Rationality: From AI to Zombies

by Eliezer Yudkowsky

When a lie has been defended for ages upon ages, the true origin of the inherited habits lost in the mists, with layer after layer of undocumented sickness; then the wise, I think, will start over from scratch, rather than trying to selectively discard the original lie while keeping the habits of thought that protected it. Just admit you were wrong, give up entirely on the mistake, stop defending it at all, stop trying to say you were even a little right, stop trying to save face, just say “Oops!” and throw out the whole thing and begin again. That capacity—to really, really, without defense, admit you were entirely wrong—is why religious experience will never be like scientific experience. No religion can absorb that capacity without losing itself entirely and becoming simple humanity . . .