And now Starship is a failed R&D program with no meaningful progress even to high orbit much less beyond. So disastrously that NASA had to give up on SpaceX ever meeting a target, and built its own rocket that immediately blew past anything SpaceX has to offer.

And we’ve now learned (from an overly honest IPO package) that the cost-per-kilo claims of SpaceX for its rockets are hugely fudged by hidden subsidies—the real cost is much higher, and thus SpaceX’s claim to cost advantage is also fake.

Indeed that SpaceX appears to be almost entirely a scam doomed to fail is well documented by now.

So we shouldn’t spread the idea that calling out conspiracies is necessarily, or even usually, crazy or a bad thing.

I don’t. Nor does Wikipedia, which distinguishes conspiracies (facts) from conspiracy theories (myths), so anyone confused is being irresponsible by not reading the article they are supposed to read. That’s their failure not ours. You are obligated to actually read something before claiming to understand it or learn something from it.

My article is also absolutely clear. Only “an explanation for an event or situation that asserts the existence of a conspiracy by powerful and sinister group when other explanations are more probable” are “necessarily, or even usually, crazy or a bad thing.” And gave many examples to make this clear.

So, you seem to be wasting words here. I already covered this. In the article you claim to be responding to.

Sorry, I don’t understand your sentence.

Recap:

Isaiah 52/53 was originally about Cyrus ending the exile; but by the Maccabean era of the Dead Sea Scrolls it was reinterpreted to refer to a future messiah. That drove diverse sectarian attempts to figure out the date of the end times, leading to merging of Isaiah 52/53 with other passages like Daniel 9 and Wisdom 2/5 and Zechariah 3/6/12, all of which is already visible in the DSS, a system of thinking that obviously produced Christianity (not necessarily “at” Qumran; that’s just a surviving pinhole window into a wider movement Christianity came out of).

This is compatible with a historical Jesus (per my Wichita talk “You’re All Gonna Die”), whereby Jesus (like the other “Jesus Christ” figures Josephus attests: see OHJ, Ch. 4, El. 5–9) deliberately tries getting himself killed to unlock the universal atonement references in these passage, thus allowing God to begin the apocalypse (per Dan 9).

It is also compatible with an ahistorical Jesus (per my Obsolete Paradigm), whereby to solve this problem more efficiently, “visions are had” confirming everything prophesied had been perfectly completed, just somewhere out of view, “and the scriptures prove it” (1 Cor 15, Gal 1, Rom 10 and 16, Phil 2, etc.).

Generally, false claims only require one refutation to exist. Only false claims require endless arguments to keep being made for them.

The ratio is thus a function of the mental illness of antinatalists, generating a compulsion to keep trying to refute what every sane person already sees has been refuted and requires no further attention.

But by lunatics continuing to demand attention, and attempting new rhetoric and devices to infect more people and drive them insane, it is necessary for some of us to keep pointing this out.

Presumably, that’s even why you are here. Everyone else just rolls eyes and moves on, with no interest in hearing the lunatics out. But those who are disturbed or confused by their rhetoric, need a place to go to be rescued from antinatalists’ narcissistic gaslighting.

And so here we are.

My main question/critique was: Why should personal satisfaction be considered a credible metric for choosing which goals to pursue?

The question is nonsensical.

“Why should I not prefer something that dissatisfies me to something that satisfies me” sounds silly for a reason. The question answers itself. Pursuing satisfaction states is literally the only thing anyone ever has reason to do. Even when “I am satisfied by being dissatisfied” you are just defining your satisfaction state, not arguing you should pursue something other than your satisfaction.

If you subjectively value minimizing the amount of valuers, then a universe with no valuers is not worth less.

Non sequitur. What you value cannot dictate what others value or could potentially value. If I value the universe, your not valuing it has not reduced the value of the universe, because it has no impact on my valuing it. Nor does it impact the objectively determinable value, once we realize your not valuing it is objectively irrational.

Hence per the argument of Objective Value Cascade, once you know this, it becomes irrational to even choose your isolated state. If you gain more satisfaction states valuing the universe, you cannot rationally maintain not valuing it. And it is an objective fact that you gain more satisfaction states valuing the universe (because valuing things and people in it entails valuing the thing necessary to realize it).

A universe containing valuers only becomes “better” if one already assumes that the existence of valuation is itself valuable.

Now I know you didn’t read the article but just rage skimmed it for something to quote. Because this non sequitur is what the article extensively exposes and refutes. Try actually responding to that article’s argument—and to prove you read it this time, comment under that article (not here), and quote each actual premise and inference in the argument (actually quote the sentences stating each) that you wish to attempt to rebut.

Almost no one corresponds to Z; and for those who do, we have professional psychotherapists to fix them. And if Z refuses to be fixed, that’s on them; and that does not permit Z to dictate anyone else’s life or prevent non-Z’s from existing and getting the opportunities every other non-Z had. Z’s irrationality and selfishness cannot dictate others’ decisions. And if Z is really unfixable (almost zero people meet that highly restrictive definition) they can just leave. That’s their choice. They cannot force that choice on non-Z’s, present or future.

Everything else is rhetoric.

Thanks for taking the time to reply to my message Richard.

Ok, I have read the whole Wikipedia article now.

Ultimately the message of the article is almost the same as the summary that I had already read.

Any reports of conspiracies that appear to contradict the “mainstream” or ‘recognised’ “qualified experts and historians” can be given the label “conspiracy theory”, which automatically warns most people off of looking any further.

The article leaves the impression that the term “conspiracy theory” is always, or predominantly, pejorative. Therefore, by definition, to throw the label “conspiracy theory” at something is synonymous with saying that it is invalid, if not full on crazy. 

This is also how you use the term.

But that is the problem. It’s a pejorative that most of the population have been trained to accept, so that they automatically filter out any ideas that this label has been applied to, whether by the mainstream media, or even by people in their friendship circles.

This is so widespread now, that most people refrain from investigating any ideas that have been given this label by any voice representing authority or even unqualified people in the media.

But conspiracy theories are like any other theories. Some have strong evidence, some have less evidence, and some have none. There are therefore, true conspiracy theories, just as there are false conspiracy theories.

The unfortunate reality is, if you’re going to categorise any particular theory, some work is necessary.

However much it’s ridiculed, it’s necessary to perform some research. Verify that the version of the theory you have heard is accurate, by going to the source. Then apply one’s own knowledge, and if necessary investigate further.

[I say this, but I admit I’ve never lifted a finger on the keyboard to investigate any theories that involve “lizard people”, or any other extra-terrestrials for that matter lol. Perhaps I should.]

But the bulk of things which attract the label of ‘conspiracy theory’ are barely theories. They are very often simple accusations, not all encompassing theories about the whole world.

The article admits that conspiracies exist, but effectively makes it impossible to discuss them or investigate them like we would any other accusations or scientific theories.

Ironically, your own theories, about the deceits committed by the authors and editors of the bible, and also the deceits committed by the churches ever since, to deny, ignore, hide or suppress any contradictions, or things they don’t like in the bible, could be represented as “conspiracy theories”.

A lot of the conclusions that you have painstakingly expertly researched and arrived at, could be dismissed by any old pundit as “conspiracy theories”.

Once labelled like that, most people would then assume that your theories have little or no evidence, and are probably ‘cranky’. The more advanced would possibly surmise that you are suggesting an unrealistic amount of coordination between the various authors and church authorities spanning an implausible period of many centuries.

I don’t think that any of these assumptions or suspicions accurately reflect your ideas or research. But that is by-the-by, because 95% of the population would thereby, with the turn of a phrase, be inoculated against researching them, let alone buying one of your books.

There is another ‘Wiki’ that has a bearing on this, and helps explain why I think this is important. WikiLeaks has educated many people about important conspiracies that have existed, and in all Bayesian probability, probably continue to exist to this day, seriously impacting and killing people in every continent. 

So we shouldn’t spread the idea that calling out conspiracies is necessarily, or even usually, crazy or a bad thing.

Isaiah 52/53 although about ‘a future messianic era’, it is not a fulfilment of any messianic prophecy that jesus memed?

You give good reasons on why it needs to be refuted.

I just find it disturbing how much of this philosophy is on the internet like for example that Springer Nature Link website has plenty of articles on Antinatalism but I don’t see many articles of people trying to make a counter argument against this philosophy.

Also I hope I am not wasting any of your time.

My main question/critique was: Why should personal satisfaction be considered a credible metric for choosing which goals to pursue?

In The Objective Value Cascade, the following is mentioned:

“In the grand scheme of things, a universe with no valuers is not just subjectively but objectively worth less than a universe with valuers, because then by definition valued things exist in the latter but not in the former.”

(subjective worth)
If you subjectively value minimizing the amount of valuers, then a universe with no valuers is not worth less.

(objective worth)
A universe containing valuers only becomes “better” if one already assumes that the existence of valuation is itself valuable. But that assumption is itself evaluative not objective.

I see it as follows, subjective value, is like the distance between a point and a chosen reference point, representing your personal value system. Objective value is like the distance between 1 point and no other point. To create distance between two points, you need two points.

Things don’t have inherent distance, just like they don’t have objective value, things can have distance with a chosen reference point just like they can have value in your personal value system. Leading to the question, why is personal satisfaction a credible goal?

I definitely agree “pleasure” and “satisfaction” are not the same. What I meant with the hunger thing is, that when objective value would exist, and personal satisfaction is regarded as the objectively correct primary criterea for guiding public policy, then directly engineering the brain to maximize personal satisfaction follows naturally from that premise.