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    A bias that produces accurate outputs only incidentally—t... — Carmelics
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    Challenges→Effective behavior can be aided by inaccurate judgments or cognitively adaptive illusions

    A bias that produces accurate outputs only incidentally—through correlation with a narrow task—lacks the counterfactual robustness required to count as epistemically adaptive.

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    1 reason for
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    Reasons For

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    Reason for
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    • 1.Epistemic virtues require reliability across counterfactual scenarios, not just accidental success in one domain.
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    • 2.A bias that correlates with accuracy only narrowly cannot generalize or transfer, limiting its rational justification.
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    • 3.Incidental accuracy lacks the causal mechanism linking the bias to truth-tracking needed for genuine adaptation.
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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
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    • 1.Evolution selects for actual survival outcomes, not mechanisms—a bias succeeding repeatedly is adaptively sufficient.
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    • 2.Counterfactual robustness is unknowable in principle; demanding it sets an unrealistic epistemic standard.
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    • 3.Narrow-task accuracy can still be instrumentally valuable and rationally usable without broad counterfactual stability.
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    Consciousness & Mind1 linkedMoral Responsibility1 linked

    Related

    A bias that correlates with accuracy only narrowly cannot generalize or transfer...Counterfactual robustness is unknowable in principle; demanding it sets an unrea...Effective behavior can be aided by inaccurate judgments or cognitively adaptive ...Epistemic virtues require reliability across counterfactual scenarios, not just ...
    +3 moreShow less
    Evolution selects for actual survival outcomes, not mechanisms—a bias succeeding...Incidental accuracy lacks the causal mechanism linking the bias to truth-trackin...Narrow-task accuracy can still be instrumentally valuable and rationally usable ...

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    Perspectives
    2 (1 for, 1 against)
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