It’s a long mental battle between two clever people, not much for rationality techniques, but characters think rationally, and the magical parts have well defined rules, similar to Lawrence Watt-Evans’ fiction.
I would be terribly thankful to anybody who could reccomend me some more stories involving these sorts of fights. Trickery and betrayal is common enough, but a prolonged fued of this nature is rare.
Death Note is a brilliant anime, but not really a great of an example of rationality. Tvtropes calls it Xanatos Roulette.
First you start with a smart plan. That can be rational. Then you complicate the plan. It makes characters look even smarter, and still quite rational. At some point the plan is so overcomplicated, so many uncertainties are just assumed, that it’s no longer rationality but plain omniscience and characters “knowing the script of future episodes”. That’s what Death Note is. Light and L overplot, and it’s really fun to watch, and they look really “smart” when it’s well done, but it’s way past any reasonable pretense of rationality.
TvTropes has more examples, like Saw series. They’re all great fun, and not much rational.
I really liked the Death Note anime. However, I think it’s much more Sherlock-Holmes-ish than what Eliezer is asking for here. It’s been quite a long time since I saw it, but I remember at the time I was annoyed often when both the protagonist and the antagonist would make “very lucky guesses”, deducing something which is possible given the evidence at hand, but far from being the only possibility from said evidence. I haven’t read much Sherlock, but from what I’ve heard, Sherlock similarly makes amazingly lucky guesses. Certainly, EY’s summary of “magically finding the right clues and carrying out magically correct complicated chains of deduction” seems to indicate so.
I’d have to watch the Death Note series again to give any specific examples. Maybe I will do that, but probably not within the next month.
I’ve heard that complaint a lot, and I agree in the case of Sherlock Holmes, but death note seemed somehow plausible.
If you can remember it at all, do you think you could tell me specifically which parts you thought were “lucky guesses”? I like to keep those sorts of things in mind when re-reading.
Like I said, I don’t plan on rewatching the anime any time soon (and I don’t know how the anime differs from the manga). That said, if you’re serious about it, send me a private message and I’ll send you my MSN account so that you can nag me on there so I don’t forget to respond to this. =)
As far as I know, there is no private-message function built in to lesswrong. I prefer to maintain some level of anonymity anyway, and it would hardly be worth creating an account specifically for this purpose. I don’t care that much, though a general idea of which character does it or when would be appreciated.
All that aside, reading it made the whole thing move a lot faster, which probably contributed to the enjoyment, but I otherwise I think they are fairly similar.
Also, if you click on someone else’s name, that is, so you can see a different person’s profile, then there will be a direct link available to message them. But, again, unless they’re actively checking, I don’t think they’ll have any obvious way to know that a message was sent to them.
EDIT: when I said there’s no direct link, I meant “there’s no obvious simple path from just clicking stuff on the front page of LW to get to your inbox”
I don’t recommend The Dosadi Experiment as a good example of rationality; I explicitly de-recommend it.
The Vor Game, aside from being delightful, can be seen as a wonderful lesson in how setting priorities can be helpful, but it’s not about rationality, it’s about personal manipulation. One character groks another’s motivational structure and creates a situation that will make her “fall off the horse”, so to speak.
Vorkosigan works primarily through charisma and sub-conscious analysis. He’s not a rationalist in any particular sense.
Ditto for Death Note, though only the first season. The logic of a story is that the good guys will win in the end, which is not what you should necessarily expect in real life.
(spoilers)
The awesomeness of Death Note’s first season was not just in the decent instrumental rationality attributed to the characters (which gave me a very good impression), but also in that you couldn’t guess who would win. (Edited for spoilers)
Please edit this to remove everything after ”...couldn’t guess who would win”. We don’t have proper support for spoilers in comments, and saying “spoilers” isn’t enough.
(I don’t have facilities to edit your comment myself, just remove it.)
I’m a little confused—what does it mean to ban a comment? I know how one can delete a comment, or ban a user, but I’ve never heard the words used this way before.
Any fiction that can’t stand up to spoilers isn’t worth reading. I would never recommend fiction that I haven’t reread, often many times—I’d rather reread a good (or even fair) book for relaxation than get irritated trying to read something that drags. And if you’re not reading it for relaxation, textbooks are better than any fiction.
If the story poses a puzzle for the reader, and the solution to the puzzle is given further down the plot, then spoilers can in fact reduce the enjoyability of the story. In Death Note, you can actually discover the flaw in the character’s plan yourself if you pause the video and and think for a bit (although it helps that the protagonist’s intelligence is a bit...uneven. Most real people aren’t simultaneously stupid and smart like that). It’s also fun to arrive at the best possible strategy for each character...it’s pretty satisfying when you and the character independently arrive at the same conclusion.
This only applies to very tightly written stories of course.
Agree that fiction that relies solely on spoilers isn’t worth reading. Though I would not concur that textbooks are better than any fiction. Unless school has gotten waaaaaay better than I remember.
If you are not reading for relaxation, then you are probably reading for information; in that sense textbooks are better than fiction, since they have better presentation of the information in them.
The manga/anime series “Death Note”
It’s a long mental battle between two clever people, not much for rationality techniques, but characters think rationally, and the magical parts have well defined rules, similar to Lawrence Watt-Evans’ fiction.
I would be terribly thankful to anybody who could reccomend me some more stories involving these sorts of fights. Trickery and betrayal is common enough, but a prolonged fued of this nature is rare.
Death Note is a brilliant anime, but not really a great of an example of rationality. Tvtropes calls it Xanatos Roulette.
First you start with a smart plan. That can be rational. Then you complicate the plan. It makes characters look even smarter, and still quite rational. At some point the plan is so overcomplicated, so many uncertainties are just assumed, that it’s no longer rationality but plain omniscience and characters “knowing the script of future episodes”. That’s what Death Note is. Light and L overplot, and it’s really fun to watch, and they look really “smart” when it’s well done, but it’s way past any reasonable pretense of rationality.
TvTropes has more examples, like Saw series. They’re all great fun, and not much rational.
I really liked the Death Note anime. However, I think it’s much more Sherlock-Holmes-ish than what Eliezer is asking for here. It’s been quite a long time since I saw it, but I remember at the time I was annoyed often when both the protagonist and the antagonist would make “very lucky guesses”, deducing something which is possible given the evidence at hand, but far from being the only possibility from said evidence. I haven’t read much Sherlock, but from what I’ve heard, Sherlock similarly makes amazingly lucky guesses. Certainly, EY’s summary of “magically finding the right clues and carrying out magically correct complicated chains of deduction” seems to indicate so.
I’d have to watch the Death Note series again to give any specific examples. Maybe I will do that, but probably not within the next month.
I’ve heard that complaint a lot, and I agree in the case of Sherlock Holmes, but death note seemed somehow plausible.
If you can remember it at all, do you think you could tell me specifically which parts you thought were “lucky guesses”? I like to keep those sorts of things in mind when re-reading.
Like I said, I don’t plan on rewatching the anime any time soon (and I don’t know how the anime differs from the manga). That said, if you’re serious about it, send me a private message and I’ll send you my MSN account so that you can nag me on there so I don’t forget to respond to this. =)
As far as I know, there is no private-message function built in to lesswrong. I prefer to maintain some level of anonymity anyway, and it would hardly be worth creating an account specifically for this purpose. I don’t care that much, though a general idea of which character does it or when would be appreciated.
All that aside, reading it made the whole thing move a lot faster, which probably contributed to the enjoyment, but I otherwise I think they are fairly similar.
There actually is a private messaging thing built into LW, but it’s not obvious, and there’s no direct link to see incoming messages.
go to http://lesswrong.com/message/inbox to see your inbox (which includes replies to your comments).
Also, if you click on someone else’s name, that is, so you can see a different person’s profile, then there will be a direct link available to message them. But, again, unless they’re actively checking, I don’t think they’ll have any obvious way to know that a message was sent to them.
EDIT: when I said there’s no direct link, I meant “there’s no obvious simple path from just clicking stuff on the front page of LW to get to your inbox”
Mina is a rather rational magical girl.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ThirtyXanatosPileup
They specifically recommend Code Geass and The Dosadi Experiment.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/XanatosSpeedChess also mentions The Vor Game by Bujold.
I’ve spent a lot of time scouring tvtropes.org for something similar, Code Geass was one of the better ones.
Any particular reason to single those two out? I might give The Dosadi Experiment higher priority.
I don’t recommend The Dosadi Experiment as a good example of rationality; I explicitly de-recommend it.
The Vor Game, aside from being delightful, can be seen as a wonderful lesson in how setting priorities can be helpful, but it’s not about rationality, it’s about personal manipulation. One character groks another’s motivational structure and creates a situation that will make her “fall off the horse”, so to speak.
Vorkosigan works primarily through charisma and sub-conscious analysis. He’s not a rationalist in any particular sense.
Ditto for Death Note, though only the first season. The logic of a story is that the good guys will win in the end, which is not what you should necessarily expect in real life.
(spoilers)
The awesomeness of Death Note’s first season was not just in the decent instrumental rationality attributed to the characters (which gave me a very good impression), but also in that you couldn’t guess who would win. (Edited for spoilers)
Please edit this to remove everything after ”...couldn’t guess who would win”. We don’t have proper support for spoilers in comments, and saying “spoilers” isn’t enough.
(I don’t have facilities to edit your comment myself, just remove it.)
EDIT: Wasn’t edited after a bit, so banned, alas.
Seeing as there’s no obvious automated notification of replies, banning someone for not noticing a reply seems unfair.
He’s really just deleted the comment—for some reason the software uses the word “ban”. The commenter is still registered.
Yes, it’s unfair, yes, we should fix this at some point, but I deemed it more important to not spoil a unique anime.
I’m a little confused—what does it mean to ban a comment? I know how one can delete a comment, or ban a user, but I’ve never heard the words used this way before.
Delete, really. The button just says “ban” if you’re an administrator.
Ah, that’s good then. =)
So, what was the work of fiction that was mentioned in the post?
Death Note.
Any fiction that can’t stand up to spoilers isn’t worth reading. I would never recommend fiction that I haven’t reread, often many times—I’d rather reread a good (or even fair) book for relaxation than get irritated trying to read something that drags. And if you’re not reading it for relaxation, textbooks are better than any fiction.
If the story poses a puzzle for the reader, and the solution to the puzzle is given further down the plot, then spoilers can in fact reduce the enjoyability of the story. In Death Note, you can actually discover the flaw in the character’s plan yourself if you pause the video and and think for a bit (although it helps that the protagonist’s intelligence is a bit...uneven. Most real people aren’t simultaneously stupid and smart like that). It’s also fun to arrive at the best possible strategy for each character...it’s pretty satisfying when you and the character independently arrive at the same conclusion.
This only applies to very tightly written stories of course.
Agree that fiction that relies solely on spoilers isn’t worth reading. Though I would not concur that textbooks are better than any fiction. Unless school has gotten waaaaaay better than I remember.
If you are not reading for relaxation, then you are probably reading for information; in that sense textbooks are better than fiction, since they have better presentation of the information in them.