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Demosthenes comments on The Benefits of Rationality? - Less Wrong
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"Rationalism" as compared to what? Mysticism? Random decision-making? Of course rational behavior is going to be by far the best choice for achieving one's particular ends. I wasn't questioning the entire concept of rationalism, which clearly has been the driving force behind human progress for all of history. I was questioning how much making "tweaks" -- the kind discussed here and on OCB -- can do for us. Or have done for us. Put differently, is perseverating on rationality per se worth my time? Can anyone show that paying special attention to rationality has measurable results, controlling for IQ?
Mysticism and random decision making are both acceptable and highly successful methods of making decisions; most of human history has relied on those two... we still rely on them. If you are a consequentialist, you can ignore the process and just rate the outcome; who cares why nice hair is correlated with success -it just is! Why does democracy work?
What makes rationalism worth the time is probably your regard for the process itself or for its outcomes. If its the outcomes then you might want to consider other options; following your biases and desires almost blindly works out pretty well for most people.