And pretty easy to call. If it sounds too good to be true, it is. Consistently.

In particular, when the market value of a particular asset is going through the roof, and popular opinion even among "expert" economists is that this growth will continue indefinitely, that is a sure sign that there's a bubble in progress. I don't believe there is a single historical counterexample. This happens with almost every bubble, and yet it never happens when there is no bubble.

Not to mention that it only takes elementary reasoning to see that economic upturns based on, oh, companies that don't actually offer any product or service or feature anything like real a business plan, or on loans offered to people with no income and no assets, aren't on the stablest ground imaginable.

I don't find that stubborn contrarianism is especially common in practice. There aren't many people making predictions that go against all the conventional wisdom and that are wrong to a higher than average degree.

That was not my point at all. I find it strange that people can simultaneously think they are correct about something where they know that almost all future people will think them incorrect. Gay marriage, slavery etc. I never meant to bring into it concerns how they would be viewed by history. The only concern is whether they think they are on the correct side of an issue. And again remember that I am only speaking of issues where one assmmes that the future will continually deem them wrong. If they suspect that eventually it will change back to their stance my point does not apply.

The future is a different tribe, why would those that don't like to think/question things ever give a damn about another's moral code because after all, this is the way of their tribe and is therefore correct.

So you're a vegetarian?

I don't think it's common. There are probably a lot of people who see the trend, but believe that they can change it. If someone truly thinks their views will always be deemed wrong and still holds onto it, that's coming from an alienation from society. Basically their point of view would be equal to saying: "people are inherently amoral/ inferior in intelligence compared to me" That thinking has to be a result of some sort of psychological disorder.

Another way of putting it is, there's two people in life(generalizing here) those that tend to conform and those that tend to question; the former group will simply conform to whatever is acceptable in the current status quo, whereas the latter don't give a **** about what other groups think.


I think one can deduce this without asking, going by his love of his pet bird and many threads he has made revolving around animal consciousness.

I don't believe in God.

I think that most people now and in the future will still believe in God.

So yes, there are some people who are only interested in being on the correct side of an issue, no matter what people now or in the future think - no matter how small a minority they might be in.

That's another good example, I wish I'd thought of it.

I guess David is just highly optimistic and assumes that regular people will eventually "figure out" the rational way of thinking about things.

I suggest David spend more time observing regular people. They will never be rational.

(Unless we go transhuman, I admit there's some hope there.)

Or they are, in fact, inherently superior in intelligence or morality to the average person. (This is not hard. The fact that you know how to spell is a likely indicator that you would demonstrate above-average ability on most cognitive measures.)

Or they have a unique perspective / access to unique information.

Or they adhere to a more subjective view of morality and don't feel that their standard of morality needs to be externally justified.

(Also most people who accept a religious moral system probably believe that those whose actions contradict that morality are amoral relative to those whose actions adhere to that morality. For a person who believes that God says it's immoral to be gay, whether society agrees with God on that issue should probably not be relevant. I won't touch the question of whether religious people have a psychological disorder.)

So you find it strange that people don't consider the direction majority beliefs evolve towards strong evidence.. in the field of ethics?

It struck me as strange, from what I have read of DS's views*, that he would actually pose this proposition.

Perhaps not directly, but it implies that people should give priority to normative values of the majority over independent thought.
It does not appear to be too bad when you pose a currently contraversial position premise on gender bias with Augusta example but if you put it against perhaps something that might not be then the fulcrum of the argument falls to pieces.

DS's proposition also is overly modernist, in that it is linear and telelogical.
Put simply that our values are developing in a certain, with an almost hegelian ineveitability, toward more 'civilised' or 'enlightened' values.

* I had him more pidgeon holed as a hyper-modern utilitarian of the school of Bentham

This seems true and the religious example is a good one, but I don't think there are many issues where someone could be certain that people won't change their mind/learn in the future. OP's scenario requires the "unique thinker" to be sure about it. Even the religious folk might think "they will see when judgement day comes! ". I think this requirement makes the whole scenario unrealistic.

Imagine if you knew that 90% of the current atheist population will turn religious in the future. This should at least make you reconsider whether your position is correct, this doesn't mean you will change your mind to follow the crowd but you would have to revise your beliefs to see if you are not missing something. This is DS point

The trend is moving from religious to atheist, I believe (would like to see some research on this). As we move further into the future, I expect there will continue to be a higher percentage of atheists relative to religious people. I'm not sure religion will ever completely fade away, but I would expect it to become the minority viewpoint far into the future. It already is in Western Europe. This is an interesting topic though, since I would guess religious folks have more children than atheists, and religion instilled during childhood is pretty fervent.

So that example is pretty unique, imo, and I'm not sure it actually works. At this point I still believe people who think they are correct in most cases either believe future generations will agree with them or they simply don't think about such things because they are not very smart.

Edit: Another thought is they know they are wrong, but it is too impractical for them to change their actions. For example, I think I should probably not be driving my SUV at 18 miles/gal when there are smaller cars which get much better mileage. But I really enjoy the benefits of the extra space, and I rationalize it because I also use it for work where I sometimes need 4wheel drive and room for supplies. Maybe in a few decades technology will catch up and we won't need oil anymore.... Such rationalizing may have also been the case with slavery.

Ahh, well that is a much easier problem to solve.

They don't know.

I imagine that most of them don't even suspect that the world will be different.