[alancalverd]

How did you get those numbers?

You want to get there from here, because this is not a good place (why else?). At any junction you can turn left or right. If you always turn left (prejudice) you will at best get back to where you started. If you toss a coin at each stage (random choice) you will make gradual progress, at least away from here and possibly towards something better. 

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

How did you get those numbers?

You want to get there from here, because this is not a good place (why else?). At any junction you can turn left or right. If you always turn left (prejudice) you will at best get back to where you started. If you toss a coin at each stage (random choice) you will make gradual progress, at least away from here and possibly towards something better. 

If you have to make correct decisions 10 times in a row, then your chance to survive by doing it randomly is less than 0.1%

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Sam Harris explains his view of Ethics to Jordan Peterson

Jordan Peterson confronts Sam Harris on the concept of Evil

Sam Harris & Jordan Peterson - Vancouver - 2
Moderated by Bret Weinstein
06/24/2018

This is the second time Sam & Jordan appeared live together on stage. This event took place at the Orpheum Theatre in Vancouver BC Canada on June 24th 2018 in front of a sold out audience of 3000 people. The event was produced by Pangburn Philosophy.

My take on evil persons or behaviors : given several similar situations/conditions, the persons consistently make decisions which produce worse results/consequences. Bad consequences alone are inadequate to define evil, because they can also be caused by honest mistakes or force majeures.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Can we make ultimate moral judgements? | Tommy J. Curry, Joanna Kavenna, Massimo Pigliucci

For a couple of millenia in the West we have judged people and their actions by the standards of good and evil. But, from Mother Theresa to Winston Churchill the notion that an individual is simply good is hard to sustain. Almost all claim to be good. Even the Nazis believed they were on a moral crusade against the evils of corruption and deceit, managing to enlist the Catholic church in support. And, from the Crusades to 9/11, seeing oneself and one's cause as good has a habit of intensifying dispute and conflict.

Should we conclude that dividing the world into good and bad is not just misguided but actually dangerous? Should we adopt a Roman approach to human qualities and actions where kindness and brutality could both be valued in the same one individual? Or is the distinction between good and bad essential to social well being, public order, and individual growth?

Dalai Lama pointed out that evil is like cancer to the society.
But with adequate knowledge, we can turn cancers into something useful.

[alancalverd]

If you have to make correct decisions 10 times in a row, then your chance to survive by doing it randomly is less than 0.1%

Very few decisions are life and death. They are mostly about better or worse. The classic cases involve  "monkey versus expert"  investment advice trials, in which the monkey generally does just as well as the expert in the long term  if he has a broad enough portfolio.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Very few decisions are life and death.

You will almost certainly die if you decide to stop breathing.

[alancalverd]

A very difficult decision to implement. The autonomic system takes over when your blood CO2 level increases.  The decision to stop eating or drinking is fatal but usually prompted by a prior decision that  life has become intolerable and will not improve.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Goal-Oriented Decision Making: The A.P.E. Model

The APE model explores how we experience goal-oriented decision making. This includes the role of motivation and the experience of decision making in terms of how we assess, plan, and execute. The model also discusses how experience influences the use of intuition and deliberation.

The foundations of the model as well as the concept of goal-oriented decision making, was derived from research on goal theory, naturalistic decision making, and social cognitive theory.

Subconscious decisions and executions which are crucial for survival like breathing, eating, sleeping are often taken into granted.

[alancalverd]

Subconscious decisions and executions which are crucial for survival like breathing, eating, sleeping are often taken into granted.

Because two of them aren't decisions but firmware responses.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Subconscious decisions and executions which are crucial for survival like breathing, eating, sleeping are often taken into granted.

Because two of them aren't decisions but firmware responses.

They are merely different in the number of layers between inputs and outputs.

[alancalverd]

Not just the number but the nature of the layers. You will eventually sleep, however much you want to stay awake. There are two distinct layers to breathing, and whilst you have some voluntary control of the process, it is not possible to kill yourself by refusing to breathe (not the same as strangulation or drowning, but just deciding to hold your breath). But you can starve yourself to death - eating is not an autonomic reflex.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Not just the number but the nature of the layers. You will eventually sleep, however much you want to stay awake. There are two distinct layers to breathing, and whilst you have some voluntary control of the process, it is not possible to kill yourself by refusing to breathe (not the same as strangulation or drowning, but just deciding to hold your breath). But you can starve yourself to death - eating is not an autonomic reflex.

Logically, that nature of additional condition simply adds another layer between inputs and outputs, with corresponding weights for each connection. Reflexes have few layers, while thoughtful strategies require more layers.
Reflexes can be trained, such as in martial arts, riding bikes, swimming, or playing musical instruments. The training can be done deliberately or by force.
Holding breath to death is hard. But it's possible, if you are really committed to it. But you can't brag about it when successful. Some chemicals may also help.

[alancalverd]

Reflexes can be trained, such as in martial arts, riding bikes, swimming, or playing musical instruments.

Not quite. Training in these activities is about converting a conscious decision, that goes through a process of analysis and searching recall of "what to do next", into an unconscious one that makes a direct association between stimulus and response, but it isn't an autonomic reflex.  If you have learned multiplication tables or how to drive a manual-gearbox car, you have almost certainly acquired unconscious responses, but autonomic responses are the ones you were born with and keep you alive when you are asleep. 

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Reflexes can be trained, such as in martial arts, riding bikes, swimming, or playing musical instruments.

Not quite. Training in these activities is about converting a conscious decision, that goes through a process of analysis and searching recall of "what to do next", into an unconscious one that makes a direct association between stimulus and response, but it isn't an autonomic reflex.  If you have learned multiplication tables or how to drive a manual-gearbox car, you have almost certainly acquired unconscious responses, but autonomic responses are the ones you were born with and keep you alive when you are asleep. 

What's your point?
Making important responses subconscious can reduce energy consumption and response time, which makes it more efficient, and effective in most cases.

[alancalverd]

What's your point?

to distinguish between an autonomic or reflex response and a learned unconscious action. The distinction is life-critical.

The learning process is particularly interesting. At some point the memory acquires content-addressability, with a significant improvement in performance. And there's a change in visual concentration: you get to rely on peripheral vision, which is good for detecting motion, to pick up the stimulus whilst your central visual field (color, spatial resolution) starts working on the response.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

to distinguish between an autonomic or reflex response and a learned unconscious action. The distinction is life-critical.

If someone lack of an important autonomous function, hence they need to be trained to perform that function subconsciously, what would be the problem?

[alancalverd]

What would be the problem? The fact that nobody knows how to do it.

Lack of an autonomic function such as respiration or heartbeat usually leads to death within a few minutes. You can use a ventilator, cardiac massage, or whatever, but even if you could learn to breathe subconsciously, you would die as soon as you fell asleep.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

What would be the problem? The fact that nobody knows how to do it.

Lack of an autonomic function such as respiration or heartbeat usually leads to death within a few minutes. You can use a ventilator, cardiac massage, or whatever, but even if you could learn to breathe subconsciously, you would die as soon as you fell asleep.

I've read some babies don't breathe, and some don't have beating heart when they were born, until the doctors induce them to.
Do you think the doctors should let them die?

[alancalverd]

Been there a couple of times. Prefer to get them started. Lack of pulse is rare, but there are  neonatal defibs. A whiff of CO2 usually  triggers autonomic respiration.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Been there a couple of times. Prefer to get them started. Lack of pulse is rare, but there are  neonatal defibs. A whiff of CO2 usually  triggers autonomic respiration.

It means the functionalities are more important than whether or not they were acquired when we were born.