Rationality Quotes: February 2010

wedrifid

A monthly thread for posting rationality-related quotes you've seen recently (or had stored in your quotesfile for ages).

Please post all quotes separately, so that they can be voted up/down separately. (If they are strongly related, reply to your own comments. If strongly ordered, then go ahead and post them together.)
Do not quote yourself.
Do not quote comments/posts on LW/OB.
No more than 5 quotes per person per monthly thread, please.

ETA: It would seem that rationality quotes are no longer desired. After several days this thread stands voted into the negatives. Wolud whoever chose to to downvote this below 0 would care to express their disapproval of the regular quotes tradition more explicitly? Or perhaps they may like to browse around for some alternative posts that they could downvote instead of this one? Or, since we're in the business of quotation, they could "come on if they think they're hard enough!"

A monthly thread for posting rationality-related quotes you've seen recently (or had stored in your quotesfile for ages).

Please post all quotes separately, so that they can be voted up/down separately. (If they are strongly related, reply to your own comments. If strongly ordered, then go ahead and post them together.)
Do not quote yourself.
Do not quote comments/posts on LW/OB.
No more than 5 quotes per person per monthly thread, please.

http://home.netcom.com/~rogermw2/force_skeptics.html

This page persuaded me, by the way - I am now a Force Skeptic with respect to the Star Wars universe.

That page sounded like banal propaganda. Yes, any magic is indistinguishable from sufficiently advanced technology but it sounds to me like the author has a strong preference to blaming evidence on an invisible robotic dragon in his garage rather than uncover the actual explanation whatever it may be.

This is a world where you can hear sound in space and of light is more of a guideline than an actual rule. Your real world preconceptions just don't apply. Once there is any evidence whatsoever that Jedi are unwilling to subject the force to any scientific scr... (read more)

2gwern16y

From an EU perspective, that page is quite wrong, especially with assertions like [...] (EU introduced Force-detecting devices left over from the Jedi purges.) or [...] (I think Lucas himself wrote in a blind Jedi or two.)