All of arch1's Comments + Replies

Er, how about the wisdom to know whether a thing should be changed in the 1st place?

neq1,

Thanks for the great learning. One apparent inconsistency puzzled me a bit:

You go out of your way to say that you expect Θsens>1-Θspec (which looks sensible to me), then follow up by choosing a pair of priors which, assuming independence, appear to violate this expectation a significant fraction of the time - perhaps 20-25%, just eyeballing the distributions.

Can you comment on the apparent inconsistency, or straighten out my misconceptions?

Great post, thanks for the learning. I am a bit puzzled however as to why you go out of your way to say "In addition, we expect Θsens>1-Θspec," (which expectation BTW makes sense to me), only to follow this up by assuming priors for Θsens and Θspec which (assuming independence) violate this expectation with significant probability (perhaps 25% of the time, based on a crude eyeballing of the curves).

Can you help me better understand your thinking here (or clear up any misconception on my part)?

Yes Nisan, that is the gist as I recall it. One can see how such a tool might help with a whole host of dysfunctional discussion/meeting behaviors.

A skeptic might regard this as gimmicky, and point out that the discipline required to use the tool properly would, if present, have prevented the dysfunctions in the first place. To which I reply: Well, maybe. But it's cheap to try. You might even enjoy it.

Morendil, Thank you for reminding me of this book! A technique I remember being described there is very attractive to me. My memory will mangle the details, but basically it is a convention by which either party in a discussion (say, party A in a discussion with party B) can call a point of order to ask the other party (in this case, B) to state A's position to A's satisfaction.

I have tried this some with mixed results, which I suspect could have been better with more preparatory groundwork. I'd love to hear of others' experiences.

The best-ROI techniques I've found to date are getting sufficient sleep, and trying hard. I know that these work, andthey work quite reliably.

Another which is somewhat less reliable is 'sleeping on it.' I mean quickly and intensively priming the mental pumps on a task, then doing something else, then coming back (ideally after a good night's sleep) to the task later. I often perceive the benefit of signicant effortless processing which must have taken place in the interim,

Back to trying hard. To help w/ this, I tend to psych myself differently dependi... (read more)

Apprentice, You appear to be of like mind with - ironically, Russell himself (I'm not a Russell fanatic, really I'm not: - though I clearly find him a vein worth mining deeply on this particular topic:-). From 'Why I Am Not A Christian,' a 1927 talk to the National Secular Society in London (on a day on which I suppose his stomach was feeling better):

" I am told that that sort of view [of the earth eventually becoming cold, dead and lifeless] is depressing, and people will sometimes tell you that if they believed that, they would not be able to go on... (read more)

Kazuo, I agree; given our current knowledge that quote is open to criticism on several points of fact (most obviously its focus on the solar system rather than whatever passes for the universe these days). That's why I said I admire it mainly for its courage and style.

Finally, a third from Russell that I admire chiefly for its unflinching courage. And love him or hate him, you've got to admit - the guy had a way with words:

"That man is the product of causes that had no prevision of the end they were achieving; that his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and his beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms; that no fire, no heroism, no intensity of thought and feeling, can preserve individual life beyond the grave; that all the labors of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspir... (read more)

A habit of basing convictions upon evidence, and of giving to them only that degree of certainty which the evidence warrants, would, if it became general, cure most of the ills from which the world is suffering. (Bertrand Russell)

Men fear thought as they fear nothing else on earth, more than ruin, more even than death.... Thought is subversive and revolutionary, destructive and terrible, thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions, and comfortable habit. Thought looks into the pit of hell and is not afraid. Thought is great and swift and free, the light of the world, and the chief glory of man. (Bertrand Russell)