What a great read! Based on the post score and the amount of comments, I guess I’m pretty alone in appreciating the literary value of the piece.
Long try
Wow, I failed the 2-4-6 test.
But then, do you think the way it is presented—that is, the paragraphs of flowing conversations, of Hermione’s guesses and Harry’s answers—did its part in molding our thinking toward her reasoning? In other words, we (OK, I) were biased by the very literature we were reading and thus couldn’t think straight?
- 24 Aug 2020 1:17 UTC; 7 points) 's comment on Charting Is Mostly Superstition by (
OMG this is great. Reading about Harry being outgunned by Hat-Harry is an intense experience. Indeed, facing our self is the greatest challenge—one that I doubt anybody but a very few eminent rationalists can do.
Yes, your 1st point makes sense. I take it that since it’s somewhat difficult to accurately predict whether the question will hook those people, an umbrella approach where I post in many media is the most rational 1?
My scenario is really hypothetical. I forgot to mention xkcd What if? as an option in my list in the OP, but yeah, it will fit very nicely and frankly I think my question belongs there. But unfortunately, it seems that xkcd has stopped answering What if queries, because his latest entry is 2017 or so.
Your guess is spot-on. My question needs some details and can hardly be summarized into a neat google query.
OK, so it’s hard to describe what X be like; but this picture is the inspiration of my pondering: https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap160911.html
The simplest form of my inquiry would be along the line of “What happens next?”. In that case, what do you think X is?
Just tried. No responds so far. I think the APOD forum is even less visited than LW, so the reach is really short.
Hola! Been around for a few months, time to move out into the light. My intention was to finish LW’s 3 core readings before introducing myself, but then I gave up on RA-Z and yesterday I stopped HPMOR at chapter 59. My expectation is now so low that I won’t put my bet on Codex, though I’ll definitely try reading it soon. So here I am.
I live in Vietnam. Not to my surprise, none or very few on this platform are from the country. If you are, give me a shout out!
I don’t really work now, though I do have some stock exchange accounts. That means I have quite some time to spend during a day. So I learn Spanish and other stuffs. I’m currently in a project to finish all APOD posts during 4 years, and have read up to 2017. I try to find the best online courses to learn day by day, and completed quite some.
It’s also my goal to watch the best films or TV shows. Since the rating system for TV is not as extended as movies, I rely on IMDb 250 to filter the shows. And have worked my way up to Breaking Bad now! That means I’ve completed GoT (was intrigued by people’s hype all these years), and man the early seasons were really good. On the other hand, I have a feeling that I’ve missed many great recent films because the aggregating site flickmetric stopped working properly when I reached around year 1988; so if you have any recommendations, feel free to enlighten me :) My criteria for a good movie are: RT critic score >94%, audience score >89%, letterboxd 5-star votes > 4 star votes, and IMDB score >7.9.
Like most members of LW, I have big ideas. But for now I want to have a better, more accurate view of the world so that when I spring into actions, they will produce expected effects. Also, to wait for a depression to make use of the investment money. In the current situation, earning is not easy. BTW, when do you think it’ll happen?
I will profoundly and immensely change the world for the better from the ground level, by creating and/or modifying the constituent element, the building block of civilization—in other words, the very foundation of society itself.
Why does my heart not laugh hysterically at the thought? Is it because I really do believe it firmly?
May be off-topic, but can you elaborate on where LW culture wants to go? Or point to a specific post...
Thanks a bunch, Val. I say you saved me dozens if not hundreds of hours, because I was (am) pretty confused about the big picture around here.
The associated Ken Wilber image helps with the understanding a lot. Now, if I don’t really get nearly half of the articles on LW, does that mean I’m redder than orange? Are there tests on the internet where I can pretty reliably tell where I’m standing on that scale? Also, I’m quite sure that my goal is to get to the turquoise level. What online resources I should learn and/or what “groups” I should join, in your personal recommendation?
Oh come on, many says one can’t rely on wiki. On higher topics like quantum & maybe electricity, wiki uses high words that confuse the hell out of me. For example, it uses the term “drifting speed” to describe “electrons’ velocity in wires”—how can I know to find it to read in the 1st place?
OTOH, I posted another question here asking where I should ask a question. Some people suggest posting on as many sites as possible, which means LW included. Even the FAQ or some other “official” documents here encourages asking any and all kinds of questions.
If by downvoting you meant the community only accept high-level questions where one must do substantial research (how substantial is defined by those who read the questions) before even considering writing it, then I think you succeeded. I do feel bad seeing my question got downvoted to a rotund 0, and do feel discouraged from asking questions in the future.
My appreciation—that’s really helpful, especially point 2. I was a bit hesitating when I saw the amount of links in cousin_it’s link, but point 3 encourages me to do it, even slowly.
Point 4 is kinda hard from my POV. I admit I’m too lazy to dig all the sources to display in a post. But then, if a question is formatted like that, wouldn’t it be way too long? I thought titles should be concise & provoking.
Woah, it’s a thought that never occurred to me: turbines slow down when we use electricity. Makes sense when 1 thinks hard about it. Did you work in a power plant or something?
There’s another relevant question. When turbines rotate, they must be doing it inside a set of huge magnets; or they must themselves rotate the magnets inside a huge coil. In either case, there’s a need for magnets. As per my understanding, they can’t be electric magnets because it will destroy the purpose of generating electricity in the 1st place. So they must be natural ones. Those will decay over time because their field energy is being used all day. Therefore… theoretically, if humans exist long enough then we will run out of magnets and thus no electricity? For now I have no idea what is the Earth’s capacity for magnetic materials.
Has anyone suggested it yet? I think LW should have a system to notice users whether they’ve read a linked article or not when they’re reading inside another. That’s a basic & universal need, yet I’m surprised it’s not implemented. On other sites, it’s simply the link’s color: blue if unread, violet if read. If you guys decide to opt for a more sophisticated system, then I propose using 8 rainbow colors: black means the user hasn’t read it, red indicates once, orange twice… purple 7 times or more. In case you’re worried the various long link shades may distract people, then just apply them to that circle indication at the end of the link. You could make it bigger and bold for readers to distinguish the colors.
I guess you guys running the site like monochrome. While it’s ok enough to differentiate on the homepage, where blog titles are big and bold, I doubt using that scheme will be effective with hover.
Besides, that will requires readers to reach out and move their mouse over the link for 1 second, squint for a while to find whether it’s grey or black, and then move it out and wait another 1 second for the preview to go off; in contrast to just glance at the circle icon to find out. No-brainer IMO.
A few, but overall it doesn’t change very much.
Your last sentence perfectly describes the main obstacle a supposed IAL will face in the process of emerging into global usage. It must prove way more effective than the next candidate in order to persuade.
immigration law is a stronger barrier to travel and work permits than languages are.
That’s true. However, I’d say that if the total difficulty is 100%, then immigration law contributes around 55% and language barrier 45%. If you can eliminate the latter, then you effectively make it twice as easier to do it.
Moreover, IMO immigration law is kinda ephemeral. Trump was elected and put up some barriers. Biden then went razed them down. Meanwhile, something as basic as language is much more rooted—the US hasn’t changed its official language since its birth.Western education itself without the signaling value is able to change the lives in developing countries doesn’t have a good base.
I didn’t emphasize Western education anywhere in my post. Chances are you’re biased against Eastern education?
Whether education is about signaling or not, isn’t it just better to have more education? I think we can agree on this point.When it comes for example to China, the way contracts are enforced seems to be much more central than the wording of the contracts when it comes to trust.
Agree! I hadn’t thought about it thoroughly enough, now that you mentioned it. How about a different point? Companies always have to spend resources on the translation process when dealing with foreign partners—in your example, China. But now they don’t have to do it anymore, and thus have more capital to spend on other projects.
English works for that purpose and most fields get centered in a way that makes the important communication English.
English can do the job at an ‘huh, OK’ level. It was patchily built throughout many centuries with not-for-scientific-research mindset. Not to mention when scientist actually go to their colleague’s foreign lab for collaboration, they will face even more difficulties, because in every-day purposes, English is also far from great.
Huh? Also from Wikipedia, I read that “English has between 450m & 2B speakers”, so an unbiased figure should hover around 1B.
My imaginations consider a great IAL, one that has many advantages over English. So while they do still apply to English, the magnificence of each facet is limited. Taking the snowball effect into account, it’s like putting a handicap of −75% on Benefits. Why settle on something inferior?
Besides, there’s a reason why English can’t ever be a true IAL—which I may address in the next part of the series. To put it in your scenario, it’s likely the question: if everyone in the world spoke English as a second language, then what first tongue are the Americans, British and Australian… speaking?
Thank you! I think that’s a better formula. But I don’t understand the phrase after “especially if...”
Do you have 1st hunch about what kind of outside funding sources a project like this can more likely draw from?
Excuse my ignorance, what is OB?