Posts

Rationality Quotes April - June 2017 2017-04-01T09:06:34.200Z
Rationality Quotes January - March 2017 2017-01-02T10:48:32.090Z
Rationality Quotes September–December 2016 2016-09-02T06:44:39.085Z
Rationality Quotes August 2016 2016-08-01T09:32:22.095Z
Rationality Quotes July 2016 2016-07-01T09:02:15.327Z
Rationality Quotes June 2016 2016-06-03T07:51:29.792Z
Rationality Quotes May 2016 2016-05-06T15:15:26.628Z
Rationality Quotes April 2016 2016-04-06T07:01:43.352Z
Rationality Quotes Thread August 2015 2015-08-03T09:50:08.880Z

Comments

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on on bacteria, on teeth · 2024-10-02T22:33:53.526Z · LW · GW

Those side effects don't seem so bad. I'm not planning to put it in my ear; I don't get any irritation or allergic reactions, and the way I'm using it (applying a toothpaste containing it around my implants after brushing my teeth, as prescribed by my dental hygienist) doesn't seem to discolor my teeth either. 4-chloroaniline and hexamethylenediamine do look scary though...

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on on bacteria, on teeth · 2024-10-02T08:25:43.392Z · LW · GW

What is so bad about chlorhexidine? 

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Is being a trans woman (or just low-T) +20 IQ? · 2024-04-25T06:51:59.700Z · LW · GW

LOL! I don't think women's clothing is less itchy (my husband's isn't any itchier than mine), but even if it were, that advantage would be totally negated by most women having to wear a bra.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Conspiracy Theorists Aren't Ignorant. They're Bad At Epistemology. · 2024-02-29T14:57:29.222Z · LW · GW

Yes, exactly. From a bit later in the article:

"The causes of this distrust are complex and diverse. They include psychological traits that predispose some people towards paranoid worldviews; institutional failures, such as telling noble lies to manage public behaviour and dismissing legitimate ideas as conspiracy theories; and feelings—often justified—of exclusion from positions of power and influence."

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Conspiracy Theorists Aren't Ignorant. They're Bad At Epistemology. · 2024-02-29T09:15:09.442Z · LW · GW

See also https://iai.tv/articles/misinformation-is-the-symptom-not-the-disease-daniel-walliams-auid-2690:
"Nevertheless, the model of misinformation as a societal disease often gets things backwards. In many cases, false or misleading information is better viewed as a symptom of societal pathologies such as institutional distrust, political sectarianism, and anti-establishment worldviews. When that is true, censorship and other interventions designed to debunk or prebunk misinformation are unlikely to be very effective and might even exacerbate the problems they aim to address.

To begin with, the central intuition driving the modern misinformation panic is that people—specifically other people—are gullible and hence easily infected by bad ideas. This intuition is wrong. A large body of scientific research demonstrates that people possess sophisticated cognitive mechanisms of epistemic vigilance with which they evaluate information.

If anything, these mechanisms make people pig-headed, not credulous, predisposing them to reject information at odds with their pre-existing beliefs. Undervaluing other people’s opinions, they cling to their own perspective on the world and often dismiss the claims advanced by others. Persuasion is therefore extremely difficult and even intense propaganda campaigns and advertising efforts routinely have minimal effects."

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Epistemic Hell · 2024-02-14T18:48:18.250Z · LW · GW

Huh, whatever it was, it appears to have been solved; the link works like it should now. I haven't changed anything on my end.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Epistemic Hell · 2024-02-10T16:23:02.731Z · LW · GW

Today when I allowed the site in the viruschecker, Firefox said:

>Secure Connection Failed

>An error occurred during a connection to www.secretorum.life. Peer received a valid certificate, but access was denied.

>Error code: SSL_ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED_ALERT

   >The page you are trying to view cannot be shown because the authenticity of the received data could not be verified.
   >Please contact the website owners to inform them of this problem.

and I could only choose Retry, which didn't work.

After telling the viruschecker to allow www.secretorum.life  too, I got the same message, but this time Firefox allowed me to go there anyway, and of course there doesn't look to be any problem. Maybe there is a wrong setting somewhere...

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Epistemic Hell · 2024-02-08T10:32:34.286Z · LW · GW

My viruschecker thinks Life on the Grid: Terra Incognita is dangerous, and says I shouldn't go there...

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on For fun: How long can you hold your breath? · 2023-12-08T16:05:32.414Z · LW · GW

62 seconds.

68-year-old woman
take a 45-60 min. walk every day
go to fitness bootcamp 2x/week

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Assume Bad Faith · 2023-08-28T15:17:01.257Z · LW · GW

Oh yes, of course. I was only talking about the people Stephen mentioned, "who have no care for the truth and will say whatever they think will make them look good in the short term or give them immediate pleasure".

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Assume Bad Faith · 2023-08-26T15:42:20.194Z · LW · GW

They're bullshitters. 
"Both in lying and in telling the truth people are guided by their beliefs concerning the way things are. These guide them as they endeavour either to describe the world correctly or to describe it deceitfully. For this reason, telling lies does not tend to unfit a person for telling the truth in the same way that bullshitting tends to. ...The bullshitter ignores these demands altogether. He does not reject the authority of the truth, as the liar does, and oppose himself to it. He pays no attention to it at all. By virtue of this, bullshit is a greater enemy of the truth than lies are."
Harry G. Frankfurt, On Bullshit

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Introducing bayescalc.io · 2023-07-08T15:49:28.777Z · LW · GW

Nitpick: in the help text, "effect your beliefs" should be "affect your beliefs".

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on My "2.9 trauma limit" · 2023-07-04T10:47:30.873Z · LW · GW

conscious

Typo, should be conscience

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Humanity and science are incompatible. · 2023-06-04T13:08:03.060Z · LW · GW

If knowledge can create problems, it is not through ignorance that we can solve them.
Isaac Asimov

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Being at peace with Doom · 2023-04-17T10:35:49.649Z · LW · GW

Heart shall be bolder, harder be purpose,
more proud the spirit as our power lessens!
Mind shall not falter nor mood waver,
though doom shall come and dark conquer.
J.R.R. Tolkien, The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm’s Son

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Meetup Tip: Nametags · 2023-03-11T12:38:52.523Z · LW · GW

Make sure the names are written in big, bold letters, so they can be read from normal talking distance. Give people a thick marker to write with if you have them write their own names.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on What fact that you know is true but most people aren't ready to accept it? · 2023-02-04T17:10:49.482Z · LW · GW

I'd love to know more about this.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Preventing atherosclerosis, the easiest way to improve your life expectancy? · 2022-12-04T12:57:42.755Z · LW · GW

Thank you!  I was already eating pretty healthy, but now I'm replacing milk yogurt with soy yogurt, and eating fewer eggs and more bread with nut butter. I already don't eat a lot of meat, but I'm also replacing meat with tempeh in one more meal.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Why is fiber good for you? · 2022-11-02T17:31:44.081Z · LW · GW

DF decreases estrogen (which could cause cancer)

There's your negative effect: DF may be partly responsible for my low sex drive.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Some thoughts on Animals · 2022-07-10T11:45:29.070Z · LW · GW

>The question is whether future humans will even bother trying to carry Earth animals with them or not?

Of course we will bring our pets! I don't know about other animals though. If it's up to me, mosquitoes will get left behind, for one.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on It’s Probably Not Lithium · 2022-06-29T11:44:25.129Z · LW · GW

This guy says it's fructose, plus salt and MSG. "Nature puts a “survival switch” in our bodies to protect us from starvation. Stuck in the “on” position, it’s the hidden source of weight gain, heart disease, and many other common health struggles. But you can turn it off." I think he's on to something; since I've been following his recommendations, I've been able to lose weight again ( ~9 kg since the end of April).

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Dagger of Detect Evil · 2022-06-21T15:19:20.248Z · LW · GW

Maybe you don't have to stab the entity to death?

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Before Colour TV, People Dreamed in Black and White · 2022-02-02T12:03:06.299Z · LW · GW

Same for me. I remember one dream from when I was little, before we even had a TV, let alone a color TV. It was in color.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Tough Choices and Disappointment · 2021-12-27T13:31:40.481Z · LW · GW

Small nitpick about English: it's "life expectancy", not "live expectancy". 

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Nonverbal thinkers: how do you experience your inner critic? · 2021-12-11T12:48:13.209Z · LW · GW

As I've gotten older, my inner voice has been getting ever quieter, and now I often go long stretches without it. Like you, I sometimes feel like my inner critic has been saying something nasty, but mostly the thing has just shut up, which is very nice! At the same time I've gotten over my depression (never officially diagnosed, but I'm pretty sure I had it). Coincidence? I think not, but I don't know which is cause and which effect, or just how it happened, so I don't have any advice.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Extrinsic and Intrinsic Moral Frameworks · 2021-12-11T11:44:55.066Z · LW · GW

What does SCP mean?

Comment by bbleeker on [deleted post] 2021-11-01T20:30:31.280Z

I guess the thing to do would be to correct yourself right away, apologize to the person you told the lie to and tell the truth. Of course that will be embarrassing, but if you let S1 get away with lying, it will get rewarded for doing it and it won't stop.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on A new option for building lumenators · 2021-07-17T20:32:35.668Z · LW · GW

Please don't 'twist some wires together', connect them with connector strips like these. Much safer!

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on How can there be a godless moral world ? · 2021-06-22T09:04:51.344Z · LW · GW

I understand why there is niceness. I don't understand why I should be nice if God doesn't exist.

Because being nice feels nice. Humans are a social species. We can't survive alone, and so we evolved gut feelings that make us behave nicely to each other (at least inside the in-group).

Comment by bbleeker on [deleted post] 2021-04-08T08:48:52.679Z

Many, I bet! Me, for one. I'm actually quite happy now, but if someone offered me the chance to live my life over the same way again, I'd refuse. And I haven't even had a bad life, objectively.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation · 2021-02-19T11:15:46.639Z · LW · GW

No, I have no idea about how/whether it's enforced.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation · 2021-02-17T12:06:11.031Z · LW · GW

The Netherlands allows dual nationality only for people from countries that don't allow one to give up their nationality. If your country allows you to give up your nationality, you have to do that in order to become Dutch.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on What are your greatest one-shot life improvements? · 2021-02-17T11:35:09.516Z · LW · GW

Yes, I think it was where he explained that you don't really feel better when you smoke. What happens is that a smoker feels worse in the times they don't smoke, and then a cigarette brings them up to normal again for a short while; so while you're smoking you feel as good as a non-smoker feels all the time. But I don't know if just reading that would have done the trick without the rest of the book.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on What are your greatest one-shot life improvements? · 2021-02-13T12:43:29.320Z · LW · GW

I'm actually not quite sure. It's not a whole program; you just read the book, and (if you're anything like me) you're sober, just like that. I'm not a 'recovering alcoholic' the way I see some people writing who have been sober for even longer than I have; I'm done with alcohol, for good, and I knew it right away. He basically talks about the negatives of drinking and the positives of sobriety, with stories and examples, in a way that just 'clicked' for me.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Book review: The Geography of Thought · 2021-02-10T13:55:01.580Z · LW · GW

I'm Dutch, and not into homesteading or anything like that at all, but I also chose the cow going with the grass. Maybe it's because I'm not a native speaker of English? Do you interpret 'goes with' as 'is more like'? I'd have thought it means 'belongs together'. (Of course the cow and the chicken also belong together, in the sense that both live on a farm, but 'one eats the other' seems like a more direct relationship.)

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Senior quote ideas · 2021-01-27T15:31:53.652Z · LW · GW

High intelligence has the same problem as four-wheel-drive. It lets you get stuck much farther away from help. –Karl Gallagher

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on How do you celebrate your birthday? · 2020-09-17T13:03:44.919Z · LW · GW

I'll probably just go out for dinner with my husband. Usually I have a party with friends and family as well, but this year that isn't a good idea. Just when I'm turning 65, too... :(

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Memory is not about the past · 2020-06-19T10:47:32.916Z · LW · GW

Thank you!

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Memory is not about the past · 2020-06-18T13:46:14.419Z · LW · GW

Very interesting! I'd like to read the rest, too.

Comment by bbleeker on [deleted post] 2020-06-02T11:03:31.549Z

I'm not sure that sites like that look that way because they just don't know any better. I think they may be signaling they're not an 'establishment' site, and so *increase* their trustworthiness in the eyes of their target audience.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on What are your greatest one-shot life improvements? · 2020-05-22T11:06:47.333Z · LW · GW

I took 10 lessons, and I think I could probably have done it with 8. I still feel myself sagging now and again, and then I have to correct myself (and then I wonder why I sagged to begin with, because the correct posture is actually more comfortable). I have also bought a new chair ( https://www.ikea.com/nl/nl/p/kullaberg-bureaustoel-zwart-90325518/, only mine has a different color) and removed the backrest. I have found that chairs with a backrest and armrests tempt you to lean on them, and then you can end up sitting in a wrong posture for a long time without noticing. Without them, I soon notice and can correct myself.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on What are your greatest one-shot life improvements? · 2020-05-22T10:57:46.847Z · LW · GW

Yes, and I had tried several times before, without success. The difference is that earlier I just wanted to stop smoking for health reasons, but I still loved smoking. After reading the book, I don't want to smoke because I just don't like it anymore.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on What are your greatest one-shot life improvements? · 2020-05-17T09:52:20.476Z · LW · GW

Taking Alexander technique classes improved my posture a lot, and cured the tendinitis I used to get in my shoulders.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on What are your greatest one-shot life improvements? · 2020-05-17T09:50:52.858Z · LW · GW

Reading https://www.amazon.com/Allen-Carrs-Easy-Control-Alcohol-ebook/dp/B07B7QRWTH enabled me to quit drinking alcohol very easily. It was almost like it just turned off my desire to drink for good. ~3.5 years alcohol-free now.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on What are your greatest one-shot life improvements? · 2020-05-17T09:47:12.713Z · LW · GW

Reading https://www.amazon.com/Allen-Carrs-Easy-Stop-Smoking-ebook/dp/B0051XSN50/ enabled me to stop smoking very easily, and I've not wanted a smoke in 25+ years now.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Resource on alcohol problems · 2020-02-28T12:18:52.512Z · LW · GW

I'm missing Allen Carr's book (https://www.amazon.com/Allen-Carrs-Easy-Control-Alcohol-ebook/dp/B07B7QRWTH ) in the list of books. I quit drinking after reading that book over 3 years ago, and it was almost like flipping a switch, so fast did it turn off my desire to drink.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on What spiritual experiences have you had? · 2019-12-27T19:35:42.666Z · LW · GW

Almost half a century ago, when I was 16 or 17 and still believed in God, I went to a synagogue with some people of my church for some kind of exchange thing. The service was quite boring though, as everything was in Hebrew and I didn't understand a thing. But there was nothing to be done except sitting still trying to be respectful. So I guess I fell into some kind of meditative state, and I don't remember anything about that, but just afterwards I felt that I had been in the presence of God, and a sense of great gratitude. I'm still surprised I didn't convert to Judaism on the spot; maybe I would have if I weren't so shy...

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on If giving unsolicited feedback was a social norm, what feedback would you often give? · 2019-12-04T15:15:49.926Z · LW · GW

OK, I'll go first. I'd correct people's grammar and spelling a lot, and I'd tell overweight people how to lose weight.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on "Mild Hallucination" Test · 2019-11-11T11:57:44.161Z · LW · GW

Oh wait, I misunderstood the afterimage thing. No, I usually don't see them while I'm looking at something, only when I close my eyes or look away. I do sometimes get the effect you describe, but not often. I tried to see the 'snow' again just now, but I didn't see any.

Comment by Sabiola (bbleeker) on Deleted · 2019-10-23T11:14:53.051Z · LW · GW

Carnivore diets