Flinter

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 10:31 PM

  0 points

  on: Wel­come to Less Wrong! (11th thread, Jan­uary 2017) (Thread B)

  I am new and a moderator already made a clearly irrational action against me and I am dumbfounded. I mean to present a very difficult subject that no one else can present, and I did so perfectly and in the only way possible and the moderator moderated the attempt out of existence.

  Doesn’t irrationality run counter to this site’s stated mission?

  To be clear, I am presenting the most important topic in the world, with the assumption that it is probably significant and correct because it’s John Nash’s (most significant) work.

  Why is Less Wrong censoring out Nash’s work and implying that it is irrational?

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 9:36 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: gjm’s comment on: A Pro­posal for a Sim­pler Solu­tion To All Th­ese Difficult Ob­ser­va­tions and Problems

  Yes I understand what you mean to say here. And so I mean to attend to your questions:

  “Would you care to be absolutely explicit about the following question? Do you, or do you not, have an actual notion of value in mind, that you believe satisfies all the relevant requirements? Because some of the things you’re saying seem to presuppose that you do, and some that you don’t.”

  Yes I do have an actual notion of value in mind, that does satisfy all of the relevant requirements. But first we have to find a shared meaning for the word “ideal”: http://​​lesswrong.com/​​r/​​discussion/​​lw/​​ogt/​​do_we_share_a_definition_for_the_word_ideal/​​

  Because the explanation of the notion is difficult (which you already know because you quote the owner of this site as being undecided on it etc.)

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 9:33 PM

  1 point

  in reply to: gjm’s comment on: A Pro­posal for a Sim­pler Solu­tion To All Th­ese Difficult Ob­ser­va­tions and Problems

  I REALLY appreciate this dialogue. Yup I am suggesting #1. It’s observable reality that smart agents converge to value the same thing yes, but that is the wrong way to say it. “Natural evolution will levate (aka create) the thing that all agents will converge to”, this is the correct perspective (or more valuable perspective). Also I should think that is obvious to most people here.

  Eliezer Y will rethink this when he comes across what I am proposing.

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 9:29 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: gjm’s comment on: Open thread, Jan. 16 - Jan. 22, 2016

  Because I cannot do what was required to make a proper post, which was to not have to make “shit posts” before I make my initial post (which needed to be independent). So the filter, which is trying to foster rational thinking, filtering out the seeds of it.

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 9:24 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: gjm’s comment on: A Pro­posal for a Sim­pler Solu­tion To All Th­ese Difficult Ob­ser­va­tions and Problems

  “The entirety of our markets” do not have anywhere near enough computational power to solve chess. (At least, not unless someone comes up with a novel way of solving chess that’s much cleverer than anything currently known.)

  It is the opinion of some well established (and historical) economics philosophers the markets can determine the optimal distribution of our commodities. Such an endeavor is at least several orders of magnitudes higher than the computing power required to solve chess.

  “It sounds as if this is meant to be shorthand for some sort of argument for your thesis (though I’m not sure exactly what thesis) but if so I am not optimistic about the prospects for the argument’s success given that “we all” don’t value or feel the same things as one another.”

  You have stepped outside the premise again, which is a stable metric of value, this implies objectivity, which implies we all agree on the value of it. This is the premise.

Do we Share a Defi­ni­tion for the word “ideal”?

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 8:26 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: gjm’s comment on: A Pro­posal for a Sim­pler Solu­tion To All Th­ese Difficult Ob­ser­va­tions and Problems

  Yes I mean to outline the concept of a stable metric of value and then I will be able to show how to solve such a problem.

  “But in this case I remark that you aren’t in fact proposing “a simpler solution to all these difficult observations and problems”, you are proposing that instead of those difficult problems we solve a probably-much-simpler problem, namely “how should we handle AI alignment etc. once we have an agreed-upon notion of value that matches our actual opinions and feelings, and that’s precisely enough expressed and understood that we could program it into a computer and be sure we got it right?”.”

  No I don’t understand this, and I suspect you haven’t quite understood me (even though I don’t think I can be clearer). My proposal, a stable metric of value, immediately resolves many problems that are effectively paradoxes (or rendered such by my proposal, and then re-solved).

  I’m not sure what you would disagree with, I think maybe you mean to say that the introduction of a stable metric still requires “solutions” to be invented to deal with all of these “problems”. I’m not sure I would even agree to that, but it doesn’t speak to the usefulness of what I suggest if I can come up with such a metric for stable valuation.

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 8:22 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: gjm’s comment on: Open thread, Jan. 16 - Jan. 22, 2016

  Yes I think its not reasonable, because it acted counter-productive to the intended use that you are suggesting it was implemented for.

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 8:21 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: moridinamael’s comment on: A Pro­posal for a Sim­pler Solu­tion To All Th­ese Difficult Ob­ser­va­tions and Problems

  Yes that is relevant. Now I have said something to this end. It is a stable VALUE metric we should be wanting to levate. And that will allow us to (also) quantify our own sanity. I think I can suggest this and speak to that link.

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 8:18 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: gjm’s comment on: A Pro­posal for a Sim­pler Solu­tion To All Th­ese Difficult Ob­ser­va­tions and Problems

  “When you say “problem X is easily solved by Y” it can mean either (1) “problem X is easily solved, and here is how: Y!” or (2) “if only we had Y, then problem X would easily be solved”.”

  Yes I am speaking to (2) and once we understand the value of it, then I will explain why it is not insignificant.

  “Third: having such a notion of value is not necessarily enough. Here is an example of a problem for which it is probably not enough: Suppose we make an AI, which makes another AI, which makes another AI, etc., each one building a smarter one than itself. Or, more or less equivalently, we build an AI, which modifies itself, and then modifies itself again, etc., making itself smarter each time. We get to choose the initial AI’s values. Can we choose them in such a way that even after all these modifications we can be confident that the resulting AI—which may work very differently, and think very differently, from the one we start with—will do things we are happy about?”

  You would create the first AI to seek value, and then knowing that it is getting smarter and smarter, it would tend towards seeing the value I propose and optimize itself in relation to what I am proposing, by your own admission of how the problem you are stating works.

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 8:15 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: gjm’s comment on: A Pro­posal for a Sim­pler Solu­tion To All Th­ese Difficult Ob­ser­va­tions and Problems

  So lets take poker for example. I have argued (lets take it as an assumption which should be fine) that poker players never have enough empirical evidence to know their own winrates. It’s always a guess and since the game isn’t solved they are really guessing about whether they are profitable and how profitable they are. IF they had a standard basis for value then it could be arranged that players brute force the solution to poker. That is to say if players knew who was playing correctly then they would tend towards the correct players strategy.

  So there is an argument, to be explored, that the reason we can’t solve chess is because we are not using our biggest computer which is the entirety of our markets.

  The reason your points are “moot” or not significant, is because there is not theoretically possible “better’ way of dealing with ai, than having a stable metric of value.

  This happens because objective value is perfectly tied to objective morality. That which we all value is that which we all feel is good.

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 7:53 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: gjm’s comment on: A Pro­posal for a Sim­pler Solu­tion To All Th­ese Difficult Ob­ser­va­tions and Problems

  Yup you are speaking perfectly to my point. Thankfully I am familiar with Szabo’s works to some degree which is very relevant and inter-linked with the link you gave. In regard to cannons I don’t mean it in the derogatory sense although I think ultimately it might be shown that they are that too.

  So I think you are speaking to the problem of creating such a metric. But I urging us to push past that and take it as a given that we have such a unit that is objective value.

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 7:50 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: gjm’s comment on: A Pro­posal for a Sim­pler Solu­tion To All Th­ese Difficult Ob­ser­va­tions and Problems

  That’s sort of moot for 2 reasons. Firstly what I have proposed would be the game theoretically optimal approach to solving the problem of a super terrbad ai. There is no better approach against such a player. I would also suggest there is no other reasonable approach. And so this speaks to the speed in relation to other possible proposed solutions.

  Now of course we are still being theoretical here, but its relevant to point that out.

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 7:46 PM

  1 point

  in reply to: gjm’s comment on: A Pro­posal for a Sim­pler Solu­tion To All Th­ese Difficult Ob­ser­va­tions and Problems

  Yes but my claim was IF we had such a clear notion of value then most of the problems on this site would be solved (by this site I mean for example what popular cannons are based around as interesting problems). I think you have simply agreed with me.

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 7:28 PM

  1 point

  in reply to: Davidmanheim’s comment on: A Pro­posal for a Sim­pler Solu­tion To All Th­ese Difficult Ob­ser­va­tions and Problems

  Ok. I skimmed it, and I think I understand your post well enough (if not I’ll read deeper!). What I am introducing into the dialogue is a theoretical and conceptually stable unit of value. I am saying, let’s address the problems stated in your articles as if we don’t have the problem of defining our base unit and that it exists and is agreed upon and it is stable for all time.

  So here is an example from one of your links:

  “Why is alignment hard?

  Why expect that this problem is hard? This is the real question. You might ordinarily expect that whoever has taken on the job of building an AI is just naturally going to try to point that in a relatively nice direction. They’re not going to make evil AI. They’re not cackling villains. Why expect that their attempts to align the AI would fail if they just did everything as obviously as possible?

  Here’s a bit of a fable. It’s not intended to be the most likely outcome. I’m using it as a concrete example to explain some more abstract concepts later.

  With that said: What if programmers build an artificial general intelligence to optimize for smiles? Smiles are good, right? Smiles happen when good things happen.”

  Do we see how we can solve this problem now? We simply optimize the AI system for value, and everyone is happy.

  If someone creates “bad” AI we could measure that, and use the measurement for a counter program.

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 7:20 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: niceguyanon’s comment on: Open thread, Jan. 16 - Jan. 22, 2016

  No you don’t understand. I have something valuable to bring but I needed to make my INTRO post an independent one and I was stripped of that possibility by the process.

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 6:15 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: Flinter’s comment on: Open thread, Jan. 16 - Jan. 22, 2016

  I don’t think I should have done what I did to get my first two karma points. I suspect it degrades the quality of the site at a rate in which rationality can’t inflate it. But I’ll save my reasoning and the discussion of it ftm. I am now able to post my discussion on its own it seems, so I did it.

  2x cheers.

A Pro­posal for a Sim­pler Solu­tion To All Th­ese Difficult Ob­ser­va­tions and Problems

• FlinterJan 16, 2017, 5:44 PM

  1 point

  on: Open thread, Jan. 16 - Jan. 22, 2016

  I wanted to make a discussion post about this but apparently I need 2 karma points and this forum is too ignorant to give them out. I’ll post here and I guess probably be done with this place since its not even possible for me to attempt to engage in meaningful discussion. I’d also like to make the conjecture that this place cannot be based on rationality with the rule sets that are in place for joining-and I don’t understand why that isn’t obvious.

  Anyways, here is what would have been my article for discussion:

  “I am not perfectly sure how this site has worked (although I skimmed the “tutorials”) and I am notorious for not understanding systems as easily and quickly as the general public might. At the same time I suspect a place like this is for me, for what I can offer but also for what I can receive (ie I intend on (fully) traversing the various canons).

  I also value compression and time in this sense, and so I think I can propose a subject that might serve as an “ideal introduction” (I have an accurate meaning for this phrase I won’t introduce atm).

  I’ve read a lot of posts/​blogs/​papers that are arguments which are founded on a certain difficulties, where the observation and admission of this difficulty leads the author and the reader (and perhaps the originator of the problem/​solution outlines) to defer to some form of a (relative to what will follow) long winded solution.

  I would like to suggest, as a blanket observation and proposal, that most of these difficult problems described, especially on a site like this, are easily solvable with the introduction of an objective and ultra-stable metric for valuation.

  I think maybe at first this will seem like an empty proposal. I think then, and also, some will see it as devilry (which I doubt anyone here thinks exists). And I think I will be accused of many of the fallacies and pitfalls that have already been previously warned about in the canons.

  That latter point I think might suggest that I might learn well and fast from this post as interested and helpful people can point me to specific articles and I WILL read them with sincere intent to understand them (so far they are very well written in the sense that I feel I understand them because they are simple enough) and I will ask questions.

  But I also think ultimately it will be shown that my proposal and my understanding of it doesn’t really fall to any of these traps, and as I learn the canonical arguments I will be able to show how my proposal properly addresses them.”

• FlinterJan 15, 2017, 11:45 PM

  0 points

  on: A Re­turn to Discussion

  I have a different experience with my blog. Seems no one feels comfortable commenting (or many people simply find nothing to say but seem to pass around the links enough). I move to these more obscure sites to find my audience and to have dialogue on the content/​arguments. But I am not looking for students so much as teachers...people that might correct me.

  Also I have learned and found of very significant writers/​writings through these different social networks, that I wouldn’t have found otherwise.

  I think then we can re-solve the two views by suggesting we are each looking for something and these different outlets provide different solutions, but they are complex and inextricable in regard to the reasoning for our preferences for any one.

  I came to LW for these sentiments, but the hoops and protocol I have to jump through just to make a submission isn’t related to why I am here (or I don’t understand it!) ;p