To be clear, it’s not “Yudkowsky’s paradox” as Yudkowsky is explaining a standard and known problem in cosmology here.
Admittedly, many cosmologists are not super careful when reasoning about Boltzmann Brains and they also disagree about what exactly is the problem they pose (e.g., see this dialectic between Carroll (2017)and Elga (2025)about whether belief in Boltzmann Brains leads to “cognitive instability”). But the core phenomenon of Boltzmann Brains and that they seem like bad news for many cosmological models is well-understood.
After a brief chat with one of the AI’s I had the impression that the main value of the BB was more about model/theory evaluation. Basically a theory that predicts a lot of the phenomenon should be questioned and probably “back to the drawing board” case.
A lot I don’t follow here but seems like the post might be challenging that, or perhaps some more simplified applications of that view.
But after the chats I actually wonder if that is the critical aspect rather than juts how we deal with infinities/really long time frames or how we think/define of equilibriums as the more critical areas of exploration.
To be clear, it’s not “Yudkowsky’s paradox” as Yudkowsky is explaining a standard and known problem in cosmology here.
Admittedly, many cosmologists are not super careful when reasoning about Boltzmann Brains and they also disagree about what exactly is the problem they pose (e.g., see this dialectic between Carroll (2017) and Elga (2025) about whether belief in Boltzmann Brains leads to “cognitive instability”). But the core phenomenon of Boltzmann Brains and that they seem like bad news for many cosmological models is well-understood.
After a brief chat with one of the AI’s I had the impression that the main value of the BB was more about model/theory evaluation. Basically a theory that predicts a lot of the phenomenon should be questioned and probably “back to the drawing board” case.
A lot I don’t follow here but seems like the post might be challenging that, or perhaps some more simplified applications of that view.
But after the chats I actually wonder if that is the critical aspect rather than juts how we deal with infinities/really long time frames or how we think/define of equilibriums as the more critical areas of exploration.