Have you created a list of all possible approaches for when encountering a complex problem? That would be cool. I think creating a list of all possible ideas would not be the best item on the list for all situations. Most notably when a list is the wrong structure because of the overlap and interconnectivity of the ideas being examined, but also when that amount of effort is imprudent.
I’ll also note, any list that doesn’t include “all possibilities not included in the other list items” is almost certainly not a complete list of all possibilities. I like to be explicit about that unless there is strong proof that the list does contain all possibilities. This is the reason I like to make statements like “I notice two answers” rather than “I’ve listed all possible answers” unless I’ve put in some serious effort to actually splitting up the space of all possibilities.
I create two dimensional matrix of the most important characteristics which I hope will catch most variability and use it as x and y axis. For example, for AI risk can be number of AIs and AI’s IQ (or time from now). It is Descartes method.
There are other tricks to collect more ideas for the list—reading literature, asking a friend, brain-shtroming, money prizes.
I created a more general map of methods of thinking but didn’t finish yet.
As a person quite obsessed with studying high dimensional semantic spaces, I do get a little bit of anxiety from the idea of arbitrarily privileging 2 dimensions. I often think on paper but use nodes and lines to allow more complicated connections than with 2 named dimensions. I guess this is just brain storming, but I often like to copy the graph to a separate sheet of paper allowing related concepts to move closer together as I re-examine them.
I think when trying to explore all possible possibilities I like to collect relevant propositions and explore the ways they could be true, false, or failing to have a truth value. That tends to generate more propositions that can become parts of the list or re-examined. It does unfortunately feel quite ad-hoc.
I created a more general map of methods of thinking but didn’t finish yet.
Yes, but processing 3D and more is difficult and representing on paper also difficult. Therefore, several 2D slices of mental hyperspace can work. You can have a look on last version but it is in Russian.
I’m thinking more about high dimensional webs unrolled and projected into 2d with annotations if any higher dimensional structure is important. Trees and graphs, basically.
Your link is pretty cool. Thanks. I skimmed with use of google translate.
This is very good.
Have you created a list of all possible approaches for when encountering a complex problem? That would be cool. I think creating a list of all possible ideas would not be the best item on the list for all situations. Most notably when a list is the wrong structure because of the overlap and interconnectivity of the ideas being examined, but also when that amount of effort is imprudent.
I’ll also note, any list that doesn’t include “all possibilities not included in the other list items” is almost certainly not a complete list of all possibilities. I like to be explicit about that unless there is strong proof that the list does contain all possibilities. This is the reason I like to make statements like “I notice two answers” rather than “I’ve listed all possible answers” unless I’ve put in some serious effort to actually splitting up the space of all possibilities.
I create two dimensional matrix of the most important characteristics which I hope will catch most variability and use it as x and y axis. For example, for AI risk can be number of AIs and AI’s IQ (or time from now). It is Descartes method.
There are other tricks to collect more ideas for the list—reading literature, asking a friend, brain-shtroming, money prizes.
I created a more general map of methods of thinking but didn’t finish yet.
As a person quite obsessed with studying high dimensional semantic spaces, I do get a little bit of anxiety from the idea of arbitrarily privileging 2 dimensions. I often think on paper but use nodes and lines to allow more complicated connections than with 2 named dimensions. I guess this is just brain storming, but I often like to copy the graph to a separate sheet of paper allowing related concepts to move closer together as I re-examine them.
I think when trying to explore all possible possibilities I like to collect relevant propositions and explore the ways they could be true, false, or failing to have a truth value. That tends to generate more propositions that can become parts of the list or re-examined. It does unfortunately feel quite ad-hoc.
I’d be interested if you ever do finish this : )
Yes, but processing 3D and more is difficult and representing on paper also difficult. Therefore, several 2D slices of mental hyperspace can work.
You can have a look on last version but it is in Russian.
I’m thinking more about high dimensional webs unrolled and projected into 2d with annotations if any higher dimensional structure is important. Trees and graphs, basically.
Your link is pretty cool. Thanks. I skimmed with use of google translate.
Actually, I have metaethic classification in my again unpublished yet article about badness of death
It needs large revision as a lot of work now can be done by LLM. Levenchuk is making now 1M size prompts which teach LLM “system thinking”.
That’s cool but also kinda freaky.
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/iBg6AAG72wqyosxAk/the-badness-of-death-in-different-metaethical-theories