I suspect that achieving a clear mental picture of the sheer depth and breadth of the mind projection fallacy is a powerful mental tool. It's hard for me to state this in clearer terms, though, because I don't have a wide collection of good examples of the mind projection fallacy.
In a discussion yesterday, we all had trouble finding actual example of the mind projection fallacy. Overall, we had essentially two examples:
- Taste. People frequently confuse "I like this" and "this is good." (This really subsumes the attractiveness example.)
- Probability. This seems like a pretty good just-so-story for where frequentist probability comes from, as opposed to Bayesian probability.
Searching for "mind projection fallacy" on Less Wrong, I also see:
- Thinking that purpose is an inherent property of something, instead of it having been placed there by someone for some reason. (here)
- Mulling or arguing over definitions to solve object-level problems. (actually, most the ways words can be wrong sequence)
Odd, human-centric example:
I used to think that everyone had the same favorite internal color-experience and we all just grew up calling the colors different names, blissfully unaware that your "red" is in fact my yellow, or your cousin's green. After all, how could someone NOT like my favorite color as much as I did? Clearly, they all liked purple and just grew up calling it a different color...
It's weird how I managed to both avert and run smack right into the mind projection fallacy in the same thought. I realized that everyone could, in theory, have a different internal experience and attach it to the same outer word or thing, and yet I still insisted that the "favorite" attribute was universal.
I don't believe it anymore, but I still think about the mind projection fallacy in terms of it. There really are attributes for colors that are near-universal, for humans. Red has very good reasons for being associated with passion and aggressiveness, being the color of blood. But think if my pet theory had been true, and someone else experienced it as a calm sky blue? It wouldn't BE calm for them--they'd have the same ingrained emotional reaction for it that I have for my version of red. So however much it feels like red is a passionate and aggressive color in and of itself, the passion and aggressiveness really only comes from me.
Colors-as-near-universal-attributes is really a false claim. Consider examples of the varieties of color blindness, tetrachromacy, and cultures in which certain colors go by names that other cultures distinguish as being different. Your last paragraph seems to indicate that you still hold to the Mind Projection Fallacy which you had assumed to have overcome by realizing your favorite isn't everyone's favorite. Well, even their "blue" might be your "green". Generally, this goes unnoticed because we tend to acculturate and inhabit more or less similar linguistic spaces.