You’re leaning heavily on the concept “amateur”, which (a) doesn’t distinguish “What’s your level of knowledge and experience with X?” and “Is X your day job?”, and (b) treats people as being generically “good” or “bad” at extremely broad and vague categories of proposition like “propositions about quantum physics” or “propositions about macroeconomics”.
I think (b) is the main mistake you’re making in the quantum physics case. Eliezer isn’t claiming “I’m better at quantum physics than professionals”. He’s claiming that the specific assertion “reifying quantum amplitudes (in the absence of evidence against collapse/agnosticism/nonrealism) violates Ockham’s Razor because it adds ‘stuff’ to the universe” is false, and that a lot of quantum physicists have misunderstood this because their training is in quantum physics, not in algorithmic information theory or formal epistemology.
I think (a) is the main mistake you’re making in the economics case. Eliezer is basically claiming to understand macroeconomics better than key decisionmakers at the Bank of Japan, but based on the results, I think he was just correct about that. As far as I can tell, Eliezer is just really good at economic reasoning, even though it’s not his day job. Cf. Central banks should have listened to Eliezer Yudkowsky (or 1, 2, 3).
Eliezer’s econ case is based on reading Scott Sumner’s blog, so it’s not very informative that Sumner praises Eliezer (3 out of 4 endorsements you linked, the remaining one is anon).
bfinn was discounting Eliezer for being a non-economist, rather than discounting Sumner for being insufficiently mainstream; and bfinn was skeptical in particular that Eliezer understood NGDP targeting well enough to criticize the Bank of Japan. So Sumner seems unusually relevant here, and I’d expect him to pick up on more errors from someone talking at length about his area of specialization.
First, thanks for your comments on my comments, which I thought no-one would read on such an old article!
Re your quantum physics point, with unusual topics like this that overlap with philosophy (specifically metaphysics), it is true that physicists can be out of their depth on that part of it, and so someone with a strong understanding of metaphysics (even if not a professional philosopher as such) can point out errors in the physicists’ metaphysics. That said, saying X is clearly wrong (due to faulty metaphysics) is a weaker claim than that Y is clearly right, particularly if there are many competing views. (As there are AFAIK even in the philosophy of QM.) Just as a professional physicist can’t be certain about getting the metaphysics bit of QM right, even a professional philosopher couldn’t be certain about the physics bit of it; not certain enough to claim a slam-dunk. So without going into the specifics of the case (which I’m not qualified to do) it still seems like an overreach.
Also, more generally, I assume interdisciplinary topics like this (for which a highly knowledgeable amateur could spot flaws in the reasoning of someone who’s a professional in one discipline but not the other) are the exception rather than the rule.
Re the economics case, well, for all I know, EY may well have been right in this case (and for the right reasons), but if so then it’s just a rare example of an amateur who has a very high professional-level understanding of a particular topic (though presumably not of various other parts of economics). I.e. this is an exception.
That said, and without going into the fine details of the case, the professionals here presumably include the top macroeconomists in Japan. Is it really plausible that EY understands the relevant economics and knows more relevant information than them? (E.g. they may well have considered all kinds of facts & figures that aren’t public or at least known to EY.) Which is presumably where the issue of other biases/influences on them would come in; and while I accept that there could be personal/political biases/reasons for doing the economically wrong thing, this can be too easy a way of dismissing expert opinion.
So I’d still put my money on the professional vs the amateur, however persuasive the latter’s arguments might seem to me. And again, the fact that the Bank of Japan’s decision turned out badly may just show that economics is an inexact science, in which correct bets can turn out badly and incorrect bets turn out well.
One other exception I’d like to add to my original comment: it is certainly true that a highly expert professional in a field can be very inexpert in topics that are close to but not within their own specialism. (I know of this in my own case, and have observed it in others, e.g. lawyers. E.g. a corporate lawyer may only have a sketchy understanding of IP law. Though they are well aware of this.)
You’re leaning heavily on the concept “amateur”, which (a) doesn’t distinguish “What’s your level of knowledge and experience with X?” and “Is X your day job?”, and (b) treats people as being generically “good” or “bad” at extremely broad and vague categories of proposition like “propositions about quantum physics” or “propositions about macroeconomics”.
I think (b) is the main mistake you’re making in the quantum physics case. Eliezer isn’t claiming “I’m better at quantum physics than professionals”. He’s claiming that the specific assertion “reifying quantum amplitudes (in the absence of evidence against collapse/agnosticism/nonrealism) violates Ockham’s Razor because it adds ‘stuff’ to the universe” is false, and that a lot of quantum physicists have misunderstood this because their training is in quantum physics, not in algorithmic information theory or formal epistemology.
I think (a) is the main mistake you’re making in the economics case. Eliezer is basically claiming to understand macroeconomics better than key decisionmakers at the Bank of Japan, but based on the results, I think he was just correct about that. As far as I can tell, Eliezer is just really good at economic reasoning, even though it’s not his day job. Cf. Central banks should have listened to Eliezer Yudkowsky (or 1, 2, 3).
Eliezer’s econ case is based on reading Scott Sumner’s blog, so it’s not very informative that Sumner praises Eliezer (3 out of 4 endorsements you linked, the remaining one is anon).
bfinn was discounting Eliezer for being a non-economist, rather than discounting Sumner for being insufficiently mainstream; and bfinn was skeptical in particular that Eliezer understood NGDP targeting well enough to criticize the Bank of Japan. So Sumner seems unusually relevant here, and I’d expect him to pick up on more errors from someone talking at length about his area of specialization.
First, thanks for your comments on my comments, which I thought no-one would read on such an old article!
Re your quantum physics point, with unusual topics like this that overlap with philosophy (specifically metaphysics), it is true that physicists can be out of their depth on that part of it, and so someone with a strong understanding of metaphysics (even if not a professional philosopher as such) can point out errors in the physicists’ metaphysics. That said, saying X is clearly wrong (due to faulty metaphysics) is a weaker claim than that Y is clearly right, particularly if there are many competing views. (As there are AFAIK even in the philosophy of QM.) Just as a professional physicist can’t be certain about getting the metaphysics bit of QM right, even a professional philosopher couldn’t be certain about the physics bit of it; not certain enough to claim a slam-dunk. So without going into the specifics of the case (which I’m not qualified to do) it still seems like an overreach.
Also, more generally, I assume interdisciplinary topics like this (for which a highly knowledgeable amateur could spot flaws in the reasoning of someone who’s a professional in one discipline but not the other) are the exception rather than the rule.
Re the economics case, well, for all I know, EY may well have been right in this case (and for the right reasons), but if so then it’s just a rare example of an amateur who has a very high professional-level understanding of a particular topic (though presumably not of various other parts of economics). I.e. this is an exception.
That said, and without going into the fine details of the case, the professionals here presumably include the top macroeconomists in Japan. Is it really plausible that EY understands the relevant economics and knows more relevant information than them? (E.g. they may well have considered all kinds of facts & figures that aren’t public or at least known to EY.) Which is presumably where the issue of other biases/influences on them would come in; and while I accept that there could be personal/political biases/reasons for doing the economically wrong thing, this can be too easy a way of dismissing expert opinion.
So I’d still put my money on the professional vs the amateur, however persuasive the latter’s arguments might seem to me. And again, the fact that the Bank of Japan’s decision turned out badly may just show that economics is an inexact science, in which correct bets can turn out badly and incorrect bets turn out well.
One other exception I’d like to add to my original comment: it is certainly true that a highly expert professional in a field can be very inexpert in topics that are close to but not within their own specialism. (I know of this in my own case, and have observed it in others, e.g. lawyers. E.g. a corporate lawyer may only have a sketchy understanding of IP law. Though they are well aware of this.)