[jedharris]

This is an example that supports Scott's point that people don't have world models. The people who "believe" this don't wonder how stock market continues to operate now that NYC is a wreck. Etc.

I wonder in what sense they really do "believe". If they had a strong practical reason to go to a big city, what would they do?

[fallous]

I'm not sure that you can reach the conclusion that "people don't have world models" based on beliefs that do not fully integrate with such a model. We too often try to misapply binary truth requirements to domains in which there exists at least a trinary logic, if not a greater number of logic truths.

If I meet a random stranger, do I trust them or distrust them? The answer is "both/neither," because a concept such as "trust" isn't a binary logic in such a circumstance. They are neither trustworthy nor untrustworthy, they are in a state of nontrustworthiness (the absence of trust, but not the opposite of truth).

World models tend to have foundational principles/truths that inform what can be compatible for inclusion. A belief that is non-compatible, rather than compatible/incompatible, can exist in such a model (often weakly) since it does not meet the requirements for rejection. Incomplete information can be integrated into a world model as long as the aspects being evaluated for compatibility conform to the model.

Requiring a world model to contain complete information and logical consistency at all possible levels from the granular to the metaphysical seems to be one Hell of a high bar that makes demands no other system is expected to achieve.