I keep a list of quotations exactly for situations like this. (A few are even from LessWrong.)
-If you’ve never wasted an effort, you’re filtering on far too high a required probability of success.
-1. When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
2. The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
3. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
-Just because your brain is missing, it doesn’t mean that the Jews took it.
-If you’re unsure about which alleged rapist to vote for, you can always vote 3rd party.
-I wasted so many years being miserable because I assumed it was the only way to be.
-If something stops working for you it might just be that you’ve adapted to whatever intervention you were using to begin with. There does not have to be a deep reason behind it.
-Generally speaking the errors in religion are dangerous. Those in philosophy are only ridiculous.
-Most of your life is the process of solving problems. It is not and will never be a condition of basking in the absence of all problems. There will always be something to do. The frame of mind in which you do it determines the quality of your life. You can’t wait until you solve your problems to be happy.
-every corpse on Mt Everest was once an extremely motivated person.
-If I were not Diogenes, I would also want to be Diogenes.
-The power of decision theory is that it can be applied across twelve orders of magnitude of human suffering.
-Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt.
-Rewire your brain for the long term.
-Become addicted to possibility.
-That’s not right. That’s not even wrong.
-You can’t polish a turd but you can roll it in glitter.
-When they realized they were in the desert, they built a religion to worship thirstiness.
-In the moment when I truly understand my enemy, understand him well enough to defeat him, then in that very moment I also love him. I think it’s impossible to really understand somebody, what they want, what they believe, and not love them the way they love themselves.
-To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.
-There’s never enough time to do all the nothing you want.
-Love is your favorite meal for every breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
-Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place.
-Trying to find planets to live on is the same as looking for caves to inhabit rather than building houses.
-I’ve had time, and I’ve had motivation, but never both at the same time.
-the world has tin edges.
(I imagine some of these are not appropriate but they are still funny imo)
I keep a list of quotations exactly for situations like this. (A few are even from LessWrong.)
-If you’ve never wasted an effort, you’re filtering on far too high a required probability of success.
-1. When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong. 2. The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible. 3. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
-Just because your brain is missing, it doesn’t mean that the Jews took it.
-If you’re unsure about which alleged rapist to vote for, you can always vote 3rd party.
-I wasted so many years being miserable because I assumed it was the only way to be.
-If something stops working for you it might just be that you’ve adapted to whatever intervention you were using to begin with. There does not have to be a deep reason behind it.
-Generally speaking the errors in religion are dangerous. Those in philosophy are only ridiculous.
-Most of your life is the process of solving problems. It is not and will never be a condition of basking in the absence of all problems. There will always be something to do. The frame of mind in which you do it determines the quality of your life. You can’t wait until you solve your problems to be happy.
-every corpse on Mt Everest was once an extremely motivated person.
-If I were not Diogenes, I would also want to be Diogenes.
-The power of decision theory is that it can be applied across twelve orders of magnitude of human suffering.
-Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt.
-Rewire your brain for the long term.
-Become addicted to possibility.
-That’s not right. That’s not even wrong.
-You can’t polish a turd but you can roll it in glitter.
-When they realized they were in the desert, they built a religion to worship thirstiness.
-In the moment when I truly understand my enemy, understand him well enough to defeat him, then in that very moment I also love him. I think it’s impossible to really understand somebody, what they want, what they believe, and not love them the way they love themselves.
-To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.
-There’s never enough time to do all the nothing you want.
-Love is your favorite meal for every breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
-Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place.
-Trying to find planets to live on is the same as looking for caves to inhabit rather than building houses.
-I’ve had time, and I’ve had motivation, but never both at the same time.
-the world has tin edges.
(I imagine some of these are not appropriate but they are still funny imo)
I’ve always preferred the contrapositive of this: Any technology that’s distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.