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The past is not true

sive.rs

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Re: The past is not true

#91

Post by javert »

anbende wrote: post #78
PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not sure that differentiating between "that which I physically sensed with my own body" and "information I received from others" leads to particularly good place. Yes, we should probably put a little more weight on things we experienced, but even they are subject to massive differences of interpretation based on prior experience and knowledge. Humanity has made enormous strides by being able to believe in inform…

I agree with this point. I hadn't meant to suggest that we should discard information received from others. But I think it would be crazy to not to differentiate between immediate experience and what we've been told. Not even because immediate experience is always more accurate. Sometimes it is NOT, but it's a different source of information subject to different problems. Often more trustworthy but not always, though…

I am impressed with the clarity of your thinking on this. Since you value epistemological hygiene, you might like Ayn Rand's work in metaphysics and epistemology.

Re: The past is not true

#92

Post by mitchdoogle »

firebirdn99 wrote: post #81
abirch wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The past also suffers from survivorship bias. Although there's a 1 in 8 chance of flipping 3 consecutive heads, in the future after flipping 3 consecutive heads you forget about the other possibilities. E.g., there was a 1 in 8 chance that Hitler, Stalin, and Mao could have all been born women before they were conceived.

> Although there's a 1 in 8 chance of flipping 3 consecutive heads, in the future after flipping 3 consecutive heads you forget about the other possibilities. In other contexts, also known as the gambler's fallacy if I recall.

If you are specifically looking for a result of 3 coin flips, then it's 1 in 8 chance of getting 3 of the same. The gambler's fallacy is seeing 2 coin flips come up heads and thinking there's only a 1 in 8 chance that the last one will come up heads.

Re: The past is not true

#93

Post by zzzeek »

hef19898 wrote: post #41
zzzeek wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does feel a little made up right ? Could be true. Could be maybe a little bit dramatized. Derek Sivers seems to have so many stories like this

Then he should be more careful in public spaces and around other people, shouldn't he? Assuming it is true, that is, otherwise he should switch to fiction books.

careful about what, that he makes shit up? I think you'd be surprised how many people operate at that level by default.

Re: The past is not true

#94

Post by bluetomcat »

stared wrote: post #72

There is a common conception that we don't know the future, but we know the past. In our heads, we have models of the past and models of the future. Sure, there is an asymmetry between knowing the past and the future - due to thermodynamics. Still, in both cases, it is good to think of these as probabilistic models, far from any certainty.

We have partial impressions of the past. We have seen, felt, thought something at various points in time and then we construct a sequential story of what happened, often employing abstract cause-effect reasoning. Two different observers might come up with different stories. To reach a consensus, they have to exchange their points of view.

Once all the observers forget their story or they disappear, the past "fact" disappears from collective memory, unless that story was passed to newer generations by speech, writing, etc.

Re: The past is not true

#95

Post by signa11 »

check out the movie ‘rashomon’ by kurosawa, one incident recalled from different folks and it is all colored by their own perspective, Truth, is hard to glean.

Re: The past is not true

#96

Post by tppiotrowski »

I had this moment during the Covid pandemic. I read a lot of history and I saw pictures of the Spanish influenza and was told it killed more people than WW1. Somehow I pictured the world in the late 1910s with everyone sick and in hospital but now I think it was more like Covid. People got sick and died but life went on and some people were completely unaffected. The world doesn't grind to a halt for world wars and pandemics. People still have kids and get married and start businesses and hike and play the guitar, etc. History is just what we decide to deem important or not.

Re: The past is not true

#97

Post by simonh »

mmusson wrote: post #51
anbende wrote: post #40

I think the article is sending a pretty problematic overall message. The underlying story is somewhat interesting. The author went through life with a lot of unnecessary guilt and suffering because he was carrying around a false narrative, and it is true that false narratives happen. But the larger conclusion he tries to draw from it seems really problematic: >History is not true. You can change history. The actual f…

I think the point is that interpretation is all we really have. We believe that memories are these absolute things, but rigorous studies show that no human being remembers things perfectly, even when they believe they do. For many years as a kid, I knew Santa Claus was real because I had seen him come to my house. My faith was unshakable, because I had observed it with my own eyes. Years later, I found out that on Ch…

I did that once. After I snuck back into the house I heard our 3 year old say to my wife "Mummy, did you know that Santa Clause looks like my Daddy?"

Re: The past is not true

#98

Post by thanksbucko »

anbende wrote: post #84
thenerdhead wrote: post #44

> The actual factual events are such a small part of the story. Everything else is interpretation. This is why it is important to forgive your parents. They interpret events differently and it usually isn’t until you become a parent yourself do you develop enough empathy to see how those interpretations came to be.

Oof, as a psychologist that deals a lot with people who were abused and mistreated, this is a pretty big generalization. Yes, as we age we come to see things from a more experienced perspective and the perspectives of the adults we grew up with and change, but going all the way to "that is why it is important to forgive your parents" is a big big step. It is typically a good idea to try to get to forgiveness, you're…

You may have a skewed view of the frequency of that level of abuse, due to the (very important) work you do. When it comes to humans there are exceptions to every rule, but not every single exception needs be called out. Not everything is “problematic” nor worth an “oof”.

Re: The past is not true

#99

Post by ChrisSD »

yakcyll wrote: post #89
qwnp wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there is an asymmetry between knowing the past and the future - due to thermodynamics Would you please elaborate on this?

I think this may refer to the second law of thermodynamics - entropy cannot decrease over time in an isolated system. One could argue the entire universe is one.

But our local "system" has a gigantic miasma of incandescent plasma on our doorstep. The Earth itself should not need to worry about entropy for a long while yet...
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