gwern comments on Rationality Quotes July 2014 - LessWrong

6 Post author: VAuroch 06 July 2014 06:51AM

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Comment author: gwern 17 July 2014 12:22:19AM 21 points [-]

"Independence is for the very few, it is a privilege of the strong. Whoever attempts it enters a labyrinth, and multiplies a thousandfold the dangers of life. Not least of which is that no one can see how and where he loses his way, becomes lonely, and is torn piecemeal by some minotaur of conscience. If he fails, this happens so far from the comprehension of men that they cannot sympathise nor pity."

--29, Part 2: The Free Spirit, Friedrich Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil- Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future

Comment author: Stabilizer 17 July 2014 12:35:25AM 7 points [-]

While Nietzsche writes it beautifully, perhaps the simplified, layman version would be:

"If you insist on refusing social obligations and violating social norms, then life becomes very hard: you will be lonely and your conscience will bother you a lot. If you fail---i.e. the pain of being outcast exceeds the benefits of independence---then no one will give a damn."

(The last part is almost tautological; if you're lonely, then most people don't care about you. The exception might be when one writes one's experiences down, as Nietzsche probably did.)

Comment author: gwern 17 July 2014 01:28:26AM 7 points [-]

I was actually thinking it applied better to cranks than generic 'social obligations and norms'.

Comment author: D_Malik 09 August 2014 01:41:30AM 4 points [-]

Also in this vein is Sebastian Marshall's The Million Dollar Question.

Comment author: gwern 14 August 2014 12:11:35AM 2 points [-]

A very interesting post. I don't think that's more than a small fraction of what's going on, but I could believe it's a fraction.