Why is it so hard to be rational? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?

#21

Post by nvilcins » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 2:29 PM UTC

XorNot wrote: post #7

alecst wrote: post #4

It's really hard (for me, and I imagine, for everyone else) to not put myself into my views and opinions. Like, when someone shows me that I'm wrong, it's natural for me to feel attacked, instead of just taking it as a learning moment. Noticing when this happens and working with it has been my main struggle in learning how to be more rational. Those views and opinions really don't need to be a part of what I consider…

> Allowing multiple beliefs to overlap This doesn't seem very rational. If your beliefs are in conflict and you're content to not resolve that, then pretty much by definition you're accepting a logical inconsistency. If resolving the intersection doesn't lead to a new stable belief system, then aren't you basically going with "whatever I'm feeling that day"?

We all operate with abstractions and simplifications - because it's impractical (and actually impossible given the complexity of the world) to process end evaluate every single detail.

Dealing with contradictions in our own beliefs (paradoxes) is a part of life. The rational approach is to accept that and "fuse" those beliefs carefully, not (a) accept one and reject the others or (b) avoid the topic entirely.

Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?

#22

Post by TuringTest » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 2:31 PM UTC

adrhead wrote: post #9

It is quite hard to become rational as humans are emotional beings. Sometimes, emotions will take over rationality in making decisions. This is why people struggle to make wise decisions.

Conversely, it is impossible to be rational without emotions.

Reason needs axioms (beliefs) to build a rational discourse, and without emotions, it is impossible to choose a limited set of starting axioms to begin making logical inferences from.

I agree with the person above who said being rational is about making post-hoc rationalizations. We know by cognitive science that a majority of explanations are build that way: after observing facts, we intuitively develop a story that is consistent with our expectations about the fact, as well as with our preconceived beliefs. "Being rational" in this context would be limited to reviewing our beliefs when these ad-hoc rationalizations become inconsistent one with another.

Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?

#23

Post by cortesoft » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 2:31 PM UTC

DoingIsLearning wrote: post #16

SMAAART wrote: post #11

Nobody wants to deal with rational people. Big business want people to buy things they don't need, with money they don't have to impress people they don't like Politicians want people who will drink the cool-aid and follow what they (the politicians) say (and not what they do) Religions... well, same. And so all messages from advertisement, to movies, TV, narrative is about hijacking people's feelings and suppressing…

I don't disagree but I have to say this absolute reads like a voice-over from an Adam Curtis documentary.

I think part of it is a quote from Fight Club

Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?

#24

Post by TheGigaChad » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 2:32 PM UTC

nathias wrote: post #3

Ah yes, the modern rationalists, few things are as cringe as modern adaptation of classical intellectual currents. Like reddit atheism, it makes a great disservice to the concept from which they steal their name. They have no education beyond their narrow limits, no interest in what lies beyond their time or their common sense.

Idiot dumbass, get cancer and die squealing like a lab rat.

Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?

#25

Post by legrande » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 2:32 PM UTC

jjbinx007 wrote: post #5

legrande wrote: post #2

I try to avoid mind viruses , or ideas that can hijack your decisions and thought process and take over. Think of a mind virus as a sort of dangerous meme that underpins everything you do. This is why first principles and making decisions based on sound foundations is better, absent of some sort of virulent dogma.

Viruses. Virii isn't the plural of virus. There's a YouTube channel (1) called Street Epistemology which has a guy interview members of the public and ask them if they have a belief they hold to be true such as "the supernatural exists" or "climate change is real" or "x is better than y". He then asks them to estimate how certain they are that it's true. Then they talk. The interviewer asks a question and makes notes…

> Virii isn't the plural of virus.

Thanks for correcting me. I will refrain from ever using virii again!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plural_of_virus

Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?

#26

Post by lalaithion » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 2:33 PM UTC

btilly wrote: post #14

I maintain that it isn't just hard, it is computationally impossible. We should all know that given a belief about the world, and evidence, Bayes' Theorem describes how to update our beliefs. But what if we have a network of interrelated beliefs? That's called a Bayesian net, and it turns out that Bayes' Theorem also prescribes a unique answer. However, unfortunately, it turns out that working out that answer is NP-h…

That's why it's called "less wrong". The goal isn't to be perfect, the goal is to do better. To be less wrong.

Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?

#27

Post by achenatx » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 2:34 PM UTC

The ultimate issue is that underpinning every action is a value system. Value systems are opinions and are fundamentally not rational.

Virtually every political disagreement is based on values, though most of the time people dont recognize it.

Values determine priorities and priorities underpin action.

For example some people feel that liberty (e.g. choice) is more important than saving lives when it comes to vaccines.

Some people feel that economic efficiency is less important than reducing suffering.

Some people feel that the life of an unborn child is worth less than the ability to choose whether to have that child

Even in the article, is a stereo that sounds better actually better than a stereo that looks better? That is a value judgement and there is no right or wrong.

No one is actually wrong since everything is value judgements. Many people believe in universal view of ethics/morality. There is almost no universal set of ethics/morality if you look across space and time.

However some values allow a culture to out compete other cultures causing the "inferior" values to disappear. New mutations are constantly being created. Most are neutral and have no impact on societal survival. Some are negative and some are positive.

Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?

#28

Post by toshk » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 2:36 PM UTC

SMAAART wrote: post #11

Nobody wants to deal with rational people. Big business want people to buy things they don't need, with money they don't have to impress people they don't like Politicians want people who will drink the cool-aid and follow what they (the politicians) say (and not what they do) Religions... well, same. And so all messages from advertisement, to movies, TV, narrative is about hijacking people's feelings and suppressing…

When all experiences we have are based in meaning those emotional experiences in some sense might be more "real" then a logical thought.

Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?

#29

Post by johnwheeler » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

Perfect rationality is impossible because in order to make correct decisions you need all the facts and a rational actor would do nothing at all given that all the facts can’t be had. The best you can do is to be an odds maker;therefore, an odds maker would spend their time looking for as many of the lowest effort ventures with the highest chances of success and biggest payoffs relative to effort and chance. In their free time (time when no reasonable opportunities were present), they would learn as much as possible to increase decision making power thus odds of success.

Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?

#30

Post by throwaway9690 » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

I think part of the problem is that most people are conditioned into many beliefs from a young age

I know a guy who hates foo (using a place holder). In fact he's downright foophobic. He is pretty convinced he has a natural unbiased hate of foo and is being rational when he expresses it.

To me as an outsider it is pretty obvious that his hate of foo is the result of cultural conditioning. To him it is perfectly rational to hate foo and to me it is totally irrational, especially since he can't give any concrete reason for it.

So who is right and who is being rational?