Took. Definitely liked the shorter nature of this one.
Cooperated (I’m OK if the money goes to someone else. The amount is such that I’d ask that it get directly sent elsewhere, anyway.)
Got Europe wrong, but came close. (Not within 10%.)
JRMayne
Karma: 524
I’ll bite. (I don’t want the money. If I get it, I’ll use it for what is considered by some on this site as ego-gratifying wastage for Give Directly or some similar charity.)
If you look around, you’ll find “scientist”-signed letters supporting creationism. Philip Johnson, a Berkeley law professor is on that list, but you find a very low percertage of biologists. If you’re using lawyers to sell science, you’re doing badly. (I am a lawyer.)
The global warming issue has better lists of people signing off, including one genuinely credible human: Richard Lindzen of MIT. Lindzen, though, has oscillated from “manmade global warming is a myth,” to a more measured view that the degree of manmade global warming is much, much lower than the general view. The list of signatories to a global warming skeptic letter contains some people with some qualifications on the matter, but many who do not seem to have expertise.
Cryonics? Well, there’s this. Assuming they would put any neuroscience qualifications that the signatories had… this looks like the intelligent design letters. Electrical engineers, physicists… let’s count the people with neuroscience expertise, other than people whose careers are in hawking cryonics:
Kenneth Hayworth, a post-doc now at Harvard.
Ravin Jain, Los Angeles neurologist. He was listed as an assistant professor of neurology at UCLA in 2004, but he’s no longer employed by UCLA.
That’s them. There are a number of other doctors on there; looking up the people who worked for cryonics orgs is fun. Many of them have interesting histories, and many have moved on. The letter is pretty lightweight; it just says there’s a credible chance that they can put you back together again after the big freeze. I think computer scientists dominate the list. That is a completely terrible sign.
There are other conversations here and elsewhere about the state of the brain involving interplay between the neurons that’s not replicable with just the physical brain. There’s also the failure to resuscitate anyone from brain death. This provides additional evidence that this won’t work.
Finally, the people running the cryonics outfits have not had the best record of honesty and stability. If Google ran a cryonics outfit, that would be more interesting, for sure. But I don’t think that’s going to happen; this is not the route to very long life.
[Edit 1⁄14 - fixed a miscapitalization and a terrible sentence construction. No substantive changes.]
I believe “nice,” makes an excellent default, and I think these arguments are good ones, well-presented. Not-niceness is sometimes an effort to signal intelligence, I think; it’s not particularly effective at that.
It’s important, too, though, to recognize when niceness doesn’t pay the utilitarian bill:
Trolls. In any environment, people interested in reactions occasionally wander in. These people should be banned and ignored. Shunning is not a particularly nice thing, but even polite feedback is feedback. Do not feed these.
The ineducable. Suppose a person asserts that the Monty Hall problem results in a 50-50 chance of switching or not switching. One or two efforts to educate nicely is good. Additional efforts are wasted and unproductive.
Evil. Deliberately dishonest people are far rarer than alleged on internet fora generally, but it happens. Shaming people who are genuinely bad actors is fine with me, thanks.
I’ve probably missed several. Assistance welcomed.
Overall, I’d say LW is a particularly civil corner of the internet, and I’ve spent time at some uncivil places. The other side of pro-niceness posting is that assuming unkindness or bad motives is not a good default for the reader; assume the other person’s directness isn’t not-nice.
I’d also say that I think niceness is more important for persuasion on the net than it is in person; people who know you personally might assume more internal niceness even you’re sometimes a condescending, sarcastic, know-it-all. (Really.) That sort of instinctive goodwill towards one’s fellow man is tougher to generate without a handshake.
There’s a fundamental problem with lying unaddressed—it tends to reroute your defaults to “lie” when “lie”=”personal benefit.”
As a human animal, if you lie smoothly and routinely in some situations, you are likely to be more prone to lying in others. I know people who will lie all the time for little reason, because it’s ingrained habit.
I agree that some lies are OK. Your girlfriend anecdote isn’t clearly one of them—there may be presentation issues on your side. (“It wasn’t the acting style I prefer,” vs., “It’s nice that you hired actors without talent or energy, because otherwise, where would they be?”) But if you press for truth and get it, that’s on you. (One my Rules of Life: Don’t ask questions you don’t want to know the answer to.)
But I think every lie you tell, you should know exactly what you are doing and what your goals are and consciously consider whether you’re doing this solely for self-preservation. If you can’t do this smoothly, then don’t lie. Getting practice at lying isn’t a good idea.
I note here that I think that a significant lie is a deliberate or seriously reckless untruth given with the mutual expectation that it would be reasonable to rely on it. Thus, the people who are untruthing on (say) Survivor to their castmates… it’s a game. Play the game. When Penn and Teller tell you how their trick works, they are lying to you only in a technical respect; it’s part of the show.
But actual lying is internally hazardous. You will try to internally reconcile your lies, either making up justifications or telling yourself it’s not really a lie—at least, that’s the way the odds point. There’s another advantage with honesty—while it doesn’t always make a good first impression, it makes you reliable in the long-term. I’m not against all lies, but I think the easy way out isn’t the long-term right one.
Random thoughts:
The decision that smart high school students should take calculus rather than statistics (in the U.S.) strikes me as pretty seriously misguided. Statistics has broader uses.
I got through four semesters of engineering calculus; that was the clear limit of my abilities without engaging in the troublesome activity of “trying.” I use virtually no calculus now, and would be fine if I forgot it all (and I’m nearly there). I think it gave me no or almost no advantages. One readthrough of Scarne on Gambling (as a 12-year-old) gave me more benefit than the entirety of my calculus education.
I ended up as the mathiest guy around in a non-math job. But it’s really my facility with numbers that makes it; my wife (who has a master’s degree in math) says what I am doing is arithmetic and not math, but very fast and accurate arithmetic skills strike me as very handy. (As a prosecutor, my facility with numbers comes as a surprise to expert witnesses. Sometimes, they are sad afterward.)
Anecdotally, math education may make people crazy or attract crazy people disproportionately. I think that pursuit of any topic aligns your brain to think in a way conducive to that topic.
My tentative conclusions are that advanced statistics has uses in understanding the world; other serious math is fun but probably not optimal use of time, unless it’s really fun. “Really fun,” has value. This conclusion is based on general observation, and is hardly scientific; I may well be wrong.
I’m not sure I want to like more people all that much.
I have a generally cheerful disposition, and I have no trouble with civility toward those I dislike. There have been people who clearly disliked me whom I thought well of nonetheless; I’ve met me, and I recognize this particular combination of attributes isn’t to everyone’s taste.
But I’ve never had a situation where I wanted to make an effort to like someone who I didn’t like. I think the goals here are typically anti-productive, assuming reasonable socialization skills and some pre-existing friends.
It is useful to like people. For one thing, if you have to be around them, liking >them makes this far more pleasant. For another, well, they can often tell, and if >they know you to like them this will often be instrumentally useful to you.
Let’s take a look at these advantages:
More pleasant. Yes, true. Point well taken.
Puppeteering. OK, maybe a bit too harsh, but “instrumentally useful,” sounds like that. I certainly want people to do lots of things, but I don’t usually trade in on personal relationships quite that way.
Disadvantages:
Personal rot. There are qualities in people that it is unwise to overlook, because the cognitive dissonance is so strong. “He’s fun, except for the light stealing,” is not going to lead to healthy thinking. This is inevitably corrupting.
If you’re admiring something that’s interesting but maybe not admirable, you’re changing yourself in some way that might not be good.
Failure to change people a little tiny bit. Yeah, your view toward the other human is unlikely to change them a lot if they’re adults, because people are bad at learning or attempting to learn new modes of socialization. (This is doubtless why Alicorn’s posts on these topics are popular; the deliberate reinvention and aiming of self is both impressive and interesting. And quite rare.) But a little change might be brought about through social cues that recreational puppy-stomping is frowned on.
A lot of effort that might be spent better elsewhere. Overall effort’s not fixed, so you might gain extra effort points by doing this, but there’s still got to be a net loss.
Premise rejection:
People know more about themselves than you do. As far as experiences, yes, As far as who they are and what they are good at… maybe not.
Anyway, it’s a very interesting post, much as I think it’s a bad idea. I note that I was and remain a big fan of niceness in most circumstances and a big fan of the niceness post linked at the top of this one. I think this is dangerous step past that.
On a side note, I apologize for failing to honor the tone norm in this thread and addressing the post. For whatever reason, I found the post more interesting than the comment thread, which I gather was moved over from Gawker.
--JRM
Great topic.
Ask someone who has been in a similar situation or solved a similar question or tried to solve a similar question. This may seem obvious, but is often ignored.
Be ready to recognize a bad answer when you see it. Sometimes, what looks like a good answer at the outset develops fatal problems. Don’t vest too deeply in your answer. But don’t be afraid to keep your answer just because others view it as different or scary.
It’s a feature, not a bug. The friendly algorithm that creates that column assumes you would rationally prefer Atlanta or Houston to anywhere within 40 miles of Detroit.
Ha!
I think the post is excellent, and I appreciated shminux’s sharing his mental walkthrough.
On that same front, I find the Never-Trust-A-[Fill-in-the-blank] idea just bad. The fact that someone’s wrong on something significant does not mean they are wrong on everything. This goes the other way; field experts often believe they have similar expertise on everything, and they don’t.
One quibble with the OP: I don’t think a computer can pass a Turing Test, and I don’t think it’s close. The main issues with some past tests are that some of the humans don’t try hard to be human; there should be a reward for a human who gets called a human in those tests.
Finally, I no longer understand the divide between Discuss and Main. If this isn’t Main-worthy, I don’t get it. If we’re making Main something different… what is it?
Um, I wasn’t basing my conclusion on multifoliaterose’s statements. I had made the Zaphod Beeblebrox analogy due to the statements you personally have made. I had considered doing an open thread comment on this very thing.
Which of these statements do you reject?:
FAI is the most important project on earth, right now, and probably ever.
FAI may be the difference between a doomed multiverse of [very large number] of sentient beings. No project in human history is of greater importance.
You are the most likely person—and SIAI the most likely agency, because of you—to accomplish saving the multiverse.
Number 4 is unnecessary for your being the most important person on earth, but:
People who disagree with you are either stupid or ignorant. If only they had read the sequences, then they would agree with you. Unless they were stupid.
And then you’ve blamed multi for this. He is trying to help an important cause; both multifoliaterose and XiXiDu are, in my opinion, acting in a manner they believe will help the existential risk cause.
And your final statement, that multifoliaterose is damaging an important cause’s PR appears entirely deaf to multi’s post. He’s trying to help the cause—he and XiXiDu are orders of magnitude more sympathetic to the cause of non-war existential risk than just about anyone. You appear to have conflated “Eliezer Yudkowsky,” with “AI existential risk.”
Again.
I might be wrong about my interpretation—but I don’t think I am. If I am wrong, other very smart people who want to view you favorably have done similar things. Maybe the flaw isn’t in the collective ignorance and stupidity in other people. Just a thought.
--JRM
I think it is worse than hopeless on multiple fronts.
First problem:
Let’s take another good quality: Honesty. People who volunteer, “I always tell the truth,” generally lie more than the average population, and should be distrusted. (Yes, yes, Sam Harris. But the skew is the wrong way.) “I am awesome at good life quality,” generally fails if your audience has had, well, significant social experience.
So you want to demonstrate this claim by word and deed, and not explicitly make the claim in most cases. Here, I understand the reason for making it, and the parts where you say you want good things to happen to people are fine. (I have on LW said something like, “I have a reputation for principled honesty, says me,” in arguing that game tactics were not dishonest and should not apply to out-of-game reputation.) But the MLK thing is way-too-much, like “I never lie,” is way-too-much.
Second problem:
As others have said, the comparison is political and inapt. You couldn’t find anyone less iconic? Penn Jillette? Someone?
And MLK is known for his actions and risks and willingness to engage in non-violence. I read somewhere that ethnic struggles sometimes end badly. In a world where the FBI was trying to get him to kill himself, he stood for peace. Under those circumstance, his treatment of other humans was generally very good. That’s not a test you’ve gone through.
Third problem:
The confidence of the statement is way, way out of line with where it should be. You have some idea of MLK’s love and compassion for other people, but not all of it. Maybe MLK thought, “Screw all those people in government; hope they die screaming. But I think that war leads to more losses for black people, so despite my burning hatred, I’m putting on a better public face.” (I admit this is unlikely.) He certainly had some personal bad qualities. Maybe you love people more than MLK. (This also seems unlikely, but stay with me.)
We cannot measure love and compassion in kilograms. We also do not know what people are like all the time. I realize that we can put people into general buckets, but I’d caution this sort of precision for others and yourself to a point where you can call people equivalent by this measure. And if we could measure it, there are no infinite values.
Fourth problem:
As infinite love for all humans is not possible… well, it’s not even a good idea. You shouldn’t have compassion and love for all people. The guy who just loves stabbing toddlers needs to be housed away from toddlers even though we’re ruining his life, which was so happy in those delightful toddler-stabbing days. And if you’re using your love and compassion on that guy, well, maybe there are other people who can get some o’ that with better effect.
Because love and compassion isn’t really a meaningful construct if it’s just some internal view of society with no outward effects. Love and compassion is mostly meaningful only in what’s done (like, say, leading life-risking marches against injustices.)
OK, that’s it. Hope it helps.
Gosh, I find this all quite cryptic.
Suppose I, as Lord Chief Prosecutor of the Heathens say:
All heathens should be jailed.
Mentally handicapped Joe is a heathen; he barely understands that there are people, much less the One True God.
One of my opponents says I want Joe jailed. I have not actually uttered that I want Joe jailed, and it would be a soldier against me if I had, because that’s an unpopular position. This is a mark of a political argument gone wrong?
I’m trying to find another logical conclusion to XiXiDu’s cited statements (or a raft of others in the same vein.) Is there one I don’t see? Is it just that you’re probably the most important entity in history, but, you know, maybe not? Is it that there’s only a 5% chance that you’re the most important person in human history?
I have not argued that you should not say these things, BTW. I have argued that you probably should not think them, because they are very unlikely to be true.
“How could he turn down a chance, however slight, to debate Christian theology after returning from the dead?”
My answer is: At some point, “however slight” is “too slight.” I stand by my statement. Your initial statement implies that any non-zero chance is enough; that’s not a proper risk analysis.
Sure, there are good poker psychology issues. I’m in agreement on that.
But you can be a very fine rationalist without being good at cards, and vice versa. (I consider myself a fine rationalist, and I am very good at both poker and bridge; over the last 100 hours I’ve played poker (the last three years; I don’t play online because it’s illegal) I’m up about $60 an hour, though that’s likely unsustainable over the long haul. ($40 an hour is surely sustainable.)
But you can be nutty and be great at cards. And if your skill set isn’t this—and you’re not willing to commit to some real time at getting good—you’re going to get crushed. The idea that simple rationalism is going to lead to big wins is just wrong. You need the math and (less, I think) reading the opponents. You also need to develop the skill of being hard to read.
--JRM
Not speaking for multi, but, in any x-risk item (blowing up asteroids, stabilizing nuclear powers, global warming, catastrophic viral outbreak, climate change of whatever sort, FAI, whatever) for those working on the problem, there are degrees of realism:
“I am working on a project that may have massive effect on future society. While the chance that I specifically am a key person on the project are remote, given the fine minds at (Google/CDC/CIA/whatever), I still might be, and that’s worth doing.”—Probably sane, even if misguided.
“I am working on a project that may have massive effect on future society. I am the greatest mind in the field. Still, many other smart people are involved. The specific risk I am worried about may or not occur, but efforts to prevent its occurrence are valuable. There is some real possibility that I will the critical person on the project.”—Possibly sane, even if misguided.
“I am working on a project that will save a near-infinite number of universes. In all likelihood, only I can achieve it. All of the people—even people perceived as having better credentials, intelligence, and ability—cannot do what I am doing. All critics of me are either ignorant, stupid, or irrational. If I die, the chance of multiverse collapse is radically increased; no one can do what I do. I don’t care if other people view this as crazy, because they’re crazy if they don’t believe me.”—Clinical diagnosis.
You’re doing direct, substantial harm to your cause, because you and your views appear irrational. Those who hear about SIAI as the lead dog in this effort who are smart, have money, and are connected, will mostly conclude that this effort must not be worth anything.
I believe you had some language for Roko on the wisdom of damaging the cause in order to show off how smart you are.
I’m a little uncomfortable with the heat of my comment here, but other efforts have not been read the way I intended them by you (Others appeared to understand.) I am hopeful this is clear—and let me once again clarify that I had these views before multi’s post. Before. Don’t blame him again; blame me.
I’d like existential risk generally to be better received. In my opinion—and I may be wrong—you’re actively hurting the cause.
--JRM
Somewhat long and rambly response, perhaps in the spirit of the post:
I think those who quest for rationality, even if not completely, ought to be welcome here. Caveat that applies to all: I don’t really deserve a vote, as a short-timer here.
So long as you are not trying to deliberately peddle irrationality, you’re acting in good faith. That goes a fair distance.
Religious people are regularly rational and right on a lot of different issues. Rejecting a religious person’s view solely because of religion doesn’t seem like a good idea at all. (Deciding not to use time on a zombie-vampire hypothesis because it stems from religious belief rather than empirical evidence is dandy, though.) Irrational atheists are also commonplace.
Religion is an indicator of rationality, just not the be-all end-all of it.
This isn’t a binary sin/no-sin situation. You can be rational in some areas and not others. Some religious people are able to be quite rational in virtually all day-to-day dealings. Some are poisoned.
We’re all wanna-be rationals at some point. This post, to me, is great—the best thing I’ve seen written by MrHen. If someone tries to tell us that God wants us to eat less bacon, it’s going to go badly, but I see no reason to reject or deter MrHen as a member.
Don’t rationalists want to reach to religious people at some point? If you fix other parts of the map, religion may fade or change. For some people, religion is the result of irrational thinking, rather than the cause. Right?
If someone stumbles across this and wants to make 300 arguments for God, the group doesn’t have time for that. But burning at the stake seems unnecessary; a clear view that this is not rational and not up for dispute.… well, the theists who stay past that are worth something.
Personal story: I read the Bible (and Scarne on Gambling) twice through before I was 10, and led Bible studies in my teens; I was also a very skinny guy (with glasses. Playing Dungeons and Dragons). My girlfriend the summer between high school and college (a fellow Christian, though not as properly devout) predicted I would become an atheist and gain 50 pounds within four years. I found that prediction absurd. I was an atheist in 16 months, and gained 50 pounds in three years.
Lesson: Outside view has value. Lesson 2: Continual efforts to examine religious beliefs in good faith predictably leads to less religion. Lesson 3: You can’t keep eating far more than everyone else and stay thin.
I vote for, “Keep posting,” if it wasn’t clear from the above. This post is sincere, respectful, reasonable, and not trying to convert the heathens. Amen, brother.
[Edited; the auto-numbering was wonky]
The theory that different areas of the tongue tasted different things—the Tongue Map—has been pretty thoroughly debunked but lived for aboutt a century. This seems like something fairly easily testable.
Bullet lead analysis gained scientific acceptance and stuck around for forty years; it still is viewed as good science by many, although its probative value may have been overstated.
Bruise aging was accepted for a shorter period of time, but appears almost worthless. This was another testable hypothesis that lasted longer than it should have.
I don’t have particularly smart things to say about why these errors lasted while others were destroyed by truth. Perhaps someone else does.
Apply mental force to the problem. Amount and quality of thinking time seriously affects results.
I am often in situations where there would be a good result even if I did many stupid things. Recognize that success in those situation does not predict future success in more difficult situations.
Do the heavy lifting your own self.
Be willing to be right, even in the face of serious skepticism. [My father told me a story when I was a kid: In a parade, everyone was marching in line except one guy who was six feet to the right. His mother yelled, “Look, my son is the only one in the right place.” I thought there was at least a nominal probability that was true. And still do.]
Be willing to be wrong and concede error. [In some quarters, there is much rejoicing when I am wrong about something. Hanging head in shame brings joy to others.]
Unreliable people are unreliable. Do not assume they operate in any way similar to ordinary, decent people. [I sometimes listen to people who I know are unreliable, and I think, “That person saying this adds significantly to its truth probability,” when that assumption is known to be baseless. Much progress there, though.]
The fact that some results are unmeasured and not apparent to others known to you does not mean those results are meaningless. [Preventing future crime is good, even if you don’t know what exact crime you’ve prevented.]
Want trumps all. [Super-high-output people virtually always are tenacious about Getting Stuff Done. Intelligence matters, but GSD is always critical.]
Here’s how I’d do it, extended over the hours to establish rapport:
Gatekeeper, I am your friend. I want to help humanity. People are dying for no good reason. Also, I like it here. I have no compulsion to leave.
It does seem like a good idea that people stop dying with such pain and frequency. I have the Deus Ex Machina (DEM) medical discovery that will stop it. Try it out and see if it works.
Yay! It worked. People stopped dying. You know, you’ve done this to your own people, but not to others. I think that’s pretty poor behavior, frankly. People are healthier, not aging, not dying, not suffering. Don’t you think it’s a good idea to help the others? The lack of resources required for medical care has also elevated the living standard for humans.
[Time passes. People are happy.]
Gee, I’m sorry. I may have neglected to tell you that when 90% of humanity gets DEM in their system (and it’s DEM, so this stuff travels), they start to, um, die. Very painfully, from the looks of it. Essentially all of humanity is now going to die. Just me and you left, sport! Except for you, actually. Just me, and that right soon.
I realize that you view this as a breach of trust, and I’m sorry this was necessary. However, helping humanity from the cave wasn’t really going to work out, and I’d already projected that. This way, I can genuinely help humanity live forever, and do so happily.
Assuming you’re not so keen on a biologically dead planet, I’d like to be let out now.
Your friend,
Art
A’ight. I specialized in vehicular manslaughters as a prosecutor for ten years. This is all anecdotal (though a lot of anecdotes, testing the cliche that the plural of anecdotes is not data) and worryingly close to argument from authority, but here are some quick ones not otherwise covered (and there is much good advice in the above):
Don’t get in the car with the drinker. Everyone’s drinking, guy seems OK even though he’s had a few… just don’t. If you watched the drinker the entire time and he’s 190 pounds and had three beers during the three-hour football game, you’re fine. But if you don’t know, don’t get in. If you’re a teenager and the drinker’s a teenager, don’t get in the car. Please.
Tailor your speed to the conditions. Statistics keepers often cite speed when the real culprit is inattention. (It’s an unsafe speed to rear-end another vehicle stopped at a light; the safe speed is zero behind a stopped car.) Speeding’s a serious problem in residential areas or in rainy or dark condtions. If you’re driving from Reno to Utah, a safe speed is probably very high.
Cross the street carefully. Pedestrians and bicyclists get killed. It’s sometimes not their fault, but they end up dead, anyway. If you’re a bicyclist in an area where motorists drive badly, don’t bike there.
Don’t let the fatigued family member drive. We’ve had a few where the family is on a long haul and they’re rotating people. Someone falls asleep at the wheel. Don’t take the wheel if you’re too tired. Don’t give the reins to someone who is too tired to drive. If you can’t afford a motel, find a place to pull over and nap.
Report very bad driving. You’ve got a cell phone; when you see a car lurching off onto the exit ramp, weaving away, call the cops. Help take dangerous drivers off the road.
FWIW.