A frame that I use that a lot of people I speak to seem to find A) Interesting and B) Novel is that of “idiot units”.
An Idiot Unit is the length of time it takes before you think your past self was an idiot. This is pretty subjective, of course, and you’ll need to decide what that means for yourself. Roughly, I consider my past self to be an idiot if they have substantially different aims or are significantly less effective at achieving them. Personally my idiot unit is about two years—I can pretty reliably look back in time and think that compared to year T, Jay at year T-2 had worse priorities or was a lot less effective at pursuing his goals somehow.
Not everyone has an Idiot Unit. Some people believe they were smarter ten years ago, or haven’t really changed their methods and priorities in a while. Take a minute and think about what your Idiot Unit might be, if any.
Now, if you have an Idiot Unit for your own life, what does that imply?
Firstly, hill-climbing heuristics should be upweighted compared to long-term plans. If your Idiot Unit is U, any plan that takes more than U time means that, after U time, you’re following a plan that was designed by an idiot. Act accordingly.
That said, a recent addition I have made to this—you should still make long-term plans. It’s important to know which of your plans are stable under Idiot Units, and you only get that by making those plans. I don’t disagree with my past self about everything. For instance, I got a vasectomy at 29, because not wanting kids had been stable for me for at least ten years, so I don’t expect more Idiot Units to change this.
Secondly, if you must act according to long-term plans (A college/university degree takes longer than U for me, especially since U tends to be shorter when you’re younger) try to pick plans that preserve or increase optionality. I want to give Future Jay as many options as possible, because he’s smarter than me. When Past Jay decided to get a CS degree, he had no idea about EA or AI alignment. But a CS degree is a very flexible investment, so when I decided to do something good for the world, I had a ready-made asset to use.
Thirdly, longer-term investments in yourself (provided they aren’t too specific) are good. Your impact will be larger a few years down the track, since you’ll be smarter then. Try asking what a smarter version of you would likely find useful and seek to acquire that. Resources like health, money, and broadly-applicable knowledge are good!
Fourthly, the lower your Idiot Unit is, the better. It means you’re learning! Try to preserve it over time—Idiot Units naturally grow with age so if yours stands still, you’re actually making progress.
I’m not sure if it’s worth writing up a whole post on this with more detail and examples, but I thought I’d get the idea out there in Shortform.
A frame that I use that a lot of people I speak to seem to find A) Interesting and B) Novel is that of “idiot units”.
An Idiot Unit is the length of time it takes before you think your past self was an idiot. This is pretty subjective, of course, and you’ll need to decide what that means for yourself. Roughly, I consider my past self to be an idiot if they have substantially different aims or are significantly less effective at achieving them. Personally my idiot unit is about two years—I can pretty reliably look back in time and think that compared to year T, Jay at year T-2 had worse priorities or was a lot less effective at pursuing his goals somehow.
Not everyone has an Idiot Unit. Some people believe they were smarter ten years ago, or haven’t really changed their methods and priorities in a while. Take a minute and think about what your Idiot Unit might be, if any.
Now, if you have an Idiot Unit for your own life, what does that imply?
Firstly, hill-climbing heuristics should be upweighted compared to long-term plans. If your Idiot Unit is U, any plan that takes more than U time means that, after U time, you’re following a plan that was designed by an idiot. Act accordingly.
That said, a recent addition I have made to this—you should still make long-term plans. It’s important to know which of your plans are stable under Idiot Units, and you only get that by making those plans. I don’t disagree with my past self about everything. For instance, I got a vasectomy at 29, because not wanting kids had been stable for me for at least ten years, so I don’t expect more Idiot Units to change this.
Secondly, if you must act according to long-term plans (A college/university degree takes longer than U for me, especially since U tends to be shorter when you’re younger) try to pick plans that preserve or increase optionality. I want to give Future Jay as many options as possible, because he’s smarter than me. When Past Jay decided to get a CS degree, he had no idea about EA or AI alignment. But a CS degree is a very flexible investment, so when I decided to do something good for the world, I had a ready-made asset to use.
Thirdly, longer-term investments in yourself (provided they aren’t too specific) are good. Your impact will be larger a few years down the track, since you’ll be smarter then. Try asking what a smarter version of you would likely find useful and seek to acquire that. Resources like health, money, and broadly-applicable knowledge are good!
Fourthly, the lower your Idiot Unit is, the better. It means you’re learning! Try to preserve it over time—Idiot Units naturally grow with age so if yours stands still, you’re actually making progress.
I’m not sure if it’s worth writing up a whole post on this with more detail and examples, but I thought I’d get the idea out there in Shortform.
I like the idea, but you can also get fake Idiot Units for moving in a random direction that is not necessarily an improvement.