The chief bias against rational thinking is the temptations of Satan. The way to overcome this is to read the Bible, which is the inerrant revealed word of God. A member can give much more detail than that, and get his post voted for by all his friends who agree with him. Therefore that member would be in favour of an open forum, where posts are voted on.
Abigail
Karma: 62
I am not capable of producing posts of the quality OB has had so far.
I would like a benign dictator, picking the best of a rationalist forum to post to an OB blog.
Why not have a moderated forum, whose members come by invitation, for the benign dictator to select from?
Also another forum, where anyone can post, from which people could be invited to the higher forum?
One could even have a long regression of such forums.
I would also like the blog as it stands to remain. I could still benefit from reading old posts.
I learned in my undergraduate degree, in about 1987, that “deductive” reasoning was different from “inductive” reasoning, that syllogisms did not add to actual knowledge, and scientific method which did was not deductive, and could not be certain in the same way.
I too would like shorter posts. Much of this post appears to be explaining what I have just said, even if in quite an entertaining way.
I was wondering whether to make the pedantic point that sometimes people do fight fire with fire, by seeking to stop a forest fire by burning a patch in the fire’s path, so that the fire cannot leap over that patch.
I think too much pedantry can paralyse thought, but if our aim is rationality we should avoid untruths.
I disagree with ZM Davis. The method described in the post is a useful method of deciding Means, and may even help to decide Ends, if we see what we thought to be Ends as really Means to more fundamental Ends.
Read what the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible calls 4 Maccabees (I am not sure if the text has other names). In that, people decide that eating pork is to be avoided at all costs, and therefore suffer extremities of torture and even death rather than eating pork. The text is full of Stoic philosophy about how one can achieve ones ends if one is sufficiently single-minded.
In ZM Davis’ parable, Jones might ask “Do I want to obey the Great Leader?” and then ask, Will that give me the supportive community which I need as a human being? Might other communities benefit me more than this one? And backing further up, Do I need a supportive community?
Are the Great Leader’s commands the highest Good? (Moving into moral argument).
The question “Why do I do what I do?” may apply to Ends as well as means.
I might want to make even these decisions emotionally rather than rationally, unconsciously rather than by conscious thought. Conscious thought might not be the most efficient use of my brain.
Also, do I want to devote all the energy I would need to answer these questions, now? I use a QWERTY keyboard, it seems good enough at the moment, Why? Well, why not?
However for practice at being rational with that conscious thought bit of the brain, this is a useful exercise.
And- I get a great deal from the theories of Carl Rogers, who postulated an Organismic Self, or a “Me” which is my whole organism, and a “Self-concept”, which is those bits of me which I allow myself to be conscious of, excluding bits which I am too ashamed of to be conscious of them, and including bits which are not really me, but which I pretend are me because of my concept of “good”. I also see myself as an evolved being, and so draw from this that I fit into that habitat which I find myself: if an ancestor did not fit enough, he would not have become my ancestor.
If I feel divided against myself, opposing my own conscious goals, this may be because there is a shadow-part of the organismic self, a part which I deny because it is too uncomfortable. So I try to draw these parts out of the shadow, because they are Good. I also try to see what is self-concept, but not really me.
Perhaps some will manage to keep their self-concepts very close to their organismic selves, and such struggles are of little interest. For me, others’ struggles are of great interest. Thank you for sharing.
I see “Me” as all that is within my skin.
I find it helpful to think of different bits of me. My “Inner Toddler” is the bit which Wants things, or is upset by things. If I just tell it to shut up, it will become recalcitrant. If I listen to it, even though I will not necessarily do what it says, it is happier and I am happier.
This is why I am not Rationalist. I try to use Rationality to understand the World, and “myself”, but I use emotion to set my goals, just as it gives me my rewards.
Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive But- practice makes perfect. Soon, fair youth, Your lies will seem as pure as truth.
I thought quite hard before I came up with an answer to Sir Walter which rhymed and scanned. The hero of that poem, whose name I cannot remember at the moment, is fair haired. Perhaps it is not also true, but perhaps that is the point.
Is not subjective objectivity the highest degree of objectivity possible for a human being?
Objective truth does exist, but people can only perceive it with their own perception filters. And, perhaps, AIs with the perception filters of their makers.
I have to decide what is truth as best I can, and may choose to assert a truth even though every one else denies it, eg Galileo. It is to my advantage to seek to make my perception filters as little distorting as possible, but I doubt I could ever achieve that completely.
What about BSE? The Government said there was no risk, no problem, there turned out to be a problem, there was huge damage to the British beef farming industry, and certain people may have got nvCJD. I was a student in the high risk period, the 1980s, and I ate a lot of sausage, and I understand there is a very long possible incubation period.
It works both ways. In the case of BSE, such analysis as there was, was wrong; the risks turned out Not to be justified, and the losses were appalling.
So people like me, who cannot independently analyse all the papers, have even less trust in Government and those who advise on such things.
Eliezer: Or the first replicator to catch on, if there were failed alternatives lost to history—but this seems unlikely, given the Fermi Paradox; a replicator should be more improbable than that, or the stars would teem with life already.
Why should you assume that they do not? Humans may not have detected other life forms, but you cannot deduce from that that they do not exist. They might not want us to detect them. It might not be possible for a civilisation to extend beyond its solar system.