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Glen00

So, in context this is someone trying to diffuse a dangerous situation with placating lies. How is this rationality?

Glen00

That is true. However, at some point you are trying to fit too much into a single image or chart. I think what you're describing here could work if you keep it focused on a smaller range of ideas, rather than this many. It would also allow people to think individually about each claim, which larger sets don't really do.

I think your proposed chart would work best as an introduction or header to a more in depth analysis. Show the shape of the arguments and faults, then discuss each one thoroughly beneath the image.

Glen400

I have taken the survey

Glen120

I believe the problem people have with this is that it isn't actually helpful at all. It's just a list of outgroups for people to laugh at without any sort of analysis on why they believe this or what can be done to avoid falling into the same traps. Obviously a simple chart can't really encompass that level of explanation, so it's actual value or meaningful content is limited.

EDIT: Also, looking over your list it seems that you have marked most philosophies and alternate governments as "Immoral", along with literally everything as "Pointless and Counterproductive". Anarchism, Authoritarianism, Bushido, Collectivism, Cultural Relativism, Cynicsm, Defeatism, Ecocentrism, Egocentrism, Error Theory, Ethical Egoism, fascism, Gothicismus, Harmonious Society & Scientific Outlook on Development, Hedonism, Illegalism, Libertarianism, Machiavellianism, Medievalism, Misanthropy, Misology, Moral Relativism, Moral Skepticism, Moral Subjectivism, Nihilism, Non-Atomic Eudaiominism, Opportunism, Pacifism, Sensualism, Ubuntu(!), Value-Pluralism, Virtue Ethics, Voluntaryism are all marked as "Immoral" and nothing else. I have a lot of issues with your list, but the one that jumps out hte most is Ubuntu. How is UBUNTU of all things Immoral, Pointless and Counterproductive?

Glen90

By he I meant Vox. I read the linked post, and it makes all these mistakes. I wouldn't expect a quote to include a full argument or evidence base, but the source ideally should.

Glen40

He lists a single "parasitic" non-profit, and then declares the entire field of non-profits to be corrupt thieves on the scale of the financial sector. This post is explicitly about his disgust with the "non-profit world", and he pretty clearly believes that this sort of this is common despite providing no strong evidence in support of that belief. That is his mistake, generalizing from a single example with no additional evidence provided or even discussed.

Glen80

The closest thing to rationality content I can pull from this is "just because a thing looks good, doesn't mean it is good". However, the source page lists a grand total of one corrupt non-profit. You can find one bad version of anything, no matter how good or bad the whole group is. You could probably even find a hundred such examples, just from population size and base rate alone. Vox doesn't attempt to check if he is right, he doesn't even list a few examples. He just lists a single instance of a probably corrupt non-profit and, pleased with his own cynicism and insight, declares he they has found a pattern. This is a good example of what not to do, and an important failure mode to watch out for, but you are presenting it as though it were rational rather than a cautionary tale.

Glen00

This is an interesting historical note, but I am having a hard time seeing why it is a rationality quote. Perhaps as a record of people acting irrationally? Would you mind explaining a bit?

Glen30

Even if "do what makes you happy" were the best rationality advice, the big problem is figuring out what actually makes you happy, how to achieve it, and how to maintain/improve it. Getting drunk is pretty bad advice for a rationality standpoint, because it's sacrificing long term gain for short term pleasure, which is basically the opposite of what you should do. The man drinking at a bar all day is happier right now than the one working extra hours or studying, but in a few years, their happiness will probably be reversed as the latter's investment pays off and the former is still just drinking (only with more health problems).

Glen70

That's not even true, though. If you are kidnapped and then tortured, you are not remotely in control of your own happiness, just to take the most obvious extreme answer. Even for more mundane situations, people can be trapped in terrible situations, where cruel people have power over them. If you are working at a minimum wage job with bills coming seemingly every day and which you only overcome by working 18 hour days before collapsing exhausted and doing it all again in the morning, there is very little you can do about it. Now if one of the supervisors at one of your jobs is a petty tyrant who makes you miserable, what choice do you have that would increase your happiness?

I see what the quote is trying to say, as a call to action to change your own life, but it simply isn't true. It also fails the false wisdom reversal test, in that a quote saying "You have no true control over your own happiness; therefore, you must accept your lot in life with all the grace you can muster" sounds just as deep and helpful.

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