Quotes About Reasoning

It was as though I had parted company all at once with my usual reasoning self, which had withdrawn into the shadows, leaving me no means of communicating with it; while another "I" took command, functioning at a different, more mysterious level, where all outer appearances were deceptive, and even the thoughts in my head shot with ambiguity.

Even research communities of highly intelligent and well-meaning individuals can fall prey to confirmation bias, as IQ is positively correlated with the number of reasons people find to support their own side in an argument

As with visual illusions, we can't make our minds work differently than they do no matter how smart we are. Just as we can't unsee an illusion, intellect or willpower alone can't make us resist motivated reasoning.

If you put individuals together in the right way, such that some individuals can use their reasoning powers to disconfirm the claims of others, and all individuals feel some common bond or shared fate that allows them to interact civilly, you can create a group that ends up producing good reasoning as an emergent property of the social system. This is why it's so important to have intellectual and ideological diversity within any group or institution whose goal is to find truth.

Why might my belief not be true? What other evidence might be out there bearing on my belief? Are there similar areas I can look toward to gauge whether similar beliefs to mine are true? What sources of information could I have missed or minimized on the way to reaching my belief? What are the reasons someone else could have a different belief, what's their support, and why might they be right instead of me? What other perspectives are there as to why things turned out the way they did?

thinking in bets is not a miracle cure. Thinking in bets won't make self-serving bias disappear or motivated reasoning vanish into thin air. But it will make those things better. And a little bit better is all we need to transform our lives.

This irrational, circular information-processing pattern is called motivated reasoning. The way we process new information is driven by the beliefs we hold, strengthening them. Those strengthened beliefs then drive how we process further information, and so on.

We did not evolve to solve tricky logic puzzles on our own, they point out, and so we shouldn't be surprised by the fact that we're no good at it, any more than by the fact that we're no good at breathing underwater. What we did evolve to do is persuade other people of our views, and to guard against being misled by others. Reasoning is a social activity, in other words, and should be practiced as such.

And I do not fear to say that those who are held Wise among men and who search the reasons of things Are those who bring the most sorrow on themselves.

I'm merely trying to give you the sort of argument that would appeal to your intelligence.

All effort is pointless, but it passes the time. Reasoning is sterile, but amusing. Loving is tedious, but possibly preferable to not loving.

Should we reason our way out of sadness ? But why, when reasoning requires effort ? And the sad man lacks the necessary energy to make any effort at all.

Anything that involves action, be it war or reasoning, is false; and anything that involves abdication is false too.

Cuando discutimos de algún asunto la razón no la tiene quien más grita sino el que es capaz de enlazar sus argumentos de modo adecuado.

I want to study philosophy. That fascinates me.

All things make sense; you just have to fathom how they make sense.

We apply law to facts. We don't apply feelings to facts.

You never ask why you've been fired because if you do, they're liable to tell you.

He is no lawyer who cannot take two sides.

Arithmetic! Algebra! Geometry! Grandiose trinity! Luminous triangle! Whoever has not known you is without sense!

I was awfully curious to find out why I didn't go insane.

Culture is the habit of being pleased with the best and knowing why.

I don't know why, it's the same reason why you like some music and you don't like others. There's something about it that you like. Ultimately I don't find it's in my best interests to try and analyze it, since it's fundamentally emotional.

That's why we don't give the government extra money as conservatives because government generally stinks at spending money. That's why!