I think two things are being conflated here into a 3rd position no one holds
-Some people don’t like the big R community very much.
-Some people don’t think improving the world’s small-r rationality/epistemics should be a leading EA cause area.
Are getting conflated into:
-People don’t think it’s important to try hard at being small-r rational.
I agree that some people might be running together the first two claims, and that is bad, since they are independent, and it could easily be high impact to work on improving collective epistemics in the outside world even if the big R rationalist community was bad in various ways. But holding the first two claims (which I think I do moderately) doesn’t imply the third. I think the rationalists are often not that rational in practice, and are too open to racism and sexim. And I also (weakly) think that we don’t currently know enough about “improving epistemics” for it to be a tractable cause area. But obviously I still want us to make decisions rationally, in the small-r sense internally. Who wouldn’t! Being against small-r rationality is like being against kindness or virtue; no one thinks of themselves as taking that stand.
I. - Some people don’t like the big R community very much.
AND
2a. - Some people don’t think improving the EA community small-r rationality/epistemics should be one of top ~3-5 EA priorities. OR 2b. - Some people do agree this is important, but don’t clearly see the extent to which the EA community imported healthy epistemic vigilance and norms from Rationalist or Rationality-adjacent circles
=>
- As a consequence, they are at risk of distancing from small r rationality as a collateral damage / by neglect
Also I think many people in the EA community don’t think it’s important to try hard at being small-r rational at the level of aliefs. No matter what is the actual situation revealed by actual decisions, I would expect the EA community to at least pay lip service to epistemics and reason, so I don’t think stated preferences are strong evidence.
“Being against small-r rationality is like being against kindness or virtue; no one thinks of themselves as taking that stand.” Yes I do agree almost no one thinks about themselves that way. I think it is maybe somewhat similar to “Being against effective charity”—I would be surprised if people though about themselves that way.
Eh, I agree with you that LW-style rationalists are far from sinless in this regard, but it’s hard to not notice that many people, including on EAF, seem to have a strong revealed preference for irrationality.
I’m not sure why; one guess I have is that people (subconsciously) correctly identify rational irrationality as the best strategy to come across as loyal to one’s tribe. I find this sad, but I don’t have a real answer here; the incentives are strong and point in the wrong direction.
In my ideal culture, everybody will be polite about it, but sloppy thinking will still be heavily censured, rather than rewarded.
(slightly feverish, apologies if I’m not making as much sense, ironically).
On LW, I thought comments here were very poor, with a few half-exceptions. It wasn’t even a controversial topic!
On EAF, I pragmatically am not that interested in either starting new fights, or relitigating past ones. I will say that making my comment here solely about kindness, rather than kindness and epistemics, was a tactical decision.
I think two things are being conflated here into a 3rd position no one holds
-Some people don’t like the big R community very much.
-Some people don’t think improving the world’s small-r rationality/epistemics should be a leading EA cause area.
Are getting conflated into:
-People don’t think it’s important to try hard at being small-r rational.
I agree that some people might be running together the first two claims, and that is bad, since they are independent, and it could easily be high impact to work on improving collective epistemics in the outside world even if the big R rationalist community was bad in various ways. But holding the first two claims (which I think I do moderately) doesn’t imply the third. I think the rationalists are often not that rational in practice, and are too open to racism and sexim. And I also (weakly) think that we don’t currently know enough about “improving epistemics” for it to be a tractable cause area. But obviously I still want us to make decisions rationally, in the small-r sense internally. Who wouldn’t! Being against small-r rationality is like being against kindness or virtue; no one thinks of themselves as taking that stand.
I don’t think so. I think in practice
I. - Some people don’t like the big R community very much.
AND
2a. - Some people don’t think improving the EA community small-r rationality/epistemics should be one of top ~3-5 EA priorities.
OR
2b. - Some people do agree this is important, but don’t clearly see the extent to which the EA community imported healthy epistemic vigilance and norms from Rationalist or Rationality-adjacent circles
=>
- As a consequence, they are at risk of distancing from small r rationality as a collateral damage / by neglect
Also I think many people in the EA community don’t think it’s important to try hard at being small-r rational at the level of aliefs. No matter what is the actual situation revealed by actual decisions, I would expect the EA community to at least pay lip service to epistemics and reason, so I don’t think stated preferences are strong evidence.
“Being against small-r rationality is like being against kindness or virtue; no one thinks of themselves as taking that stand.”
Yes I do agree almost no one thinks about themselves that way. I think it is maybe somewhat similar to “Being against effective charity”—I would be surprised if people though about themselves that way.
Eh, I agree with you that LW-style rationalists are far from sinless in this regard, but it’s hard to not notice that many people, including on EAF, seem to have a strong revealed preference for irrationality.
I’m not sure why; one guess I have is that people (subconsciously) correctly identify rational irrationality as the best strategy to come across as loyal to one’s tribe. I find this sad, but I don’t have a real answer here; the incentives are strong and point in the wrong direction.
In my ideal culture, everybody will be polite about it, but sloppy thinking will still be heavily censured, rather than rewarded.
(slightly feverish, apologies if I’m not making as much sense, ironically).
What instances do you have in mind by “strong revealed preference for irrationality”?
On LW, I thought comments here were very poor, with a few half-exceptions. It wasn’t even a controversial topic!
On EAF, I pragmatically am not that interested in either starting new fights, or relitigating past ones. I will say that making my comment here solely about kindness, rather than kindness and epistemics, was a tactical decision.