-your relation to most things is that “YOU DON’T KNOW”

-and you know that you don’t know — because you could test it

-you could test your understanding by making predictions

-you could BET on your predictions

-but you don’t. You know you’d lose

 

Every action you take is a bet on certain state of the universe

You take it — and get your shit results

Then you talk

Because only talking is left

You know it’s nonsense, but it’s all you have left

You know you have nothing interesting to say — because you know nothing about how the world works

Otherwise you would have acted in such way that resulted in glorious outcomes

And you’d make predictions so wise that leaders of the world would line up to listen to your precious advice

But that doesn’t happen, alas

 

So in a way we know we don’t know

Then we switch to other mode of ALWAYS WINGING IT, ALWAYS HAVING OPINIONS, ALWAYS RUNNING OUR MOUTH

We do it in public

We do it privately

Even as privately as in our conversations with ourselves, talking to ourselves

 

I suppose we’re born this way,

To act safely, all in all

But think big, feel confident

(even people who think small and are insecure — still massively overestimate their grasp of reality, i.e. think too confidently about what they know and how they relate with the world)

 

This is not new,

we call it “skin in the game”

The epiphany is not that there is such concept as “skin in the game” — and that only then we get serious about reality and truth

The epiphany is why we even are so stupid

Why we have such completely conflicting two modes (doing and talking)

And why though we progress as society, clearly valuing and taking advantage of the truth once we know it — we still always devolve to bullshit, nonsense, overconfidence, delusion — when we don’t know that we don’t know

The epiphany is why we even need such concept — instead of outright preferring and optimising for the truth from the start

 

Indeed this must just be innately human

In how we want to perceive the world, think about ourselves, think about thinking — we want to feel confident and in control and as though we get it

But in action — a wiser mode takes over — where we dare not take that foolish bet, that we wouldn’t like to lose

 

All this is of course very important to consider, is it not

It’s the problem of truth, reality, success, coordination and cooperation, progress, society, etc.

-We look for truth in books and education and science and empirical evidence

-We look for truth in a vague notion of “critical thinking”

-We look for truth in consilience

-We look for truth in tradition and religion, that which has “stood the test of time”, maybe that’s more realistic to be true

-We look for truth in proven track record and expertise

-We look for truth in the aforementioned skin in the game

-We look for truth in the markets

(whereas morons look for truth in what sounds plausible, or what looks attractive, or what confirms their biases, etc etc etc)

 

Well maybe, before we look for truth in the above ways, which are all valid,

Maybe we should first JUST remind ourselves that we are, from the outset — NOT DISPOSED to find truth

If we do — it’s only because life forced us to, the challenge forced us to

Maybe that would be a good start,

A more general start, and less domain-specific

And more universal,

Since not everything you can TEST with action,

Not everywhere do you have skin in the game… or perhaps your skin in the game optimises for the wrong variable (e.g. for maintaining your reputation, rather than tracking reality — it’s all a function of incentives)

Not everything you can read in books or consult experts on

Not everything you can just “figure out” with “critical thinking”,

And predominately,

It’s not when you engage in the above practices that you’re the most vulnerable,

The scientist is most vulnerable to delusion the moment he walks out of his lab

The professor when he’s opening his mouth on a subject outside of his curriculum,

The tech-bro when he’s sharing his brilliant political ideas,

Again: the problem is often not that we lack the tools to approximate the truth — it’s the invisible switch which takes us from seeking truth — to seeking OPINIONS

And maybe if we profoundly concentrated on that first — we would actually be A LITTLE BIT LESS WRONG

 

…and wrong we are

And it’s ok

Except it’s not

If at least we did justice to the degree to which we’re CLUELESS — there would be no problem

If you at least hedged your bold prediction,

Or maybe put a number on it, BAYESIAN PROBABILITY, ODDS

And if you were so serious, for a change, to revisit this brilliant prediction of yours, and review it

And if you actually made a falsifiable and well-defined prediction — not BS that you can retcon post-factum

Wouldn’t that be a lovely world?

Where your word actually had value — other than you enjoying making bombastic sounds

 

Maybe, if you remembered — that everything you say when you’re NOT extremely confident, not an expert, not well-experienced in the matter — if you remembered that it’s likely BULLSHIT, that you’d never bet on,

maybe then you’d shut your fucking mouth

 

…indeed, finally, this is societal

Maybe I’m wrong, but perhaps we’re just not epistemically advanced yet

The science of epistemology has failed to propagate AT ALL, outside philosophy (and those eggheads are not very interested in truth either, besides their little realm of language games)

We simply lack standards of rationality, rational decision, truth-pursuing — in how we live and think about ANYTHING but that at which we’re serious experts already, or have very direct, undistorted skin in the game