Thomas comments on Rationality quotes: April 2010 - Less Wrong

5 Post author: wnoise 01 April 2010 08:41PM

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Comment author: Thomas 02 April 2010 04:52:20PM 18 points [-]

Wandering in a vast forest at night, I have only a faint light to guide me. A stranger appears and says to me: 'My friend, you should blow out your candle in order to find your way more clearly.' The stranger is a theologian.

  • Denis Diderot
Comment author: Pfft 04 April 2010 01:17:58AM 6 points [-]

But blowing out the candle actually would make it easier to find your way (it ruins your night vision).

Comment author: James_K 04 April 2010 07:57:01PM 4 points [-]

Not if the forest is sufficiently dark that your night vision doesn't have enough light to work with.

Comment author: Zubon 05 April 2010 01:02:47AM 1 point [-]

That seems like an easy case to test, provided you have some way to re-light the candle.

Comment author: roundsquare 05 April 2010 09:40:00AM 0 points [-]

You need to make two assumptions for the analogy.

1) You can't re-light the candle.

2) If you do things exactly right, you'll get out with just before starving to death (or dying somehow) otherwise, you are dead.