prase comments on Belief in Self-Deception - Less Wrong

51 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 05 March 2009 03:20PM

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Comment author: prase 22 February 2011 12:59:32PM 1 point [-]

I accept on an intellectual level that my belief could be wrong. This doesn't seem to enable me to stop believing.

Of course it doesn't. To accept that your belief can be wrong isn't the same as accepting that it is wrong. The former is a complete triviality (if person doesn't accept that his particular belief can be wrong, even in principle, either the belief is not a real belief, or the person is seriously irrational). The latter not only may enable you stop believing, but should force you to do so.

Of course those experiences and perceptions may be inaccurate and are subject to my own interpretations, so I can't claim that my beliefs are rational.

As is true for any experiences of any person, and still, a lot of people strive to have rational beliefs. While your formulation seems to imply that you happily accept being irrational. Which leads me to ask why? Is it because you think that rationality (however you define it) isn't always the best way to arrive to true beliefs? Or because you don't always mind having false beliefs? Or some other reason?