This was a really great Petrov day thing-to-do. I clicked on the link basically instinctively, after having a panic about being under time pressure, and about having my preferred outcome not taken, and therefore not being able to think so well about what my actions would actually do. Immediately after clicking, I felt very good, and like I had made the right decision, and then I felt a sinking sensation in my gut as I realized that if I had not taken any action, and nobody else had taken any action, then in a year I’d get to see what LessWrong as a collective decided, and I realized that actually I really wanted to see the result of that Petrov day, even if it meant Petrov day wouldn’t be about preventing the end of the world.
For the rest of that day, and into today, I could not be in the world where LessWrong both collectively voted on what they wanted, and collectively refused to overrule the majority. It felt like I had ruined Petrov day. Even if others had still clicked the link in my stead, I still didn’t want to have been among the people who ruined Petrov day, and it would feel even worse if I was the first, which I place nontrivial probability on (according to Firefox’s history, and my LessWrong message history, I received the message at 6:49 PM, and closed the tab the link opened at 6:51 PM, so it does indeed seem like I was the first one to click the link).
I’ve been feeling really terrible about this since doing it, imagining how sad people will feel when they see that someone has clicked this year’s instantiation of the button.
While feeling bad about it, I could also feel my mind trying to come up with excuses for why it isn’t so bad. The following are interesting rationalizations I’ve come up with:
Unilateralism to save the world is in the Petrov day spirit. Petrov was in fact a unilateralist, and he decided contrary to his legitimate government that he would overrule his country, and refuse to report incoming missiles.
The LessWrong team are the ones ultimately in charge of LessWrong. They set up a democratic process with a unilateralist element. Their word on their justifications should be taken as literal, if they believe allowing for the option to overrule the majority will better the kind of aggregation of will they’re aiming for to decide next year’s virtue, then I should use the special power they gave me in the way they described they wanted me to use it.
But both fell when I just imagined the world I created, and felt sad because I wouldn’t see the Petrov day decided by the communal process that I liked better than my own personal decisions.
My mind went through other processes, among them being my mind attempting to blame the LessWrong team for giving me this choice (to be clear: I do not blame them, and actually thank them), wanting to swear off my own ability to make unilateralist decisions on anything forever & always getting a second opinion on anything I could do that significantly affects anyone’s life (seems overkill, but lesson learned about the kind of situations my mind is bad at thinking under!), trying to blame things on the fact that this year’s button was not a button but a poorly labeled link (true buttons are not universally labeled as such, and I did have the hint that it was Petrov day, which future people won’t. Also the link wasn’t so poorly labeled), and blaming my own terrible reading comprehension (situationally induced panic that I should have seen ahead of time for some reason is a less self-serving label to put on the situation than generally being bad at reading comprehension in all situations).
Probably this was the most emotional experience I’ve felt around LessWrong’s Petrov day, and I learned a lot about a particular state my mind can get into for which I should not make actions, and about how the world may likely end. Perhaps in a similar circumstance one day, where three different people across the world have the option to click their own links and buttons, but not enough space or time to make their minds actually think about the actual worlds they’re making possible or impossible. Or maybe two of them can actually think, but the third has the kind of mind that panics in that particular way when under that particular pressure who then clicks their button, and maybe lives long enough to regret their decision once they get to think about it.
Some of the experience does get taken away knowing my group was not in fact the minority, and there was no absolute plans to change next year’s Petrov day plans.
This all sounds bad, but I really did love the experience. And you don’t need to worry that you distracted me from work I could have otherwise done! I worked double-time in order to try to distract myself from the issue!
This was a really great Petrov day thing-to-do. I clicked on the link basically instinctively, after having a panic about being under time pressure, and about having my preferred outcome not taken, and therefore not being able to think so well about what my actions would actually do. Immediately after clicking, I felt very good, and like I had made the right decision, and then I felt a sinking sensation in my gut as I realized that if I had not taken any action, and nobody else had taken any action, then in a year I’d get to see what LessWrong as a collective decided, and I realized that actually I really wanted to see the result of that Petrov day, even if it meant Petrov day wouldn’t be about preventing the end of the world.
For the rest of that day, and into today, I could not be in the world where LessWrong both collectively voted on what they wanted, and collectively refused to overrule the majority. It felt like I had ruined Petrov day. Even if others had still clicked the link in my stead, I still didn’t want to have been among the people who ruined Petrov day, and it would feel even worse if I was the first, which I place nontrivial probability on (according to Firefox’s history, and my LessWrong message history, I received the message at 6:49 PM, and closed the tab the link opened at 6:51 PM, so it does indeed seem like I was the first one to click the link).
I’ve been feeling really terrible about this since doing it, imagining how sad people will feel when they see that someone has clicked this year’s instantiation of the button.
While feeling bad about it, I could also feel my mind trying to come up with excuses for why it isn’t so bad. The following are interesting rationalizations I’ve come up with:
Unilateralism to save the world is in the Petrov day spirit. Petrov was in fact a unilateralist, and he decided contrary to his legitimate government that he would overrule his country, and refuse to report incoming missiles.
The LessWrong team are the ones ultimately in charge of LessWrong. They set up a democratic process with a unilateralist element. Their word on their justifications should be taken as literal, if they believe allowing for the option to overrule the majority will better the kind of aggregation of will they’re aiming for to decide next year’s virtue, then I should use the special power they gave me in the way they described they wanted me to use it.
But both fell when I just imagined the world I created, and felt sad because I wouldn’t see the Petrov day decided by the communal process that I liked better than my own personal decisions.
My mind went through other processes, among them being my mind attempting to blame the LessWrong team for giving me this choice (to be clear: I do not blame them, and actually thank them), wanting to swear off my own ability to make unilateralist decisions on anything forever & always getting a second opinion on anything I could do that significantly affects anyone’s life (seems overkill, but lesson learned about the kind of situations my mind is bad at thinking under!), trying to blame things on the fact that this year’s button was not a button but a poorly labeled link (true buttons are not universally labeled as such, and I did have the hint that it was Petrov day, which future people won’t. Also the link wasn’t so poorly labeled), and blaming my own terrible reading comprehension (situationally induced panic that I should have seen ahead of time for some reason is a less self-serving label to put on the situation than generally being bad at reading comprehension in all situations).
Probably this was the most emotional experience I’ve felt around LessWrong’s Petrov day, and I learned a lot about a particular state my mind can get into for which I should not make actions, and about how the world may likely end. Perhaps in a similar circumstance one day, where three different people across the world have the option to click their own links and buttons, but not enough space or time to make their minds actually think about the actual worlds they’re making possible or impossible. Or maybe two of them can actually think, but the third has the kind of mind that panics in that particular way when under that particular pressure who then clicks their button, and maybe lives long enough to regret their decision once they get to think about it.
Some of the experience does get taken away knowing my group was not in fact the minority, and there was no absolute plans to change next year’s Petrov day plans.
This all sounds bad, but I really did love the experience. And you don’t need to worry that you distracted me from work I could have otherwise done! I worked double-time in order to try to distract myself from the issue!
Thanks for sharing all of that in such detail, <3 You make me feel quite glad we did this celebration.
Would you like to know which number click yours was?
I do want to know
You were the first, as you guessed.