Rationality Quotes September 2012

7 Post author: Jayson_Virissimo 03 September 2012 05:18AM

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  • Do not quote yourself
  • Do not quote comments/posts on LW/OB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.

Comments (1088)

Sort By: Controversial
Comment author: lukeprog 16 September 2012 08:48:32AM -1 points [-]

What you understand, you can command, and that is power enough to walk on the Moon.

Harry Potter, in Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality by Eliezer Yudkowsky

Comment author: David_Gerard 16 September 2012 09:08:01AM 4 points [-]

That arguably counts as LW/OB.

Comment author: lukeprog 16 September 2012 09:21:43AM 4 points [-]

If HPMoR isn't allowed, that should be specified in the rules.

Comment author: [deleted] 01 September 2012 09:06:54PM 0 points [-]

The best way for doubters to control a questionable new technology is to embrace it, lest it remain wholly in the hands of enthusiasts who think there is nothing questionable about it.

Stewart Brand

(from Bret Victor's excellent quotes page)

Comment author: [deleted] 02 September 2012 06:19:19PM 1 point [-]

We must remember that, strictly speaking, "formal" does not mean merely "rigorous", but "according to form". Meaning need be ascribed only to the result of a formal process. It is not needed to guide the process itself. We ascribe meaning to intermediate formal states primarily, nay solely, to reassure ourselves.

Guy Steele

Comment author: aqace 11 September 2012 08:52:01PM 0 points [-]

Memories can be vile, repulsive little brutes. Like children, I suppose. haha.

But can we live without them? Memories are what our reason is based upon, if we can't face them, we deny reason itself! Although, why not? We aren't contractually tied down to rationality!

There is no sanity clause!

-The Joker, A Killing Joke

Comment author: MixedNuts 11 September 2012 09:11:53PM 0 points [-]

Obsoleted by sticky notes.

Comment author: augustuscaesar 05 September 2012 03:00:58AM *  0 points [-]

"A mind to which the stern character of an armchair is more immediately apparent than its use or its position in the room, is over-sensitive to expressive forms. It grasps analogies that a riper experience would reject as absurd. It fuses sensa that practical thinking must keep apart. Yet it is just this crazy play of associations, this uncritical fusion of impressions, that exercises the powers of symbolic transformation."

Susanne Langer, Philosophy in a New Key

Comment author: alex_zag_al 05 September 2012 03:21:11AM 1 point [-]

For authors are ordinarily so disposed that whenever their heedless credulity has led them to a decision on some controverted opinion, they always try to bring us over to the same side, with the subtlest arguments; if on the other hand they have been fortunate enough to discover something certain and evident, they never set it forth without wrapping it up in all sorts of complications. (I suppose they are afraid that a simple account may lessen the importance they gain by the discovery ; or perhaps they begrudge us the plain truth.)

Descartes, in Rules for the Direction of the Mind

Comment author: alex_zag_al 05 September 2012 03:21:50AM *  8 points [-]

A related Sherlock Holmes quote:

“Beyond the obvious facts that he has at some time done manual labour, that he takes snuff, that he is a Freemason, that he has been in China, and that he has done a considerable amount of writing lately, I can deduce nothing else.”

Mr. Jabez Wilson started up in his chair, with his forefinger upon the paper, but his eyes upon my companion.

“How, in the name of good-fortune, did you know all that, Mr. Holmes?” he asked. “How did you know, for example, that I did manual labour. It’s as true as gospel, for I began as a ship’s carpenter.”

“Your hands, my dear sir. Your right hand is quite a size larger than your left. You have worked with it, and the muscles are more developed.”

“Well, the snuff, then, and the Freemasonry?”

“I won’t insult your intelligence by telling you how I read that, especially as, rather against the strict rules of your order, you use an arc-and-compass breastpin.”

“Ah, of course, I forgot that. But the writing?”

“What else can be indicated by that right cuff so very shiny for five inches, and the left one with the smooth patch near the elbow where you rest it upon the desk?”

“Well, but China?”

“The fish that you have tattooed immediately above your right wrist could only have been done in China. I have made a small study of tattoo marks and have even contributed to the literature of the subject. That trick of staining the fishes’ scales of a delicate pink is quite peculiar to China. When, in addition, I see a Chinese coin hanging from your watch-chain, the matter becomes even more simple.”

Mr. Jabez Wilson laughed heavily. “Well, I never!” said he. “I thought at first that you had done something clever, but I see that there was nothing in it after all.”

“I begin to think, Watson,” said Holmes, “that I make a mistake in explaining. ‘Omne ignotum pro magnifico,’ you know, and my poor little reputation, such as it is, will suffer shipwreck if I am so candid."

That's from The Red-Headed League.

Comment author: Bruno_Coelho 03 September 2012 12:15:45AM 1 point [-]

There is not a man living whom it would so little become to speak from memory as myself, for I have scarcely any at all, and do not think that the world has another so marvellously treacherous as mine.

-- Motaigne

Comment author: shminux 13 September 2012 10:50:21PM *  3 points [-]

I'll risk a bit of US politics, just because I like the quote:

While some observers might find his lack of philosophical consistency a problem, I see it as a plus. He's a pragmatist. If he were running for the job of Satan he would say he's in favor of evil, at least until he got the job and installed central air conditioning in Hell. To put it more bluntly, it's not his fault that so many citizens are idiots and he has to lie to them just to become a useful public servant.

Scott Adams on one of the two presidential candidates being skilled at the art of winning (with some liberal use of dark arts).

Comment author: Delta 05 September 2012 01:45:55PM 0 points [-]

“The world is just a word for the things you value around you, right? That’s something I’ve had since I was born. If you tell me to rule such a world, I already rule it.” – Tohsaka Rin (Fate: stay night) on not taking over the world.

I think it is having a small core of things and people you value that keeps you grounded and healthy. Our "Something to Protect" if you like. Without that investment and connection to things that matter it's easy to lose your way.

Comment author: roland 04 September 2012 05:50:07PM 7 points [-]

A common way for very smart people to be stupid is to think they can think their way out of being apes with pretensions. However, there is no hack that transcends being human. Playing a "let's pretend" game otherwise doesn't mean you win all arguments, or any. Even with the best intentions and knowledge about biases and rational thinking, you won't transcend and avoid the pitfalls of having a brain designed, in the words of Science of Discworld, to shout at monkeys in the next tree. This doesn't mean you shouldn't give it a damn good try and LessWrong gives it a better shot than most, but remember that you, yes you, are an idiot. -- rationalWiki

Comment author: katydee 12 September 2012 12:11:49AM 3 points [-]

A scientist, like a warrior, must cherish no view. A 'view' is the outcome of intellectual processes, whereas creativity, like swordsmanship, requires not neutrality, or indifference, but to be of no mind whatsoever.

Buckaroo Banzai

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 12 September 2012 12:52:23AM 5 points [-]

...

...

dur....

....

Comment author: katydee 12 September 2012 01:33:57AM *  1 point [-]

I'll take the new -5 karma hit to point out that this comment shouldn't be downvoted. It is an interesting critique of the post it replies to.

Comment author: gwern 12 September 2012 01:38:11AM *  5 points [-]

How is it a critique? The quote is an adequate expression of Eliezer's own third virtue of rationality, and I daresay if anyone had responded as uncharitably as that to his "Twelve Virtues", he would have considered 'dur' to be an adequate summary of that person's intellect.

Comment author: thomblake 12 September 2012 01:36:25PM 2 points [-]

How is it uncharitable? Eliezer is emptying his mind as recommended by Doctor Banzai. Not sure how it's a "critique" though.

Comment author: allandong 14 September 2012 07:30:46PM 3 points [-]

Warning: Your milage may vary.

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." -George Bernard Shaw

Comment author: RomanDavis 01 September 2012 12:18:46PM *  6 points [-]

A scientific theory

Isn't just a hunch or guess

It's more like a question

That's been put through a lot of tests

And when a theory emerges

Consistent with the facts

The proof is with science

The truth is with science

They Might Be Giants

Comment author: Jayson_Virissimo 17 September 2012 05:25:47AM 6 points [-]

For nothing ought to be posited without a reason given, unless it is self-evident (literally, known through itself) or known by experience or proved by the authority of Sacred Scripture.

-William of Ockham

Comment author: [deleted] 01 September 2012 04:17:29PM 10 points [-]

Life is like a box of crayons. Most people are the 8-color boxes, but what you're really looking for are the 64-color boxes with the sharpeners on the back. I fancy myself to be a 64-color box, though I've got a few missing. It's ok though, because I've got some more vibrant colors like periwinkle at my disposal. I have a bit of a problem though in that I can only meet the 8-color boxes. Does anyone else have that problem? I mean there are so many different colors of life, of feeling, of articulation... so when I meet someone who's an 8-color type... I'm like, 'hey girl, magenta!' and she's like, 'oh, you mean purple!' and she goes off on her purple thing, and I'm like, 'no - I want magenta!'

John Mayer

Comment author: Armok_GoB 03 September 2012 07:16:25PM 2 points [-]

"Do you want 1111 1111 0000 0000 1111 1111 or 1111 1101 0000 0100 1111 1111? "

Comment author: [deleted] 29 September 2012 10:03:14AM 3 points [-]

gravity does not need policemen to make things fall!

-- Iain McKay et al., An Anarchist FAQ, Sec. F.2.1

Comment author: shminux 19 September 2012 04:52:15AM 3 points [-]

More from Scott Adams:

It turns out that the historical data is more like a Rorschach test. One economist can look at the data and see a bunny rabbit while another sees a giraffe. You and I haven't studied the raw data ourselves, and we probably aren't qualified anyway, so we are forced to make our decisions based on the credibility of economists. And seriously, who has less credibility than economists? Chiropractors and astrologists come close.

Comment author: [deleted] 09 September 2012 09:09:20AM *  5 points [-]

Your life has a limit, but knowledge has none. If you use what is limited to pursue what has no limit, you will be in danger. If you understand this and still strive for knowledge, you will be in danger for certain.

--Zhuangzi, being a trendy metacontrarian post-rationalist in the 4th century BC

Comment author: [deleted] 09 September 2012 09:17:02AM *  2 points [-]

Zhuangzi says knowledge has no limit, one could spend his entire life making a good map of a vast and diverse territory and it would not be enough to make a good map.

If one does not know this and makes maps for travel, he may be travelling to safe lands. This is weak evidence one is in danger.

If one knows this and still makes such maps, this is strong evidence one is in danger, for to travel to safe lands he would not make such foolhardy attempts.

Comment author: RobertLumley 07 September 2012 07:53:37PM 5 points [-]

"How many lives do you suppose you've saved in your medical career? … Hundreds? Thousands? Do you suppose those people give a damn that you lied to get into Starfleet Medical? I doubt it. We deal with threats to the Federation that jeopardize its very survival. If you knew how many lives we’ve saved, I think you’d agree that the ends do justify the means.”

Luther Sloan to Juilian Bashir in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, “Inquisition”, written by Bradley Thompson and David Weddle, created by Rick Berman and Michael Piller

Comment author: Vaniver 07 September 2012 08:05:28PM 9 points [-]

"How many lives do you suppose you've saved in your medical career? … Hundreds? Thousands? Do you suppose those people give a damn that you lied to get into Starfleet Medical? I doubt it.

Presuming that Starfleet Medical has limited enrollment, and that if he hadn't lied, a superior candidate would have enrolled, then that superior candidate would have saved those hundreds or thousands, and then a few more.

Comment author: mrglwrf 10 September 2012 09:01:37PM 0 points [-]

I see no good reason to presume a correlation between a med school's admissions criteria and total lives saved over a doctor's career as tight as this reasoning requires. Or to presume that it is near certain that if he hadn't lied, another liar wouldn't have been accepted in his place.

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 11 September 2012 04:48:08AM 5 points [-]

This reasoning merely requires that the correlation exist and be positive.

Comment author: chaosmosis 24 September 2012 05:23:28PM -2 points [-]

Whatever its political, pedagogical, cultural content, the plan is always to get some meaning across, to keep the masses within reason; an imperative to produce meaning that takes the form of the constantly repeated imperative to moralise information to better inform, to better socialize, to raise the cultural level of the masses, etc. Nonsense: the masses scandalously resist this imperative of rational communication. They are giving meaning: they want spectacle.

Baudrillard, In the Shadow of Silent Majorities

Comment author: chaosmosis 27 September 2012 04:04:05PM *  -1 points [-]

I was curious why the Baudrillard comment was downvoted when it expresses the same idea as the Nietzsche comment, it just uses a different style and approaches the problem from a different direction. Ideas, anyone?

Comment author: [deleted] 27 September 2012 04:34:15PM 1 point [-]

Priming? Beaudrillard is associated with humanities, pomo and academic philosophy; Nietzche is associated with atheism, contrarianism and the idea of the ubermensch. The comment doesn't seem to be very strongly downvoted; possibly you're just dealing with detractors here (I daresay LW has more fans of the latter than of the former).

Comment author: chaosmosis 27 September 2012 04:45:25PM 0 points [-]

This was roughly my thought as well. I thought there might also have been more substantive differences though and I was curious what those might be. The only thing I could see is that Baudrillard's quote had a tone that's more critical of the masses and the way they do politics, and that Baudrillard's quote could be misread as an injunction to stop trying to make people rational (which it's not).

Comment author: bogus 27 September 2012 11:38:28PM *  2 points [-]

Well, I'm not even sure whether Boudrillard's quote is grammatically well-formed, so there's that. Then again, postmodernist texts tend to be imbued with near-poetical and mystical qualities. Much like Zen koans, they're more about exemplifying a particular mind-posture and way of thinking than they are about straightforward argumentation. I think it's unfair to expect LessWrongers to be familiar with such texts.

Comment author: chaosmosis 28 September 2012 02:57:16AM *  -1 points [-]

Oh. So this quote is difficult to read, then? More difficult than the Nietzsche one? I guess inferential gaps must be coming into play here. I'm having a difficult time trying to not-understand it, trying to emphasize with your viewpoint. I'm having a difficult time believing that you couldn't understand the quote, honestly.

I feel like you're generalizing too much about post modernism. I like lots of it, and don't think that it's mystical oriented. I would say rather that it packs a lot of information into a small amount of words through the clever use of words and through recurring concepts and subtle variations on those concepts.

Post modernism can be difficult to understand, but I don't think it is in this case, and I think that it's complexity is justified. Scientists use obscure terminology, but for a good purpose, generally. Some scientists use obscure terminology to hide the flaws in their ideas. I view post modern criticisms in almost exactly the same way - their complexity can be for both good and bad.

Also, Baudrillard is French. It might not be his fault if there's problems with the translated text.

Comment author: chaosmosis 24 September 2012 05:23:01PM 2 points [-]

When one considers how ready are the forces of young men for discharge, one does not wonder at seeing them decide so uncritically and with so little selection for this or that cause: that which attracts them is the sight of eagerness for a cause, as it were the sight of the burning match not the cause itself. The more ingenious seducers on that account operate by holding out the prospect of an explosion to such persons, and do not urge their cause by means of reasons; these powder-barrels are not won over by means of reasons!

Nietzsche, The Gay Science

Comment author: katydee 22 September 2012 12:13:11AM 6 points [-]

A noble man compares and estimates himself by an idea which is higher than himself; and a mean man, by one lower than himself.

Marcus Aurelius

Comment author: simplicio 22 September 2012 12:40:27AM 3 points [-]

Meh, there are worse things to be than a mean man.

Comment author: pragmatist 14 September 2012 02:34:36PM *  4 points [-]

If I say of myself that it is only from my own case that I know what the word "pain" means -- must I not say the same of other people too? And how can I generalize the one case so irresponsibly?

Now someone tells me that he knows what pain is only from his own case! Suppose everyone had a box with something in it: we call it a "beetle". No one can look into anyone else's box, and everyone says he knows what a beetle is only by looking at his beetle. -- Here it would be quite possible for everyone to have something different in his box. One might even imagine such a thing constantly changing. -- But suppose the word "beetle" had a use in these people's language? -- If so it would not be used as the name of a thing. The thing in the box has no place in the language-game at all; not even as a something: for the box might even be empty. -- No, one can 'divide through' by the thing in the box; it cancels out, whatever it is.

That is to say: if we construe the grammar of the expression of sensation on the model of 'object and designation' the object drops out of consideration as irrelevant.

-- Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations

Comment author: katydee 02 September 2012 09:11:35AM *  2 points [-]

It's not easy to learn a new language. We are all used to speaking in a vague verbal language when expressing degrees of belief. In daily life, this language serves us quite well and the damage caused by its ambiguity is minor, but for important decisions it is helpful to use numbers to express degrees of belief. It may be more difficult to elicit numbers, but it is much more efficient. We understand each other better, numerical expressions are more sensitive to small differences in our feelings, and in the end, our decision processes will be better.

From "An Elementary Approach to Thinking Under Uncertainty," by Ruth Beyth-Marom, Shlomith Dekel, Ruth Gombo, & Moshe Shaked.

Comment author: Kaj_Sotala 02 September 2012 07:12:41PM 2 points [-]
Comment author: roland 04 September 2012 11:28:37PM *  7 points [-]

It seems clear that intelligence, as such, plays no part in the matter-that the sole and essential thing is use.

--Oliver Sacks regarding patients suffering from "developmental agnosia" who first learned to use their hands as adults.

Comment author: Jayson_Virissimo 01 September 2012 08:18:04AM *  12 points [-]

Conspiracy Theory, n. A theory about a conspiracy that you are not supposed to believe.

-L. A. Rollins, Lucifer's Lexicon: An Updated Abridgment

Comment author: mfb 12 September 2012 07:35:22PM *  5 points [-]

All the world's major religions, with their emphasis on love, compassion, patience, tolerance, and forgiveness can and do promote inner values. But the reality of the world today is that grounding ethics in religion is no longer adequate. This is why I am increasingly convinced that the time has come to find a way of thinking about spirituality and ethics beyond religion altogether.

Tenzin Gyatso, 14. Dalai Lama

Comment author: alex_zag_al 05 September 2012 03:45:39AM 5 points [-]

At the Princeton graduate school, the physics department and the math department shared a common lounge, and every day at four o'clock we would have tea. It was a way of relaxing in the afternoon, in addition to imitating an English college. People would sit around playing Go, or discussing theorems. In those days topology was the big thing.

I still remember a guy sitting on the couch, thinking very hard, and another guy standing in front of him saying, "And therefore such-and-such is true.

"Why is that?" the guy on the couch asks.

"It's trivial! It's trivial!" the standing guy says, and he rapidly reels off a series of logical steps: "First you assume thus-and-so, then we have Kerchoff's this-and-that, then there's Waffenstoffer's Theorem, and we substitute this and construct that. Now you put the vector which goes around here and then thus-and-so . . ." The guy on the couch is struggling to understand all this stuff, which goes on at high speed for about fifteen minutes!

Finally the standing guy comes out the other end, and the guy on the couch says, "Yeah, yeah. It's trivial."

We physicists were laughing, trying to figure them out. We decided that "trivial" means "proved." So we joked with the mathematicians: "We have a new theorem -- that mathematicians can only prove trivial theorems, because every theorem that's proved is trivial."

The mathematicians didn't like that theorem, and I teased them about it. I said there are never any surprises -- that the mathematicians only prove things that are obvious.

From "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!": Adventures of a Curious Character

Comment author: VKS 05 September 2012 07:12:06AM *  5 points [-]

The view, I think, is that anything you can prove immediately off the top of your head is trivial. No matter how much you have to know. So, sometimes you get conditional trivialities, like "this is trivial if you know this and that, but I don't know how to get this and that from somesuch...".

Comment author: Matt_Caulfield 03 September 2012 03:55:04PM 16 points [-]

It may be of course that savages put food on a dead man because they think that a dead man can eat, or weapons with a dead man because they think a dead man can fight. But personally I do not believe that they think anything of the kind. I believe they put food or weapons on the dead for the same reason that we put flowers, because it is an exceedingly natural and obvious thing to do. We do not understand, it is true, the emotion that makes us think it is obvious and natural; but that is because, like all the important emotions of human existence it is essentially irrational.

  • G. K. Chesterton
Comment author: MixedNuts 04 September 2012 06:56:06PM 14 points [-]

Chesterton doesn't understand the emotion because he doesn't know enough about psychology, not because emotions are deep sacred mysteries we must worship.

Comment author: [deleted] 15 September 2012 05:58:02PM *  11 points [-]
The Perfect Way is only difficult
for those who pick and choose;
Do not like, do not dislike;
all will then be clear.
Make a hairbreadth difference,
and Heaven and Earth are set apart;
if you want the truth to stand clear before you,
never be for or against.
The struggle between "for" and "against"
is the mind's worst disease.

-- Jianzhi Sengcan

Edit: Since I'm not Will Newsome (yet!) I will clarify. There are several useful points in this but I think the key one is the virtue of keeping one's identity small. Speaking it out loud is a sort of primer, meditation or prayer before approaching difficult or emotional subjects has for me proven a useful ritual for avoiding motivated cognition.

Comment author: DanArmak 15 September 2012 06:04:12PM 0 points [-]

Struggle not "against" paperclips; it is the mind's worst disease.

-- 21st c. AI Clippy

Comment author: TimS 16 September 2012 02:31:30AM 0 points [-]

Do I understand you to be saying that you avoid "the struggle between 'for' and 'against'" to an unusual degree compared to the average person? Compared to the average LWer?

Comment author: [deleted] 16 September 2012 06:30:53AM *  6 points [-]

No. I'm claiming this helps me avoid it more than I otherwise could. Much for the same reason I try as hard as I can to maintain an apolitical identity. From my personal experience (mere anecdotal evidence) both improve my thinking.

Comment author: TimS 16 September 2012 04:04:26PM 1 point [-]

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.

Comment author: MixedNuts 15 September 2012 06:13:14PM 0 points [-]

I don't get it. Is this saying "Don't be prejudiced or push for any overarching principle; take each situation as new and unknown, and then you'll find easily the appropriate response to this situation", or is this the same old stoicist "Don't struggle trying to find food, choose to be indifferent to starvation" platitude?

Comment author: [deleted] 15 September 2012 06:32:52PM *  0 points [-]

Edited in a clarification. Though it will not help you since I have shown you the path you can not find it yourself. Sorry couldn't resist teasing or am I? :P

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 24 September 2012 02:35:06PM *  3 points [-]

“You define yourself by what offends you. You define yourself by what outrages you.”

Salman Rushdie, explaining identity politics

Comment author: chaosmosis 24 September 2012 05:20:16PM 1 point [-]

I think "identity politics" is a term of art which covers things other than that which aren't bad, like minority struggles.

Comment author: RomanDavis 14 September 2012 07:54:13AM 6 points [-]

Users always have an idea that what they want is easy, even if they can't really articulate exactly what they do want. Even if they can give you requirements, chances are those will conflict – often in subtle ways – with requirements of others. A lot of the time, we wouldn't even think of these problems as "requirements" – they're just things that everyone expects to work in "the obvious way". The trouble is that humanity has come up with all kinds of entirely different "obvious ways" of doing things. Mankind's model of the universe is a surprisingly complicated one.

Jon Skeet

Comment author: Jayson_Virissimo 11 September 2012 03:46:46AM 3 points [-]

Fictional shows are merely gripping lies.

-Bryan Caplan, Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids

Comment author: Desrtopa 11 September 2012 03:58:41AM 4 points [-]

I'd pick gripping lies over most nonfictional shows, which are mainly irrelevant or misleading truths.

Comment author: peter_hurford 01 September 2012 06:19:13PM 3 points [-]

"Is this a victory or a defeat? Is this justice or injustice? Is it gallantry or a rout? Is it valor to kill innocent children and women? Do I do it to widen the empire and for prosperity or to destroy the other's kingdom and splendor? One has lost her husband, someone else a father, someone a child, someone an unborn infant... What's this debris of the corpses?" -- Ashoka

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 27 September 2012 12:26:39AM 10 points [-]

As far as I know, Robespierre, Lenin, Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot were indeed unusually incorruptible, and I do hate them for this trait.

Why? Because when your goal is mass murder, corruption saves lives. Corruption leads you to take the easy way out, to compromise, to go along to get along. Corruption isn't a poison that makes everything worse. It's a diluting agent like water. Corruption makes good policies less good, and evil policies less evil.

I've read thousands of pages about Hitler. I can't recall the slightest hint of "corruption" on his record. Like Robespierre, Lenin, Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot, Hitler was a sincerely murderous fanatic. The same goes for many of history's leading villains - see Eric Hoffer's classic The True Believer. Sincerity is so overrated. If only these self-righteous monsters had been corrupt hypocrites, millions of their victims could have bargained and bribed their way out of hell.

-- Bryan Caplan

Comment author: shminux 27 September 2012 12:47:10AM 0 points [-]

If only these self-righteous monsters had been corrupt hypocrites, millions of their victims could have bargained and bribed their way out of hell.

That sums it up.

Comment author: MixedNuts 28 September 2012 09:17:49AM 3 points [-]

Hitler was at least a hypocrite - he got his Jewish friends to safety, and accepted same-sex relationships in himself and people he didn't want to kill yet. The kind of corruption Caplan is pointing at is a willingness to compromise with anyone who makes offers, not any kind of ignoring your principles. And Nazis were definitely against that - see the Duke in Jud Süß.

Comment author: Alicorn 16 September 2012 10:31:22PM 7 points [-]

Never do today what you can put off till tomorrow if tomorrow might improve the odds.

— Robert A. Heinlein

Comment author: MixedNuts 16 September 2012 10:59:38PM 2 points [-]

Do it today, and fix/retry tomorrow on failure?

Comment author: Athrelon 11 September 2012 03:50:48PM *  7 points [-]

The use of Fashions in thought is to distract the attention of men from their real dangers. We direct the fashionable outcry of each generation against those vices of which it is least in danger and fix its approval on the virtue nearest to that vice which we are trying to make endemic...Thus we make it fashionable to expose the dangers of enthusiasm at the very moment when they are all really becoming worldly and lukewarm; a century later, when we are really making them all Byronic and drunk with emotion, the fashionable outcry is directed against the dangers of the mere "understanding". Cruel ages are put on their guard against Sentimentality, feckless and idle ones against Respectability, lecherous ones against Puritansm; and whenever all men are really hastening to be slaves or tyrants we make Liberalism the prime bogey.

CS Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

Comment author: RobinZ 05 September 2012 08:52:08PM *  7 points [-]

[...] Three years later a top executive for those same San Diego Padres would say that the reason the Oakland A's win so many games with so little money is that "Billy [Beane, the general manager] got lucky with those pitchers."

And he did. But if an explanation is where the mind comes to rest, the mind that stopped at "lucky" when it sought to explain the Oakland A's recent pitching success bordered on narcoleptic.

Michael Lewis, Moneyball, Chapter Ten, "Anatomy of an Undervalued Pitcher".

Comment author: peter_hurford 01 September 2012 06:16:01PM 15 points [-]

"Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity -- in all this vastness -- there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. It is up to us." - Sagan

Comment author: buybuydandavis 03 September 2012 11:21:44AM *  9 points [-]

Rorschach: You see, Doctor, God didn't kill that little girl. Fate didn't butcher her and destiny didn't feed her to those dogs. If God saw what any of us did that night he didn't seem to mind. From then on I knew... God doesn't make the world this way. We do.

EDIT: Quote above is from the movie.

Comment author: Ezekiel 03 September 2012 02:19:52PM *  8 points [-]

Verbatim from the comic:

It is not God who kills the children. Not fate that butchers them or destiny that feeds them to the dogs. It's us.
Only us.

I personally think that Watchmen is a fantastic study* on all the different ways people react to that realisation.

("Study" in the artistic sense rather than the scientific.)

Comment author: ChrisHallquist 03 September 2012 06:22:54AM *  23 points [-]

“Why do you read so much?”

Tyrion looked up at the sound of the voice. Jon Snow was standing a few feet away, regarding him curiously. He closed the book on a finger and said, “Look at me and tell me what you see.”

The boy looked at him suspiciously. “Is this some kind of trick? I see you. Tyrion Lannister.”

Tyrion sighed. “You are remarkably polite for a bastard, Snow. What you see is a dwarf. You are what, twelve?”

“Fourteen,” the boy said.

“Fourteen, and you’re taller than I will ever be. My legs are short and twisted, and I walk with difficulty. I require a special saddle to keep from falling off my horse. A saddle of my own design, you may be interested to know. It was either that or ride a pony. My arms are strong enough, but again, too short. I will never make a swordsman. Had I been born a peasant, they might have left me out to die, or sold me to some slaver’s grotesquerie. Alas, I was born a Lannister of Casterly Rock, and the grotesqueries are all the poorer. Things are expected of me. My father was the Hand of the King for twenty years. My brother later killed that very same king, as it turns out, but life is full of these little ironies. My sister married the new king and my repulsive nephew will be king after him. I must do my part for the honor of my House, wouldn’t you agree? Yet how? Well, my legs may be too small for my body, but my head is too large, although I prefer to think it is just large enough for my mind. I have a realistic grasp of my own strengths and weaknesses. My mind is my weapon. My brother has his sword, King Robert has his warhammer, and I have my mind… and a mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone, if it is to keep its edge.” Tyrion tapped the leather cover of the book. “That’s why I read so much, Jon Snow.”

--George R. R. Martin, A Game of Thrones

Comment author: Vaniver 28 September 2012 02:19:00AM 4 points [-]

I believe in getting into hot water; it keeps you clean.

-- G.K. Chesterton

Comment author: shminux 17 September 2012 10:32:40PM 4 points [-]

I cannot tell if this is rationality or anti-rationality:

Q: What is Microsoft's plan if Windows 8 doesn't take off?

A: You know, Windows 8 is going to do great.

Q: No doubt at all?

A: I'm not paid to have doubts. (Laughs.) I don't have any. It's a fantastic product. ...

Steve Ballmer

Comment author: chaosmosis 13 September 2012 04:07:35PM *  4 points [-]

All are lunatics, but he who can analyze his delusions is called a philosopher.

Ambrose Bierce

Comment author: juliawise 11 September 2012 06:42:31PM *  8 points [-]

This is my home, the country where my heart is;

Here are my hopes, my dreams, my sacred shrine.

But other hearts in other lands are beating,

With hopes and dreams as true and high as mine.

My country’s skies are bluer than the ocean,

And sunlight beams on cloverleaf and pine.

But other lands have sunlight too and clover,

And skies are everywhere as blue as mine.

-Lloyd Stone

Comment author: V_V 11 September 2012 07:27:14PM 5 points [-]

And skies are everywhere as blue as mine.

obviously he never visited the British Isles :D

Comment author: asparisi 07 September 2012 02:55:20AM *  9 points [-]

.... he who works to understand the true causes of miracles and to understand Nature as a scholar, and not just to gape at them like a fool, is universally considered an impious heretic and denounced by those to whom the common people bow down as interpreters of Nature and the gods. For these people know that the dispelling of ignorance would entail the disappearance of that sense of awe which is the one and only support of their argument and the safeguard of their authority.

Baruch Spinoza Ethics

Comment author: Stabilizer 04 September 2012 05:22:25PM *  9 points [-]

Mathematics is a process of staring hard enough with enough perseverance at the fog of muddle and confusion to eventually break through to improved clarity. I'm happy when I can admit, at least to myself, that my thinking is muddled, and I try to overcome the embarrassment that I might reveal ignorance or confusion. Over the years, this has helped me develop clarity in some things, but I remain muddled in many others. I enjoy questions that seem honest, even when they admit or reveal confusion, in preference to questions that appear designed to project sophistication.

-- William Thurston

Comment author: [deleted] 04 September 2012 08:40:20AM *  14 points [-]

Erode irreplaceable institutions related to morality and virtue because of their contingent associations with flawed human groups #lifehacks

--Kate Evans on Twitter

Comment author: [deleted] 05 September 2012 08:36:08PM *  10 points [-]

He had bought a large map representing the sea, / Without the least vestige of land: / And the crew were much pleased when they found it to be / A map they could all understand.

“What’s the good of Mercator’s North Poles and Equators, / Tropics, Zones, and Meridian Lines?" / So the Bellman would cry: and the crew would reply / “They are merely conventional signs!

“Other maps are such shapes, with their islands and capes! / But we’ve got our brave Captain to thank: / (So the crew would protest) “that he’s bought us the best— / A perfect and absolute blank!”

-Lewis Carroll, The Hunting of the snark

Comment author: peter_hurford 01 September 2012 06:18:48PM 20 points [-]

"In a society in which the narrow pursuit of material self-interest is the norm, the shift to an ethical stance is more radical than many people realize. In comparison with the needs of people starving in Somalia, the desire to sample the wines of the leading French vineyards pales into insignificance. Judged against the suffering of immobilized rabbits having shampoos dripped into their eyes, a better shampoo becomes an unworthy goal. An ethical approach to life does not forbid having fun or enjoying food and wine, but it changes our sense of priorities. The effort and expense put into buying fashionable clothes, the endless search for more and more refined gastronomic pleasures, the astonishing additional expense that marks out the prestige car market in cars from the market in cars for people who just want a reliable means to getting from A to B, all these become disproportionate to people who can shift perspective long enough to take themselves, at least for a time, out of the spotlight. If a higher ethical consciousness spreads, it will utterly change the society in which we live." -- Peter Singer

Comment author: Dolores1984 01 September 2012 09:54:11PM 3 points [-]

An ethical approach to life does not forbid having fun or enjoying food and wine

I'm not at all convinced of this. It seems to me that a genuinely ethical life requires extraordinary, desperate asceticism. Anything less is to place your own wellbeing above those of your fellow man. Not just above, but many orders of magnitude above, for even trivial luxuries.

Comment author: MixedNuts 01 September 2012 10:08:42PM 19 points [-]

Julia Wise would disagree, on the grounds that this is impossible to maintain and you do more good if you stay happy.

Comment author: Dolores1984 02 September 2012 06:00:50AM 0 points [-]

That sounds to me like exactly the sort of excuse a bad person would use to justify valuing their selfish whims over the lives of other people. If we're holding our ideas to scrutiny, I think the idea that the 'Sunday Catholic' school of ethics is consistent could take a long, hard look.

Comment author: Kaj_Sotala 06 September 2012 08:12:05AM *  3 points [-]

The coalition of modules in your mind that believes in ascetism being the only acceptable solution is most likely vastly outnumbered by the hedonistic modules. (Most people for which this wasn't the case were most likely filtered out of the gene pool.) As with politics, if you refuse to make compromises and insist on pushing your agenda while outnumbered, you will lose, or at best (worst?) create a deadlock in which nobody is happy. If you're not so absolute, you're more likely to achieve at least some of your aims.

Or, as Carl Shulman put it:

As those who know me can attest, I often make the point that radical self-sacrificing utilitarianism isn't found in humans and isn't a good target to aim for. Almost no one would actually take on serious harm with certainty for a small chance of helping distant others. Robin Hanson often presents evidence for this, e.g. this presentation on "why doesn't anyone create investment funds for future people?" However, sometimes people caught up in thoughts of the good they can do, or a self-image of making a big difference in the world, are motivated to think of themselves as really being motivated primarily by helping others as such. Sometimes they go on to an excessive smart sincere syndrome, and try (at the conscious/explicit level) to favor altruism at the severe expense of their other motivations: self-concern, relationships, warm fuzzy feelings.

Usually this doesn't work out well, as the explicit reasoning about principles and ideals is gradually overridden by other mental processes, leading to exhaustion, burnout, or disillusionment. The situation winds up worse according to all of the person's motivations, even altruism. Burnout means less good gets done than would have been achieved by leading a more balanced life that paid due respect to all one's values. Even more self-defeatingly, if one actually does make severe sacrifices, it will tend to repel bystanders.

Comment author: Raemon 10 September 2012 06:32:57PM 6 points [-]

I believe Peter Singer actually originally advocated the asceticism you mention, but eventually moved towards "try to give 10% of your income", because people were actually willing to do that, and his goal was to actually help people, not uphold a particular abstract ideal.

Comment author: fubarobfusco 10 September 2012 08:34:43PM 4 points [-]

An interesting implication, if this generalizes: "Don't advocate the moral beliefs you think people should follow. Advocate the moral beliefs which hearing you advocate them would actually cause other people to behave better."

Comment author: katydee 02 September 2012 11:39:57PM 3 points [-]

And the great philosopher Diogenes would disagree with her.

Comment author: RomanDavis 03 September 2012 05:53:39AM 8 points [-]

So, how many lives did he save again?

Clever guy, but I'm not sure if you want to follow his example.

Comment author: Desrtopa 04 September 2012 05:46:18PM 9 points [-]

Judged against the suffering of immobilized rabbits having shampoos dripped into their eyes, a better shampoo becomes an unworthy goal.

I'm not at all convinced that this is the case. After all, the shampoos are being designed to be less painful, and you don't need to test on ten thousand rabbits. Considering the distribution of the shampoos, this may save suffering even if you regard human and rabbit suffering as equal in disutility.

Comment author: chaosmosis 09 September 2012 12:34:36AM 11 points [-]

"You're very smart. Smarter than I am, I hope. Though of course I have such incredible vanity that I can't really believe that anyone is actually smarter than I am. Which means that I'm all the more in need of good advice, since I can't actually conceive of needing any."

  • New Peter / Orson Scott Card, Children of the Mind
Comment author: J_Taylor 02 September 2012 03:33:00AM *  11 points [-]

Major Greene this evening fell into some conversation with me about the Divinity and satisfaction of Jesus Christ. All the argument he advanced was, "that a mere creature or finite being could not make satisfaction to infinite justice for any crimes," and that "these things are very mysterious."

Thus mystery is made a convenient cover for absurdity.

  • John Adams
Comment author: Will_Newsome 01 September 2012 10:17:14AM *  11 points [-]

Proceed only with the simplest terms, for all others are enemies and will confuse you.

— Michael Kirkbride / Vivec, "The Thirty Six Lessons of Vivec", Morrowind.

Comment author: Ezekiel 03 September 2012 03:17:59PM 5 points [-]

Am I the only one who thinks we should stop using the word "simple" for Occam's Razor / Solomonoff's Whatever? In 99% of use-cases by actual humans, it doesn't mean Solomonoff induction, so it's confusing.

Comment author: Will_Newsome 03 September 2012 09:08:24PM *  0 points [-]

Yeah, various smart people have made that point repeatedly, but Eliezer and Luke aren't listening and most people learn their words from Eliezer and Luke, so the community is still being sorta silly in that regard.

Comment author: CronoDAS 06 September 2012 11:05:03AM 24 points [-]

“The goal of the future is full unemployment, so we can play. That’s why we have to destroy the present politico-economic system.” This may sound like the pronouncement of some bong-smoking anarchist, but it was actually Arthur C. Clarke, who found time between scuba diving and pinball games to write “Childhood’s End” and think up communications satellites. My old colleague Ted Rall recently wrote a column proposing that we divorce income from work and give each citizen a guaranteed paycheck, which sounds like the kind of lunatic notion that’ll be considered a basic human right in about a century, like abolition, universal suffrage and eight-hour workdays. The Puritans turned work into a virtue, evidently forgetting that God invented it as a punishment.

-- Tim Kreider

The interesting part is the phrase "which sounds like the kind of lunatic notion that’ll be considered a basic human right in about a century, like abolition, universal suffrage and eight-hour workdays." If we can anticipate what the morality of the future would be, should we try to live by it now?

Comment author: Thomas 07 September 2012 06:12:15AM 0 points [-]

The way to divorce work from income is the ownership. Be an owner!

Comment author: roystgnr 07 September 2012 04:38:28PM 3 points [-]

One way to divorce work from income is to own stuff.

A more popular way is to find someone else who owns stuff, then take their stuff.

Comment author: wedrifid 07 September 2012 04:47:29PM 3 points [-]

A more popular way is to find someone else who owns stuff, then take their stuff.

That counts as work.

Comment author: Oscar_Cunningham 07 September 2012 06:43:24PM 1 point [-]

Not if it's in the form of "Be poor in a country that taxes the rich to give to the poor".

Comment author: DanArmak 07 September 2012 06:16:06PM 0 points [-]

No, you just need to own enough stuff to pay workers to take even more stuff from others.

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 07 September 2012 05:18:04AM 1 point [-]

If we can anticipate what the morality of the future would be, should we try to live by it now?

Are you sure you can. It's remarkably easy to make retroactive "predictions", much harder to make actual predictions.

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 07 September 2012 05:26:53AM 5 points [-]

like abolition, universal suffrage and eight-hour workdays.

One of these things is not like the others.

Comment author: DanArmak 07 September 2012 06:18:07PM *  3 points [-]

One of these things is not like the others.

Yes, no state has ever implemented truly universal suffrage (among minors).

Comment author: TheOtherDave 07 September 2012 07:15:45PM 0 points [-]

Or non-humans.

Comment author: Jayson_Virissimo 07 September 2012 06:38:08AM *  4 points [-]

One of these things is not like the others.

In Jasay's terminology, the first is a liberty (a relation between a person and an act) and the rest are rights {relations between two or more persons (at least one rightholder and one obligor) and an act}. I find this distnction useful for thinking more clearly about these kinds of topics. Your mileage may vary.

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 07 September 2012 08:05:35AM *  1 point [-]

I was actually referring to the the third being what I might call an anti-liberty, i.e., you aren't allowed to work more than eight-hours a day, and the fact that is most definitely not enforced nor widely considered a human right.

Comment author: [deleted] 07 September 2012 08:19:16AM 3 points [-]

I thought eight-hours workdays were about employers not being allowed to demand that employees work more than eight hours a day; I didn't know you weren't technically allowed to do that at all even if you're OK with it.

Comment author: Slackson 07 September 2012 08:51:08AM 2 points [-]

It would be very hard to distinguish when people were doing it because they wanted to, and when employers were demanding it. Maybe some employees are working that extra time, but one isn't. The one that isn't happens to be fired later on, for unrelated reasons. How do you determine that worker's unwillingness to work extra hours is not one of the reasons they were fired? Whether it is or not, that happening will likely encourage workers to go beyond the eight hours, because the last one that didn't got fired, and a relationship will be drawn whether there is one or not.

Comment author: [deleted] 07 September 2012 10:19:41PM 0 points [-]

It's not like you can fire employees on a whim: the “unrelated reasons” have to be substantial ones, and it's not clear you can find ones for any employee you want to fire. (Otherwise, you could use such a mechanism to de facto compel your employees to do pretty much anything you want.)

Also, even if you somehow did manage to de facto demand workers to work ten hours a day, if you have to pay hours beyond the eighth as overtime (with a hourly wage substantially higher than the regular one), then it's cheaper for you to hire ten people eight hours a day each than eight people ten hours a day.

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 08 September 2012 05:03:14AM 1 point [-]

(Otherwise, you could use such a mechanism to de facto compel your employees to do pretty much anything you want.)

Only if they can't get another job.

Comment author: [deleted] 08 September 2012 08:54:19AM *  1 point [-]

That assumption isn't that far-fetched. Also, the same applies to doing that to compel them to work extra time (or am I missing something?).

Comment author: fortyeridania 07 September 2012 01:28:58PM 6 points [-]
  1. You are allowed to work more than eight hours per day. It's just that in many industries, employers must pay you overtime if you do so.
  2. Even if employers were prohibited from using "willingness to work more than 8 hours per day" as a condition for employment, long workdays would probably soon become the norm.
  3. Thus a more feasible way to limit workdays is to constrain employees rather than employers.

To see why, assume that without any restrictions on workday length, workers supply more than 8 hours. Let's say, without loss of generality, that they supply 10. (In other words, the equilibrium quantity supplied is ten.)

If employers can't demand the equilibrium quantity, but they're still willing to pay to get it, then employees will have the incentive to supply it. In their competition for jobs (finding them and keeping them), employees will be supply labor up until the equilibrium quantity, regardless of whether the bosses demand it.

Working more looks good. Everyone knows that; you don't need your boss to tell you. So if there's competition for your spot or for a spot that you want, it would serve you well to work more.

So if your goal is to prevent ten-hour days, you'd better stop people from supplying them.

At least, this makes sense to me. But I'm no microeconomist. Perhaps we have one on LW who can state this more clearly (or who can correct any mistakes I've made).

Comment author: DanArmak 07 September 2012 06:25:02PM 4 points [-]

How is that different from pointing out that you're not allowed to sell yourself into slavery (not even partially, as in signing a contract to work for ten years and not being able to legally break it), or that you're not allowed to sell your vote?

Comment author: ArisKatsaris 07 September 2012 09:04:20AM *  4 points [-]

I'd say each of the three can be said to be unlike the others:

  • abolition falls under Liberty
  • universal suffrage falls under Equality
  • eight-hour workdays falls under Solidarity
Comment author: DanielLC 11 September 2012 02:56:10AM 3 points [-]

If we had eight-hour workdays a century ago, we wouldn't have been able to support the standard of living expected a century ago. I'm not sure we could have even supported living. The same applies to full unemployment. We may someday reach a point where we are productive enough that we can accomplish all we need when we just do it for fun, but if we try that now, we'll all starve.

Comment author: TheOtherDave 11 September 2012 03:54:04AM 0 points [-]

So, accepting the premise that the ability to support "full unemployment" (aka, people working for reasons other than money) is something that increases over time, and it can't be supported until the point is reached where it can be supported... how would we recognize when that point has been reached?

Comment author: CronoDAS 11 September 2012 03:40:02AM *  7 points [-]

If we had eight-hour workdays a century ago, we wouldn't have been able to support the standard of living expected a century ago.

Is that true? (Technically, a century ago was 1912.)

Wikipedia on the eight-hour day:

On January 5, 1914, the Ford Motor Company took the radical step of doubling pay to $5 a day and cut shifts from nine hours to eight, moves that were not popular with rival companies, although seeing the increase in Ford's productivity, and a significant increase in profit margin (from $30 million to $60 million in two years), most soon followed suit.

Comment author: DanielLC 11 September 2012 04:07:51AM 1 point [-]

The quote seemed to imply we didn't have them a century ago. Just use two centuries or however long.

My point is that we didn't stop working as long because we realized it was a good idea. We did because it became a good idea. What we consider normal now is something we could not have instituted a century ago, and attempting to institute now what what will be normal a century from now would be a bad idea.

Comment author: Viliam_Bur 06 September 2012 03:54:05PM 7 points [-]

If you are a consequentialist, you should think about the consequences of such decision.

For example, imagine a civilization where an average person has to work nine hours to produce enough food to survive. Now the pharaoh makes a new law saying that (a) all produced food has to be distribute equally among all citizens, and (b) no one can be compelled to work more than eight hours; you can work as a volunteer, but all your produced food is redistributed equally.

What would happen is such situation? In my opinion, this would be a mass Prisoners' Dilemma where people would gradually stop cooperating (because the additional hour of work gives them epsilon benefits) and start being hungry. There would be no legal solution; people would try to make some food in their free time illegally, but the unlucky ones would simply starve and die.

The law would seem great in far mode, but its near mode consequences would be horrible. Of course, if the pharaoh is not completely insane, he would revoke the law; but there would be a lot of suffering meanwhile.

If people had "a basic human right to have enough money without having to work", situation could progress similarly. It depends on many things -- for example how much of the working people's money would you have to redistribute to non-working ones, and how much could they keep. Assuming that one's basic human right is to have $500 a month, but if you work, you can keep $3000 a month, some people could still prefer to work. But there is no guarantee it would work long-term. For example there would be a positive feedback loop -- the more people are non-working, the more votes politicians can gain by promising to increase their "basic human right income", the higher are taxes, and the smaller incentives to work. Also, it could work for the starting generation, but corrupt the next generation... imagine yourself as a high school student knowing that you will never ever have to work; how much effort would an average student give to studying, instead of e.g. internet browsing, Playstation gaming, or disco and sex? Years later, the same student will be unable to keep a job that requires education.

Also, if less people have to work, the more work is not done. For example, it will take more time to find a cure for cancer. How would you like a society where no one has to work, but if you become sick, you can't find a doctor? Yes, there would be some doctors, but not enough for the whole population, and most of them would have less education and less experience than today. You would have to pay them a lot of money, because they would be rare, and because most of the money you pay them would be paid back to state as tax, so even everything you have could be not enough motivating for them.

Comment author: CronoDAS 06 September 2012 08:01:57PM 1 point [-]

Well, if your society isn't rich enough, you just do what you can. (And a lot of work really isn't all that important; would it be that big of a disaster if your local store carried fewer kinds of cosmetics, or if your local restaurant had trouble hiring waiters?)

See also.

Comment author: khafra 07 September 2012 07:46:35PM 3 points [-]

If you are a bayesian, you should think about how much evidence your imagination constitutes.

For example, imagine a civilization where an average person gains little or no total productivity by working over 8 hour per day. Imagine, moreover, that in this civilization, working 10 hours a day doubles your risk of coronary heart disease, the leading cause of death in this civilization. Finally, imagine that, in this civilization, a common way for workers to signal their dedication to their jobs is by staying at work long hours, regardless of the harm it does both to their company and themselves.

In this civilization, a law preventing individuals from working over 8 hours per day is a tremendous social good.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 08 September 2012 09:57:24AM 2 points [-]

Work hour skepticism leaves out the question of the cost of mistakes. It's one thing to have a higher proportion of defective widgets on an assembly line (though even that can matter, especially if you want a reputation for high quality products), another if the serious injury rate goes up, and a third if you end up with the Exxon Valdez.

Comment author: [deleted] 07 September 2012 01:08:46AM 2 points [-]

the higher are taxes, and the smaller incentives to work

You mean “incentives to fully report your income”, right? ;-) (There are countries where a sizeable fraction of the economy is underground. I come from one.)

how much effort would an average student give to studying, instead of e.g. internet browsing, Playstation gaming, or disco and sex?

The same they give today. Students not interested in studying mostly just cheat.

Comment author: jbeshir 06 September 2012 08:49:29PM -1 points [-]

It is true that in the long run, things could work out worse with a guarantee of sufficient food/supplies for everyone. I think, though, that this post answers the wrong question; the question to answer in order to compare consequences is how probable it is to be better or worse, and by what amounts. Showing that it "could" be worse merely answers the question "can I justify holding this belief" rather than the question "what belief should I hold". The potential benefits of a world where people are guaranteed food seem quite high on the face of it, so it is a question well worth asking seriously... or would be if one were in a position to actually do anything about it, anyway.

Prisoners' dilemmas amongst humans with reputation and social pressure effects do not reliably work out with consistent defection, and models of societies (and students*) can easily predict almost any result by varying the factors they model and how they do so, and so contribute very little evidence in the absence of other evidence that they generate accurate predictions.

The only reliable information that I am aware of is that we know that states making such guarantees can exist for multiple generations with no obvious signs of failure, at least with the right starting conditions, because we have such states existing in the world today. The welfare systems of some European countries have worked this way for quite a long time, and while some are doing poorly economically, others are doing comparably well.

I think that it is worth assessing the consequences of deciding to live by the idea of universal availability of supplies, but they are not so straightforwardly likely to be dire as this post suggests, requiring a longer analysis.

Comment author: Viliam_Bur 07 September 2012 08:06:28AM *  6 points [-]

As I wrote, it depends on many things. I can imagine a situation where this would work; I can also imagine a situation where it would not. As I also wrote, I can imagine such system functioning well if people who don't work get enough money to survive, but people who do work get significantly more.

Data point: In Slovakia many uneducated people don't work, because it wouldn't make economical sense for them. Their wage, minus traveling expenses, would be only a little more, in some cases even less than their welfare. What's the point of spending 8 hours in work if in result you have less money? They cannot get higher wages, because they are uneducated and unskilled; and in Slovakia even educated people get relatively little money. The welfare cannot be lowered, because the voters on the left would not allow it. The social pressure stops working if too many people in the same town are doing this; they provide moral support for each other. We have villages where unemployment is over 80% and people have already accommodated to this; after a decade of such life, even if you offer them a work with a decent wage, they will not take it, because it would mean walking away from their social circle.

This would not happen in a sane society, but it does happen in the real life. Other European countries seem to fare better in this aspect, but I can imagine the same thing happening there in a generation or two. A generation ago most people would probably not predict this situation in Slovakia.

I also can't imagine the social pressure to work on the "generation Facebook". If someone spends most of their day on Facebook or playing online multiplayer games, who exactly is going to socially press them? Their friends? Most of them live the same way. Their parents? The conflict between generations is not the same thing as peer pressure. And the "money without work is a basic human right" meme also does not help.

It could work in a country where the difference between average wage (even for a less educated and less skilled people) is much more than one needs to survive. But it can work long-term only if the amount of "basic human right money" does not grow faster than the average wage. -- OK, finally here is something that can be measured: what is the relative increase in wages vs welfares in western European countries in recent decades; optionally, extrapolate these numbers to estimate how long the system can survive.

Comment author: Legolan 06 September 2012 04:44:21PM 2 points [-]

Systems that don't require people to work are only beneficial if non-human work (or human work not motivated by need) is still producing enough goods that the humans are better off not working and being able to spend their time in other ways. I don't think we're even close to that point. I can imagine societies in a hundred years that are at that point (I have no idea whether they'll happen or not), but it would be foolish for them to condemn our lack of such a system now since we don't have the ability to support it, just as it would be foolish for us to condemn people in earlier and less well-off times for not having welfare systems as encompassing as ours.

I'd also note that issues like abolition and universal suffrage are qualitatively distinct from the issue of a minimum guaranteed income (what the quote addresses). Even the poorest of societies can avoid holding slaves or placing women or men in legally inferior roles. The poorest societies cannot afford the "full unemployment" discussed in the quote, and neither can even the richest of modern societies right now (they could certainly come closer than the present, but I don't think any modern economy could survive the implementation of such a system in the present).

I do agree, however, about it being a solid goal, at least for basic amenities.

Comment author: RolfAndreassen 06 September 2012 04:24:08PM 16 points [-]

If we can anticipate what the morality of the future would be, should we try to live by it now?

Not if it's actually the same morality, but depends on technology. For example, strong prohibitions on promiscuity are very sensible in a world without cheap and effective contraceptives. Anyone who tried to live by 2012 sexual standards in 1912 would soon find they couldn't feed their large horde of kids. Likewise, if robots are doing all the work, fine; but right now if you just redistribute all money, no work gets done.

Comment author: Alicorn 06 September 2012 05:42:53PM 3 points [-]

Anyone who tried to live by 2012 sexual standards in 1912 would soon find they couldn't feed their large horde of kids.

Not if they were gay.

Comment author: [deleted] 06 September 2012 05:53:10PM *  -2 points [-]

Then they'd just be dead, or imprisoned.

Comment author: Alicorn 06 September 2012 05:58:35PM 9 points [-]

We're talking about morality that is based around technology. There is no technological advance that allows us to not criminalize homosexuality now where we couldn't have in the past.

Comment author: [deleted] 06 September 2012 06:12:21PM 0 points [-]

Naming three:

  1. Condoms.
  2. Widespread circumcision.
  3. Antibiotics.
Comment author: shminux 06 September 2012 06:26:57PM *  1 point [-]

Homosexuality was common/accepted/expected in many societies without leading to any negative consequences, so technology is not an enabler of morality here.

Comment author: Salemicus 06 September 2012 06:54:26PM 4 points [-]

Homosexuality has certainly been present in many societies.

However, your link does not state, nor even suggest, that it did not lead to any negative consequences.

Comment author: Alicorn 06 September 2012 06:40:13PM 5 points [-]

I didn't specify promiscuous homosexuality. Monogamously inclined gay people are as protected from STDs as anyone else at a comparable tech level - maybe more so among lesbians.

Comment author: [deleted] 06 September 2012 07:09:02PM *  4 points [-]

Neither did I, but would rather refrain from explaining in detail why I didn't assume promiscuity.

It's really annoying that you jumped to that conclusion, though. Further, I'm confused why the existence of some minority of a minority of the population that doesn't satisfy the ancestor's hypothetical matters.

Comment author: CronoDAS 06 September 2012 07:50:23PM 6 points [-]
Comment author: [deleted] 07 September 2012 01:00:14AM 7 points [-]

Widespread circumcision.

What?

Comment author: CCC 07 September 2012 07:43:14AM 2 points [-]

Didn't the Jews have that back in the years BC? It's sort of cultural, but it's been around for a while in some cultures...

Comment author: RichardKennaway 01 September 2012 04:03:28PM 18 points [-]

Nothing can be soundly understood
If daylight itself needs proof.

Imām al-Ḥaddād (trans. Moṣṭafā al-Badawī), "The Sublime Treasures: Answers to Sufi Questions"

Comment author: Alicorn 17 September 2012 05:43:03PM 14 points [-]

I've always thought of the SkiFree monster as a metaphor for the inevitability of death.

"SkiFree, huh? You know, you can press 'F' to go faster than the monster and escape."

-- xkcd 667

Comment author: [deleted] 04 September 2012 06:55:38AM 14 points [-]

"If at first you don't succeed, switch to power tools." -- The Red Green Show

Comment author: DanArmak 06 September 2012 10:05:09PM 2 points [-]

I can confirm that this works.

Comment author: AlexMennen 04 September 2012 02:11:40AM 22 points [-]

Discovery is the privilege of the child, the child who has no fear of being once again wrong, of looking like an idiot, of not being serious, of not doing things like everyone else.

Alexander Grothendieck

Comment author: [deleted] 14 September 2012 10:48:16AM 8 points [-]

the fact that ordinary people can band together and produce new knowledge within a few months is anything but a trifle

-- Dienekes Pontikos, Citizen Genetics

Comment author: Jayson_Virissimo 03 September 2012 08:59:50AM 33 points [-]

...beliefs are like clothes. In a harsh environment, we choose our clothes mainly to be functional, i.e., to keep us safe and comfortable. But when the weather is mild, we choose our clothes mainly for their appearance, i.e., to show our figure, our creativity, and our allegiances. Similarly, when the stakes are high we may mainly want accurate beliefs to help us make good decisions. But when a belief has few direct personal consequences, we in effect mainly care about the image it helps to project.

-Robin Hanson, Human Enhancement

Comment deleted 01 September 2012 09:35:51AM *  [-]
Comment author: [deleted] 04 September 2012 08:39:45AM *  17 points [-]

Neither side of the road is inherently superior to the other, so we should all choose for ourselves on which side to drive. #enlightenment

--Kate Evans on Twitter

Comment author: roystgnr 04 September 2012 10:39:00PM 5 points [-]

Don't we all choose for ourselves on which side to drive? There's usually nobody else ready to grab the wheel away from you...

Comment author: DaFranker 04 September 2012 02:50:17PM *  3 points [-]

Have successfully quoted this to counter a relativist-truth argument that was aimed towards supporting "freedom of faith" even in hypothetical scenarios where the majority of actors would end up promoting and following harmful faiths.

While counterintuitive to me, it was apparently a necessary step before the other party could even comprehend the fallacy of gray that was being committed.

Comment author: mrglwrf 11 September 2012 07:00:03PM 18 points [-]

You know those people who say "you can use numbers to show anything" and "numbers lie" and "I don't trust numbers, don't give me numbers, God, anything but numbers"? These are the very same people who use numbers in the wrong way.

"Junior", FIRE JOE MORGAN

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 10:09:31AM 9 points [-]

If science proves some belief of Buddhism wrong, then Buddhism will have to change.

-- Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama

Comment author: Sophronius 11 September 2012 11:53:23AM 0 points [-]

Not all that rational. Note that he requires scientific proof before he is willing to change his beliefs. The standards should be much lower than that.

Comment author: ChristianKl 11 September 2012 08:48:09PM 2 points [-]

No, the claim is that a scientific proof is sufficient from him to feel the need to change his beliefs. It isn't that it's necessary.

Comment author: Sophronius 11 September 2012 11:58:19PM 4 points [-]

Technically true, but nice though that is, saying that scientific proof would force you to change your beliefs still isn't a very impressive show of rationality. It would be better if he had said "Whenever science and Buddhism conflict, Buddhism should change".

I know, it is good to hear it from a religious figure, but if it were any other subject the same claim would leave you indifferent. "If it were scientifically proven that aliens don't exist I will have to change my belief in them." Sound impressive? No? Then the Dalai Lama shouldn't get any more praise just because it's about religion.

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 06 September 2012 04:53:20AM 9 points [-]

"Even in a minute instance, it is best to look first to the main tendencies of Nature. A particular flower may not be dead in early winter, but the flowers are dying; a particular pebble may never be wetted with the tide, but the tide is coming in."

G. K. Chesterton, "The Absence of Mr Glass"

Note: this was put in the mouth of the straw? atheist. It's still correct.

Comment author: Kaj_Sotala 01 September 2012 06:08:27PM 49 points [-]

The person who says, as almost everyone does say, that human life is of infinite value, not to be measured in mere material terms, is talking palpable, if popular, nonsense. If he believed that of his own life, he would never cross the street, save to visit his doctor or to earn money for things necessary to physical survival. He would eat the cheapest, most nutritious food he could find and live in one small room, saving his income for frequent visits to the best possible doctors. He would take no risks, consume no luxuries, and live a long life. If you call it living. If a man really believed that other people's lives were infinitely valuable, he would live like an ascetic, earn as much money as possible, and spend everything not absolutely necessary for survival on CARE packets, research into presently incurable diseases, and similar charities.

In fact, people who talk about the infinite value of human life do not live in either of these ways. They consume far more than they need to support life. They may well have cigarettes in their drawer and a sports car in the garage. They recognize in their actions, if not in their words, that physical survival is only one value, albeit a very important one, among many.

-- David D. Friedman, The Machinery of Freedom

Comment author: DanielLC 02 September 2012 08:03:58PM 0 points [-]

He's just showing that those people don't give infinite value, not that it's nonsense. It's nonsense because, even if you consider life infinitely more intrinsically valuable than a green piece of paper, you'd still trade a life for green pieces of paper, so long as you could trade them back for more lives.

Comment author: RobinZ 02 September 2012 10:23:33PM 2 points [-]

If life were of infinite value, trading a life for two new lives would be a meaningless operation - infinity times two is equal to infinity. Not unless by "life has infinite value" you actually mean "everything else is worthless".

Comment author: olalonde 06 September 2012 10:26:29AM *  0 points [-]

Related:

The really important thing is not to live, but to live well. - Socrates

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 01 September 2012 07:56:47PM 20 points [-]

"Nontrivial measure or it didn't happen." -- Aristosophy

(Who's Kate Evans? Do we know her? Aristosophy seems to have rather a lot of good quotes.)

Comment author: peter_hurford 01 September 2012 06:19:37PM 30 points [-]

"He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his candle at mine, receives light without darkening me. No one possesses the less of an idea, because every other possesses the whole of it." - Jefferson

Comment author: khafra 10 September 2012 07:06:52PM 11 points [-]

I particularly like the reminder that I'm physics. Makes me feel like a superhero. "Imbued with the properties of matter and energy, able to initiate activity in a purely deterministic universe, it's Physics Man!"

-- GoodDamon (this may skirt the edge of the rules, since it's a person reacting to a sequence post, but a person who's not a member of LW.)

Comment author: imaxwell 03 September 2012 10:01:52PM 22 points [-]

The only road to doing good shows, is doing bad shows.

  • Louis C.K., on Reddit
Comment author: wallowinmaya 02 September 2012 10:30:35PM 34 points [-]

Nobody is smart enough to be wrong all the time.

Ken Wilber

Comment author: CronoDAS 03 September 2012 12:28:48AM 2 points [-]

Unless you're a fictional character. Or possibly Mike "Bad Player" Flores:

There is an episode of Seinfeld where George—a lifelong screw up—decides to do the opposite of his natural instincts and impulses at every turn. He has a great day, lands his job at the Yankees, etc.

I was a superb Onslaught drafter, but there was probably a reason my buddy Scott had a dim confidence in my game play. So I decided to draft normally but pull a George and do the opposite of everything I was inclined to in game.

The result was a Day 2 with a terrible Sealed deck and 3-0 / 6-0 in my first draft. I needed 2-1 for Top 8.

The "Even Steven" part is that at that point I was so full of myself I forgot to do the opposite of what I wanted to do and made about three important mistakes... Exactly enough to land myself one point out of Top 8 at Grand Prix Boston (Kibler won).

Comment author: Daniel_Burfoot 04 September 2012 12:08:03PM *  5 points [-]

An interesting corollary of the efficient market hypothesis is that, neglecting overhead due to things like brokerage fees and assuming trades are not large enough to move the market, it should be just as difficult to lose money trading securities as it is to make money.

Comment author: Salutator 04 September 2012 12:28:10PM 1 point [-]

No, not really. In an efficient marked risks uncorrelated with those of other securities shouldn't be compensated, so you should easily be able to screw yourself over by not diversifying.