Psychohistorian comments on Religion, Mystery, and Warm, Soft Fuzzies - Less Wrong

17 Post author: Psychohistorian 14 May 2009 11:41PM

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Comment author: Psychohistorian 16 May 2009 04:08:09PM *  3 points [-]

rationality isn't the only way to experience the world...

But it's the one that wins. And people do want to win.

No, no, no, a thousand times no. Rationality is not how we experience the world; it's how we process our experience. I'm eating something tasty; rationality has nothing whatsoever to do with that immediate experience. I can apply rationality to that experience to figure out how to have more like it, or if a somewhat similar experience would be similar in enough ways to give me a pleasant experience. But if you put "rationality" into "way to experience the world" you get a category error.