FI Learning

For learning with practice. Posts are not private and could end up on Bing.

🛠 Mindfulness Meditation

ingracke wrote:

You can learn some mindfulness meditation techniques for thinking about the feeling, identifying it, identifying the physical sensations and thoughts that you interpret as "frustrated" (or whatever), and sort of "stepping outside" of your thoughts and just viewing them, instead of being carried away by them. 

and

There are a lot of different apps that can help you get started with meditation, with guided meditations. They are of varying quality – some aren't actually very good. One that I have liked is Waking Up. 

I like this idea. Justin also said on Discord that he likes the Waking Up app. 

I have two reservations:

  1. I find Sam Harris annoying on his podcast. Maybe I’ll be biased against him. I could try a different app or book or something. Or I could try Waking Up and see how it goes.
  2. I’ve tried meditation briefly a few times before and not gotten anything from it. Maybe I was doing a different kind. ingracke talks about thinking about feelings and stepping outside your thoughts, which seems like it could help people understand their feelings and thoughts better, which seems good. What I did before seemed like trying not to have any feelings or thoughts, which I didn’t see the point of.

I will give Waking Up a try. It’s got a free trial that covers some intro sessions and some audio essays.

Comments & Events

Anne B
I classified this as a Project. But I didn’t think to do project planning for it. I’ll do some informal planning now.

Goal: Try out some mindfulness meditation and decide if I think I’ll benefit from it.

Plan for the first sub-project:
  • Try out the Waking Up app for its free trial period.
  • Keep in mind my reservations about it above.
  • Write down my thoughts about it as I go.
  • At the end, decide whether to continue with Waking Up, try mindfulness meditation in some other way, or drop the idea for now.
Justin Mallone
FYI if u like waking up app you can get a year for free by just asking https://app.wakingup.com/request-free-account
I did the intro course and have been listening to daily meditations and stoic path lately 
Justin Mallone
Sam Harris meditation stuff focuses on  vipassana. He talks about it here some https://samharris.org/how-to-meditate/

You can Google and see if it sounds okay compared to whatever you tried before 
Justin Mallone
I'm not exactly a big Sam Harris fan in other areas btw, but his meditation stuff seems okay 
Justin Mallone
I've had to ask ingracke some questions about some aspects tho. Like it's not always super clear to me what the point is. Be sure you try asking questions if you don't see the point of something Anne B Anne  . Don't just try doing a bunch stuff you don't understand the point of.
Anne B
Justin wrote:

Sam Harris meditation stuff focuses on  vipassana. He talks about it here some https://samharris.org/how-to-meditate/

Sam Harris writes there:

The problem is not thoughts themselves but the state of thinking without knowing that one is thinking.

This matches what I want to get out of it. It's not saying that thinking is bad. It's promoting awareness of thinking.

(Edit fixed a typo.)
Anne B
I just realized I did something I've done before. I read through that "How to Meditate" page and looked for a quote I agreed with. I didn't look for things in it that I disagreed with.
ingracke
Just to note about the Waking Up app. 

I tried a bunch of meditation apps, and Waking Up was my favourite. I liked Sam Harris' beginner meditations (the Introductory Course) a lot. It was more to the point and had better explanation than most of the ones I listened to did. I have never listened to his podcast, so don't know if what the similarities or differences are.

I haven't gone through all the app content, but I can tell you that for meditations, I liked the Introductory Course and the Daily Meditations. I also think the Stoic Path is good (it's not by Sam Harris, and they aren't really guided meditations though: it's more like theory).

In the Theory section, I've listened to Fundamentals, Mind & Emotion, and The Illusory Self. I think all of those were good and worth listening to. I think there is value in thinking about the idea of "self" being an illusion. There are some bad ways of interpreting that, but I think that what Sam says is all consistent with a good way of interpreting it too. 

BUT Sam Harris did talk about Free Will in one of the Mind & Emotion talks, and I don't agree with him about that. He has an entire section on Free Will, which I also suspect I would disagree with. So you could probably just skip that part. I just wanted to be clear that is NOT what I am recommending the app for. 
Anne B 👍
Anne B

ingracke wrote:

I think there is value in thinking about the idea of "self" being an illusion. There are some bad ways of interpreting that, but I think that what Sam says is all consistent with a good way of interpreting it too. 

I'm trying to figure this out. I don't understand how they mean that the self is an illusion. I'm not asking you to say more on the topic, just pointing out that it's something I'm pondering as I listen to things on the app. 
doubtingthomas
I thought this was a community to pile on Sam Harris but people accepting him is making a bit nervy. But I have a positive attitude about this and I'm ready to change my mind about Sam Harris again. I was actually steeped into understanding meditation and contemplative practices and thought it was the ultimate truth to understand in life until I found DD stuff.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
Some of Harris' stuff can be good, and some bad, and he can be irrational as a general truth-seeker/debater/discusser, all at the same time. You don't have to and should not pick which tribe to be in, the pro-Harris or anti-Harris tribe.

Meditation is not the ultimate truth to understand life. I don't think Harris claims that it is, though. Some more Eastern meditation stuff treats it more like an ultimate truth, but the more Eastern stuff is worse.
doubtingthomas
Meditation is not the ultimate truth to understand life

This is what I think now as well.

I don't think Harris claims that it is, though.

He wouldn't literally say this but something pretty close. He's said something like "this is all you need to know to be happy in this world". And (paraphrase) "You can be happy if you know this stuff even if you are in the worst possible imaginable conditions", he gives example of Buddhist Tibetian monks being tortured by the Chinese.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
Dan Harris doesn't have to be a great intellectual to write a decent book (that, btw, Sam Harris has praised) about attaining modest goals (10% improvement) using mindfulness meditation:


Sam also doesn't have to be a great intellectual, or be reasonable about capitalism or neuroscience, in order to do decent work re mindfulness meditation. If Dan can do it, why not Sam? You don't have to give Sam significant credit as an intellectual to think he did something useful – just don't automatically disqualify him from everything over his other, bad work (which isn't all bad but has large bad elements mixed in as themes).

Similarly, I think you'll find it unremarkable that Dan could be a social climber who is sometimes dishonest, but was still able to write a decent not-especially-intellectual book. Flawed people sometimes make decent stuff, and most decent stuff comes from people with tons of flaws. So if Dan can do it, why couldn't Sam do it too?
doubtingthomas
I have this (I guess) mistaken view of you that you are either fully pro someone or anti. I see I also need to improve at this stuff of putting people in tribes.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
He [Sam Harris] wouldn't literally say this but something pretty close. He's said something like "this is all you need to know to be happy in this world". And (paraphrase) "You can be happy if you know this stuff even if you are in the worst possible imaginable conditions", he gives example of Buddhist Tibetian monks being tortured by the Chinese.

I didn't know that. I'm not that familiar with Harris. I think that's bad and is related to his intellectual arrogance that's seen in some of his other work (which he blocks error correction about while pretending to be open to public debate/criticism/etc).
doubtingthomas
I also think that the idea that learning how to control you mind through meditation is the ultimate skill you need is mistaken. It's a solipsistic error (I think) . It's saying there's only this inner world you need to care about.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
I have this (I guess) mistaken view of you that you are either fully pro someone or anti. I see I also need to improve at this stuff of putting people in tribes.

That view is projection. It's about you and how you see the world. It has nothing to do with me. It's actually extremely foreign and unintuitive to me.

I've contradicted it routinely, e.g. by criticizing Popper on politics, Rand on induction, Deutsch on lots of things while still recommending his books, etc. Most stuff I like comes from people I disagree with about other stuff, e.g. I simultaneously think The Selfish Gene is a good book but that Dawkins has major flaws. Jonathan Stark, who I've recently been following and linking some stuff from, has a BLM banner on his website.
Justin Mallone
FWIW I didn't look into meditation previously because I generally associated it with eastern mysticism, and even if I had looked into meditation, I probably wouldn't have prioritized Sam Harris' stuff if it had not been specifically recommended to me.

I think people of all sorts can have some knowledge and make some useful contribution. OTOH, I think I had a view of what meditation was trying to accomplish - be some sort of overall secret of truth or approach to life - that did not seem compatible with my understanding of things. If, however, one views meditation as a technique or useful tool with some knowledge and tradition behind it - if you view meditation functionally - then I think you can get something out of it even if you generally try to follow rational philosophy.

FWIW I think I didn't look into the Stoics much before because I encountered some good criticisms of them and prematurely rejected them, when in fact there is some stuff there that would be useful. I think prematurely rejecting stuff cuz it's not in some way perfect is a common issue I've had and that I suspect a lot of other people have. On the one hand, it's rational to prioritize your efforts where you think they'll be most fruitful, and if you spot a flaw in something that might be a reason to give it lower priority. OTOH, if you're looking at/interested in something anyways, it's worth giving it a serious chance and seeing what value you can get from it rather than just being like "meh, this lacks attribute X or has flaw Y, so I'm going to reject it entirely." 
doubtingthomas 👍
doubtingthomas
That view is projection. It's about you and how you see the world.

Makes sense.

To give more details: for example when I see a blog post titled "Eliezer Yudkowsky is a fraud" I'm like cool! One less stupid person I don't need to care about. It changes my plans like I'm not gonna listen to all the podcasts I had downloaded featuring him.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
But I read EY's (long!) books... He's one of the relatively few people that I actually found was worth reading (about philosophy, even! That's one of the hardest subjects to write worthwhile stuff about).
Justin Mallone
I've often thought about the tribal perspective as the positive desire to want to feel like a part of a big group. And I think there's something to that, something that many people like about that, and it comes up with memes and stuff too.

But now I wonder how much of the tribes stuff is just about not wanting to make much mental effort to engage with people outside the tribe and take their ideas seriously.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
Partly people want an outgroup to be mean to, to feel superior to, to scapegoat for stuff, etc.
Justin Mallone 👍
doubtingthomas
But I read EY's (long!) books...

This changed my mind. I didn't even read the blog post. I just wanted to make quick judgements. Justin said it. Stuff about rejecting other tribe to save time.
doubtingthomas
This empowers me to ask: How can you call Elon stupid? I consider him to be in top 100 achievers in humanity. Going to Mars would've been delayed 10+ years if not for him.
doubtingthomas
PS: I think his sacrificial journey makes me biased towards him.
doubtingthomas
I've had this question for 4+ months but just hid it.
doubtingthomas
He's probably wrong on environmental stuff.
Justin Mallone
1) quote of curi calling Elon Musk stupid?

2) "Going to Mars would've been delayed 10+ years if not for him." That's written as if we already went to Mars, or maybe at least were going to Mars soon - as if it's a sure thing. Did I miss some news?
Justin Mallone
 I consider him to be in top 100 achievers in humanity. 

Are you confident in your ability to judge and rank the top achievers of the human race?
Justin Mallone
I think his sacrificial journey makes me biased towards him.

What sacrificial journey?
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
As far as I know, Elon hasn't done any significant good intellectual work, and is just an idiot social climber.

Things he's good at include:

- getting government help for his businesses
- bullying his wife into signing a harsh post-nup without her understanding what it meant
- dressing and talking in a way that engineers are OK with, while also being able to talk with suits
- (maybe) some stuff about hiring nerds

His family and personal life are a horrible mess too. There's video footage of his second+third wife talking about routinely wanting to leave him, and this is while they're together and he's sitting next to her, and he's like "Really?" and then she's like "no not really" but she totally meant it – and said it in front of a camera – and he's super gullible.

He's really into making his women get blonde hair. He likes to hang out with celebs, go to elite parties and restaurants, hang around people where the women are all trophy wives (or trophy gfs) who are into cosmetic surgery but not thinking or talking, etc.

One of his wives reported a revealing incident where he was seeing a stylist (like to get fashionable clothing) and Elon said roughly "no you don't understand, i can't look too hip or the engineers won't like me". He's an intentional, knowing manipulator in major ways.

But he's no good at science, technology, etc. Lots of his big projects he talks about are idiotic from the pov of someone who knows science stuff. See thunderf00t's repeated debunkings on youtube.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
i see from the discord chat that you've been referred to thunderf00t before. you had this issue for months but did you watch any?
doubtingthomas
2) "Going to Mars would've been delayed 10+ years if not for him." That's written as if we already went to Mars, or maybe at least were going to Mars soon - as if it's a sure thing. Did I miss some news?

Yeah it's not a sure thing but SpaceX is transporting to ISS and orbit frequently. Based on that I would guess that going to mars would work as well. Elon says a rocket will land by 2024.
doubtingthomas
i see from the discord chat that you've been referred to thunderf00t before. you had this issue for months but did you watch any?

I didn't watch them properly. I also looked through comments to see what other people were saying. I was social reasoning. I mostly fail at most things you tell me to do. That doesn't have anything to do with you I guess. I fail at most things in general.
doubtingthomas
Are you confident in your ability to judge and rank the top achievers of the human race?

I've spent a considerable amount of time in forming a picture of human achievements so I think I pretty much came across all important people. I'm not sure how good that makes me at judging and ranking. I didn't come across Rand so I would guess I missed some pretty important people as well.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
Have you read what Elon's first wife has written about him and his defense? He's a terrible person. His main defense is that he claims not to have met his second wife until after the divorce, and he just married her super fast rather than beginning a relationship with her while still married. If true, that counters one point of speculation while leaving most of the other accusations unanswered.

Have you read any anti-Elon stuff before forming the opinion that he's great? Or did you only look at one side of the story, one tribe's opinion?

Hollywood celebs have similar issues all the time but, afaik, intellectuals not so much. I think e.g. Sam Harris is famous enough for people to be interested in gossip about his personal life being awful (and it'd also be relevant to his claims about using meditation to be calm and happy and stuff).
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
I've spent a considerable amount of time in forming a picture of human achievements so I think I pretty much came across all important people.

Wow you're so arrogant.
Justin Mallone
Based on that I would guess that going to mars would work as well. Elon says a rocket will land by 2024.

I don't regard his statements as particularly trustworthy. My understanding is he's been lying about self-driving functionality and timeline stuff for years and also misrepresented whether he got some government approvals re: hyperloop, so I wouldn't put credence on his Mars timeline stuff.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
Thunderf00t covers Mars lies in some vids...
Justin Mallone
I've spent a considerable amount of time in forming a picture of human achievements so I think I pretty much came across all important people. I'm not sure how good that makes me at judging and ranking. I didn't come across Rand so I would guess I missed some pretty important people as well.

I think if your human achievement survey methodology missed the most important thinker of the 20th century you might wanna be a bit more humble
doubtingthomas
What sacrificial journey?

He pretty much put all his money in both his companies in 2008 when the financial crisis was happening. He was ready to be give it all up to accomplish something he believed in.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
you might wanna be a bit more 

the double qualifier ("might" + "a bit") is a social dynamics autopilot
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
He pretty much put all his money in both his companies in 2008 when the financial crisis was happening. He was ready to be give it all up to accomplish something he believed in.

He wasn't in danger of being poor. You're just impressed by his propaganda.
doubtingthomas
I've spent a considerable amount of time in forming a picture of human achievements so I think I pretty much came across all important people.

Wow you're so arrogant.

I later added that I missed Rand so that makes me think that I might be wrong. Isn't that not arrogant?
doubtingthomas
You're just impressed by his propaganda.

Looks like it.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
I later added that I missed Rand so that makes me think that I might be wrong. Isn't that not arrogant?

You wrote the sentence. If you don't mean it, write it differently. Don't write the wrong thing, expect people to read it, and be like "nvm j/k" in later text.
doubtingthomas
I don't regard his statements as particularly trustworthy. My understanding is he's been lying about self-driving functionality and timeline stuff for years

Looks like it finally might be coming but it was delayed a lot. He made a lot of people pay for it since way before.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
He's literally killing people with his lies about self-driving.
doubtingthomas
You wrote the sentence. If you don't mean it, write it differently. Don't write the wrong thing, expect people to read it, and be like "nvm j/k" in later text.

Yeah that's bad. Sorry. Didn't even know I did it. My poor reasoning powers are failing me.
doubtingthomas
Actually I don't understand this error with high confidence. I kind of get it.
doubtingthomas
He's literally killing people with his lies about self-driving.

As in the tech makes mistakes which killed people?
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
no, the lies kill ppl. ppl think the tech works differently than it does. if he told the truth they'd use it differently by e.g. always being in the driver's seat instead of making videos about having the car drive with no one in the driver's seat, which is unsafe and has killed ppl.

the lies are both from Tesla, who misnamed some features on purpose, and from Musk. also if Tesla was an ethical company, besides communicating about the features differently, they would detect if anyone is in driver's seat and pull the car over if it's self-driving with no one there. cars already can and do do similar detection, e.g. to enable or disable passenger airbag based on detecting a person there.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
basically they made some driver assist features and then called them self-driving.
doubtingthomas
One of his wives reported a revealing incident where he was seeing a stylist (like to get fashionable clothing) and Elon said roughly "no you don't understand, i can't look too hip or the engineers won't like me". He's an intentional, knowing manipulator in major ways.

yeah that's pretty revealing. changes my mind. it's kind of weird that I saw him as not being able to do social well and be a savant types

Edit: genius savant types
doubtingthomas
also if Tesla was an ethical company, besides communicating about the features differently, they would detect if anyone is in driver's seat

yeah that's some really stupid thing. they can easily put weight detection sensors to know if someone is in the driver's seat. they don't even have that
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
aside: on Discourse, a mod would be able to take all the posts that were already written re Musk and move them to their own topic.
Justin Mallone 👍
Anne B nice
doubtingthomas
lol. was this about meditation?
doubtingthomas
Have you read any anti-Elon stuff before forming the opinion that he's great? Or did you only look at one side of the story, one tribe's opinion?

one tribe only. he's considered god in silicon valley I guess so that convinced me. a VC guy who is a friend of elon told a story that Larry Page once told elon's friend that larry is inspired by what elon has achieved and thought about wanting to give all his (larry's) money to elon
doubtingthomas
and that google has created very little value when compared to tesla. Larry would've wanted to do more of what elon did
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
I think Larry Page is one of the main ppl responsible for how extremely evil Google is...
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
google search has created a lot of value though. tesla might be negative value.
doubtingthomas
I'll watch thunderfoot videos and then ask about science
doubtingthomas
There's this argument going around that if self driving cars lead to less accidents then having people driver's doesn't make sense. is it correct?

Edit: people driving not people driver's
doubtingthomas
Have you read what Elon's first wife has written about him and his defense? He's a terrible person. His main defense is that he claims not to have met his second wife until after the divorce, and he just married her super fast rather than beginning a relationship with her while still married. If true, that counters one point of speculation while leaving most of the other accusations unanswered.

I don't get this. Defense as in legal defense during legal proceedings of their divorce?
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
defensive arguments
doubtingthomas
against his first wife's claims that he started a relationship with a woman who became his second wife before they were divorced?
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
against "what Elon's first wife has written about him"
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
this is the kind of inability to read/understand that i don't understand clearly enough.
doubtingthomas
this inability is happening probably because I'm emotionally caught up about stuff above
doubtingthomas
I'm not able to write quick tiny replies anymore
doubtingthomas
stuff above

specially about arrogant stuff
doubtingthomas
tesla might be negative value.

why might? I thought you considered all environmental stuff negative that will cost trillions of dollars
doubtingthomas
I'm not giving importance to stuff other than science that elon is wrong about. I understood two examples from the many you gave where he is doing pretty stupid stuff.

I got some clarity now and this is what I am thinking: Calling someone stupid is belittling all their accomplishments. I agree when you call musk stupid for doing social stuff. So this is what I am thinking. You say 'Elon is stupid' I take it to mean that all that elon has accomplished is senseless and wrong because he built things based on wrong ideas. And he had wrong ideas because he is stupid.

I think this is a mistake I am making. Did I spot it right?
doubtingthomas
For example: 'Elon is stupid' doesn't mean SpaceX is a useless accomplishment.
doubtingthomas
or that building SpaceX was an easy task or that SpaceX is not having any positive value
doubtingthomas
this inability is happening probably because I'm emotionally caught up about stuff above

I felt that you are upset with me now or disappointed or think little of me. Another thing I thought you might be thinking: This guy was once making some progress but is now back to square one. Making the same stupid mistakes.
doubtingthomas
brought it back to meditation I suppose. 😎
doubtingthomas
(joking to feel better)
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
I felt that you are upset with me now or disappointed or think little of me. 

You have it all wrong in many ways.

I have > 100x the conversation experience that you do. I don't really care. This conversation doesn't stand out. I'm not being reactive to it. It isn't occupying a big place in my mind. It just blends in with all the others. It seems like a big deal to you b/c it's a much larger portion of all your conversations (plus newer ones get weighted more heavily).

I am not going through a rollercoaster of overestimating you then being disappointed. I did not lower my opinion of you from this conversation. I wasn't getting something wrong yesterday that I have to now revise. My opinions of people are more stable than that. I don't get all emotionally excited about new people and think they'll be amazing and then get emotionally disappointed. I'm not emotional about  you. I never have been.

Currently, I happen to be extremely tired, not focusing well, and extra tuned out and distant as a result. I was having this conversation today partly because it's really easy and low stakes for me. I can't do a lot of other stuff atm cuz too tired, but this is something chill I can still do.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
I appreciate that you are in a friendly, non-defensive mode and will admit to some stuff that is common but other ppl will not admit to in conversation with me. It's useful when ppl will share some of their conventional stuff instead of me having to guess it all by reading between the lines.
doubtingthomas
this inability is happening probably because I'm emotionally caught up about stuff above

I felt that you are upset with me now or disappointed or think little of me. Another thing I thought you might be thinking: This guy was once making some progress but is now back to square one. Making the same stupid mistakes.

Another reason I felt so was because the frequency of your replies decreased and Justin left too. I thought I did something wrong.

I considered that I wasn't giving any substantial arguments anymore so you both didn't see anything to respond to. I also considered that you might have chosen to reply later. This was in line with your policy of interacting which is a bit unconventional. I am starting to understand it and see value in it.
doubtingthomas
I appreciate that you are in a friendly, non-defensive mode and will admit to some stuff that is common but other ppl will not admit to in conversation with me.

I'm getting out a lot more than I am putting in. There's just a bit of fear in the start like jumping out of airplane but afterwards the return is a lot higher.
Anne B

Elliot wrote:

One of his wives reported a revealing incident where he was seeing a stylist (like to get fashionable clothing) and Elon said roughly "no you don't understand, i can't look too hip or the engineers won't like me". He's an intentional, knowing manipulator in major ways.

Don't most people choose their clothes based on social factors? Don't most people use clothes to try to get others to view them in certain ways?

Maybe many people do it without being conscious of it.

Even if they are conscious of it, they might not say it out loud like this.
Elliot, Fallible Ideas
Anne, you haven't said what your point or goal is.
Anne B
The point or goal of my previous message or of the mindfulness meditation project?
Anne B
Justin wrote:

I've had to ask ingracke some questions about some aspects tho. Like it's not always super clear to me what the point is. Be sure you try asking questions if you don't see the point of something Anne B Anne . Don't just try doing a bunch stuff you don't understand the point of.

I have some doubts about this.

  • I don't want to pressure ingracke to answer a bunch of questions.
  • Meditation seems like the kind of thing you can't understand really well when you first start it. If I tried to be clear about the point before doing it, it could be a long time before I actually did it.
Justin Mallone
Anne said:

  • I don't want to pressure ingracke to answer a bunch of questions.

I think Ingracke can decide whether they want to reply or not, and you can also just ask questions generally of anyone without specifically directing them to ingracke.

  • Meditation seems like the kind of thing you can't understand really well when you first start it. If I tried to be clear about the point before doing it, it could be a long time before I actually did it.
I didn't say don't try stuff at all if you don't see the point of it. There was a typo (should have been "a bunch of stuff") but I had in mind like, don't do something for days or weeks if you don't see the point. You can just try stuff a couple of times and see how it goes but if you're confused or don't see the point then ask questions.
Anne B
Okay, that makes sense.
Justin Mallone 👍
Anne B
I've done the first five meditations in the Intro Course, some of them more than once.

So far, I think the point is to 
  • practice focusing your mind on a particular thing, for example your breath
  • notice what thoughts pop up in your mind
  • notice physical sensations