In the same sense that every thermal differential wants to equalize itself, and every computer program wants to become a collection of ad-hoc patches, every Cause wants to be a cult. It’s a high-entropy state into which the system trends, an attractor in human psychology.
For this to be strictly true, there would have to be more cultish microstates, more possible cultish groups, than sane ones. Do you think that’s actually the case?
Aren’t those cults whose banner is Rationality in a better position than those who aren’t? They may be just as cultish on the inside, but they have publicly accepted a standard that makes then vulnerable to criticism they cannot just dismiss.
They can still dismiss it by redefining “rationality” to exclude the methods the attacker is using.
That thought occurred to me too, and then I decided that EY was using “entropy” as “the state to which everything naturally tends” But after all, I think it’s possible to usefully extend the metaphor.
There is a higher number of possible cultish microstates than non-cultish microstates, because there are fewer logically consistent explanations for a phenomenon than logically inconsistent ones. In each non-cultish group, rational argument and counter-argument should naturally push the group toward one describing observed reality. By contrast, cultish groups can fill up the rest of concept-space.
In the same sense that every thermal differential wants to equalize itself, and every computer program wants to become a collection of ad-hoc patches, every Cause wants to be a cult. It’s a high-entropy state into which the system trends, an attractor in human psychology.
For this to be strictly true, there would have to be more cultish microstates, more possible cultish groups, than sane ones. Do you think that’s actually the case?
Aren’t those cults whose banner is Rationality in a better position than those who aren’t? They may be just as cultish on the inside, but they have publicly accepted a standard that makes then vulnerable to criticism they cannot just dismiss.
They can still dismiss it by redefining “rationality” to exclude the methods the attacker is using.
That thought occurred to me too, and then I decided that EY was using “entropy” as “the state to which everything naturally tends” But after all, I think it’s possible to usefully extend the metaphor.
There is a higher number of possible cultish microstates than non-cultish microstates, because there are fewer logically consistent explanations for a phenomenon than logically inconsistent ones. In each non-cultish group, rational argument and counter-argument should naturally push the group toward one describing observed reality. By contrast, cultish groups can fill up the rest of concept-space.