Here's a dangerous idea!

[QuickTwist]

I don't believe JP holds that position and has never actually talked about passing on genes as a priority. He's not a Darwinian, he's a pragmatist.

I'd appreciate if you didn't try and derail the thread any further, thanks.

I did not derail because that is his position and in the context that rationality is not real, it is the same as saying what Peterson has said on truth. If evolution is all we can go on which is our bias then that is also how rationality is not real. It's not a matter of denying bias it is a matter of saying reducing rationality to only bias makes evolution the only option. Do you wish me to like the video again where Peterson denies truth the way rationality is hypothetically being denied in this thread because truth and rationality go hand in hand.

I started watching that video you linked. The author either doesn't understand what claims JP is actually making OR it's clickbait. I know the positions that JP holds and the fatal error that the author of the video makes is saying that JP is arguing for a Darwinian truth when he is not. JP explicitly says that irt spreading your genes is the top priority for life that is a Darwinian claim and not necessarily the claim that JP is making.

 

[QuickTwist]

@QuickTwist
I get you don't want the derail, but you did ask him for a citation...

Also, you're not listening to him. He's got a video of JP literally saying these things.

That video is ridiculously cherry picked. The author of the video has clearly never read a word of the book 'Maps of Meaning' which details exactly what JP's truth entails. Nowhere in any interview or podcast or what I have read of his material does he imply he believes that passing on your genes is a priority.

 

[Teax]

OK, so given we can all agree it's not possible to know EVERYTHING, what exactly is it that is actually informing our decisions?

Perception. Which in turn is converted into something I will call "personal truth" which in turn informs our decisions.
e.g. you perceive a chair, you generate the assertions "a chair exists. It is in this room".

I'm not saying that personal-truth is truth. Truth is usually understood as some sort of global concept. Absolute-truth if you will. The connection of personal-truth to absolute truth is off-topic.

I would posit that if it is rationality, then full information/context is needed in order to draw a conclusion.

It seems that your definition of "rationality" is based on absolute-truth rather than personal-truth? If so, I will agree that such rationality, let me call it absolute-rationality does not exist, because nobody knows absolute-truth.

And as you say, therefore something else is guiding our decisions.

That something-else I shall call personal-rationality. As a result of personal-truth, no full information/context is needed in order to draw a personally-rational conclusion.

OK, sure, but what exactly does it mean to be "more rational?" As I see it, being rational is rather black and white - either you are rational or you are not. Don't see a whole lot of room for play with this since being rational hinges on being objective and impartial.

Yes, it is black&white, except the rational answer is not always a certainty.

e.g. Just like when calculating the expected outcome of a coin-flip, we end up with a certain 50%. The concepts "certain" and "50%" in that sentence are not in contradiction with each other. "Certain" is the black&white part, while "50%" is the rational answer.

What would be the implications of this?

The implications of not having absolute-rationality is that what is rational can differ from person to person or even from time to time. As new information comes in, as your priorities shift, the calculation of what is rational will yield different results.

You can call the new decision "more rational" if you want, though, it's just an expression.

The idea I am trying to put forth is not solipsism or the antithesis of rationality necessarily. So what is left if we neither indulge ourselves of the whim of rationality or solipsism? Is there truly no other way? What does bias have to do with this? If bias is the paradigm by which we live, would it not be better to adhere to such a thing, being aware that it exists and is influencing our behavior? What is the answer? Tell me.

The bias lies in the catalog of personal-truths that a person collects over their lifetime as fuel for their personal-rationality. These personal-truths include perceptions(beliefs) as well as goals.

Yes it pays to be aware of one's own bias. Without such awareness, a person will likely miss the chance to expand/update their catalog of personal-truths when it's important = when such update has a substantial effect on the success of one's own rationality and life choices.

 

[redbaron]

no please it was almost dead

 

[The Grey Man]

Another pass:

The antidote to solipsism is not any conceptual tinker toy construct of the intellect, but will and only will. Understanding and reason only show one the path; one takes it because one wants to, because to act is just what it is to be. Decision-making is not and has never been rational except insofar as the information upon which it is based (but never determines by itself what decision is made) is a product of intellectual operations.

I believe will is your "something else that guides our decision-making process".

rationality is a process that we've evolved to be capable of

Oh yeah? How do you know? Your reason tell you so?

 

[Black Rose]

ra·tion·al·i·ty
ˌraSHəˈnalədē/
noun

1. the quality of being based on or in accordance with reason or logic.

You do not need reason and logic to be absolute. They simply work. Rationality simply works. 1 + 1 = 2

 

[Ex-User (14663)]

Rationality as applied to the empirical world – applied rationality – works insofar as our perception of reality and the various abstractions we perform to make sense of it are aligned with the objective reality of the world. Otherwise we wouldn't be able survive or do anything in the world at all. We apply this rationality repeatedly throughout the day. If I put 2 bottles of beer into my fridge and drink one of them, then by rational reasoning there is 1 bottle left in the fridge. That turns out to be correct surprisingly often. If someone doesn't believe in applied rationality, they have just as much reason to say there is 1 bottle in the fridge as there are 100 bottles in the fridge. I invite QT to start applying the latter strategy in life and see how it works out.

 

[redbaron]

if rationality doesn't exist then how come there's a book series called Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality???

checkmate solipsists

 

[DoIMustHaveAnUsername?]

nobody knows absolute-truth.

is that an absolute truth?

 

[Teax]

is that an absolute truth?

I wouldn't know.
I posited that as a personal truth, one that QuickTwist seemed to share.