Group rationality diary, 12/25/12

I think I'm going to stop having opinions.

Well, let me explain what I mean by that; I'm using the word opinion in an idiosyncratic sense which I hope will be made clear by the following. Of course it makes sense to have beliefs about the world (let's say, e.g., "If the legislature passes the Foobar Act, then it will reduce the budget deficit and save thousands of quality-adjusted life-years"), and it makes sense to have preference orderings over states of the world (e.g., "I would prefer to live in worlds with smaller budget deficits and people living longer, healthier lives"). But the opinionated state of mind which passionately insists, "The legislature should pass the Foobar Act!" in the absence of any actual planning to bring about that outcome, is a confusion, a waste of cognition (insofar as we construe the function of thought as to select actions). The legislature has no reason to know that I exist, so why bother getting so upset about whatever they're going to do anyway, with or without my approval? Insofar as someone cares what I think, I'm happy to tell them what's on my mind, or even to argue (in the sense of offering arguments, not in the sense of trying to win). But, you know, to a first approximation, no one cares what I think. They really don't. Why pretend otherwise?

Let me preempt some potential misunderstandings. I'm not simply reiterating that politics is the mindkiller; I think the argument carries even if an ideal reasoner would agree that the Foobar Act really would be a good thing if passed. And I'm not saying that one should never participate in any collective project in which one person's effort is unlikely to make a critical difference; there are certainly reasons why someone might want to do that (e.g., timeless-decision-theoretic "I should decide as if deciding for all instances of this decision algorithm" reasoning might apply, or a small probability of a large impact might be worth it in expectation, &c.). But notice these possible reasons for participating in a collective project are not most people's actual reasons for having opinions about things they're not going to affect.

Of course, integrating this insight into my thoughts will make it even harder than it already is for me to communicate with people who haven't spent the last five years obsessing about the nature of rationality ... but the other thing I need to stop doing is expecting to be able to communicate with arbitrary people on arbitrary topics.

For the past five years, I've spent a lot of time being really upset and angry and offended and mindkilled that most people in society seem to systematically conflate schooling (enrolling in courses and obeying the commands issued by the designated teacher) and that which I would call education (learning important things by whatever means). I still judge this to be a worthy sentiment---I really would prefer to live in a world with more authenticity, and existing schools still seem really terrible in contrast to what people can do for themselves when they're really motivated---but it's only now that I'm starting to see (really see, not just dutifully mouth the words) that my behavior of being outraged all the time wasn't actually contributing to that goal, that visibly resenting the fact that other people don't care about the things that I care about is pointless: it doesn't help them, and it doesn't help me. Better that I should just learn to lie (as part of the general trend where, surprisingly, I become a better person as I become less principled), or at least, to not wear my heart on my sleeve all the damned time.

I discovered a method to find if you are getting enough sleep, one that seems so trivial in hindsight it's a wonder how I never thought about it or encountered it before.

Basically, if your alarm clock wakes you up, you are sleep deprived.

P.S. Oh, and I'm new here, so hello everybody.

I've started a 'don't break the chain' style of habit formation for 3 habits I'm trying to work on - taking various supplerments every morning rather than haphazardly whenever I remember, exercising, and going outside every day. A tick in the relevant box indicates that I did the task, a blank indicates not doing the task, a line indicates I did the bare minimum that could technically qualify as doing the task (eg. if I forgot to exercise and so spent 5 minutes in bed doing ankle strengthening exercises before going to sleep, I haven't really exercised in the meaning I originally intended but it's better than nothing). So far I've noticed that it makes me a lot more conscious both of whether I've done the tasks but also how I feel about the task. For example, I'm considering removing or modifying 'go outside' because it turns out that I don't really care very much about whether I get it done or not, whereas with the other two I get warm fuzzies from ticking the boxes.

My mom wanted to run a small Christmas errand, but didn't want to even turn onto the relevant road, since it was likely to be really crowded, and she hates traffic. So I recommended we precommit to a time limit on the errand, after which we would bail out of the road and the task, even if we were getting close, so she had a guarantee the suffering would be limited. That was enough to head out, and it turned out there was no traffic at all.

Someone once mentioned at a LW meetup that he had stopped hiccups by physically paying his SO one dollar each time he hiccuped, as a disincentive. The other day, I may have successfully hacked this to only imagine myself giving away money to nobody in particular; the hiccups stopped after only two instances. I'll have to try this some more to see if it works consistently...

Despite having previously thought that (given total time spent) I should try optimizing toothbrushing, and even flossing specifically, it's only today that the thought occurred to me that I spend way too much time and mental energy trying to floss in a way that conserves floss, compared to a brief search online to find cheap floss that I don't mind wasting.

My dryer has three settings: more dry, less dry, and optimum dry. I can't...I can't bring myself to use any setting but 'optimum'.

I'm a relatively new LWer, so still working on the basics. Mostly, I keep catching myself rationalising impulsive decisions. It's startling just how frequently I do this.

This morning I decided to go buy new hiking boots, changing my mind from doing it in the afternoon after I'd worked on an overdue essay. Having made my decision, I justified it saying that it was an important purchase to get right and I should do it while I'm freshest - this thought occurring after the decision was made. I hardly need spell out what the true motivation was.

Well, it's one thing to catch myself rationalising and acknowledge a problem, but it's a harder step to honestly reevaluate the options and choose rationally. That's what I need to work on now. Tsuyoku Naritai.

For the past few weeks I've been doing at least 15 minutes a day of some sort of exercise, and I've only missed a few days.

"Some sort of exercise" means tai chi, qi gong and/or the five tibetans (the most energetic of the bunch-- it's a cross between yoga and calisthenics).

A couple of times I've wanted a second 15 minutes later in the day, and I've done it.

I think part of why this is working is that it's more than I've been doing, but less than I fantasize that I ought to do.