I think the notion the 'most people suffer from significant problem X' is very often plain misunderstood. If everybody 'suffers' X, X is the norm, not an affliction (with exceptions such as, say, lower back pain). You're projecting your normative values onto factual matters.
Also, the notion that we have deficient moral/mental capacities seems to me unsupported and basically quasi-religious. "What we think of as normal is very dysfunctional..." Red pill or blue pill. Please.
Our attachment to material trinkets, material self-worth, emotion expression abilities, family problems etc. all stem from our evolutionary background and the conflicting selection pressures our species was subjected to. Why would one even think that an conflict-free perfect Bayesian could, would or should result from evolution?
Yes, it sucks loving your spouse and wanting to cheat at the same time. I just don't see how this translates into "significant psychological problems." Especially not some that need be overcome before moving on towards rationality Nirvana. I suggest bullet-biting as the cure for this ailment.
It is possible for X to be the norm and simultaneously cause suffering, contra your first paragraph. How common the characteristic is and how much suffering it causes are only loosely related. I'm not talking about normative values at all.
OF COURSE attachment to material trinkets, etc., come from our evolutionary background. Where else would they come from? That has no bearing at all on whether we would benefit from overcoming some of evolved tendencies. I have no idea how you could possibly have misinterpreted me to be arguing that a "conflict-free p...
What do you believe that most people on this site don't?
I'm especially looking for things that you wouldn't even mention if someone wasn't explicitly asking for them. Stuff you're not even comfortable writing under your own name. Making a one-shot account here is very easy, go ahead and do that if you don't want to tarnish your image.
I think a big problem with a "community" dedicated to being less wrong is that it will make people more concerned about APPEARING less wrong. The biggest part of my intellectual journey so far has been the acquisition of new and startling knowledge, and that knowledge doesn't seem likely to turn up here in the conditions that currently exist.
So please, tell me the crazy things you're otherwise afraid to say. I want to know them, because they might be true.