A person is not just a set of ideas.

Their personality definitely is a result of the ideas they have. But people are much deeper than their personalities. They are idea-generators.

A person is not inherently evil.

It is the evil ideas they hold in their mind that cause us to say so.

Some people can be hard to reason with. Force and dogma can blind a person to better ideas. But minds are malleable.

While criticizing, focus on specific ideas, not people.

An Ad Hominem argument is not going to help improve the ideas someone holds in their mind. It will usually arouse indignation from the person being criticized.

Labelling people also inclines you to dismiss their ideas. Which hampers the growth of knowledge.

Remember, people are not their ideas. They can change their mind.

Paul Graham’s Hierarchy of Disagreement relates to this idea of how to disagree well.

The Amazing Things & Ideas List

1. Book I’m reading

The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand

2. A long awaited conversation

Naval Ravikant interviews David Deutsch.

• Humans

• Knowledge

• AGI

• Taking Children Seriously

• Good explanations

• And much more

3. The Critical Rationalism Hub

Arjun Khemani @arjunkhemani

🚨 ANNOUNCING: Critical Rationalism Hub The place to learn all about our deepest theory of knowledge. Learn more at CriticalRationalism.org

criticalrationalism.orgCritical RationalismA crowdsourced collection of resources about and adjacent to Critical Rationalism....

5:03 PM ∙ Feb 7, 2023

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4. On the nature of experience

“Experience is not what happens to a man; it is what a man does with what happens to him.”

— Aldous Huxley, 1932, Texts and Pretexts

New Podcast Episode

#13 – Danny Miranda: Creating Podcasts and The Future

Danny Miranda is the host of The Danny Miranda Podcast where he’s interviewed people like Bryan Johnson, Morgan Housel, Gary Vaynerchuck, David Perell, Jim O’Shaughnessy, Sam Parr, Anthony Pompliano, Derek Sivers, among many others.

We talk about Danny’s thoughts on creating content, the invaluableness of Twitter, Danny’s entire process of creating a podcast, optimism, the future of podcasting, and more!

Listen on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

Thank you for reading.

I’ve got to meet the coolest people through work I’ve published on the Internet. Don’t hesitate to reach out by replying to this email or by sending me a DM on Twitter.

If you enjoy my newsletter, the best way to support it is by sharing it. And if you have the means, please consider buying me a coffee.

Onward,
Arjun

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