cupholder comments on Rationality quotes: June 2010 - Less Wrong

4 Post author: Morendil 01 June 2010 06:07PM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (215)

You are viewing a single comment's thread.

Comment author: cupholder 12 June 2010 12:18:25PM 6 points [-]

Do not ask whether a statement is true until you know what it means.

Errett Bishop

Comment author: wedrifid 18 June 2010 12:35:28PM 1 point [-]

Bad advice.

I do not want to understand all untrue statements. Not only is there an opportunity cost associated with thinking or learning, understanding false statements can bias your brain in undesirable directions.

There are times (say, you know an expert you trust on the subject) when you can establish with acceptable confidence that a statement is not true. In such cases it is often better to not bother giving the false statement another thought.