I found it gloomy when I was younger. Now I find it merely an interesting take on somehow increasing some aspects of IQ and perception without increasing the rational aspects (acceptance of truth, action in pursuit of goals) of a mind. Also, I’m far more aware of the metaphor for life: youth is stupid and unknowing, we learn things and understand more as we age, then we wither and die. This is perhaps gloomy, but perhaps simply the way of things.
And the question that would make it relevant to less wrong and rationality is: it moves the reader, sure. Does it move the reader toward truth and rational models of the universe, or in some other direction? Simply increasing one’s view of hypothesis-space is good enough to be worthwhile, but there’s a LOT of works which do that. How does this one excel?
A good question. I would think that while the story doesn’t have much to offer regarding conscious mental calculation and systems, it still includes a set of powerful allegories (in my article I did mention one of them: Algernon seems to stand for the somatic part, with the person turning into a purely mental entity; another allegory seems to be about the need to stop extrapolating thoughts to prevent an overload) which can, consciously or not, bring about changes to the reader’s rationality.
I don’t think the story has much to do with youth and experience. After all, as we all know (unless we are youths ;) ) while some knowledge only can be had by experience and thus only be gotten in time, the more theoretical types of knowledge are available to highly intelligent youths as well, eg an elementary school pupil can be already exceptionally good at math.
I found it gloomy when I was younger. Now I find it merely an interesting take on somehow increasing some aspects of IQ and perception without increasing the rational aspects (acceptance of truth, action in pursuit of goals) of a mind. Also, I’m far more aware of the metaphor for life: youth is stupid and unknowing, we learn things and understand more as we age, then we wither and die. This is perhaps gloomy, but perhaps simply the way of things.
And the question that would make it relevant to less wrong and rationality is: it moves the reader, sure. Does it move the reader toward truth and rational models of the universe, or in some other direction? Simply increasing one’s view of hypothesis-space is good enough to be worthwhile, but there’s a LOT of works which do that. How does this one excel?
A good question. I would think that while the story doesn’t have much to offer regarding conscious mental calculation and systems, it still includes a set of powerful allegories (in my article I did mention one of them: Algernon seems to stand for the somatic part, with the person turning into a purely mental entity; another allegory seems to be about the need to stop extrapolating thoughts to prevent an overload) which can, consciously or not, bring about changes to the reader’s rationality.
I don’t think the story has much to do with youth and experience. After all, as we all know (unless we are youths ;) ) while some knowledge only can be had by experience and thus only be gotten in time, the more theoretical types of knowledge are available to highly intelligent youths as well, eg an elementary school pupil can be already exceptionally good at math.