waitingforgodel comments on Rationality Quotes: December 2010 - Less Wrong

6 Post author: Tiiba 03 December 2010 03:23AM

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Comment author: waitingforgodel 07 December 2010 05:09:49PM *  2 points [-]

Willingness to:

  1. Think about problems that don't seem "worth thinking about"

  2. Come to non-traditional conclusions, and share those thoughts publicly... even it it makes you look silly

Comment author: Vaniver 07 December 2010 05:26:00PM 2 points [-]

Think about problems that don't seem "worth thinking about"

That hardly strikes me as rational- that just sounds like "curious" or "intellectually unbounded."

Come to non-traditional conclusions, and share those thoughts publicly... even it it makes you look silly

A good reason as to why this is Hanson displaying rationality, but that doesn't seem to me to be a "rationality quote." It isn't particularly deep wisdom that he imagines the closer harm to him is worse than the further harm to him. Being cuckolded is terrible enough for people to kill others, being raped is terrible enough for people to kill others and kill themselves; I suspect Hanson is unconsciously revealing which issue worries him more rather than which issue is actually worse to deal with.

There is also the following issue which I was hoping you would address:

Do not quote comments/posts on LW/OB. That's like shooting fish in a barrel. :)

Comment author: waitingforgodel 07 December 2010 05:33:13PM *  2 points [-]

A good rationality quote is one that gets deeper the more you think about it -- and, for me personally, the above quote has been on the back of my mind all night.

YMMV, of course.

Edit: I took the LW/OB rule to be about more "obvious" quotes

Comment author: Desrtopa 09 December 2010 01:52:51PM *  1 point [-]
  1. Come to non-traditional conclusions, and share those thoughts publicly... even it it makes you look silly.

If it accomplishes little else, I don't see how this signifies rationality. It shows a lack of understanding of the importance of signaling.

Comment author: David_Gerard 09 December 2010 02:24:43PM *  0 points [-]

You have to stick around to defend them, and (and this is the tricky bit) have people willing to bother arguing them with you. Overcoming Bias appears to have disappeared down the rabbit hole of no feedback, for example. I suspect one needs to keep a close eye on one's awareness of how different one is from the mainstream of thought.

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