I think your article is wonderfully grounded, with subtle but practical advice. It triggers a number of heuristics I have for detecting good advice, like (1) being a description of something you’ve already tested for yourself and found helpful, rather than being something that “should work in theory”, and (2) noting that social aspects of the technique (IE more structure and fewer tangents in social conversations) could have downsides via damaged friendships but seems not to have problems in practice based on specific evidence from specific events with specific people.
I expect to find myself thinking of this advice when I find myself in situations where I can gainfully apply it in the future.
In the meantime, I’ve been developing the hypothesis that highly voted content walks a very careful line between deploying the dark arts “for the side of good” while talking about the development of personal rationality. And I note that your article doesn’t (for example) explain how I can win arguments and status, nor does it deploy in-group/out-group applause lights by carefully managed references to politics and religion.
In this light, I wanted to consciously thank you for writing a good and useful article that seems very epistemically hygienic, even if it doesn’t rocket to the top of Top. Thank you for both the content and the restraint :-)
I think your article is wonderfully grounded, with subtle but practical advice. It triggers a number of heuristics I have for detecting good advice, like (1) being a description of something you’ve already tested for yourself and found helpful, rather than being something that “should work in theory”, and (2) noting that social aspects of the technique (IE more structure and fewer tangents in social conversations) could have downsides via damaged friendships but seems not to have problems in practice based on specific evidence from specific events with specific people.
I expect to find myself thinking of this advice when I find myself in situations where I can gainfully apply it in the future.
In the meantime, I’ve been developing the hypothesis that highly voted content walks a very careful line between deploying the dark arts “for the side of good” while talking about the development of personal rationality. And I note that your article doesn’t (for example) explain how I can win arguments and status, nor does it deploy in-group/out-group applause lights by carefully managed references to politics and religion.
In this light, I wanted to consciously thank you for writing a good and useful article that seems very epistemically hygienic, even if it doesn’t rocket to the top of Top. Thank you for both the content and the restraint :-)
Aww. ^_^ You’re entirely welcome.