Something I still need to work on, but which I think would be an important one (perhaps instead a general class of 5-second-skills rather than a single one) would be “remember what you know when you need it”
Example: you’re potentially about to escalate a already heated political debate and make in personal. 5-second-skill: actually remembering that politics is the mind-killer, thus giving yourself a chance to pause, reconsider what you’re about to do, and thus have a chance to avoid doing something stupid.
I’d also apply this notion to what you said about testability. Not so much being able to think of a quick test as much as being able to quickly remember to think about how it could be tested.
Perhaps this general category of 5-second-skills could be called “pause and think” or “pause and remember”.
ie, the critical thing this 5-second-skill here isn’t so much being able to swiftly execute some other rationalist skill quickly as much as remembering to use that skill at all when you actually need to.
If you must argue an opinion, then pin it down so that it can’t wriggle around. Example: if you have the opinion ‘AI can/will paperclip’, then try to pin down how and why it can as strictly as you can, and then take the argument from ‘it can happen’ to ‘perhaps we can test this’. Bring it out of the clouds and into reality as quickly as possibly.
If you manage to kill someone’s opinion, showing that it is just wrong, then pause and mourn its passing instead of gloating. It can’t hurt to apologize for winning, since feelings are so easily hurt.
Hrm… That could work for the specific “remember that politics is the mindkiller” rule (Although, of course, while one can distinguish issues of preference from issues of fact… issues of opinion vs issues of fact seems more questionable. :))
Well, I view opinions as inherently meaningless to attempt to test. A fact can be looked up or tested, but an opinion either can’t be tested yet or is worthless to test.
‘The sky is blue’ is testable unless you’ve been stuck for generations underground. ‘I like pink’ is worthless to test, and really worthless to argue against. ‘When we can do X it will then proceed to Y’ is hard to do anything about until we can actually X, but if we pin the specifics down enough then it isn’t totally useless to argue about it.
Some opinions can also just be completely infeasible to test as well, due to the steps the test would need to take. (Hayek vs. Keynes, I’m looking at you.)
Sorry for delayed reply. “I like pink” is an assertion of a preference, rather than an opinion about a fact. (Well, I guess it’s asserting the fact that you like pink… and stuff like brain analysis may help test it. ;))
Well, yes, some are difficult to test… but then one can argue the reasoning for having them.
Oh, just to clarify, I was proposing a sort of 5-second-meta-skill of “remembering your rationalist knowledge/skills when you need them”, the “remember politics is the mind killer” being an example rather than one I wanted to single out.
*blinks at the edit* erm? disregard which part/aspect of it? (ie, are you retracting a claim, or...?)
Something I still need to work on, but which I think would be an important one (perhaps instead a general class of 5-second-skills rather than a single one) would be “remember what you know when you need it”
Example: you’re potentially about to escalate a already heated political debate and make in personal. 5-second-skill: actually remembering that politics is the mind-killer, thus giving yourself a chance to pause, reconsider what you’re about to do, and thus have a chance to avoid doing something stupid.
I’d also apply this notion to what you said about testability. Not so much being able to think of a quick test as much as being able to quickly remember to think about how it could be tested.
Perhaps this general category of 5-second-skills could be called “pause and think” or “pause and remember”.
ie, the critical thing this 5-second-skill here isn’t so much being able to swiftly execute some other rationalist skill quickly as much as remembering to use that skill at all when you actually need to.
How about ‘flinch away from drama’?
Never argue opinions, only facts.
If you must argue an opinion, then pin it down so that it can’t wriggle around. Example: if you have the opinion ‘AI can/will paperclip’, then try to pin down how and why it can as strictly as you can, and then take the argument from ‘it can happen’ to ‘perhaps we can test this’. Bring it out of the clouds and into reality as quickly as possibly.
If you manage to kill someone’s opinion, showing that it is just wrong, then pause and mourn its passing instead of gloating. It can’t hurt to apologize for winning, since feelings are so easily hurt.
Edit—please disregard this post
Hrm… That could work for the specific “remember that politics is the mindkiller” rule (Although, of course, while one can distinguish issues of preference from issues of fact… issues of opinion vs issues of fact seems more questionable. :))
Well, I view opinions as inherently meaningless to attempt to test. A fact can be looked up or tested, but an opinion either can’t be tested yet or is worthless to test.
‘The sky is blue’ is testable unless you’ve been stuck for generations underground. ‘I like pink’ is worthless to test, and really worthless to argue against. ‘When we can do X it will then proceed to Y’ is hard to do anything about until we can actually X, but if we pin the specifics down enough then it isn’t totally useless to argue about it.
Some opinions can also just be completely infeasible to test as well, due to the steps the test would need to take. (Hayek vs. Keynes, I’m looking at you.)
Edit—please disregard this post
Sorry for delayed reply. “I like pink” is an assertion of a preference, rather than an opinion about a fact. (Well, I guess it’s asserting the fact that you like pink… and stuff like brain analysis may help test it. ;))
Well, yes, some are difficult to test… but then one can argue the reasoning for having them.
Oh, just to clarify, I was proposing a sort of 5-second-meta-skill of “remembering your rationalist knowledge/skills when you need them”, the “remember politics is the mind killer” being an example rather than one I wanted to single out.
*blinks at the edit* erm? disregard which part/aspect of it? (ie, are you retracting a claim, or...?)