Navigating Tribal Identities and Rationality

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Exploring the influence of hidden variables on human perception and decision-making, this chapter discusses the impact of neural networks on conscious and unconscious confidence levels. It delves into the importance of wearing identities lightly, distinguishing between agreeing with a group's positions and deeply identifying with them. The conversation emphasizes the balance between rationality and emotional tribal labels, advocating for actions that prioritize positive impact on the world over validating personal identities.

Mom, apple pie, and rationality — all things that are unquestionably good, right? But rationality, as much as we might value it, is easier to aspire to than to achieve. And there are more than a few hot takes on the market suggesting that we shouldn’t even want to be rational — that it’s inefficient or maladaptive. Julia Galef is here to both stand up for the value of being rational, and to explain how we can better achieve it. She distinguishes between the “soldier mindset,” where we believe what we’re told about the world and march toward a goal, and the “scout mindset,” where we’re open-minded about what’s out there and always asking questions. She makes a compelling case that all things considered, it’s better to be a scout.

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Julia Galef received a BA in statistics from Columbia University. She is currently a writer and host of the Rationally Speaking podcast. She was a co-founder and president of the Center for Applied Rationality. Her new book is The Scout Mindset: Why Some People See Things Clearly and Others Don’t.

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