It’s the opposite for me. I was curious and couldn’t find answers. Or rather, the answers that people helpfully provided to me with high confidence all turned out to be wrong. After a few decades I have mostly found the answers I was looking for. If I could send them back to myself using a time machine, I would.
What answers were these? I’ve never felt the fascination with labels, and observing how others use them it seems that they mostly function as Mysterious Answers, where people ask “Why am I like this?”, and for psychological reasons they find “You have like-this-itis” to be a much more satisfying answer than “You’re just like this”.
Labels are pointers to somewhere. In the degenerate case, they just point to their own description. “Why can’t I get anything done?” “Because you are lazy.” “What does ‘lazy’ mean?” “It means the person who can’t get anything done.” Those are the mysterious answers.
(The problem with mysterious answers is that people mistake a classification label with causal explanation. There is nothing wrong with “x ∈ S” per se; the problem is the “x ∈ S because x ∈ S” circular reasoning.)
Useful labels point to some useful knowledge. “Why can’t I get anything done?” “Because you have ADHD.” “How is that useful to know?” “You may want to try Adderall or Ritalin.”
Could we just skip the label and go directly to the advice? “Why can’t I get anything done?” “Try Ritalin.” Nope, that’s exactly how you get a generation of kids medicated with something that most of them don’t need. ADHD is more than just a synonym for “can’t get anything done”; it is a(n assumed) specific mechanism that causes the symptom. Sometimes the same symptom can be used by many different mechanisms, and you need differential diagnostics to figure out whether the specific label applies. Not all people who “can’t get anything done” have the version of “can’t get anything done” that benefits from trying Ritalin. The label ADHD refers only to those who do. (Even this is simplifying things.) Therefore, knowing that you have ADHD is more useful than merely knowing that you can’t get anything done.
If you are weird in some way, people will give you a label anyway. It just probably won’t be a useful one. It could be a mysterious one, such as “lazy”. Or it could be a misapplied one, such as “ADHD” when your problem is actually something completely different, so you will try dozen ADHD medications and only get some mild placebo effect.
“You’re just like this” is not enough. I want to become stronger. But I won’t achieve that by banging my head against the wall, which is the standard “just try harder” advice. If a pill can make me stronger, I want to know that. If noise canceling headphones can make me stronger, I want to know that, too. I have no objection against using “crutches”. If there is a way through the maze, I want to know it.
But experimenting with possible solutions is costly. If you try random pills just to see if any of them works, it will take a lot of time (you should probably only do one at a time? and wait for a month to see whether it works?), may have bad side effects, and could be illegal (or jumping through the hoops will take even more time). If your workplace does not allow headphones, you need to change your job before trying them. Etc.
Having a good model of yourself helps you make better predictions about what will or won’t work for you.
.
Now I am thinking about all those rationalists in Bay Area who believe that meditation will help them solve their problems. Wouldn’t it be nice if they had a way to predict whether this will work for them, or whether a decade later they will regret all the time wasted on something that in hindsight was obviously unrelated to the actual source of their problems? But wouldn’t a correct answer involve some kind of label?
If a pill can make me stronger, I want to know that.
Ritalin makes everyone stronger. Its effects on average people are well-tested by academics and college students. I believe your use of labels has led you astray.
What answers were these? I’ve never felt the fascination with labels, and observing how others use them it seems that they mostly function as Mysterious Answers, where people ask “Why am I like this?”, and for psychological reasons they find “You have like-this-itis” to be a much more satisfying answer than “You’re just like this”.
Labels are pointers to somewhere. In the degenerate case, they just point to their own description. “Why can’t I get anything done?” “Because you are lazy.” “What does ‘lazy’ mean?” “It means the person who can’t get anything done.” Those are the mysterious answers.
(The problem with mysterious answers is that people mistake a classification label with causal explanation. There is nothing wrong with “x ∈ S” per se; the problem is the “x ∈ S because x ∈ S” circular reasoning.)
Useful labels point to some useful knowledge. “Why can’t I get anything done?” “Because you have ADHD.” “How is that useful to know?” “You may want to try Adderall or Ritalin.”
Could we just skip the label and go directly to the advice? “Why can’t I get anything done?” “Try Ritalin.” Nope, that’s exactly how you get a generation of kids medicated with something that most of them don’t need. ADHD is more than just a synonym for “can’t get anything done”; it is a(n assumed) specific mechanism that causes the symptom. Sometimes the same symptom can be used by many different mechanisms, and you need differential diagnostics to figure out whether the specific label applies. Not all people who “can’t get anything done” have the version of “can’t get anything done” that benefits from trying Ritalin. The label ADHD refers only to those who do. (Even this is simplifying things.) Therefore, knowing that you have ADHD is more useful than merely knowing that you can’t get anything done.
If you are weird in some way, people will give you a label anyway. It just probably won’t be a useful one. It could be a mysterious one, such as “lazy”. Or it could be a misapplied one, such as “ADHD” when your problem is actually something completely different, so you will try dozen ADHD medications and only get some mild placebo effect.
“You’re just like this” is not enough. I want to become stronger. But I won’t achieve that by banging my head against the wall, which is the standard “just try harder” advice. If a pill can make me stronger, I want to know that. If noise canceling headphones can make me stronger, I want to know that, too. I have no objection against using “crutches”. If there is a way through the maze, I want to know it.
But experimenting with possible solutions is costly. If you try random pills just to see if any of them works, it will take a lot of time (you should probably only do one at a time? and wait for a month to see whether it works?), may have bad side effects, and could be illegal (or jumping through the hoops will take even more time). If your workplace does not allow headphones, you need to change your job before trying them. Etc.
Having a good model of yourself helps you make better predictions about what will or won’t work for you.
.
Now I am thinking about all those rationalists in Bay Area who believe that meditation will help them solve their problems. Wouldn’t it be nice if they had a way to predict whether this will work for them, or whether a decade later they will regret all the time wasted on something that in hindsight was obviously unrelated to the actual source of their problems? But wouldn’t a correct answer involve some kind of label?
Ritalin makes everyone stronger. Its effects on average people are well-tested by academics and college students. I believe your use of labels has led you astray.
With diminishing returns and some bad side effects, right?
If not, can you please recommend me the research that you find most convincing?