[HervalFreire]

There was a science experiment where they took pessimists and optimists and had them rate themselves from one to ten in terms of looks.

Then they had another external group of people rate them based off of the same 1 to 10 scale to get an unbiased baseline.

Turns out pessimists had a more accurate and realistic rating around how good they looked. While optimists had ratings that were wildly overblown. There are other experiments that measured other things related to these two groups of people.

It turns out optimists are, happier, have higher salaries and are much more successful in life while pessimists are more likely to be clinically depressed.

This experiment tells us a dark truth about human nature. We lie to ourselves to stay sane. We construct illusions to protect ourselves from fully experiencing the cruel reality of life.

Optimism is a special kind of blindness. It's blindness that blinds you from being aware you're blind.

So look deeply at yourself. Are you happy? Are you optimistic? If so then that is in itself a statistical statement about how delusional and intelligent you actually are. Can you handle the truth?

I wonder how this post will get voted? Down for being depressing and negative? Or up for being truthful?

[r3trohack3r]

> I wonder how this post will get voted? Down for being depressing and negative? Or up for being truthful?

Likely down for talking about votes.

And for assuming there is only one truth.

> We construct illusions to protect ourselves from fully experiencing the cruel reality of life.

Reality is cruel. Nature is cruel. Existence is cruel. And Humans have overcome a substantial amount of that cruelty and enjoy a quality of life our ancestors couldn't even dream of.

There are many other things to be optimistic about given where life on earth started and how it is going for humans. Our ancestors have come a long way in 4.5bn years, it would be special kind of blindness to write that progress off as a lie we tell ourselves to stay sane.

[HervalFreire]

Who knows? You could be right and I could be the one that is totally blind.

I propose an experiment to find out just which one of us is actually more delusional. To start off, how would you rate yourself in terms of looks from 1 to 10?

[mewpmewp2]

I disagree with a lot of what you are saying. Firstly I wouldn't label myself any way, neither pessimist or optimist.

But you can be amazed at what has happened throughout the whole history and what humans have built, and be optimistic and excited about the future, and that we can handle the problems thrown at us and be completely realistic at the same time.

And even if there was some way to accurately judge whether optimists or pessimists view the World more accurately, it doesn't mean you can't still view the world accurately and be an optimist at the same time.

It might just be that optimists on average are more likely to view things in a better light than they are, but it doesn't apply to every single optimist.

There is truth, but also even bad truth like a problem coming your way you can treat it as an exciting challenge or a nuisance.

[HervalFreire]

https://radiolab.org/episodes/91618-lying-to-ourselves

What I'm saying is not something I made up. It's actual science.

Listen to the podcast if you have the time. It's derived from actual multitudes of scientific research done on thousands of people. It's only 12 minutes and it's really good and it will change your perception of the importance of knowing the truth.

This is real. And the experiments cited in this podcast are only a fraction of the psychological experiments used to confirm this theory. It's not about a matter of your opinion, it's science.

But even if it's real it doesn't matter does it? Because it's all about your perception and your ability to delude yourself.

[mewpmewp2]

I was responding to your points. Is there any other specific point you want me to respond to?

Because the arguments are that you can overestimate your capabilities or be overconfident to perform better, which I agree with, but my point is that none of it is indicative that someone having generally a positive view of the world necessarily implies that they would have less grasp on reality.

I think the experiments are not evidence that one has to "delude" themselves to be positive or happy. Because the end of your post implied that there must be at least some level of delusion going on.

[HervalFreire]

>but my point is that none of it is indicative that someone having generally a positive view of the world necessarily implies that they would have less grasp on reality.

From the podcast:

    Joanna: The people who were the most realistic, that actually see the world exactly as it is, tend to be slightly more depressed than others.

    Robert: Time and time again, researchers have found that depressed people lie less.

    Ruben: They see all the pain in the world. How horrible people are with each other and they tell you everything about themselves. What their weaknesses are, what terrible things they've done to other people and the problem is they're right....

That one research study they used as an example is one out of multitudes used to formulate the conclusion I cited above.

In short:

   People who tend to be realistic tend to be depressed. People who lie to themselves tend to be happy. 

I mean it's obvious that this point contradicts your claim. Ask yourself, are you lying to yourself right now? Are you currently being optimistically delusional about what was actually stated in the podcast? Hard to say.

[mewpmewp2]

It may be that on average "realistic" people are more depressed, but it doesn't mean an individual "realistic" person can't be generally happy.

It's only an "average". You can have a set with average of -20, but it could be a range of -60 to 20, so you can have 20s in the set while on average the set is below 0.

> They see all the pain in the world. How horrible people are with each other and they tell you everything about themselves. What their weaknesses are, what terrible things they've done to other people and the problem is they're right

There's both negatives and positives in the World. You can accept the negatives and appreciate the positives. Humans have suffered throughout the whole duration they have existed as species. You don't have to be depressed because of that. You can appreciate all what humanity has built, and where we have reached in our quest to advance and innovate. We are discovering more and more every day. You can focus on your curiosity. I have no problem discussing those topics or noticing those issues.

> What their weaknesses are

You can accept your weaknesses and either work on them or consider them not worthy to be worked on and focus on your strengths instead. Some weaknesses are worth working on, others are not and you can just accept that they exist.

> what terrible things they've done to other people and the problem is they're right

Everyone makes mistakes. No point in staying around feeling guilty about it. Move on and do your best.

> I mean it's obvious that this point contradicts your claim. Ask yourself, are you lying to yourself right now? Are you currently being optimistically delusional about what was actually stated in the podcast? Hard to say.

It's not contradicting, it's just taking one seemingly unhealthy mindset, that seems to correlate with certain type of realism, but overall you can have an healthy mindset about realism where you accept the bad and appreciate the good.

The podcast is missing this healthy type of acceptance and appreciation of truth.

[HervalFreire]

>The podcast is missing this healthy type of acceptance and appreciation of truth.

The podcast is grounded in science and only speculates about the consequences via the data and the studies it cites. The people who were interviewed are psychologists who empirically study this scientifically and their conclusions are more well developed then yours given that they've spent a huge amount of time dedicated to elucidating these findings.

Your conclusion on the other hand was not formulated on data. It was formulated in attempt to fulfill your bias. You took the data and tried to mold it so it would fit your current world view instead of adjusting your world view according to what the data straight forwardly implies. I mean you are trying to push the conclusions of the study toward a positive outcome when reality in essence doesn't care about positive or negative outcomes. It can all be negative and that is a completely valid outcome.

I mean where is the data about people who healthily accept the truth? You would need that data to formulate a scientific conclusion. If no such data exists then where did your conclusion come from?

Perhaps the subject of podcast was talking about something you're doing right now.

I ask myself in attempting to get at the absolute dark truth... is what I'm doing good for either of us in terms of mental health? Probably not. I take it back.

You're completely right and I'm wrong.

[mewpmewp2]

Okay, listening to the podcast. I understand your point much better now, that seems like a very interesting episode, thank you for that. Like if there are some unpleasant truths that if you don't believe to be true would make your life much easier.

But the questionnaire on the streets - to be fair, if I were to answer "no" there, it doesn't mean I would be lying to myself, I might only be lying to the interviewer, for obvious reasons.

[mewpmewp2]

I mean it's very interesting topic, but there's many things to take a part or consider here. Visualising success is a recommended activity for instance, but it doesn't necessarily mean lying to oneself, it's just preparing yourself, going through what is upcoming.

[rixed]

Let's see if there is anything of value in between those two extreme viewpoints...

Reality is cruel and often sad, and for our own sake our brain tricks us into believing it's all pink, making us optimistic, delusional and stupid.

On the other hand, contemplating all the time just how cruel and vain everything is left us depressed and unmotivated and eventually makes life useless and worthless.

Well, then maybe we could aim for the middle, aknowledge that our brain has a tendency to paint everything either pink or black, but that with some little effort it's not so hard to recognize these trends when they happen and navigate in between, and be realistically satisfied that we can actually achieve to do that and be happy without delusion?

[mnky9800n]

but it isn't a lie. everything you said here is biased by your perspective on reality. everything you read here is biased by your perspective. everything i understand you said is biased by my perspective. it is a wonder any of us at all are able to communicate with each other ideas using words and body language. it is quite possible that we are all non-overlapping cognitive bubbles traveling around interpreting input never actually connecting or understanding each other in any real way.

[HervalFreire]

Would it be different if I told you that what I wrote here is based on and confirmed by science?

When subject to the rigor of statistical confirmation then what I said is no longer a "perspective". It is a fundamental fact about reality as we know it.

[mnky9800n]

Science is an attempt to remove bias from perception but it's not perfect. I feel like we are on the same page but reading different books.

[HervalFreire]

Its nearly perfect if the sample size is big enough.

Barring that it's also the best we can do. There's no better alternative to science so you either believe in the science or you believe something significantly less accurate then science.

If you're not on board with science that has been thoroughly researched then it's akin to saying you're not on board with reality.

[mnky9800n]

I feel like I'm on board with science. I have a PhD in physics and a position at a researcher both in an industrial research lab and part-time at a university. I spend most days thinking about something related to science.

But I also think about how we as individuals perceive reality and is there an objective perception of that reality? Often times our perceptions bias even what we choose to observe scientifically. This can blind us or make us stick to things even when they are no longer useful. For example, Sabine Hossenfelders criticism of inventing new particles with the only evidence being various unexplained statistical uncertainties [1]. Science is quite useful because it's a way to try and average our perceptions of reality such that we get an explanation that we all more or less agree with. But, most of these explanations are wrong in some way depending on what initial and boundary conditions you pick. That is, it's all about the perspective you choose when approaching a problem as to whether you ever arrive at a meaningful solution or not.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/sep/26/physic...