Counterpoint: Google is paying Apple $20b/year to keep themselves as the default search engine in iOS. Android's biggest competitor is iOS. They are now effectively funding their competition on a core product interface. I see this as strategically devastating.
Sure, and a world where we're more dependent on each other would be a better world. It's clearer all the time that humans work much better that way.
But if you're only a "kindee", if you structure your life in a way that you can only receive help from other people and never be the helper, that's not humans dependent on each other.
Tangentially related, but I enjoyed reading "The Most Human Human" by Brian Christian - granted it's written in a pre-LLM world, it's still very much relevant.
The book is following the annual Turing Test competition, in which, humans are chatting with AIs or real humans without knowing which is which and give them a score out of 10 for being most human and the AI that is "the most human" wins the competition. The twist is, not all humans get 10/10 for being human either - so the human that's the most human also wins a prize.
Tolerance Paradox is not a "Tolerance Threshold" - it's a Paradox. You cannot be maximally liberal "up to Tolerance Paradox" - as soon as you are maximally liberal to any threshold, you are no longer liberal - hence the paradox.
It seems you define liberal in a rigid way. What I tried to convey is that for any Tolerance to exist, it has room to tolerate anything except Anti-Tolerance, as part of its essence. Paradox isn't a contradiction ("you are no longer liberal"), it is something that might seem like a contradiction. But maybe we agree about that and my wording was confusing.
Let's leave "liberal" definition aside. I agree it's not well defined - I only used, because you said "maximally liberal".
A dilemma is a hard choice.
A paradox is a principle that undermines itself when applied consistently. It doesn't "seem" like it - it is. In this case, if you stop intolerant ideas, you are no longer tolerant. That's quite simple, and Popper named it correctly as such. Now, if I put my 2c on it, the danger of this arbitrary "Tolerant except for the Anti-tolerant" idea is that, the tools you use to stop the Anti-Tolerant will one day turn around be used against the Tolerant as well, because these definitions are fluid.
When the example are "People from X are vermin" - yes this is anti-tolerant. But when "We should first create jobs for people born here"; is this anti-tolerant? It's a slippery slope where all ideas except the ruling one can be muted.
Exactly, Popper recognized that the paradox was not a rule or even a suggestion, but was rather a problem without a clear solution. That’s why he named it as such.
Besides, Popper isn’t a god nor is he the only one with an opinion on this problem. Rawls for instance thought that only in exceptional circumstances should intolerance be suppressed. Popper’s paradox also isn’t anything special, literally every theory of human rights can be attacked by finding specific cases in which exceptions must be made for self protection. These exceptions do not invalidate those rights nor the necessity for them.
> These exceptions do not invalidate those rights nor the necessity for them.
Important, glad you mention that. The Paradox of Tolerance gives people a tool to free themselves from rigid beliefs that ultimately push people to give up rights. People are way more united if they can see each other unmediated. They share principles! Guided by these a healthy debate and democratic process is possible. Revisiting decisions as well when society progresses.
(Ok, I think the confusion is due to how English has used this french word for centuries, but since early 20th century gave it a new meaning. English Wikipedia redefines it from "seemingly absurd yet really true" to a shallow form, erasing doxa, thus only keeping a contradiction as defined in formal Logic.)
My point is that Anti-Intolerance is the essence of Tolerance, not something outside of it.
> , the tools you use to stop the Anti-Tolerant will one day turn around be used against the Tolerant as well, because these definitions are fluid.
I understand. Discussion about that should be part of a healthy society, between conformant players that respect the public democratic order. Knowing the paradox is the anti-dote against the players seeking to destroy this shared system, those that do not respect democratic boundaries, they like to play the game of taking a principle, coming up with something absurd, declaring that the principle should be understood as rigid, all to declare that the principle does not exist. Because for the few to take advantage, the many have to give up their common values.
That is the big rift. And that is why I want to give this tool to the online HN reader, because the learned Rigid Beliefs only serve to destroy common principles needed for a just society. (Especially in the US context, where boolean thinking is imho very prevalent, which I see as the fruits of political marketing.) People reading about the Paradox might get some proper mind frame for the first time to escape the nihilist narratives.
> When the example are "People from X are vermin" - yes this is anti-tolerant. But when "We should first create jobs for people born here"; is this anti-tolerant? It's a slippery slope where all ideas except the ruling one can be muted.
When you discriminate against people not born here, I would ask: why?
a) Are people born here disadvantaged and do you bring balance, or
b) Do you think citizens not born here are less worthy than
those who are?
In the case of (a), I can see how you could propose that. There might be a discussion about equal outcome or equal chance. You have a democracy and public healthy debate, you share a common society. I propose you have a debate and vote for it.
In the case of (b), this would not be a discussion in my country as the constitution stipulates that everyone being in this country will be treated equally in the same circumstances, reasoning from "equal value". There is also the declaration of Human Rights. So I would say it puts a real burden on the proponent to defend why seeking inequality at the detriment of a group is justified.
The discipline of writing for sharing knowledge is immense - not only for the sharing part, but to look at yourself (or your research) in the mirror with a critical eye and revise it multiple times. If you don't have that discipline, sharing knowledge even with colleagues / networks becomes harder. It's not only LLM churning out slop, but it's also without that discipline, the researcher putting out half finished work.
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