Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why are there so many rationalist cults?

asteriskmag.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

381–390 of 947 posts

Re: Why are there so many rationalist cults?

#381

Post by mikestew »

jacquesm wrote: post #249
prepend wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People reading the book and being into it and telling other people. It’s also a hard book to read so it may be smart kids trying to signal being smart.

The only thing that makes it hard to read is the incessant soap-boxing by random characters. I have a rule that if I start a book I finish it but that one had me tempted.

I’m convinced that even Rand’s editor didn’t finish the book. That is why Galt’s soliloquy is ninety friggin’ pages long. (When in reality, three minutes in and people would be unplugging their radios.)

Re: Why are there so many rationalist cults?

#382

Post by ratelimitsteve »

JohnMakin wrote: post #85

One of a few issues I have with groups like these, is that they often confidently and aggressively spew a set of beliefs that on their face logically follow from one another, until you realize they are built on a set of axioms that are either entirely untested or outright nonsense. This is common everywhere, but I feel especially pronounced in communities like this. It also involves quite a bit of navel gazing that m…

Are you familiar with ship of theseus as an arugmentation fallacy? Innuendo Studios did a great video on it and I think that a lot of what you're talking about breaks down to this. Tldr - it's a fallacy of substitution, small details of an argument get replaced by things that are (or feel like) logical equivalents until you end up saying something entirely different but are arguing as though you said the original thing. In this video the example is "senator doxxes a political opponent" but on looking "senator" turns out to mean "a contractor working for the senator" and "doxxes a political opponent" turns out to mean "liked a tweet that had that opponent's name in it in a way that could draw attention to it".

Each change is arguably equivalent and it seems logical that if x = y then you could put y anywhere you have x, but after all of the changes are applied the argument that emerges is definitely different from the one before all the substitutions are made. It feels like communities that pride themselves on being extra rational seem subject to this because it has all the trappings of rationalism but enables squishy, feely arguments

Re: Why are there so many rationalist cults?

#383

Post by lazide »

ants_everywhere wrote: post #208
geoffeg wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just a note that the Heaven's Gate website is still up. It's a wonderful snapshot of 90s web design. https://www.heavensgate.com/

what a wild set of SEO keywords > Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestri…

It’s the aliens to yoga ratio that really gets me. Yogis got really shortchanged here.

Re: Why are there so many rationalist cults?

#385

Post by to11mtm »

dan_quixote wrote: post #339
jl6 wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think it’s just (or even particularly) bad axioms, I think it’s that people tend to build up “logical” conclusions where they think each step is a watertight necessity that follows inevitably from its antecedents, but actually each step is a little bit leaky, leading to runaway growth in false confidence. Not that non-rationalists are any better at reasoning, but non-rationalists do at least benefit from some…

As a former mechanical engineer, I visualize this phenomenon like a "tolerance stackup". Effectively meaning that for each part you add to the chain, you accumulate error. If you're not damn careful, your assembly of parts (or conclusions) will fail to measure up to expectations.

I like this analogy.

I think of a bike's shifting systems; better shifters, better housings, better derailleur, or better chainrings/cogs can each 'improve' things.

I suppose where that becomes relevant to here, is that you can have very fancy parts on various ends but if there's a piece in the middle that's wrong you're still gonna get shit results.

Re: Why are there so many rationalist cults?

#386

Post by mikestew »

notahacker wrote: post #351
meheleventyone wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s hard to read because it’s tedious not because you need to be smart though.

tbf you have to have read it to know that! I can't help but think it's probably the "favourite book" of a lot of people who haven't finished it though, possibly to a greater extent than any other secular tome (at least LOTR's lightweight fans watched the movies!). I mean, if you've only read the blurb on the back it's the perfect book to signal your belief in free markets, conservative values and the American Dream:…

at least LOTR's lightweight fans watched the movies!

Oh, there’s movies for lazy Rand fans, too.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0480239/

More of a Fountainhead fan, are you? Do ya like Gary Cooper and Patricia Neal?

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0041386/?ref_=ext_shr_lnk

Re: Why are there so many rationalist cults?

#387

Post by Jtsummers »

> Many of them also expect that, without heroic effort, AGI development will lead to human extinction.

> These beliefs can make it difficult to care about much of anything else: what good is it to be a nurse or a notary or a novelist, if humanity is about to go extinct?

Replace AGI causing extinction with the Rapture and you get a lot of US Christian fundamentalists. They often reject addressing problems in the environment, economy, society, etc. because the Rapture will happen any moment now. Some people just end up stuck in a belief about something catastrophic (in the case of the Rapture, catastrophic for those left behind but not those raptured) and they can't get it out of their head. For individuals who've dealt with anxiety disorder, catastrophizing is something you learn to deal with (and hopefully stop doing), but these folks find a community that reinforces the belief about the pending catastrophe(s) and so they never get out of the doom loop.

Re: Why are there so many rationalist cults?

#388

Post by om8 »

BeFlatXIII wrote: post #259
jl6 wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think it’s just (or even particularly) bad axioms, I think it’s that people tend to build up “logical” conclusions where they think each step is a watertight necessity that follows inevitably from its antecedents, but actually each step is a little bit leaky, leading to runaway growth in false confidence. Not that non-rationalists are any better at reasoning, but non-rationalists do at least benefit from some…

> Not that non-rationalists are any better at reasoning, but non-rationalists do at least benefit from some intellectual humility. Non-rationalists are forced to use their physical senses more often because they can't follow the chain of logic as far. This is to their advantage. Empiricism > rationalism.

Good rationalism includes empiricism though

Re: Why are there so many rationalist cults?

#389

Post by human_person »

MajimasEyepatch wrote: post #271
jl6 wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think it’s just (or even particularly) bad axioms, I think it’s that people tend to build up “logical” conclusions where they think each step is a watertight necessity that follows inevitably from its antecedents, but actually each step is a little bit leaky, leading to runaway growth in false confidence. Not that non-rationalists are any better at reasoning, but non-rationalists do at least benefit from some…

I feel this way about some of the more extreme effective altruists. There is no room for uncertainty or recognition of the way that errors compound. - "We should focus our charitable endeavors on the problems that are most impactful, like eradicating preventable diseases in poor countries." Cool, I'm on board. - "I should do the job that makes the absolute most amount of money possible, like starting a crypto exchang…

"I should do the job that makes the absolute most amount of money possible, like starting a crypto exchange, so that I can use my vast wealth in the most effective way."

Has always really bothered me because it assumes that there are no negative impacts of the work you did to get the money. If you do a million dollars worth of damage to the world and earn 100k (or a billion dollars worth of damage to earn a million dollars), even if you spend all of the money you earned on making the world a better place, you arent even going to fix 10% of the damage you caused (and thats ignoring the fact that its usually easier/cheaper to break things than to fix them).

Re: Why are there so many rationalist cults?

#390

Post by GeoAtreides »

JohnMakin wrote: post #85

One of a few issues I have with groups like these, is that they often confidently and aggressively spew a set of beliefs that on their face logically follow from one another, until you realize they are built on a set of axioms that are either entirely untested or outright nonsense. This is common everywhere, but I feel especially pronounced in communities like this. It also involves quite a bit of navel gazing that m…

Epistemological skepticism sure is a belief. A strong belief on your side?

I am profoundly sure, I am certain I exist and that a reality outside myself exists. Worse, I strongly believe knowing this external reality is possible, desirable and accurate.

How suspicious does that make me?

Post reply on HN