Ever since I adopted the rule of “That which can be destroyed by the truth should be,” I’ve also come to realize “That which the truth nourishes should thrive.” When something good happens, I am happy, and there is no confusion in my mind about whether it is rational for me to be happy. When something terrible happens, I do not flee my sadness by searching for fake consolations and false silver linings. I visualize the past and future of humankind, the tens of billions of deaths over our history, the misery and fear, the search for answers, the trembling hands reaching upward out of so much blood, what we could become someday when we make the stars our cities, all that darkness and all that light—I know that I can never truly understand it, and I haven’t the words to say. Despite all my philosophy I am still embarrassed to confess strong emotions, and you’re probably uncomfortable hearing them. But I know, now, that it is rational to feel.
I feel that this is beautifully written and, while I don’t believe that visualising past and future scenarios for context is [always] necessary (and this isn’t prescribed by Yudkowsky), I think it reflects deep wisdom about marrying self- and world- models.
An excerpt from Descartes’ Fourth Meditation that in my view discusses similar ideas (will = feeling) with an additional lens of freedom:
[Will] … consists simply in the fact that when the intellect puts something forward for affirmation or denial or for pursuit or avoidance, our inclinations are such that we do not feel we are determined by any external force. In order to be free, there is no need for me to be inclined both ways; on the contrary, the more I incline in one direction—either because I clearly understand that reasons of truth and goodness point that way, or because of a divinely produced disposition of my inmost thoughts—the freer is my choice. Neither divine grace nor natural knowledge ever diminishes freedom; on the contrary, they increase and strengthen it. But the indifference I feel when there is no reason pushing me in one direction rather than another is the lowest grade of freedom; it is evidence not of any perfection of freedom, but rather of a defect in knowledge or a kind of negation. For if I always saw clearly what was true and good, I should never have to deliberate about the right judgement or choice; in that case, although I should be wholly free, it would be impossible for me ever to be in a state of indifference.
I feel that this is beautifully written and, while I don’t believe that visualising past and future scenarios for context is [always] necessary (and this isn’t prescribed by Yudkowsky), I think it reflects deep wisdom about marrying self- and world- models.
An excerpt from Descartes’ Fourth Meditation that in my view discusses similar ideas (will = feeling) with an additional lens of freedom: