That’s my take also. In any case, we don’t now have The Correct Description, and there’s no likelihood of getting it soon, so we have to figure out how to act rationally without one.
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Replying to @Meaningness @juliagalef and
… and this is “meta-rational” because, to apply any formally rational method, you need *some* description, which means you need to choose one; and that choice is about *how* best to apply rationality.
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Hm, so maybe "CFAR rationality" can really be thought of as a meta-rationality that holds "Yes, there is a normative criterion according to which one ought judge which is 'best' when considering how best to apply different formally and informally rational methods. It's 'max EV'."
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Well, to the extent that it holds that there *is* a single normative criterion, I would categorize it as rationalist (and mistaken imo).
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Replying to @Meaningness @catherineols and
On the other hand, if one admits that EV is inherently nebulous (not well defined) then it starts to move away from hard rationalism. But then it’s not so clear what work EV is doing. It becomes a “floating signifier” and it’s not clear whether the theory has any bite.
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I don't know whether to call EV "inherently nebulous" or "inherently well-defined in theory, but nebulous in practice" But again, I prefer to stay away from discussions at that level of abstraction. Maybe a better philosopher than me can untangle it. But...
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Replying to @juliagalef @Meaningness and
... the claim of *applied rationality* is that there exist strategies that will predictably improve the goodness of a decision-maker's expected outcomes, relative to the default human approach to decision-making
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Replying to @juliagalef @Meaningness and
And you can object that "goodness" is undefined, fine, but I feel like that philosophical game can be played with tons of concepts that we nevertheless find meaningful and useful in real life
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Replying to @juliagalef @Meaningness and
Like, there are interesting grey areas to discuss, sure - is goodness of outcome simply defined by my preferences? Do preferences even exist, given that the human mind is not a single unified agent? etc.
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Replying to @juliagalef @Meaningness and
Those grey areas are worth digging into. But they don't stop us from being able to talk about "better" and "worse" outcomes in a common sense way, in real life, in the meantime.
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Here we are in violent agreement! I enthusiastically concur that there are better ways of thinking, feeling, and acting than the defaults (that’s the tagline of http://meaningness.com !) and also that it’s not any sort of problem that “better” is not well-defined.
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