Comment by clusterfoo | Hacker News Reader

Comment by clusterfoo | Hacker News Reader

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I don't really understand what is being argued. Two statements are made:

> A: The mediocrity principle simply states that you aren't special.

> B: Most of what happens in the world is just a consequence of natural, universal laws.

The argument being that B implies A.

First this is self-contradictory: B implies B and nothing more.

What does he mean by "special". Are we talking about some mushy, subjective definition of "special". If that's the case, then it's a moot point. By that definition you're as special as someone thinks you are, including yourself. If your mom thinks you're special, you're special. That's what subjective means.

If that's not the case, by special, does he mean highly unlikely, finite, or unique? -- Math is infinite and governed by sets of universal rules, yet there are many unique ("special") mathematical patterns.

In this case, we don't know if we're special or unlikely because we don't know what the odds of us existing are. We don't know how common or uncommon intelligent life is.

"But intelligent life is not special, even if it were uncommon, because it's governed by the same universal laws as unintelligent dead matter."

Then, if our definition of special is not subjective, and uniqueness or unlikelihood does not imply specialness, then what is the definition of special that we're using here?

Or does he mean "governed by intent" (of a deity or purposeful universe). Now we've got a new problem, which is defining what intent is, and if there even is such a thing (which, if there isn't, the whole point is moot again).

I take "special" here to mean "deserving of privileges over and above other instances". In this sense, if you think you are "special" that means you think that you ought to be able to bend the rules more than other people, or that cashiers ought to be nicer to you than to the rest of the people in line, or that you deserve to get that last discount TV on the shelf on Black Friday, or that it's okay for you to zoom past traffic on the shoulder because you're in a hurry moreso than anyone else.

Possibly part of your trouble in interpreting the essay is that you're missing out on what the essay is in response to. The question was posed: "What scientific concept would improve everybody's cognitive toolkit?"

Whether the Mediocrity Principle is "correct" or not is not even the point. The point is that assuming the Mediocrity Principle to be true and acting as if you and your situation are not special is a productive stance to take in life, as it is in science.

It's another way of saying "the world does not revolve around you", "you are not the center of the universe", etc.

It's a false dichotomy to say the only two choices are 1) Acceptance of the Mediocrity Principle or 2) Believing you are the center of the universe. I can easily posit a third option where some aspect of our Universe and existence is special without needing to be the center of it all.

Who said there are only two choices? The point is that it's often more useful to assume the Mediocrity Principle. Not that it's the truth. And not even that it's always better. Just that more often than not it's more useful.

> What does he mean by "special"

I think he means that the universe does not gain meaning by our existence. The universe will (or will not) be there regardless of whether we happen to exist or not, because our existence is just a fortunate combination of physical laws. Given a slightly different combination (the Sun being slightly further away from this planet, for example), you/we wouldn't exist at all, but the universe would still be there. Other forms of intelligent life may or may not exist elsewhere, but this still does not mean that the universe exist in order to have intelligent life. The universe will or will not exist because of the laws of physic; everything else will be subject to these laws, and so it will never be "special".

This is debatable. The universe is not an observer of our existence IF the universe is not a simulation. If the universe happens to be a simulation than there is some external entity or rather the universe in itself, that is some kind of observer. As such, if he does fancy a stroll inside my particular life, I can suddenly become a graph of relationships and influences that have "special" meaning. If the universe is not an observer, there is still the possibility that a certain miserable existence (think elementary particle) can affect a larger system (think Big Bang). Was the elementary particle special or not? Difficult to say.

It's not really much of an argument. I mean, even your paraphrase is being highly charitable; the article itself is much more muddled. A colder, less charitable reading of it would be that he's blurring together the statements "improbable things are improbable" and "I never grew out of teenage angst, which makes me superior to you". There isn't really much to respond to.

Based on reading his blog Pharyngula a few years ago, I suspect that was a response to the "Biology is stupid because it says God didn't create us as his special children" sort of thing he's probably heard too much of when teaching intro bio classes.

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