This is the public group rationality diary for May 24th - June 13th, 2015. It's a place to record and chat about it if you have done, or are actively doing, things like:
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Established a useful new habit
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Obtained new evidence that made you change your mind about some belief
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Decided to behave in a different way in some set of situations
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Optimized some part of a common routine or cached behavior
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Consciously changed your emotions or affect with respect to something
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Consciously pursued new valuable information about something that could make a big difference in your life
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Learned something new about your beliefs, behavior, or life that surprised you
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Tried doing any of the above and failed
Or anything else interesting which you want to share, so that other people can think about it, and perhaps be inspired to take action themselves. Try to include enough details so that everyone can use each other's experiences to learn about what tends to work out, and what doesn't tend to work out.
Archive of previous rationality diaries
Note to future posters: no one is in charge of posting these threads. If it's time for a new thread, and you want a new thread, just create it. It should run for about two weeks, finish on a Saturday, and have the 'group_rationality_diary' tag.
Taking zinc on the first signs of a cold. Seems to have avoided three cases but whether it shortens a cold remains to be seen.
Obtained new evidence that made you change your mind about some belief
Decided to behave in a different way in some set of situations
I read "Getting to Yes" and used that to improve negotiations (one with a mechanic). The change mostly consists in asking questions instead of making my own position transparent (transparency is good, but position is not).
I made a habit to consciously reflect on the future merit of web-pages I'm browsing instead of just following my intuition (and impulse). It led to skipping quite a few low to medium value pages.
My model of my own learning was that I adapt quickly to new information - but often overshoot the target. I believed that I this was a sign of quickness of mind but when thinking about the differences in reasoning and how fast we adapt to new information I realized that my overadapting really might mean that I take facts too literally. That I don't sufficiently question the underlying assumptions - and thus overshoot. I'm still not clear how to deal with that. The good thing is that after overshooting I return equally fast - if given further input/feedback.