Emile comments on Ace Attorney: pioneer Rationalism-didactic game? - Less Wrong

19 Post author: Raw_Power 23 May 2011 11:28PM

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

Comments (29)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: Emile 24 May 2011 02:17:31PM *  1 point [-]

Any situation where individuals are pitted against one another is going to be difficult training ground for rationality. Evidence needs to be treated not just as something to deploy against others. Reframing truth-seeking as a cooperative, positive-sum venture rather than an adversarial, zero-sum one can go a long way.

That only holds if the individuals are trying to change each other's mind, or prove that the other is wrong to a third party. If the conflict isn't around belief or values, then the involved parties have better use the available evidence to be as effective as possible. So games like Diplomacy or Starcraft could be decent training grounds for instrumental rationality.

(I still agree with what you meant, i.e. adverserial debate isn't very conductive to either party weighting the evidence honestly and updating their beliefs in consequence)

Comment author: badger 24 May 2011 03:32:09PM 2 points [-]

Yes, I should have specified situations where the conflict is over beliefs. Conflicts over goals don't have the same mind-killing quality.