People ask what the goal of the Rationalist community is. It’s to raise the sanity waterline. To flood the cities with sanity. To wash the streets with pure reason. To engulf the land in common sense. And when our foes, gasping for air, scream “this literally can’t be happening!” we’ll remind them that 0 and 1 are not probabilities.
In science we have standards for what qualifies as evidence. In increasing order of respectability, we have personal opinion, expert opinion, case reports, cohort studies, RCTs, and meta-analyses.
And then if none of those work, we use what’s known as an ‘SSC lit review’.
To be honest, I’m somewhat skeptical of this aim. I suspect the timelines are too short for this to be a viable strategy. We need to find a way of winning regardless.
People ask what the goal of the Rationalist community is. It’s to raise the sanity waterline. To flood the cities with sanity. To wash the streets with pure reason. To engulf the land in common sense. And when our foes, gasping for air, scream “this literally can’t be happening!” we’ll remind them that 0 and 1 are not probabilities.
In science we have standards for what qualifies as evidence. In increasing order of respectability, we have personal opinion, expert opinion, case reports, cohort studies, RCTs, and meta-analyses.
And then if none of those work, we use what’s known as an ‘SSC lit review’.
In an alternate universe: All the over-estimators, under-estimators, slow updaters will look up and shout, “save us!” And we’ll whisper “Bayes”.
To be honest, I’m somewhat skeptical of this aim. I suspect the timelines are too short for this to be a viable strategy. We need to find a way of winning regardless.