[zebomon]

Very engaging look at a very difficult topic to approach analytically.

I'm reminded of something I learned about the founder of Stormfront, the internet's first white supremacist forum. His child went on to attend college away from home, her first time away from her family, and over a period of roughly two years, she attended dinners with a group of Jewish students who challenged each of her beliefs one at a time. Each time, as she accepted the evidence her friends presented to her about a particular belief, she nonetheless would integrate the new information with her racist worldview. This continued piece by piece until there was nothing left of her racist worldview at all.

It's both heartening and disheartening at the same time, because if this person can change her mind after almost two decades of constant indoctrination during her formative years, then surely anyone can change their mind. That's the heartening part: the disheartening part is, of course, that the effort it took is far from scalable at present and much more difficult to apply to someone who remains plugged into whatever information sources they are getting their current fix of nonsense from.

[zahlman]

It's also noteworthy that she was willing to sit with and listen to them in the first place.

[pessimizer]

I think this is just gloating. Children leaving home for college and quickly abandoning the belief systems of their family is almost more common than the opposite, where they maintain them. Especially if the belief system is something as unpopular as white supremacy mythology; not easy to make new friends at your new school if you don't give that up.

I'm sure she maintains many beliefs that may people would see as racist, along with her classmates. She hasn't been educated or fixed, she just left home.

[hn_acc1]

IIRC, the stats say that overwhelmingly, children will become a version of their parents, including beliefs, etc. This actually seems more like the exception than the rule.

[mensetmanusman]

AI chat bots in the future may be a part of ritual mind cleansing.

[staph]

Wait are you writing from the past?

[ilaksh]

I remember my first year in college as being the time when I solidified my own first worldview. Prior to that, I had some ideas like the existence of God (in some form) that I was ambivalent about or maybe deferring final judgement. That's when I decided that I was an atheist.

Coincidentally, around the same time my twin brother became a serious Christian. He was socially integrated into a group. He finished college. I did not.

Then years later, maybe late 20s or early 30s, I became convinced that I had been wrong about my government my whole life and that they were not trustworthy. 9/11 being a false flag (which I still believe) was evidence of that.

The interesting thing was at the time when I was in New York I had completely accepted the idea that those three buildings had all turned into dust because the jet hit them. I remember walking around lower Manhattan to pick up a check and the dust was just coating everything.

I had even done some word processing on one of the twin towers leases shortly before the event while temping at Wachtell Lipton. At the time I made no connection.

Anyway, I think an underappreciated aspect of belief graphs is their connection to social groups and identity. It was much easier for me to question institutions when I already felt more marginalized and actually partly blamed society for it being so hard for me to handle my needs and find a place in it.

Another aspect of group membership and beliefs is practical. When groups are competing strategically, they often do so in ways that are not particularly ethical. It's much easier to justify this if you think of the other group as being deeply flawed, evil, invaders, etc.

Although some of these demonization s of the other group do have some kernel of truth to them, they are largely oversimplifications in the belief graphs leading to dangerous inaccuracies.

What are the practical structural and cultural differences that lead to the group divisions? They largely seem geographic, economic, ethnic.

Could a more sophisticated, better integrated, and more accurate belief system help? Or do the social structures and networks largely define the groups?

Are we just basically mammalian ant colonies? Brutally fighting each other for dominance any time there is a resource conflict?

If the other side seems to be trying to hog important resources any time they get a chance, you perceive that you are not playing a fair game. It's not a civil interaction. The other doesn't play by the rules or tell the truth or leave any subtly in discourse. So why should your group, unless it wants to get wiped out?

In my worldview the faint hope is that having more abundance of resources will somehow lead to more civility.

[01HNNWZ0MV43FF]

> If the other side seems to be trying to hog important resources any time they get a chance, you perceive that you are not playing a fair game.

That's why I'm okay with Democratic states and counties using gerrymandering to keep seats. The Electoral College, and the Senate, and the House of Representatives, are tilted towards states that always vote Republican. It is already far from "One person, one vote". I'll fight fair when the people who want me dead and exiled fight fair first. I already have my honor in that I don't want them killed for their stupid beliefs.