I was originally confused when I read this quote, assuming that “should” was being used in the sense of “morally just”. It makes a lot more sense with “should” meaning “according to my model of reality”
A little of both. Her point is that human brains have a tendency to confuse “is” and “ought”, mixing the moral or preferential with the actual, thereby clouding the issue.
If you don’t want it to be raining, then feeling or protesting that it shouldn’t be happening is an error. But it’s an error that human brains commonly make, because our genes wish us to signal our disapproval of things we find objectionable, so that others will be persuaded to behave differently.
The problem is that reality isn’t going to behave differently because you think it should, and most of the time even people aren’t going to behave differently just because you think they should. Protesting that something should or shouldn’t be a particular way is generally a non-helpful response to things as they are: if you want to change how things are, that change can only be made to happen in the future. At the present moment, things simply are how they are, and there is nothing you can do about that without using a time machine. (Even then, the change will still have to happen in your subjective future!)
The reason this passage uses “raining” is that it’s a relatively innocuous example to introduce the problems involved in “arguing with reality”, in a non-controversial way. Most of the subjects touched on in the rest of the book are things that people usually feel much more strongly about… and therefore have even more reason to separate “is” and “ought” about. (Like, “my spouse should listen to me”, to stick to a still relatively-innocuous example.)
I’m not sure I see the problem the quotation is attacking then. Allowing for the very real possibility that I’m oblivious or live in a bubble, my model of how people work has them understanding the difference between “ought” and “expected” most of the time.
I get the impression that there is a real insight here into how people think about the world, but there’s a disconnect between the idea and the author’s words that I’m not bridging.
my model of how people work has them understanding the difference between “ought” and “expected” most of the time
Understanding it and applying it are two different things, in the same way that knowing about a bias doesn’t stop you from exhibiting it.
People tend to obsess over things that “shouldn’t have” happened—a mistake they made, an embarrassing situation, something infuriating that somebody else did, or some impending but inevitable life change. They fret and scheme and worry and just can’t seem to get it out of their mind, even if they want to.
This behavior is generally caused by the alief that the thing “should not” have happened that way, or that the upcoming thing should not happen, or that they “should have done better”, or some other “should” belief. Byron Katie’s book is about a method of surfacing and questioning these aliefs, so as to stop fretting over what can’t be changed, thus to focus on what can. As Quirrelmort put it:
“Amateur foolisshnesss.”
“Pardon? ” hissed Harry.
“You ssee misstake, think of undoing, ssetting time back to sstart. Yet not even with hourglasss can time be undone. Musst move forward insstead.”
While Byron Katie and Quirrelmort would disagree on quite a few things, this is one thing they have in common.
(Interestingly, her book “I need your love; is that true?” is very Quirrelmortish in the sense of highlighting how much people’s seeming goodness or altruism is driven by self-centeredness—but it’s a book about how to stop doing that yourself, not using other people’s actions as a way to justify doing more of it. Indeed, it’s about being able to have compassion for the misguided or self-centered actions of others, not contempt ala Quirrelmort. Hm. Actually, the more I think about it, the more she seems like a true opposite to Quirrelmort, in a way that neither Harry nor Dumbledore are. If she were in-world, she’d be sort of like a non-naive McGonagall crossed with a Dumbledore who could not be made to despair or blinded by grief or regret or vengeance.)
A little of both. Her point is that human brains have a tendency to confuse “is” and “ought”, mixing the moral or preferential with the actual, thereby clouding the issue.
If you don’t want it to be raining, then feeling or protesting that it shouldn’t be happening is an error. But it’s an error that human brains commonly make, because our genes wish us to signal our disapproval of things we find objectionable, so that others will be persuaded to behave differently.
The problem is that reality isn’t going to behave differently because you think it should, and most of the time even people aren’t going to behave differently just because you think they should. Protesting that something should or shouldn’t be a particular way is generally a non-helpful response to things as they are: if you want to change how things are, that change can only be made to happen in the future. At the present moment, things simply are how they are, and there is nothing you can do about that without using a time machine. (Even then, the change will still have to happen in your subjective future!)
The reason this passage uses “raining” is that it’s a relatively innocuous example to introduce the problems involved in “arguing with reality”, in a non-controversial way. Most of the subjects touched on in the rest of the book are things that people usually feel much more strongly about… and therefore have even more reason to separate “is” and “ought” about. (Like, “my spouse should listen to me”, to stick to a still relatively-innocuous example.)
I’m not sure I see the problem the quotation is attacking then. Allowing for the very real possibility that I’m oblivious or live in a bubble, my model of how people work has them understanding the difference between “ought” and “expected” most of the time.
I get the impression that there is a real insight here into how people think about the world, but there’s a disconnect between the idea and the author’s words that I’m not bridging.
Understanding it and applying it are two different things, in the same way that knowing about a bias doesn’t stop you from exhibiting it.
People tend to obsess over things that “shouldn’t have” happened—a mistake they made, an embarrassing situation, something infuriating that somebody else did, or some impending but inevitable life change. They fret and scheme and worry and just can’t seem to get it out of their mind, even if they want to.
This behavior is generally caused by the alief that the thing “should not” have happened that way, or that the upcoming thing should not happen, or that they “should have done better”, or some other “should” belief. Byron Katie’s book is about a method of surfacing and questioning these aliefs, so as to stop fretting over what can’t be changed, thus to focus on what can. As Quirrelmort put it:
While Byron Katie and Quirrelmort would disagree on quite a few things, this is one thing they have in common.
(Interestingly, her book “I need your love; is that true?” is very Quirrelmortish in the sense of highlighting how much people’s seeming goodness or altruism is driven by self-centeredness—but it’s a book about how to stop doing that yourself, not using other people’s actions as a way to justify doing more of it. Indeed, it’s about being able to have compassion for the misguided or self-centered actions of others, not contempt ala Quirrelmort. Hm. Actually, the more I think about it, the more she seems like a true opposite to Quirrelmort, in a way that neither Harry nor Dumbledore are. If she were in-world, she’d be sort of like a non-naive McGonagall crossed with a Dumbledore who could not be made to despair or blinded by grief or regret or vengeance.)