username2 comments on Rationality Quotes Thread November 2015 - Less Wrong

5 Post author: elharo 02 November 2015 12:30PM

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Comment author: username2 13 November 2015 12:42:31PM 0 points [-]

Could you explain this quote?

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 13 November 2015 01:45:57PM *  4 points [-]

You think you've understood a situation, but you might be missing something. Is there anything else worth considering?

Sturgeon on the subject

Ask the next question, and the one that follows that, and the one that follows that. It's the symbol of everything humanity has ever created, and is the reason it has been created. This guy is sitting in a cave and he says, "Why can't man fly?" Well, that's the question. The answer may not help him, but the question now has been asked.

The next question is what? How? And so all through the ages, people have been trying to find out the answer to that question. We've found the answer, and we do fly. This is true of every accomplishment, whether it's technology or literature, poetry, political systems or anything else. That is it. Ask the next question. And the one after that.

PDF in which Sturgeon discusses this at greater length

Comment author: username2 13 November 2015 02:59:06PM 0 points [-]

Thank you!