roland comments on Please do not downvote every comment or post someone has ever made as a retaliation tactic. - Less Wrong

39 Post author: Will_Newsome 21 August 2011 12:35PM

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Comment author: roland 25 August 2011 05:24:32AM -2 points [-]

First of all, thanks for the constructive argument!

What sort of tests can you think of that differentiate well between people who are thoroughly biased and people who used evidence?

One that I have thought of long ago is asking the basic question of rationality, "Why do you believe what you believe." The result can be seen here: http://lesswrong.com/lw/5kz/the_5second_level/4c68 and here: http://lesswrong.com/lw/1ww/undiscriminating_skepticism/4c63

Needless to say, both questions were also ignored.

I don't know what other tests could be performed, considering that the people in question are apparently not willing to participate in any.

Comment author: Manfred 25 August 2011 07:43:56AM 2 points [-]

Well, that's still the "confronting" test. Given that people answered "because of the other evidence" in various places, either you're wrong about people deciding irrationally, or people are rationalizing a lot (which would make it a non-discriminating test). What sort of test would discriminate between a rational-ish person and someone who originally chose because of some bias ("bias X") and then rationalized, without requiring examination of the annotated bibliography of all the evidence someone ever considered ever?

Comment author: roland 25 August 2011 07:34:26PM -1 points [-]

I don't know, do you have any suggestion?