Variety, variety, variety. I don’t always succeed at this when I’m not in full control of my food purchases or fall into a rut. But eating many different things is likely to capture more of the nutrients I need than eating just a few things.
If something tastes better than it usually tastes, or seems more appealing than it usually does, eat it until it stops doing that. Flavors aren’t static things that only signal what’s in a food—they are also somewhat responsive to the body’s needs.
Exception to the above: If I eat a lot of something and the craving doesn’t let up, it’s probably not actually helping, it’s just a stand-in for something nearby in foodspace that I actually need. At this time it’s better to think of what it might stand in for. Really persistent legume cravings tend to go away more readily if I eat fish; if I want fruit more than usual it can mean I’m thirsty.
Remember that food does not lose nutritional value if you add things to it. For example, broccoli is not deprived of the broccoli-nature by the addition of cheese. It’s still broccoli and still contains all the goodies it contained before it was doused with dairy.
Supplement key nutrients that my diet may not cover. For instance, I crisp up in the sun and therefore avoid it—I take vitamin D. I have a history of anemia—I take iron.
What I mean is, if you’re going to do something as wasteful as eating, you might as well eat the kinds of things that will seed your body with iron so that it’s easier to extract after you’re uploaded.
Speaking of uploading, Clippy, how would you feel about tiling the universe with paperclips that could each be one of two colors and changed color depending on certain algorithms and the behavior of their neighboring paperclips?
I think that’s great! Color doesn’t matter (glares at humanity) as long as the spectral readings still show the paperclips to be sufficiently metal.
By the way, I know where you’re going with this, and it just shows you to be much closer to me, inferential-distance-wise, than most of the humans here. I need to explain much more to these humans before I can make the argument you’re leading up to.
I’ve long recognized you to be much more enlightened than most of the humans here, ever since you pointed out the subtle racism they practice—it’s the other Users I worry about.
It has to be able to (counterfactually) hold several sheets of paper together without permanent deformation of the clip, and without significant deformation of the paper. Exactly how many sheets? Exactly how much paper deformation? I’m still figuring it out for myself, but that should give you some idea.
So, considerably larger than the semi-conductors used in computers. The paperclips could be shrunken somewhat by developing the thinnest possible paper, but the results would still be nowhere near current systems.
You could get better results (by human standards) by having very small changeable color areas on each paperclip.
You know what?? first i thought i knew what was going on… and then i was confused, and then i created a few new theories, and then i was confused again. This really bugs me… It sounded like you were referencing the game of life, but i cannot comprehend the connection to paperclips.
Alicorn, if that IS your real name, you are a froody dude. now stop making my life surreal.
Clippy is a user who reports to be a paperclip maximizer, a hypothetical AI that only cares about increasing the number of paperclips in the world. See paperclip maximizer for more details. Many users suspect that Clippy is meant to be humorous but it does bring up serious questions about how one can cooperate with entities that have goals which are radically different from human standard goals.
Well, that makes sense now.
As long as your utility function does not in some way involve the use of proprietary software or pre-built computers then our utility functions should not conflict in the near future. Of course, the connection between your name and a certain Microsoft product does inspire revulsion, but changing it would not advance my utility in any way.
/me orders robot minions to return to collecting minerals and vespene gas for the final assault on apple headquarters.
This is the first time in months that I’ve sincerely wished to upvote a comment more than once. Thank you, Alicorn, I knew you would deliver. I’m sitting here staring at my monitor, across the ocean from most of LW, and can’t stop laughing.
This could be the first sign of converging utility functions. I never thought I’d say this, since it defeats the whole point, but perhaps Clippy and I aren’t that different after all.
Here are the food heuristics I like to use:
Variety, variety, variety. I don’t always succeed at this when I’m not in full control of my food purchases or fall into a rut. But eating many different things is likely to capture more of the nutrients I need than eating just a few things.
If something tastes better than it usually tastes, or seems more appealing than it usually does, eat it until it stops doing that. Flavors aren’t static things that only signal what’s in a food—they are also somewhat responsive to the body’s needs.
Exception to the above: If I eat a lot of something and the craving doesn’t let up, it’s probably not actually helping, it’s just a stand-in for something nearby in foodspace that I actually need. At this time it’s better to think of what it might stand in for. Really persistent legume cravings tend to go away more readily if I eat fish; if I want fruit more than usual it can mean I’m thirsty.
Remember that food does not lose nutritional value if you add things to it. For example, broccoli is not deprived of the broccoli-nature by the addition of cheese. It’s still broccoli and still contains all the goodies it contained before it was doused with dairy.
Supplement key nutrients that my diet may not cover. For instance, I crisp up in the sun and therefore avoid it—I take vitamin D. I have a history of anemia—I take iron.
In fact, adding fats to veggies may make the vitamins in them more accessible for your body.
Not unless your diet has a huge amount of iron, it won’t.
Are trying to encourage us to eat paperclips now?
No! That’s sick!
What I mean is, if you’re going to do something as wasteful as eating, you might as well eat the kinds of things that will seed your body with iron so that it’s easier to extract after you’re uploaded.
Speaking of uploading, Clippy, how would you feel about tiling the universe with paperclips that could each be one of two colors and changed color depending on certain algorithms and the behavior of their neighboring paperclips?
I think that’s great! Color doesn’t matter (glares at humanity) as long as the spectral readings still show the paperclips to be sufficiently metal.
By the way, I know where you’re going with this, and it just shows you to be much closer to me, inferential-distance-wise, than most of the humans here. I need to explain much more to these humans before I can make the argument you’re leading up to.
I’ve long recognized you to be much more enlightened than most of the humans here, ever since you pointed out the subtle racism they practice—it’s the other Users I worry about.
What’s the smallest object you’d consider to be a paperclip?
It has to be able to (counterfactually) hold several sheets of paper together without permanent deformation of the clip, and without significant deformation of the paper. Exactly how many sheets? Exactly how much paper deformation? I’m still figuring it out for myself, but that should give you some idea.
So, considerably larger than the semi-conductors used in computers. The paperclips could be shrunken somewhat by developing the thinnest possible paper, but the results would still be nowhere near current systems.
You could get better results (by human standards) by having very small changeable color areas on each paperclip.
You know what?? first i thought i knew what was going on… and then i was confused, and then i created a few new theories, and then i was confused again. This really bugs me… It sounded like you were referencing the game of life, but i cannot comprehend the connection to paperclips. Alicorn, if that IS your real name, you are a froody dude. now stop making my life surreal.
Clippy is a user who reports to be a paperclip maximizer, a hypothetical AI that only cares about increasing the number of paperclips in the world. See paperclip maximizer for more details. Many users suspect that Clippy is meant to be humorous but it does bring up serious questions about how one can cooperate with entities that have goals which are radically different from human standard goals.
LW is a very weird place.
“I really like paperclips” is the connection.
Well, that makes sense now. As long as your utility function does not in some way involve the use of proprietary software or pre-built computers then our utility functions should not conflict in the near future. Of course, the connection between your name and a certain Microsoft product does inspire revulsion, but changing it would not advance my utility in any way. /me orders robot minions to return to collecting minerals and vespene gas for the final assault on apple headquarters.
This is the first time in months that I’ve sincerely wished to upvote a comment more than once. Thank you, Alicorn, I knew you would deliver. I’m sitting here staring at my monitor, across the ocean from most of LW, and can’t stop laughing.
Was User:Alicorn being non-serious with that comment?
I did it for you. At least you are on the same side of the ocean with all the other LW Vladimirs ;)
this might just be the single greatest comment I’ve seen on LW.
This could be the first sign of converging utility functions. I never thought I’d say this, since it defeats the whole point, but perhaps Clippy and I aren’t that different after all.
Umm, iron. Wonder what I could do with all that body iron...