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There is quite the chance he'll drop dead, so I personally think his method is irrational under the vast majority of circumstances. In the case that winning an endurance bike race saves one million lives this strategy is not that bad, however.
That's a value judgement. He appears to think the risks he places himelf in when he's not in control are an acceptable price for the utility he derives from his bicycling.
In response to
Rationality Quotes: October 2009
(approximate, my translation)
Blessed are those who believe without seeing. Who wants to be blessed when they could see.
-- Esa Lappi, my high school math teacher when showing us the proof of some theorem.
How does one escape from biology? This seems more closely related to transhumanism than rationality.
By applying software patches that detect hardware faults and compensate or work around them.
In response to
Biking Beyond Madness (link)
Did Eliezer or someone else with admin rights just edit the tags? I don't think this is really relevant to akrasia, as it isn't about doing something that wouldn't otherwise be done at all, but ignoring thoughts known to be erroneous("I'm at the limit of my strength"), making a convulsive effort and doing the winning thing instead of the "sensible" or "rational."
Biking Beyond Madness (link)
‘‘During race, I am going crazy, definitely,’’ he says, smiling in bemused despair. ‘‘I cannot explain why is that, but it is true.’’
The craziness is methodical, however, and Robic and his crew know its pattern by heart. Around Day 2 of a typical weeklong race, his speech goes staccato. By Day 3, he is belligerent and sometimes paranoid. His short-term memory vanishes, and he weeps uncontrollably. The last days are marked by hallucinations: bears, wolves and aliens prowl the roadside; asphalt cracks rearrange themselves into coded messages. Occasionally, Robic leaps from his bike to square off with shadowy figures that turn out to be mailboxes. In a 2004 race, he turned to see himself pursued by a howling band of black-bearded men on horseback.
‘‘Mujahedeen, shooting at me,’’ he explains. ‘‘So I ride faster.’’
This 2006 New York Times story is about Jure Robic, a Slovenian ultra long distance bicycler who goes seriously insane when he pushes himself far enough during the races. At the point he feels like dying out of fatigue he still has a major portion (estimated 50 % by his team) of his strength left. So he hands over control to his team and with their help, pushes himself into the realm of insanity and gives up control to the team:
Unless there's akrasia involved. I can only imagine how tempting it would be to just outright buy a house if I were suddenly handed a million dollars, no matter how sternly I told myself not to just outright buy a house.
Ha! Buying a house and even more so moving is hard work, even with hired help. No way I'd do that right away.
In response to
The Nature of Offense
I have no idea what I'm wading into here, but a few things occured to me reading this:
Taking offense to something relies on status and perhaps more significantly on interpellation. Interpellation and its inherent insistence on dignity create barriers to what I'll call effective communication and introduce a rhetoric of respect. If we wish to be rationalists, really and truly, it seems like we must have a discourse that avoids insisting on respect for anyone or anything. We must all get thick skins, be willing to hear ourselves treated as objects of outside analysis and be willing to be ignored when we have bad ideas. Unwise, "offensive" comments like the one that seemed to kick off this discussion can be assayed because they are examples of poor thinking rather than because they are causes of emotional distress. Here, when it gets down to serious business, we should each have no more merit or status than our own arguments give us.
However, I have no idea how to sum this up in a maxim or otherwise implement this. What I offer is not a solution but an objective. I hope others can flesh it out.
As kpreid already said, that's pretty much Crocker's Rules, but few people can manage them, so assuming them or expecting people to declare them is a bad idea.
Racist statements don't seem to automatically imply lower status for the offended group. For example, many people found this "joke" offensive, even though the only claim seems to be that black people eat lots of watermelon. Similarly, a statement like "Jews control the financial system" could easily offend Jews, even though if anything it assigns them high status.
Stereotypes imply lack of individuality, which is usually low-status. As does grouping them as a single entity, especially if that grouping is made with a hint of sinisterity as would often be the case when talking about financial system -controlling jews.
I think you are on to something. When you think about it, humans are different enough that it's hard to create a work that everyone thinks is great. You might be able to create a work that nobody profoundly dislikes, but such a work is likely to be so bland, watered-down, and lacking in risks that nobody is profoundly thrilled with it, either. Creating a work that resonates with the worldview and experience of a certain group to a high magnitude can make it inaccessible or laughable to other groups of people with different values.
There may be a "Conversation of Fandom" of some sort going on: for every enthusiastic fan you produce with a work, you must also produce someone who hates it.
Contra Bond, it's not badness that produce fandom. Rather, elements with a high variance of appeal produce both fans in some groups of people, and badness from the perspective of other groups of people. These groups can even overlap, in the case of So Bad It's Good.
for every enthusiastic fan you produce with a work, you must also produce someone who hates it.
Kathy Sierra arguing along those lines, with emphasis on software expanding on Scott Adams on the subject. Sounds plausible.
ETA: I mean, useful as a general heuristic when thinking about whether something should be done or not for a product. Of course especially in software some things that gain undying love can be added in a fashion that does not distract those who don't want it.
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I used to argue with a more strident, arrogant tone than I try to adopt now. One influence in changing my tone was Ben Franklin's autobiography:
"I wish well-meaning, sensible men would not lessen their power of doing good by a positive, assuming manner, that seldom fails to disgust, tends to create opposition, and to defeat everyone of those purposes for which speech was given to us, to wit, giving or receiving information or pleasure. For, if you would inform, a positive and dogmatical manner in advancing your sentiments may provoke contradiction and prevent a candid attention."
He describes how he cultivated "the habit of expressing myself in terms of modest diffidence; never using, when I advanced any thing that may possibly be disputed, the words certainly, undoubtedly, or any others that give the air of positiveness to an opinion; but rather say, I conceive or apprehend a thing to be so and so; it appears to me, or I should think it so or so, for such and such reasons; or I imagine it to be so; or it is so, if I am not mistaken.
...
When another asserted something that I thought an error, I deny'd myself the pleasure of contradicting him abruptly, and of showing immediately some absurdity in his proposition; and in answering I began by observing that in certain cases or circumstances his opinion would be right, but in the present case there appear'd or seem'd to me some difference, etc. I soon found the advantage of this change in my manner; the conversations I engag'd in went on more pleasantly. The modest way in which I propos'd my opinions procur'd them a readier reception and less contradiction; I had less mortification when I was found to be in the wrong, and I more easily prevail'd with others to give up their mistakes and join with me when I happened to be in the right."
Another influence was Yvain's How To Not Lose An Argument. The common part of Franklin and Yvain's advice is to phrase your message in such a way that minimal status will be lost by your opponent agreeing with you. Your opponent must not see (consciously or subconsciously) your rhetoric as an attempt to gain status at zir expense.
Kind of goes against the very good point
(edited fixing formatting)