LW
Are You a Solar Deity?
Scott uses Littledale's satire proving Max Muller was a solar myth to show how comparative methods can prove anything, and asks how to tell true correspondences from false ones.
8 min read 1,221 words
The independent Scott Alexander archive
Scott Alexander, collected.
Essays, arguments, and unexpected connections. An independent archive of Slate Star Codex, Astral Codex Ten, and LessWrong.
The collection
2,008 essaysLW
The Skeptic's Trilemma
Scott argues that good skeptics should try to explain strange claims, as Marinatos did with Atlantis and Santorini, rather than worship them or reflexively ignore them.
11 min read 1,647 words
LW
The Least Convenient Possible World
Scott argues that rationalists should test their objections against 'the least convenient possible world,' where convenient excuses are removed, in order to find their true reasons and avoid dodging hard questions.
10 min read 1,438 words
LW
Talking Snakes: A Cautionary Tale
Scott uses a conversation with a Muslim woman who found evolution absurd to show that the absurdity heuristic, as used in Bill Maher's "talking snake" argument, is a bad way to dismiss beliefs.
6 min read 844 words
LW
The Apologist and the Revolutionary
Scott explains Ramachandran's theory that anosognosia and split-brain confabulation reflect a left-brain 'apologist' and a right-brain 'revolutionary' whose balance governs our ability to change our minds.
11 min read 1,618 words
LW
You May Already Be A Sinner
Scott uses Calvinist predestination and Tversky's ice-water heart study to show how people confuse correlation with causation and deceive themselves about their own motives.
8 min read 1,094 words
LW
The Mystery of the Haunted Rationalist
Using a haunted mansion thought experiment, Scott argues that one mind can hold separate levels of belief about ghosts: what it professes, what it bets on, and what it fears.
6 min read 890 words
LW
Simultaneously Right and Wrong
Scott uses self-handicapping studies to argue that people can hold a biased belief on the surface and an accurate one underneath, much like belief in belief.
7 min read 1,066 words
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