I’m a ML/AI engineer and student for context, if that makes my worldview and how I choose to tackle problems like this any more apparent. I’m quite busy with my work right now IRL due to the time of year. I don’t really have a ton of time to write essays.
Full time surgical tech by day, part time nursing student by night, here. I get it. I 100% shouldn't be doing these lengthy writeups either lol. Doing it anyway:
A big problem for me here is the illicit nature of this sort of reasoning, and it pops up in a lot of your ethos. You start out by making some sort of statistical observation, such as the fact that there are so many bad parents, then use it to make a universal assertion… e.g, “it’s a losing battle either way.” You can either admit that what you actually mean is “very unlikely,”
Oh, if an absolutist statement in response to very high or very low probability is a hangup, then that explains a lot of why you're taking issue with my posts. Nothing is certain in an absolute sense. If that car zipping toward the cliff's edge starts some kind of professional-tier driving maneuver right now where it skids to a 180° turn and uses the full force of the engine to apply force in the opposite direction, then yeah, maybe it'll have a chance at not going over the edge. But when we're talking about about the statistical equivalent to a miracle, I'm confident in using absolutist language to say that won't be the case: the car will go off the edge, even if "will" in this case is only 99% or w/e certain.
To the contrary, I'd argue that making a decision based on that fleeting possibility of a perfectly executed turnaround to be an act of faith, as it's in blatant disregard to very well documented trends.
That isn’t really strategy, though. Collapsing into moralist abstention surrenders the strategic domain entirely. Strategy answers the question of “what interventions change outcomes?” Your default must be: could any action plausibly alter trajectories? You’ve refused that question by fiat. If abstention is your only strategy, state it is a moral choice, not a “real-world strategy.”
Disagree. I'll put my nurse hat on for this one: interventions in healthcare are typically made with the goal of being curative or at least stabilization to set the groundwork for what will later be curative. But that's only when the patient's condition is one that can plausibly improve. There comes a point where your body is so fucked up that we literally stop attempting curative interventions. And that absolutist response happens even when there's still a tiny chance at turning that patient around: we don't attempt curative interventions all the way up until you die. When you're a hundred or so yards out from that cliff, we put you on hospice so you can live out the tiny remainder of your life in as much comfort as possible.
Humanity is our patient. That patient has not been compliant with the healthcare plan that could have saved their life, and the condition is now so unstable that further interventions are exceedingly unlikely to work. It's time to go on hospice.
Reduction of suffering is both a real-world strategy and a moral choice.
You’re mistaking emotional stance for epistemic method. What you’re calling “optimism” isn’t wishful thinking. It’s a methodologically based refusal to collapse uncertainty into certainty, to keep probability distinct from necessity.
You appear to be projecting again. Your stance is clinging to a hope based on the tiny possibility that humanity will deviate from the trends that have culminated into our current state. That is wishful thinking. Optimism. My assertion is that the trends we've observed will continue: much like the object in motion that stays in motion, our trajectory will remain unchanged unless we apply an opposing force of enough magnitude to turn us around - and so far humanity has not shown any willingness to do so. A minority of us have expressed the desire to do so, but that isn't going to cut it.
You’re substituting anecdote and grievance for argument
Climate data and global political trends are not anecdote. I've only brought anecdote into this conversation a single time, which I prefaced by specifically calling out as anecdote.
Are there counterfactual statements?: What specific intervention would falsify your claim?
No. Humanity as a whole, including its governments, corporations, and individuals would need to unify under the goal of, at the very least, stabilizing our climate. That would give us the time we need fix the other shit like civil liberties. Not only are we not doing that, we are actively accelerating in the opposite direction.
Probability: Are you claiming zero probability or very low probability? Be numeric if you can.
Very low. The problem isn't that humanity doesn't have the power to turn this around, the problem is that it's refusing. I can't quantify that any more than I could a type 2 diabetic subsisting on a diet of candy bars and soda: I can scream about how each mouthful is pushing them closer to a death that they're already standing on the edge of; but this just amuses them because they think it makes me a 'triggered lib' or some shit.
Value disclosure: Is this conclusion driven by empirical expectation or by moral preference? Label it and throw it into one of these two bins.
That is a false dichotomy. My conclusion is based on the empirical data of climate and political trends; and the moral preference of not willingly subjecting anyone to that cruelty.
