(I’m Edan Maor)
Thanks a lot to all of you! I really appreciate both getting a gift, and the way you did it—I agree with you in wishing that more people would make donations as a gift.
You guys made my day! :)
edanm
Karma: 467
I’m not sure where, but I remember Eliezer writing something like ~”one of the biggest advances in the economy is the fact that people have internalized that they should invest their money, instead of having it lying around”.
I’m looking for 2 things:
Does anyone remember where this was written? My google-fu is failing me at the moment.
Can anyone point me to any economic literature that talks about this?
Question for anyone that’s taking the course: is it worthwhile for the average LW’er? I assume most of us have an above-average familiarity with these topics.
Isn’t that just technological progress? Except for asking people for advice, nothing else there changes how people think, so it’s hard to call it a rationality technique IMO.
I believe there are meaningful things people believe/do nowadays that they didn’t 300 years ago (e.g. using the scientific method).
Unfortunately, for all these things, they’re either: a) adopted only by some people, not the majority. b) As DanArmak says, adopted only because of “peer pressure” or other social reasons.
Now, that’s not to say CFAR’s mission isn’t still worthwhile—raising the sanity waterline of just certain segments of the population, e.g. the top X% in terms of intelligence, is still of great importance.
But if there really aren’t general “rationality techniques” that have been adopted by most people, if the average person today is no more rational than a person 500 years ago, then I suppose you’re right—my bottom line might need to change to “maybe we can’t reach the general populace”.
That’s a very good point, although I think a good a first stage is to find what techniques people are actually using, then try and understand why.
Perhaps, but I’m trying to convince intelligent people that there are real changes we can introduce that will be adopted by most people, so I’m not sure the lottery fits the bill.
Examples of Rationality Techniques adopted by the Masses
“ This is obviously and offensively wrong. Does the risk of robbery improve living conditions? Does the risk of death improve life? Also, a future society where consent is optional appears to be a terrible dystopia: assuming a free democratic government, lack of consent implies that advertisers and corporations could force consumers to buy things. This quote needs A LOT of additional justification and qualification (and ideally deletion) to avoid implying that “raising the sanity waterline” means “abolishing liberty and ethics.””
That part of the story wasn’t trying to say “this is something that needs to happen to raise the sanity waterline”. Remember, it’s just a fictional story. Rather, it was trying to show an example of something that we today would find incredibly offensive and morally unjustifiable, and yet that became a part of humanity.
Remember that for someone 500 years ago, many of our current practices seem absolutely repugnant and morally unjustifiable, even though today they’re just part of culture. Even 100 years ago, the idea of a black person sitting next to a white person on a bus was considered terrible, not to mention women having any kind of rights at home. In some parts of the world, a woman showing her hair is considered immoral and unjustifiable.
The story just wanted to give something that could happen but most people would think is wrong.
I agree that textbooks are undervalued, but I’m still unsure that textbooks that meet my requirements exist.
Do you have any examples of textbooks that help a layperson understand economics in the way I envision that’s better than a more “popularized” book?
Relatedly, The Law of Superheroes is a funny look at applying Law to pretend cases that could happen in a world with superheroes. Very recommended.
It works well for what I want, but isn’t in-depth enough to really leave me feeling that I’ve learned law. But the law is tricky in that, afaict, it’s a lot of details and unofficial know-how, so many it’s not a field where a book like I describe could exist.
I don’t think that’s the right approach.
A textbook is in many ways the opposite of what I want. In-depth look at a narrow part of the field. I want just the opposite. Also, something that’s more about giving the story behind the field and making the field interesting.
Another good example—Thomas Sowell’s Basic Economics taught me enough to understand the idea behind economics, the basic vocabulary, how an economist approaches things, etc. To learn more, I’m now looking at textbooks on Economics, but I definitely wouldn’t have started there. And for the vast majority of people that I want to just know a bit of economics, Basic Economics is perfect. (Potentially even some lighter texts cold work, e.g. Naked Economics).
I once read “I will Teach you to be Rich” by Ramit Sethi. It went into a fair bit of detail on this.
I didn’t finish the book and can’t really recommend it, since most of the advice was very US-centric (e.g. optimizing credit scores isn’t relevant for me). But it might be a starting place.
Reading “The Selfish Gene” teaches enough evolutionary biology to understand what the field is about, to understand the basics of the field, and to be able to converse on it intelligently.
What book can I read that will do the same for me in:
Medicine/biology/physiology (e.g. able to understand the very basic concepts of what a doctor does)
Law (e.g. able to understand the very basic concepts of working as a lawyer).
Bonus points—if the book on Law explains the practical difference between common-law and civil-law.
Thanks!
I find most interesting the question of which God/religion to believe in. How do they deal with the fact that the actual, historical reason that they believe in their specific God/religion is because they were born into it (most likely—not true for everyone). Have they ever considered switching religions? What was their reason not to do so?
This usually leads to very interesting discussions on the “proofs” of their religion. And they tend to be interesting indeed.
Also, I might start the debate off by more general questions, e.g. “how do you define evidence, what do you consider knowledge to be”, etc. E.g. I really want to understand how they know that their God/religion is founded on truth, and not on “alien teenagers”, Matrix, etc. At least theoretically.
Like Anatoly, I also really liked the book. It’s not very deep in my mind, but it’s just good ol’ fashioned fun, for the kind of people who love hearing of highly technical matters (about which they honestly know little, at least in my case).
Glanced at the “Have a nice day” article. I’m absolutely shocked by how much can be said about a banal expression, especially how much negative stuff and criticism people level at it. Wow.
What made you stumble on it?
It gets worse. Most of his fantasy novels are actually connected into one world (called the Cosmere).
He guesses there will be a total of 30-40 books in this world.
Btw, for anyone that doesn’t know, Brandon Sanderson was chosen as the author of the final Wheel of Time books, the ones that came out after the original author Robert Jordan passed away. So yeah, he knows what happens to people who start 10-book series.
What I meant by that was:
The magic system is basically comparable to him inventing a world with extra laws of physics. The magic is usually well understood, at least eventually, and is basically treated like just more physics.
E.g. (ROT13′d for minor spoiler): Bar bs uvf obbxf pbagnvaf n flfgrz gung, jura crbcyr qevax inevbhf xvaqf bs zrgny, gurl ner noyr gb “ohea hc” gur zrgny gb tnva pregnva cbjref, sbe rknzcyr, gryrxvarfvf. Guvf vf irel jryy haqrefgbbq naq hfrq, lbh haqrefgnaq gur zntvp, gur yvzvgf, vg erdhverf fbzr xvaq bs ryrzrag gb cbjre vg, rgp. Va bgure jbeqf, vg fbhaqf yvxr ryrpgevpvgl jbhyq fbhaq gb fbzrbar jub qbrfa’g xabj nobhg vg.
Guvf vf abg gur xvaq bs zntvp flfgrz jurer enaqbz crbcyr ner noyr gb qb guvatf juvpu lbh arire ernyyl haqrefgnaq, naq gung ner oneryl hfrq. Guvf vf zber n jbeyq jvgu rkgen ryrzragnel sbeprf.
Did the survey. It felt much shorter this year.