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We Are All Confident Idiots

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Re: We Are All Confident Idiots

#51

Post by enobrev »

adwf wrote: post #39

I usually accredit the evolution attribution problem to the phrase "survival of the fittest". It's a catchy line, it implies that the better you are the more likely you are to survive, which is kinda true, but leads to the mistaken agency issue. It has the additional benefit of aligning with the ethic of hard work (ie. do better to survive) that we also try to teach kids, which I think is one of the reasons it persis…

There's also a matter of motivation. "Survival of the fittest" comes along with the connotation that it's better to aim for the top [let's say 10]% in order to continue to exist. "Death to the weakest" heeds a similar connotation meaning rise above the bottom [let's stick with 10]%. So, just don't slack as terribly as the very worst slackers in your group and you'll do just fine.

All in all, that's not necessarily false, just not a great motivator. I know quite a few people who get by on bare-minimum without completely giving up and they lead very happy lives. It took me a long time in my own life and perspective to appreciate theirs.

Re: We Are All Confident Idiots

#52

Post by bryanlarsen »

lucio wrote: post #14

In the curved-tube image, clearly the ball will exit with a clockwise spinning, because it'll be rolling on the external wall of the tube (based on the "Newtonian principle" of inertia). I'll bet if you try it as a experiment (inside the atmosphere) the ball will follow "C"... Am I a confident idiot?

That's a standard fallacy I often run into: over estimating second order effects. Yes, unless the ball is perfectly smooth or in a vacuum you will get slight curvature. But it would be so slight that it would look like B.

Re: We Are All Confident Idiots

#53

Post by byEngineer »

tomp wrote: post #31
byEngineer wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The FED artificially kept low interest rates since 2001 till 2008. All that money had to go somewhere. It went to housing. Cause and effect, plain and simple. The same currently nobody seems to understand that we have even lower interest rates today. From 2008 till 2014. And all this money goes to (primarily) US Treasuries. US Treasuries are currently the most expensive in its 300 year history. Mortgage APR fixed for…

> People don't like to think. Well, that's a mostly empty statement, as it's unfalsifiable - even people who think, and see this happening, what can they do? Is there any way to profit from the mispricing of assets, when everything is overvalued? Well, you could short stuff, but that's a huge risk (since the central banks have an incentive to keep the bubble from bursting, so they can ramp the asset prices even highe…

Hypothetical scenario: US Treasuries go south, the bubble bursts. The next day Chinese announce they start selling their Treasuries on the open market. So instead of keeping your money with the most indebted Government on the face of the planet, you keep it with the biggest creditor in the world. Doesn't sound as a bad deal, huh? And as an extra bonus just to make sure everyone drops US Treasuries ASAP to buy the Chinese paper: tie the currency to gold. Guarantee that yuan is as good as gold. Why not? Yuan reserve currency of the world, so the same mistakes can be made all over again ;-)

This what Keynsians call in this case problem for Chinese I call a huge win. Keynsians will tell you: oh, but now Chinese exports will get prohibitively expensive! And I say: BS! The yuan currency will go up in value up to 6 times. Why to export anywhere when you just got 1 billion new consumers worth 6 times more than before?! Next step: rest of the world starts producing again, including US. China stops being factory of the world as we can't afford their stuff anymore. We need to relearn how to build and assemble it again. Voila, here you have balance back in the system.

Re: We Are All Confident Idiots

#54

Post by byEngineer »

bostonpete wrote: post #37
byEngineer wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The FED artificially kept low interest rates since 2001 till 2008. All that money had to go somewhere. It went to housing. Cause and effect, plain and simple. The same currently nobody seems to understand that we have even lower interest rates today. From 2008 till 2014. And all this money goes to (primarily) US Treasuries. US Treasuries are currently the most expensive in its 300 year history. Mortgage APR fixed for…

Do they have "Doomsday Preppers" on the other side of the pond?

They do. In mainstream. Things like possibility of US defaulting on its debt or going towards hyper inflationary root are mainstream over here.

Re: We Are All Confident Idiots

#55

Post by adwf »

JulianMorrison wrote: post #48
adwf wrote: post #39

I usually accredit the evolution attribution problem to the phrase "survival of the fittest". It's a catchy line, it implies that the better you are the more likely you are to survive, which is kinda true, but leads to the mistaken agency issue. It has the additional benefit of aligning with the ethic of hard work (ie. do better to survive) that we also try to teach kids, which I think is one of the reasons it persis…

No, the correct way to phrase it is "survival of the fit ". It's very common for limiting factors (water, calories, vitamins, etc) to have a plateau. In the range from starvation to 'enough', more ability to find food is an advantage. In the range from 'enough' to 'excess', there's no payoff. So what evolution creates is a population of surviving individuals who are each 'enough' on all their success parameters, but…

Yeah, my issue wasn't with the mechanism of evolution, more with the phrasing. The word "survive" implies some sort of agency, the inverted phrasing does not. I could alter it to "decline of the weakest attributes as they are less successful and thus less likely to breed and pass their genetics on", but that's quite a mouthful for a tagline to teach schoolkids! ;)

PS: And yes I know there are plenty of situations where even "weak" attributes won't necessarily get weeded out, but then you'd be extending the tagline quite a bit!

Re: We Are All Confident Idiots

#56

Post by karmacondon »

adwf wrote: post #39

I usually accredit the evolution attribution problem to the phrase "survival of the fittest". It's a catchy line, it implies that the better you are the more likely you are to survive, which is kinda true, but leads to the mistaken agency issue. It has the additional benefit of aligning with the ethic of hard work (ie. do better to survive) that we also try to teach kids, which I think is one of the reasons it persis…

Evolution doesn't have anything to do with strength or weakness, it's about fitting the current environment. Sometimes smaller organisms are more likely to survive because it's easier for them to hide from predators. Sometimes the most important thing is coloration that allows an organism to blend in to the background. Some of the most successful organisms in history (ie, pigeons) aren't particularly strong or "not weak", they were just the best suited to survive in the world that they lived in.

Philosophers like to attach social messages to evolution, but one of the real lessons is "Adapt to your environment". It's not about working hard, or not being the weakest, it's about being the right organism for the moment. In the evolutionary environment of human society it's not being the smartest or working the hardest, it's being in the right place at the right time.

Re: We Are All Confident Idiots

#57

Post by Shivetya »

I wonder where those of us who tend to self depreciating humor, who also in turn confess to not knowing much while being told we get things done, fall. I know some of what I am totally clueless about but revel in being told when I am factually wrong in something I thought otherwise. However there are areas where I just refuse to understand and worse I think I know what some of those are and still won't correct it.

Re: We Are All Confident Idiots

#58

Post by lucio »

adwf wrote: post #42
lucio wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not just a spin? "survival of the fittest" is exactly the same as "death to the weakest". "survival of the fittest" = "not survival of the not-fit" And also "fit" it is not the same as "strong"

Yes it is spin, but not just spin. "Survive" often implies some sort of agency, that there is some sort of struggle that was overcome and the organism is still alive. We teach survival skills. Whereas if you drop some antibiotics on a bacteria culture, there is no struggle, the bacteria that aren't already resistant just die. That's why I think the inverted phrasing is clearer in meaning (although yes I meant "weakes…

There isnt a struggle?. Do the non-resistant bacteria "try" to survive and fail, then die? or it "just die"?

The inverted phrase will be a PR disaster for Darwin ;)

Re: We Are All Confident Idiots

#59

Post by adwf »

enobrev wrote: post #51
adwf wrote: post #39

I usually accredit the evolution attribution problem to the phrase "survival of the fittest". It's a catchy line, it implies that the better you are the more likely you are to survive, which is kinda true, but leads to the mistaken agency issue. It has the additional benefit of aligning with the ethic of hard work (ie. do better to survive) that we also try to teach kids, which I think is one of the reasons it persis…

There's also a matter of motivation. "Survival of the fittest" comes along with the connotation that it's better to aim for the top [let's say 10]% in order to continue to exist. "Death to the weakest" heeds a similar connotation meaning rise above the bottom [let's stick with 10]%. So, just don't slack as terribly as the very worst slackers in your group and you'll do just fine. All in all, that's not necessarily fa…

Yeah, that's exactly the point I was trying to make at the end. It's far more motivating to believe that hard work will get you to the top, rather than it being an arbitrary "right place, right time" kind of life - and for humans that's probably true, but it doesn't necessarily have anything to do with evolution. That's why I was wondering if people find the "Survival" way of phrasing evolution confusing and might find it easier to deal with the inverted phrase as it implies no agency.
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