Rationality Quotes September 2012

Jayson_Virissimo

Here's the new thread for posting quotes, with the usual rules:

Please post all quotes separately, so that they can be voted up/down separately. (If they are strongly related, reply to your own comments. If strongly ordered, then go ahead and post them together.)
Do not quote yourself
Do not quote comments/posts on LW/OB
No more than 5 quotes per person per monthly thread, please.

Here's the new thread for posting quotes, with the usual rules:

Please post all quotes separately, so that they can be voted up/down separately. (If they are strongly related, reply to your own comments. If strongly ordered, then go ahead and post them together.)
Do not quote yourself
Do not quote comments/posts on LW/OB
No more than 5 quotes per person per monthly thread, please.

Respectfully, your success at being apolitical is poor.

Further, I disagree with the quote to extent that it implies that taking strong positions is never appropriate. So I'm not sure that your goal of being "apolitical" is a good goal.

Since we've already had exchanges on how I use "being apolitical", could you please clarify your feedback. Are you saying I display motivated cognition when it comes to politically charged subjects or behave tribally in discussions? Or are you just saying I adopt stances that are associated with certain political clusters on the site?

Also like I said it is something I struggle with.

3simplicio14y

I disagree with the quote too. On the other hand, the idea of keeping one's identity small is not the same as being apolitical. It means you have opinions on political issues, but you keep them out of your self-definition so that (a) changing those opinions is relatively painless, (b) their correlations with other opinions don't influence you as much. (Caricatured example of the latter: "I think public health care is a good idea. That's a liberal position, so I must be a liberal. What do I think about building more nuclear plants, you ask? It appears liberals are against nuclear power, so since I am a liberal I guess I am also against nuclear power.")

2[anonymous]14y

I understand how a position can be correct or incorrect. I don't understand how a position can be strong or weak.