It makes sense that some people might be turned off by ritual. I hope those people went to one of the several other New York Less Wrong megameetups, or to the designated ritual-free day Sunday, or even on Saturday for the two hours before the ritual started. If they come to an event that has “RITUAL” in big letters all over it on the day when the ritual is scheduled to occur then I don’t think you can fairly accuse it of being inflicted on them without such a sweeping redefinition of “consent” that it becomes impossible to ever do anything that doesn’t exactly conform to social norms.
It was not my intention to accuse the ritual of being inflicted on anyone; I didn’t think I said or implied such a thing, but if so, let me assure you that I quite realize that attendance was voluntary. As for the other megameetups, I will try to attend the next time a non-ritual one happens. I was sadly unable to make it on that Sunday. They seem to happen about once a year, yes?
Your other comments seem to suggest that you think that I am worried about brainwashing, or what have you; that’s just not the issue here. So your comments such as
I don’t know if it’s possible to do inspiration without even the slightest chance of brainwashing, but I’d rather not ban all inspirational activities until we prove it.
To excise all of those things from our lives because we can’t prove they don’t cause some residual brainwashing would make the world less than it was.
miss the mark a bit. Like Risto_Saarelma, I just dislike rituals (fairly strongly). From your comment, and others in this thread, I’ve discovered that some (most?) people do like them, and like them enough to serve as motivation for traveling some distance, or at least for attending an event they’d otherwise skip. All I can say is: mind = blown. I really, genuinely did not expect this to be such a prevalent preference in the rationalist community.
I’m sorry, I may have either rounded you to the nearest cliche or lumped my responses to other people’s comments into my response to yours.
Your comments about “social pressure” and “how can something be consensual if you enshrine it as a ritual” did make me think there was a consent aspect to it, and your comment about “using ritual to insert things deep into your psyche is something that I think is just bad” was where I got the feeling of brainwashing from, but I can see how I might’ve been misunderstanding them.
So you’re saying you have such strong anti-ritual preferences that you assumed people must have been awkwardly attending something they didn’t like in order to fit in? Hm. That makes sense.
I guess what I’ve learned from this is that I still can’t describe the reasons for why I like things. “Community bonding” sounds good, but when you press me on it I admit it’s kind of dumb and the ritual wasn’t really about that at all. “Sense of the sacred” sounds good but there were a lot of other easier ways to get that feeling I didn’t go for. I’m just going to say I have an unexplained preference for rituals of about the same magnitude as an unexplained preference for playing fantasy role-playing games, and although I can come up with just-so stories for it (“group bonding”, “search for meaning”, whatever) I can’t explain it but would like to keep doing it anyway.
So you’re saying you have such strong anti-ritual preferences that you assumed people must have been awkwardly attending something they didn’t like in order to fit in? Hm. That makes sense.
I… suppose. Sort of.
Reading the OP made me immediately update to a realization that at least some people really liked this sort of thing; I assumed the other attendees had their own reasons for attending (which may not have just boiled down to peer pressure); I didn’t expect to subsequently learn that a preference for rituals is a) apparently everyone’s reason for coming, and b) much more common in the rationalist community than I thought. My own concerns about consent and social pressure are part of my reaction, though not, as I’ve said, the entirety.
For what it’s worth, I, too, have a pretty strong preference for playing fantasy role-playing games (especially of the tabletop variety), so your analogy hits close to home. I am trying to imagine what it would be like to have a strong “ick” reaction to tabletop RPGs such that I couldn’t understand why anyone would do it and would avoid a group that engaged in this activity, and I think I am succeeding, at least partly. (Of course, what I can’t do is verbalize any reason why I’d have such a reaction, which I definitely can for my objections to rituals.) Putting myself back in my own shoes, my response to such a person would be a lack of comprehension of what it was they found so objectionable; I guess I wouldn’t have much to say in response other than a shrug and “well, RPGs are awesome and we like playing them and it doesn’t hurt anyone”. I surmise from your comment that your response to my feelings about rituals can be summed up similarly?
Which assumptions generated the incorrect predictions? Are you pulling your Bayesian updates backwards through the belief-propogation network given this new evidence?
(In other words: updating on a small probability event should change your mind about a whole host of related beliefs.)
I think it was some variant of the Typical Mind Fallacy, albeit one based not only on my own preferences but on those of my friends (though of course you’d expect that I’d associate with people who have preferences similar to mine, so this does not make the fallacy much more excusable).
I think the main belief I’ve updated based on this is my estimate on the prevalence of my sort of individualistic, suspicious-of-groups, allergic-to-crowds, solitude-valuing outlook in the Less Wrong community, which I have adjusted strongly downward (although that adjustment has been tempered by the suspicion, confirmed by a couple of comments on this post, that people who object to things such as rituals etc. often simply don’t speak up).
I have also been reminded of something I guess I knew but hadn’t quite absorbed, which is that, apparently, many people in aspiring rationalist communities come from religious backgrounds. This of course makes sense given the base rates. What I didn’t expect is that people would value the ritual trappings of their religious upbringing, and value them enough to construct new rituals with similar forms.
I will also add that despite this evidence that way more people like rituals than I’d have expected, and my adjustment of my beliefs about this, I am still unable to alieve it. Liking ritual, experiencing a need for and enjoyment of collectivized sacredness, is completely alien to me to the point where I am unable to imagine it.
(although that adjustment has been tempered by the suspicion, confirmed by a couple of comments on this post, that people who object to things such as rituals etc. often simply don’t speak up)
For epistemology’s sake I’ll speak up so you may be more confident in the suspicion...
I find these rituals, as described, to be completely uninteresting as social activities, and have a visceral negative reaction to imagining people doing this, even semi-seriously. “Group self-hacking for cohesion and bonding” is the...sort-of good way to put it I guess, because I would rather describe it as “optimistically wielding double-edged daggers forged from the Dark Arts”.
I do want to note that, for at least one proponent of the ritual (Yvain, see here), the “cohesion and bonding” turned out not to be the underlying motivation. This makes sense to me, and I am very suspicious about any claims such as “research indicates that group bonding increases happiness, so I choose to do this thing that I believe will generate group bonding”, or “group cohesiveness is beneficial, so we should have rituals because they promote group cohesiveness”. They just don’t ring true; I have a hard time believing that people think that way. It seems to me that some people just really like and enjoy rituals. I don’t really understand why, of course, but that’s just because my preference skews in the opposite direction. The stuff about bonding and cohesion seems like rationalization, or, at best, an attempt to describe one’s bare preference, rather than an explanation of what actually motivated a choice.
That having been said, I quite agree that rituals are forged from the Dark Arts. This contributes to, though does not constitute, my dislike of them.
Thanks! You have already updated, so I’m not sure if you want to update further, but I’m wondering if you had read Why our kind can’t cooperate, and what your reaction to that was?
I have indeed read it; I’ve even linked it to other people on this site myself, and taken explicit steps to counteract the effect; see e.g. this post.
I have no problem saying “I agree; you are right and/or this is awesome”. This happens to be a topic to which my reaction is otherwise. I think it’s especially important to speak up in cases where I disagree and where I think a number of other people also disagree but hesitate to speak.
Sorry, that’s not the context at which I meant it—I’m sure you’re as willing to admit you were wrong as the next rationalist. I mean it in the context of “Barbarians vs. Rationalists”—if group cohesion is increased by ritual, and group cohesion is useful to the rationality movement, than ritual could be useful. Wanting to dissociate ourselves from the trappings of religion seems like a case of “reversed stupidity” to me...
Wanting to dissociate ourselves from the trappings of religion seems like a case of “reversed stupidity” to me...
Yes, and if that were the reason behind my dislike of ritual, that would be an apropos comment; but as I explained, that’s not the case.
(I apologize for the harsh tone there, but I am failing to think of a way to express that response with a suitable level of tact, maybe because it’s 2 AM here. Sorry. :\ )
As for the larger “Barbarians vs. Rationalists” point, I have two responses.
One: I really don’t think that “rituals generate group cohesion, and group cohesion is useful” is actually anyone’s true motivation here. I think people just like rituals. Which… is fine (with some caveats), even if I dislike it. But I don’t think we should be putting forth rationalizations as true motivations.
Two: I don’t think we should look at everything solely through the lens of “is this useful to the rationality movement”. If doing things that are “useful to the rationality movement” causes us to systematically do things we don’t actually like doing, or want to do, then I think we’ve rather missed the point. Now you might respond: “But Said, we do like this thing! We do want to do it!” Well, ok. Then do it. But then, as the mathematicians say, this reduces to the earlier argument.
It was not my intention to accuse the ritual of being inflicted on anyone; I didn’t think I said or implied such a thing, but if so, let me assure you that I quite realize that attendance was voluntary. As for the other megameetups, I will try to attend the next time a non-ritual one happens. I was sadly unable to make it on that Sunday. They seem to happen about once a year, yes?
Your other comments seem to suggest that you think that I am worried about brainwashing, or what have you; that’s just not the issue here. So your comments such as
miss the mark a bit. Like Risto_Saarelma, I just dislike rituals (fairly strongly). From your comment, and others in this thread, I’ve discovered that some (most?) people do like them, and like them enough to serve as motivation for traveling some distance, or at least for attending an event they’d otherwise skip. All I can say is: mind = blown. I really, genuinely did not expect this to be such a prevalent preference in the rationalist community.
I’m sorry, I may have either rounded you to the nearest cliche or lumped my responses to other people’s comments into my response to yours.
Your comments about “social pressure” and “how can something be consensual if you enshrine it as a ritual” did make me think there was a consent aspect to it, and your comment about “using ritual to insert things deep into your psyche is something that I think is just bad” was where I got the feeling of brainwashing from, but I can see how I might’ve been misunderstanding them.
So you’re saying you have such strong anti-ritual preferences that you assumed people must have been awkwardly attending something they didn’t like in order to fit in? Hm. That makes sense.
I guess what I’ve learned from this is that I still can’t describe the reasons for why I like things. “Community bonding” sounds good, but when you press me on it I admit it’s kind of dumb and the ritual wasn’t really about that at all. “Sense of the sacred” sounds good but there were a lot of other easier ways to get that feeling I didn’t go for. I’m just going to say I have an unexplained preference for rituals of about the same magnitude as an unexplained preference for playing fantasy role-playing games, and although I can come up with just-so stories for it (“group bonding”, “search for meaning”, whatever) I can’t explain it but would like to keep doing it anyway.
I… suppose. Sort of.
Reading the OP made me immediately update to a realization that at least some people really liked this sort of thing; I assumed the other attendees had their own reasons for attending (which may not have just boiled down to peer pressure); I didn’t expect to subsequently learn that a preference for rituals is a) apparently everyone’s reason for coming, and b) much more common in the rationalist community than I thought. My own concerns about consent and social pressure are part of my reaction, though not, as I’ve said, the entirety.
For what it’s worth, I, too, have a pretty strong preference for playing fantasy role-playing games (especially of the tabletop variety), so your analogy hits close to home. I am trying to imagine what it would be like to have a strong “ick” reaction to tabletop RPGs such that I couldn’t understand why anyone would do it and would avoid a group that engaged in this activity, and I think I am succeeding, at least partly. (Of course, what I can’t do is verbalize any reason why I’d have such a reaction, which I definitely can for my objections to rituals.) Putting myself back in my own shoes, my response to such a person would be a lack of comprehension of what it was they found so objectionable; I guess I wouldn’t have much to say in response other than a shrug and “well, RPGs are awesome and we like playing them and it doesn’t hurt anyone”. I surmise from your comment that your response to my feelings about rituals can be summed up similarly?
I always refer to this chapter on ritual from the book Secular Wholeness.
Which assumptions generated the incorrect predictions? Are you pulling your Bayesian updates backwards through the belief-propogation network given this new evidence? (In other words: updating on a small probability event should change your mind about a whole host of related beliefs.)
I think it was some variant of the Typical Mind Fallacy, albeit one based not only on my own preferences but on those of my friends (though of course you’d expect that I’d associate with people who have preferences similar to mine, so this does not make the fallacy much more excusable).
I think the main belief I’ve updated based on this is my estimate on the prevalence of my sort of individualistic, suspicious-of-groups, allergic-to-crowds, solitude-valuing outlook in the Less Wrong community, which I have adjusted strongly downward (although that adjustment has been tempered by the suspicion, confirmed by a couple of comments on this post, that people who object to things such as rituals etc. often simply don’t speak up).
I have also been reminded of something I guess I knew but hadn’t quite absorbed, which is that, apparently, many people in aspiring rationalist communities come from religious backgrounds. This of course makes sense given the base rates. What I didn’t expect is that people would value the ritual trappings of their religious upbringing, and value them enough to construct new rituals with similar forms.
I will also add that despite this evidence that way more people like rituals than I’d have expected, and my adjustment of my beliefs about this, I am still unable to alieve it. Liking ritual, experiencing a need for and enjoyment of collectivized sacredness, is completely alien to me to the point where I am unable to imagine it.
For epistemology’s sake I’ll speak up so you may be more confident in the suspicion...
I find these rituals, as described, to be completely uninteresting as social activities, and have a visceral negative reaction to imagining people doing this, even semi-seriously. “Group self-hacking for cohesion and bonding” is the...sort-of good way to put it I guess, because I would rather describe it as “optimistically wielding double-edged daggers forged from the Dark Arts”.
Thank you for posting, I really do appreciate it.
I do want to note that, for at least one proponent of the ritual (Yvain, see here), the “cohesion and bonding” turned out not to be the underlying motivation. This makes sense to me, and I am very suspicious about any claims such as “research indicates that group bonding increases happiness, so I choose to do this thing that I believe will generate group bonding”, or “group cohesiveness is beneficial, so we should have rituals because they promote group cohesiveness”. They just don’t ring true; I have a hard time believing that people think that way. It seems to me that some people just really like and enjoy rituals. I don’t really understand why, of course, but that’s just because my preference skews in the opposite direction. The stuff about bonding and cohesion seems like rationalization, or, at best, an attempt to describe one’s bare preference, rather than an explanation of what actually motivated a choice.
That having been said, I quite agree that rituals are forged from the Dark Arts. This contributes to, though does not constitute, my dislike of them.
Thanks! You have already updated, so I’m not sure if you want to update further, but I’m wondering if you had read Why our kind can’t cooperate, and what your reaction to that was?
I have indeed read it; I’ve even linked it to other people on this site myself, and taken explicit steps to counteract the effect; see e.g. this post.
I have no problem saying “I agree; you are right and/or this is awesome”. This happens to be a topic to which my reaction is otherwise. I think it’s especially important to speak up in cases where I disagree and where I think a number of other people also disagree but hesitate to speak.
Sorry, that’s not the context at which I meant it—I’m sure you’re as willing to admit you were wrong as the next rationalist. I mean it in the context of “Barbarians vs. Rationalists”—if group cohesion is increased by ritual, and group cohesion is useful to the rationality movement, than ritual could be useful. Wanting to dissociate ourselves from the trappings of religion seems like a case of “reversed stupidity” to me...
Yes, and if that were the reason behind my dislike of ritual, that would be an apropos comment; but as I explained, that’s not the case.
(I apologize for the harsh tone there, but I am failing to think of a way to express that response with a suitable level of tact, maybe because it’s 2 AM here. Sorry. :\ )
As for the larger “Barbarians vs. Rationalists” point, I have two responses.
One: I really don’t think that “rituals generate group cohesion, and group cohesion is useful” is actually anyone’s true motivation here. I think people just like rituals. Which… is fine (with some caveats), even if I dislike it. But I don’t think we should be putting forth rationalizations as true motivations.
Two: I don’t think we should look at everything solely through the lens of “is this useful to the rationality movement”. If doing things that are “useful to the rationality movement” causes us to systematically do things we don’t actually like doing, or want to do, then I think we’ve rather missed the point. Now you might respond: “But Said, we do like this thing! We do want to do it!” Well, ok. Then do it. But then, as the mathematicians say, this reduces to the earlier argument.