Which beliefs are the most rationalist?

2.1kṀ18k

resolved Aug 6

Resolved

YES

we are prone to "become attached to beliefs we may not want", but we can take explicit reasoning steps to mitigate this problem.

Resolved

82%

most people are too often overconfident that they know what someone else is trying to say. It can be helpful in discussions to take a step back and check whether you are actually

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82%

"The Sequences" are worth reading in their entirety

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76%

beliefs which do not influence future predictions (ie. ones that can only explain things in retrospect or ones that don't explain anything) are useless

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76%

you should never be 100% confident of any belief

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75%

Rationality is the art of winning; if there's a behavior you think is rational, but it tends to lose, you're not actually being rational. This includes properly modeling other people who are not rational.

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69%

I would be very happy if Scott Alexander was president

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60%

Emotions are bad and dumb. Smart people try to ignore them.

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59%

The probability that AI destroys humanity or causes incredible suffering before 2100 is >5%.

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56%

I personally try to do whatever I can in order to make better decisions

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50%

learning about common biases and trying to account for them in yourself can help one to make better decisions

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50%

studying game theory can help one to make better decisions

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50%

it's important to distinguish between your model of reality and reality itself

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50%

Consequentialism and deontology are not at odds. Use deontology because it's easier to work with on a daily basis; use consequentialism so you have the ability to reason about, question, and adjust your deontology, and handle exceptions.

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50%

It is important to vet beliefs such that your beliefs will be true and you will not hold beliefs that are false.

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44%

studying economics can help one to make better decisions

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44%

I am smarter than most people.

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40%

one should change their beliefs when presented with new information.

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36%

everyone should do what they can in order to make better decisions

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35%

I would be very happy if Eliezer Yudkowsky was president

Please add more beliefs.

Once the market ends I will create a poll for each of them (with the options "agree and rationalist", "disagree and rationalist", "agree and not rationalist", "disagree and not rationalist", "neither disagree nor agree and rationalist", "neither disagree nor agree and not rationalist") and for each one find the difference between the percentage of rationalists who agree and the percentage of non-rationalists who agree. I will then normalize them such that answers with no difference will resolve to 50% while the answer with the most difference will resolve to YES (or NO if the largest difference is negative for some reason).

This market is meant to be about what makes rationalists and non-rationalists different, not just their differences. For example: rationalists and non-rationalists seem to have different beliefs about AI, and answers about AI are allowed, but I don't think those differences are essential, so I don't think they are the point of the market, please keep that in mind.

Philosophy

Epistemology

Rationality

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