Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?
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Notes -
What are your 'load-bearing beliefs?' The ones that, if they were disproven (to your epistemic satisfaction) would actually 'collapse' your worldview and force a reckoning with your understanding of reality.
I'm definitively talking about the "is" side of the is/ought distinction. Not your moral beliefs or 'hopes' for how things will turn out.
And not focused on such dry, mostly undisputed facts like "the earth's gravity pulls things towards it center" or "the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell."
Ideally beliefs that you consistently use to make predictions about actual events, despite not having sincere certainty about their accuracy.
One that I've been leaning on a lot lately: "Intelligence tends to be positively (if imperfectly) correlated with wisdom."
This is probably the one thing preserving my general optimism for humanity's future.
There are definitely high-IQ sociopaths running about, but I strongly believe that the world would be in a much worse place if the smartest apes amongst us were not also generally aware of their own limitations and were trying to make good decisions that considered more than just short term interests.
I actually start thinking the opposite - there's a weak anti-correlation between high intelligence and wisdom at the top ranges. I observe too many obviously highly intellectually capable people falling victims to various mind viruses, fallacies and fads. It's like there's a car and a driver, and the car - the IQ power, what we call "intelligence" - could we awesome, but if the driver is not skilled and you put them into a race car, they'd likely hurt themselves pretty badly, and may not survive the experience even. And I am not sure what constitutes being a "good driver" yet, but I am pretty sure it has nothing to do with the car power. Of course, if the car is a child's pedal car (very low IQ) you'll never get anywhere far, regardless of driver skills. But if it's in a normal range, or especially - slightly above normal - something else comes into play.
Sounds great, until some apes try to build a future paradise and murder 20 millions of other apes in the process, because not being murdered is just a short-term interest that can be sacrificed for the greater good of the future.
Dang, good image!
Very true. There's more than just a mind and its computational power in a human being. Something like a soul, or experiencer, or at least some personality qualities that vary wildly between individuals.
I wonder how much of it is innate to the person and how much it's a thing that's taught. I expect it has something to do with self monitoring and meta-cognition. Having a second layer of consciousness that monitors the first one. A quality of mindfulness (which can be trained). Not assuming all ones own thoughts and feelings are "right". It may be related to conscientiousness too (but not in the blindly rule- or plan-following way). I dunno.
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