Imagine two people, Alice and Bob, share the goal of deadlifting X lbs. Alice and Bob are equally "interested and successful at achieving" all their other goals besides deadlifting X lbs. Bob is stronger than Alice. Therefore, he is more likely to be able to deadlift X lbs. Can we thereby conclude that Bob is more rational than Alice?
No. It is incredibly weak evidence that Bob is more rational than Alice.
Today's post, The Martial Art of Rationality was originally published on November 22, 2006. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):
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