Qiaochu_Yuan comments on Rationality Quotes January 2013 - Less Wrong

6 Post author: katydee 02 January 2013 05:23PM

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Comment author: Qiaochu_Yuan 03 January 2013 12:47:46AM *  2 points [-]

So, to answer the question, this is the mood in which I question the usefulness of doing useful things.

Aren't useful things kind of useful to do kind of by definition? (I know this argument is often used to sneak in connotations, but I can't imagine that "is useful" is a sneaky connotation of "useful thing.")

What you describe sounds to me like a failure to model your friend correctly. Most people cannot fix themselves given only instructions on how to do so, and what worked for you may not work for your friend. Even if it might, it is hard to motivate yourself to do things when you are miserable and depressed, and when you are miserable and depressed, hearing someone else say "here are all the ways you currently suck, and you should stop sucking in those ways" is not necessarily encouraging.

In other words, "useful" is a two- or even three-place predicate.