Oh nvm; @mbateman made my point five mins later

Unless you think reasons are never expressed in or enacted through anything observable to others, I think you have to conclude this

I think this is even easier with young children who have not yet developed the skill of hiding their thoughts and motivations from those around them, but possible and useful to do with anyone of any age

In other words, even if I were a Critical Rationalist I could take action based on my best guess of how well I understood their reasons and my best guess of what their reasons are?

And I just think that’s wrong? You can make observations of their behaviour, their body language etc to build up a hypothesis of what you think their reasons are, you can do tests and experiments, you can get information from the results of your experiments—

Listening to @astupple on @diviacaroline’s podcast with @mbateman; he claims that a child’s reasons are never fully knowable to you (~min 55) and therefore you should not act on the basis of your understanding of their reasons as if you know them

https://t.co/T6oEWmcAs8

Friend reminded me of this post I wrote a few years ago about chi; I reread it just now and I wanna recommend you read it, particularly if you might think chi is bullshit:

Did not appreciate how much a toddler’s language acquisition over time would resemble an AI generated image loading

I think I might be a Type of Guy

Ok children’s’ librarian seems to be fine with her on the kids table

This is leaving aside questions of safety; I’m comfortable spotting her most places

Obvious yes—an empty picnic table next to a playground Obvious no—the dinner table at a nice restaurant The children’s table at the library? Idk man

Ok I need help with an etiquette question. At home we let our 15mo climb onto tables as long as they aren’t being used for eating at Which tables would you let her climb onto in public?

And the converse question, which is something like ‘how do you tolerate the world in which you refrain from trying to shape your children, when it’s difficult to tolerate?’

‘Should you try to shape your children, and if so, to what degree?’ seems to be the most religious question I see people and communities I know grappling with on a day-to-day basis

Something about the way I understand marriages makes me think I could have an amazing matchmaking hit rate with only age, sex, all grandparents’ religious affiliations, and mother’s highest academic qualification (pending physical chemistry)

I’ve had a toddler for all of three weeks, and afaict toddlers’ desires are only incompatible with property rights and non-ergodic consequences

submission to a sufficiently loving authority is indistinguishable from freedom

Paging @nwilliams030