It's going against entropy. There are few ways to be rational, and infinitely many ways to irrational.
Why is it so hard to be rational?
81–90 of 309 posts
Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
There was no new evidence. I'm not sure we have even learned anything regarding the efficacy of masks trough the pandemic. All what we know was already known prior of it.
'We' as the scientific community may not have, but 'we' the unwashed public learned much.
Being rational doesn't prevent you to be wrong. If your assumption is that the government tells the truth and you conclude that mask don't work. Then you have reasoned rationally.
But if you dont trust the governement, and for this specific case you followed them, then this is not rational.
Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?
#83Nobody 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 think this is connected to another reason why so many seem to reject "rationality" today.
They are rejecting the authorities that in the past have tried to associate themselves with "rationality". The political think tanks. The seminaries. The universities. Government agencies. Capitalist CEOs following the "invisible hand" of the market.
All of these so-called elites have biases and agendas, so of course none of them should be accepted at face value.
I think what's missed, is rationality is not about trusting people and organizations, but about trusting a process. Trusting debates over lectures. Trusting well designed studies over trusting scientists. Trusting free speech and examining a broad range of ideas over speech codes and censorship. Trusting empirical observation over ideological purity.
This is the value system of the so called "classical liberals", and they are an ever more lonely and isolated group. There is a growing embrace for authoritarianism and defense of tribal identity on both the "left" and the "right" taking its place.
Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?
#84> In a recent interview, Cowen—a superhuman reader whose blog, Marginal Revolution, is a daily destination for info-hungry rationalists—told Ezra Klein that the rationality movement has adopted an “extremely culturally specific way of viewing the world.” It’s the culture, more or less, of winning arguments in Web forums. This matches my observations, too. > Cowen suggested that to understand reality you must not just…
I agree that a culture of “winning arguments in Web forums” often has bias in of itself that requires going out and diversifying experiences. But I don’t think it will always require travel. Volunteering at a soup kitchen, fostering a rescue animal, organizing a community event, and talking to the elderly in care facilities will all expose you to experiences outside of the internet and don’t require travel.
Sure, those are good for learning more about your own community.
But you’re not going to learn the same things you would from travel. For example, you’re not likely to learn another language if everyone you talk to speaks English. Similarly for learning about other cultures that aren’t near you.
But I’m not sure how much brief travel to see the tourist sites helps, and hanging out with expats might not help so much.
Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?
#85Because we didn't evolve to be rational. We evolved to reproduce as often as possible, not to thing as precises as possible. We're not thinking machines, we're reproduction machines.
That we are able to think somewhat rational-ish is only because we adapted by adopting extensive modeling simulations. The fundamental function of these simulations is to simulate other beings, primarily human. And in that our brainware is lazy as hell, because - to quote evolution; why do perfect, when you can do good enough? Saves a ton of energy.
The wetware we employ was never expected to rationally solve differential equations or do proper statistical analysis. At best it was expected to guess the parabola of a thrown stone or spear, or empate the best way to mate without facing repercussions from the tribe.
So, really. It's not that thinking is hard. It's just that we're just not equipped to do it.
Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
A rationalist would recognize that we update our beliefs as new evidence is available and not attack people for having erroneous beliefs before that evidence was available. The "masks don't work" advice was active for a short time in March 2020 and almost immediately dumped. They thought at the time that only n95 masks would be good enough, these masks were in short supply and health care workers needed them, this wa…
There was no new evidence. I'm not sure we have even learned anything regarding the efficacy of masks trough the pandemic. All what we know was already known prior of it.
First, there is active research and we demonstrably have learned something. See https://aricjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s1375..., https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-72798-7, and https://www.pnas.org/content/118/4/e2014564118 for several examples.
Second, your simplistic analysis demonstrated that you, personally, are ignorant of the real tradeoffs involved in whether masks work.
Wearing a mask reduces how much virus leaves your mouth. But when you breathe out, most of the virus is in larger droplets that quickly hit the ground. However breathing out through a mask creates perfect conditions to create an aerosol, which can allow more of the virus to stay in the air for an indefinite period of time. So there is a tradeoff, and there were reasons to question whether cloth masks were better than simple social distancing.
It turns out that what matters most is not that you get exposed, but rather the initial viral load that you get. You see, the virus will go on an exponential growth until the relatively fixed time it takes the immune system to figure things out and start shutting it down. If the virus gets a solid head start, the odds of serious illness go up. Therefore the lingering aerosol from a mask is (except if it accumulates in poorly ventilated indoor spaces) of less concern than an unmasked person talking directly to you.
So the result is that masks work. Even crappy cloth masks work.
Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?
#87Isn't the answer obvious? Because doing otherwise involves a lot more work, and people choose the easier path.
To quote evolution; why go for perfect when you can go for good enough?
Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
Correct. Rationality is Bounded. That fact won a Nobel Prize - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbert_A._Simon The recommendation of the theory is if you cant be rational about a specific problem pick another problem, preferably a simpler problem. Unfortunately lots of chimps in the troupe are incapable of doing that and therefore we shall always have drama.
> Correct. Rationality is Bounded. That fact won a Nobel Prize. It's a model not a fact. As a model, it can't really be correct only more or less accurate.
any model better than naive intuition is better imo
Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?
#89Isn't the answer obvious? Because doing otherwise involves a lot more work, and people choose the easier path.
Sometimes I go into deep-dives to try to find some truth to a contentious issue. I think it’s important not to take the easy path; certainly not if you want a well-learned opinion. Any sense of superiority this gives me is dashed when I realize:
1) It’s not reasonable to expect someone to dig so deeply, and there isn’t enough time to do it for every issue.
2) Someone, somewhere, has done an even deeper dive into the same issue. From their perspective, I’m the one that hasn’t done my research. When it’s “enough” is a fuzzy line.
Re: Why is it so hard to be rational?
#90USA members need the Fact-Check algorithm integrated into permanent surgically installed face masks.