= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
May I suggest you put this meetup and future ones on the calendar?
In response to
Cambridge Less Wrong Meetup Sunday, Sep 19
How long does the meetup typically last?
In response to
Two Truths and a Lie
I think you oversell the usefulness of this test, both because of how hard it is to make predictions about unrepeatable "experiments" that don't include value-judgments and because of how easy it is to game the statements - imagine:
(A) the false statement to be selected to be false for extraneous reasons and (B) for the proponent of the Big Idea to argue (A) when it isn't true.
Let's say my friend and I are doing this test. His Big Idea is signaling; my task is to construct three statements.
1) Men who want to mate spend a lot of money. (Signaling resources!) 2) Women who want to mate volunteer. (Signaling nurturing!) 3) Children often share with each other, unprompted, while young. (Signaling cooperation to parents!)
Well, obviously #3 isn't right because of other concerns - it turns out competing for, and hoarding, resources has been evolutionarily more successful than signaling social fitness. Does that mean signaling as an idea isn't useful? No; it wrongly explained (3) for a valid reason. (3) is false for reasons unrelated to signaling.
Psychohistorian doesn't say the idea isn't useful, just that reliance on it is incorrect. If the theory is "people mostly do stuff because of signalling", honestly, that's a pretty crappy theory. Once Signalling Guy fails this test, he should take that as a sign to go back and refine the theory, perhaps to
"People do stuff because of signalling when the benefit of the signal, in the environment of evolutionary adaptation, was worth more than its cost."
This means that making predictions requires estimating the cost and benefit of the behavior in advance, which requires a lot more data and computation, but that's what makes the theory a useful predictor instead of just another bogus Big Idea.
Not to point fingers at Freakonomics fans (not least because I'm guilty of this myself in party conversation) but it's real easy to look at a behavior that doesn't seem to make sense otherwise and say "oh, duh, signalling". The key is that the behavior doesn't make sense otherwise: it's costly, and that's an indication that, if people are doing it, there's a benefit you're not seeing. That technique may be helpful for explaining, but it's not helpful for predicting since, as you pointed out, it can explain anything if there's not enough cost/benefit information to rule it out.
Post in this thread if you live in Massachusetts
Medford, MA. Enjoyed the OB meetup on the MIT campus, which was convenient since I work across the street. I'd be up to renting a car and driving to Amherst or New Hampshire for a meetup on a weekend, especially if there was time for hiking.
= b715d02e85f7b3b4ae65ca3d3e450868)
Subscribe to RSS Feed
= f037147d6e6c911a85753b9abdedda8d){kind=logo}
Yes. I've taken 5 (or 6?) courses, all at the Dhamma Dhara center in Massachusetts. I did feel physically and mentally safe there. I'll try to address the red flags you mentioned.
First it should be noted that the centers are somewhat independent, even though the course is quite standardized. They are run on volunteer donations and time, and as a result the set of people working there changes often. Most just come to volunteer for a single 10-day course. Therefore your experience will be partly dependent on the volunteer pool for that center. Some geographical locations will be probably better than others.
Now to your red flags:
The course schedule does indeed indicate that you should get 6.5 hours sleep, but you don't have to. I'm fairly sure a majority of students skip the first meditation session (from 4:30am to 6:30am) and simply get up for breakfast at 6:30am, allowing for 8.5 hours of sleep. Personally I didn't have much trouble getting up for the early session.
This could be a problem. The teachers seem to mostly parrot Goenka's instructions, even though they have extensive meditation experience. It's unfortunate. I didn't feel the need to ask many questions during my courses so it wasn't a major issue for me. More personalized instruction would be better and could allow for faster progress.
As I've never tried I can't speak to this personally. At the start of the course they do encourage you not to leave until the end. I've volunteered for some courses at the Massachusetts center and I've observed the procedure there. If you want to leave a volunteer will first ask you about the problem you're having. If they can address it they will, otherwise they'll ask you to talk to the teacher about it. I think the teacher usually encourages you to stay for one more session or something, since the desire to leave could be the result of a transient emotional storm. If they still want to leave, volunteers will help them get their stuff (and a taxi if need be). Again, your experience will be partly determined by the people who happen to be there.
In my experience the dhamma.org courses provided a positive and supportive environment. You will have to endure some (but not too much) dogma/garbage, which will probably also be the case in courses elsewhere.
Their pages mention that they are funded entirely by donations from past students.
After you've taken the course, how much do they contact you (to solicit donations or otherwise)?