Put me down as a very tentative maybe.
Bindbreaker
All these posts referring to people selling themselves as products and so on reflect an extremely commodified view of sex, which can be very harmful. I wouldn’t continue with this analogy.
Better. Not ideal, but better.
Yes.
It surprises me that people here, of all places, don’t recognize this point immediately. People aren’t stupid. People are irrational.
“My interest is in the future because I am going to spend the rest of my life there.”
Charles F. Kettering
I’ve been trying to ease some friends into basic rationality materials but am running into a few obstacles. Is there a quick and dirty way to deal with the “but I don’t want to be rational” argument without seeming like Mr. Spock? Also, what’s a good source on the rational use of emotions?
Usually they seem to think that being rational is the same as being emotionless, despite my efforts to convince them otherwise. I think this may again be thanks largely to that dreaded Mr. Spock.
In one of the discussions surrounding the AI-box experiments, you said that you would be unwilling to use a hypothetical fully general argument/”mind hack” to cause people to support SIAI. You’ve also repeatedly said that the friendly AI problem is a “save the world” level issue. Can you explain the first statement in more depth? It seems to me that if anything really falls into “win by any means necessary” mode, saving the world is it.
Started reading the first one—from the prologue alone, Kellhus seems absurdly strong/skilled/fast. He reads people’s minds by looking at the patterns of their facial muscles, catches arrows out of the air, kills large groups of enemies by himself in hand-to-hand combat, etc. I’m not sure what lessons could really be derived from this, since these actions are far beyond the realm of normal human ability. Does the series/book get any better, or am I missing something here?
Care to give us a bit more information?
Why is this post being downvoted? It seems a valid question to me.
Being polite is only essential when it can be done without causing problems. Administrative decisions are better kept in public so as to avoid confusion and aid in transparency.
Sadly, they do.
That people don’t do this every day. If you decide that you should change your behavior, there’s no time like the present.
In a way, the uncanny valley has already been crossed—video game characters in some games are sufficiently humanlike that I hesitate to kill them.
You’re being downvoted because people think you’re either being irrational or trolling.
New Year’s prediction: adefinitemaybe will be banned from Less Wrong. Sixty-five percent.
Rationale behind my prediction:
I don’t dislike you (I’ve upvoted some of your comments, downvoted others, and left some alone entirely), but people who are being consistently downvoted have been told to leave in the past. You match that profile the best of anyone I’ve seen on this site—better than someone who Eliezer recently asked to leave. Eliezer was himself downvoted when he announced that, so I’m not sure whether this rule is still in effect, which is why I estimated sixty-five percent instead of ninety.
It is the result of a net negative or zero vote on each. Independent of any action by other members, I know I’ve upvoted three of your posts—“I’ve already retracted the word “legitimate” as being redundant...” “I may have memory of always existing...” and “Anyway, not to worry. We can still be sure of taxes.” I am not sure why you would doubt me on this.
Did you read any of the articles here or on Overcoming Bias before signing up?
I liked the story; that said, the ending seemed obvious to me. This may be a good sign.