Comments on: Truly Worth Honoring http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/05/truly_worth_hon.html Overcoming Bias is economist Robin Hanson’s blog, on honesty, signaling, disagreement, forecasting, and the far future. Sun, 14 Mar 2010 07:33:43 -0400 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.5 hourly 1 By: Michael F. Cannon http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/05/truly_worth_hon.html#comment-419055 Michael F. Cannon Sun, 17 Jun 2007 04:00:11 +0000 http://prod.ob.trike.com.au/2007/05/truly-worth-honoring.html#comment-419055 But then you should honor your community as well, even though it was wrong, because it was opposing another community when that community was wrong. So you'd be honoring both warring camps, equally, simply because each made war against a community in the wrong. Ad absurdum, you might honor both the Nazis and the Soviets. It seems to me that neither community should be honored -- though, per Truman, we might want to arm whichever side is losing so they'll kill as many of each other as possible. We should only honor those who fight for or against our community when they do so for the right reason. But then you should honor your community as well, even though it was wrong, because it was opposing another community when that community was wrong. So you’d be honoring both warring camps, equally, simply because each made war against a community in the wrong. Ad absurdum, you might honor both the Nazis and the Soviets. It seems to me that neither community should be honored — though, per Truman, we might want to arm whichever side is losing so they’ll kill as many of each other as possible. We should only honor those who fight for or against our community when they do so for the right reason.

]]> By: Robin Hanson http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/05/truly_worth_hon.html#comment-419054 Robin Hanson Mon, 11 Jun 2007 08:47:42 +0000 http://prod.ob.trike.com.au/2007/05/truly-worth-honoring.html#comment-419054 Eliezer, I would be very proud to live in a community with the plaque you suggest. Michael, I might not honor them as much if they had the wrong reasons, but I would still probably honor them. Eliezer, I would be very proud to live in a community with the plaque you suggest.

Michael, I might not honor them as much if they had the wrong reasons, but I would still probably honor them.

]]> By: Eliezer Yudkowsky http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/05/truly_worth_hon.html#comment-419053 Eliezer Yudkowsky Mon, 11 Jun 2007 03:07:29 +0000 http://prod.ob.trike.com.au/2007/05/truly-worth-honoring.html#comment-419053 How about: "We frankly admit that we don't know whether or not we should be honoring these fallen soldiers." How about: “We frankly admit that we don’t know whether or not we should be honoring these fallen soldiers.”

]]> By: Michael F. Cannon http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/05/truly_worth_hon.html#comment-419052 Michael F. Cannon Mon, 11 Jun 2007 02:36:33 +0000 http://prod.ob.trike.com.au/2007/05/truly-worth-honoring.html#comment-419052 Do you honor those who fought against our community when it was wrong, even if they did so for the wrong reasons? Do you honor those who fought against our community when it was wrong, even if they did so for the wrong reasons?

]]> By: Jef Allbright http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/05/truly_worth_hon.html#comment-419051 Jef Allbright Fri, 01 Jun 2007 23:30:19 +0000 http://prod.ob.trike.com.au/2007/05/truly-worth-honoring.html#comment-419051 How about We honor those who fought for principles promoting our community's most coherent values. Never mind, more than one level of abstraction loses nearly all the popular audience. How about

We honor those who fought for principles promoting our community’s most coherent values.

Never mind, more than one level of abstraction loses nearly all the popular audience.

]]> By: mobile http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/05/truly_worth_hon.html#comment-419050 mobile Fri, 01 Jun 2007 19:47:59 +0000 http://prod.ob.trike.com.au/2007/05/truly-worth-honoring.html#comment-419050 At the risk of devolving into a Judean Peoples' Front meeting, how about <BLOCKQUOTE>We honor and dishonor all of those who fought and didn't fight for and against our community when it was right and/or wrong.</BLOCKQUOTE> At the risk of devolving into a Judean Peoples’ Front meeting, how about

We honor and dishonor all of those who fought and didn’t fight for and against our community when it was right and/or wrong.

]]> By: Pareen http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/05/truly_worth_hon.html#comment-419049 Pareen Fri, 01 Jun 2007 12:22:51 +0000 http://prod.ob.trike.com.au/2007/05/truly-worth-honoring.html#comment-419049 Amazing, There have been long essays and books written to express all that you have expressed in just a few lines... I salute you for that... Pareen Amazing,

There have been long essays and books written to express all that you have expressed in just a few lines…

I salute you for that…

Pareen

]]> By: Prasanth http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/05/truly_worth_hon.html#comment-419048 Prasanth Fri, 01 Jun 2007 09:48:49 +0000 http://prod.ob.trike.com.au/2007/05/truly-worth-honoring.html#comment-419048 Brian, ["Our community" has waged wars against murderous terrorists, fascists, Nazis, slave masters, communists, totalitarians, genocidal dictators, or megalo-maniacs bent on world domination. I cannot think of a single one of "our community's" enemies that does not fit one of the descriptions above, aside from the Spanish.] Apart from the examples given above, What was the US trying to do when they were fighting against all of the above types and many more innocent ones? megalo-maniacs bent on world domination seems a reasonable guess :) Brian,
["Our community" has waged wars against murderous terrorists, fascists, Nazis, slave masters, communists, totalitarians, genocidal dictators, or megalo-maniacs bent on world domination. I cannot think of a single one of "our community's" enemies that does not fit one of the descriptions above, aside from the Spanish.]
Apart from the examples given above, What was the US trying to do when they were fighting against all of the above types and many more innocent ones?
megalo-maniacs bent on world domination seems a reasonable guess :)

]]> By: Bernard Guerrero http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/05/truly_worth_hon.html#comment-419047 Bernard Guerrero Wed, 30 May 2007 19:49:46 +0000 http://prod.ob.trike.com.au/2007/05/truly-worth-honoring.html#comment-419047 Joe, "So I guess the real issue is not to attempt to overcome all biases, but rather to choose wisely which biases we do and do not want to overcome." Possibly there are two sorts of bias. (Forgive me if this has come up before and I've missed the posts.) There is clearly a bias involved in mis-mapping reality to one's mental picture. The Monty Hall Problem describes a bias; probabilities are what they are, regardless of whether we intuitively grasp them. Likewise for overconfidence and more mudane mis-mapping like "the sky is green", "the Moon is made of cheese" or, with somewhat more serious consequences, "the Jews are out to destroy Germany". OTOH, some bias would appear to not be a matter of mis-mapping. I am clearly going to feel it more and in a very different way if I break my leg in a car accident than I will if you do. I might feel a great deal of sympathy/empathy for your leg, but the break in mine might well have me screaming in agony. Joe,

“So I guess the real issue is not to attempt to overcome all biases, but rather to choose wisely which biases we do and do not want to overcome.”

Possibly there are two sorts of bias. (Forgive me if this has come up before and I’ve missed the posts.) There is clearly a bias involved in mis-mapping reality to one’s mental picture. The Monty Hall Problem describes a bias; probabilities are what they are, regardless of whether we intuitively grasp them. Likewise for overconfidence and more mudane mis-mapping like “the sky is green”, “the Moon is made of cheese” or, with somewhat more serious consequences, “the Jews are out to destroy Germany”.

OTOH, some bias would appear to not be a matter of mis-mapping. I am clearly going to feel it more and in a very different way if I break my leg in a car accident than I will if you do. I might feel a great deal of sympathy/empathy for your leg, but the break in mine might well have me screaming in agony.

]]> By: Bernard Guerrero http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/05/truly_worth_hon.html#comment-419046 Bernard Guerrero Wed, 30 May 2007 18:42:24 +0000 http://prod.ob.trike.com.au/2007/05/truly-worth-honoring.html#comment-419046 Michael Vassar, "I agree that most people agree, but most people haven't allocated sufficient attention to noticing the degree to which 'beliefs' are typically simply signifiers of group loyalties (hence part of the importance of overcoming bias)." This raises two objections in my mind: A) As I stated previously, to some extent we _are_ our biases. A dislike of slavery and slavers is, to some extent, an arbitrary one. Unless you take as received knowledge some base set of morals, a great deal of behavior you don't like really only boils down to arbitrary taste, with no error in mapping reality to mental picture involved. A slaver might be quite rational, simply taking advantage of a chance to confiscate somebody else's labor simply because he can. I'm not sure you want to give up your biases in that situation. B) In some cases, arbitrary group loyalties (and the signaling of same) might actually be the rational response to a given set of circumstances. Keep in mind the theory that the rapid evolution of human language is a response to the free-rider problem which allows a given group to easily identify outsiders who are less likely to carry the group's genes. Michael Vassar,

“I agree that most people agree, but most people haven’t allocated sufficient attention to noticing the degree to which ‘beliefs’ are typically simply signifiers of group loyalties (hence part of the importance of overcoming bias).”

This raises two objections in my mind:

A) As I stated previously, to some extent we _are_ our biases. A dislike of slavery and slavers is, to some extent, an arbitrary one. Unless you take as received knowledge some base set of morals, a great deal of behavior you don’t like really only boils down to arbitrary taste, with no error in mapping reality to mental picture involved. A slaver might be quite rational, simply taking advantage of a chance to confiscate somebody else’s labor simply because he can. I’m not sure you want to give up your biases in that situation.

B) In some cases, arbitrary group loyalties (and the signaling of same) might actually be the rational response to a given set of circumstances. Keep in mind the theory that the rapid evolution of human language is a response to the free-rider problem which allows a given group to easily identify outsiders who are less likely to carry the group’s genes.

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