How Does Veritula Work?
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With an account, you can revise, criticize, and comment on ideas.If I understand Veritula correctly, we first start with an idea. We accept that idea as true until it is criticized. The idea is considered false until all criticism is resolved. Since the goal is to live a rational life, we wouldn't act in accordance with that idea. We don't submit bulk ideas or criticisms. Ideas (including criticisms), even if related, should generally be submitted separately. Also, avoid duplicate ideas.
What if, at that time, the best idea one has is the false idea?
The idea is not good if it has outstanding criticisms.
Don’t worry about which ideas are better than others. That’s a remnant of justificationism. Only go by whether an idea has outstanding criticisms.
Say you have an idea, that you take to be true, but at the same time, you understand that that idea has flaws, you haven't come up with a better idea yet, so you act based on this idea.
I guess that's where figuring that out before acting comes in.
Can you give an example of a flawed idea you think is true and want to act on?
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The reframing of an idea with criticism being problematic instead of false solves this. Because now I’m not acting based on a false idea but a problematic idea.
I don’t think that solves it because one shouldn’t act on a problematic idea either. And falseness can still be the reason an idea is problematic in the first place.
So, please give an example.
The current city I live in. I have outstanding criticisms about it. But I still live here.
The mere idea ‘continue living in city X’ may have pending criticisms. But so might the idea ‘leave X’. Maybe leaving is too expensive right now, or you’d have to find a new job and you like your job more than you want to leave, etc. In which case there could be a third idea: ‘At some point I’d like to leave X, but for right now that’s too expensive and too cumbersome, so staying in X for another year is fine.’ And that idea may not have any pending criticisms.
Does that make sense?
It does. But wouldn't that explain away the problem itself? I guess understanding and moving the problem into the future where I might be better suited to solve it is a good idea. So now I am acting on an explanation that solves the problem tentatively.
It’s just an example. We’re not actually trying to solve the problem of where you want to live. We’re trying to understand how Veritula works.
Another example is physics. The idea ‘Newtonian physics is the true explanation of gravity’ has pending criticisms. For all we know, it’s false. But the idea ‘As an architect, I use Newtonian physics to make calculations because it’s simpler than general relativity and gives nearly identical results on earth’ may have no pending criticisms. So it’s rational for the architect to go with Newtonian physics.
The architect isn’t moving the problem into the future. Finding the true explanation of gravity was never his problem. He’s picking the best tool for the job, today.
The idea is considered false until all criticism is resolved. Since the goal is to live a rational life, we wouldn't act in accordance with that idea.
To someone unfamiliar with Veritula, this may sound like you’re suggesting not to live according to an idea even after all its criticisms have been resolved.
I recommend changing it to ‘we wouldn't act in accordance with an idea that has outstanding criticisms.’