= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
RichardKennaway comments on The Rationality Wars - Less Wrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
= 783df68a0f980790206b9ea87794c5b6)
Loading…= b715d02e85f7b3b4ae65ca3d3e450868)
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Powered by Reddit
= f037147d6e6c911a85753b9abdedda8d)
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (41)
But there was a specification - IEEE 754 - that the Pentium was supposed to be implementing, and wasn't. There's no similar objective standard for rationality.
There is.
That's a poem, not a specification.
It's a poem and a specification.
Not in any way that is meaningful from an engineering point of view.
I do not agree. (Point of view = Ph.D. biomedical engineering.)
I have a sad that you didn't challenge me on my previous reply to you; that means that you've written me off as an interlocutor, probably on the suspicion that I'm a hopeless fanboy.
...which, on reflection, would be no more than I deserve for going into pissing-match mode and not being straightforward about my point of view. Oh well.
I felt that the discussion wasn't going to become productive, hence I disengaged.
Upvoted, but I would like to point out that it is not immediately obvious that the template can be modified to suit instrumental rationality as well as epistemological rationality; At a casual inspection the litany appears to be about epistemology only.
The corresponding specification for instrumental rationality would be the VNM axioms, wouldn't it?
No.
If working standing as opposed to sitting will increase my health,
I desire to have the habit of working standing.
If working standing as opposed to sitting will decrease my health,
I desire to have the habit of working sitting.
Let me not become attached to habits that do not serve my goals.
Note also that there are some delightful self-fulfilling prophecies that mix epistemic and instrumental rationality, with a hint of Löb's Theorem:
If believing that (taking this sugar pill will cure my headache) will mean (taking this sugar pill will cure my headache),
I desire to believe that (taking this sugar pill will cure my headache).
If believing that (taking this sugar pill will not cure my headache) will mean (taking this sugar pill will not cure my headache),
I desire to believe that (taking this sugar pill will cure my headache).
Let me not become attached to self-fulfilling beliefs that disempower me.
For a much more in-depth look, see this article by LWer BrienneStrohl:
Lob's Theorem Cured My Social Anxiety
Yes, that's roughly the reformulation I settled on. Except that I omitted 'have the habit' because it's magical-ish - desiring to have the habit of X is not that relevant to actually achieving the habit of X, rather simply desiring to X strongly enough to actually X is what results in the building of a habit of X.