Just a personal problem that seems to me to be a precursor to the rationality question.
Various studies have shown that a persons ‘memory’ of events is very much influenced by later discussion of the event, when put into situations such as the ‘Stanford Prison Experiment’ or the ‘Milgram Experiment’ people will do unethical acts under pressure of authority and situation.
Yet people have a two-fold response to these experiments.
A) They deny the experiments are accurate, either in whole, or in degree
B) They deny that they fall into the realm of those that would be so affected.
With of course, the obvious caveat that some people actually are not so affected in those experiments (or do remember thing accurately), and will stand up for what they determine as ethical regardless.
The obvious fact seems to be that it is among those that honestly consider the possibility that their thoughts can be affected by these outside influences that the greatest chance of successfully maintaining one’s own identity against them exists, but others than acknowledging this fact (Which can certainly be faked, even self-deceptively) what self-assessments allow one to develop this?
Once we have that, it seems to me that the question of maintaining rationality itself clarifies itself greatly.
Just a personal problem that seems to me to be a precursor to the rationality question.
Various studies have shown that a persons ‘memory’ of events is very much influenced by later discussion of the event, when put into situations such as the ‘Stanford Prison Experiment’ or the ‘Milgram Experiment’ people will do unethical acts under pressure of authority and situation.
Yet people have a two-fold response to these experiments. A) They deny the experiments are accurate, either in whole, or in degree B) They deny that they fall into the realm of those that would be so affected.
With of course, the obvious caveat that some people actually are not so affected in those experiments (or do remember thing accurately), and will stand up for what they determine as ethical regardless.
The obvious fact seems to be that it is among those that honestly consider the possibility that their thoughts can be affected by these outside influences that the greatest chance of successfully maintaining one’s own identity against them exists, but others than acknowledging this fact (Which can certainly be faked, even self-deceptively) what self-assessments allow one to develop this?
Once we have that, it seems to me that the question of maintaining rationality itself clarifies itself greatly.
Jonnan