That only helps if your “rationalist community” in fact pushes you to more accurate reasoning… in my experience the “rationalist community” is mostly that in name only.
I find this claim unsettling, since the rationalist community aggressively promotes an unusual set of epistemic norms (e.g. lots of reliance on logic and numeracy, on careful scrutiny of sources and claims, a trade in debunking explanations) which appear to me to be unusually good at producing true beliefs. You presumably have experience with these norms (e.g. you read stuff Eliezer writes, you sometimes talk to at least me and presumably other rationalists, you are sometimes at rationalist parties), and seem to be rejecting the claim that these norms are actually truth-promoting.
I certainly agree that we don’t have the kind of evidence that could decisively settle the question to an outsider, and I think skepticism is reasonable. The main reason someone would be optimistic about the rationalists is by actually looking at and reasoning about rationalist discourse. You seem to have done this though, so I read your comment as a strong suggestion that this reasoning is not very weighty given the absence of a track record that might provide more decisive evidence.
Even if you use truth-promoting norms, their effect can be weak enough that other effects overwhelm this effect. The “rationalist community” is different in a great many ways from other communities of thought.
the rationalist community aggressively promotes an unusual set of epistemic norms
Unusual..? How unusual do you think these epistemic norms would be to someone from hard sciences? Or even to, say, a civil engineer?
You keep on setting a low bar. It’s really not that hard to be better than the average.
appear to me to be unusually good at producing true beliefs
True beliefs are at best an intermediate, instrumental goal. What you need to do is be good at producing desirable outcomes in reality, not inside your own head.
One problem with threads of this form is that I feel inclined to respond even when I don’t expect it to be useful. It would be nice to cultivate norms that allow us to wind these things down somewhat more quickly+gracefully; I think this would improve my willingness to comment here and on the EA forum.
I would like to make a response like “I have objections to this comment, but I don’t think that continuing this conversation in this medium is likely to be the best use of our time” and for you to have the option of responding “I probably have objections to your objections” and for us to leave it at that, letting readers to infer what they will and to continue the discussion if they want to.
I think the problem with saying nothing is that it feels (probably irrationally) like accepting the last word, which is somewhat unpleasant if you have objections you’d like to express.
I think the problem with just making a dismissive comment like this is that it reads more aggressively than I would like it to read; it also reads like an implicit claim that I have the social position or credibility to justify such dismissiveness. But it’s just trying to be a judgment about what disagreements are useful.
For now I might try making the somewhat dismissive response with a link to this discussion:
In such situations I usually offer to agree to disagree. That’s not a put-down, but a clear signal that I don’t think the conversation is going anywhere. It also offers the other side an opportunity for parting words.
And if the other party doesn’t take the hint, you can just shrug, tap, and bail.
You said:
I find this claim unsettling, since the rationalist community aggressively promotes an unusual set of epistemic norms (e.g. lots of reliance on logic and numeracy, on careful scrutiny of sources and claims, a trade in debunking explanations) which appear to me to be unusually good at producing true beliefs. You presumably have experience with these norms (e.g. you read stuff Eliezer writes, you sometimes talk to at least me and presumably other rationalists, you are sometimes at rationalist parties), and seem to be rejecting the claim that these norms are actually truth-promoting.
I certainly agree that we don’t have the kind of evidence that could decisively settle the question to an outsider, and I think skepticism is reasonable. The main reason someone would be optimistic about the rationalists is by actually looking at and reasoning about rationalist discourse. You seem to have done this though, so I read your comment as a strong suggestion that this reasoning is not very weighty given the absence of a track record that might provide more decisive evidence.
Even if you use truth-promoting norms, their effect can be weak enough that other effects overwhelm this effect. The “rationalist community” is different in a great many ways from other communities of thought.
Unusual..? How unusual do you think these epistemic norms would be to someone from hard sciences? Or even to, say, a civil engineer?
You keep on setting a low bar. It’s really not that hard to be better than the average.
True beliefs are at best an intermediate, instrumental goal. What you need to do is be good at producing desirable outcomes in reality, not inside your own head.
One problem with threads of this form is that I feel inclined to respond even when I don’t expect it to be useful. It would be nice to cultivate norms that allow us to wind these things down somewhat more quickly+gracefully; I think this would improve my willingness to comment here and on the EA forum.
I would like to make a response like “I have objections to this comment, but I don’t think that continuing this conversation in this medium is likely to be the best use of our time” and for you to have the option of responding “I probably have objections to your objections” and for us to leave it at that, letting readers to infer what they will and to continue the discussion if they want to.
I think the problem with saying nothing is that it feels (probably irrationally) like accepting the last word, which is somewhat unpleasant if you have objections you’d like to express.
I think the problem with just making a dismissive comment like this is that it reads more aggressively than I would like it to read; it also reads like an implicit claim that I have the social position or credibility to justify such dismissiveness. But it’s just trying to be a judgment about what disagreements are useful.
For now I might try making the somewhat dismissive response with a link to this discussion:
I have objections to this comment, but I don’t think that continuing this conversation in this medium is likely to be the best use of our time
I am interested in whether people think this is a good policy, or something else would work better.
In such situations I usually offer to agree to disagree. That’s not a put-down, but a clear signal that I don’t think the conversation is going anywhere. It also offers the other side an opportunity for parting words.
And if the other party doesn’t take the hint, you can just shrug, tap, and bail.