I think it’s more apt to characterize winning as a goal of rationality, not as its mark.
In Bayesian terms, while those applying the methods of rationality should win more than the general population on average—p(winning|rationalist) > p(winning|non-rationalist)-- the number of rationalists in the population is low enough at present that p(non-rationalist|winning) almost certainly > p(rationalist|winning), so observing whether or not someone is winning is not very good evidence as to their rationality.
Ack, you’re entirely right. “Mark” is somewhat ambiguous to me without context, I think I had imbued it with some measure of goalness from the GP’s use.
I have a bad habit of uncritically imitating peoples’ word choices within the scope of a conversation. In this case, it bit me by echoing the GP’s is-ought confusion… yikes!
I wonder about the time scale for winning. After all, a poker player using an optimal strategy can still expect extended periods of losing, and poker is better defined than a lot of life situations.
Winning is a truer mark of rationality.
I think it’s more apt to characterize winning as a goal of rationality, not as its mark.
In Bayesian terms, while those applying the methods of rationality should win more than the general population on average—p(winning|rationalist) > p(winning|non-rationalist)-- the number of rationalists in the population is low enough at present that p(non-rationalist|winning) almost certainly > p(rationalist|winning), so observing whether or not someone is winning is not very good evidence as to their rationality.
Ack, you’re entirely right. “Mark” is somewhat ambiguous to me without context, I think I had imbued it with some measure of goalness from the GP’s use.
I have a bad habit of uncritically imitating peoples’ word choices within the scope of a conversation. In this case, it bit me by echoing the GP’s is-ought confusion… yikes!
I wonder about the time scale for winning. After all, a poker player using an optimal strategy can still expect extended periods of losing, and poker is better defined than a lot of life situations.