Epistemic Status: This is a collection of useful heuristics I’ve gathered from a wide range of books and workshops, all rather evidence-based (robustness varies). These techniques are designed to supplement basics of rationalist discourse, helping facilitate interactions—mostly with those unfamiliar with rationalist thought, especially on entry-level arguments. They may also be useful in conversations between rationalists on occasion. This is also a minimal viable product for an upcoming sequence that will dive into the analysis of well-managed disagreements. Details are intentionally left out.

Tl;dr: Rephrase, ask questions, do not presume your conversation partner shares your epistemology (i.e way of coming to conclusions, in general), ask them for real-world counter-examples, share personal experiences both ways as a means to get clearer, check what kinds of blindspots their own motivation presumes, dovetail interests with brainstorming, and also, all of what I’ve just said is merely pointing to a specific state [...]

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.