Changing priors

One question that  is pertinent to politics as well as psychology is the nature of moral progress. When I say moral progress, I mean the process by which individuals end up updating or modifying their basic moral beliefs (or priors). This process usually is a slow one, and at the micro level involves one’s reaction [...]

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On bias and extremism in politics

Megan’s article reminded me of some thoughts I have had in the past about political polarizations. There are several commonly held intellectual blinkers, or, to use a Robin Hanson terminology, roads to rationality ruin, that prevent us from properly appraising the value of a political position. This is true with respect to positions we support [...]

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A discussion on morality and the nature of values

To make up for my lack of posting, let me link to a discussion over at Aristotle’s blog. It started off with Rawls but has evolved into topics like the nature of morality and the objectivity (or lack thereof) of values. — To a casual reader of the thread linked above, I might come across [...]

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Yeah, right

Apparently there is something called World Homoeopathy day. A function was held in [Kanpur] to observe the World Homeopathy Day. Speaking on the occasion, Dr Anil Katiyar, a noted homeopath said, “The good aspect is that homeopathy is capable of curing a person completely and there are no side-effects from this mode of treatment.” I [...]

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Libertarianism and climate science denial

Ryan Avent on the incompatibility of climate science and some libertarians: That is to say, confronted by a problem demanding solutions inimical to libertarian beliefs, libertarians were faced with the choice of reneging on their beliefs or turning their back on science. Tellingly, they chose the latter. One might think that’s a rather drastic decision, given [...]

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A ski helmet rant from ten years ago

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Bjorn Lomborg on global warming

Set aside 30 minutes today to watch this wonderful presentation by Bjorn Lomborg on global warming. Lomborg is no libertarian — he is a liberal who favours a welfare state and strong redistribution through taxation — and  indeed, there is no mention of any intrinsic value of freedom and property rights in his presentation. His [...]

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The age bias

I have realized that I suffer from the age bias, and I suspect I am not alone in this. When I come across a political or philosophical writing by someone who is younger than me, I subconsciously view this fact as increasing the probability that he is wrong. In short, my immediate emotional instinct is [...]

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The power of the truth

“That which can be destroyed by the truth should be.” – P.C. Hodgell

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The libertarian vice

I came across this old post by Tyler Cowen today: The libertarian vice is to assume that the quality of government is fixed.  The libertarian also argues that the quality of government is typically low, and this is usually the bone of contention, but that is not the point I wish to consider.  Often that [...]

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Anti-loyalty alliance is still an alliance

A nice follow-up by Robin Hanson to his earlier post I had linked to: You just can’t fight “conformity” by indulging the evil pleasure of enjoying your conformity to a small tight-knit group of “non-conformists.”  All this does is promote some groups at the expense of other groups, and poisons your mind in the process.  [...]

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The real winner of this election

Andrew Sullivan is effusive in his praise of Five Thirty Eight, the polling aggregation and analysis website created by Nate Silver: The only state their model got wrong was Indiana, where they expected a narrow Obama loss. He won the state by a hair. Nate Silver owned this election on the polling front: one young [...]

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The road to rationality ruin

Robin Hanson expresses eloquently a theme I have often touched upon: We feel a deep pleasure from realizing that we believe something in common with our friends, and different from most people.  We feel an even deeper pleasure letting everyone know of this fact.  This feeling is EVIL.  Learn to see it in yourself, and [...]

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Atheism doesn’t necessarily imply common sense

Via a post by Althouse, I was alerted to this recent Richard Dawkins quote about children reading Harry Potter and other fantasy fiction: I think it is is anti-scientific – whether that has a pernicious effect, I don’t know… I think looking back to my own childhood, the fact that so many of the stories [...]

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Ideological echo chambers

In an article published at Newsweek and Slate, Jacob Weisberg says the current crisis proves that “[libertarianism] makes no sense”. In fact he goes further than that: Like other ideologues, libertarians react to the world’s failing to conform to their model by asking where the world went wrong. Their heroic view of capitalism makes it [...]

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