TheAncientGeek comments on Rationality Quotes July 2014 - Less Wrong

6 Post author: VAuroch 06 July 2014 06:51AM

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Comment author: wedrifid 10 July 2014 02:24:35AM 4 points [-]

Experience by itself teaches nothing... Without theory, experience has no meaning. Without theory, one has no questions to ask. Hence, without theory, there is no learning.

This is false. It is false in theory and it is false in practice. Learning can occur without theory. I spent years researching and developing systems to do just that. And on the practical side (actually human psychology) learning frequently---even predominately---occurs without theory. Abstract theoretical reasoning is a special case of 'learning' and one that is comparatively recent and under-developed in the observed universe.

Comment author: TheAncientGeek 10 July 2014 03:21:55PM 0 points [-]

Theory answers the question "what should I observe"am, .ir rather it answers it internally. On the absence of theory, a learning entity needs to spoon fed data.