How rational are you?

[Revoltingest]

I’m not sure how many people realize that this poll is a Rorschach test with the options of the poll substituting for inkblots.

I'll wager that more posters here realize
more things than you give them credit for.

 

[MikeF]

I'll wager that more posters here realize
more things than you give them credit for.

Indeed.

 

[Augustus]

I agree completely. Self-evaluations are not to be trusted. So what does that mean? Are there methods and means by which we can check ourselves? Are there tools available to mitigate human error and help us circumvent those “many cognitive functions that we evolved with that specifically act to prevent us being fully rational”?

Yes there are methods we can use to reduce the likelihood of error, but these can only mitigate to a degree rather than solve problems.

Rationality on the other hand seems to imply thought conducted in a way that conforms to some set of accepted premises, norms, and knowledge. An individual may be considered to behave rationally when evaluated within the individual's accepted premises, norms,and accepted knowledge set, but deemed irrational in regards to a different set of premises, norms, and accepted knowledge set which may or may not be identical to the other knowledge set.

So in terms of your references to Nazi Germany etc, it would be using increased knowledge to more effectively oppress and kill, which is what I think you are suggesting by placing the term rationality in quotes. Whether they acted within the domain of rationality depends entirely upon what set of premises, norms, and accepted knowledge set is to be used to make the determination. Your examples seem to be about value choices rather than about reason. As I indicated in an earlier post, competing value choices are not resolved with reasoning, rather through political negotiation, with the caveat that if a value choice is dependent upon faulty premises or knowledge, those would be grounds to challenge the value choice.

The problem with rationality is that if you aim to be rational from flawed premises or axioms, the results are irrational.

The Nazis were often very rational in the logistics of their persecution of Jews, but based on some ludicrous racialist premises.

Lots of our values are the products of socialisation, happenstance, half or partial truths, etc.

If we both accept the “hardware/software” metaphor for human behavior and agree that socialization and indoctrination can result in instilling irrationality, then it would imply that on the software end, humans can be made either more irrational or more rational than their baseline hardware state. If this is indeed the case, then better scientific understanding of how we work, how we behave, as well as of the objective world, will only help in moving the needle in the direction of humans becoming more rational.

Humans can be made more rational, but only up to a limit. Our evolved cognition has numerous features that function to deceive us after all.

You can't play a modern game on a 1992 486 DOS system no matter how much you play around with the software. You can't change a brain that evolved to facilitate survival in a simpler environment, into a truth seeking machine in a vastly more complex environment.

And in a mass society, the more we learn about what makes us rational/irrational, the better people get at manipulating us via our irrationalities. The more information we are exposed to, the more misinformed we become (being misinformed and being informed are 2 independent variables, we can become both more informed and more misinformed at the same time).

 

[MikeF]

Yes there are methods we can use to reduce the likelihood of error, but these can only mitigate to a degree rather than solve problems.



The problem with rationality is that if you aim to be rational from flawed premises or axioms, the results are irrational.

The Nazis were often very rational in the logistics of their persecution of Jews, but based on some ludicrous racialist premises.

Lots of our values are the products of socialisation, happenstance, half or partial truths, etc.



Humans can be made more rational, but only up to a limit. Our evolved cognition has numerous features that function to deceive us after all.

You can't play a modern game on a 1992 486 DOS system no matter how much you play around with the software. You can't change a brain that evolved to facilitate survival in a simpler environment, into a truth seeking machine in a vastly more complex environment.

And in a mass society, the more we learn about what makes us rational/irrational, the better people get at manipulating us via our irrationalities. The more information we are exposed to, the more misinformed we become (being misinformed and being informed are 2 independent variables, we can become both more informed and more misinformed at the same time).

Excellent points. I agree. Humanity has its work cut out for itself.

 

[MikeF]

That's why I regularly like to internalize my skepticism as well as shine it outward upon dubious claims. As someone who claims to be a true skeptic, such a posture seems only fair.

I agree. Does that mean, in your opinion, the skeptic applies skepticism not only upon themselves, but upon the Poll as well in this instance?

 

[vulcanlogician]

I agree. Does that mean, in your opinion, the skeptic applies skepticism not only upon themselves, but upon the Poll as well in this instance?

Sure. Why not?

 

[Augustus]

I agree. Does that mean, in your opinion, the skeptic applies skepticism not only upon themselves, but upon the Poll as well in this instance?

What scepticism would you say needs to be applied to the poll?

The purpose of the polls was simply to find out about people's self-perception: "How rational do you think you are?" and there are numerous subjectivities built in to this.

That's why I didn't try to define what it meant to be rational, and only minimally explained about belief so as to rule out the enormous number of basic facts we have learned in our lives, especially via direct experience.

Ultimately though, it's just asking someone an opinion about themselves.

 

[MikeF]

What scepticism would you say needs to be applied to the poll?

The purpose of the polls was simply to find out about people's self-perception: "How rational do you think you are?" and there are numerous subjectivities built in to this.

That's why I didn't try to define what it meant to be rational, and only minimally explained about belief so as to rule out the enormous number of basic facts we have learned in our lives, especially via direct experience.

Ultimately though, it's just asking someone an opinion about themselves.

In your view, an explanation is required to make sense of the response then? If so, then that's all I'm saying.

 

[MikeF]

In your view, an explanation is required to make sense of the response then? If so, then that's all I'm saying.

I would also add that skepticism towards the Poll does not mean distrust. It simply means one thinks critically about it before answering, and asking, for example, whether the options flow in cogent fashion. For example, the first two questions are almost identical and neither mention irrationality. The third then jumps to most (at least 51%?) being rational (no mention of quality of evidence), and a lot (less than 50% more than 40%?) being probably irrational. What should one consider irrational, simply being incorrect or is something more required? Does it involve discounting valid information or active self-deception? Is this the next logical option if the bar on the first two, almost identical options is too high?

That's all I mean about being skeptical toward the poll. Please tell me if this is irrational, otherwise, how am I to know?

 

[THINK!]

All thinks are Designed, so there's a Maker.

 

[Viker]

I'm perfectly rational even when maybe some of my beliefs appear not to be.

 

[RestlessSoul]

All thinks are Designed, so there's a Maker.

I prefer to say life is a gift, and where there’s a gift there has to be a giver.

That said, and troubling though this is to many cosmologists, our universe does appear to be exceptionally well ‘designed’ to support life.

 

[THINK!]

I prefer to say life is a gift, and where there’s a gift there has to be a giver.

That said, and troubling though this is to many cosmologists, our universe does appear to be exceptionally well ‘designed’ to support life.

Only the Earth.

 

[Valjean]

All thinks are Designed, so there's a Maker.

That doesn't follow.
Design implies intention. The automatic mechanisms of chemistry and physics can create marvelously complex 'thinks.'

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

That doesn't follow.
Design implies intention. The automatic mechanisms of chemistry and physics can create marvelously complex 'thinks.'

Yeah, but the problem is regards to rational and external experince as objective is that it is marvelous, is that marvelous is witthout rationality and objective evidence.
-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

-based on facts rather than feelings or opinions

Objective Definition & Meaning | Britannica Dictionary

OBJECTIVE meaning: 1 : based on facts rather than feelings or opinions not influenced by feelings; 2 : existing outside of the mind existing in the real world

www.britannica.com

In effect for the folk belief that only the objective and rational matters, the problem is that matters in a feeling, emotion or opinion.

In other words, it may be that the universe is natural, material, physical, but no human can do that only objectively. Not even the atheists.
So as for skepticism, critical thinking and rational I always look for first person non-objective and non-rational claims and as far as I can tell based on the record history of human attemps of being only objective and rational, nobody has so far do that as only objective and rational.
We always end in what the world is and how that matters. The latter is not objective and rational, while that former can be do so. There is not unique in that and in fact it is what is going on here:

Science has limits: A few things that science does not do - Understanding Science

undsci.berkeley.edu

So yes, you can claim that it matters to you how you do being a human, but you can't do that as rational and objective, no matter how much you claim that you are rational and use skepticism and critical thinking.

 

[Valjean]

All thinks are Designed, so there's a Maker.

That doesn't follow.
Design implies intention. The automatic mechanisms of chemistry and physics can create marvelously complex 'thinks.'

I prefer to say life is a gift, and where there’s a gift there has to be a giver.

That said, and troubling though this is to many cosmologists, our universe does appear to be exceptionally well ‘designed’ to support life.

How do we determine that, without knowing the variables? The Non-Fine-Tuned Universe: The Astronomical Failure of the Cosmological Argument for Theism

 

[Heyo]

That doesn't follow.
Design implies intention. The automatic mechanisms of chemistry and physics can create marvelously complex 'thinks.'

Wooosh!

 

[RestlessSoul]

That doesn't follow.
Design implies intention. The automatic mechanisms of chemistry and physics can create marvelously complex 'thinks.'

How do we determine that, without knowing the variables? The Non-Fine-Tuned Universe: The Astronomical Failure of the Cosmological Argument for Theism

We can all Google something in support of whatever position we choose to take, on any subject under the sun. Nevertheless, the fine-tuning ‘problem’ remains an unresolved issue in cosmology. It certainly exercised the mind of self-professed atheist Stephen Hawking, right till the end of his life. We are all, of course, free to draw from this whatever conclusions we want.

 

[Heyo]

We can all Google something in support of whatever position we choose to take, on any subject under the sun. Nevertheless, the fine-tuning ‘problem’ remains an unresolved issue in cosmology. It certainly exercised the mind of self-professed atheist Stephen Hawking, right till the end of his life. We are all, of course, free to draw from this whatever conclusions we want.

Do you even know what the fine tuning problem is?

 

[RestlessSoul]

Do you even know what the fine tuning problem is?

In cosmology? In a nutshell, there are several properties of the universe (the strength of gravity, the mass of an electron, the asymmetry of matter and anti-matter particles, the cosmological constant, critical density, etc..) in regard to which, were the parameters or values to deviate even slightly from what they are observed to be, the universe would not have been able to support the formation of galaxies, complex chemistry, or life.

Put another way, according to theoretical models of cosmology, the probability of a bio-compatible universe emerging from the Big Bang is astronomically low. Though above zero, obviously, since we are here; which is where the anthropic principle comes in. The anthropic principle, however, is a tautology, and deeply unsatisfying even to those cosmologists like Hawking, who mobilised it as a philosophical argument to explain away the impossible odds against our being here.