Assume a person who believes that testable ideas are the most interesting ones. Or (weaker form) that stuff that can be laid down in a very neat and logical way or is testable has a strong superiority.
He will devote all his time etc. to this kind of questions, thereby creating a whole body of knowledge that has been selected not on the basis of importance, utility, reality & truth, but on the basis of what meets the technical criteria.
This may create a very distorted world view. and a off the mark body of knowledge.
Even more extreme oddities will emerge in the dynamics of knowledge and learning. When there is more literature and more people talking about a minor question that happened to fit the "science" criteria. Now other people will develop their life, perception and research in this direction, deviating even more form the more relevant issues that do not fit into technical handling.
These dynamics may create a very biased world view. As examplified elsewhere, small innitial biases may contribute to great deviation in the end.
A great example can be seen with happiness research. Put aside what is "correct" for happiness, it seems plausible that even just because some happiness measures are more "neat" and handy, they become "the currency of trade" in the research community.
AFTER they have become "the currency" of the research, they have several advantages including "framing" (i.e. they are written on the wall of the mind all the time as happiness strengthning their imagined relavance). The other advantage of is that even if you disagree with the idea, you will use it just because there is so much research based on that.
On balance, we have many reasons to value technically collected research. We should as well remember that our goal is not being technically correct. We want certain things from life, and should remember that technical science and logic can handle only part of reality.
Reality is there as it is. It does not care what we want it to be. Sometimes, reality even fights back to those trying to ignore it.
Thursday, August 14, 2008
On Balance - Importance of an encompassing opinion
Understanding things on balane. Not just narrow opinions!
It is relatively easy to say a highly confined statement (it is cheaper to drive this way).Harder when more considerations come into play (include cost of driving. time. emotional effects. etc.)
Because it is hard to have clear cut evidence about the "on balance" issues, it is easy to build contradicting opinions + finding evidence upon request to satisfy whatever needs/interests you have.
The opinion that is general_all_summed_in is what counts in real life.Alas, it is harder. Hard to feel sure about. Complex.
Reality is that. Reality never apologizes and leaves no prisoners. Admit it, or escape into the territory of delusion. It dreams much better out there......
See my piece above on "the academic bias", regarding how being technically right absolutely can drive your attention to narrow/irelevant places.
It is relatively easy to say a highly confined statement (it is cheaper to drive this way).Harder when more considerations come into play (include cost of driving. time. emotional effects. etc.)
Because it is hard to have clear cut evidence about the "on balance" issues, it is easy to build contradicting opinions + finding evidence upon request to satisfy whatever needs/interests you have.
The opinion that is general_all_summed_in is what counts in real life.Alas, it is harder. Hard to feel sure about. Complex.
Reality is that. Reality never apologizes and leaves no prisoners. Admit it, or escape into the territory of delusion. It dreams much better out there......
See my piece above on "the academic bias", regarding how being technically right absolutely can drive your attention to narrow/irelevant places.
I bought a newspaper
because I got seduced at the grocery store.
On the way, I realized what a mistake it was. I threw it to the garbage before entering my house. It is better to lose the buck I already paid for the paper, than lose a chunk of brain and some time.
Unhealthy food, should be thrown away as soon as you realize that it is negative to eat it. "Do not waste it" is irrational and unethical. The Talmud recognized it two millenia ago, when saying that the prohibition of wasting stuff, is irelevant when the body is the counter party. "The waste of the body is more important".
There has been times when it was crucial to keep food. Nowadays our trouble is the opposite and attitudes should be adjusted accordingly.
On the way, I realized what a mistake it was. I threw it to the garbage before entering my house. It is better to lose the buck I already paid for the paper, than lose a chunk of brain and some time.
Unhealthy food, should be thrown away as soon as you realize that it is negative to eat it. "Do not waste it" is irrational and unethical. The Talmud recognized it two millenia ago, when saying that the prohibition of wasting stuff, is irelevant when the body is the counter party. "The waste of the body is more important".
There has been times when it was crucial to keep food. Nowadays our trouble is the opposite and attitudes should be adjusted accordingly.
Friday, July 25, 2008
The Metaphor of Mean-Variance
Sitting on the beach with a friend, we discussed the eternal topic of how much beauty one should look for. It is known that for the same "price" you will get either more beautiful and less smart and vice versa. Those with beauty and wits, will look for a higher quality lad than you.
Friend says that everyone looks for different kinds of beauty.
But there is a common element!
There is no contradiction. If you ask different people to rate beauty, you will find some correlation between them.
Common element + individual/deviant element.
Mean-variance is very relevant to every knowledge. All we know is partial, and depends on conditions (the correlation between the beauty in my eyes an African man is lower than between me and other Israelis, I guess. But there also there is a strong correlation! again. three quantities: common to all, more common for Israelis alone, and variable). It can go on...
Intuition can be true. However, without thinking it out, we suspect it a little. Its reliability is probabilistic (any knowledge is probabilistic. Anyone not understanding it should see a doctor). On average ("mean") it has certain chance to be right, but a good probability to be a mistake = unknown
Many controversies come about because of not understanding. Evidence to an effect does not say it is exclusive, and the same for counter examples. Many counter examples disprove just the generality of the rule, there may still be a partial generality (sometimes a generality is dependent on various conditions and other problems. Long story).
The mind does not like half truths, continuous gradients of stuff, etc.
Baumeister (the cultural animal) explains: Most decisions and actions in life are discreet. You either order the cake or not. tell the joke or.... tell first three words and see reactions.... (this is the continuous way, but most do not use it). Our mind May have a adapted to this reality.
Simplification of information is another reason. I surmise that both explanations are right.
PS. To make Nassim Taleb happy, I state that variance can be a crazy distribution/fractal/unknown/jumpy or whatever. In another sense, the idea of mean and variance above, reflects the idea of commonalities between things, while there are differences and possibly big ones. Sorry reader. It is not me complicating matters. It is reality that is opaque making our minds dizzy.
Friend says that everyone looks for different kinds of beauty.
But there is a common element!
There is no contradiction. If you ask different people to rate beauty, you will find some correlation between them.
Common element + individual/deviant element.
Mean-variance is very relevant to every knowledge. All we know is partial, and depends on conditions (the correlation between the beauty in my eyes an African man is lower than between me and other Israelis, I guess. But there also there is a strong correlation! again. three quantities: common to all, more common for Israelis alone, and variable). It can go on...
Intuition can be true. However, without thinking it out, we suspect it a little. Its reliability is probabilistic (any knowledge is probabilistic. Anyone not understanding it should see a doctor). On average ("mean") it has certain chance to be right, but a good probability to be a mistake = unknown
Many controversies come about because of not understanding. Evidence to an effect does not say it is exclusive, and the same for counter examples. Many counter examples disprove just the generality of the rule, there may still be a partial generality (sometimes a generality is dependent on various conditions and other problems. Long story).
The mind does not like half truths, continuous gradients of stuff, etc.
Baumeister (the cultural animal) explains: Most decisions and actions in life are discreet. You either order the cake or not. tell the joke or.... tell first three words and see reactions.... (this is the continuous way, but most do not use it). Our mind May have a adapted to this reality.
Simplification of information is another reason. I surmise that both explanations are right.
PS. To make Nassim Taleb happy, I state that variance can be a crazy distribution/fractal/unknown/jumpy or whatever. In another sense, the idea of mean and variance above, reflects the idea of commonalities between things, while there are differences and possibly big ones. Sorry reader. It is not me complicating matters. It is reality that is opaque making our minds dizzy.
Jump to achieve/change
Our options are limited. We try to choose the best one (assume).
But we can create new interesting options.
For me, driving involves so much effort, that having a car is useless. But if I engage in driving for a long time, driving will become automatic. Then having a car may improve my life.
There are endless ways we can have better options by engaging a certain amount of negative/effortful experience.
Those endless possibilities do not occur naturally. They occur only when you forget everything you know about your own
life and experience. Questioning even the smallest basic assumption about how you feel, function, mind working, wants, etc.
Beware, that even with much effort, you will see only a minority of hidden options in your life. The scope of potential
possibilities is never seen fully.
Consider:
1) Over optimism. We expect life to get better after the change becoming natural. We are usually overestimating the
expected improvement. We may not learn the skill/get used to the situation. The very usefulness of the learned stuff can be illusory. Adaptation, that is human's tendency to get used to everything, cancels out various supposedly improvements of life.
2) Gamble. Skewed bets (like lottery, but with maybe positive expectation). Sometimes, the cost is relatively low, but the possible progress is enormous. No big loss if useless. But the change in life can be forever. Other changes to life are long investment, but small improvement for a little while only.
Life is short!
A change starts negatively, where we lose immediately from it. The trick is that sometimes, the later value is large. The farther the positive value, the larger the effort invested, the less worth it seems to be.
Hidden options are endless. It is a complex territory, sometimes worth the trouble.
But we can create new interesting options.
For me, driving involves so much effort, that having a car is useless. But if I engage in driving for a long time, driving will become automatic. Then having a car may improve my life.
There are endless ways we can have better options by engaging a certain amount of negative/effortful experience.
Those endless possibilities do not occur naturally. They occur only when you forget everything you know about your own
life and experience. Questioning even the smallest basic assumption about how you feel, function, mind working, wants, etc.
Beware, that even with much effort, you will see only a minority of hidden options in your life. The scope of potential
possibilities is never seen fully.
Consider:
1) Over optimism. We expect life to get better after the change becoming natural. We are usually overestimating the
expected improvement. We may not learn the skill/get used to the situation. The very usefulness of the learned stuff can be illusory. Adaptation, that is human's tendency to get used to everything, cancels out various supposedly improvements of life.
2) Gamble. Skewed bets (like lottery, but with maybe positive expectation). Sometimes, the cost is relatively low, but the possible progress is enormous. No big loss if useless. But the change in life can be forever. Other changes to life are long investment, but small improvement for a little while only.
Life is short!
A change starts negatively, where we lose immediately from it. The trick is that sometimes, the later value is large. The farther the positive value, the larger the effort invested, the less worth it seems to be.
Hidden options are endless. It is a complex territory, sometimes worth the trouble.
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Darwin's Epistemological insight: Unreliability of probabilities.
What are the probabilities of our existence?
OK. There could have been many "existence" so the question should be asked "what is the probability of an existence that is 'interesting'" or something like that.
Technically, we cannot calculate, because we have no knowledge about the variety of processes that could have happen.
But we may try intuitively, with some understanding of the space of possibilities, to gauge. Where are the odds going to land?
In short, I see that it feels that the probability is very low. Not 1 / 1 ^ infinite zeros. But rather 1 / 1 ^ very many zeros.
Darwin killed 99.9999% of the improbability of existence.
But I believe, that while we may (and have to) intuit about these probabilities, we should learn from this experience is how far our estimates can be from the ultimate numbers.
Before Darwin, if asked what are the odds for this world, reply would be infinitely low. Because the probabilities for all these species and their complexity and efficiency is so impossible.
One good algorithm of Darwin (gradual process of evolutionary selection) dumped the probabilities infinitely. They still seem low, but in relation to the odds we had before Darwin, the odds are infinitely more probable.
Statistically, Darwin taught us how a not thought of process can change dramatically our subjective probability assessments.
We Know that our estimates are terribly unreliable. That is, after Darwin
Epistemologically, that is Darwin's most important lesson!
OK. There could have been many "existence" so the question should be asked "what is the probability of an existence that is 'interesting'" or something like that.
Technically, we cannot calculate, because we have no knowledge about the variety of processes that could have happen.
But we may try intuitively, with some understanding of the space of possibilities, to gauge. Where are the odds going to land?
In short, I see that it feels that the probability is very low. Not 1 / 1 ^ infinite zeros. But rather 1 / 1 ^ very many zeros.
Darwin killed 99.9999% of the improbability of existence.
But I believe, that while we may (and have to) intuit about these probabilities, we should learn from this experience is how far our estimates can be from the ultimate numbers.
Before Darwin, if asked what are the odds for this world, reply would be infinitely low. Because the probabilities for all these species and their complexity and efficiency is so impossible.
One good algorithm of Darwin (gradual process of evolutionary selection) dumped the probabilities infinitely. They still seem low, but in relation to the odds we had before Darwin, the odds are infinitely more probable.
Statistically, Darwin taught us how a not thought of process can change dramatically our subjective probability assessments.
We Know that our estimates are terribly unreliable. That is, after Darwin
Epistemologically, that is Darwin's most important lesson!
Monday, June 30, 2008
The problem of being gifted
Geniuses are able to invent explanations on all fronts with no apparent difficulty. When those guys come up with a nice theory, be skeptic. They have the capability of making up endless kinds of theories explanation and combinations thereof. That is a big problem.
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