I did a similar experiment on myself when I went on an organized trip to Israel. When we stopped at the Whaling (Western) Wall, I decided to test out my rationality. As you know, you’re suppose to write down a wish on a piece of paper and put it in the wall i.e. another way of praying. I decided to write down “I wish my family would die in 2 weeks,” and put it in the wall to see if I can do it.
To my surprise, I did feel a bit weird, a little anxious, but after a while I was fine. It is hard to overcome the emotions induced by our biases, but can be done with practice.
Just curious, would anyone not write the note (that I wrote)? Assuming you’d be compensated for your effort to write it and put it in the wall.
Bravo! This would be a good rite of passage for aspiring rationalists, which could also be carried out with a wishing well.
Magical thinking really can make some people worried and contribute an extra jot of misery. This seems like it should help.
But you really should write down “I wish I would die in 2 weeks”, because if, you know, everyone does this, sooner or later someone’s family is going to die in 2 weeks.
Perhaps the wish should be “I wish to no longer be a rationalist.” If the wishing well is the real deal, and it comes true, then it is clearly not desirable to be a rationalist, which makes the wish a genuine one. If you remain a rationalist, you have proved that the wishing well does not work. A win-win situation!
Not so. If the wall works, then being a rationalist will allow you to correctly interpret the evidence of that fact, while irrationality might cause you to ignore the evidence and incorrectly conclude that the wall has no effect.
Something other than the wall could grant your wish to believe that the wall grants wishes, and then you would believe a falsehood. (Unless the wall grants wishes, too, but ignored yours in particular for some reason. But that’s a Gettier case.)
I don’t think this is so easy. I am sure you do not wish to die in two weeks. You are pretending to wish and thus you are lying. Why should the wishing well fulfill a pretend wish? Writing “I wish my family wil die in two weeks” is surely irresponsible. What if your family discovers the note, do you explain that it was a scientific experiment? What if something happens to your family after 10⁄20 days—are you free of guilt by a rational act of will? Words hurt. Words can boomerang. And the heart has its Reason. This experiment is a betrayal of the heart committed by logical arrogance (and inexperience).
I didn’t say the rock was listening. You are listening. And thus you can lie or tell the truth—or maybe both lie and tell the truth at the same time and change your mind about them after a short while.
I like the idea, except that to me it seems somehow dishonest: to wish for something is (inter alia) to state that one wants it to happen, which I assume was not true in this case. And I think reluctance to be dishonest even when no one else is going to be deceived is a valuable emotion, to counter self-deception.
This might just be rationalization (introspecting, it seems to me that I’d be reluctant to do as you did), but I don’t think so because similar introspection suggests that I’d be (e.g.) quite unafraid to learn that some group of religious people were praying for my death, unless there were some risk that they or their friends might try to bring it about by natural means.
I don’t like this because there is an entity listening in on what you wrote: you (and now us, I guess, but we’re less salient, not knowing your family).
Given that what we say influences how we think, I’m not sure it’s a good idea as a rite of passage in general to voice a wish that indicates that you don’t care about people you want to continue to care about.
Thought 1: If hypothetically one’s family was going to die in an accident or otherwise (for valid causal wish-unrelated reasons), the added mental/emotional effect on oneself would be something to avoid in the first place. Given that one is infallible, one can never assert absolute knowledge of non-causality (direct or indirect), and that near-infinitesimal consideration could haunt one. Compare this possibility to the ease, normally, of taking other routes and thus avoiding that risk entirely.
...other thoughts are largely on the matter of integrity… respect and love felt for family members, thus not wishing to badmouth them or officially express hope for their death even given that neither they nor anyone else could hear it… hmm.
Pragmatically, one could cite a concern regarding taken behaviours influencing ease of certain thoughts: I do not particularly want to become someone who can more easily write a request that my family members die.
There are various things that I might wish that I would not carry out if I had the power to directly (and secretly) do so, but generally if doing such a thing I would prefer to wish for something I actually wanted (/would carry out if I had the power to do so myself), on the off-chance that some day if I do such to the knowledge of another the other is inclined to help me reach it in some way.
Given the existence of compensation, there is yet the question of what compensation would be sufficient to make me do something that made me feel sullied. Incidentally notable that I note there are many things that would make others feel sullied that I would do with no discomfort at all.
...a general practice of acting in a consistent way… a perception of karma not as something which operates outside normal causality, but instead similar-to-luck just those parts of normal causality that one cannot be aware of… ah, I’ve reached the point of redundancy were I to continue typing.
I probably wouldn’t do it. If I am being compensated for writing the note, it means there is a person that is offering to pay me to write the note. Since this is a weird request, and I cannot be sure of the person’s motivation, as a safety precaution I would assume malice. Especially if the “compensation” is large. Like, nobody is their right mind would pay me a million dollars to put a note on the wall that says that I wish my family would die just to prove a point. I would assume malice. This person could be a psycho serial killer who would kill my family in two weeks in order to teach me “not to mess with magic” or something like that. Point is, when a weird person makes a weird request, I believe it’s better (safer) not to engage. I’d probably call my family and warn them to be careful too, just in case.
I did a similar experiment on myself when I went on an organized trip to Israel. When we stopped at the Whaling (Western) Wall, I decided to test out my rationality. As you know, you’re suppose to write down a wish on a piece of paper and put it in the wall i.e. another way of praying. I decided to write down “I wish my family would die in 2 weeks,” and put it in the wall to see if I can do it.
To my surprise, I did feel a bit weird, a little anxious, but after a while I was fine. It is hard to overcome the emotions induced by our biases, but can be done with practice.
Just curious, would anyone not write the note (that I wrote)? Assuming you’d be compensated for your effort to write it and put it in the wall.
Bravo! This would be a good rite of passage for aspiring rationalists, which could also be carried out with a wishing well.
Magical thinking really can make some people worried and contribute an extra jot of misery. This seems like it should help.
But you really should write down “I wish I would die in 2 weeks”, because if, you know, everyone does this, sooner or later someone’s family is going to die in 2 weeks.
Perhaps the wish should be “I wish to no longer be a rationalist.” If the wishing well is the real deal, and it comes true, then it is clearly not desirable to be a rationalist, which makes the wish a genuine one. If you remain a rationalist, you have proved that the wishing well does not work. A win-win situation!
Not so. If the wall works, then being a rationalist will allow you to correctly interpret the evidence of that fact, while irrationality might cause you to ignore the evidence and incorrectly conclude that the wall has no effect.
A better wish might be “I wish to believe that this wall grants wishes.” If the wish is granted, then you will believe truth; and if it is not granted, then you will also believe truth.
Something other than the wall could grant your wish to believe that the wall grants wishes, and then you would believe a falsehood. (Unless the wall grants wishes, too, but ignored yours in particular for some reason. But that’s a Gettier case.)
p(wishgranted|~wallgrants) is negligible, I think. Still, I suppose you could just recite the entire Litany of Tarski.
What is p(wish is answered by Murphy the mad god of irony)?
If you think that’s proof then it sounds like you are half way there!
I don’t think this is so easy. I am sure you do not wish to die in two weeks. You are pretending to wish and thus you are lying. Why should the wishing well fulfill a pretend wish? Writing “I wish my family wil die in two weeks” is surely irresponsible. What if your family discovers the note, do you explain that it was a scientific experiment? What if something happens to your family after 10⁄20 days—are you free of guilt by a rational act of will? Words hurt. Words can boomerang. And the heart has its Reason. This experiment is a betrayal of the heart committed by logical arrogance (and inexperience).
You can neither speak truth nor lie to a rock.
I didn’t say the rock was listening. You are listening. And thus you can lie or tell the truth—or maybe both lie and tell the truth at the same time and change your mind about them after a short while.
I like the idea, except that to me it seems somehow dishonest: to wish for something is (inter alia) to state that one wants it to happen, which I assume was not true in this case. And I think reluctance to be dishonest even when no one else is going to be deceived is a valuable emotion, to counter self-deception.
This might just be rationalization (introspecting, it seems to me that I’d be reluctant to do as you did), but I don’t think so because similar introspection suggests that I’d be (e.g.) quite unafraid to learn that some group of religious people were praying for my death, unless there were some risk that they or their friends might try to bring it about by natural means.
I don’t like this because there is an entity listening in on what you wrote: you (and now us, I guess, but we’re less salient, not knowing your family).
Given that what we say influences how we think, I’m not sure it’s a good idea as a rite of passage in general to voice a wish that indicates that you don’t care about people you want to continue to care about.
Sure, it may have had a small (overstatement) effect, but it was worth it.
Thought 1: If hypothetically one’s family was going to die in an accident or otherwise (for valid causal wish-unrelated reasons), the added mental/emotional effect on oneself would be something to avoid in the first place. Given that one is infallible, one can never assert absolute knowledge of non-causality (direct or indirect), and that near-infinitesimal consideration could haunt one. Compare this possibility to the ease, normally, of taking other routes and thus avoiding that risk entirely.
...other thoughts are largely on the matter of integrity… respect and love felt for family members, thus not wishing to badmouth them or officially express hope for their death even given that neither they nor anyone else could hear it… hmm.
Pragmatically, one could cite a concern regarding taken behaviours influencing ease of certain thoughts: I do not particularly want to become someone who can more easily write a request that my family members die.
There are various things that I might wish that I would not carry out if I had the power to directly (and secretly) do so, but generally if doing such a thing I would prefer to wish for something I actually wanted (/would carry out if I had the power to do so myself), on the off-chance that some day if I do such to the knowledge of another the other is inclined to help me reach it in some way.
Given the existence of compensation, there is yet the question of what compensation would be sufficient to make me do something that made me feel sullied. Incidentally notable that I note there are many things that would make others feel sullied that I would do with no discomfort at all.
...a general practice of acting in a consistent way… a perception of karma not as something which operates outside normal causality, but instead similar-to-luck just those parts of normal causality that one cannot be aware of… ah, I’ve reached the point of redundancy were I to continue typing.
I probably wouldn’t do it. If I am being compensated for writing the note, it means there is a person that is offering to pay me to write the note. Since this is a weird request, and I cannot be sure of the person’s motivation, as a safety precaution I would assume malice. Especially if the “compensation” is large. Like, nobody is their right mind would pay me a million dollars to put a note on the wall that says that I wish my family would die just to prove a point. I would assume malice. This person could be a psycho serial killer who would kill my family in two weeks in order to teach me “not to mess with magic” or something like that. Point is, when a weird person makes a weird request, I believe it’s better (safer) not to engage. I’d probably call my family and warn them to be careful too, just in case.