Eliezer_Yudkowsky comments on Teachable Rationality Skills - Less Wrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (257)
Skill: Anti-rationalization (1): Prevent your mind from selectively searching for support of only one side of an argument.
Exercise material (prerequisite for multiple exercises below): Have a hot-topic list such that incoming students at the expected level (e.g. level = typical LW reader) would be tempted to rationalize at least some of them. This requires both that someone care about the topic, and that the topic isn't so cut-and-dry that there's no temptation to distort anything. E.g., I care about atheism but I don't have any emotional fear of that argument coming out "the wrong way" - on the other hand, putting me in an actual argument with, say, my parents, or someone who was a really clever theistic arguer in front of an audience, might generate the emotional temptation to cheat to ensure winning on every single point.
We can probably generate a good hot topic list from the past discussions on LW. Here's some suggestions based on a very quick attempt at recalling past debates.