DavidPlumpton

• DavidPlumpton 26 Jul 2011 0:51 UTC

  4 points

  on: Wel­come to Less Wrong! (2010-2011)

  Hi there!

  I’m a 43 year old software Developer in New Zealand. I’ve found this site through the Quantum Physics sequence, which has given me an enormous improvement in my understanding of the subject, so a huge thank you to Eliezer. (I’d like to know the detailed maths, but I don’t hold much hope of that happening). I’ve since managed to do the double-slit experiment using a laser pointer, Blu-tack and staples, which was great fun. I’m currently trying to think through the Schrödinger’s cat experiment, which seems to me to be described slightly incorrectly. I may try to write up a page or so about that some time.

  The Bayes’ Theorem stuff was also a great topic, although I’ve not been able to think of practical ways to apply it yet.

  I’m a pessimist on the Singularity: I think that various resource, time and complexity constraints will flatten exponential curves into linear ones (and some curves will even decline).

  I’ve always valued accuracy in the sense that we should try to find out what’s really happening and understand our evidence and assumptions. I find one of my main tools for thinking is the “level of confidence”, e.g. when people say “you can’t prove that” I like to re-state the issue in terms of “this evidence gives us an extremely high level of confidence”.

  I’m currently reading the Methods of Rationality story and loving it.

• DavidPlumpton 23 Aug 2011 0:44 UTC

  1 point

  on: For fic­tion: How could alien minds differ from hu­man minds?

  How about:

  • Enhancing the brain with hardware for that memory/​intelligence boost.

  • Superior intuition for probability

  • Different/​worse optical illusions/​blind spots from different optical nerve wiring

  • Superior 3D spatial visualization for ocean dwellers

  • Creatures that get stuck in a correlation/​causation confusion and manage to continue along mostly successfully

  • Types of synaesthesia far more elaborate than in Humans

  • A conflict between intelligence and instinct where instinct is in total control but intelligence knows it’s doing the wrong thing

  • Minds partitioned more finely than the human left/​right hemisphere split, with more independence between them

  • Species that specialize their intelligence like insects becoming workers/​warriors/​queens/​drones etc. but for intelligence

  Lots of fun possibilities in this area.

• DavidPlumpton 25 Aug 2011 23:07 UTC

  10 points

  on: A His­tory of Bayes’ Theorem

  Can anybody give a URL or show a simple practical worked example similar to the applications described here? It all sounds awesome but I have little idea how to apply it to estimating the mass of Saturn and my artillery shelling is suffering somewhat.

  Actually a fun example might be the probability that the Nickel/​Hydrogen low energy fusion system being developed by Rossi is real or bogus. Points in favour: several tricky to fake successful demonstrations in front of scientists and the president of a skeptics society. Points against: no public disclosure of the secret catalyst, previous convictions for fraud, and cancelling the contract with the company that was going to manufacture the system.

That cat: not dead and alive

• DavidPlumpton 30 Aug 2011 8:35 UTC

  1 point

  on: Do you ex­pect a sin­gu­lar­ity within your life time?

  No, sadly. If we make a brain by simulating neurons then we will end up with a brain that can’t understand itself well enough to make improvements, just like ours. Writing a program to be intelligent to a level similar to a human seems to be something we’ve made no progress on for 50 years (all the impressive progress has been in very niche areas). It seems highly likely to me that we won’t know how to do this 20 to 30 years from now either. And then of course it would still need to be self-improving.

  Then over this period of time (and likely much less) we still have the major challenge of keeping civilization ticking along at all. Resource production rates are falling and will start falling at increasing rates. There don’t seem to be any magical/​technological solutions to dropping power rates. Economies all over the world are already suffering. Computers don’t work well without electricity.

  So close, and yet so far.

What is the most ra­tio­nal view of Peak Oil and its near term con­se­quences?

• DavidPlumpton 4 Sep 2011 4:07 UTC

  0 points

  in reply to: jsalvatier’s comment on: What is the most ra­tio­nal view of Peak Oil and its near term con­se­quences?

  I think we are in trouble even if the markets are very efficient (although inefficient markets would be even worse). If all forms of energy were to increase in cost the markets can’t do much to save us. So the real questions to me are still unchanged.

• DavidPlumpton 4 Sep 2011 4:23 UTC

  −1 points

  in reply to: Logos01’s comment on: What is the most ra­tio­nal view of Peak Oil and its near term con­se­quences?

  Can you cite any evidence that is clearer than the geological evidence that oil is being exhausted just enough for production rates to begin declining?

• DavidPlumpton 4 Sep 2011 4:30 UTC

  −2 points

  in reply to: KPier’s comment on: What is the most ra­tio­nal view of Peak Oil and its near term con­se­quences?

  I understand the point about more details lowering the probability, but I just can’t see how we can get halfway down the list and have it turn into “and we all lived happily ever after”. The greatest sources of uncertainty in the probabilities seem to be can we invent some new technology, can we reduce energy needs for a few years without collapsing too much, etc. Everything else has a probability of very close to 1 if the earlier steps are agreed.

• DavidPlumpton 4 Sep 2011 4:34 UTC

  −2 points

  in reply to: Logos01’s comment on: What is the most ra­tio­nal view of Peak Oil and its near term con­se­quences?

  I can see that I’m not convincing you, but I find your counterpoints very unconvincing. Where is any plant in the world today (or even in the near future) turning out significant amounts of energy from an “alternate” source? It’s just not happening in significant amounts.

  Starvation rates in the third world rose significantly following food price rises in 2007-2008. It’s not something that won’t happen; it’s already happening.

• DavidPlumpton 4 Sep 2011 20:27 UTC

  0 points

  in reply to: jsalvatier’s comment on: What is the most ra­tio­nal view of Peak Oil and its near term con­se­quences?

  Oil does not need to become super scare to cause major problems. Right now the total supply and demand are quite closely matched. Reduce the supply just 10% and big problems happen.

• DavidPlumpton 6 Sep 2011 0:51 UTC

  5 points

  on: Pri­soner’s Dilemma Tour­na­ment Results

  Having a known number of rounds seems like a problem to me. Everybody wants to defect on the last round. It might be interesting to retry with a number of rounds chosen randomly from 100 to 110 or where after 100 each round has a 25% chance of being the final round. However a large number of matches might be needed to offset the advantages of playing in some matches with a higher than average number of rounds.

• DavidPlumpton 9 Sep 2011 0:58 UTC

  6 points

  on: [Ques­tion] Do you know a good game or demo for demon­strat­ing sunk costs?

  A couple of years ago there was an online auction site that a number of people semi-seriously described as “pure evil”. Items would appear for sale, and you could bid a small amount, maybe $5 for a stereo or something. But you gave up that $5 there and then. People would eventually buy a $300 item for $60 or so, but the site would take in $1000 for that $300 item. Wish I could remember the name of that site...

• DavidPlumpton 13 Sep 2011 1:27 UTC

  0 points

  in reply to: Jayson_Virissimo’s comment on: 9/​11 as mindkiller

  At least WW2 ended.

• DavidPlumpton 18 Sep 2011 21:17 UTC

  0 points

  in reply to: steven0461’s comment on: De­ci­sion Fatigue

  Thanks for the warning… I’ve removed it.

• DavidPlumpton 2 Oct 2011 8:16 UTC

  4 points

  on: Ex­am­ples of mys­ter­ies ex­plained *away*

  Spontaneous Human Combustion. Somebody living alone gets drunk/​has stroke/​heart attack spills alcohol/​perfume on themselves and a cigarette ignites a fire. The body slumps onto carpet and the body fat together with clothing and carpet form a candle wick effect and a small high temperature fire burns for some hours. Parts of the body with low fat levels (e.g. lower legs) often remain unburned. It’s a simple experiment to do with a pig carcass.

Pri­vate Manned Moon­base in the 1990s, Yet Another Plan­ning Fallacy

• DavidPlumpton 5 Oct 2011 20:04 UTC

  8 points

  on: On self-deception

  I’ve noticed this sort of thing with documentaries about the JFK assassination. One documentary will seem to produce very strong and reasonable evidence that Oswald did it, and the next documentary seems to have a similar strength argument that he did not. Sigh. The real world is confusing some times; when smart people are trying to make you more confused then life is hard.

• DavidPlumpton 6 Oct 2011 19:47 UTC

  1 point

  in reply to: James_Miller’s comment on: 9/​11 as mindkiller

  Yikes. But then the two Koreas are technically still at war IIRC.

• DavidPlumpton 9 Oct 2011 9:06 UTC

  0 points

  in reply to: Normal_Anomaly’s comment on: Wel­come to Less Wrong! (2010-2011)

  Here’s a picture of the double slit experiment http://​​imgur.com/​​a/​​2Uyux

  I think achieving Human level intelligence is tough but doable. I suspect that self-improvement may be very difficult. But either way I strongly suspect that the power required to keep society ticking along will not be sustained. I think an AGI is 30 years away and that society does not have 30 years up its sleeve. I hope I am wrong.