I can sympathize with the frustration, and I also think the assertion that EY has “No idea what he is talking about” is too strong. He argues his positions publicly such that detailed rebuttals can be made at all, which is a bar the vast majority of intellectuals fail at.
Edit: I reread the FDT rebuttal for the first time since it came out just to check, and I find it as unconvincing now as then. The author doesn’t grasp the central premise of FDT, that you are optimizing not just for your present universe but across all agents (many worlds or not) who implement the same decision function you are implementing.
The fact that someone argues his positions publicly doesn’t make it so that they necessarily have an idea what they’re talking about. Deepak Chopra argues his positions publicly.
I agree! Eliezer deserves praise for writing publicly about his ideas. My article never denied that. It merely claimed that he often confidently says things that are totally wrong.
I suppose he gets one cheer for arguing publically, but for the full three cheers he also needs to listen, and update occasionally. People who disagree with him have a very different view if his rationality to those who don’t.
I can sympathize with the frustration, and I also think the assertion that EY has “No idea what he is talking about” is too strong. He argues his positions publicly such that detailed rebuttals can be made at all, which is a bar the vast majority of intellectuals fail at.
Edit: I reread the FDT rebuttal for the first time since it came out just to check, and I find it as unconvincing now as then. The author doesn’t grasp the central premise of FDT, that you are optimizing not just for your present universe but across all agents (many worlds or not) who implement the same decision function you are implementing.
The fact that someone argues his positions publicly doesn’t make it so that they necessarily have an idea what they’re talking about. Deepak Chopra argues his positions publicly.
and Deepak deserves praise for that even if his positions are wrong.
I agree! Eliezer deserves praise for writing publicly about his ideas. My article never denied that. It merely claimed that he often confidently says things that are totally wrong.
I suppose he gets one cheer for arguing publically, but for the full three cheers he also needs to listen, and update occasionally. People who disagree with him have a very different view if his rationality to those who don’t.