Qiaochu_Yuan comments on Open Thread, July 1-15, 2013 - Less Wrong

4 Post author: Vaniver 01 July 2013 05:10PM

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Comment author: Qiaochu_Yuan 01 July 2013 09:14:53PM 19 points [-]

My strategy is to avoid conversations of this form entirely by default. Most Greens do not need to be shown that the belief system they claim to have is flawed, and neither do most Blues. Pay attention to what people do, not what they say. Are they good people? Are they important enough that bad epistemology on their part directly has large negative effects on the world? If the answers to these questions are "yes" and "no" respectively, then who cares what belief system they claim to have?

Comment author: niceguyanon 02 July 2013 04:43:11AM 2 points [-]

If the answers to these questions are "yes" and "no" respectively, then who cares what belief system they claim to have?

I'm really going to try and remind myself of this more often. Most of the time the answers are "yes" and "no" and points are rarely won for pointing out bad epistemology.