Marlon

Karma: 42

Marlon 12 Mar 2015 17:19 UTC
14 points
on: Welcome to Less Wrong! (7th thread, December 2014)
Hello. New to the active part of the site, I’ve been lurking for a while, reading much discussions (and not always agreeing, which might be the reason I’m going active). I’ve come to the site thanks to HPMOR and the quest towards less bias.

I’m a (soon starting a PhD) student in molecular dynamics in France, skeptic (I guess) and highly critical of many papers (especially in my field). Popper is probably the closest to how I define, although with a few contradictions, the philosophy of what I’m doing.

I’m in the country of wine, cheese and homeopathy, don’t forget it :)

Marlon 12 Mar 2015 17:41 UTC
2 points
on: Pascal’s Mugging: Tiny Probabilities of Vast Utilities
I think you are overestimating the probabilities there: it is only Pascal’s Mugging if you fail to attribute a low enough probability to the mugger’s claim. The problem, in my opinion, is not how to deal with tiny probabilities of vast utilities, but how not to attribute too high probabilities to events whose probabilities defy our brain’s capacity (like “magic powers from outside the Matrix”).

I also feel that, as with Pascal’s wager, this situation can be mirrored (and therefore have the expected utilities canceled out) if you simply think “What if he intends to kill those people only if I abide by his demand ?”. As with Pascal’s wager, the possibilities aren’t only what the wager stipulates: when dealing with infinites in decision making (I’m not sure one can say “the probability of this event doesn’t overcome the vast utility gained” with such numbers) you probably have another infinite which you also can’t evaluate hiding behind the question.

Tell me your thoughts.

Marlon 13 Mar 2015 13:10 UTC
0 points
in reply to: dxu’s comment on: Pascal’s Mugging: Tiny Probabilities of Vast Utilities
Is this simply one statement ? Is Solomonoff complexity additive with multiple statements that must be true at once ? Or is it possible that we can calculate the probability as a chain of Solomonoff complexities, something like:

s1, s2 … etc are the statements. You need all of them to be true: magic powers, matrix, etc. Are they simply considered as one statement with one Solomonoff complexity K = 2^(x) ? Or K1K2… = 2 ^ (x1 + x2 + …) ? Or K1^K2^… = 2^(2^(2^...)) ?

And if it’s considered as one statement, does simply calculating the probability with K1^K2^… solve the problem ?

Point taken on the summation of the possibilities, they might not sum to zero.

Also, does invoking “magic powers” equal invoking an infinite ? It basically says nothing except “I can do what I want”

LW should go into mainstream academia ?

Marlon13 May 2015 13:23 UTC

7 points

57 comments1 min readLW link

Marlon 14 May 2015 12:33 UTC
0 points
in reply to: ChristianKl’s comment on: LW should go into mainstream academia ?
MIRI self publishes if I’m not wrong.

Why not publish in mainstream academia ?

Marlon 14 May 2015 12:40 UTC
0 points
in reply to: Ishaan’s comment on: LW should go into mainstream academia ?
I agree, most writings are derived from academic works.

That may seem weird, but I don’t think “basic clear thinking” should be excluded from academia. Philosophy problems should in my opinion not simply be something we “solve it ourselves”, and should enter as formal as it can in academia. I may also simply be unaware of the possibly similar works on this problem too.

That said, I haven’t been confused by this problem either, simply got more confused after reading LW and asking what people thought around me—that it was really something that bothered people.

And TDT has been self published … Why not in mainstream academia ?

Marlon 14 May 2015 12:56 UTC
1 point
in reply to: IlyaShpitser’s comment on: LW should go into mainstream academia ?
Same reason why milesmathis (google it, have fun) isn’t taken, and shouldn’t be taken seriously by the mainstream. Because “playing by the rules” didn’t work—you usually end up with an unending amount of crackpottery in what is actually not published: books, blogs, etc.

Not publishing in the mainstream while publishing books and self published articles is the crackpott’s artillery, unfortunately.

Think like the mainstream: given the amount of crazy stuff that’s present on the internet that couldn’t be published because it was, indeed, crazy, should I care about this particular guy that doesn’t publish anything but books (or self published articles) ? The unfortunate answer is no.

Marlon 14 May 2015 13:01 UTC
3 points
in reply to: pianoforte611’s comment on: LW should go into mainstream academia ?
This should be interesting to look at

Marlon 14 May 2015 13:04 UTC
1 point
in reply to: Gram_Stone’s comment on: LW should go into mainstream academia ?
There is no dichotomy here: it is possible to both keep blogs and publish in mainstream journals.

Marlon 14 May 2015 13:12 UTC
0 points
in reply to: ChristianKl’s comment on: LW should go into mainstream academia ?
Indeed, I stand corrected.

I still find a rather big amount of self-published articles in this list. I find the idea of self-publishing articles to be a bit self-defeating :/

Marlon 14 May 2015 14:05 UTC
0 points
on: Newcomb’s Problem and Regret of Rationality
The way I see it, causal decision theory simply ignores a part of the problem: that the Predictor is able to “predict”.

Evidence should get inside the equation, but not the same way as evidential decision theory: the evidence is what should fuel the hypothesis “The Predictor predicts our choices”.

It does not matter if we “think” that our “choice” shouldn’t change what’s inside the boxes—as the main thing about a prediction is that we aren’t actually making any “choice”, that “choice” is already predicted. It’s the whole “free will” illusion all over again, that we think our choices are ours, when the presence of such a Predictor would simply invalidate that hypothesis.

Causal decision theory should still work, but not with a reasoning that forgets about the Predictor. Since the Predictor is gone, our choice shouldn’t (and won’t) affect what’s in the boxes—but as our choice was predicted, accurately, and as we have supposedly enough evidence to infer this prediction, we should one box—and this won’t be a “choice”, it will simply have been predicted, and we’ll get the money.

I’m probably not being clear, and will try to say it another way. “Choosing” to one box will simply mean that the Predictor had predicted that choice. “Choosing” to two box will also mean the same. It’s not a “choice” at all—our behavior will simply be deterministic. Therefore we should one box, even though that is not a real “choice”.

The features of the Predictor should appear in causal decision theory.

Marlon 14 May 2015 14:21 UTC
3 points
on: How to come to a rational believe about whether someone has a crush on yo
One problem I see is trying to see the signals that would raise the crush probability … While you would also need to see the signals that would make that probability drop.

The sensible route seems in my opinion to be what signals would they give me if they didn’t have a crush on me ?, as you seem to be going the confirmation bias route otherwise.

I’m also one of those for whom the whole “You’re overthinking this, don’t think, stay natural” simply does not work. I appreciate the idea of such a survey to get a prior though, it seems like a great idea.

Marlon 14 May 2015 14:33 UTC
1 point
in reply to: pre’s comment on: Punctuality—Arriving on Time and Math
For this problem, you could make the distribution of the time it takes to get to the train station—you could easily compute the average time it takes for going there, and seeing that by planning to take exactly this amount of time to get there will make you 20 minutes late 50% of the time.

The prep time will only make the “late amount of time” discontinuous, it won’t change the probability of being late.

Marlon 15 May 2015 12:27 UTC
2 points
on: Thoughts on minimizing designer baby drama
I don’t know if that has been pointed out, but it has been done only recently and with moderately bad results …

It could become a thing if every human on the planet wouldn’t go crazy at every mention of “gene editing” (or simply “gene” for that matter, as 80% of americans support the labeling of DNA containing foods …).

This kind of development would be … strange. The generations of semi-enhanced humans would indeed feel rather strange.

But I have to point out one thing: genes don’t work like that. You don’t have one (or few) gene for height, genes for psychopathy, genes for intelligence, compassion, benevolence, reflectiveness … Each of those groups has more than one single effect. Modifying such genes (or corresponding regulatory regions) have way more than one single effect and the result would be much harder to guess than what our imagination enables us to when we hear “gene-editing”.

Marlon 18 May 2015 16:28 UTC
4 points
on: Which ideas from LW would you most like to see spread?
More knowledge about bias, which would particularly undermine the unfortunately common and well regarded stance “I only believe what I see”. People rely too much on their direct feelings/intuitions without assessing them.

The idea that in order to have an accurate representation of reality, one must have background knowledge in science. Add in a little philosophy (recent philosophy, like Popper).

Also praising the ones who admit their mistakes—that happens too little.

The final idea would be like yours, more Bayesian thinking.

I’m probably too optimistic.

Marlon 18 May 2015 21:55 UTC
0 points
in reply to: ChristianKl’s comment on: Which ideas from LW would you most like to see spread?
Updating priors with evidence. Standing by your beliefs seems to be praised—at least where I live.

I consider Popper as an important thinker, falsification is quite important right now for example. Why do you seem to think he’s unimportant ?

Marlon 21 May 2015 15:25 UTC
0 points
in reply to: ChristianKl’s comment on: Which ideas from LW would you most like to see spread?
I agree with gurugeorge response and see Popper the same way.

That said, I do think that although Pearl’s work is great, the key word is “in principle”—the methods rely on a number of assumptions that you can’t test (like independance) and he also says that the experiment is the only guaranteed way to establish causation (in his talk the art and science of cause and effect). I also may be wrong, as this talk was given in 1996, he might have changed his mind.

Moreover, your “trust your intuitions sometimes” is misleading: it is still not simply trusting your intuitions, it is trusting them only in the cases where there is data suggesting that intuition gives better results in similar cases. It has data behind it—the intuition is not taken for granted.

As Popper wrote, sensory data comes through organs that aren’t ‘perfect’ sensers. Our brain is also not a ‘perfect’ thinker. We know all that thanks to our knowledge of evolution—and that’s the starting point of Popper. Popper didn’t have Kahnemans’ or Pearl works, but he still encouraged critical thinking of hypotheses while not treating intuitions as given (only as hypotheses, and only if they were falsifiable), and falsification is still the basis of science at this moment.

Marlon 21 May 2015 15:59 UTC
−1 points
on: How my social skills went from horrible to mediocre
So … Should I understand that you’re now talking about subjects you have no interest in ?

Or your final point is that you’re working on talking about subjects you do have an interest in with more “sociality” (and I don’t get why people would take it differently if the subjects are, as I perceive, not common) ?

Marlon 4 Jun 2015 8:39 UTC
0 points
in reply to: IlyaShpitser’s comment on: Which ideas from LW would you most like to see spread?
I wasn’t very clear, and probably misleading. Although I’m not an expert, I have “read” Pearl’s book a few years ago (Causality: Models, Reasoning, and Inference, it’s available as a pdf) and it really seemed to me that some independence was hard to test, and sometimes was an assumption given the system. It’s also true that I haven’t read it deeper now that I have a bit more knowledge, and I lack time to do so.

If you have more hindsight about that, I would love to read it.

Marlon 4 Jun 2015 8:41 UTC
0 points
in reply to: JonahS’s comment on: How my social skills went from horrible to mediocre
Does your increase in social skills made you better at discussing (without boring others) subjects you have an interest in then ?

Marlon

LW should go into main­stream academia ?

LW should go into mainstream academia ?