I agree that the entry appears to ignore the positive utility of cached thoughts, but I think what the entry really needs are descriptions with references to primary sources, Wikipedia style. What aspects of “cached thought” are original to Eliezer and what aspects are discussed elsewhere?
If this is more work than you intend to do, then I think a portion of your suggested change would improve the entry.
″Cached thought‴ also allow for complex problems to be handled with a relatively small number of simple components.
However I am less certain about this:
These problem components when put together only approximate the actual problem, because they are slightly flawed ‴cached thoughts.‴
This statement could generally be applied to all thoughts, not just cached thoughts. In general we tend to reason using models that only approximate reality.
For a cached thought to be currently valid, the model that was used to generate it must be valid within the current context.
Valid conclusions can be reached more quickly with these slightly flawed cached thoughts then without.
I would say that conclusions can be reached more quickly with cached thoughts than without. The validity of the conclusions would be highly context sensitive and I’m not sure you can generally claim anything about it.
You have a good point that my analogy is too broad. I was trying to express that it would take inordinately long to solve complex problems with out depending on “cached thoughts” and that the cached thoughts can be flawed yet still contain utility. It is inappropriate relance on cached thoughts or treating them like facts rather then guesses that gets people in.
and that the cached thoughts can be flawed yet still contain utility
I suspect that this is true for some contexts, but making this claim would require careful explanation. For the wiki I would like to see statements like this backed up with primary sources.
I agree that the entry appears to ignore the positive utility of cached thoughts, but I think what the entry really needs are descriptions with references to primary sources, Wikipedia style. What aspects of “cached thought” are original to Eliezer and what aspects are discussed elsewhere?
If this is more work than you intend to do, then I think a portion of your suggested change would improve the entry.
″Cached thought″ appears to be related to dynamic programming.
You capture this idea nicely with:
However I am less certain about this:
This statement could generally be applied to all thoughts, not just cached thoughts. In general we tend to reason using models that only approximate reality.
For a cached thought to be currently valid, the model that was used to generate it must be valid within the current context.
I would say that conclusions can be reached more quickly with cached thoughts than without. The validity of the conclusions would be highly context sensitive and I’m not sure you can generally claim anything about it.
You have a good point that my analogy is too broad. I was trying to express that it would take inordinately long to solve complex problems with out depending on “cached thoughts” and that the cached thoughts can be flawed yet still contain utility. It is inappropriate relance on cached thoughts or treating them like facts rather then guesses that gets people in.
I suspect that this is true for some contexts, but making this claim would require careful explanation. For the wiki I would like to see statements like this backed up with primary sources.