I just wanted to flag that this post hasn’t been reviewed yet, despite being one of the most nominated posts. (And mosts of the nominations here are quite short).
The most obvious sort of review that’d be good to see is from people who were in this post’s target demographic (i.e. people who hadn’t understood or been unpersuaded about what sort of problem MIRI is trying to solve), about whether this post actually helped them understand that.
I’d also be interested in reviews that grapple a bit more with “how well exactly does this metaphor hold up?”, although I’m not sure how to go about that.
A thing I wanted to check: were you grokking the general premise that calculus and much of physics haven’t been invented yet, and the metaphor here is more about an early stage physicist who has gotten a sense of how “I feel confused here, and I might need to invent [something that will turn out to be calculus]”, but, it’s at an early enough stage that crisp physics to easily explain it doesn’t exist yet?
(If you did get that part, I’m interested in hearing a little bit more about what felt annoying, and if you didn’t get that, I’m interested in what sort of things might have helped make the pre-physics/calculus part more clear)
I didn’t get the premise, no. I got that it was before a lot of physics was known, didn’t know they didn’t know calculus either. Just stating it plainly and clearly at the start would have been good. Even with that premise, I still find it very annoying. I despise the refusal to speak clearly, the way it’s constantly dancing around the bush, not saying the actual point, to me this is pretty obviously because the actual point is a nothing burger(because the analogy is bad) and by dancing around it, the text is trying to distract me and convince me of the point before I realize how dumb it is.
Why the analogy is bad: rocket flights can be tested and simulated much more easily than a superintelligence, with a lot less risk
Analogies are by nature lossy, this one is especially so.
I just wanted to flag that this post hasn’t been reviewed yet, despite being one of the most nominated posts. (And mosts of the nominations here are quite short).
The most obvious sort of review that’d be good to see is from people who were in this post’s target demographic (i.e. people who hadn’t understood or been unpersuaded about what sort of problem MIRI is trying to solve), about whether this post actually helped them understand that.
I’d also be interested in reviews that grapple a bit more with “how well exactly does this metaphor hold up?”, although I’m not sure how to go about that.
personally, I found how Beth just kept saying ‘not really’ and not saying the actual physics very very annoying.
A thing I wanted to check: were you grokking the general premise that calculus and much of physics haven’t been invented yet, and the metaphor here is more about an early stage physicist who has gotten a sense of how “I feel confused here, and I might need to invent [something that will turn out to be calculus]”, but, it’s at an early enough stage that crisp physics to easily explain it doesn’t exist yet?
(If you did get that part, I’m interested in hearing a little bit more about what felt annoying, and if you didn’t get that, I’m interested in what sort of things might have helped make the pre-physics/calculus part more clear)
I didn’t get the premise, no. I got that it was before a lot of physics was known, didn’t know they didn’t know calculus either.
Just stating it plainly and clearly at the start would have been good. Even with that premise, I still find it very annoying. I despise the refusal to speak clearly, the way it’s constantly dancing around the bush, not saying the actual point, to me this is pretty obviously because the actual point is a nothing burger(because the analogy is bad) and by dancing around it, the text is trying to distract me and convince me of the point before I realize how dumb it is.
Why the analogy is bad: rocket flights can be tested and simulated much more easily than a superintelligence, with a lot less risk
Analogies are by nature lossy, this one is especially so.