Goffman on Frame Analysis and Lakoff on metaphor, I hope. Their best contributions. — Isaac

Exactly. Goffman looks like he's almost too much fun to read.

It's nit that we actually want everyone to be like us — Isaac

Yes, that's what I find interesting about the bone-headed approach; "just like me" isn't in there as a goal or even a preference. It's just a really cheap analysis. It's "process", but shows up as if it's a preference in almost exactly the same way models also behave as if they're filters. I need a cheap way to figure out your behavior, so I start by comparing you to me. It's not about my preferences at all, but it looks like it is.

Will have to get to the rest later. I still really want to see what will drive us to form abstractions like "intention" that we'll use in more sophisticated analysis.

Will have to get to the rest later. I still really want to see what will drive us to form abstractions like "intention" that we'll use in more sophisticated analysis. — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, I'd missed your last post (wrote half of my response earlier). Heading out now, will have a look in the morning.

what failure would force me to consider an abstract element of my action, and of yours, called the "intention"? That's more work, so why do we do it? — Srap Tasmaner

Interesting. As a guess, trust. If we're short-cutting, then the only reason to give that up is if it's not giving us unsurprising results. So to understand why we might give up any shortcut we need to look at where it might be producing surprise. Here, if I were a pro-vaccine, pro-science, left-of-centre intellectual (to pick one of the off-the-shelf social narratives), I'd expect a super-libertarian conservative to be anti-vaccine and might simply decry their choice as part of my script (why do people boo the villain in panto). But it would be surprising to find another pro-vaccine, pro-science, left-of-centre intellectual who, on this occasion, wasn't on script. That, I'd have thought, would trigger an analysis of 'intent', or some other abstraction, to resolve the surprise.

But the alternative is to simply deny the person acting so off-script is actually playing the same role as you afterall, rather they're nothing but an imposter! Much quicker. So maybe no trigger for analysis there either.

There always seem to be shortcuts available, and always reason to take them.

So, at the end of the day, we need the analysis to have a gain greater than the effort, doing it needs to be part of the story.

nteresting but pessimist and depressive news we should to check out about the new variant...
What is the Mu variant of COVID-19 the WHO is now monitoring? — javi2541997

Heard a new term yesterday, about how news outlet keep scaring people with new variants: "variant porn".

"variant porn". — Olivier5

Oh wow! the press and media do not know what to say anymore... we can also find out other names too. I would name it the mustard variant

Locking down creates immunity debt. So since we basically had no RSV season last year, it's booming now.

The same is predicted to happen with flu this year, and in places like Australia, probably next year. Long lockdowns come at a deadly price.

The simplest things I can think of are cases where something blocks action. That could be something external, akrasia, laziness, uncertainty, who knows. I could recognize in my own case that I have chosen a course of action but not carried it out yet, and describe this as having an intention. If you tell me you have chosen a course of action, and I know you haven't acted, I could describe you as having an intention.

For an action actually carried out, we're in Quine-Duhem territory: there are any number of ways of describing the action, mixing reasons and causes and beliefs and preferences and circumstances. Presumably the only reason to bother parsing intention and friends here is to make better predictions than we can make just using the action itself.

For the blocked-action case, it seems like the baseline would be a single prediction: that the intended act will be carried out. (And then we can modify later as we lose patience and so on.) We can think of intention as the well-defined little box into which we put "what you will do unless ..." So an intention is a special kind of prediction. Duh.

One funny thing about this is that if it's a single prediction (instead of a whole complex with various confidences), we can reverse the association -- that is, treat something for which we have a single prediction as if it were an intention.

I think you can actually hear this in daily conversation. If the baseline expectation is same-as-me, I can just predict you'll continue to be same-as-me. (Single prediction, yay!) If it turns out you've not taken some action I would have, or in fact have, I assume you intend to (this is the previous paragraph's point).

"Got my jab yesterday. You get yours?"
"No."
"But you're going to right?"

It's the immediate fallback. If you're not just like me, something stopped you from being like me -- gosh, what could it have -- nope, doesn't matter what it was, no use spending calories on that, presumably things will get back on track soon and you'll be just like me again. I predict it, therefore you intend it.

We know from our own case how externalities can interfere with our actions, and when we're forced to consider someone's behavior diverging from our prediction, we'll reach for that first, and preserve the assumption that your intention is to be like us. To show you this chain of reasoning, movies have to use dialogue, and they do this all the time:

"How was your date with Marcus last night?"
"I didn't go."
"Oh, got called into work again?"
"No."
"Marcus couldn't make it?"
"No."
"????" unable even to form the thought that you decided not to go.

The point of all of this is that we might use the same-as-me strategy as the starting point for judgment because it's dirt cheap. Similarly we might use same-as-me predictions because they're dirt cheap, guaranteed to be degenerate non-branching decision trees. Non-branching trees we talk about as intentions, both for ourselves and for others. (This is consonant with current neuroscience, right? We act, for reasons we know not, and if needed bolt-on a retrodiction of that action and call it the intention we had when we acted.) Non-branching trees are cheaper, and we will resist giving them up even when surprised.

I keep emphasizing the same-as-me strategy because it does seem like the cheapest baseline available, but your (Goffmanesque?) scripts and part-playing are similar, right? Once I've stocked my toolkit with single-path predictions that can be quickly and cheaply selected, I'll insist on using them. And when you fail to say the lines I've assigned you, my immediate fallback will be assuming you intend to say them and something stopped you. Acknowledging that you diverged on purpose is the last thing I want to do, because then to predict you I'll have to engage in expensive research (i.e., talk to you, which is not so bad, talk is cheap, but in this case I'll also have to listen to you and that blows).

Presumably the only reason to bother parsing intention and friends here is to make better predictions than we can make just using the action itself. — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, I think so. From a position of uncertainty about the variables, we might want to be wary (from a desire for surprise avoidance) of developing models which are insufficiently sensitive to them. If, every time I see a cup of foaming green liquid I recoil, I'll probably save myself a poisoning and only miss out on the occasional niche cocktail. But if, every time I see a cup of any liquid at all I recoil, I'm going to go thirsty. The model response is too insensitive to the variables colour and foaminess, which make a difference.

Here, if we have a just-like-me model, with caveats (not literally identical, just close enough), then we'd be wise to know something of the variables which determine that difference (the extent to which it's not exactly-like-me). Not knowing those variables leave us applying our shortcut randomly. We know we can't expect others in our role to behave exactly like us, but we've no idea how much variety to allow.

Take your smartly dressed man. He can judge his female colleague, even using the just-like-me method if he knows the variable of difference. He knows that [gender] is a variable, and he knows that it causes variation in dress-vs-trousers, colour, make-up etc. He knows it doesn't allow difference in the extent of scruffiness, sports branding, or decency. Knowing these he can use just-like-me because 'like' is well-defined.

Non-branching trees we talk about as intentions, both for ourselves and for others. (This is consonant with current neuroscience, right? We act, for reasons we know not, and if needed bolt-on a retrodiction of that action and call it the intention we had when we acted.) Non-branching trees are cheaper, and we will resist giving them up even when surprised. — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, that's right, and this gets us into very conflicting territory, between folk-psychology and psychology. In folk psychology, 'Intentions' are a similar beast, both in terms of prediction and in terms of cause. "I will walk down the road because I intend to go to the pub" and "I walked down the road because I intended to go to the pub". But psychologically (in my model anyway - everyone else is, unfortunately, wrong!), prediction is about interaction with the environment, sensation<>belief (likelihood to act as if...) and cause is, as you say, about retrospective storytelling, memory<>belief. Two quite different beasts.

I keep emphasizing the same-as-me strategy because it does seem like the cheapest baseline available, but your (Goffmanesque?) scripts and part-playing are similar, right? — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, I'm tempted to say scripts are cheaper. The trouble with same-as-me, is that it always has caveats, it requires the assessment of sameness. Scripts tend to already accommodate variety. There's a range of next lines, a range of next actions, and a range of tokens identifying others playing the same role. Tradition has already widened the parameters in response to a kind of cultural evolutionary pressure to do so. It's too surprising to have too strict a requirement (people can't keep to it and so often act out of role), but it's also too surprising to have too lose a requirement (it doesn't have any predictive power at all. The hero of a story never does exactly the same thing (except the latest Star Wars films, of course!), but they're always recognisable, they never kill and old lady for the fun of it, and if they do, we're cross.

Acknowledging that you diverged on purpose is the last thing I want to do, because then to predict you I'll have to engage in expensive research (i.e., talk to you, which is not so bad, talk is cheap, but in this case I'll also have to listen to you and that blows). — Srap Tasmaner

Yeah, this is still true notwithstanding the above, but regarding what's happening here? I'm stepping out of role, by not getting vaccinated, or being insufficiently just-like-them, but the response is to assume I've done so mistakenly? I'm not sure that quite describes the responses, seems like there's more to it.

Yes, I'm tempted to say scripts are cheaper. The trouble with same-as-me, is that it always has caveats, it requires the assessment of sameness. Scripts tend to already accommodate variety. — Isaac

That's very interesting. You could be absolutely right. Of course my approach has been to presume that we put as little work as possible into the sameness judgment -- starting from zero, just assuming it, and revising as little as possible at each step. So you could be right that just assigning to someone an off-the-shelf role is cheaper. Sadly, this is starting to look like something you'd want to design experiments for and the armchair phase might be done.

I'm stepping out of role, by not getting vaccinated, or being insufficiently just-like-them, but the response is to assume I've done so mistakenly? I'm not sure that quite describes the responses, seems like there's more to it. — Isaac

Sure. But now I have a new way of describing my thing about "not believing in disagreement": same-as-me can assume you're not getting vaccinated because there's something you don't know (that I do), or don't understand (that I do), or indeed that you've made a mistake, some error of reasoning (that I didn't). You having your own reasons, also valid, is the absolute last resort. There may even be some general exasperation at having to go all the way to the end of the list of options for dealing with you -- you've cost people precious calories, and at each step towards the next more expensive option there's this hope that we're about to be done, right before that hope is dashed.

All of that is *before* genuine disagreement is acknowledged, grudgingly, and I don't have anything to say about that yet.

Sadly, this is starting to look like something you'd want to design experiments for and the armchair phase might be done. — Srap Tasmaner

Already have though. from the famous (infamous) Asch, Milgram and Zimbardo, through to the less famous stuff like Birney, Burdick, and Teevan (work on hippy culture in the 60s) or the stunningly insightful, prescient, well-designed, and handsomely researched, but sadly before-it's-time, work done by a young psychology researcher at the tail end of the last millennium...I forget his name...

All suffer, of course from the perennial problem of psychology experiments in that they're little more than glorified guesswork, but you know, glorified guesswork is better than just, well, guesswork.

If we can adopt roles just by changing clothes, then it seems unlikely that an all pervasive just-like-me system is in play. If our own judgement of appropriate behaviour is dictated somewhat by tokens of social role (dress, badges, titles), then it seems unlikely we'll not be influenced by those same tokens when we see them on others and judge the appropriateness of their behaviour accordingly.

What we could say, I suppose, is that we still have a just-like-me judgement system when we're within roles (ie judging someone in the same role as us). It might be that we judge others by conformity to their social-stereotypes but judge the detail of the role we're currently playing by our own decisions within it, rather than the much broader parameters of it's own social narrative. Would be interesting, I'm not aware of anything done in that specific area.

same-as-me can assume you're not getting vaccinated because there's something you don't know (that I do), or don't understand (that I do), or indeed that you've made a mistake, some error of reasoning (that I didn't). You having your own reasons, also valid, is the absolute last resort. — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, this is good. I mean, I couch it in terms of social roles, but the analysis is the same so it doesn't matter. The last resort is that the social role we're playing is broader than we thought, contains more options. After all the whole point of social roles is to constrain the maddening chaos of options. Or, heaven forfend, that we might actually be playing the role wrong. That we might be the ones off-script. What an annoyance finding that out would be.

There may even be some general exasperation at having to go all the way to the end of the list of options for dealing with you -- you've cost people precious calories, and at each step towards the next more expensive option there's this hope that we're about to be done, right before that hope is dashed. — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, and I'm truly sorry about that, litigation is available, my professional indemnity insurance covers lost calories.

If we can adopt roles just by changing clothes, then it seems unlikely that an all pervasive just-like-me system is in play. — Isaac

I honestly have no idea what value the "just-like-me" idea has. It is An Idea I Had, so I've been screwing around with it.

One point about it of interest is that in the vaccination case, everyone who has an opinion about another's behavior has faced the same choice, or some variation on the same choice, as those they are judging, which is a little unusual; and what's unusual about that -- as opportunities for moral judgment go -- is taken as the usual case for discussions that aspire to transcend taste: philosophy, politics, science, the sort of stuff we do around here.

We don't treat differences of opinion as a matter of taste here: when a question is put to you, it is the same question that's put to everyone; disagreement between you and me is exactly a case of you not being enough like me. Maybe that counts as a case of this:

What we could say, I suppose, is that we still have a just-like-me judgement system when we're within roles (ie judging someone in the same role as us). — Isaac

It's just a little thin, at first glance, to call discussing philosophy "taking on the role of person-discussing-philosophy". On the other hand, people do have a surprising amount to say about the behavior they expect of their fellow discussers -- "I don't have the burden of proof, you do," "Why won't you answer my question?!" "Why do you keep bringing that up, I've already addressed it!" and the rest. Maybe it's just that within a discussion there are a number of different roles available and we tend both to lose track and make too much of which role each participant is supposed to be playing at the moment. Bleh.

Anyhow, this thread did have a kind of doubling up of the usual demand that everyone have the same opinion I do -- as a matter of philosophical integrity -- as a bonus demand that they make the same decision I did IRL.

I suppose what's of particular interest to you is when the social roles or the parts we're playing obtrude upon our "universal" discussion. People use this as an accusation -- "Of course, you'd think that, because you're a tree-hugging Gaia worshiper." This amounts to a claim that I have reasons for my beliefs but your beliefs are caused, which might be the most widely held belief on the forum.

I honestly have no idea what value the "just-like-me" idea has. It is An Idea I Had, so I've been screwing around with it. — Srap Tasmaner

That's cool, I'm always interested in ideas.

everyone who has an opinion about another's behavior has faced the same choice, or some variation on the same choice, as those they are judging, which is a little unusual — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, in classical 'moral dilemma' terms, this is a moral dilemma we all face (as opposed to the seeming abundance of runaway trolley cars which remarkably I've never had the misfortune to have to deal with). And also, perhaps, that the decision is binary. It's not like giving to charity, or even abortion which can have scalar answers.

The effect is maybe to make the script less variable. We see it in the associations. Trump thinks the virus came from China, everyone sane has to think it didn't. Gun-toting rednecks don't mask, urban liberals have to mask... there's only two options and if one of them is the one the villain picked, the hero's choices are a bit limited. They can't both wear black.

people do have a surprising amount to say about the behavior they expect of their fellow discussers -- "I don't have the burden of proof, you do," "Why won't you answer my question?!" "Why do you keep bringing that up, I've already addressed it!" and the rest. Maybe it's just that within a discussion there are a number of different roles available and we tend both to lose track and make too much of which role each participant is supposed to be playing at the moment. — Srap Tasmaner

Possibly. I think that the anonymity of internet discussion just allows for a greater variety of roles and people may lose track.

People use this as an accusation -- "Of course, you'd think that, because you're a tree-hugging Gaia worshiper." This amounts to a claim that I have reasons for my beliefs but your beliefs are caused, which might be the most widely held belief on the forum. — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, we read this a lot. Of course we all have reasons for our beliefs, it's just that they're not always reasons other people find satisfactory. That's all we've got here really, an exchange of reasons and a summing up of why we find the other's unsatisfactory.

Except, of course, it's all bullshit because the idea that people are truly assessing reasons like philosophical jewellers examine a diamond for flaws is nonsense. The decision comes first, then the assessment of reason to find sufficient flaws to justify it.

Except, of course, it's all bullshit because the idea that people are truly assessing reasons like philosophical jewellers examine a diamond for flaws is nonsense. The decision comes first, then the assessment of reason to find sufficient flaws to justify it. — Isaac

Here I am slowly peeling back the lid so that the worms can only come out of the can one by one and we get a chance to look at them, and then you come along and just smash the thing open on the counter.

First, even if our reasons are rationalizations, they can be "good" or "bad": not all stories make sense.

Next, given Quine-Duhem, maybe the reasons you give are not your actual reasons in any meaningful sense, but they could have been, and what difference does it make?

And when it comes to other people's ideas, I tend to think the intuitive, even "emotional" response is valuable, even when it precedes whatever rational support we can find for it. (My posting history is littered with proof.) Something in me has run some models and said "no", I just don't know why. And I happen to *really* enjoy trying to figure out what my intuition might have spotted on my behalf. It could turn out my intuition has been jumping to conclusions again and I can overrule it. Bad intuition! Bad! But it gets a lot right too.

Your burden would be to show how the roles we play and the stories we tell can evolve, without a two-tiered model that explicitly accommodates review and revision. I think.

I have several thousand other things to say about all this...

First, even if our reasons are rationalizations, they can be "good" or "bad": not all stories make sense. — Srap Tasmaner

This and the psychologists fallacy, which is that you can't allege someone else's failure to be objective is due to inherent psychological limitations and not apply the same to yourself.

From a pre-print:

Massive randomized study is proof that surgical masks limit coronavirus spread, authors say (Sep 1, 2021)


You'll occasionally see someone not having their mask cover their nose, or otherwise not used quite right. I guess effectiveness depends on a few things, on some scale, not just (y) or (n). (No @frank this isn't derived from that report, just a general observation. :smile:)

the psychologists fallacy — Hanover

Not wild about this argument. Or maybe I just don't quite understand it. Is the idea that psychologist's claim is self-refuting, or are we just calling out a double standard? Maybe I just can't work up much enthusiasm for the idea of "objective truth", either to affirm it or deny it.

How do you see this argument "biting"? Can you spell it out a little for me?

It arose earlier, more along the lines of arguing that the position one assumes in the Covid debate is determined by political alignment/ social identification and we're only fooling ourselves to suggest otherwise. That is, our justifications are mere self preservation rationalizations. If that is the case, then those informing us of this must realize that their wisdom is nothing but rationalization as well and therefore useless.

I place this in the camp of deterministic problems, where you are forced to deny meaningful assessment can exist but must accept you just must believe as you must. No one can get outside his own bubble and is stuck with accepting what he will regardless of the evidence or logic presented to him.

It's anti-philosophical and anti-rational. It asserts a fixed state of beliefs for all based upon predetermined psychological factors.

That is, our justifications are mere self preservation rationalizations. — Hanover

What's the problem with saying this is often, pre-reflectively, the case, but that with sufficient self examination the tendency may be overcome, and you might actually change your mind?

The "fixed" part is just empirically false, but can't I believe that my beliefs are fully determined by my state and my environment, rather than a matter of free choice, and just note that what I read, the arguments people make to me, and so on, are also part of my environment, and go into modifying my state?

but can't I believe that my beliefs are fully determined by my state and my environment, rather than a matter of free choice — Srap Tasmaner

If course you can believe that. If determinism is true then you will either be determined to believe that or not. And the determination could of course change.

I think @Hanover is pointing to the problem that, if determinism is true, then beliefs are not rationally, but causally, determined. Of course the two determinants might appear to coincide, but if determinism is true then there is no necessity that they must or that we must be correct in thinking that our beliefs are rationally determined.

The "fixed" part is just empirically false, but can't I believe that my beliefs are fully determined by my state and my environment, rather than a matter of free choice, and just note that what I read, the arguments people make to me, and so on, are also part of my environment, and go into modifying my state? — Srap Tasmaner

If the algorithm of the universe dictates Srap will believe X, it will be so. If you claim your beliefs are from what you read, that will be the case because the algorithm dictated you would say that. All is determined, even your beliefs for why you have your beliefs. If you take seriously the idea that your beliefs are beyond your control, you have no reason to debate your beliefs.

I place the ability to freely judge an argument in the category of foundational assumptions required to make the world intelligible. If you wish to reject this foundational assumption, you go the way of the solipsist, and it's for that reason I don't find that objection worth debating. It's a universal rejection of reason, and it could be inserted in every thread on this site.

Telling me I'm stuck arguing for X because my ilk just believes that way ends every debate, thus my claim it is an anti-philosophical, anti-rational position.

If you take seriously the idea that your beliefs are beyond your control, you have no reason to debate your beliefs. — Hanover

And evidently don't need one, as you just said. It's still a fact that I do. Maybe what I say causes your beliefs to change or fails to; maybe you evaluate my words rationally and freely choose to agree or not. What difference does it make?

Telling me I'm stuck arguing for X because my ilk just believes that way — Hanover

And again that's just empirically false and you could easily prove it.

Is it inconsistent to disbelieve this part (the "fixed" and "stuck" business) if I believe the other part?

if determinism is true, then beliefs are not rationally, but causally, determined — Janus

Sure, I get that.

And if the thesis of determinism is true, then some of the things I say, and some of the things you could reasonably claim are presupposed both by what I say and by my saying them, are not literally true. Whatever that means, if anything.

I don't see why I have to care. I absolutely do not know what the current thinking either in science or in philosophy is on determinism. I don't know if it's a well-defined thesis at all. I do not endorse it.

But neither do I endorse what Strawson famously called the "obscure and panicky metaphysics of libertarianism." That position I know I can't make any sense of.

So I'm inclined to pass by the whole question as ill-formed, and I'm not at all inclined to throw in with either side. There's plenty of other stuff to think about.

Whatever that means, if anything. — Srap Tasmaner

So I'm inclined to pass by the whole question as ill-formed, and I'm not at all inclined to throw in with either side. — Srap Tasmaner

I agree and wasn't making any claim for the truth of determinism. I've always thought that compatibilism is a fudge, though, because the logics of determinism and freedom just don't mesh with one another.

So this

That is, our justifications are mere self preservation rationalizations. — Hanover


What's the problem with saying this is often, pre-reflectively, the case, but that with sufficient self examination the tendency may be overcome, and you might actually change your mind? — Janus

was just to say that change of mind is not inconsistent with determinism, leaving aside the question of freedom.

.

our justifications are mere self preservation rationalizations — Hanover

rationalization as well and therefore useless — Hanover

Meant to respond to this idea. No.

The only things I want to capture by using the familiar word "rationalization" are that they are rational -- they do work to justify the position they're supposed to -- and they are post-hoc.

I think of them like proofs in mathematics: you can have a crummy proof that you stumble on god knows how and thus learn that a hypothesis is true; later you can come up with a beautiful proof that shows the deep connections between things, those connections motivating each step, with the result being a sequence of steps that shows clearly why the theorem is true and illuminates the field of which it is a theorem. The latter is better, and the latter is the kind of rationalization we like.

I've always thought that compatibilism is a fudge, though, because the logics of determinism and freedom just don't mesh with one another. — Janus

I'm so indifferent to the issue I don't even care if you call me a "compatibilist" (as people have Strawson). Isms are junk, suitable only for doing cereal-box philosophy. ("This one tastes better but I know this other one is better for me, hmmmm." Like that. That's not thinking, that's shopping.)

So I'm inclined to pass by the whole question as ill-formed, and I'm not at all inclined to throw in with either side. There's plenty of other stuff to think about. — Srap Tasmaner

This line of discussion wasn't intended to sway your opinion on determinism, but was initiated only to explain my objection to @Isaac's line of argument. I raised the psychologist's fallacy, and you asked for a better description of it. I get that the free will debate isn't something that everyone will be interested in thinking through,, but if an argument is presented that implicates an unworkable logical outcome, that can't be ignored simply because it broaches a topic not of personal interest.

if an argument is presented that implicates an unworkable logical outcome, that can't be ignored simply because it broaches a topic not of personal interest — Hanover

I suppose that's fair. I was a little feisty about it, but I tried to indicate that I'm not sure it's an issue worth anyone's interest, not in the form it's usually presented.

On the other hand, your original point was about objectivity and you never picked up that thread. Putting the pieces together I get something like this:

1. Our beliefs are objective only if arrived at through reason.
2. If our beliefs are caused then they are not arrived at through reason.
Therefore
3. If our beliefs are caused, then they are not objective.

Is that the argument? I mean, (2) is clearly true, but what's the justification for (1)? Why isn't (1) something more like "Our beliefs are only objective if supported by reason"? Then (1) would leave room for post-facto justifications, which, as I said, is more or less how I use the word "rationalization". (If the word "rationalization" is the problem because it has a disreputable common usage, I'm happy to drop it.)

But why does that have to be the actual process? It feels like we're treading perilously close to a genetic fallacy, or mixing up discovery and confirmation. -- Is that the right pair of terms? I remember at one time it being a big deal in the philosophy of science, that the steps leading to an insight, an hypothesis, might not be logical or defensible, might be some chance thing, but no worries because the process of testing that hypothesis are completely different, rigorous, logical and exacting. Maybe people don't think that anymore, but it always made sense to me. I'd have ideas at the chessboard and no idea where they came from, but then you have to analyze. That simple. Maybe that's another reason post-hoc justification seems so natural to me.

NOTE ADDED:
Not challenging your use of "objective" but what's it mean here? Is it synonymous with "arrived at by reason"?

Here I am slowly peeling back the lid so that the worms can only come out of the can one by one and we get a chance to look at them, and then you come along and just smash the thing open on the counter. — Srap Tasmaner

Sorry, my mood was perhaps worse than I ought to have allowed myself to communicate whilst in.

First, even if our reasons are rationalizations, they can be "good" or "bad": not all stories make sense. — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, that's exactly the purpose, I think, of the stories in the first place. Not just any old story will do, some are better than others and we can swap out the rubbish ones for the better ones. This is spot on. Precisely my aim in analysing such stories (in myself, anyway - I've yet to be convinced that such analysis alone can influence others - as in my analysis of their story).

Next, given Quine-Duhem, maybe the reasons you give are not your actual reasons in any meaningful sense, but they could have been, and what difference does it make? — Srap Tasmaner

The difference is only in recognising the limits. For each reason you identify as part of your post-hoc rationalisation, you might dislike it, you might want to choose a better story, and that better story might lead to better intuitive actions next time, but you'd miss that opportunity if you only considered your actions to be determined by those reasons you originally gave. All reasons sound reasonable - we're not generally that stupid, we don't act contrary to what seems like reason. So to change our actions we have to have some concept of alternative reasons (rather than just a concept of reasons being flawed). Quine-Duhem. There's too many acceptable reasons, we have to choose.

when it comes to other people's ideas, I tend to think the intuitive, even "emotional" response is valuable, even when it precedes whatever rational support we can find for it. (My posting history is littered with proof.) Something in me has run some models and said "no", I just don't know why. And I happen to *really* enjoy trying to figure out what my intuition might have spotted on my behalf. It could turn out my intuition has been jumping to conclusions again and I can overrule it. Bad intuition! Bad! But it gets a lot right too. — Srap Tasmaner

Maybe. It depends how you analyse the outcome. What properties of an action (prompted by intuition) do you use to categorise it as 'Bad' or 'Good'? Is it the extent to which you're satisfied with it - surely just the extent to which it fits with your identity, your own social narrative? You can't be judging it by any objective standard of outcome, that would require a level of brainpower we just don't have access to. Shortcuts aren't always an optional energy-saver, sometimes they're simply a necessity of the mechanism, like a pocket calculator's short version of Pi.

Your burden would be to show how the roles we play and the stories we tell can evolve, without a two-tiered model that explicitly accommodates review and revision. I think. — Srap Tasmaner

No, I think a two-tiered model is appropriate. We just shouldn't get caught up in the social exercise of what is a private function. You may well review and revise your stories, select others which fit better or feel more satisfying, these may well lead to better actions in the future. That's not the necessarily same thing as you engaging in the social game of review and revision. That's all I'm saying (in what was way too ornery and laconic a turn of phrase...sorry).

I raised the psychologist's fallacy — Hanover

which is that you can't allege someone else's failure to be objective is due to inherent psychological limitations and not apply the same to yourself. — Hanover

Have I done this? If you can find an example, I'd be sorely disappointed It's certainly been my intention and (as far as I can remember) my actual reality, to be clear that this applies to me as much as anyone else.

I don't see how that causes a problem. One's opinion will be formed, in large part, by the opinion which is used as a membership token for the social groups to which one wishes to belong, or the social roles one plays. That includes my opinion just expressed, which is part of a generic 'psychologist' role - fusty academic (I even have the tweeds and the leather armchair...), see everything as a psychological issue, detracted observer, etc.. A social narrative, a story. One I quite like (which is why I keep it).

I don't see how it's being a role prevents me playing it, or prevents anyone else from responding to it in kind.