Roko comments on On the Power of Intelligence and Rationality - Less Wrong

13 Post author: alyssavance 23 December 2009 10:49AM

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Comment deleted 27 December 2009 12:45:24AM *  [-]
Comment author: alyssavance 29 December 2009 09:37:42AM 1 point [-]

"right place, right time, luck, populism and ambition seems to explain them."

Even if luck is a big factor (which it probably is), if rationality is important, you'd still expect pretty much all the successful groups to have above-average rationality. Everyone agrees, for instance, that luck is a big factor in your ability to become an actor, yet pretty much all actors have above-average physical attractiveness.

"Also, as a matter of fact, they lost so badly and in such a horrific way that the agenda of white/aryan power has been badly damaged; they managed to actually anti-optimize their goal!"

My point was that rationalists generally won on the scale of nations/civilizations/decades, but didn't have a big advantage on the scale of individuals/small groups/minutes to years.

Comment author: Douglas_Knight 27 December 2009 06:01:57AM 0 points [-]

Also, as a matter of fact, they lost so badly and in such a horrific way that the agenda of white/aryan power has been badly damaged; they managed to actually anti-optimize their goal!

Not to disagree with the particular example, but be careful to distinguish between slogans and actual goals. Names are often villanized without actually tainting the meaning.