I don’t remember any sudden move towards rationality—I was raised in a godless household in a mostly godless country (France). I’ve always been pretty interested in science-fiction and in religion (though not as something I might believe in).
What pushed me a bit more towards rationalism:
Maths classes that required a lot of demonstrations (and having to be able to do them again on the blackboard with an examinator)
A physics teacher who insisted that we always include an uncertainty factor throughout our calculations, and not give excess decimals (I’ve noticed that I tend to think in terms of probability distributions more than others around me)
Questioning a lot of my political opinions, and noticing when my brain was “up to no good”, for example when EvaluateAsLeftWingOrRightWing(idea) was being called before EvaluateTruth(idea).
Getting annoyed with atheists who consider religion to be the only domain where one can be irrational
Working as a programmer, which doesn’t leave much place for wishful thinking
If you want to learn from your experience most effectively and efficiently, and to stop making the same kinds of mistakes, with subtle variations, again and again, it is necessary to engage in reflection about the erroneous thoughts that caused the bug/problem and the thoughts and mental processes that were absent but could have prevented the problem. It depends how much one cares about improving, and how quickly, but for anybody who seeks mastery, I don’t see how you can avoid thinking about thinking.
I don’t remember any sudden move towards rationality—I was raised in a godless household in a mostly godless country (France). I’ve always been pretty interested in science-fiction and in religion (though not as something I might believe in).
What pushed me a bit more towards rationalism:
Maths classes that required a lot of demonstrations (and having to be able to do them again on the blackboard with an examinator)
A physics teacher who insisted that we always include an uncertainty factor throughout our calculations, and not give excess decimals (I’ve noticed that I tend to think in terms of probability distributions more than others around me)
Questioning a lot of my political opinions, and noticing when my brain was “up to no good”, for example when EvaluateAsLeftWingOrRightWing(idea) was being called before EvaluateTruth(idea).
Getting annoyed with atheists who consider religion to be the only domain where one can be irrational
Working as a programmer, which doesn’t leave much place for wishful thinking
Reading Overcoming Bias daily
Regarding working as a programmer, I entirely agree.
I don’t know of any other discipline, even math, where one is more repeatedly confronted with one’s mistakes.
Yet you are not forced to think about your own thinking.
If you want to learn from your experience most effectively and efficiently, and to stop making the same kinds of mistakes, with subtle variations, again and again, it is necessary to engage in reflection about the erroneous thoughts that caused the bug/problem and the thoughts and mental processes that were absent but could have prevented the problem. It depends how much one cares about improving, and how quickly, but for anybody who seeks mastery, I don’t see how you can avoid thinking about thinking.
I wish some of the programmers I’ve worked with realised this.