How rational are you?

[Augustus]

Simple question: How rational do you think you are?

By beliefs I mean things that are at least contested/debatable to some degree: political beliefs, contested scientific beliefs, religious or irreligious beliefs, beliefs relating to culture, history, psychology, etc. rather than obvious fact like water freezes at 0c, or injecting creme de menthe into your testicles is likely to be painful.

Is being rational important to you? What are the limits of human rationality (or your rationality)?

 

[exchemist]

Simple question: How rational do you think you are?

By beliefs I mean things that are at least contested/debatable to some degree: political beliefs, contested scientific beliefs, religious or irreligious beliefs, beliefs relating to culture, history, psychology, etc. rather than obvious fact like water freezes at 0c, or injecting creme de menthe into your testicles is likely to be painful.

Is being rational important to you? What are the limits of human rationality (or your rationality)?

It's vitally important, but needs to be tempered with a lot of other things or one becomes an ********.

 

[George-ananda]

'The vast majority of my beliefs are rational and based on high quality evidence' got my vote.​

And I believe a lot of 'out there' stuff in the paranormal, spiritual, alien and crypto realms. The evidence and its quality are vastly underrated in my opinion as society holds mainstream science as a Demi-God which has a materialist bent and is uncomfortable with those subjects I mentioned.

 

[fantome profane]

I am one billion times more rational than the square root of 2.

 

[Soandso]

Third option for me. I have my biases and sometimes those biases are based in bad logic despite my efforts. It's cool to find where that bad line of thinking is, though. It's a chance to reassess my understanding of things and to readjust where appropriate

 

[RestlessSoul]

I believe it's possible to rationalise almost any belief, prejudice, or opinion. And since no one is immune from this, we must all be perfectly rational beings, in our own eyes.

 

[Augustus]

I believe it's possible to rationalise almost any belief, prejudice, or opinion. And since no one is immune from this, we must all be perfectly rational beings, in our own eyes.

I would say that rationalising a belief is very different to a belief being rational.

We all do this of course, but I'm not sure that makes us perfectly rational in our own eyes. I may not always be able to identify when I am being irrational, but I'm absolutely certain that there are times when I am irrational.

To be honest, I could probably give a pretty accurate list of some issues where I am more likely to hold irrational beliefs, but I'm not going to tell anyone my weaknesses here

 

[RestlessSoul]

I would say that rationalising a belief is very different to a belief being rational.

We all do this of course, but I'm not sure that makes us perfectly rational in our own eyes. I may not always be able to identify when I am being irrational, but I'm absolutely certain that there are times when I am irrational.

To be honest, I could probably give a pretty accurate list of some issues where I am more likely to hold irrational beliefs, but I'm not going to tell anyone my weaknesses here

Well yeah, the ability to rationalise is no guarantor of rational thought or behaviour.

For myself, I hold many beliefs which others might call irrational, but I can certainly justify them to myself; and I don't feel any overwhelming need to justify my beliefs to others. Behaviours might be another matter, but I'm quite highly socialised these days, so I find my behaviour seldom offends.

 

[Yerda]

Dunno.

When asked I would say I experience a preference for rational beliefs but I don't worry about it often, if at all.

What are we debating?

 

[Augustus]

What are we debating?

Not much, whether you think you are rational and if it's important.

It's in the debate forum because it's easier than trying to remember what other forums there are that might be fractionally more relevant

 

[MikeF]

I would assume most consider themselves rational. I think the problem that arises is that some aspects of life involve personal preference as opposed to objective truth. If preferences clash it is not about who is most reasoned in their value choice, it simply requires some amount of compromise to resolve.

 

[Vee]

Rational is hard to measure. Many people have different ideas of what that is.
I apply my beliefs every day and that has led me to a simple but balanced life, no debt, no conflict with others, I'm in good shape and good health, people who work with me appreciate the quality of what I do, and my conscience is clear. Given the overall results of my actions, I'd say I'm rational enough. My beliefs haven't failed me yet.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Simple question: How rational do you think you are?

By beliefs I mean things that are at least contested/debatable to some degree: political beliefs, contested scientific beliefs, religious or irreligious beliefs, beliefs relating to culture, history, psychology, etc. rather than obvious fact like water freezes at 0c, or injecting creme de menthe into your testicles is likely to be painful.

Is being rational important to you? What are the limits of human rationality (or your rationality)?

The problem is that being rational is too easy.
It has no strong objective referent and everybody can claim it for contradictory claims. It works like this in the sloppy way, I claim/do X, that makes sense to me, therefore I am rational.
Just tell me how you think/feel about something and how you understand it and I can agree or disagree.

If I have to play this game confusing objective and subjective can have bad consequences, but that is in effect morality and that is not rational as per this definition: based on facts or reason and not on emotions or feelings.

Rational Definition & Meaning | Britannica Dictionary

RATIONAL meaning: 1 : based on facts or reason and not on emotions or feelings; 2 : having the ability to reason or think about things clearly

www.britannica.com

And since I am in effect a subjectivist, as when it comes to it, all that matters, is what as good or bad in the end, then rational only matters as a means to good. So I don't care about being rational other than a secondary ability that can in some cases do good, but in others do bad.

 

[MikeF]

I would assume most consider themselves rational. I think the problem that arises is that some aspects of life involve personal preference as opposed to objective truth. If preferences clash it is not about who is most reasoned in their value choice, it simply requires some amount of compromise to resolve.

I would also say that reason requires sufficient data to reason upon in order to reach a sufficiently accurate or sound conclusion. Often we feel compelled to make a reasoned determination in the absence of sufficient data.

 

[Quintessence]

I find the question problematic for two reasons.

Problem the first - post-Enlightenment cultural values put "rational" on an (ironically) irrationally high pedestal. So much so that it's the sort of thing that of course you are going to say you are, because to do otherwise is a faux pas.

Problem the second - what is and isn't adjudged "rational" is (again, ironically) prone to such heavy non-rational biases as to be almost meaningless on the face of it.

I do not care about being "rational." I care about humans being self-aware enough that they can examine how and why they do the things they do and can step out of their egos enough to be at least somewhat recognize the biased lens through which they assess everything ("reason" being one of many of those biased lenses).

 

[Brickjectivity]

I have thought before that I was privileged and that I was very lucky to know more than everyone else. I believed this, and I was wrong. This cost me dearly more than once, and I am still hurt from the spanking. People lie. People are wrong. People will cost you everything to save themselves from very little trouble, and they will do it with a smile and an angelic halo, too.

There is more information available today for those who would question everything, but the living twin to that is the burden of checking everything. If you don't gather the evidence then it is of lower quality for you. Also: many lies we simply have to forgive, or we'd never get anything done. Lies are like tiny taxes that appear all over, and you still have to make purchases. You can't always know.

I have you met your senator? What about just your town council rep? You probably haven't. Who does?

When you hear about someone accused of a crime and going to trial, do you hurry down to the courthouse to make sure every procedure is legitimate? I doubt that you do. You probably expect someone else to do it, but if you are ever on trial you probably would like to hope that someone else, some selfless stranger, becomes interested in your particular case. It rarely happens for the same reason that you yourself don't take the time out to investigate other people's convictions.

 

[vulcanlogician]

I chose "Most of my beliefs are rational, but quite a lot are probably irrational too."... because I think that is probably the most realistic self-assessment I can give.

I would LIKE to be option 2: "The vast majority of my beliefs are rational and based on high quality evidence." And I often think of myself that way. But that could very well be an overestimate of my rationality. Maybe I do come close to that mark (on a good day) but maybe I often fall short of that mark and don't even realize it.

Option 1 is incredibly unrealistic, even with the conditional "As far as I know,." We all have biases and emotional dispositions. Some of them may float under the radar, but even I must admit that these things influence my perceptions more than I'd like (and in a way I am able to catch myself in sometimes).

Is being rational important to you? What are the limits of human rationality (or your rationality)?

Being rational is incredibly important to me. Concerning certain things, I think we ought to try our best to be rational. And I think we can achieve much through such efforts. Perfect rationalism is too high a goal to achieve for any of us. But I do not doubt that some of us (with effort and exposure to dissenting views) might achieve something called "very rational."

Anything that exists in the universe that is incomprehensible to us necessarily lies outside the grasp of rationality. At best, we could recognize THAT such a thing cannot be an object of rational inquiry. I'm not talking spirits, gods, or ghosts here... more so the things that caused reality in the first place (even if it is a natural phenomenon) may be WELL beyond human comprehension.

But I'm rather optimistic about ordinary things in the universe and the capacity of reason to help us understand those things better.

 

[vulcanlogician]

Problem the first - post-Enlightenment cultural values put "rational" on an (ironically) irrationally high pedestal.

Plato (being the hipster that he was) was doing this WAY before it was cool. (Back in 399 BC).

 

[Revoltingest]

My values stem from personal preferences.
They're neither-right-nor-wrong moral relativism.

They aren't rational....they just are the result of genes
& experience. But neither are they "irrational", which
connotes wrongful reasoning. Assuming the values
that I have, reason can then be applied to decide
how to act, & what politics I support. That's where
"rational" comes in, ie, logically reasoning from the
premises. The results certainly aren't "The Truth".
So it's a mix of rational & not.

Thus far, I'm the only one who selected...
<Some of my beliefs are rational, many are not>

 

[Augustus]

Option 1 is incredibly unrealistic, even with the conditional "As far as I know,." We all have biases and emotional dispositions. Some of them may float under the radar, but even I must admit that these things influence my perceptions more than I'd like (and in a way I am able to catch myself in sometimes).

Ironically, it is pretty irrational to consider oneself so rational

Being rational is incredibly important to me. Concerning certain things, I think we ought to try our best to be rational. And I think we can achieve much through such efforts. Perfect rationalism is too high a goal to achieve for any of us. But I do not doubt that some of us (with effort and exposure to dissenting views) might achieve something called "very rational."

Anything that exists in the universe that is incomprehensible to us necessarily lies outside the grasp of rationality. At best, we could recognize THAT such a thing cannot be an object of rational inquiry. I'm not talking spirits, gods, or ghosts here... more so the things that caused reality in the first place (even if it is a natural phenomenon) may be WELL beyond human comprehension.

But I'm rather optimistic about ordinary things in the universe and the capacity of reason to help us understand those things better.

In general, I'm not really sure about whether it is a good thing to consider being rational important given we aren't ever going to be consistently rational.

I suppose it doesn't matter a great deal, unless it leads people to think that the best solution to humanity's problems lie in making us a more rational animal, rather than trying to mitigate the problems while accepting our collective irrationality is insoluble.