[ExI] Aristotle on trolling

[Anders Sandberg]

A recent translation of Aristotle's classic "On trolling" (it is CC, so 
you can read the whole thing):
http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=10293503&fileId=S2053447716000099
Many good points, and just two pages.

An excerpt:
> One might wonder whether there is an art of trolling and an 
> excellence; and indeed some say that Socrates was a troll, and so that 
> the good man also trolls. And this is in fact what the troll claims: 
> that he is a gadfly and beneficial, and without him to ‘stir up’ the 
> thread it would become dull and unintelligent. But this is incorrect. 
> For Socrates was speaking frankly when he told the Athenians to care 
> for their souls, rather than money and honors, and showed that they 
> lacked knowledge. And this is not trolling but the contrary, 
> exhortation and truth-telling—even if the citizens get very annoyed. 
> For annoyance results from many kinds of speech; and the peculiarity 
> [/idion/] of the troll is not annoyance or controversy in general, but 
> confusion and strife among a community who really agree. And since the 
> one who does this on every occasion must act with knowledge, and on 
> the basis of practice and care, he has a kind of art—just as one might 
> speak of the art of the hack or of the grifter. But it is not really 
> an art, being without any function; and it belongs not to the serious 
> person to be a troll but to the one who lacks education.

I am reminded of Frankfurt's classic "On bullshit":
http://www.stoa.org.uk/topics/bullshit/pdf/on-bullshit.pdf

Which is doubly relevant today given Trump's candidacy and the epistemic 
approach of Putin's Russia. Know your epistemic defenses and virtues.

-- 
Anders Sandberg
Future of Humanity Institute
Oxford Martin School
Oxford University

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20160508/c738641d/attachment.html>