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DeVliegendeHollander comments on Rationality Quotes Thread May 2015 - Less Wrong
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Yup. You might think that "prayer might not work even though lots of people think it does" is an entirely obvious idea, but I'm not sure it was so obvious in 1872.
(Although I notice that the argument "It must not have been obvious, or Galton wouldn't have bothered pointing it out" is uncomfortably similar to the argument Galton is refuting.)
The kind of feeling-better that comes from having more fish to feed your family is not the same as the kind of feeling-better that comes from having prayed. (E.g., one will stop your children starving and the other won't.) Isn't this relevant?
It is. I guess I was probably reading too much into it. It is just, if see a widespread practice, I don't want to simply take the most literal possible prediction of what they claim it does, and if that doesn't, then consider them idiots. I will assume people are essentially economical so not idiots as long as time invested vs. some kind of psychological profit gained goes, and want to find out in what other ways does it work i.e. what kind of potential profit it gains, even if just psychological (and sometimes not just psychological but e.g. social).