaning you may start with accepting the plugins dished up to you, but then might discover _some new cool plugin_ that conflicts with something already in your distribution.

Rule of thumb, perhaps install some of the plugins these distributions use.

You're better off with a decent dotfile manager like [https://yadm.io](https://yadm.io) and then considering a modular approach [http://branliu.com/blog/2012/05/14/organizing-your- vimrc/](http://branliu.com/blog/2012/05/14/organizing-your-vimrc/)

much less headaches in the end.</comment>


China Forces Birth Control on Uighurs to Suppress Population - <AUTHOR> https://news.yahoo.com/china-forces-widespread-birth-control-115023009.html <comment><USER2> Roman Catholic Church Bans Birth Control for Catholic Parishioners to Increase Population.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm kinda worried about China. A lot of thinks I'm hearing from it in the recent years sounds a lot like the the thinks I have heard about early hitler Germany during history school class and other sources (I'm German).

It's not even that much about the situation about Uighurs but more about aspects like:

\- The propaganda they use.

\- The way they don't care about human live and dignity.

\- The way they slowly bit by bit make military (and non military) advances. (Germany bit by bit broke many restrictions imposed on it and the world didn't act because they had other problems, and non of the steps by itself where "to big". Take a look at recent Chinese military and "cyber" actions).

\- And very important the sometimes subtle but always present nationalist, fascism and generally reasoning that violence (sometimes even genocide) is ok if it's for the "right" reason you find in close to all Chinese wuxia novels (~= read fantasy youth novels) (from my experience), movies (from my dads experience) and probably other entertainment material.

The last point plus propaganda can easily create a mindset over some generations which is open for pointless war and war crimes, including genocide, if its for revenge and defeats the enemy for good. The problem is that such a thing can easily lead to a vicious cycle of radicalization. And tbh. I wouldn't be surprised if many people making decisions about the Uighurs would also be fine with genocide, it's just not necessary as they can make their culture disappeare without it which is a much more politically efficient method.

I really hope I'm completely wrong about this.

EDIT: Removed PS see my other post about some parts the article misses, maybe intentionally.

<comment><USER4> > like the things I have heard about early hitler Germany

Yes, there are strong similarities between dictatorships in general.

China was thought of as inward-focused and benign until recently. However their goal of having a navy as large as the US and their behavior in the 9-dashes area has changed that.

The Belt-and-Road initiative is a thinly-veiled attempt to colonize weak countries economically.

The corona pandemic has made the world aware of behavior that was previously downplayed.

But what will cause extreme friction with other countries is China's refusal to ever accept no for an answer. This posture of "never compromise" will lead to war with forceful leaders like Trump or proud neighbors like India.

I think the US should give Japan 100 nuclear weapons, then after that, the US should forcibly clear the 9-dashes islands.

<comment><USER4> At first this may not sound that bad, but it is truly Hitler-level stuff:

China forcing birth control on Uighurs to suppress population, report says

[https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia- china-53220713](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-53220713)

<comment><USER3> Note that China is forcing birth control on __all of it 's population __. Through they do seem to more strictly apply their general law to the Uighurs minority.

I posted that the article misses out on this on another top level post.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I am no fan of China, but people on the West want sustainable growth, jobs in local countries with strong IP protections (no outsourcing or even manufacturing outside if possible), carbon footprint to be reduced by developing countries with a fraction of per capita income as them and who historically did not put much into the atmosphere (i know China is the biggest polluter but it manufactures for the entire world and does have a high population and historical per capita emissions are low) on one hand ...

...and on the other hand they do not allow the universal applications of a rule to the entire country crying genocide without any nuance, historical analysis etc.

Muslim fertility rate and child bearing ages(compared to overall population) are very high in India too and if India brings a population control bill for the entire country in the future i guess similar narratives will be created.

The same people will go on online forums and then talk about 'street shitter' memes and why countries without basic sanitation access should not pursue space dreams etc.

I mean it is very reasonable to limit family to 2 kids (replacement fertility level) today, increasing life expectancies do not help the economics either.

</comment><comment><USER3> This article specifically misses one point. China already has policies wrt. the amount of children (now 2, in the past one) and sterilization of woman had been a common thing in especially rural china since years. Through some minorities where excluded from this rules. But this means that this is indeed in line with chines law independent of any minorities. Through it's most likely a discriminatory selective application of the law. Enforcing it much stricter against Uighurs than anyone else.

Copied from my other post. I don't want to intermix two different aspects of discussion.</comment>


Wealth creation - <AUTHOR> http://blog.anomalistdesign.com/wealth-creation <comment><USER2> _> My own opinion is very strong that we humans have power to change things. Simply put, the power is given to us by the historical fact of The Lord Jesus Christ and his life and work seen in the Gospels. I believe he is the Son of God, but a person only needs to understand him and his deeds and his words as these present in the Gospels, so as to gain fully spiritual and immensely practical answers to our self-inflicted, self-engaged and self-interested political and economic systems for self-harm._

Right.</comment>


Flooding in Europe - The Big Picture  - <AUTHOR> http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2013/06/flooding_in_europe.html <comment><USER2> > The Danube River reached its highest level in 500 years.

Yet the world seems sure there is no chance we are witnessing some sort of human induced climate change (or at least that seems to be the opinion here is Australia)?

The climate change sceptics say it's only natural variations in climate, nothing to worry about.

The thing I never understand is, if I'm wrong and the climate change turns out to be natural, the worst that can happen is we end up with a cleaner world and in any case we still have to deal with a naturally changing climate.

But if the climate sceptic (wins the debate yet) is wrong, we end up doing nothing and the planet suffers decades of man induced suffering and misery, as we desperately try to fix the issue we ignored for far too many years :(</comment>


In the Age of Google DeepMind, Do the Young Go Prodigies of Asia Have a Future? - <AUTHOR> http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/in-the-age-of-google-deepmind-do-the-young-go-prodigies-of-asia-have-a-future <comment><USER2> I mean, that's like asking whether marathon runners have a future now that we've got cars. Exercising one's brain/having pleasure through the game could be an end in itself, and is independent of how machines perform.

<comment><USER3> Take it from someone that walked the path of becoming a professional Go player, being a professional and an amateur are completely different attitudes towards the game. Tic Tac Toe is solved, but can be fun to play when you are a kid. Amateur Go playing can still exist, but the goal of strength is more instilled in the path to pro-ship.

This really suggests that going the path of being the strongest is no longer sensical. Why would a human try to be the best calculator in the world, knowing it will never beat any calculator ever? Just to prove itself to other human caculator wannabes? Senseless.

This is a real paradigm shift and we still need to understand what to do. But obliviously ignore AlphaGo is akin should be unfathomable for a professional aspiring player.

As a professional, the first question to ask is what will AlphaGo bring to Go Theory. We still dont know how much stronger it is than Lee Sedol (or how far it is from "God"). Pushing it to its limits will show us insights we havent found yet and we will update ourselves as players to the most current theory.

The second step is answering the following question: Can human + AlphaGo beat Alpha Go? A human potentiated with AlphaGo's reading power can intuitively pick variations that would give it an edge? If so, we have found that Go still harbors a human secret that is jsut overly compensated by reading.

The last step would be, even if human participation gives negligible results, can human + Alpha Go create better games than Alpha Go?

<comment><USER4> Anything that Go has to go through as a result of AlphaGo, Chess has already gone through with Stockfish and its predecessors (such as Deep Blue, though I realize it's not exactly the same).

Is there a particular reason why a chess computer would be any more undefeatable than a Go computer? Even though Kasparov lost, Nakamura destroyed Rybka 10 years later. Now that we have a competitive Go AI, isn't it likely the game of Go will shift and be even more competitive since now more players can get world-class practice and suggestions on their own?

<comment><USER3> If I understand AlphaGo correctly, I don't think that any human in the future will be able to beat the AlphaGo today. AlphaGo didn't beat Lee Sedol because it played new and marvelous moves we need to understand.

It played better because it knew the exact consequences of the options it was presented, and could calculate it and make better decisions than human intuition. No human can develop that reading power, and its not reasonable to think a human in the future will have intuition that beats the calculation of AlphaGo.

Since reading, the core ability of Go can now be completely replaced by a computer, the question is what others decisions can a player make. Can he make strategic decisions better than AlphaGo? Can intuition still best AlphaGo calculating capacity?

Eventually, we can think that we will have computational power to actually solve Go, and if there is any sense at all to play Go after that, its about finding those beautiful games, from beginning to end, that provoke emotions and turn Go purely into art.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> From the article: "It is estimated that, of South Korea's three hundred and twenty pros, only around fifty are able to earn a living on tournament winnings." This isn't going to result in massive unemployment.

However, cheating with computer assistance is likely to become a problem, as it is in chess.[1] (The state of the art in computer chess is now roughly at "laptop with off the shelf program can curb-stomp human world champion.")

[1] [http://en.chessbase.com/post/yet-another-case-of-cheating- in...](http://en.chessbase.com/post/yet-another-case-of-cheating-in-chess)

<comment><USER6> What kind of configuration would you need to run the DeepMind setup? Looking at the wikipedia page if we assume the setup [1] there then it seems like at this time it would be out of the realm of feasibility at this time of setting up this software for cheating.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaGo#Hardware](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaGo#Hardware)

<comment><USER7> Google's infrastructure gives it an extra boost, but even the single machine version can beat the distributed version 25% of the time.[1]

[1] [https://twitter.com/demishassabis/status/708489093676568576](https://twitter.com/demishassabis/status/708489093676568576)

<comment><USER8> The nice thing about most of this deep learning stuff is that you can use a million machine hours to train your model, and almost no time to make an evaluation. So the single machine version has all of the pattern recognition given to it by the cluster, but a few ply less tree search depth.

So to me this underscores the relative importance of the deep learning model vs the tree search.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The game play among human competitors is sure to change just as in chess, as new players will train on AlphaGo, etc. whose gameplay will differ significantly from accepted norms in a purely human playing field. For instance, chess programs can plan and optimize to a much further depth (number of moves) in terms of strategy. So, newer players like Carlsen, etc. play differently these days than older ones like Anand, etc. [1]

[1] [http://noenthuda.com/blog/2016/03/11/how-computers-have- chan...](http://noenthuda.com/blog/2016/03/11/how-computers-have-changed- chess/)

<comment><USER10> This is already happening. Down at the end of a recent Wired article about Fan Hui, the European champion who lost to AlphaGo recently, it mentions that his close interactions with the software has changed his view of the game, and his ranking has also moved, from 633 "into the 300s".

The relevant paragraph is the one with the heading "Machine changes human", at the end.

[http://www.wired.com/2016/03/sadness-beauty-watching- googles...](http://www.wired.com/2016/03/sadness-beauty-watching-googles-ai- play-go/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> The safest best for sectors of the economy that will continue to prosper under a hard-AI regime are those that involve making humans, especially the rich (eg, owners of AI-based companies) feel happy via human interactions. Go instructors are such a niche.

Actually I would expect game-players and game-instructors to do better than the median profession under such a scenario, because playing games against other humans for entertainment & pure enjoyment of competition is a very human pursuit.

<comment><USER12> If that's the future, then I'd say AI companies should have to be at least 49% owned by a trust fund in which every citizen automatically has a share.

<comment><USER11> In the limit near every company becomes an AI company.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I wouldn't write those professionals off so easily. People barely knows AlphaGo until now. Once they start learning about AlphaGo's behaviors, they may be able to come out with new tactics. No doubt it will be a collective effort from the Go community, no one can beat the machine alone.

<comment><USER14> It's true that humans should be allowed a rematch. And all professionals Go players could be playing in concert.

Hell, Google should organize a "AlphaGo against the world" on internet.

<comment><USER15> Can't wait for Twitch Plays Go.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> In the age of Deep Blue, do young chess prodigies have a future?

<comment><USER17> In the age of high tech robot replacements, do unskilled factory workers have a future?

<comment><USER18> This one unfortunately isn't analogous with the others.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> In general I'd suggest reading "The player of Games" by Banks. A Culture novel that explores why would someone care about being good at "boardgames" in a universe where even the dumbest appliance could easily outperform any human.

<comment><USER20> One thing that Banks never addressed in his Culture novels was humans wanting to become Minds. I mean if I live in a society where there are humanoids and Minds, then I want to be a Mind, with a stream-of-consciousness that includes the transition. Wouldn't this be true of many people who are in to science?

<comment><USER21> Didn't the Minds manipulate culture to channel their charges in various directions (ie, against war-like tendencies)? Maybe ascension was one of the thought-patterns they engineered out.

<comment><USER22> They did. It isn't explicitly stated, to the best of my knowledge, but the Minds are smart enough that they could easily have done that—and were shown to engineer other parts of the society, such as their deathism.

Humanity has very limited purpose in the Culture. On the surface, it looks nice, but they're effectively pets. Their willingness to ascend was cut off right along with their willingness to live.

All of which is done by social engineering. If you _want_ to go the intelligence-enhancement route, they'll help. They just make sure that very few people do.

<comment> david-given That's true, but it's also rather deceptive. Humans are the fundamental core of the Culture; its basic purpose is to look after human-scale people, and this shapes everything it does --- the Culture's a bit suspicious of ascension because they feel it's an abandonment of their responsibilities. Humans are, in effect, the Minds' religion.

And dying is just one of several end-of-life events you can pick, if you want to (including opting out entirely). Naturally it's the one we tend to focus on, because it's the only one we currently have, but the Culture's got lots.

<comment><USER20> Right, this is where things break down. It's fictional universe, after all.

What are the negative effects of having more Minds? Resource depletion?

If your cat suddenly tells you that what it wants more than anything is to learn General Relativity, then either you're having a psychotic episode, or you have to question how benevolent and ethical your coddling is for your fuzzy wuzzy slave animal.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I would think this has to be a serious inflection point... As far learning how to think, strategize, competing with friends, etc go will remain. However for the extremely few say 100 really top level players, this has to in a way be disheartening... at that level its about competition, and the will, discipline and ability to advance... it has to be disheartening to know you will never be the best.

Its kind of like climbing mount Everest 'because it was there'. Its just not 'there' anymore.

<comment><USER24> It'd be like climbing Everest on foot in the shadow of a cable car which runs to the top. Still a clallenge, but one that feels pointless.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Go has still much more to offer as it is not even close to be a solved game. Additionally, there's handicap Go, and additionally handicaps can be applied to the machine. Go offers the possibility for players of different levels to enjoy a game.

</comment><comment><USER26> It seems like the authors are trying to use the latest story in the Go world to write about how all the jobs will be replaced by neural networks or something. I mean, people still throw javelins even though it is fairly trivial to build a machine that shoots a projectile farther than a human can throw.

We still enjoy trivia games even though it is easy to google the answers. I dunno, I think it is a bit of a stretch to think AlphaGo has ended serious competitive human Go.

</comment><comment><USER27> I'm pretty sure humans will not stop playing go at intensely high levels just because a computer can beat them.

The analogy to chess is an interesting one, though, not quite as straightforward as it may seem. Chess, when it was first conquered by computers a couple of decades ago, was a triumph of computer vs human, sure, but in such a different way from the way humans play it. Chess is amenable to brute force search in a way that go isn't (though I understand the chess programs really aren't pure brute force), but human chess players don't (as far as I know) really don't play chess in a brute force way, they rely in intuition, experience, and even a bit of gambling and hedging whether their opponent will "see" or "realize" the strategy in time.

As a result, the chess programs were winning through a "reasoning" process that was very different from what you experience watching people play the game. Something very different is going on when humans play, which makes it interesting - in that sense you can sort of dismiss the machine as playing a different game, albeit one with the same board, pieces, and rules. Instead, it's a giant calculation that happens to beat the more intuitive approach once you can search and score X positions per second through an entirely alternate approach to the game.

This current breakthrough with go sounds different, in that it _may_ mean that computers now play go in a way that is much more similar to the way humans play it (it would be interesting to see if a chess program designed more like the go program would have a huge edge over the brute force search approach). Or, if not the same, perhaps a way that is equally if not more interesting.

I'm kind of bummed that I'm out of my depth on this one (I don't know go or chess well enough to really say), but it's an interesting question.

</comment><comment><USER28> Good writing.

I also expect that more people will start playing Go, or like me, get a renewed interest in the game.

I read that Lee Sidol is planning on retiring from active play in a few years and move to the USA to evangelize the game in the West.

I played the South Korean national champion and the women's world champion in handicapped exhibition games in the 1970s. It would be awesome to get to do the same with Lee Sidol!

</comment><comment><USER29> This reminds me of the 1947 story "With Folded Hands" \- [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/With_Folded_Hands](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/With_Folded_Hands) \- where a post apocalyptic future is the consequence of full automation and robotics . people have no purpose left.

</comment><comment><USER30> Well, absolutely, if they're talking about Golang that is. In all seriousness, a computer did fairly well on Jeopardy some years back, and we're still watching the game show as it's still quite relevant.

<comment><USER31> And a trained human + computer with internet access (Google search!) could beat the best humans in Jeopardy for quite a while now.

<comment><USER32> Not really. Jeopardy is all about buzzer timing[0]. With Google search, you're always going to be slow on the buzzer. That's okay, though. The actual trivia is pretty easy. It's designed this way to be accessible to the average TV viewer.

[0] [http://www.pisspoor.com/buzzer.html](http://www.pisspoor.com/buzzer.html)

<comment><USER33> Buzz then search. I think players tend to work this way too, buzzing as soon as they feel like they'll know the answer, but before they actually consciously have it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Maybe if they learn to collaborate with AI. Or eventually, get implants. As all serious professionals will need to do. That may seem far-fetched, but how many runners compete with bicyclists?

<comment><USER35> Well you don't see pro runners get bicycle implants (that would hurt)

<comment><USER34> True. But people do get surrogate limbs.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> TL;DR: several personal stories about people who invested a lot of time in the game, general information about go in general as well as what's going on right now, and finally, a semi-answer with a quote:

"A dolphin swims faster than Michael Phelps, but we still want to see how fast he can go," Lockhart said. "We're humans and we care about other humans and what they can do."

Too many words, too little information for one article.

</comment><comment><USER37> Here's a related and possibly more interesting question nobody seems to be asking -- in the age of robotics and artificial intelligence, does exploitation of workers and environmental catastrophe at the point of extraction of the materials we use to build computers and robots have a future?

And if the answer is yes, why isn't anyone trying to use robots for that purpose?

<comment><USER31> People are automating resource gathering all the time. See eg [http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-10-18/rio-tinto-opens- worlds...](http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-10-18/rio-tinto-opens-worlds-first- automated-mine/6863814)

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> All AI does is remove the ability to progress through the ranks accurately via online play. Unregulated online competition will suddenly become a bumpy road full of Elo-breaking presences.

I gather this may be a Big Deal, but except insofar as it kills the sport by a thousand cuts, 'Young Go Prodigies' have nothing to worry about.

<comment><USER31> The computer will be able to give you an Elo number just by looking at all the moves you did in a few games.

Since the computer can tell for every single move whether you played perfectly or if not, by how much you decreased your chances of winning against perfect competition, you'll be able to get a hundred signals out of a game into your elo calculation, instead of just one win/loss condition.

They already do that for catching cheaters in chess. In essence, you treat the positions that occur in a game not as a logical sequence, but as a series of multiple-choice questions.

<comment><USER38> Color me skeptical. The value of things like Elo is they provide a ramping scale with some degree of statistical significance, because they cover play over many games. I don't think a computer is going to be able to extrapolate with a high degree of confidence, because human play is variable from game to game and long-run strategies are non-obvious constructs for the computer.

You're thinking in terms of 'The AI has solved Go mathematically', but that's not the case; Just because you can run a Monte Carlo best-choice- picker/guesser algorithm doesn't mean you can meaningfully rank how deliberate choices compare with each other more than a few plays away.

<comment><USER31> Long-run strategies are a human crutch. It's easiest to see when you solved a game mathematically, that you can just value positions independently.

Go hasn't been solved to that level, but it's apparently been solved to higher level than humans ever reached.

I am just parroting [http://www.uschess.org/content/view/12677/763](http://www.uschess.org/content/view/12677/763) here, so I might as well quote:

"To catch an alleged cheater, Regan takes a set of chess positions played by a single player—ideally 200 or more but his analysis can work with as few as 20—and treats each position like a question on a multiple-choice exam. The score on this exam translates to an Elo rating, a score Regan calls an Intrinsic Performance Rating (IPR)."

This approach also allows to score historic players absolutely, instead of only relatively and trying to find sets of overlapping lifetimes until we reach the modern age.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> This article is trying to answer a question no one asked. Of course Go prodigies will always have a future regardless of how well computers become at playing Go. When we start handling out championships, officially ranking computer programs and awarding prize money to them then we can have this conversation.

</comment><comment><USER40> Why should I really be concerned about Go prodigies? Aren't there a lot more ordinary people being affected by technological unemployment who have much fewer resources to fall back on?

<comment><USER34> Such as lawyers. And truck drivers, of course.

But there's so much more to this than human obsolescence. This is the cusp of a new stage in evolution.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> I would love to see AlphaGo vs itself.

</comment><comment><USER25> In the age of computers and pocket calculators, does mental calculation have a future?

</comment><comment><USER42> Forgive me, but the headline, all by itself, left me thinking:

      Why are there so many young programmers adopting the Go
      programming language, throughout Asia, exclusively?

</comment><comment><USER43> ...Have Chess players had a future...?!

</comment><comment><USER44> This is stupid.</comment>


Insanity vs Intelligence: Pinky and the Brain Conspiracy Theory - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@WritersWasteland/insanity-vs-intelligence-pinky-and-the-brain-conspiracy-theory-78079e5cbe28 <comment><USER2> Yet another individual who can't separate a quote from a definition. I had to stop before finishing solely because this author insists on claiming "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result." is not only the definition of insanity(at best you could consider it an anecdotal indicator) but also incorrectly attributes it to Einstein. I know the quality of most medium articles is suspect to begin with, but please stop force feeding people obvious bullshit.

</comment><comment><USER3> Subtlety is not a conspiracy.</comment>


Ask HN: How much of your product/project is your own code? - <AUTHOR>

With all the wonderful apps and services out there that have been made or are in the works, it'd be interesting to know how much was built by hand and how much was built on pre-existing code. Did you build it from the ground up or use other services? While the use of other services will most likely be the case for things such as digital delivery and payment processing (be sure to include those though), perhaps there will be a few surprises. <comment><USER2> For a fairly quickly implementable web product logic (include basic auth, profiles, blogs, dynamic pages - they don't count to main logic, however are necessary), I usually end up writing ~40% of the code, remaining is code-reuse or available in choice of development framework or at some corner of github.

</comment><comment><USER3> Do searches on github count?

</comment><comment><USER4> Depends on the project. My usual go-to is Django, so relatively speaking, while I might have 'written' the authentication model, it depends on thousands of lines of code that the wonderful Django devs already wrote for me.

The right answer to this question, for me at least, is "as little as I can get away with". Sometimes you end up with a bit of technical debt, as a lot of libraries don't quite work how you want or expect, so you end up either forking or rewriting those after launch, but I'm a firm believer in just 'getting to launch' as quickly as possible, and you don't get there by writing your own ORM, caching mechanism, etc.

Sorry to give what has to be a very non-surprising answer.</comment>