Do you think about distances in Metric or Imperial units? Both are equally true, so probably in whichever units you happen to be more fluent in.
Do you use Newtonian mechanics or full relativity for calculating the motion of some object? Relativity is more true, but sometimes the simpler model is good enough and easier to calculate, so it may be better for the situation.
These seem like silly examples to me.
I think about distances in Imperial units, but it seems very weird, inaccurate, and borderline absurd to describe me as believing the Imperial system to be “true”, or “more true”, or believing the metric system to be “not true” or “false” or “less true”. None of those make any sense as descriptions of what I believe. Frankly, I don’t understand how you can suggest otherwise.
Similarly, it is a true fact that Newtonian mechanics allows me to calculate the motion of objects, in certain circumstances (i.e., intermediate-scale situations / phenomena), to a great degree of accuracy, but that relativity will give a more accurate result, at the cost of much greater difficulty in calculation. This is a fact which I believe to be true. Describing Relativity as being “more true” is odd.
Do you consider your romantic partner a wonderful person who you love dearly and want to be happy, or someone who does various things that benefit you, in exchange for you doing various things that benefit them? Both are true, but the former framing is probably one that will make for a happier and more meaningful relationship.
If both are true (as, indeed, they are, in many relationships), then this, too, seems like an odd example. Why choose? These are not in conflict. Why can’t someone be a wonderful person whom you love dearly and want to be happy, and who does various things that benefit you, in exchange for you doing various things that benefit them? I struggle to see any conflict or contradiction.
Meaning no disrespect, Kaj, but I spy a motte-and-bailey approach in these sorts of examples. The motte, of course, is “Newtonian mechanics” and so on. The bailey is “mythic mode”. To call the latter “indefensible” is an understatement.
If both are true (as, indeed, they are, in many relationships), then this, too, seems like an odd example. Why choose? These are not in conflict. Why can’t someone be a wonderful person whom you love dearly and want to be happy, and who does various things that benefit you, in exchange for you doing various things that benefit them? I struggle to see any conflict or contradiction.
That’s my point. That none of this stuff about choosing beliefs is in conflict with standard LW rationality, and that there are plenty of situations where you can just look at the world in one way or the other, and both are equally true, and you just focus on one based on whichever is the most useful for the situation. If you say that “these are not in conflict”, then yes! That is what I have been trying to say! It’s not true that this is a “poisonous philosophy”, because this is mostly just a totally ordinary thing that everyone does every day and which is totally unproblematic!
Someone might then respond, “well if it’s so ordinary, what’s this whole thing about post/metarationality being totally different from ordinary rationality, then?” Honestly, beats me. I don’t think it really is particularly different, and giving it a special label that implies that it’s anything else than just a straightforward application of ordinary rationality is just confusing matters and doing everyone a disservice. But that’s the label we seem to have ended up with.
Meaning no disrespect, Kaj, but I spy a motte-and-bailey approach in these sorts of examples. The motte, of course, is “Newtonian mechanics” and so on. The bailey is “mythic mode”. To call the latter “indefensible” is an understatement.
This is difficult to answer, because just as there are many things going under the label “rational”—some of which are decidedly less rational than others—there are also many ways in which you could think of mythic mode, even if you only limited yourself to different ways of interpreting Val’s post on the topic. Without getting deeper into that topic, I’ll just say that there are ways of interpreting mythic mode which I think are perfectly in line with the kinds of examples I’ve been giving in the comments of this post, and also ways of interpreting it which are not and which are just crazy.
none of this stuff about choosing beliefs is in conflict with standard LW rationality
What do you mean, “choosing beliefs”? The bit of my comment that you quoted said nothing about choosing beliefs. The situation I describe doesn’t seem to require “choosing beliefs”. You just believe what is, to the best of your ability to discern, true. That’s all. What “choosing” is there?
Someone might then respond, “well if it’s so ordinary, what’s this whole thing about post/metarationality being totally different from ordinary rationality, then?” Honestly, beats me. I don’t think it really is particularly different, and giving it a special label that implies that it’s anything else than just a straightforward application of ordinary rationality is just confusing matters and doing everyone a disservice. But that’s the label we seem to have ended up with.
Maybe what you’re talking about is different from what everyone else who is into “postrationality”, or what have you, is talking about?
Without getting deeper into that topic, I’ll just say that there are ways of interpreting mythic mode which I think are perfectly in line with the kinds of examples I’ve been giving in the comments of this post
But… I think that your examples are examples of the wrong way to think about things… “crazy” is probably an overstatement for your comments (as opposed to those of some other people), but “wrong” does not seem to be…
“Someone might then respond, “well if it’s so ordinary, what’s this whole thing about post/metarationality being totally different from ordinary rationality, then?” Honestly, beats me. I don’t think it really is particularly different, and giving it a special label that implies that it’s anything else than just a straightforward application of ordinary rationality is just confusing matters and doing everyone a disservice. But that’s the label we seem to have ended up with.”
Maybe what you’re talking about is different from what everyone else who is into “postrationality”, or what have you, is talking about?
(sorry; I can’t seem to nest blockquotes in the comments; that’s the best I could do)
For myself I find this point is poorly understood by most self-identified rationalists, and I think most people reading the sequences come out of them as positivists because Eliezer didn’t hammer the point home hard enough and positivism is the default within the wider community of rationality-aligned folks (e.g. STEM folks). I wish all this disagreement were just a simple matter politics over who gets to use what names, but it’s not because there’s a real disagreement over epistemology. Given that “rationality” was always a term that was bound to get conflated with the rationality of high modernism, it’s perhaps not surprising that those of us who got fed up with the positivists ended up giving ourselves a new name.
This is made all the more complicated because Eliezer does specifically call out positivism as a failure mode, so it makes pinning people down on this all the more tricky because they can just say “look, Eliezer said rationality is not this”. As the responses to this post make clear, though, the positivist streak is alive and well in the LW community given what I read as a strong reaction against the calling out of positivism or for that matter privileging any particular leap of faith (although positivists don’t necessarily think of themselves as doing that because they disagree with the premise that we can’t know the criterion of truth). So this all leads me to the position that we have need of a distinction for now because of our disagreement on this fundamental issue that has many effects on what is and is not considered to be useful to our shared pursuits.
For myself I find this point is poorly understood by most self-identified rationalists, and I think most people reading the sequences come out of them as positivists because Eliezer didn’t hammer the point home hard enough and positivism is the default within the wider community of rationality-aligned folks (e.g. STEM folks).
Maybe so, but I can’t help noticing that whenever I try to think of concrete examples about what postrationality implies in practice, I always end up with examples that you could just as well justify using the standard rationalist epistemology. E.g. all my examples in this comment section. So while I certainly agree that the postrationalist epistemology is different from the standard rationalist one, I’m having difficulties thinking of any specific actions or predictions that you would really need the postrationalist epistemology to justify. Something like the criterion of truth is a subtle point which a lot of people don’t seem to get, yes, but it also feels like one which doesn’t make any practical difference whether you get it or not. And theoretical points which people can disagree a lot about despite not making any practical difference are almost the prototypical example of tribal labels. John Tooby:
The more biased away from neutral truth, the better the communication functions to affirm coalitional identity, generating polarization in excess of actual policy disagreements. Communications of practical and functional truths are generally useless as differential signals, because any honest person might say them regardless of coalitional loyalty. In contrast, unusual, exaggerated beliefs—such as supernatural beliefs (e.g., god is three persons but also one person), alarmism, conspiracies, or hyperbolic comparisons—are unlikely to be said except as expressive of identity, because there is no external reality to motivate nonmembers to speak absurdities.
(sorry; I can’t seem to nest blockquotes in the comments; that’s the best I could do)
Not related to your points, but re: blockquotes and nesting, try the GreaterWrong editor; you can select some text and click the blockquote button, then select text (including the blockquoted) and click blockquote again, etc., and it’ll nest it properly for you.
These seem like silly examples to me.
I think about distances in Imperial units, but it seems very weird, inaccurate, and borderline absurd to describe me as believing the Imperial system to be “true”, or “more true”, or believing the metric system to be “not true” or “false” or “less true”. None of those make any sense as descriptions of what I believe. Frankly, I don’t understand how you can suggest otherwise.
Similarly, it is a true fact that Newtonian mechanics allows me to calculate the motion of objects, in certain circumstances (i.e., intermediate-scale situations / phenomena), to a great degree of accuracy, but that relativity will give a more accurate result, at the cost of much greater difficulty in calculation. This is a fact which I believe to be true. Describing Relativity as being “more true” is odd.
If both are true (as, indeed, they are, in many relationships), then this, too, seems like an odd example. Why choose? These are not in conflict. Why can’t someone be a wonderful person whom you love dearly and want to be happy, and who does various things that benefit you, in exchange for you doing various things that benefit them? I struggle to see any conflict or contradiction.
Meaning no disrespect, Kaj, but I spy a motte-and-bailey approach in these sorts of examples. The motte, of course, is “Newtonian mechanics” and so on. The bailey is “mythic mode”. To call the latter “indefensible” is an understatement.
That’s my point. That none of this stuff about choosing beliefs is in conflict with standard LW rationality, and that there are plenty of situations where you can just look at the world in one way or the other, and both are equally true, and you just focus on one based on whichever is the most useful for the situation. If you say that “these are not in conflict”, then yes! That is what I have been trying to say! It’s not true that this is a “poisonous philosophy”, because this is mostly just a totally ordinary thing that everyone does every day and which is totally unproblematic!
Someone might then respond, “well if it’s so ordinary, what’s this whole thing about post/metarationality being totally different from ordinary rationality, then?” Honestly, beats me. I don’t think it really is particularly different, and giving it a special label that implies that it’s anything else than just a straightforward application of ordinary rationality is just confusing matters and doing everyone a disservice. But that’s the label we seem to have ended up with.
This is difficult to answer, because just as there are many things going under the label “rational”—some of which are decidedly less rational than others—there are also many ways in which you could think of mythic mode, even if you only limited yourself to different ways of interpreting Val’s post on the topic. Without getting deeper into that topic, I’ll just say that there are ways of interpreting mythic mode which I think are perfectly in line with the kinds of examples I’ve been giving in the comments of this post, and also ways of interpreting it which are not and which are just crazy.
What do you mean, “choosing beliefs”? The bit of my comment that you quoted said nothing about choosing beliefs. The situation I describe doesn’t seem to require “choosing beliefs”. You just believe what is, to the best of your ability to discern, true. That’s all. What “choosing” is there?
Maybe what you’re talking about is different from what everyone else who is into “postrationality”, or what have you, is talking about?
But… I think that your examples are examples of the wrong way to think about things… “crazy” is probably an overstatement for your comments (as opposed to those of some other people), but “wrong” does not seem to be…
(sorry; I can’t seem to nest blockquotes in the comments; that’s the best I could do)
For myself I find this point is poorly understood by most self-identified rationalists, and I think most people reading the sequences come out of them as positivists because Eliezer didn’t hammer the point home hard enough and positivism is the default within the wider community of rationality-aligned folks (e.g. STEM folks). I wish all this disagreement were just a simple matter politics over who gets to use what names, but it’s not because there’s a real disagreement over epistemology. Given that “rationality” was always a term that was bound to get conflated with the rationality of high modernism, it’s perhaps not surprising that those of us who got fed up with the positivists ended up giving ourselves a new name.
This is made all the more complicated because Eliezer does specifically call out positivism as a failure mode, so it makes pinning people down on this all the more tricky because they can just say “look, Eliezer said rationality is not this”. As the responses to this post make clear, though, the positivist streak is alive and well in the LW community given what I read as a strong reaction against the calling out of positivism or for that matter privileging any particular leap of faith (although positivists don’t necessarily think of themselves as doing that because they disagree with the premise that we can’t know the criterion of truth). So this all leads me to the position that we have need of a distinction for now because of our disagreement on this fundamental issue that has many effects on what is and is not considered to be useful to our shared pursuits.
Maybe so, but I can’t help noticing that whenever I try to think of concrete examples about what postrationality implies in practice, I always end up with examples that you could just as well justify using the standard rationalist epistemology. E.g. all my examples in this comment section. So while I certainly agree that the postrationalist epistemology is different from the standard rationalist one, I’m having difficulties thinking of any specific actions or predictions that you would really need the postrationalist epistemology to justify. Something like the criterion of truth is a subtle point which a lot of people don’t seem to get, yes, but it also feels like one which doesn’t make any practical difference whether you get it or not. And theoretical points which people can disagree a lot about despite not making any practical difference are almost the prototypical example of tribal labels. John Tooby:
Not related to your points, but re: blockquotes and nesting, try the GreaterWrong editor; you can select some text and click the blockquote button, then select text (including the blockquoted) and click blockquote again, etc., and it’ll nest it properly for you.