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Comment by shaesays on Absolute denial for atheists · 2009-07-17T04:01:04.143Z · LW · GW

How about this:

When I was a little kid, too young to know about or process the idea that alcohol gets you high, my mom and dad drank beer. Cheap beer no less. I asked for a taste and they gave me one, thinking I wouldn't like it. I liked it.

I remember it tasted interesting, and dazzling, like soda.

Comment by shaesays on Avoiding Failure: Fallacy Finding · 2009-07-16T01:56:49.836Z · LW · GW

Sorry to comment on this so late, but I was very interested in the topic and have been tied up working late all week where I'm not able to stream videos.

It would be cool if lots of people made videos like these, maybe giving them a common prefix (Fallacy Finding - The South Carolina Democratic Primary Debate - Part 1), so that a search could be done to find all videos of a similar nature. I think a little community could build up around the idea. I'd certainly be interested in making and/or watching them.

Comment by shaesays on Sunk Cost Fallacy · 2009-04-15T18:40:13.765Z · LW · GW

I became aware of the sunk-cost fallacy one day when I bought a giant diet coke that tasted funny.

My first impulse was to drink it because I had paid for it, and because it was huge, and because it seemed a shame to waste it. I think I was too far away from the fast food place to complain.

Then I realized that I wasn't particularly thirsty (I'd been interested in the taste and had eaten the food I wanted to drink it with), it had no nutritional value, and I didn't get it for the caffiene boost. There was absolutely no reason to drink it, so I didn't. And felt pretty proud of myself for noticing how stupid it would have been to have drunk it.