From Omnilibrium:
cleonid
Karma: 304
Rational discussion of politics
Experiment: Changing minds vs. preaching to the choir
Should you write longer comments? (Statistical analysis of the relationship between comment length and ratings)
Measuring open-mindedness
Rational Discussion of Controversial Topics
The seeming irrationality of the customers choice may disappear after the cost of decision-making is taken into account.
In our daily life we are constantly required to estimate trade-offs between things that are very difficult to quantify (e.g. pleasure of wearing a new jacket—money that has to be paid – extra hours of work to earn this money - …). Hence using simple subconscious heuristics (such as “improving the trade-off by 50% is worthy of your time, 5% is not”) is very helpful. A constant search for an optimal solution would make a nightmare out of our every decision, which is hardly worth an occasional 5$ saving.
In this specific example, I believe that increasing the price differentials would have justified an additional mental effort, leading more people to the “optimal choice”.
Natural Selection of Government Systems
To promote rational rather than emotional discussion, one should avoid argumentum ad Hitlerum. The general point seems to be unrelated to Nazism, so I propose rewriting the post using a more neutral background story. Something like
“You are General Grant. It is 1865. Colonel Y proposes to outlaw Democratic Party for its support of slavery...”
“You’re using rationalist methods to support religion”
Thank you very much for the compliment. However, it is totally undeserved. Being essentially an atheist (well, agnostic to be precise), supporting religion was the last thing on my mind. What I really wanted to do is to test how rational and intelligent people, which I hoped would be overrepresented on this forum, would react to arguments that go against their preferred view.
It is interesting that everyone seems to assume that I am a religious person myself, though I thought the contrary should be pretty obvious from the post title. Personally, I have yet to meet people who would call their beliefs “irrational”.
The website is intended for discussion of all ideologically divisive issues that are currently avoided on LW (economic policies, historical analysis etc.).
It is claimed that Golda Meir once requested Nixon not to appoint jews as his delegates in Israel. There was a strong feeling in Israel that to avoid accusations of bias, delegates who happen to be jewish tend to lean the other way instead.
In general, how can we be sure that by “correcting” subconscious associations, we really shift our subconscious towards rationality rather than suppress what those around us consider a “thoughtcrime”?
Rational Defense of Irrational Beliefs
From Omnilibrium:
Opinion changes about grand things like a political doctrine may be difficult precisely because the opinions themselves are inconsequential. If I mistakenly vote for the party A instead of the party B, there are no personal consequences (my vote won’t change the outcome). By contrast, if I change my mind there are at least two negative consequences:
1) My ego will be hurt (I’ll have to admit that I was wrong before)
2) My friends and colleagues will be annoyed with me (statistically, friends and colleagues are likely to vote for the same party)