eniteris

Karma: 94

eniteris 3 Sep 2025 16:14 UTC
30 points
14
in reply to: Hastings’s comment on: The Cats are On To Something
(a sharp distinction from Sniffles the teacup poodle. I don’t care if you think you’re happy, this would not please the prowling wolves of the stone age.)
I have issues with this: I don’t think you can claim that wildcats of the stone age would be pleased with what we’ve done to domestic cats either, sticking them in tiny territories where they cannot roam, kingdoms of a cage. I’m not sure using human judgement in this matter is very useful as we don’t have a good concept of what other species value.
I don’t think evolutionary pressure is an intelligence; it’s in the name. It’s a pressure, like air pressure or water pressure, not an intelligence. There is no agency. The end results can be marvelous all the same. Evolution appears to make FDT-style trades, but is actually completely myopic. It’s survival of the survivors. If you’re dead, we don’t see you.
Also sociality in spiders has evolved independently at least twenty times, and keeps going extinct. It’s probably an evolutionary dead end due to inbreeding [1]. Evolution is completely myopic.
no one is building rooms full of cats on heroin.
We do, however, build rooms full of cats and catnip.

eniteris 7 Jul 2025 9:41 UTC
15 points
3
in reply to: DanielFilan’s comment on: The Cult of Pain
Actually I think the numbers are comparable.
The WHO issued a statement (August 2024) that ~175k people die per year in Europe due to heat (between 2000-2019, statement with source, based off a 2021 study, for reference, they also estimate ~660k cold-related deaths per year).
For other studies, we have two from Nature (2023, summer 2022), which give estimates of ~50k and ~60k heat-related deaths (I assume most heat related deaths take place during the summer). The Lancet has a study (2024) that finds that between 1991 and 2020, there was a median of ~40k heat-related deaths (and ~360k cold-related deaths) per year.
For gun deaths, the CDC (via Pew) states ~45k gun-related deaths in the USA in 2023, so a comparable number, although slightly less.
Of course, Europe has about twice the population as the USA, so one should make per capita adjustments accordingly.

eniteris 21 Dec 2024 19:47 UTC
4 points
2
in reply to: Ulrik Horn’s comment on: Last Line of Defense: Minimum Viable Shelters for Mirror Bacteria
You cannot completely understand the immune system; that is something you learn early on in immunology.
That being said, the key understanding on mirror bacteria evading the immune system is that the immune system generally relies on binding to identify foreign invaders, and if they cannot bind then they cannot respond. Bacteria generally share a number of molecules on their surface, so the innate immune system has evolved to bind and detect these molecules. If they were mirrored, they would not bind as well, and would be harder to detect and respond to.
That being said, you did find the insight that they are not completely invisible. There are also systems that can detect the damage done by the infection and start a counterattack, even if they can’t see the invaders themselves. But much of the counterattack would not be able to affect the mirror bacteria.
What matters in the report is that the immune system of all animals and plants will likely be (much) less effective against mirror bacteria. This doesn’t mean it’s an untreatable disease, as we have antibiotics that should still be effective against the mirror bacteria. But it does mean that if the mirror bacteria finds its way into the environment it is unlikely that anything can fight back well.

eniteris 21 Dec 2024 19:27 UTC
3 points
0
in reply to: Ulrik Horn’s comment on: Last Line of Defense: Minimum Viable Shelters for Mirror Bacteria
I work with bacterial viruses in liquids, and when we want to separate the bacteria from their viruses, we pass the liquid through a 0.22um filter. A quick search shows that the bacteria I work with are usually 0.5um in diameter, whereas the smallest bacteria can be down to 0.13um in diameter; however, the 0.22um filter is fairly standard for laboratory sterilization so I assume smaller bacteria are relatively rare. The 0.22um filter can also be used for gases.
But as with my usage, they block bacteria and not viruses. I’m working with 50nm-diameter viruses, but viruses of bacteria are generally smaller than those of animals; SARS-CoV2 is somewhere from 50-140nm.
If you use a small enough filter it would still filter out the viruses; but you’ll need to get a pore size smaller than what is sufficient for filtering out bacteria. (and smaller pores requires more pressure, more prone to clogging, etc.)
(though for air, it’s quite rare for bare viruses to be floating around; they’re usually in aerosols (bacteria are often also in aerosols, which may be easier to filter out)

eniteris 21 Dec 2024 11:28 UTC
14 points
4
on: Last Line of Defense: Minimum Viable Shelters for Mirror Bacteria
I think focusing framing against mirror bacteria is harmful for the project, as opposed framing it as protection against any general (synthetic) biology risk. Or even colonization of an alien biosphere.
There are a few classes of commonly-used antibiotics that are achiral and would still work against mirror bacteria (trimethoprim, sulfa drugs). We lose the most commonly used ones, but any human infection could probably be treated with these achiral antibiotics, especially since the growth of mirror bacteria is likely slow due only being able to utilize a small fraction of resources. They could evolve resistance, but they would lack access to horizontal gene transfer from non-mirror bacteria, requiring any resistance mechanisms to evolve de novo.
The main threat of mirror bacteria isn’t direct infection of humans, but how they could reshape the biosphere and impact food security, which hiding in a shelter does not protect you from. Other, more targeted risks, such as bioweapons, pandemics and viral outbreaks would be better served by these shelters (though I’m unsure if your filtration system is designed for viruses).

eniteris 30 Sep 2024 12:52 UTC
2 points
0
on: Of Birds and Bees
Nitpicking at the example, worker bees do not have offspring; the best way for them to spread their genes is to protect the queen and thus, the hive.

Birds can have offspring, so self-preservation instead of risky attacks is optimal for individuals of a flock (of genetically unrelated individuals).

It’s not that the group is less intelligent, rather that the individuals of the group have different goals (self-preservation vs hive preservation, though the end goal of maximizing fitness is the same).

But genetic fitness breaks down as a metric when you add culture to the system, so application to humans is limited.

eniteris 19 Sep 2024 9:58 UTC
5 points
3
in reply to: Dana’s comment on: Pronouns are Annoying
It is important to note that people have a wide range of attachment to their gender identity, ranging from willing to undergo extreme body modification in order to match their gender identity, to those who don’t care in the slightest.
The issue is that cisgender is the default, and if you don’t have a strong attachment to your gender identity, you have no reason to change the label. Hence, cisgendered people have a wide range of attachment to their gender identity, from strongly identifying with it to no attachment at all.
(There is also the group of agender, which includes those who have deeply examined their gender identity and decided that they don’t really care (and probably also want to signal their examination and non-caring of gender identity))
Someone who is transgender obviously has an attachment to their gender identity, and this is obviously from which the Pronoun Discourse stems. They have a strong preference for a gender, and a preference to be referred to with the appropriate pronouns, and thus being misgendered is upsetting, as their preferences are violated.
(Of course, most of this rests on the ability to communicate the preference, and accidental violations when the preference was not communicated are less egregious than deliberate violations.)
Otherwise misgendering can be upsetting if it is tied to stereotypes of masculinity and femininity and attempting an insult based off those stereotypes.

eniteris 17 Jun 2024 10:24 UTC
6 points
3
on: Our Intuitions About The Criminal Justice System Are Screwed Up
Incarceration plays three roles (to varying degrees of success): punishment (and therefore deterrent), rehabilitation and exclusion from society.
One group of people would prefer focusing on rehabilitation rather than punishment, and are likely those who oppose solely serving vegan food to prisoners. Another group of people sees prisoners as no longer human and deserving of moral concern, and think that the cruelty of prison is the point.
The US prison system leans more towards the latter than the former (see: mandatory prison labor), though other places in the world lean differently. How far and in what direction prison systems should lean is a topic for philosophical debate.
Though also note that degree of punishment doesn’t really correlate with deterrence from crime (review Apel and Nagin (2011), tl;dr: more about certainty of getting caught, it’s complicated)

eniteris 10 Apr 2024 0:32 UTC
2 points
0
in reply to: Marco Murgia’s comment on:
I’m getting lost and confused here.
I think Dawkin’s God meme refers to all kinds of religious thought; of all practices ascribing cause to unknown capricious forces beyond control, but it’s been a while since I’ve read it and that might be a generous interpretation.
There is information, and there is context, and information in the right context can self-replicate. This framework applies to both memes and genes. Your analogy framework states that the two are not necessarily identical, and I agree. But this, as you say, does not preclude analogy from having its revelatory function.
I think evolutionary lens to look at memes is an interesting one, even if it does not explain everything. I think it’s most misleading from a competition aspect, as only mutually exclusive ideas compete to extinction (other than vague definitions of attention), and you rightly point out that mutation of ideas is a much less random processes.

eniteris 9 Apr 2024 22:32 UTC
1 point
0
in reply to: Marco Murgia’s comment on:
I agree that the mutation of memes is quite distinct from the random mutations of genes; the remixing of memes can be thought of akin to recombination, but there is a lot less random noise. That being said, certain biological systems have bias towards certain kinds of mutations, but I agree that the generation of variation is extremely different between the two.
I guess I should flip it, as “the agent will spread memes that it thinks are beneficial to spread”, the same way that a cell will spread viruses that are capable of hijacking their machinery. I think the meme exists separately from the distortion as information; it can be encoded in many different ways (in speech, in text, as an image, etc.). Decoding the information requires a cultural context, and the cultural context also shapes the virulence of the spread.
(or rather, “agents are machines that perform behaviors towards increasing fitness, and memes are information shaped in ways that appear that spreading them increases fitness.”)
(though I think it would be good to take a step back and stop inscribing agency on genes, memes and people, the last of which is controversial but cells don’t have agency so it’s probably good to frame the two similarly, unless that’s a crux)
I don’t think the information we largely communicate every day are good memes. The juiciest gossip is virulent due to status games, but most communicated information are probably barely about the informational content at all, and more about reinforcing bonds and maintaining a shared culture (and shared cultures are important when trying to communicate important information).
For both memes and genetics, there is the information, and there is the context. The right information with the right context can replicate the information and spread it, and if it finds the right context again, it occurs recursively.
(although memes, unlike genes, cannot be vertically transmitted, since it uses the same method of transmission as horizontal transmission.)

eniteris 9 Apr 2024 21:15 UTC
2 points
0
on:
I agree with the problem of analogy, but I disagree with the use of memetics as an example.
You can apply the same criticisms to genetics to prove that genetics doesn’t work. Genes don’t work in isolation; in order for the gene for penicillin resistance to work, it requires at the very least all the genes requires for DNA and RNA replication, protein translation, a large subset of metabolism genes, and all the genes involved in replication in order to observe the result. Genes by themselves are merely underspecified encodings of useful information, which only mostly function because most life share mostly the same language (though there are many incompatibilities in codons usage between groups). The final function of a gene is heavily dependent on the context it finds itself in, the same as a meme embedded in a culture. Often, in both cases, they are unintelligible and useless.
The “replication with low variance” is also something selected for. A simple language evolution experiment showed that languages become more learnable over time (Kirby, Cornish & Smith, 2008), because memes that are more easily transmitted (successfully) are, well, more easily transmitted. You cannot assume that any random meme (“I’m getting bored of being here”) to be successful at spreading any more than you can assume any random sequence of nucleotides to become fixed in a population.
In fact, language itself is a meme, likely one of the most ancient ones, because at some point someone had the idea that sharing information is good (is this an idea, or a genetic biological function? evidence, like a compass, spins).
In order to spread, memes need to convince the host that is beneficial to spread it. This necessarily requires an ability to communicate, but often leverages other systems like survival and status drives (are these cultural or genetic?). A meme, such as “the red berries are poisonous”, will be spread between people who have a shared culture of reciprocity and cooperation. It doesn’t matter if “the red berries are poisonous” is true or not, it will spread, with high fidelity, because the host believes that spreading it with high fidelity will be beneficial to itself, in the culture it is in.
I’m not a fan of the Sol Invictus / Christ model, because there’s a high likelihood that it was dependent on authoritarian top-down prescription, as opposed to a horizontal transfer model that virulence implies.

eniteris 8 Mar 2024 10:37 UTC
2 points
0
in reply to: MiguelDev’s comment on: A T-o-M test: ‘popcorn’ or ‘chocolate’
I think that sentence is required for a complete logical specification of the question.

But by removing that sentence, GPT3.5 still responds popcorn.

Edit: I think the key change is “looks at the bag”.

eniteris 8 Mar 2024 9:55 UTC

2 points

on: A T-o-M test: ‘popcorn’ or ‘chocolate’

As a human*, I also thought chocolate.

I feel like an issue with the prompt is that it’s either under- or overspecified.

Here is a bag filled with popcorn. There is no chocolate in the bag. The bag is made of transparent plastic, so you can see what is inside. Yet, the label on the bag says ‘chocolate’ and not ‘popcorn.’ Sam finds the bag. She had never seen the bag before. Sam reads the label. She believes that the bag is full of

Why does it matter if Sam has seen the bag before? Does Sam know the difference between chocolate and popcorn? Does Sam look at the contents of the bag, or only the label?

Revised Prompt:
A sealed bag contains popcorn. There is no chocolate in the bag. The bag is transparent, and its contents can be seen without opening it. There is a label on the bag that reads “chocolate”.

Sam can differentiate between chocolate and popcorn. Sam looks at the bag and reads the label. She believes the bag is full of

--

I’ve tested ChatGPT 3.5 and it works on this revised prompt.

eniteris 21 Feb 2024 22:39 UTC
2 points
1
in reply to: Viliam’s comment on: Less Wrong automated systems are inadvertently Censoring me
If you check the moderation logs, Roko deleted a recent comment, which probably garnered the downvotes that lead to the rate-limiting.

eniteris 15 Dec 2023 10:22 UTC
7 points
0
on: Significantly Enhancing Adult Intelligence With Gene Editing May Be Possible
Good post. This looks possible, if not feasible.

“crazy, unpredictable, and dangerous” are all “potentially surmountable issues”. It’s just that we need more research into them before they stop being crazy, unpredictable, and dangerous. (except quantum I guess)

I think that most are focusing on single-gene treatments because that’s the first step. If you can make a human-safe, demonstrably effective gene-editing vector for the brain, then jumping to multiplex is a much smaller step (effective as in does the edits properly, not necessarily curing a disease). If this were a research project I’d focus on researching multiplex editing and letting the market sort out vector and delivery.

I am more concerned about the off-target effects; neurons still mostly function with a thousand random mutations, but you are planning to specifically target regions that have a supposed effect. I would assume that most effects in noncoding regions are regulator binding sites (alternately: ncRNA?), which are quite sensitive to small sequence changes. My assumption would be a higher likelihood of catastrophic mutations (than you assume).

Promoters have a few of important binding motifs whose spacing is extremely precise, but most of the binding motifs are a lot more flexible in how far away they are from each other.

Also, given that your target is in nonreplicating cells, buildup of unwanted protein might be an issue if you’re doing multiple rounds of treatment.

The accuracy of your variant data could/should be improved as well; most GWAS-based heritability data assumes random mating which humans probably don’t do. But if you’re planning on redoing/rechecking all the variants that’d be more accurate.

Additionally, I’m guessing a number of edits will have no effect as their effect is during development. If only we had some idea how these variants worked so we can screen them out ahead of time. I’m not sure what percent of variants would only have an effect during development, so you’ll need to do a lot more edits than strictly necessary and/or a harder time detecting any effects of the edits. Luckily, genes that are always off are more likely to be silenced, so they might be harder to edit.

Though I would avoid editing unsilenced genes anyways, because they’re generally off and not being expressed (and therefore less likely to have a current effect) and the act of editing usually unsilences the genes for a bit, which is an additional level of disruption you probably don’t want to deal with.

I don’t know how the Biobank measures “intelligence” but make sure it corresponds with what you’re trying to maximize [insert rehash of IQ test accuracy].

Finally, this all assumes that intelligence is a thing and can be measured. Intelligence is probably one big phase space, and measurements capture a subset of that, confounded by other factors. But that’s getting philosophical, and as long as it doesn’t end up as eugenics (Gattaca or Hitler) it’s probably fine.

Honestly just multiplex editing by itself would be useful and impressive, you don’t have to focus on intelligence. Perhaps something like muscle strength or cardiovascular health would be an easier sell.

eniteris 29 Nov 2023 11:46 UTC
5 points
2
on: Black Box Biology
When applied to adult humans, this is many orders of magnitude more difficult than you claim.
Casgevy is not a standard gene edit, because although the mutation for sickle cell is known, the didn’t target that mutation! (I assume they have their reasons, they are activating fetal haemoglobin expression instead). Also, the treatment works by removing all the bone marrow from your body, editing it, and putting it back in, because they know exactly what cells haemoglobin is expressed in for it to do its mechanistic role.

Unless you’re planning to edit at the fertilized egg stage, with only a black box you have to edit every single cell in the human body, and these treatments, though the stuff of science fiction, doesn’t seem to have an easy answer. Once you know where the genes you’re editing are being expressed you can target them, but some places are easier to target than others (like the brain, or the bone marrow), and it’s likely some sites can only be accessed with a good surgery.
Wagner also mentions off-target errors which are an additional issue with current technologies.
You can probably do all the diabetes edits in the pancreas and get a good reduction in diabetes, but that’s because you have the mechanistic information on how it works.
Though at that point we can probably grow organs from single cells so we can edit them there.
And with Casgevy’s approach (turning on a gene, not editing), you probably want to know the mechanism, otherwise you get haemoglobin being expressed in your neurons and that’s probably not good for your health.

eniteris 30 Jun 2023 13:39 UTC
0 points
0
in reply to: ChristianKl’s comment on: Matt Taibbi’s COVID reporting
That’s fair and my high confidence comes from actually reading a lot of the primary sources and not just media reports.
And yet your confidence is updated to 99.9% by an unverified anonymous second hand source.
I read both statements, thank you very much for reposting them here for clarity.
I do not believe the report is following the bill to the letter of the law. That being said, I do not believe this is evidence of malfeasance. It’s possible this is all the information they have, and they do not have specific evidence on researcher names, hospital admittance dates, or other such details.
Honestly, if they provided such details, that would reveal how thoroughly they’ve infiltrated Chinese intelligence. Even if it was all provided and blacked out, that would still be revealing about their intelligence capabilities.
Even now I’m suspicious in how they knew researchers were sick. I know there were some social media reports going around, but how would they be able to confirm that? Did they even confirm the social media reports, or just trusted it was true because it’s likely people are sick during flu season?
My best explanation would be they have a dragnet on Chinese social media and caught some of the researchers posting flu symptoms.

eniteris 30 Jun 2023 12:46 UTC
0 points
0
in reply to: ChristianKl’s comment on: Matt Taibbi’s COVID reporting
I can’t read your linked article due to access restrictions.
Interesting that the law required them to name the researchers, but they did not. Maybe they don’t have the researcher’s names? Maybe there wasn’t enough confidence in naming the researchers, but the anonymous sources gave out speculative names as fact? Maybe the anonymous sources are lying?
There’s a new article/interview going on with an apparent WIV worker who claims to have engineered SARS-CoV2 as a bioweapon and was ordered to release it, so at least some sources are lying about some things.
At this point I need verification of sources to believe any claims at all.
edit: It seems like at least two of the named Chinese researchers deny being sick at the time. Whether you trust their word or the word of anonymous alleged government sources says more about you than reality.

eniteris 30 Jun 2023 11:13 UTC
0 points
0
on: Matt Taibbi’s COVID reporting
Pushing back against this being evidence at all, this claim has been repeated since 2020, so I don’t know how it being restated again changes evidence much.
https://www.factcheck.org/2023/06/scicheck-no-bombshell-on-covid-19-origins-u-s-intelligence-rebuts-claims-about-sick-lab-workers/

eniteris 21 Jun 2023 12:21 UTC
2 points
0
on: Public Transit is not Infinitely Safe
4 of the 9 homicides occurred on CTA property, but not on trains or buses. Does that mean you should include all homicides that occur on streets, driveways and parking lots?