Instrumental rationality is more important than epistemic rationality. It is more important to win than to be right. "Markets can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent." Trivers showed that false beliefs can be adaptive.
However, instrumental and epistemic rationality do tend to be correlated.
Friday, 1 March 2019
Incentives matter
Many people don't learn without some reward or penalty. People with inconsistent preferences will probably modify them if you try to turn them into a money pump. But not always! E.g. gambling addicts.
Markets aren't magic. They need to be trained, by eliminating stupid participants. Correct odds in gambling were achieved by evolution, millennia before probability theory was invented in the 17th century. However, knowledge of probability did give people like John Law an edge in certain less well-established games.
Markets aren't magic. They need to be trained, by eliminating stupid participants. Correct odds in gambling were achieved by evolution, millennia before probability theory was invented in the 17th century. However, knowledge of probability did give people like John Law an edge in certain less well-established games.
Environment and conservatism
If you take an organism out of its natural environment, it usually dies pretty quickly. This includes humans: early settlers in New England relied on the native Squanto to show them how to fertilize the soil. Some homeless people would thrive if they were given some investment to get them back on their feet: in their "natural environment" of having a home and a job they thrive, but outside of it, they languish and cannot get back into it. Forcible ujamaa "villagization" in Tanzania (described by James C. Scott in "Seeing Like A State") can be conceptualised as ripping people out of their natural habitats, with fatal consequences.
Large changes to one's environment can be fatal. Voluntary, gradual changes are not. This is an argument for conservatism.
Large changes to one's environment can be fatal. Voluntary, gradual changes are not. This is an argument for conservatism.
Eusocial organisms
Eusocial organisms like a colony of ants are best viewed as a single organism. They share the same genes, and crucially the drones do not reproduce. The colony or hive reproduces.
But a single cod or zebra or human can't survive alone -- we survive in groups. As Jordan Peterson said, there is no such thing as "a" cod.
The difference between eusocial organisms and normal organisms is that eusocial organisms can't have conflicts between individuals.
But a single cod or zebra or human can't survive alone -- we survive in groups. As Jordan Peterson said, there is no such thing as "a" cod.
The difference between eusocial organisms and normal organisms is that eusocial organisms can't have conflicts between individuals.
Biology is destiny
Fools say "race is a social construct", but actually society is a racial construct.
Countries look the way they do because of their people. If you change the people, you change the country. A colony of beavers escaped from a zoo after generations in captivity -- they went straight back to building dams.
You could say that a society is an emergent property of its people. Emergence is where simple entities interact to produce complex things. In a sense the society is encoded in the DNA of its people, in the same way the beavers' dam is encoded in the DNA of the beavers. In the case of the beavers, chance has little impact. In the case of a complex society, with path dependency, it is possible that chance has more of an impact and the society would turn out differently if you started from scratch. But it's unlikely when you look at how peoples recreate their societies when they move around the world.
Countries look the way they do because of their people. If you change the people, you change the country. A colony of beavers escaped from a zoo after generations in captivity -- they went straight back to building dams.
You could say that a society is an emergent property of its people. Emergence is where simple entities interact to produce complex things. In a sense the society is encoded in the DNA of its people, in the same way the beavers' dam is encoded in the DNA of the beavers. In the case of the beavers, chance has little impact. In the case of a complex society, with path dependency, it is possible that chance has more of an impact and the society would turn out differently if you started from scratch. But it's unlikely when you look at how peoples recreate their societies when they move around the world.
Risk-free
Nothing is risk free. In finance, government bonds are often referred to as "risk-free", the "risk-free interest rate". This is false. Governments can choose to default, as happened with Russia in 1998. Even without formal default, a government can inflate their debt away: inflation risk.
Neither are government bonds necessarily the lowest interest rate available. In 2012, the yield on Greek government bonds was far higher than that of the Coca Cola Hellenic Bottling Company.
Neither are government bonds necessarily the lowest interest rate available. In 2012, the yield on Greek government bonds was far higher than that of the Coca Cola Hellenic Bottling Company.
Aesthetics
Aesthetics can be used to justify anything, even genocide. This is not an argument against aesthetics.
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