While I do think there are parts of Buddhist practice and thought that could
be useful to rationalists, I think this post is fundamentally in the wrong
direction. Instead of trying to identify and isolate these useful parts you
simply try to mash together all the fundamental principles of Bayesianism and Buddhism in a single swoop, which makes you come across as the victim of an affective death spiral.
Unfortunately, this post will probably make people somewhat less likely to
consider more fruitful ideas in this direction later on.
Seeing as its your first post this should have been submitted to the Discussion section first.
While I do think there are parts of Buddhist practice and thought that could be useful to rationalists, I think this post is fundamentally in the wrong direction. Instead of trying to identify and isolate these useful parts you simply try to mash together all the fundamental principles of Bayesianism and Buddhism in a single swoop, which makes you come across as the victim of an affective death spiral.
Unfortunately, this post will probably make people somewhat less likely to consider more fruitful ideas in this direction later on.
Seeing as its your first post this should have been submitted to the Discussion section first.
Amen, to all of the above, and worth repeating. Strongly suggest the OP move this to the discussion section and seek assistance in breaking the post into individual pieces that emphasize rationality first, Buddhist connection second.
FWIW, I’m someone who has both studied Zen and has often been told that my writings are examples of Buddhist principles, so I have nothing against Buddhism in small doses, and would be interested in seeing good crossover articles. The current article, alas, does not qualify as something I’d read even someplace other than LW, due to it requiring a strong interest in both topics.
(Actually, I imagine this article would currently be better for inspiring a Buddhist to be curious about rationalism, than the other way around.)
What I attempted to do in this post was to establish some common
ground between epistemic rationality and Buddhism. The purpose was to
illuminate the epistemic rationality within Buddhism.
As you and Luke_Grecki suggest, this isn’t the right approach for the
LW audience where rationality should be emphasized first.
Strongly suggest the OP move this to the discussion section...
That is a good suggestion, but it isn’t obvious to me how to do that.
Do I need to delete this article and repost?
That was my original assumption, but the edit button is not available to me for this post...
I may have caused this. Earlier today I closed a browser window with edit open on this article. I suppose that may be blocking me from editing in a new window.
That wouldn’t do it. The only explanation I can think of that makes sense, is that your karma has fallen under the main section posting threshold (20), and the post you’re trying to edit is in the main section. If that is indeed the cause, then that’d be a bug (you shouldn’t need karma to move things from the main section into the discussion section).
Was going to vote up to test, but it looks like it’s too late since this is already deleted.
Even though the post has been deleted I still can’t edit it. If I can edit it again when my karma goes over 20, that will help to confirm your idea.
I might be able to do this soon, someone has managed to upvote the deleted post. This puts me near the 20 threshold. (Edit: spoke too soon, the upvote is gone now.)(Edit: Back again thanks to AdeleneDawner.)
On a side note, I wanted to see what happened if I resubmitted the deleted post. I did not really expect to be able to undelete the post, but I was curious.
First I submitted it to myself as a draft. This had the effect of preventing me from accessing the post if I was not logged in as myself. It appears that deleting a post and resubmitting it as a draft locks out other people.
Then I submitted it to Discussion. The post is still marked as deleted and did not show up in Discussion, which is what I expected. However now when I edit the post, I no longer have any submission choices, I can only submit it back to Discussion.
That was me, I think. I was testing to see if it was upvotable—of course I forgot to check your karma before trying to upvote it, so I had to remove the vote to check and make sure it actually affected it.
I’ll put the upvote back for now, so if you can get someone else to do the same you’ll be over the threshold.
While I do think there are parts of Buddhist practice and thought that could be useful to rationalists, I think this post is fundamentally in the wrong direction. Instead of trying to identify and isolate these useful parts you simply try to mash together all the fundamental principles of Bayesianism and Buddhism in a single swoop, which makes you come across as the victim of an affective death spiral.
Unfortunately, this post will probably make people somewhat less likely to consider more fruitful ideas in this direction later on.
Seeing as its your first post this should have been submitted to the Discussion section first.
Amen, to all of the above, and worth repeating. Strongly suggest the OP move this to the discussion section and seek assistance in breaking the post into individual pieces that emphasize rationality first, Buddhist connection second.
FWIW, I’m someone who has both studied Zen and has often been told that my writings are examples of Buddhist principles, so I have nothing against Buddhism in small doses, and would be interested in seeing good crossover articles. The current article, alas, does not qualify as something I’d read even someplace other than LW, due to it requiring a strong interest in both topics.
(Actually, I imagine this article would currently be better for inspiring a Buddhist to be curious about rationalism, than the other way around.)
What I attempted to do in this post was to establish some common ground between epistemic rationality and Buddhism. The purpose was to illuminate the epistemic rationality within Buddhism.
As you and Luke_Grecki suggest, this isn’t the right approach for the LW audience where rationality should be emphasized first.
That is a good suggestion, but it isn’t obvious to me how to do that. Do I need to delete this article and repost?
No. Click “Edit” then on the “Post To” dropdown, select “LessWrong Discussion”.
That was my original assumption, but the edit button is not available to me for this post...
I may have caused this. Earlier today I closed a browser window with edit open on this article. I suppose that may be blocking me from editing in a new window.
That wouldn’t do it. The only explanation I can think of that makes sense, is that your karma has fallen under the main section posting threshold (20), and the post you’re trying to edit is in the main section. If that is indeed the cause, then that’d be a bug (you shouldn’t need karma to move things from the main section into the discussion section). Was going to vote up to test, but it looks like it’s too late since this is already deleted.
Even though the post has been deleted I still can’t edit it. If I can edit it again when my karma goes over 20, that will help to confirm your idea.
I might be able to do this soon, someone has managed to upvote the deleted post. This puts me near the 20 threshold. (Edit: spoke too soon, the upvote is gone now.)(Edit: Back again thanks to AdeleneDawner.)
Upvoted. Can you edit now?
On a side note, I wanted to see what happened if I resubmitted the deleted post. I did not really expect to be able to undelete the post, but I was curious.
First I submitted it to myself as a draft. This had the effect of preventing me from accessing the post if I was not logged in as myself. It appears that deleting a post and resubmitting it as a draft locks out other people.
Then I submitted it to Discussion. The post is still marked as deleted and did not show up in Discussion, which is what I expected. However now when I edit the post, I no longer have any submission choices, I can only submit it back to Discussion.
Yes I can, thanks for the help.
That was me, I think. I was testing to see if it was upvotable—of course I forgot to check your karma before trying to upvote it, so I had to remove the vote to check and make sure it actually affected it.
I’ll put the upvote back for now, so if you can get someone else to do the same you’ll be over the threshold.