Our biological immune system tries to filter out bad things while letting in good things.
With a biological immune disorder, your immune system is weakened, and this filter is lowered.
Memetic ~ memes ~ ideas. So a memetic immune system can be thought of as something that filters out bad ideas while trying to allow in the good ones. And a memetic immune disorder would be something that lowers this filter.
The post claims, and I think it is pretty widely agreed upon, that reason functions as a memetic immune disorder. It lowers the filters. This allows in good ideas like EA and cyronics that otherwise get filtered out by other peoples memetic immune system. But it can also allow in bad ideas that otherwise would get filtered out by other peoples memetic immune system. Be aware of and careful about this.
As for the latter, the idea is that, as you make progress as a rationalist, it doesn’t always make you better off. Sometimes it makes you worse off. In the long run it should… hopefully… make you better off (although this isn’t widely agreed upon). But the journey is more of a roller coaster than a straight line.
Meta: I’d recommend this to any newcomer. But I also think it is particularly important for younger newcomers like high school aged people to hear.
Understand the concept of Reason as memetic immune disorder and the related concept of Valleys of bad rationality.
Here’s how I’d explain the former:
Our biological immune system tries to filter out bad things while letting in good things.
With a biological immune disorder, your immune system is weakened, and this filter is lowered.
Memetic ~ memes ~ ideas. So a memetic immune system can be thought of as something that filters out bad ideas while trying to allow in the good ones. And a memetic immune disorder would be something that lowers this filter.
The post claims, and I think it is pretty widely agreed upon, that reason functions as a memetic immune disorder. It lowers the filters. This allows in good ideas like EA and cyronics that otherwise get filtered out by other peoples memetic immune system. But it can also allow in bad ideas that otherwise would get filtered out by other peoples memetic immune system. Be aware of and careful about this.
As for the latter, the idea is that, as you make progress as a rationalist, it doesn’t always make you better off. Sometimes it makes you worse off. In the long run it should… hopefully… make you better off (although this isn’t widely agreed upon). But the journey is more of a roller coaster than a straight line.