Then I don’t see the point of the game.
hrishimittal
Karma: 123
I don’t understand how the average guess will be 0. Can you please explain?
I’ve never been actively part of an online community before, so I’m a bit scared to come along. I do find this group interesting though, so I might come to the next meetup.
I don’t mind the place as long as it’s quiet, but prefer the format to be casual. Except for Tuesday, any day of the week is fine by me.
and when possible, use irrationality for the short run.
How exactly do you use irrationality?
I’m considering donating to World Vision UK. Does anyone know much about them?
More generally, is there an easy way to find out how good a charity is? Are there reviews done by third parties?
Eric Drexler.
Thanks for the link Cyan.
I’m in a situation which seems sort of the opposite of yours. I’m with a woman, who’s more rational than any other I personally know. But the sex is just not very good, and I find myself getting physically drawn to other women a bit too much. I’ve struggled for weeks, trying to decide whether to continue or not. I’ve tried hard to think what I really want. And I think that if I were sexually satisfied, I would be very happy with the relationship because everything else seems perfect. So, I’m trying to work on that now. I’m paying more attention to being a loving and sensuous partner. Let’s say I’m experimenting on the weak aspects of my relationship.
If I were in your place, I’d take each point of disagreement on its own merit. If it’s decisions where the results can be seen clearly I wouldn’t argue but just politely point to the results. As far as religious beliefs are concerned, the more I think about it the more I feel, that defining myself as an ‘atheist’ is only useful in saying that I don’t believe in God. Beyond that, it doesn’t add anything valuable to my personality. It can’t because it’s a negative definition. So, I would try and deal with specific issues rather than try to convince my partner that theism is wrong. If she believes in magic, playful humour might lighten things up a bit.
I also think it would be useful if you learnt more about her way of thinking, just like she has learnt about yours.
Thanks. That looks like a really interesting body of work. This one on ethics is quite a fun read.
“Plod forever, but never believe you are going to get there.”
EDIT: I found this quote funny and strangely motivational, if you read it within the context. But looks like some people really dislike it.
If the master sat there listening to people’s inane theories about how they need to punch differently than everybody else, or their insistence that they really need to understand a complete theory of combat, complete with statistical validation against a control group, before they can even raise a single fist in practice, that master would have failed their students AND their Art.
Even so, as a student, I do want the master to understand a complete theory of combat, complete with statistical validation against a control group.
What is your theory o Master?
Thanks. I’ll check it out.
Can you share the video?
Hi, I’m Hrishi, 26, male. I work in air pollution modelling in London. I’m also doing a part-time PhD.
I am an atheist but come from a very religious family background.
When I was 15, I once cried uncontrollably and asked to see God. If there is indeed such a beautiful supreme being then why didn’t my family want to meet Him? I was told that their faith was weak and only the greatest sages can see God after a lot of self-afflicted misery. So, I thought nevermind.
I’ve signed up for cryonics. You should too, or it’ll just be 3 of us from LW when we wake up on the other side. I don’t mind hogging all the press, but inside me lives a shiny ball of compassion which wants me to share the glory with you.
I wish to live a happy and healthy life.
I’m seriously thinking about asking my boss about that one. With a pro-rata decrease in salary, of course.
The extra money just doesn’t seem to be worth the constant struggle with myself. Plus I think it would be good to start at a level I’m comfortable with and build on that. By forcing myself to work at a rate I’m clearly incapable of, I’m losing out on all the positive feedback that comes from small successes.
To draw a crude analogy, air pollution modelling is as hard a problem for me as say, AI is for EY. And if he needed to take every other day off once upon a time,...
EDIT: PS I have been reading OB/LW for a while but have started commenting here only recently. Hello everyone!
Genetic engineering aside, given a large aggregation of human beings, and a long time, you cannot reasonably expect rational thought to win. You could as reasonably expect a thousand unbiased dice, all tossed at once, all to come down ‘five,’ say. There are simply far too many ways, and easy ways, in which human thought can go wrong. Or, put it the other way round: anthropocentrism cannot lose.
That’s the same argument against rationalist winning that has been seen many times on LW. However, it is based on hopelessness and fear, rather than on knowledge of even a single failure of an organised attempt at large-scale rational winning. So, while Stove recognises the obviously wrong thoughts of philosophers, he himself goes wrong in thinking the above by making a wrong probability estimate.
So just to be clear, we are saying that the probability of a significant number of people turning to rational thinking is greater than the probability of winning a lottery, right?
Thanks Alicorn. This sounds like a brilliant idea. I have been thinking of something along these lines but hadn’t quite thought of day chunks—makes a lot of sense to me too.
I’ll give it a try. And yes, I’ll be careful.
We value rationality first and foremost because if you take the long view it wins and in the world we populate it wins.
You seem to be making an argument both for and against our cause in the same breath.
The reason irrationality “wins” for the “many people” you mention is that they re-define winning in hindsight when things don’t work out.
We are challenging those social systems, which are unaccountable and only provide mysterious explanations when they fail. We aspire to build more robust systems. That’s what I think winning is.
I imagine you feel bad for all the religious people being left out, but that’s only because of their large numbers. No one feels bad for string theorists. A large following doesn’t make religion right. Lots of stupidity is not intelligence.
What I’m basically getting at is that the tendency to emphasize the latter distinction can cause one to undervalue dissimilarity in the human social world.
The point of emphasising this distinction is to put the value of human intelligence on the right order.
And if your main point is recognising the fact that bad or irrational decisions may perhaps be a result of variability in intelligence or its use, then religion only functions to hide that truth. We are at least admitting it and saying it’s not fair.
I just got off the phone with my mom.
Mom: You’re working hard on your PhD, aren’t you?
Me: Yes, ma there’s lots to do. Oh and I put in a paper for a conference. If it gets accepted I’ll go to America to present it.
Mom: Of course it will get accepted. You’re working so hard, won’t God listen to you?
Everything comes from God. Forget making amazing awe-inspiring monuments. Writing a paper on air pollution in London comes from Him. Getting to go to a conference comes from Him.
My mom can’t truly appreciate what I do. Because fundamentally, at the gut level, she can’t get that I can accomplish anything. It’s arrogant for me to even think I could do anything without Lord Krishna’s supreme flute inspired magic.
Now that’s a problem I want to solve.
Surely the only point you’re making in this long post is not that naïve consequentialism is a bad idea?
And how exactly does one attach priorities?