handoflixue comments on That Magical Click - Less Wrong

58 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 20 January 2010 04:35PM

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Comment author: handoflixue 29 July 2011 11:35:27PM 6 points [-]

Oddly, I self identify as both being very good at "clicking", and very able to compartmentalize. I'm used to roleplaying an elf in WOW, a religious person at church, and a rationalist here. It makes it very easy to "click" because I can go "oh, of course, in the world that an elf inhabits, in that world view, this just makes sense", and because I have a lot of practice absorbing very odd ideas (I've worked out agricultural requirements for keeping a pet dragon...)

The big perk is that, say, my religious objections to cryonics don't even come up when I'm playing a rationalist and working it out there. So even if cryonics clashes with a lot of what I believe, I can still evaluate the idea. I don't have any commitment to being right or wrong, because my actual opinion is in a separate box.

Of course, it only works if I'm ensuring that the right mode/self/compartment is handling the right situation. If I'm debating cryonics, I want to be playing as a 12th level Rationalist, not my 3rd level Elven Ranger! :)