
Survey says: gays & lesbians preferred over homosexuals in military - anateus
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2114
======
lionhearted
> The largest observed difference in support for spending was between the
> traditional category "welfare" and the two variant forms "assistance for the
> poor" and "caring for the poor."

It's the same reason unpleasant jobs have the name of the job changed every 10
to 20 years. Janitorial services, custodial services, sanitation technian,
etc... in the beginning, it avoids the stigma of what it is - cleaning up
dirt/filth/etc. Over time, people catch up, and you have to change the name of
it again. Arguably "Secretary" to "Executive Assistant" is the same thing.

Welfare works similarly - when it's rebranded, it does well for a while, then
sinks back down into unpopularity. When someone says "social safety net" these
days it tends to evoke a more favorable response, but they usually don't mean
anything significantly different from general welfare, unemployment, and other
state-provided assistance. But a social safety net doesn't have the same
associations with welfare, so it's more favorable right now. If social safety
net acquires the same connotations as welfare, the name will be changed again
in 10-20 years.

------
derefr
They should have also tested "gay men" and "lesbians" separately; I have a
feeling that people were only more positive to the "gay men and lesbians"
aggregate category because people haven't actually internalized the idea that
women serve in the military—so when you say "homosexuals", the image triggered
is purely of gay men, and that gets neither the feminist nor lewd-fantasy
vote.

------
goodside
Those interested in the (extensive) science of framing biases in human
reasoning will want to consult Kahneman and Tversky's classic "Choices,
Values, and Frames": <http://amzn.com/0521627494>

Yes, it's dry and scholarly and will require that you relearn basic
statistics. You want to read it anyway.

~~~
Eliezer
Read "Judgment Under Uncertainty" first.

------
hussong

      "A cynical commenter at TPM suggested the control experiment
      of asking people if they favor "heterosexuals" serving
      openly in the military."
    

I think that would actually be a very enlightening experiment.

------
Mz
Reminds me of an old story of a politician "slandering" his opponent in the
campaign by telling the mostly poorly educated locals things like "Do you know
what that man did at college? He matriculated!" in a tone that suggests that's
something sleazy. There was no means to rebut it. It was true and if you then
gave a vocabulary lesson to your voters, you would just be calling them
stupid.

~~~
Eliezer
Citation if available?

~~~
Mz
I don't have a citation. My understanding is that it is a true story. If you
want to look for it, you might check for mudslinging political campaigns in
the Deep South of the US prior to, say, 1950 (possibly even 1800's).

EDIT: Found a reference to this:

 _Reynolds told the backcountry crowds that his opponent had once sunk so low
as go up to Harvard (pronounced HAW-vud). What did the man do there? Why, he
"matriculated"! And, worse, he became "a thespian"! Imagine.

Naturally, Reynolds won the race._

[http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/02/21/morro...](http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/02/21/morrow2_21.a.tm/index.html)

~~~
Eliezer
Arigatou.

------
rbranson
More proof that humans are fucking crazy.

~~~
Eliezer
Why is this downvoted? This is exactly what the experimental results coming
out of the field of heuristics and biases say.

~~~
lionhearted
Because it's not particularly insightful? Also, humans aren't "fucking crazy"
so much as they make near-instant judgments sometimes in flawed ways, with
associations, context, language, and thought getting jumbled up and being
hijackable sometimes.

(That said, wow, it's so cool to be responding to a comment by Eliezer
Yudkowsky, you're like a hero to me and brilliant and thanks for all your work
on Bayes, rationality, and thinking, and tsuyoki naritai, and that three
worlds collide story, and all the rest - seriously, huge admirer of yours
here)

~~~
Eliezer
> Also, humans aren't "fucking crazy" so much as they make near-instant
> judgments sometimes in flawed ways, with associations, context, language,
> and thought getting jumbled up and being hijackable sometimes.

With respect, and with gratitude for your compliments, I ask: Is there really
that much of a difference?

~~~
lionhearted
> With respect, and with gratitude for your compliments, I ask: Is there
> really that much of a difference?

I think so. "Fucking crazy" implies a madness/insanity/etc that can't be
overcome. It's fine if you're trying to make a point and need quick words
("Wow, humans can be really fucking crazy sometimes" in response to a story),
but pointing out _how_ humans are crazy also shines a light on potential
solutions.

Saying, "People are prone to making associations with certain words instead of
concepts" is helpful - you can think, "Okay, then how can I use descriptive
words that aren't loaded with unnecessary baggage?" Or if you're trying to
persuade, you can look for terms that are favorable. Or you can point out the
error in word association. Or you can try to "humanize" the concept - that's
my guess at what happened in this particular story. "Homosexuals" implies
someone else - a third party, an enemy, "not one of us". "Gay men and
lesbians" implies people, humans.

Just writing off humanity with, "People are fucking crazy" makes it easier for
people to shrug their shoulders and say, "Well, that's how it is." Instead, I
think it's something to be overcome. The more we point out exactly what our
errors tend to be, the more we can work specifically on them.

~~~
Eliezer
Fair enough, but I hope you won't overlook the points that:

1) People are, in fact, fucking crazy.

2) People often have difficulty in coming to terms with the above fact in its
_simple_ form, to the detriment of their development as rationalists; it's why
I use "People are crazy, the world is mad" as a slogan. They pass up
opportunities like a valid startup idea or signing up for cryonics because
they think that other people will laugh, and they haven't gotten on a deep gut
level that the people laughing at them are crazy. Vide:
<http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Conformity_bias>

This is why I objected to the downvoting of the original comment (I'm pleased
to see it's been voted up now). The referenced poll _is_ , in fact, more proof
that humans are fucking crazy, and people _need_ proof of that.

------
ww520
Coding monkey, programmer, software engineer. What's the difference?

~~~
gaius
PHP, Python and J2EE respectively ;-)

~~~
ovi256
Well, if using Python over J2EE is wrong, I don't want to be right.

