Russell is not just saying that beliefs should be proportional to evidence (if anyone on LW disagrees with THAT, I’ll be shocked); he’s saying that if that were done, it would eliminate most of the world’s problems.
If he had said ‘many’ instead of ‘most,’ it would be a great quote. Unfortunately there is a huge class of problems that, although they may eventually be solved by rational methods, are not solved just by being rational. Turning everyone rational overnight doesn’t automatically cure death, for example. Nor does it remedy the partiality of human utility functions, or cure psychopaths of their psychopathy… et cetera.
You should not take the statement too literally: Look it in a historical context. Probably the biggest problems at Russel’s time were wars caused by nationalism and unfair resource allocation due to bad (idealistic/traditionalist) policies.. Average life expectancy was around 40-50 years. I don’t think anyone considered e.g. a mortality a problem that can or should be solved. (Neither does over 95% of the people today). Population was much smaller. Earth was also in a much more pristine state than today.
Times have changed. We have more technical issues today, since we can address more issues with technology, plus we are on a general trajectory today, which is ecologically unsustainable if we don’t manage to invent and use the right technologies quickly. I think this is the fundamental mistake traditional ecological movements are making: There is no turning back. We either manage to progress rapidly enough to counteract what we broke (and will inevitably break) or our civilization collapses. There is no stopping or turning back, we have already bet our future. Being reasonable would have worked 100 years ago, today we must be very smart as well.
Russell is not just saying that beliefs should be proportional to evidence (if anyone on LW disagrees with THAT, I’ll be shocked); he’s saying that if that were done, it would eliminate most of the world’s problems.
If he had said ‘many’ instead of ‘most,’ it would be a great quote. Unfortunately there is a huge class of problems that, although they may eventually be solved by rational methods, are not solved just by being rational. Turning everyone rational overnight doesn’t automatically cure death, for example. Nor does it remedy the partiality of human utility functions, or cure psychopaths of their psychopathy… et cetera.
You should not take the statement too literally: Look it in a historical context. Probably the biggest problems at Russel’s time were wars caused by nationalism and unfair resource allocation due to bad (idealistic/traditionalist) policies.. Average life expectancy was around 40-50 years. I don’t think anyone considered e.g. a mortality a problem that can or should be solved. (Neither does over 95% of the people today). Population was much smaller. Earth was also in a much more pristine state than today.
Times have changed. We have more technical issues today, since we can address more issues with technology, plus we are on a general trajectory today, which is ecologically unsustainable if we don’t manage to invent and use the right technologies quickly. I think this is the fundamental mistake traditional ecological movements are making: There is no turning back. We either manage to progress rapidly enough to counteract what we broke (and will inevitably break) or our civilization collapses. There is no stopping or turning back, we have already bet our future. Being reasonable would have worked 100 years ago, today we must be very smart as well.