Davorak comments on Being your own censor - Less Wrong Discussion
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Comments (18)
Bottom line. When you take the time to learn A piece of information you have scarified learn B, C, D, … in the same time slot. This opportunity cost creates that you prioritize you learning. If you let someone censor you, you are letting them set your priorities. Rarely can other people be trusteed to know what priorities are best for you; at least until we have a better understanding of neurology.
I think of this case not as a case for censorship but for a case of priorities. TvTropes is fine as long as you have worked out all of the priorities ahead of TvTropes first.
Well the importance of the information knocks it up the list in priorities and the potential down sides knock it down the list. If methods/techniques to circumvent the downsides are learned then it gets knocked back up the list.
There are good reasons in normal circumstance not to pry into other peoples privacy. In general it is so low a priority that finding out what life is like with out break Y persons privacy has a higher priority.
You are human you need to enjoy yourself to be productive some amount of escapist media is just fine. I am not going to claim it is only ok if it directly increase you productivity, I think it is a complex issue that I am not going to get into further.
Does X information bring benefit to you? Or rather the real problem is can you tell if they bring you benefit before they cause you damage. If you don't know if they can cause you damage then reading about X is probably not as important as find out how susceptible you are to psychological damage. Then once you have answered that question you can determine the priority of X information.
If you think that you morality can be so easily change then learning not to be unduly influence by arguments should be high priority for you. You are exposed to arguments that while irrational can be convincing if you do not think them through properly.
If you are demotivated by reality then it should be high priority to learn how to be more realistic.
Same as one.
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