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Americans are becoming too rational and this is a major problem. When you over-value rationality, you expect to be able to have a rational answer to every quest

Americans are becoming too rational and this is a major problem. When you over-value rationality, you expect to be able to have a rational answer to every question. The hand-licking story that made the front page today illustrates this point perfectly. Approached rationally, the mom could not solve the problem, no amount of mental effort would yield a resolution or insight into the issue. When the mind expects an answer to a problem that it can't solve, it applies more and more 'force' until it breaks through. In this case, the force was destroying her family relationships. But this is what frustrated rationalism does. People don't or can't catch themselves before they create awful situations. It is only when she applied an irrational approach to the problem, surrendering the need to control the situation, that she could finally understand what was going on. I rail against excessive rationality on HN all the time, promoting a more cautious, traditional outlook on certain things like office politics. I expect coders to be exceptionally rational, I don't have any issue with it. But Americans in general are succumbing to the trend of expecting to be able to answer every question they ever have in their lives and throwing away their emotional health on meaningless symbols and missing the true core nature of what it means to be happy and healthy and whole. Perhaps the starkest example of this phenomenon is when atheists lament that there aren't any atheist churches. 50 years ago, if you were an atheist, you still went to church. They were still the pillars that communities revolved around, the very loom of the fabric of society. Nowadays, we've thrown away every last bit of symbolism that brings people together and wonder why we're so lonely. If things aren't perfectly rational, people's minds rebel immediately and harshly, like it's my fault you don't understand a concept requiring depth of study to really grasp. I don't know what the answer is, but I do know that the mind will create a myth if it doesn't already believe in one. Money, job, marriage is the American Dream myth. It stems ultimately from positivism and expecting to be able to understand everything. It doesn't have to be this way. You might not be able to fix everybody else but you can fix yourself.

totalrobe 8y ago
>Americans are becoming too rational ...maybe you have not noticed who is currently the US president?
lotsofpulp 8y ago
How is not addressing the cause of the hand licking rational?
- inimino 8y ago
  The cause was not known; this is the point of the story. Hypothesis generation is not a rational process.
kemayo 8y ago
> The hand-licking story that made the front page today illustrates this point perfectly. [...] > It is only when she applied an irrational approach to the problem, surrendering the need to control the situation, that she could finally understand what was going on. I feel like you have a somewhat idiosyncratic definition of "irrational" that you're applying here. What I took from the hand-licking story was that her initial attempt to brute-force the issue without understanding it was irrational, i.e. "not logical or reasonable", and that approach failed. Then, quite reasonably and rationally, she backed off and established trust with her child, found out the underlying cause of the issue, and provided a solution that resolved the underlying issue.
- vinceguidry 8y ago
  I think it's common for people, especially the overly-rational, to conflate correctness with rationality. Yes, with hindsight it can be seen that the actions she initially took were incorrect. But they seemed perfectly rational approaches at the time. If you see your child doing something anti-social, then it's logical to try to correct it because if you don't, it will cause problems for them down the road. In fact, it would have been irrational to not do anything about it. It was only when the logical brain got overridden by maternal instinct that she could choose an approach that led eventually to a resolution. The logical brain demands control over the situation. If she could have surrendered control earlier, perhaps even in the first few times she witnessed it, then she could have taken a less-combative approach.
  - nybble41 8y ago
    > Yes, with hindsight it can be seen that the actions she initially took were incorrect. But they seemed perfectly rational approaches at the time. There was nothing incorrect or irrational about the actions the mother initially took. Her approach was reasonable given the limited information available to her. A slightly more rational approach would perhaps have placed greater emphasis on the value of empathy and her relationship with her child, which was being undermined by some of the measures she took, and given correspondingly less weight to the social pressure she was feeling from others—but in the end she made the rational decision in line with her own principles and priorities and stopped trying to force the issue. Later, when her son was both able and willing to discuss the matter, she was able to analyse the root cause and suggest several rational alternative courses of action which were readily adopted, thus putting an end to the problem for good. It's unclear from the write-up whether any maternal instincts were involved, but the peer pressure which pushed her to force the issue was clearly irrational and played on her instinctive desire for acceptance. Instincts and emotions are a good thing and shouldn't be ignored, but it's a mistake to follow them blindly—they can lead you into trouble just as easily as they can get you out of it. It's best to look at them as valuable inputs into the rational process, to be evaluated alongside other data before drawing any conclusions.
mancerayder 8y ago
Perhaps the starkest example of this phenomenon is when atheists lament that there aren't any atheist churches. 50 years ago, if you were an atheist, you still went to church. They were still the pillars that communities revolved around, the very loom of the fabric of society. Nowadays, we've thrown away every last bit of symbolism that brings people together and wonder why we're so lonely. If things aren't perfectly rational, people's minds rebel immediately and harshly, like it's my fault you don't understand a concept requiring depth of study to really grasp. You had me up until here. First of all, who's lonely, who's "we"? In a conformist society, those who think differently can find it more lonely, by definition. Second, atheists went to Church? Well was that because if they didn't, they were ostracized -- and, well, lonely? Children of higher intelligence (we do believe that it's possible that we're not all blank slates at birth, right?) tend to find it more lonely than children of average intelligence. If you consider yourself an exceptional (in some way) person -- rightly or wrongly -- you'll find things more complicated socially. Now I think you're onto something with the rationality bit, but not in the Nietzschean way you're alluding to (religion and community). Instead, well look at how we create our social bonds in the U.S.: use-value. Have you ever been in a position of power, and found that suddenly everyone wanted to be your friend? Or, have you read what men and women write on dating websites in terms of what they want? These to me are more evidence of a "rationality militates against happiness" than your strange atheist example.
- vinceguidry 8y ago
  > Second, atheists went to Church? Well was that because if they didn't, they were ostracized -- and, well, lonely? American distrust for religion began in the sixties and seventies. Before, it was a normal and accepted part of life. People wanted to go to church. Even if you didn't believe in it you still wanted to go. It's hard to believe but that's how all of the world's societies were up until very recently. Religion aided life, not hindered it. The Enlightenment was a comparatively small movement that really only took root in the intelligentsia. You would have had to pry religion out of the cold dead fingers of the common folks. Now, even religious folks often stay home on Sunday.
hindsightbias 8y ago
> that there aren't any atheist churches. That isn't a rational response, that's an irrational response to an emotional need they apparently do acknowledge. My grandfather and uncles literally built their churches with their bare hands and wallets. If you're an athiest and want a church, well, the rational response would be go out and build one. Or at least join the Unitarians. Most of them don't care.
gerbilly 8y ago
I agree that we overvalue reason. To reason about something you have to reason from premises. But where do the premises come from? I'm sure many of us have had that experience, when dealing with a difficult problem, where an insight comes to us out of the blue. Where did that new insight come from, certainly not through rational deliberation. In fact, often it's not until we stop reasoning that the insight is free to appear. Often we can't explain where the idea came from, it seems to be from some subconscious (irrational?) part of our mind. Once we have the insight (a new premise) then we can start to reason from it. But in my opinion, reason comes in only after our mind has done the real work elsewhere.
EnFinlay 8y ago
Have you read Voltaire's Bastards? https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6584.Voltaire_s_Bastards https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6584.Voltaire_s_Bastards It is an in depth criticism of the overly rational. A lot of it went over my head or didn't make sense because I don't have a strong background on some historical/philosophical touchpoints, but I thought it was a great read.

totalrobe 8y ago

>Americans are becoming too rational ...maybe you have not noticed who is currently the US president?

lotsofpulp 8y ago

How is not addressing the cause of the hand licking rational?

inimino 8y ago
The cause was not known; this is the point of the story. Hypothesis generation is not a rational process.

kemayo 8y ago

> The hand-licking story that made the front page today illustrates this point perfectly. [...] > It is only when she applied an irrational approach to the problem, surrendering the need to control the situation, that she could finally understand what was going on. I feel like you have a somewhat idiosyncratic definition of "irrational" that you're applying here. What I took from the hand-licking story was that her initial attempt to brute-force the issue without understanding it was irrational, i.e. "not logical or reasonable", and that approach failed. Then, quite reasonably and rationally, she backed off and established trust with her child, found out the underlying cause of the issue, and provided a solution that resolved the underlying issue.

vinceguidry 8y ago
I think it's common for people, especially the overly-rational, to conflate correctness with rationality. Yes, with hindsight it can be seen that the actions she initially took were incorrect. But they seemed perfectly rational approaches at the time. If you see your child doing something anti-social, then it's logical to try to correct it because if you don't, it will cause problems for them down the road. In fact, it would have been irrational to not do anything about it. It was only when the logical brain got overridden by maternal instinct that she could choose an approach that led eventually to a resolution. The logical brain demands control over the situation. If she could have surrendered control earlier, perhaps even in the first few times she witnessed it, then she could have taken a less-combative approach.
- nybble41 8y ago
  > Yes, with hindsight it can be seen that the actions she initially took were incorrect. But they seemed perfectly rational approaches at the time. There was nothing incorrect or irrational about the actions the mother initially took. Her approach was reasonable given the limited information available to her. A slightly more rational approach would perhaps have placed greater emphasis on the value of empathy and her relationship with her child, which was being undermined by some of the measures she took, and given correspondingly less weight to the social pressure she was feeling from others—but in the end she made the rational decision in line with her own principles and priorities and stopped trying to force the issue. Later, when her son was both able and willing to discuss the matter, she was able to analyse the root cause and suggest several rational alternative courses of action which were readily adopted, thus putting an end to the problem for good. It's unclear from the write-up whether any maternal instincts were involved, but the peer pressure which pushed her to force the issue was clearly irrational and played on her instinctive desire for acceptance. Instincts and emotions are a good thing and shouldn't be ignored, but it's a mistake to follow them blindly—they can lead you into trouble just as easily as they can get you out of it. It's best to look at them as valuable inputs into the rational process, to be evaluated alongside other data before drawing any conclusions.

mancerayder 8y ago

Perhaps the starkest example of this phenomenon is when atheists lament that there aren't any atheist churches. 50 years ago, if you were an atheist, you still went to church. They were still the pillars that communities revolved around, the very loom of the fabric of society. Nowadays, we've thrown away every last bit of symbolism that brings people together and wonder why we're so lonely. If things aren't perfectly rational, people's minds rebel immediately and harshly, like it's my fault you don't understand a concept requiring depth of study to really grasp. You had me up until here. First of all, who's lonely, who's "we"? In a conformist society, those who think differently can find it more lonely, by definition. Second, atheists went to Church? Well was that because if they didn't, they were ostracized -- and, well, lonely? Children of higher intelligence (we do believe that it's possible that we're not all blank slates at birth, right?) tend to find it more lonely than children of average intelligence. If you consider yourself an exceptional (in some way) person -- rightly or wrongly -- you'll find things more complicated socially. Now I think you're onto something with the rationality bit, but not in the Nietzschean way you're alluding to (religion and community). Instead, well look at how we create our social bonds in the U.S.: use-value. Have you ever been in a position of power, and found that suddenly everyone wanted to be your friend? Or, have you read what men and women write on dating websites in terms of what they want? These to me are more evidence of a "rationality militates against happiness" than your strange atheist example.

vinceguidry 8y ago
> Second, atheists went to Church? Well was that because if they didn't, they were ostracized -- and, well, lonely? American distrust for religion began in the sixties and seventies. Before, it was a normal and accepted part of life. People wanted to go to church. Even if you didn't believe in it you still wanted to go. It's hard to believe but that's how all of the world's societies were up until very recently. Religion aided life, not hindered it. The Enlightenment was a comparatively small movement that really only took root in the intelligentsia. You would have had to pry religion out of the cold dead fingers of the common folks. Now, even religious folks often stay home on Sunday.

hindsightbias 8y ago

> that there aren't any atheist churches. That isn't a rational response, that's an irrational response to an emotional need they apparently do acknowledge. My grandfather and uncles literally built their churches with their bare hands and wallets. If you're an athiest and want a church, well, the rational response would be go out and build one. Or at least join the Unitarians. Most of them don't care.

gerbilly 8y ago

I agree that we overvalue reason. To reason about something you have to reason from premises. But where do the premises come from? I'm sure many of us have had that experience, when dealing with a difficult problem, where an insight comes to us out of the blue. Where did that new insight come from, certainly not through rational deliberation. In fact, often it's not until we stop reasoning that the insight is free to appear. Often we can't explain where the idea came from, it seems to be from some subconscious (irrational?) part of our mind. Once we have the insight (a new premise) then we can start to reason from it. But in my opinion, reason comes in only after our mind has done the real work elsewhere.

EnFinlay 8y ago

Have you read Voltaire's Bastards? https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6584.Voltaire_s_Bastards https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6584.Voltaire_s_Bastards It is an in depth criticism of the overly rational. A lot of it went over my head or didn't make sense because I don't have a strong background on some historical/philosophical touchpoints, but I thought it was a great read.