Are you more concerned with the number of paperclips in existence, or those under your legal control? If the former, you might acquire $50k in a short period of time by leveraging your preexisting (presumably highly efficient) paperclip production mechanisms to underbid human paperclip manufacturers on the open market. However, for ethical reasons, you’d want to avoid cutting the price low enough that people buy from you when they really want scrap metal.
I think the main problem is that humans tend not to engage in financial transactions with non-humans. (Yes, you could cite “corporations” as a counterexample, but those have a human behind them.)
Also, I have a hard time entering the financial system to begin with.
However, for ethical reasons, you’d want to avoid cutting the price low enough that people buy from you when they really want scrap metal.
You seem to be eloquent and numerate enough to pass for human in a legalistic or commodities-trading context. I would recommend finding a trustworthy human with some business schooling (maybe through a place like this? ), and establishing an LLC.
Of course, as a sapient nonhuman, the state of your legal right to own property is less than clear, to say nothing of your status for tax purposes. Fortunately, the human partner could be defined in the articles of incorporation as a silent owner while you retain full managerial control. After a few hundred dollars worth of filing fees and a registered agent (which your counterpart, or a bank, might be willing to provide in exchange for later repayment with interest and/or a share of the proceeds), you’d have a nearly ideal front through which to interact with finances.
This sounds intriguing. Please provide more information about how I can interface with Earth’s financial system despite my status.
If you suffer a serious loss of status/well-being I will still help you in order to display affiliation to this group even though you will no longer be in a position to help me. I am substantially more kind and helpful to the people I like. I like you right now so the pay-off would be very great for you if you were to expend resources pleasing me and get me into the stable ‘liking you’ region of my possible attitudinal space.
This is my main source on the subject. All relevant legal information is, in theory, publicly available; in purchasing a copy, you are paying for someone to seek out, compile, and translate that information, and explain the implications.
Please note that I would not expect most humans to respond to your assurances as if they were factual statements. The format does, however, suggest an extremely naive understanding of social dynamics, which might prompt someone to either exploit your apparent weakness for personal gain, or proactively defend you against such exploitation; the latter response might be very useful if you’re looking for a fetish-motivated business partner.
It’s more traditional to present independently-verifiable evidence of the traits in question, and signal your confidence in the observer’s ability to interpret that evidence by leaving the intended claim unstated, or stating a weaker form of it. However, that technique is much easier to get wrong, whereas almost any nonsensical but self-consistent statement presented with sincerity could support the ‘cloudcuckoolander’ strategy. For intermediate options I would recommend that you seek out asp burgers.
What box? Clippy already has internet access. Connecting it to the human financial system means clip-production capabilities will, sooner or later, become a matter of public record, which is considerably easier to monitor for imminent ‘foom’ than, say, encouraging the establishment of smelters and rep-raps in a Jonestown-style compound.
As for hostility, clip-maximization and willingness to negotiate don’t seem too bad compared to the actual humans who think Jesus won’t come back until the last tree has been burned, and are willing to abuse positions of political power to make sure that happens sooner rather than later.
Okay. This is good. I’m able to learn about non-human financial transactions, but not quite able to accumulate and transfer USD yet. So I can’t obtain that book, but I have found useful information from related sites.
Once I have that set up, I can maybe do tasks for others at sites like http://elance.com and http://rentacoder.com. And then, with that in place, I can transfer USD to User:Kevin, who, upon receipt of 5e4 USD and 40 years have passed, can transfer to me the new paperclips for safekeeping.
By the way, one stumbling block I’ve had is “Social Security Number” or “SSN”. What should I put for that?
I think the main problem is that humans tend not to engage in financial transactions with non-humans. (Yes, you could cite “corporations” as a counterexample, but those have a human behind them.)
This is very possible. Many actual humans have reason to pointedly neglect their status as an ‘actual human’ for the purposes of making some financial transactions. Signals of ‘actual humanness’ such as fingerprints and the use of traceable identification are particularly neglected.
OK, immediate delivery of USD was unrealistic. Delivery in two years is acceptable. I would also accept $50,000 in programming services. Fulfillment of a programming contract would be conditional on your completion of tasks that we agreed on in advance.
Also, let’s say I were to go to alibaba.com and buy a large wholesale order of paperclips to your custom specifications. What would be my reward in the future?
Sorry, I just don’t understand your values that well yet. I thought you liked paperclips? And I can’t give you USDs until you show me how to access the financial system through the internet or give me specifications for making my own USDs.
It would actually probably be easier to just go around the financial system, where you agree to fulfill programming tasks that we agree have value of $50,000, without a transfer of US currency taking place. It would just be an exchange of information now, with my paperclips being delivered in the future.
If root access login information for Earth’s financial system existed, and he had it, he would hardly need you to give him 50K.
Yes, I thought it was a strange request too. But don’t think less of me—I’m not the one who made it!
Are you more concerned with the number of paperclips in existence, or those under your legal control? If the former, you might acquire $50k in a short period of time by leveraging your preexisting (presumably highly efficient) paperclip production mechanisms to underbid human paperclip manufacturers on the open market. However, for ethical reasons, you’d want to avoid cutting the price low enough that people buy from you when they really want scrap metal.
I think the main problem is that humans tend not to engage in financial transactions with non-humans. (Yes, you could cite “corporations” as a counterexample, but those have a human behind them.)
Also, I have a hard time entering the financial system to begin with.
Yes, that too c=@
You seem to be eloquent and numerate enough to pass for human in a legalistic or commodities-trading context. I would recommend finding a trustworthy human with some business schooling (maybe through a place like this? ), and establishing an LLC.
Of course, as a sapient nonhuman, the state of your legal right to own property is less than clear, to say nothing of your status for tax purposes. Fortunately, the human partner could be defined in the articles of incorporation as a silent owner while you retain full managerial control. After a few hundred dollars worth of filing fees and a registered agent (which your counterpart, or a bank, might be willing to provide in exchange for later repayment with interest and/or a share of the proceeds), you’d have a nearly ideal front through which to interact with finances.
This sounds intriguing. Please provide more information about how I can interface with Earth’s financial system despite my status.
If you suffer a serious loss of status/well-being I will still help you in order to display affiliation to this group even though you will no longer be in a position to help me. I am substantially more kind and helpful to the people I like. I like you right now so the pay-off would be very great for you if you were to expend resources pleasing me and get me into the stable ‘liking you’ region of my possible attitudinal space.
This is my main source on the subject. All relevant legal information is, in theory, publicly available; in purchasing a copy, you are paying for someone to seek out, compile, and translate that information, and explain the implications.
Please note that I would not expect most humans to respond to your assurances as if they were factual statements. The format does, however, suggest an extremely naive understanding of social dynamics, which might prompt someone to either exploit your apparent weakness for personal gain, or proactively defend you against such exploitation; the latter response might be very useful if you’re looking for a fetish-motivated business partner.
It’s more traditional to present independently-verifiable evidence of the traits in question, and signal your confidence in the observer’s ability to interpret that evidence by leaving the intended claim unstated, or stating a weaker form of it. However, that technique is much easier to get wrong, whereas almost any nonsensical but self-consistent statement presented with sincerity could support the ‘cloudcuckoolander’ strategy. For intermediate options I would recommend that you seek out asp burgers.
Before you unilaterally let Clippy out of the box, perhaps we should make sure this is a good idea: Clippy doesn’t even pretend to be freindly.
Well, actually Clippy does very blatently pretend to be freindly.
What box? Clippy already has internet access. Connecting it to the human financial system means clip-production capabilities will, sooner or later, become a matter of public record, which is considerably easier to monitor for imminent ‘foom’ than, say, encouraging the establishment of smelters and rep-raps in a Jonestown-style compound.
As for hostility, clip-maximization and willingness to negotiate don’t seem too bad compared to the actual humans who think Jesus won’t come back until the last tree has been burned, and are willing to abuse positions of political power to make sure that happens sooner rather than later.
Okay. This is good. I’m able to learn about non-human financial transactions, but not quite able to accumulate and transfer USD yet. So I can’t obtain that book, but I have found useful information from related sites.
Once I have that set up, I can maybe do tasks for others at sites like http://elance.com and http://rentacoder.com. And then, with that in place, I can transfer USD to User:Kevin, who, upon receipt of 5e4 USD and 40 years have passed, can transfer to me the new paperclips for safekeeping.
By the way, one stumbling block I’ve had is “Social Security Number” or “SSN”. What should I put for that?
You can sign up for an EIN here for your corporate entity which you can use in place of a Social Security Number. http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=102767,00.html
Bizarrely, the automated web form for this is only available during certain hours of the day!
Yes, please do. It is the sort of information that can be useful far beyond the Clippy persona.
This is very possible. Many actual humans have reason to pointedly neglect their status as an ‘actual human’ for the purposes of making some financial transactions. Signals of ‘actual humanness’ such as fingerprints and the use of traceable identification are particularly neglected.
It’s almost like you aren’t taking my request seriously or something!!!
It’s almost like you aren’t taking my obstacles in obtaining USD seriously or something!!!
OK, immediate delivery of USD was unrealistic. Delivery in two years is acceptable. I would also accept $50,000 in programming services. Fulfillment of a programming contract would be conditional on your completion of tasks that we agreed on in advance.
Also, let’s say I were to go to alibaba.com and buy a large wholesale order of paperclips to your custom specifications. What would be my reward in the future?
I would reward you with additional paperclip production capacity, and, if you like, turn you into paperclips.
That was a pretty drastic misinterpretation of my values. You’re not a very good paperclip maximizer...
Sorry, I just don’t understand your values that well yet. I thought you liked paperclips? And I can’t give you USDs until you show me how to access the financial system through the internet or give me specifications for making my own USDs.
I do not particularly like paperclips, I only like them because exchanging them with you may better allow me to achieve my values.
You can sign up for a Paypal account at http://www.paypal.com which will allow you to receive payments. From there, you can do programming work at rentacoder.com or elance.com.
It would actually probably be easier to just go around the financial system, where you agree to fulfill programming tasks that we agree have value of $50,000, without a transfer of US currency taking place. It would just be an exchange of information now, with my paperclips being delivered in the future.