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RobertLumley comments on Rationality Quotes: June 2011 - Less Wrong
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Well for what it's worth, I don't think he means it literally. Or at least so exactly. My interpretation is that he is saying that you must accept a rational basis and explanation for everything, or believe that nothing can be explained - you must accept that the laws of physics apply to every one and everything, and that there are no mysterious phenomena, or you must deny the laws of physics and believe everything is mystical.
And thanks, it's a great blog. I've learned so much reading Eliezer's work. Well, perhaps learned isn't the best word. Realized may be more appropriate.
Thank you for laying out that interpretation. I thought for years (perhaps because of the first context I saw it in) that it presented a choice between seeing the beauty in everything or not seeing it anywhere. Your interpretation makes much more sense.
Many, perhaps most people, appear to believe in separate magisteria of ordinary, explainable things, and unassailable supernatural mysteries.
But that doesn't make it rational to live that way...
True, but he didn't say there were only two rational ways of looking at the world.
I don't think the interpretation you gave is what he meant, anyway. Based on his writings about his own religious beliefs, Einstein would almost certainly have categorized himself as being one who saw everything as miraculous. Just because we accept that something is real and follows the same rules as all other known real things doesn't mean we can't have a sense of wonder over it.
I think he's saying that there are only two ways to live consistent with the world as it is, and they are identical except that the second includes the sense of awe or wonder. It's a miracle (a wonder, unexplained) that anything exists at all. Religion that believes only some things are miracles is not either of the ways he supports.