= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
MBlume comments on The ideas you're not ready to post - Less Wrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
= 783df68a0f980790206b9ea87794c5b6)
Loading…= b715d02e85f7b3b4ae65ca3d3e450868)
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Powered by Reddit
= f037147d6e6c911a85753b9abdedda8d)
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (253)
Winning Interpersonally
cousin_it would like to know how rationality has actually helped us win. However, in his article, he completely gives up on rationality in one major area, admitting that "interpersonal relationships are out."
Alex strenuously disagrees, asking "why are interpersonal relationships out? I think rationality can help a great deal here."
(And, of course, I suppose everone knows my little sob-story by now.)
I'd like to get a read from the community on this question.
Is rationality useless -- or worse, a liability when dealing with other human beings? How much does it matter if those human beings are themselves self-professed rationalists? It's been noted that Less Wrong is incredibly male. I have no idea whether this represents an actual gender differential in desire for epistemic rationality, but if it does, it means most male Less Wrongers should not expect to wind up dating rationalists. Does this mean that it is necessary for us to embrace less than accurate beliefs about, eg, our own desirability, that of our partner, various inherently confused concepts of romantic fate, or whatever supernatural beliefs our partners wish do defend? Does this mean it is necessary to make the world more rational, simply so that we can live in it?
(note: this draft was written a while before Gender and Rationality, so there's probably some stuff I'd rewrite to take that into account)
Only if you translate this into meaning you've got to communicate like Spock, or talk constantly about things that bore, depress, or shock people, or require them to think when they want to relax. etc.
(That article, btw, is by a guy who figured out how to stop being so "rational" in his personal relationships. Also, as it's a pickup artist's blog, there may be some images or language that may be offensive or NSFW. YMMV.)
That article seems kind of dodgy to me. Do people really fail to realize that the behaviors he describes are annoying and will alienate people?
The article also gets on my nerves a bit because it assumes that learning to be socially appealing to idiots is 1) difficult and 2) rewarding. Probably I'm just not in his target demographic, so oh well.
Well, he did, and I did, so that's a sample right there.
Sounds like you missed the part of the article where he pointed out that thinking of those people as "idiots" is snobbery on your part. The value of a human being's life isn't really defined by the complexity of the ideas that get discussed in it.
No, but the value to me of interacting with them is. I would like nothing more than to know that they live happy and fulfilling lives that do not involve me.
Also, "snobbery" is a loaded term. Is there a reason I am obligated to enjoy the company of people I do not like?
Sounds like you also missed the part about acquiring an appreciation for the more experiential qualities of life, and for more varieties of people.
More so than "idiots"? ;-)
Only if you want to increase your opportunities for enjoyment in life, be successful at endeavors that involve other people, reduce the amount of frustration you experience at family gatherings... you know, generally enjoying yourself without needing to have your brain uploaded first. ;-)
I do have an appreciation for those things. I find them enjoyable, distracting, but ultimately unsatisfying. That's like telling someone who eats a healthy diet to acquire an appreciation for candy.
Haha, I wondered if you would call me on that. You are right, of course, and for the most part my attitude towards people isn't as negative as I made it sound. I was annoyed by the smug and presumptuous tone of that article.
I do fine enjoying myself as it is, and it's not like I can't work with people--I'm talking only about socializing or other leisure-time activities. And as far as that goes, I absolutely fail to see the benefit of socializing with at least 90% of the people out there. They don't enjoy the things I enjoy and that's fine; why am I somehow deficient for failing to enjoy their activities?
Like I said, I don't think I'm really in the target demographic for that article, and I'm not really sure what you're trying to convince me of, here.
I'm not trying to convince you of anything. You asked questions. I answered them.
Hm, so who's trying to convince who now? ;-)
Interesting. I found its tone to be informative, helpful, and compassionately encouraging.
Who said you were? Not even the article says that. The author wrote, in effect, that he realized that he was being a snob and missing out on things by insisting on making everything be about ideas and rightness and sharing his knowledge, instead of just enjoying the moments, and by judging people with less raw intelligence as being beneath him. I don't see where he said anybody was being deficient in anything.
My only point was that sometimes socializing is useful for winning -- even if it's just enjoying yourself at times when things aren't going your way. I personally found that it limited my life too much to have to have a negative response to purely- or primarily- social interactions with low informational or practical content. Now I have the choice of being able to enjoy them for what they are, which means I have more freedom and enjoyment in my life.
But notice that at no time or place did I use the word "deficiency" to describe myself or anyone else in that. Unfulfilled potential does not equal deficiency unless you judge it to be such.
And if you don't judge or fear it to be such, why would the article set you off? If you were really happy with things as they are, wouldn't you'd have just said, "oh, something I don't need", and went on with your life? Why so much protest?
This was the impression I got from the article's tone, as well as your previous comments--an impression of "you should do this for your own good". If that was not the intent, I apologize, it is easy to misread tone over the internet.
Because there have been other times where people expressed opinions about what I ought to be doing for enjoyment (cf. the kind of helpfulness described as optimizing others ) and I find it irritating. It's a minor but persistent pet peeve.
I remarked on the article originally mainly because the advice it offered seemed puzzlingly obvious.
Ah. All I said in the original context was that rationality is only an obstacle in social situations if you used it as an excuse to make everything about you and your ideas/priorities/values, and gave the article as some background on the ways that "rational" people sometimes do that. No advice was given or implied.
As for the article's tone, bear in mind that it's a pickup artist's blog (or more precisely, the blog of a trainer of pickup artists).
So, his audience is people who already want to improve their social skills, and therefore have already decided it's a worthy goal to do so. That's why the article doesn't attempt to make a case for why someone would want to improve their social skills -- it is, after all a major topic of the blog.
I have much I could say on the subject of interpersonal application of rationality (especially to romantic relationships), much of it positive and promising. Unfortunately I don't know yet how well it will match up with rationality as its taught in the OB/LW style - which will decide how easy that is for me to unpack here.
Well, this thread might be a good place to start =)
ETA: I don't think anything should ever be said against an idea which is shown to work. If its epistemic basis is dodgy, we can make a project of shoring it up, but the fact that it works means there's something supporting it, even if we don't yet fully understand it.
What I do need to do, is to think more clearly (for which now is not the best time) on whether or not the OB/LW flavor of rationality training is something which can communicate that methods I've worked out.
Then it's a matter of trade-offs between forcing the OB/LW flavor or trying to use a related, but better fitting flavor. Which means computing estimates on culture, implicit social biases and expectations. All of which takes time and experiments, much of which I expect to fail.
Which I suppose exemplifies the very basics of what I've found works - individual techniques can be dangerous because when over-generalized there are simply new biases to replace old ones. Instead, forget what you think you know and start re-building your understanding from observation and experiment. Periodically re-question the conclusions you make, and build your understanding from bite size pieces to larger and larger ones.
Which has everything to do with maintaining rational relationships with non-rational, and even deeply irrational people, especially romantic ones. But this takes real work, because each relationship is its own skill, its own "technique", and you need to learn it on the fly. On the plus side, if you get good at it you'll be able to learn how to deal with complex adaptive systems quickly - sort of a meta-skill, as it were.
There are people who will put up with a relentlessly and honestly rationalist approach to one's friendship or other relationship with them. However, they are rare and precious, and I use the words "put up with" instead of "enjoy and respond in kind" because they do it out of affection, and (possibly, in limited situations) admiration that does not inspire imitation. Not because they are themselves rationalists, reacting rationally to the approach, but because they just want to be friends enough to deal.
"We commonly speak of the sex 'drive', as if it, like hunger, must be satisfied, or a person will die. Yet there is no evidence that celibacy is in any way damaging to one's health, and it is clear that many celibates lead long, happy lives. Celibacy should be recognised as a valid alternative sexual lifestyle, although probably not everyone is suited to it." -J. S. Hyde, Understanding Human Sexuality, 1986
Source.
I have been in a happy, mutually satisfying romantic/sexual relationship once in my life. We had one good year together, and it was The. Best. Year. Of. My. Life. I know people say that when something good happens to you, you soon adjust, and you wind up as happy or as sad as you were before, but that was simply not my experience. I'd give just about anything to have that again. Such is my utility function, and I do not intend to tamper with it.
People differ. All I'm trying to say is this: telling someone something is a necessary precondition for their leading a meaningful life, when that is not the case, is likely to create needless suffering.
indeed
I've read several times that that feelings lasts 2-3 years for most people. That's the conventional wisdom. I've read once that, for some people, it lasts their whole life long. (I mean, once in a scholarly book. I've read it many times in novels.)
I rather suspect I might be one of those people. It's been over three years since I first fell for her, and over nine months since those feelings were in any way encouraged, and I still feel that attachment today.
If it turns out I am wired to stay in love for the long term, that'd certainly be a boon under the right circumstances.
Rather sucks now though.
Don't know if it applies to you. But I imagine a very relevant factor is whether or not you get attached to anyone else.
This is really remarkable to read six years later, since, although I don't know you personally, I know your reputation as That Guy Who Has Really Awesome Idyllic Relationships.
Er...
That's involuntary celibacy, not a lifestyle choice.
I guess the male LessWrongers that MBlume was thinking about in the ancestor comment haven't chosen that.
Right, but that's not what the quote you replied to was about.
To expand on my phrase "interpersonal relationships are out"...
Talking to people, especially the opposite sex, strongly exercises many subconscious mechanisms of our brain. Language, intonation, emotion, posture, you just can't process everything rationally as it comes at you in parallel at high bandwidth. Try dancing from first principles; you'll fail. If you possess no natural talent for it, you have no hope of winning an individual encounter through rationality. You can win by preparation - slowly develop such personal qualities as confidence, empathy and sense of humor. I have chosen this path, it works.
deleted
If by rational you mean successful, then yes. If you mean derived from logic, then no. I derived it from intuition.
deleted
Rationality helping in relationships (here used to mean all interpersonal, not just romance) :
Use "outside view" to figure out how your interactions look to others; not only to the person you are talking to but also to the social web around you.
Focus on the goals, yours and theirs. If these do not match, the relationship is doomed in the long run, romantic or not.
Obviously, the whole list of cognitive biases and how to counter them. When you -know- you are doing something stupid, catching yourself rationalizing it and what not, you learn not to do that stupid thing.
The answers to this are going to depend strongly on how comfortable we are with deception when dealing with irrational individuals.
deleted