A cool superpower to have would be the ability to slow subjective time and get a lot of thinking done. In every superhero movie, no matter how fast the protagonists fly or how hard they punch, they always end up within one step of disaster because their planning skills are dogshit. The villain loses not … Continue reading Thinking Fast and Hard
Category: rationality
Monty Hall isn't just a curious probability puzzle. It's a widely applicable demonstration of Bayesian thinking and rationality.
Should we believe what is useful to believe over what it true? I attack this question from various angles: wrong "wrongness", murder-Gandhiism, the Gorilla Channel, and fake glasses.
Should I keep trying one diet after another or just accept my figure as it is? I let the voices in my head hash it out.
Should secular liberals try to get in the head of a conservative philosopher of religion? Yes, if it's all in the pursuit of truth.
Is rationality a religion? If so, it's a really crappy one.
For the hardest choices we make in life, our gut is not enough. We also need a chart with numbers in it.
What makes people who hold an extreme opinion think that they represent the majority?
"Of all the corrupters of moral sentiments, therefore, faction and fanaticism have always been by far the greatest." - Adam Smith
Today isn't strange, it's how the world is. It didn't become that way today, we just found out now. So let's deal with this.
Welcome to day 14 of Putanumonit's birthday week celebration! It's time to wrap up the year-in-review and get ready for a couple of serious writing projects. In Zero Agents and Plastic Men I tried to conjure up some new jargon, and it turned out kind of lame and confusing. My buddy Ryan and I came … Continue reading Year 1 Redux – Friends and Rationalists
When economics became impersonal, humanity rose from ragged tribes to a prosperous civilization. It's time for a similar revolution in our morals.
Can you judge what people believe in based on the tribes they belong to? What if they explicitly tell you? And what does this have to do with the fact that only 2% of blacks support Trump?
Can Putanumonit put a number on the divine itself?
In the 17th century, John Locke described an immutable law of nature regarding the prices of goods. So why do we keep raging against it in vain to this day?
Are you having trouble navigating a complex, mathematical universe using a squishy, easily fooled monkey brain? So are we! But we also have something that may help.
An evil spell is making everybody you know ignorant, hateful and irrational. Can you break it?
To welcome my wonderful fellow SlateStarCodexers and Redditors here's a brief artistic intermission. New readers: did you know this blog buys you drinks? Usual geekery resumes Monday. The Other Path When you ask for truth and are offered illusion, When senses deceive you and reasoning lies I'll show you the path through the murky confusion, Just follow and close your … Continue reading The Other Path
This blog lives by a two-part creed: You can put a number on anything if you try hard enough (number quality not guaranteed, see store for details). Once you put a number on something, you improve your understanding and decision making (even if the number isn't of prime quality). At the core of this belief is the idea that … Continue reading We Hold These Truths
