On the contrary - I found rationalist bloggers to be the most willing to change their mind in face of new evidence out of all groups of people I've ever met o the internet. Although HN commenters are a close second.
So it does depend on what you mean by rationalist.
I think it is vastly more likely that those who feel like everything they say is incredibly important might just be idiots who self identify as rationalists, and those who are rationalists are doing more thinking than broadcasting.
You could say there is little overlap between people who are good at basketball and those who say they are good at basketball.
That statement does not have any effect on your ability to judge them by watching them play.
Right, one could make that statement. It would be silly, but they could make it. I think most people who consider themselves good at basketball are probably better than average at basketball.
> That statement does not have any effect on your ability to judge them by watching them play.
Is the notion that someone who's not good at basketball can't recognize a good basketball player?
I'm a little confused by your metaphor.
I should note that you changed the statement from say to consider themselves. It is entirely possible (and rather frequent) for people who do not consider themselves good at basketball to say that they are. People who actually are good at basketball quite often do not feel the need to say so, because it is apparent when they play.
I can change "consider themselves to be rationalists" to "say they are good at basketball" because that is just a change of premise. It leaves the structure the same.
Opinions based on insufficient information help immensely in determining whether we have sufficient information, and also raise awareness of important topics that we need more information on. These blog posts serve a very important role in the information exchange ecosystem and the whole world would be worse off if all these people held off until they're 99% certain. Nobody would be talking about climate change, about economy, about quantum gravity, about ancient civilizations, about prehistoric animal species, etc. etc. and so on.
People in the rationalist community don’t see it, because ironically they’re not rational enough. But they use the language and essay format to make it seem like they are.
I wrote in a sibling post that they like fascism because any dispute can be reduced to and solved by beating the counterpart to death with sticks.
Rational thought should help you understand yourself, not disappear.
I agree.
I might be wrong, of course, but I would argue that general intelligence -- meaning intelligence reducible to a single scalar 'g' -- does not exist. All intelligence is a hybrid ensemble and an adaptation to a particular niche or set of niches. I'm a reasonably smart human but I'd make a really dumb tree or dolphin.
To get started, look up the no free lunch theorem.
There's room for debate here though. I think our technological journey with AI is going to help answer some of these questions.
With the Rationalists, I get the sense that 'g' is a faith, a prior they won't examine.