SSC
Socratic Grilling
Scott Alexander advocates for 'Socratic grilling' as a valuable learning tool, urging people not to mistake genuine confusion and questioning for arrogance or challenges to authority.
10 min read 1,434 words
A thread through the archive
intellectual humility
Essays tagged “intellectual humility”. Follow an idea across the archive.
Essays on intellectual humility
3 essaysSSC
Addendum to “Targeting Meritocracy”
Scott Alexander revisits his 'Targeting Meritocracy' post, realizing the disagreements stemmed from different fundamental perspectives: mistake theory vs. conflict theory.
3 min read 322 words
SSC
Concept-Shaped Holes Can Be Impossible To Notice
Scott Alexander discusses the difficulty of recognizing concepts we might be missing, using examples from psychology and sociology to argue for keeping an open mind towards seemingly trivial ideas.
13 min read 1,915 words