I’m driven by a passion for self-stimat and self-estime. My work explores motivation by weaving together information theory. I am a dyslexics Brazilian guy living in Argentina, writing in English for LessWrong feels like a paraplegic playing for the major leagues—ambitious, awkward, and, every now and then, a miracle of technology.
P. João
Karma: 53
How often do we risk losing something important by assigning too high a priority to a bad vibe?
Personally, I try not to ignore any vibe or thought, but I also attempt to prioritize them by importance. Maybe I should start a ‘bad vibes journal’—a record of every time I feel something off and then compare it to the actual outcomes. My sense is that I often misjudge, but without tracking it, I can’t really calibrate my accuracy.
when I first encountered Eliezer Yudkowsky, I actually had a bad vibe about him. If I’d followed that feeling, I would’ve missed out on learning from one of the authors who has helped me a lot.
Have you ever been completely wrong about a bad vibe? If so, what did you learn from it?
You make a very good point—there are different ways to create contrasts in information that are quickly recognized, and that’s how I’ve come to understand humor. The faster the brain recognizes the information, the higher the chance it triggers a sense of pleasure, or perhaps falls somewhere along a spectrum of pleasure tied to recognizing patterns or resolving contrasts.
I also agree that many jokes can reduce authority. They signal that someone is not a threat, that they lower themselves to gain acceptance, which is often done by people who aren’t strong or authoritative and who use humor as a way to find their space. On the other hand, humor can also be used by authoritative figures to reinforce their power—when others laugh, it confirms that they don’t perceive the person as a threat. Some studies even suggest that chimpanzee laughter might be linked to this dynamic.
In my case, I would describe myself as someone who, in many ways, felt “weak” and used humor to create space for myself. I wasn’t in a position to demand authority outright. I had to teach skills like first aid in a very short amount of time, and I found that humor as positive reinforcement was much more effective than relying on negative reinforcement.
It’s a complex topic, isn’t it? There are so many variables in humor, but this is the perspective I’ve been able to develop so far: humor as something that operates on a spectrum of pleasure derived from the rapid recognition of information.
Additionally, I plan to share some stories about how humor has helped me stay attentive and better use what a class or learning environment offers in a more constructive way.
Thank you for your interest! My first idea for a post on LessWrong was actually about that—my journey from being a firefighter to discovering rationality. However, I hesitated because it felt very personal, and some of the most interesting parts of my story would be hard to verify. To summarize, I found myself unable to adapt to the “ethics” of the role, which eventually led me to leave and seek rationality as a way to rebuild my life. At the time, it felt like I had nothing left, as I had dedicated my entire life to becoming a firefighter.
Interestingly, there are some parallels between my experiences and the Brazilian movies Tropa de Elite. That kind of intense, complex environment leaves you with stories that are hard to explain but deeply shape who you are.
Thanks to your comment, though, I’m reconsidering publishing my story. Perhaps I could frame it as partly real, partly exaggerated—after all, not everything has to be 100% factual, right? Haha.
Hi! Thank you so much for your comment—it’s incredibly thoughtful and motivating. I couldn’t agree more that humor can be a powerful pedagogical tool, especially for topics like CPR, where emotions play a key role in memory retention. I also laughed at your line, “I first understood that as resuscitating people by telling them jokes. Like, when you laugh hard enough, your heart starts beating again.” 😂 Your humor actually helped me see the ambiguity in my explanation and understand where I might have made that part clearer.
In my case, as a former military firefighter in Brazil, I was often told that humor wasn’t appropriate for serious settings and that I had to maintain a strict demeanor. That left me conflicted because I knew that humor could help people learn and remember better. But I also needed a solid theoretical foundation to justify its use—and, of course, to avoid getting into trouble for making jokes inappropriately! 😅
One interesting finding from my thesis is how humor operates on different levels. The greater the contrast and the quicker the punchline, the higher the chances of eliciting pleasure and laughter. But it’s equally important to adapt humor to the context and the audience.
As for your idea of creating an educational comedy channel, I already have one! It’s called “Academia Engraçada de Comédia Humorística” (which would translate to something like “Funny Academy of Comedic Humor” in English). For now, we’re more active on Instagram, and we’ve even delivered humor-based problem-solving courses to all the prisons in Greater Buenos Aires, Argentina. I’m not very strong on YouTube yet because the courses are generally paid—except for prisoners, who don’t have much money… or anywhere to run, haha!
Once again, thank you for your brilliant comment—it’s incredibly relevant and inspiring. 😊
Hey, as a friend, I know my bias could tilt things, but I’ve tried to analyze your work as independently as I can. I’ve thrown some crappy criticisms your way, along with (hopefully) a few useful ones. But, from the very first time you told me about this, I was like: wow! This solves some complex problems, I didn’t even know existed.
[Question] Could my work, “Beyond HaHa” benefit the LessWrong community?
Although I find the text inspiring and its principles interesting, I have some questions:
How were these twelve virtues specifically identified?
Is there a particular reason for this order, starting with curiosity and ending with emptiness?
Are there any studies or practical experiences that support that these particular virtues are more effective than others in improving rational thinking?
I believe that having answers to these questions would significantly strengthen the argument and help in better implementing these virtues in practice.
Has anyone else reflected on these aspects?
It seems you’ve considered a lot of interesting variables, which would likely lower the overall probability.
Thank you for this insightful post! When discussing value distribution with my partners, we faced the challenge of fairly allocating contributions without precise knowledge of their impact. I proposed a solution: involving an external evaluator with business expertise but no direct access to the function. Their task was to predict value splits, and their reward was proportional to how accurate their estimates were compared to the final distribution.
This approach aimed to handle uncertainty while guiding team efforts strategically. It’s fascinating to see how Shapley values offer a theoretical foundation for such practical challenges.
1 What If We Rebuild Motivation with the Fermi ESTIMATion?
What type of voice analysis do you use to minimize errors and potential biases? With each iteration of improvement, do you not notice any significant enhancements? Nothing at all?
0 Motivation Mapping through Information Theory
I answered your email :)
Thank you for the suggestion! Offering coaching is indeed a great way to test and refine the framework. If anyone is interested, I’d be happy to provide free coaching sessions based on this method.
We have an initial evaluation form that can serve as a starting point, and I can guide participants through it. I only ask for some patience as my dyslexia can sometimes slow communication slightly.
If you’re interested or know someone who might be, please feel free to contact me at sistemaestimat@gmail.com. Sharing your email would also help coordinate further.
Looking forward to exploring this opportunity!
Hi Matt Goldenberg,
I’m truly happy. In a world with so much information available, catching someone’s interest made me yell like a rooster.I see that having more tested evidence would be ideal. Since 2013, I’ve been looking for ways to battle-test ESTIMAT. That year, I had to leave the military firefighting corps in Brazil because I disagreed with their “ethics,” so to speak.
I decided to start a business, and at first, ESTIMAT was a way to distribute profits by merit in a company I started with a friend. We used an experience points (XP) system for this. Although I don’t have baseline metrics or a control group, I noticed that with this system, our dedication to the business increased. Later, we lost our supplier in China and couldn’t find competitive replacements.
That’s when I thought: Why not use a similar model to evaluate myself and improve my own experience (XP)?
To measure human skills, XP, and so on, I first pursued a postgraduate degree in neuroscience to explore how pleasure might form synapses in the brain. However, I lacked the mathematical background to make solid estimations.
I tried enrolling in a master’s program in biological mathematics but couldn’t find interested peers in my city. The groups I encountered were either focused on external mathematical problems or philosophy, but I couldn’t find one that connected both fields with human behavior.
I moved to Argentina and started studying math thinking to improve my mathematical skills. Since 2015, I’ve tested various versions of ESTIMAT. At one point, I evaluated myself every 25 minutes using the method. While this isn’t what I propose now, it helped me structure my values, identities, and virtues in a more sophisticated way. According to my personal improvement graphs, the results were incredible.
I have gigabytes of spreadsheets with data testing different ESTIMAT alternatives. Even my partner joined the process at one point. However, communicating these ideas was always challenging for me because I’m dyslexic. Now, with the help of AI and visual communication tools, I’ve been able to structure a text that seems more understandable to others.
I know these proofs are far from a randomized controlled study or a large-scale simulation, but they’re the best I could manage over these years.
Additionally, my main purpose in sharing ESTIMAT here is to understand what the rationalist community thinks about the theory. I want to identify potential major flaws before investing in a more expensive experiment or simulation.
Thanks! I’m working on the text!
Thanks for the feedback, abstractapplic. You’re right—adding real-world examples could make the dialogue feel more grounded, so I’ll focus on that in the revision.
The “Yolo” suggestion makes sense to capture the spirit of System 1 without unintended associations, so I’ll go with that.
Regarding Metaculus: it’s a good platform for practicing probabilistic thinking, but I think there might be value in a more structured self-evaluation to narrow down specific behaviors. Do you know of any frameworks that could help with that—maybe something inspired by Superforecasting?
As a non-native English speaker, I realize the phrasing might come across as a bit unusual. I’ve tried refining it with tools like Claude and GPT many times, but it can get complex and occasionally leads to “hallucinations.” Let me know if you have any tips for keeping it clearer. Which part of the text seems most confusing to you?
Haha, sorry and thank you! Maybe now:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/WbQRxeCCmypgKrT7R/when-x-negotiatiates-with-y
Fascinating post. It reminds me of how the human brain can ‘fake alignment’ through self-deception—rationalizing actions to seem aligned with values while masking deeper misalignment. Could insights into LLM alignment help us understand and mitigate this kind of ‘auto-corruption’ in ourselves?
Curious if you’ve thought about parallels like this.