Comment by philh
10 years ago
I haven't created the loop, I'm just gesticulating towards it. The loop exists, I don't know exactly what form it takes, and I don't know what to do about it.
Focusing on the consequences seems like one way out, but... I feel like both sides will always tell me that if I just focus on the consequences, it will seem obvious that they're right and their opponents are wrong. And when I ask both sides "okay, what are the consequences?", they're going to argue about what the consequences are, and the argument is going to look like all the other arguments.
Now I feel Zenoed[0].
But anyway, arguments about consequences should not be infinitely recursive, because they deal with the real world, the observable reality. If you're stuck in such a loop, you're doing it wrong.
Sadly, most of the policy-related discussions are done wrong.
[0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeno's_paradoxes