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pragmatist comments on Open Thread, September 23-29, 2013 - Less Wrong Discussion

5 Post author: Mestroyer 24 September 2013 01:25AM

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Comment author: Torello 24 September 2013 01:46:00PM 15 points [-]

Robin Hanson defines “viewquakes” as "insights which dramatically change my world view."

Are there any particular books that have caused you personally to experience a viewquake?

Or to put the question differently, if you wanted someone to experience a viewquake, can you name any books that you believe have a high probability of provoking a viewquake?

Comment author: pragmatist 26 September 2013 10:23:00PM *  2 points [-]

Reading Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations prompted the biggest viewquake I've ever experienced, substantially changing my conception of what a properly naturalistic worldview looks like, especially the role of normativity therein. I'm not sure I'd assign it a high probability of provoking a viewquake in others, though, given his aphoristic and often frustratingly opaque style. I think it worked for me because I already had vague misgivings about my prior worldview that I was having trouble nailing down, and the book helped bring these apprehensions into focus.

A more concrete scientific viewquake: reading Jaynes, especially his work on statistical mechanics, completely altered my approach to my Ph.D. dissertation (and also, incidentally, led me to LW).