I suppose it was only a matter of time before less wrong found the “fnords”. Although at moment we seem to be obsessed with the silly or superficial ones. There is an art, parallel to the core art of rationality, in learning to see the assumptions and deceptions we build up in order to function, the accretion of simplifications and half-answers which become unchallenged beliefs so basic that we forget we even believe them.
And as the saying goes once you see the fnords, you see them everywhere.
And there are so many to see, under a thin coat of fear or denial, an idea or a correction lies ready to be revealed. These are cheap, although filled with the thrill of danger, because they frighten and inspire in equal measure.
But deep underneath all that, are the big ones, looming, twisting things which have tunneled their way through our knowledge and practices. These are the ones you need to ignore because they don’t just frighten or require accepting what others deny, they mean functionally shifting your entire reference frame. It is as though language itself conspires to make these deeply embedded assumptions and delusions into something inexpressible, weird at best, madness at worse.
If you search patiently and carefully enough you can start to find them. You can even catalog or map them, seeing how they unfold into each other. But that doesn’t mean you’ve figured out how the express them. How do you show them in a way that provides nearly as much engagement as a stream of rationalizations? That’s something I’m still working on.
Small fnords aren’t terribly hard to find. You just squint at the situation and notice that something is amiss, and keep yourself from shutting down your mind in fear. This post has quite a few of them around, that’s what I was referring to.
As for a big one, well we don’t have the language for those. But I’ll give you this. One of them can be found as you probe deeper and deeper past the realization that truth and honesty are unrelated concepts.
Honesty is correlation with the speaker’s understanding of the facts; truth is correlation with the actual facts. A person can be speaking honestly but falsely, or truly but dishonestly, if their understanding is in some way less than perfectly correlated with the facts. What’s so fnordish about that?
There are limits to the degree to which fnords can be discussed with others. Without doing the hard work necessary to perceive them, others cannot receive benefit from having them pointed out to them—and that can even be harmful, as our mental immune systems will construct defensive rationalizations to protect fnords brought to our attention that we’re not strong enough to abolish.
I suppose it was only a matter of time before less wrong found the “fnords”. Although at moment we seem to be obsessed with the silly or superficial ones. There is an art, parallel to the core art of rationality, in learning to see the assumptions and deceptions we build up in order to function, the accretion of simplifications and half-answers which become unchallenged beliefs so basic that we forget we even believe them.
And as the saying goes once you see the fnords, you see them everywhere.
And there are so many to see, under a thin coat of fear or denial, an idea or a correction lies ready to be revealed. These are cheap, although filled with the thrill of danger, because they frighten and inspire in equal measure.
But deep underneath all that, are the big ones, looming, twisting things which have tunneled their way through our knowledge and practices. These are the ones you need to ignore because they don’t just frighten or require accepting what others deny, they mean functionally shifting your entire reference frame. It is as though language itself conspires to make these deeply embedded assumptions and delusions into something inexpressible, weird at best, madness at worse.
If you search patiently and carefully enough you can start to find them. You can even catalog or map them, seeing how they unfold into each other. But that doesn’t mean you’ve figured out how the express them. How do you show them in a way that provides nearly as much engagement as a stream of rationalizations? That’s something I’m still working on.
What’s an example? [How about one small one and one big one?]
Small fnords aren’t terribly hard to find. You just squint at the situation and notice that something is amiss, and keep yourself from shutting down your mind in fear. This post has quite a few of them around, that’s what I was referring to.
As for a big one, well we don’t have the language for those. But I’ll give you this. One of them can be found as you probe deeper and deeper past the realization that truth and honesty are unrelated concepts.
You didn’t give any examples.
Honesty is correlation with the speaker’s understanding of the facts; truth is correlation with the actual facts. A person can be speaking honestly but falsely, or truly but dishonestly, if their understanding is in some way less than perfectly correlated with the facts. What’s so fnordish about that?
There are limits to the degree to which fnords can be discussed with others. Without doing the hard work necessary to perceive them, others cannot receive benefit from having them pointed out to them—and that can even be harmful, as our mental immune systems will construct defensive rationalizations to protect fnords brought to our attention that we’re not strong enough to abolish.