Author: Harrison Dean

Daily Practicing Quote

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From James Clear:

Two simple rules:

  1. You get better at what you practice.
  2. Everything is practice.

Look around and you may be surprised by what people are “practicing” each day. If you consider each moment a repetition, what are most people training for all day long?

Many people are practicing getting mad on social media. Others are practicing the fine art of noticing how they have been wronged. Still more have mastered the craft of making plans (but never following through).

But, of course, it doesn’t have to be that way.

What are you practicing?

Soul-Making Quote

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Alex Hormozi posted this and I want to refer to it later, hence I’m copying it below.

Imagine you’re talking to God about the person you want to become…

– You say “I want to be courageous.”
– God replies “Then I will give you monsters to terrify you. That way you can conquer them.”

– You say “I want to be patient.”
– God replies “Then I will make you work harder and longer. That way you can learn to wait.”

– You say “I want to be wise.”
– God replies “Then I will give you failures that will crush your spirit. That way you can learn the value of judgment.”

– You then say… “That sounds like a hard life. Can you give me a good life?”
– God replies “Just like we measure the quality of a blacksmith by the strength of his steel, I measure you by what you are at the end, not the fire and the hammer it took to make you. A good life isn’t an easy life. A good life makes you into a good person. And that, my child, is a hard life.”

Interview w/ Peter van Inwagen: Annihilation Wands, Philosophy, Pluralism, The Bible, & More

On By Harrison DeanIn ChristianityLeave a comment

0:00 – Introduction
1:03 – Why did van Inwagen become a philosopher?
4:50 – Did he view arguments in a different light after conversion?
5:58 – John Hick’s work
7:45 – Hick’s challenge: the arbitrariness of religious exclusivity
11:05 – “The Church” vs. “Christianity”
14:14 – Quotes from John Hick & van Inwagen’s reaction
16:20 – “What does this all got to do with feelings anyway?”
18:40 – Hick on the Church’s Salvific claims
22:28 – Me Playing Devil’s Advocate
26:33 – “If I was born in Germany in 1920, I’d probably be a Nazi!”
28:31 – Open Theism
36:20 – Pastoral concerns about sovereignty and free will
40:45 – Philosophical disagreement
45:35 – Does philosophy establish or explain things?
52:25 – Fine Tuning
53:25 – Natural Theology, The God of the Philosopher vs. God of the Bible
57:48 – Problem of Evil & Ideal Agnostics
1:03:20 – Hell
1:09:11 – Annihilation wand
1:13:38 – Is it a problem that free will is a mystery?
1:17:10 – Abstract Objects
1:27:39 – The Inspiration of the Hebrew Bible & the Morality of God’s Commands
1:40:10 – Why couldn’t God give us a coherent revelation?
1:42:50 – Epistemic possibility
1:44:30 – Can we derive doctrine from the Old Testament?
1:49:50 – Is choosing hell irrational?

Is Tech Ruining Our Relationships? | Live Speech

On By Harrison DeanIn Ethics, VideosLeave a comment

This speech has issues, but I decided to post it to learn from my mistakes.

Here are my critiques:

Style:

      • The presentation was choppy. I could have practiced more to smooth it out.
      • Asking people to visualize multiple scenarios was probably too complicated. I should have replaced it with one mini-story or something similar.
      • I should have paused longer after asking people to choose their favorite scenario.
      • I used some filler words: um, like, etc.

      Content:

        I should have clarified that my claim is not that we should always give people in our presence our attention. It’s more like all else being equal we should give people in our presence attention instead of those we’re connected to digitally.

        A Domestic Thought Experiment

        On By Harrison DeanIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

        I’ve been thinking about how to promote good relations in households. This post is an exploration of one way to do this. 

        Consider households with multiple people: each member of the household has preferences, i.e. what they like and what they don’t. Most people have numerous preferences across many domains: dishes, noise, activities, cleanliness, etc. 

        Typically, we only know a fraction of our housemates’ preferences. But consider a hypothetical: suppose we had complete knowledge of our housemates’ preferences, would that be better or worse? 

        I think it would be better, here’s why: 

        1. A complete knowledge of everyone’s preferences would reduce unintentional annoyances. If I know my roommate hates shoes in the living room, I will try not to leave mine there. (Assuming I don’t have overriding, competing ends)
        1. Knowledge of each other’s preferences would help us love each other. If I know my roommate likes being asked how his day was, that knowledge will incline me to do that more often.  

        There are two potential downsides to this complete knowledge:  

        1. A complete knowledge of each other’s preferences would make it easier to annoy housemates. If I want to bug my roommate passive-aggressively, knowing he hates shoes in the living room gives me an easy opportunity.
        1. More knowledge might be offensive. I can imagine someone saying the following after learning his housemate hates it when he plays a certain song on the piano: “You hate that song I play on the piano? Well it’s my favorite song and I’ve spent dozens of hours practicing it. It’s insulting you don’t appreciate my efforts.”  That isn’t a rational response, but it could happen.   

        I don’t think those two would occur frequently and so I don’t give them much weight. 

        So if I’m right about all this, what’s the practical application? 

        Well, if it’s better to have complete knowledge of your housemates’ preferences, maybe we can approach that ideal. Perhaps it takes the form of group discussions where people share their preferences or something like that. It’s unlikely we’ll ever get to the point of being fully informed about each other’s desires, but as far as I’m concerned, the more the better.