To Be Rational
Humans are often condemned as irrational creatures spewing forth untruths and behaving unpredictably. The few that behave rationally, we praise as being logical people. But what does that really mean, to be logical? People rarely use formal first order logic to think about things, so a logical person is more of a loose term for "people that make sense." However, if we want to become more rational people we should understand what makes one person wise and another foolish. So, I'd like to formalize what it means to be rational. I define a rational human as being both world and thought rational. Rationality in each of these categories requires completeness and consistency:
- World rational: Humans are constantly building models to represent what they experience in the world. World rationality deals with how the world is being translated into these internal models.
- Complete: If these models do not describe every phenomena that a person experiences, they are not complete.
- Consistent: If the models are an inaccurate representation of what is actually happening in the world, they are inconsistent.
- Thought rational: Once a human has built a model of the world, they use it to think and reason. Thought rationality deals with how the internal models of the world translate into a sequence of thoughts.
- Complete: If the internal model is not entirely accessible for processing, thoughts are incomplete. Human memory is fallible, so thought completeness is difficult to achieve.
- Consistent: If thoughts do not flow logically (referring to the formal definition of logic), they are inconsistent. Humans usually think in a sequence of conditionals, so logical fallacies are uncommon. More often than not, inconsistency arises from incomplete thoughts or a lack of world rationality.
I agree with the observation on what makes a man rational, but I have trouble agreeing that a man thinking in this way alone makes him wise and all others foolish. Although it may not be rational, I believe that there is great value in thinking emotionally. A man that has mastered his emotions can understand other people in a way that a man who is completely rational never could. Even so, I love this idea that you presented! Very well put together!
ReplyDeleteI agree. I should have said "Perception rational" instead of "World rational." That would consider all your perceptions including emotion, rather than just external stimulus. If you have a complete and consistent model of your own emotions, your emotional thought will be rational. I think a lot of people don't understand their emotions (incompleteness) or they don't know how to resolve conflicting emotions (inconsistency). That is what makes emotions seem irrational.
ReplyDeleteWoah. It sounds like being perfectly rational is a tall order. If our internal model is not entirely accessible, does that mean it exists for things we can't remember (or are hiding out in the back of our minds)? Even if we don't consciously remember certain things, do the lessons learned from these experiences make a passable substitute in our models? We probably don't have a lot of memories of being a baby, but we remember the basics we learned back then.
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