Then perhaps you’ve framed the problem you’re trying to solve in this thread wrong.
Oh, I definitely agree with you that trying to teach rationality to others to fix them, instead of providing a resource for interested people to learn rationality, is deeply mistaken. Where I disagree with you is the (implicit?) claim that the Sequences were written to teach instead of being a resource for learning.
I don’t think that humility can be taught in this sense, only earned through making crucial mistakes, over and over again.
Mmm. I favor Bismarck on this front. It certainly helps if the mistakes are yours, but they don’t have to be. I also think it helps to emphasize the possibility of learning sooner rather than later; to abort mistakes as soon as they’re noticed, rather than when it’s no longer possible to maintain them.
Ah! My apologies. Thought I was talking to Villiam. My responses may have made less than perfect sense.
I favor Bismarck on this front. It certainly helps if the mistakes are yours, but they don’t have to be.
You can learn from mistakes, but you don’t learn what it feels like to make mistakes (which is to say, exactly the same as making the right decision).
I also think it helps to emphasize the possibility of learning sooner rather than later; to abort mistakes as soon as they’re noticed, rather than when it’s no longer possible to maintain them.
That’s where humility is important, and where the experience of having made mistakes helps. Making mistakes doesn’t feel any different from not making mistakes. There’s a sense that I wouldn’t make that mistake, once warned about it—and thinking you won’t make a mistake is itself a mistake, quite obviously. Less obviously, thinking you will make mistakes, but that you’ll necessarily notice them, is also a mistake.
Oh, I definitely agree with you that trying to teach rationality to others to fix them, instead of providing a resource for interested people to learn rationality, is deeply mistaken. Where I disagree with you is the (implicit?) claim that the Sequences were written to teach instead of being a resource for learning.
Mmm. I favor Bismarck on this front. It certainly helps if the mistakes are yours, but they don’t have to be. I also think it helps to emphasize the possibility of learning sooner rather than later; to abort mistakes as soon as they’re noticed, rather than when it’s no longer possible to maintain them.
Ah! My apologies. Thought I was talking to Villiam. My responses may have made less than perfect sense.
You can learn from mistakes, but you don’t learn what it feels like to make mistakes (which is to say, exactly the same as making the right decision).
That’s where humility is important, and where the experience of having made mistakes helps. Making mistakes doesn’t feel any different from not making mistakes. There’s a sense that I wouldn’t make that mistake, once warned about it—and thinking you won’t make a mistake is itself a mistake, quite obviously. Less obviously, thinking you will make mistakes, but that you’ll necessarily notice them, is also a mistake.