Having had to explain to other sci-fi lovers in the past why using fiction as a counterargument is so silly, I googled to see if people had written about why it’s silly. GUESS WHAT I FOUND?
Yeah, my jaw dropped when I found that. I’m sure you won’t respond to this, as the mass of LW moves on to the most current post, but really? Was this a self-aware joke? Eliezer 2009 is that much less rational than Eliezer 2007?
It’s not evidence, but it is a pointer to an argument from existing knowledge: “you know, X probably would actually result from Y”. (Well, to a bounded rationalist that is an example of evidence, but a kind that it’s not nearly as problematic to get from fiction.)
Having had to explain to other sci-fi lovers in the past why using fiction as a counterargument is so silly, I googled to see if people had written about why it’s silly. GUESS WHAT I FOUND?
The Logical Fallacy of Generalization from Fictional Evidence, by Eliezer Yudkowsky: http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/10/fictional-evide.html
Yeah, my jaw dropped when I found that. I’m sure you won’t respond to this, as the mass of LW moves on to the most current post, but really? Was this a self-aware joke? Eliezer 2009 is that much less rational than Eliezer 2007?
It’s not evidence, but it is a pointer to an argument from existing knowledge: “you know, X probably would actually result from Y”. (Well, to a bounded rationalist that is an example of evidence, but a kind that it’s not nearly as problematic to get from fiction.)