I’m not sure which of two arguments private_messaging is making, but I think both are wrong.
Argument 1. “Yudkowsky et al think many-worlds interpretations are simpler than collapse interpretations, but actually collapse interpretations are simpler because unlike many-worlds interpretations they don’t have the extra cost of identifying which branch you’re on.”
I think this one is wrong because that cost is present with collapse interpretations too; if you’re trying to explain your observations via a model of MWI, your explanation needs to account for what branch you’re in, and if you’re trying to explain them via a model of a “collapse” interpretation of QM, it instead needs to account for the random choices of measurement results. The information you need to account for is exactly the same in the two cases.
So maybe instead the argument is more like this:
Argument 2. “Yudkowsky et al think many-worlds interpretations are simpler than collapse interpretations, because they are ‘charging’ collapse interpretations for the cost of identifying random measurement results. But that’s wrong because the same costs are present in MW interpretations.”
I think this one is wrong because that isn’t why Yudkowsky et al think MW interpretations are simpler. They think MW interpretations are simpler because a “collapse” interpretation needs to do the same computation as an MW interpretation and also actually make things collapse. I am not 100% sure that this is actually right: it could conceivably turn out that as far as explaining human observations of quantum phenomena goes, you actually need some notion more or less equivalent to that of “Everett branch”, and you need to keep track of them in your explanation, and the extra bookkeeping with an MW model of the underlying physics is just as bad as the extra model-code with a collapse model of the underlying physics. But if it’s wrong I don’t think it’s wrong for private_messaging’s reasons.
But, still, private_messaging’s argument is an interesting one, and it’s terrible to call him a troll for making it.
… Except that no one did call him a troll for making that argument.
What actually happened when he made that argument was that various people politely disagreed and offered counterarguments. The “consistent trolling” remark was somewhere entirely different, and its context was that private_messaging had been found to have something like five sockpuppets on LW, and was using them to post comments agreeing with one another, and the user who made the “consistent trolling” remark—by the way, that was wedrifid, not Yudkowsky, and I’m not sure why you call them “the usual shooter”—was saying (I paraphrase) “having sockpuppets as such isn’t so bad, and private_messaging was the user’s second account and not really a problem (it was also super-trollish, but that’s a separate issue), but the subsequent sockpuppets were just created to abuse the system and that’s not acceptable”.
Well, OK. But, still, wedrifid called private_messaging a troll. Was that unreasonable? Note that even a troll can say correct and/or interesting things sometimes; trolling is precisely about what you do “tonally”. So, here are a few comments from private_messaging. Judge for yourself whether there’s anything trollish about them.
[Yudkowsky is] spreading utter nonsense similar in nature to anti vaccination campaigning. [...] complete misinformed BS that—if he ever gains traction—will be inspiration to more of [Unabomber-style anti-tech terrorism]. I’m not charitable to any imams, any popes, any priests, and any cranks.
Seriously, why should anyone think that SI is anything more than “narcissistic dilettantes who think they need to teach their awesome big picture ideas to the mere technicians that are creating the future”, to paraphrase one of my friends?
There isn’t a lot to cite to counter utter nonsense that incompetents (SIAI) promotes. There’s a lot of fundamentals to learn, though, to be able to not fall for such nonsense. [...] The SIAI position is not even wrong. It is hundred percent misguided due to lack of understanding of simple fundamentals, and multitude of conflations of the concepts that are distinct to anyone in the field.
I dunno, seems a bit trollish to me. Again, not because it’s necessarily wrong but because it’s needlessly confrontational; private_messaging was rather fond of saying “X is wrong and stupid and you people are idiots for thinking it” when “X is wrong” would have sufficed.
I’m not sure which of two arguments private_messaging is making, but I think both are wrong.
Argument 1. “Yudkowsky et al think many-worlds interpretations are simpler than collapse interpretations, but actually collapse interpretations are simpler because unlike many-worlds interpretations they don’t have the extra cost of identifying which branch you’re on.”
I think this one is wrong because that cost is present with collapse interpretations too; if you’re trying to explain your observations via a model of MWI, your explanation needs to account for what branch you’re in, and if you’re trying to explain them via a model of a “collapse” interpretation of QM, it instead needs to account for the random choices of measurement results. The information you need to account for is exactly the same in the two cases.
So maybe instead the argument is more like this:
Argument 2. “Yudkowsky et al think many-worlds interpretations are simpler than collapse interpretations, because they are ‘charging’ collapse interpretations for the cost of identifying random measurement results. But that’s wrong because the same costs are present in MW interpretations.”
I think this one is wrong because that isn’t why Yudkowsky et al think MW interpretations are simpler. They think MW interpretations are simpler because a “collapse” interpretation needs to do the same computation as an MW interpretation and also actually make things collapse. I am not 100% sure that this is actually right: it could conceivably turn out that as far as explaining human observations of quantum phenomena goes, you actually need some notion more or less equivalent to that of “Everett branch”, and you need to keep track of them in your explanation, and the extra bookkeeping with an MW model of the underlying physics is just as bad as the extra model-code with a collapse model of the underlying physics. But if it’s wrong I don’t think it’s wrong for private_messaging’s reasons.
But, still, private_messaging’s argument is an interesting one, and it’s terrible to call him a troll for making it.
… Except that no one did call him a troll for making that argument.
What actually happened when he made that argument was that various people politely disagreed and offered counterarguments. The “consistent trolling” remark was somewhere entirely different, and its context was that private_messaging had been found to have something like five sockpuppets on LW, and was using them to post comments agreeing with one another, and the user who made the “consistent trolling” remark—by the way, that was wedrifid, not Yudkowsky, and I’m not sure why you call them “the usual shooter”—was saying (I paraphrase) “having sockpuppets as such isn’t so bad, and private_messaging was the user’s second account and not really a problem (it was also super-trollish, but that’s a separate issue), but the subsequent sockpuppets were just created to abuse the system and that’s not acceptable”.
Well, OK. But, still, wedrifid called private_messaging a troll. Was that unreasonable? Note that even a troll can say correct and/or interesting things sometimes; trolling is precisely about what you do “tonally”. So, here are a few comments from private_messaging. Judge for yourself whether there’s anything trollish about them.
Here:
Here:
Here:
I dunno, seems a bit trollish to me. Again, not because it’s necessarily wrong but because it’s needlessly confrontational; private_messaging was rather fond of saying “X is wrong and stupid and you people are idiots for thinking it” when “X is wrong” would have sufficed.