How Rational Are You?

07-11-2012 11:34PM

philologos wrote: »

All behaviour and thought falls on the rationality spectrum. If it didn't people would be fantastically selective about what they believe to be irrational. If rationality is objective and not subjective then it is what it is irrespective of opinion.

Dialogue from 1975 Woody Allen film 'Love and Death'

Russian Gentleman: "So who is to say what is moral?"
Sonja (Diane Keaton):"Morality is subjective"
Russian Gentleman :"Subjectivity is objective"
Sonja:"Moral notions imply attritbutes to substances which exist only in rational duality"
Russian Gentleman:"Not as an essential extension of ontological existence"
Sonja:"Can we not talk about sex so much"

Lyra Fangs · 07-11-2012 11:50PM

Chuck Stone wrote: »

Let's try to break this down a little shall we?

The image is of a loved one so, naturally, you're going to think about the loved one when you view it. So someone asks you to stab the image of your loved one. The act of 'stabbing' the image is going to feel uncomfortable because it's probably going to make you imagine physically stabbing your loved one which is, no doubt, disturbing.

With that in mind couldn't we equally ask what exactly is irrational about avoiding the uncomfortable feelings stabbing an image of your loved one might engender? Surely not wanting to stab the image of a loved one is more 'rational' than happily doing it without a second thought?

Exactly. In addition, speaking from an evolutionary point of view, harming your loved ones (at least blood relations anyway) is irrational because you're weakening your own fitness or chance of passing on your genes.

philologos · 07-11-2012 11:55PM

Gbear wrote: »

If there is no rational basis by which to make the decision than it doesn't fall within the realms of rationality.

Take me for example. I would have no qualms about stabbing a picture of anyone. It's a picture. It doesn't matter (unless it has material value - like it's the only version of said picture).

I wouldn't care if it was of my parents and they were watching me do it. They don't care either.
There might be no particular reason to stab a picture but it takes a minimum amount of effort and it's no skin off my nose so if some tester asked me to do it I would oblige them. There is literally nothing irrational about that.

It is rational to "respect" the picture if in doing so you gain brownie points (or rather, don't lose them) with people who are irrationally swayed by the photo . But if they don't care then there is very little in the way of cost associated with the action other than a minute amount of effort and so rationality doesn't really apply.

It'd be like if someone asked me to stick my tongue out.
"Well.. ok.. that's slightly unusual but here you go".

I think you've gone into this in a bit too much depth

All I'm saying is if you do something without having good grounds for doing it, then it is an irrational decision. I.E - It's not logical or reasonable.

Cost or no cost - it's still silly to do things without any reason to do so.

The question is why the heck would you stab a photo? What reason do you have for doing so? If the reason isn't forthcoming it's an irrational decision as far as I can see it.

If you have "no particular reason for doing something" then it is by definition an irrational act.

Gbear · 07-11-2012 11:58PM

philologos wrote: »

I think you've gone into this in a bit too much depth

All I'm saying is if you do something without having good grounds for doing it, then it is an irrational decision. I.E - It's not logical or reasonable.

Cost or no cost - it's still silly to do things without any reason to do so.

The question is why the heck would you stab a photo? What reason do you have for doing so? If the reason isn't forthcoming it's an irrational decision as far as I can see it.

I disagree.

For me it isn't enough that things have nothing in the "rational column". In order to be irrational they need to have something in the "irrational column".

SafeSurfer · 08-11-2012 12:08AM

philologos wrote: »

I think you've gone into this in a bit too much depth

All I'm saying is if you do something without having good grounds for doing it, then it is an irrational decision. I.E - It's not logical or reasonable.

Cost or no cost - it's still silly to do things without any reason to do so.

The question is why the heck would you stab a photo? What reason do you have for doing so? If the reason isn't forthcoming it's an irrational decision as far as I can see it.

If you have "no particular reason for doing something" then it is by definition an irrational act.

People were not asked to stab a photograph out of the blue. They had agreed to take part in an experiment, part of which involved being asked to stab a photograph of a loved one.

philologos · 08-11-2012 12:10AM

SafeSurfer wrote: »

People were not asked to stab a photograph out of the blue. They had agreed to take part in an experiment, part of which involved being asked to stab a photograph of a loved one.

Just because they were asked to take an experiment doesn't mean that it is "rational" to stab a photograph. It's something that should cause you to think "Why the heck should I do that?". What's the justification?

The rational approach to doing something is to do so on considering why one should do so.

philologos · 08-11-2012 12:12AM

Gbear wrote: »

I disagree.

For me it isn't enough that things have nothing in the "rational column". In order to be irrational they need to have something in the "irrational column".

All rational means is reasonable and logical. If something isn't reasonable, or logical it's not rational. It's irrational. I.E - unreasonable, and illogical.

No logic, no reason - irrational.
Based on logic and reason - rational.

That applies to all things, we can't exclude stuff just because we happen to think it should be excluded. All thought and action can conform to those two criterion. There's no thought, and no action which doesn't. It either falls into irrational, or rational.

One is the flip side of the other.

SafeSurfer · 08-11-2012 12:16AM

philologos wrote: »

Just because they were asked to take an experiment doesn't mean that it is "rational" to stab a photograph. It's something that should cause you to think "Why the heck should I do that?". What's the justification?

The rational approach to doing something is to do so on considering why one should do so.

I see your point, but one could equally take the view that the rational approach to not doing something is to do so on considering why one should not do so.

Gbear · 08-11-2012 12:31AM

philologos wrote: »

All rational means is reasonable and logical. If something isn't reasonable, or logical it's not rational. It's irrational. I.E - unreasonable, and illogical.

No logic, no reason - irrational.
Based on logic and reason - rational.

That applies to all things, we can't exclude stuff just because we happen to think it should be excluded. All thought and action can conform to those two criterion. There's no thought, and no action which doesn't. It either falls into irrational, or rational.

One is the flip side of the other.

We just keep restating our position. This is pointless.

dirtyden · 08-11-2012 12:37AM

SafeSurfer wrote: »

I saw an interesting experiment where members of a Rational and Skeptics association were in a room and asked about how rational they felt they were.
They all completely dismissed sentimentality,superstition,karma etc etc.

Then they presented them with a photograph of a relative or friend and asked them to stab it.

None of the participants were willing to stab the photo even though rationally they knew that it was just ink and paper and no one would be harmed.

If I was to suggest that something bad would happen to anybody who thanked this post?

Would you thank it?
Would you ignore it?

Its easy to ignore chain letters because you just ignore them. But if you had to actually opt in to act rationally, like the people with the photograph could you do it?

(Or would you thank the first comment as alternative?)

None of them would stab a photo??

I thought I was rational but I must be a sceptic because this sounds like rubbish to me.

Did you make this story up for some obtuse reason just to garner thanks for the post?

Pink Sky · 08-11-2012 12:39AM

√-1

holystungun9 · 08-11-2012 12:41AM

I use google images to find pictures of sexy girls. I print them off and I stab those pictures with my penis until the pictures are wet. I then put the pictures up on my hall of section of my bedroom wall (beside the Twilight posters). Is that rational enough for you?

af_thefragile · 08-11-2012 12:41AM

If rationality is based on stabbing a picture in the face, then I'm not very rational at all...

Or maybe I am because I don't see the point of the exercise at all!

WoollyRedHat · 08-11-2012 12:42AM

I wouldn't have stabbed the photo.
But had I been given a lighter, I would of burned it. Haha fire, burn, burn everything, burn the whole place down!!!!

Ahem, tea anyone?

af_thefragile · 08-11-2012 12:46AM

WoollyRedHat wrote: »

I wouldn't have stabbed the photo.
But had I been given a lighter, I would of burned it. Haha fire, burn, burn everything, burn the whole place down!!!!

Ahem, tea anyone?

I like arson!

mackg · 08-11-2012 01:35AM

I'd stab the person the photo was of, that's how fcuking rational I am.

nozzferrahhtoo · 08-11-2012 10:29AM

So they tried to test the rationality of a group of people by asking them to perform an action that had no rationale behind it whatsoever. They then judged those people to be irrational because the people performing the test assumed that their choice not to perform the action was because they did not want to harm the person in the photograph?

It all sounds a bit bull to me. So much so that I actually end up agreeing with Philologos' first post on the thread. And if anything makes me agree with someone as consistently irrational as he is then it has to be pretty out there. I did not see a link in the OP to this "study" but I would certainly like to actually read the Opening rationale, the methodology, and the conclusions behind it.

As for whether I am rational? I try. I am human and to be human is to err as they say. I have made myself a hobby of being the sworn enemy of Unsubstantiated Claims of all sorts. I seek them out and confront them even within myself. I often try to examine my own opinions on issues and ask why I actually hold them or do I just hold them because they conform to my biases. I try to seek a rational basis for my positions and if I can not do so I change them.

Does that make me rational? I do not know but I hope so. It is the best I can do and so I commit to it.

OldNotWIse · 08-11-2012 10:30AM

Why take a chance when there's nothing to be gained?

SafeSurfer · 08-11-2012 11:54AM

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

So they tried to test the rationality of a group of people by asking them to perform an action that had no rationale behind it whatsoever. They then judged those people to be irrational because the people performing the test assumed that their choice not to perform the action was because they did not want to harm the person in the photograph?

It all sounds a bit bull to me. So much so that I actually end up agreeing with Philologos' first post on the thread. And if anything makes me agree with someone as consistently irrational as he is then it has to be pretty out there. I did not see a link in the OP to this "study" but I would certainly like to actually read the Opening rationale, the methodology, and the conclusions behind it.

As for whether I am rational? I try. I am human and to be human is to err as they say. I have made myself a hobby of being the sworn enemy of Unsubstantiated Claims of all sorts. I seek them out and confront them even within myself. I often try to examine my own opinions on issues and ask why I actually hold them or do I just hold them because they conform to my biases. I try to seek a rational basis for my positions and if I can not do so I change them.

Does that make me rational? I do not know but I hope so. It is the best I can do and so I commit to it.

It was part of a Richard Dawkins documentary. I saw it on TV and though it was interesting. I am not saying it was a scientific experiment but it certainly made me think.

OldNotWIse wrote: »

Why take a chance when there's nothing to be gained?

What chance would you be taking? If you were offered €5 to stab the photograph of a loved one would you do it?

rubadub · 08-11-2012 12:09PM

SafeSurfer wrote: »

What chance would you be taking? If you were offered €5 to stab the photograph of a loved one would you do it?

For me it is the chance of hurting yourself by needlessly handling/using a knife. I would do it for €5 no bother, not for free. The image on the paper I am stabbing would have no bearing, unless there was a chance this could shown to the person whose image it was, who may be superstitious or take offence for whatever reason they have, or a video of me doing it or something. It would depend on whose image it was person in that case -I guess my great aunty would not like it, a rational mate of mine would not give a damn.

I want to know the answer to this question

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

They then judged those people to be irrational because the people performing the test assumed that their choice not to perform the action was because they did not want to harm the person in the photograph?

did they deem the people to be irrational, or did they make any comment on it?

Shenshen · 08-11-2012 12:09PM

SafeSurfer wrote: »

I saw an interesting experiment where members of a Rational and Skeptics association were in a room and asked about how rational they felt they were.
They all completely dismissed sentimentality,superstition,karma etc etc.

Then they presented them with a photograph of a relative or friend and asked them to stab it.

None of the participants were willing to stab the photo even though rationally they knew that it was just ink and paper and no one would be harmed.

If I was to suggest that something bad would happen to anybody who thanked this post?

Would you thank it?
Would you ignore it?

Its easy to ignore chain letters because you just ignore them. But if you had to actually opt in to act rationally, like the people with the photograph could you do it?

(Or would you thank the first comment as alternative?)

Heh. That's actually very interesting, though I do think there's a little more involved than just rationality or superstition.

I think what stopped people from stabbing the pictures is not so much superstition-based as more of a social taboo. The conscious or unconscious thoughts I suspect went through people's brains were not so much "If I stab it and something bad does happen, will I have caused it", but more along the lines of "I respect/love that person, how can I do this to their picture?" or "If I did it and the person finds out, what are they going to think of me? Will that damage our relationship? Will they be angry?"
Personally, I would have thought the latter.

You could have done a similar test asking a parent to throw their kid's teddy bear against a wall. It wouldn't damage the bear, it would have no impact on the child, yet I would bet most parents would refuse as they know their children would feel bad about it.

Btw, I didn't thank the post cause I can't be bothered right now.

Porkchop McGee · 08-11-2012 12:11PM

I'm very rational. After careful analysis I'd give myself 8.5 out of 10, 10 being as rational as one can be, 0 being totally irrational.

OldNotWIse · 08-11-2012 12:13PM

SafeSurfer wrote: »

It was part of a Richard Dawkins documentary. I saw it on TV and though it was interesting. I am not saying it was a scientific experiment but it certainly made me think.

What chance would you be taking? If you were offered €5 to stab the photograph of a loved one would you do it?

I was referring to the OP's request that the opening post be thanked.

the "chance" is my perception that it could result in something bad happening, based on my (albeit bordering on negligible) levels of superstition.

Yeah if someone offered me five euro I'd do it, because my levels of superstition are low enough that a fiver would swing it for me

But doing something for nothing...just dont see the point.

Shenshen · 08-11-2012 12:16PM

Pink Sky wrote: »

√-1

That's imaginary, I think you'll find.

Or i, for short.

stevenmu · 08-11-2012 12:26PM

Pherekydes wrote: »

That would mean that only irrational numbers could border irrational numbers. Where would the rational numbers go?

Ficheall wrote: »

They go between two irrationals, aye.
The probability of an irrational bordering a rational is effectively zero though.
Probability at the infinite level is a dick.

The problem is that you're not defining the concept of "bordering" accurately enough.

For any irrational number, you can find another irrational between it and the closest rational number, meaning the probability of finding a rational number bordering an irrational number is literally 0, i.e. it can not happen.

But as Pherekydes rightly points out, the rational numbers have to go somewhere.

By definition, the rational numbers can not be a subset of the irrational numbers, so you can either decide to treat the rational and irrational numbers as entirely separate and independent number systems, in which case the concept of one bordering the other makes no sense, or as part of the concept of bordering you must specify if you are talking about a rational or irrational number doing the bordering.

Now for the really fun part.

If we just look for a moment at irrational numbers bordering irrational numbers. If we have an irrational number X, and we find one of it's border numbers Y, we can always find another irrational number Z that sits between X and Y. Therefore X never borders Y, and any irrational number can not have an irrational border. Having an irrational border is impossible (which kind of ruins the first half of my post).

The only way to border an irrational number is with rational numbers. So the probability of an irrational number having rational borders is actually 1

nozzferrahhtoo · 08-11-2012 12:40PM

SafeSurfer wrote: »

It was part of a Richard Dawkins documentary. I saw it on TV and though it was interesting. I am not saying it was a scientific experiment but it certainly made me think.

It does not sound very scientific no, but I would love to read it if they release a paper on whatever it was as I said.

That said however I can imagine why some people would have issues with it even though it is just a picture.

VS Ramachandran while working with patients with Capgras delusion discovered an area of the brain that is related to evaluating the importance of a place, object or person to a person.

Capgras delusion results when the link between the centers of the brain that recognize something... and the centers that do that evaluation... are damaged.

So for example a person will look at their mother... the brain will identify this as their mother... then feed that identification into the "importance" center and... assuming they are not jewish (not my joke)... the brain responds back with good feelings and feelings of importance and relevance and the like. With Capgras delusion this does not happen and the patient becomes convinced the mother they are looking at it not their true mother but an imposter.

I would imagine that this area of the brain is no less active when looking at a picture of ones mother than if one was looking at the real mother for example. As such doing violence against even a picture might indeed set off some unpleasant sensations in the brain.

All that said I still think asking people if they are rational and then asking them to perform an action that has no rationale is a really bad experiment setup. They are likely to refuse solely to appear rational by not performing an action that is not.

SafeSurfer wrote: »

What chance would you be taking? If you were offered €5 to stab the photograph of a loved one would you do it?

If someone wished to offer me money to perform a meaningless act then by all means I would do so and happily take their money. A fool and their money are easily parted as the saying goes. I doubt they are the ones that should be evaluating how rational I am however as if the evaluation roles were to be reversed I doubt they would come out with a glowing recommendation.

rubadub wrote: »

did they deem the people to be irrational, or did they make any comment on it?

No idea at all I am only commenting on what little I have to go on so far. Which is not much as no links or anything were provided. Perhaps ask the guy who saw the experiment performed.

SafeSurfer · 08-11-2012 12:48PM

rubadub wrote: »

For me it is the chance of hurting yourself by needlessly handling/using a knife. I would do it for €5 no bother, not for free. The image on the paper I am stabbing would have no bearing, unless there was a chance this could shown to the person whose image it was, who may be superstitious or take offence for whatever reason they have, or a video of me doing it or something. It would depend on whose image it was person in that case -I guess my great aunty would not like it, a rational mate of mine would not give a damn.

I want to know the answer to this question

did they deem the people to be irrational, or did they make any comment on it?

From what I remember of the experiment, their unwillingness to stab the picture was not used to label them as irrational, rather they were asked to articulate the reasons they could not bring themselves to stab it.

Duggy747 · 08-11-2012 01:10PM

Bit of a silly and pointless experiment, really. Stabbing a picture to test rationality isn't even rational to begin with. Main reasons one wouldn't stab a picture of a loved one would be because it would invoke the thought of them actually doing it to the person themselves or even the sentimental value one would associate with it...................or maybe that was the only photo left and they didn't have the negatives to print more :pac:

If they were asked to burn the picture I bet it could have been a different story as to how many would have done it, much less violent physical action they'd have to do.

As for me, I'm rational in regards to having no superstition or beliefs in deities / supernatural stuff. Karma is a nice idea but, ultimately, it's horseshìt.

philologos · 08-11-2012 09:00PM

Duggy747 wrote: »

As for me, I'm rational in regards to having no superstition or beliefs in deities / supernatural stuff. Karma is a nice idea but, ultimately, it's horseshìt.

Who says that believing in God is irrational? Or is that something we just assume without basis?

nozzferrahhtoo · 08-11-2012 09:54PM

philologos wrote: »

Who says that believing in God is irrational? Or is that something we just assume without basis?

I was wondering how long it would take you to try and turn this thread into another one of your evangelising missions.

Lets not make this about god but lets make it a general statement that includes god. Belief in anything that is devoid of argument, evidence, data or reasoning that substantiates it in ANY way is irrational.

How Rational Are You?

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