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Intro-level training materials for rationality / critical thinking
Iksorod and I made a Google doc of intro-level training materials for rationality / critical thinking. We'll keep adding to it as we find more stuff. Please comment with your own additions.
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Comments (58)
What about this recommendation from the here be dragons video?: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Demon-Haunted_World
Added, thanks.
The "here be dragons" video is nonsence. Sorry.
He commits fallacies of his own in his explanation of fallacies.
He straw mans the entire vaccine debate and the fact that 9/11 was an inside job. Furthermore he casts doubt on "conspiracy theories" with a generalisation (that they are all theories) like a true evangelist.
There are many conspiracies that are historical fact; the Reichstag fire, the gulf of Tonkin, even Caesar’s murder.
I know mentioning the law is an appeal to authority, but, even the law knows of conspiracies. They have conspiracies to pervert the course of justice, conspiracies to commit crimes. And these arnt just coincidental terms.
"Here be dragons" fails, badly. Mainly, by assuming that Critical Thinking is on some sort of political side with science, or at least, the whole of science. Instead of being, in entirety, about analysing evidence.
Anyone who downvoted CriticalSteel just for his unpopular positions should be ashamed of themselves.
That having been said, he deserves enough downvotes, for the obnoxious and arrogant manner he uses later in the thread. Just not for this initial post.
Not at all. It is entirely legitimate to down-vote completely crackpot ideas purely because hearing the same old completely crackpot ideas can be annoying. It would also be legitimate to downvote the grandparent based off the arguments therein. They aren't nearly as ridiculous as what they descend into later in the thread but the "like a true evangelist" line as well as move to the entirely different kind of 'conspiracy' used in law (rather far removed from popular 'conspiracy theories') are both potentially downvote-worthy.
Would it be legitimate for me to downvote people the next time they mention ideas that I consider completely crackpot (like quantum immortality), or ideas that most of the world considers completely crackpot (like many-worlds)?
The arguments contained in the ancestor post criticize "Here Be Dragons" for actual failings contained therein. That the specific ideas mentioned (9/11 conspiracy, autism-vaccine connection) are considered crackpot doesn't mean one is allowed to strawman them. It's all the more reason that one doesn''t even have to strawman them.
I tend to presume less control of other people's voting behavior than you seem to.
I tried to accommodate the 9/11 trutherism by pointing to videos discussing the problems inherent in conspiracy theories that did not use that as an example. I didn't downvote the original post and ignored early signs of confusion about how words work:
This was followed in subsequent posts by map-territory confusion:
That the video did not use the word "evidence" does not strongly imply that evidence was not provided. Spelling and grammar are tools to limit confusion, and writing "the word 'evidence'" as "the word evidence" isn't helping him.
The response:
At this point, I was done but he went on:
To his credit, he apparently actually went and read about it, as he later said:
He doesn't understand how words work, doesn't understand beliefs and reality, and doesn't understand how to change his mind. I disagree with the implication that things other than tone aren't sufficient reasons to downvote his other posts.
It is not a coincidence that one person's arguments, sentences, and words are all muddled.
I endorse what wedrifid said as a reply to the new person's posts:
I agree. I downvoted some of his posts, not because he might not have a point, but because he was using a style that I do not appreciate on lesswrong: unneeded profanity, half-formed thoughts, aggressive tone, and (I'll admit) bad spelling.
However, I would not (and did not) down vote this original post, which seems like a reasonable argument (from the POV of someone who has not watched whatever video they are discussing)
...the Al-Qaeda conspiracies to blow up the World Trade Center...
HBD is tedious, and The Critical Thinker just added better conspiracy theory videos.
Part 1, Part 2
Why no mention of the Sequences?
Because it is intro-level material. The sequences require a strong base to read/understand and a lot of endurance
I won't argue with endurance, but what do you mean with "strong base"? Where in the sequences are you expected to already know something that's not part of the sequences? I've read most of it (didn't care to learn about quantum physics) and don't remember such a thing.
I don't know math, quantum mechanics or philosophy, i had to open 10-20 pages of references and google searches to follow what was going on(per individual sequence page).
It reads as though it is assumed that you are a AI graduate.
Its also strongly aimed/influenced by american culture, so some things are weird for us Europeans.
(Is there such a thing as an "AI graduate"?)
You know, while I appreciated the pop culture (and cult-classic culture) references in the Sequences while I was reading them, probably because I got almost all of them, I can definitely see the argument that they reduce accessibility for a wider audience.
Perhaps I'm used to read on, even if I might miss something. I know a bit of math, and there are a few posts that benefit from that, but only a few. I don't know much philosophy either (except the sequences, of course).
Let's take Making Beliefs Pay Rent (in (Anticipated Experiences) as an example. What would you have to look up there? And don't say "colonial alienation" ;-). For me it might be phlogiston and elan-vital. But A) understanding those words is hardly essential for understanding the post and B) they are explained somewhere else in the sequences (I never said navigating them were easy).
I'm European and I don't really know what you mean.
i have tried the read-on thing on 2 pages and it made it even worse, so i dropped back to the opening pages tactic. That page you mention is actually one of the better ones although using examples like "Wulky Wilkinsen" and post utopianism made no sense to me. Having things explained elsewhere is a big problem imho, but i intend to devote some time to help fix that.
You may have been exposed to enough american culture by tv, movie, shows and books to not get overwhelmed by them?
That's sort of the point. The words "post utopianism" and "colonial alienation" don't mean anything.
Most movies and even tv-shows that run in Germany are actually American. Books might be more of a problem, but if it's a classic like the Christmas Carole, there is a Simpsons episode about it :)
I'd recommend linking to the main Skeptic's Guide to the Universe podcast, as well as their "5x5" podcast (which is currently linked to). Most weeks some common fallacy or cognitive bias is mentioned (usually in connection with alternative medicine).
Added, thanks.
The title of McRaney's book is a bit crueler than I remember.
The Case of The Spelunkean Explorers, previously mentioned here in a post by cousin_it, offers a fascinating array of examples of different legal theories. Some of them are useful to think about in the context of metaethics, while others are more useful in discussing the hidden complexity of wishes.