(So… html tags don’t appear to work in the less wrong comment section. Too tired to find out what DOES work.)
After all, if someone you know is planning to quit her job and move to Alaska because her horoscope told her that Tauruses need more spontaneity, you shouldn’t tell her to stay because she’s actually an Aries. You tell her to stay because astrology is provably bogus.
(snort) If you didn’t care about the truth value of what you were telling her as much as you cared about getting her to change her behavior, you might very well choose to exert influence on her from within her belief system. It invokes less resistance on her part than does trying to tear apart the structure of something she places so much faith in. Provided you could convince her that she was actually an Aries and that this would somehow negate her reasons for moving, you might have a shorter, less-painful battle on your hands with respect to her plans to move than you would if you had to take on the whole system of astrology—it’s history, it’s advocates, the famous people who’ve believed in it, etc.
Mind you, this is only a temporary fix until the next time she wants to do something stupid as a result of what the ‘stars’ tell her, but if you don’t have the time for a full-blown de-bunking/brainwashing, it might behoove you to be able to exert influence from within the target belief system.
html tags don’t appear to work in the less wrong comment section.
Click the “Help” link under the lower right corner of the comment field. If JavaScript is enabled, Markdown formatting instructions will appear (without opening a new page).
(So… html tags don’t appear to work in the less wrong comment section. Too tired to find out what DOES work.)
After all, if someone you know is planning to quit her job and move to Alaska because her horoscope told her that Tauruses need more spontaneity, you shouldn’t tell her to stay because she’s actually an Aries. You tell her to stay because astrology is provably bogus.(snort) If you didn’t care about the truth value of what you were telling her as much as you cared about getting her to change her behavior, you might very well choose to exert influence on her from within her belief system. It invokes less resistance on her part than does trying to tear apart the structure of something she places so much faith in. Provided you could convince her that she was actually an Aries and that this would somehow negate her reasons for moving, you might have a shorter, less-painful battle on your hands with respect to her plans to move than you would if you had to take on the whole system of astrology—it’s history, it’s advocates, the famous people who’ve believed in it, etc.
Mind you, this is only a temporary fix until the next time she wants to do something stupid as a result of what the ‘stars’ tell her, but if you don’t have the time for a full-blown de-bunking/brainwashing, it might behoove you to be able to exert influence from within the target belief system.
You can find how to format your comments by clicking the “help” link that appears to the lower right of the comment box when you start typing a reply.
Click the “Help” link under the lower right corner of the comment field. If JavaScript is enabled, Markdown formatting instructions will appear (without opening a new page).
The comment formatting uses Markdown.