Norms to protect against consistency and commitment pressures would be very valuable. One possible mechanism would be to make public ‘Red Team’ analyses: designate a forum where you will present the strongest case you can against one of your favored ideas, along these lines:
This could be improved with rewards for success, which the speaker could provide herself using a mechanism like http://www.stickk.com/
With respect to religion, here’s some support for the vertical versus horizontal spread idea:
Catholicism-celibate priests, early spread by evangelization.
Buddhism-celibate monks, early spread by evangelization.
Islam-polygamy for believers, early spread by evangelization and violence, with capture of women for followers.
Judaism-priests and rabbis marry, tribal religion
Hinduism-contains vast diversity, but religious leaders have generally married, generally the religion is inherited and does not seek converts
I am concerned that “taking sides”, even self-consciously taking the “opposite” side, might lead to polarization and emotional attachment to factual beliefs.
However, I agree that the idea of red-teaming is interesting and should be tried, as part of an effort to develop some rationalist community best practices.
Yes this is a good point, one that Hopefully Anonymous correctly raises frequently. Rather, one should defend a point of view one rejects or has not considered, not specifically the reversal of one’s current view.
Norms to protect against consistency and commitment pressures would be very valuable. One possible mechanism would be to make public ‘Red Team’ analyses: designate a forum where you will present the strongest case you can against one of your favored ideas, along these lines:
http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/07/introducing-ram.html
This could be improved with rewards for success, which the speaker could provide herself using a mechanism like http://www.stickk.com/
With respect to religion, here’s some support for the vertical versus horizontal spread idea:
Catholicism-celibate priests, early spread by evangelization. Buddhism-celibate monks, early spread by evangelization. Islam-polygamy for believers, early spread by evangelization and violence, with capture of women for followers. Judaism-priests and rabbis marry, tribal religion Hinduism-contains vast diversity, but religious leaders have generally married, generally the religion is inherited and does not seek converts
Carl, that sounds like it could be really useful for increasing the rate of alternate idea-generation and of idea-shift.
“Do you think our group should use the public “Red Team” analyses idea?” LessWrong or SIAI?
“Have you tried it?” Yes, I have tried a version of it and found it useful for improving my model of the issue in question at the margin.
I meant SIAI / people working on existential risk.
I’d be interested in hearing any details of what you did and didn’t find useful, or what you’d recommend, as far as public “Red Team” analyses go.
That should probably go to email rather than comments.
A great idea. Just like ‘idea markets’. Will people use them?
I am concerned that “taking sides”, even self-consciously taking the “opposite” side, might lead to polarization and emotional attachment to factual beliefs.
However, I agree that the idea of red-teaming is interesting and should be tried, as part of an effort to develop some rationalist community best practices.
Yes this is a good point, one that Hopefully Anonymous correctly raises frequently. Rather, one should defend a point of view one rejects or has not considered, not specifically the reversal of one’s current view.
I look forward to the debate between geocentrism and epicycles.