Discussion about this post

User's avatar
Jeff Cliff's avatar

This post inspired a blog post : https://plus.google.com/105...

tl;dr rather than use a reality test, hone a (test for a) theory of mind. It works for both the dreaming case and the fool case: in the case of the dream, it guides moral behaviour and encourages the development of moral precepts both within and without dreams (not to mention possibly grit), in the case of the fool, you get to cooperate to the extent permissible.

tl;dr tl;dr turing test.

Expand full comment
Overcoming Bias Commenter's avatar

"We just work on the assumption that it must be the other guy."

It seems more productive to me to work under the assumption that it is *me* in the absence of specific *directed* evidence that convinces me otherwise.

Now often I'll be assuming it's the other guy, but that's because I entered the conversation with significant, already well examined priors about who the fool is likely to be. Creationists, ludwig plutonium, etc. I have lots of evidence that these folks are fools.

In an argument of this kind with some mainstream scientist or anyone with an existing solid non-crackpot reputation and minimal expertise in whatever is under discussion, my priors should be closer to 50-50 on who the fool will be in some disagreement.

Expand full comment
31 more comments...

No posts