Optimism, Pessimism, and Agency

predicting the future in a world we all influence

Recently

Neoliberal Feudalism

wrote an excellent primer on pessimism that inspired me to explore some of the themes and take an opportunity to extol the virtues of rational optimism.

Philosophical pessimism: A denial of history as progress

When considering this article and NL’s position I began to get the sense that pessimism and optimism often get conflated with the pure forecasting of future events. I realize that I do this too, so I wanted to share some thoughts about the relationship between these concepts in order to steel man the highly adaptive form of optimism I’d like to see adopted by my spiritual allies.

Forecasting Accurately

If your goal is to forecast accurately an event that you have no control over, then there is no room for optimism or pessimism. Hope and fear can only serve to bias any attempt to see things as they are and how they work in order to predict what will most likely come to pass. Forecasting is a skill that can be honed, and engaging with things like prediction markets can be useful in this regard. I won’t get too far into the weeds on epistemology here, but in order to make a point I need to at least say that for each thing we “know” about the world around us, there are only probabilities with error bars. This applies to all falsifiable beliefs.¹ Predictions about future events test the extent to which subjective assessments of probability comport to reality. The future comes to pass, and our predictions are validated or they’re not. This provides feedback regarding the probability that the models we are employing are accurate, but never proves accuracy definitively.² Instead, with accurate predictions, probabilities shift and error bars tighten, but with every forecast made, unanticipated outcomes continually threaten to reverse this process. So long as you aren’t an agent in the model, there is no place for hope nor resignation in this process. You are simply trying to construct a model optimizing for accuracy.

Forecasting and Agency

As soon as you become an agent with potential to influence the events you are forecasting, everything changes. Now, your actions have the potential to change the outcome. Now, your motivation, competence, and ingenuity are all factors that contribute to the accuracy of your model. This has substantial implications with respect to pessimism and optimism because of the way our general disposition influences our agency. Rational optimism tends to buttress our agency and strongly motivate purposeful action directed towards achieving the outcomes we most desire. Where this can be most difficult to see is in those circumstances where our individual agency seems inconsequential, such as politics on the global stage, but it nevertheless holds true. There is a temptation to frame such grand questions about the overall trajectory of the world as if we are impartial observers, almost as is if we’re academics studying a far away civilization. We aren’t impartial observers though. None of us are in this realm. Life isn’t a spectator sport, and we’re all political actors whether we’d like to be or not. This means that our overall disposition towards politics must be incorporated into any predictive model. It also means that optimizing for the accuracy of your model above all other factors will systematically undercut your agency and reduce the probability of achieving the outcomes you most desire.

Irrational Optimism < Pessimism < Rational Optimism

In all of the background NL provided on pessimism, I found his most salient point to be that anticipating a bad outcome helps ensure such outcomes can be endured, a sentiment with strong psychological justification. I should note, implicit in this framing is that he also still hopes for a good outcome, which then comes as a pleasant surprise should it be realized. This position is not an indictment of optimism generally, but of irrational optimism, to which the antidote is not pessimism, but rational optimism. It is a fundamental psychological mistake to believe that you’re owed anything. This includes positive outcomes. But what if I worked really hard? Still, you are owed nothing. But what if I’m a really good person? Still owed nothing. There is no rational argument that can be made as to why we must have anything. Conversely, it is completely rational to work towards things we desire in the hopes of achieving them. There is nothing, however, that obligates the universe to provide us with success. This simple premise is the foundation of an entire psychotherapy approach called Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy. It is very useful, but it would be a mistake to conflate it with pessimism. It is more thoroughly aligned with rational optimism with its focus on agency and behavior.

Alignment with Values

Something else I was struck by reading about pessimism was how it really just seemed kind of alien to me. The idea that life is suffering just doesn’t resonate. Perhaps my own experiences can’t be extrapolated, but I really feel like as long as you’re living a life aligned with your values, every moment is a blessing. What fun would life be if there was no evil to fight? Too easy. Are we not hard wired to enjoy overcoming challenges? It seems to me that human beings can weather whatever storm as long as they are living a life aligned with their values. Of course, that is easier said than done. But how hard is it, really? If we are ultimately confronted with a choice between suffering a life at odds with our values or struggling under conditions of extreme austerity to do the opposite, is that really such a hard choice? Maybe it is for some. Maybe even if you choose the latter, actually finding the path and staying on it is an overwhelming challenge unto itself. If this is you maybe check out Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, which is all about helping people do exactly that.

No Excuse to Do Nothing

Denying your agency undermines your very humanity.³ It ultimately serves as an excuse to do nothing. We face two main types of enemy, those that aren’t living a life aligned with their chosen values, and those who have chosen values incompatible and in opposition with our own. These two groups will always exist, and there is always something to be done in this regard. Help those who share our chosen values but don’t live a life aligned with them join us on the path. As for those who have chosen values in opposition to our own, well, they are the villains that we are obligated to fight. Doing any less necessarily means we’ve strayed from our own path. No matter how powerful our enemies may seem, or how hopeless and inept our would be allies may appear suffering under the yolk of evil sniveling shitweasels, there is always something we can do about it. Focusing on accurately forecasting the future to the extent that we neglect our own agency is an abrogation of our duty, whatever that may be. In a world where holding people accountable for their actions has become increasingly difficult, there is a clear place to start in order to move towards a more attractive future: yourself. Determine what you want, chose the values you’ll live by, hold yourself accountable. If life is suffering, what do you have to lose?

1. I’ll give spiritual beliefs a pass for now, but I may go so far as to say this epistemological principle applies universally. Whereas some people conceive of faith as certainty, I consider it simply an expression of confidence. We can express supreme confidence in any spiritual matter while retaining the epistemic humility to stop short of absolute certainty. I expect this footnote to be particularly persuasive in this regard, I more just wanted to clarify my own thoughts on this point.

2. Indeed, no model is fully “accurate” but always a limited simulacra of reality as it is, the full and complete conception of which will always be outside our grasp.

3. Had a discussion about this article with my boys last week in case you’re interested.