loqi

• loqi 16 Jun 2013 20:56 UTC

  5 points

  in reply to: Mitchell_Porter’s comment on: How ac­cu­rate is the quan­tum physics se­quence?

  I’d be interested in reading more about your top ten cool possibilities. They sound cool.

• loqi 4 Nov 2011 8:11 UTC

  2 points

  in reply to: pragmatist’s comment on: Great Explanations

  My takeaway: Sometimes people don’t behave in aggregate the way we think they should. By replacing their money with money\k and convincing them it’s still just money, we can manipulate their behavior by jiggling k.*

  And it apparently goes without saying that the coupon-issuer has a good way to distinguish “legitimate” reasons to cut back on going out. E.g., flu outbreak, new compelling indoor family activity, all the other stuff no one’s even thought of yet, etc.

  The Keynesian “key to enlightenment” is that we can cram a knob onto the economy and jack with it?

• loqi 4 Nov 2011 6:25 UTC

  −1 points

  in reply to: mindspillage’s comment on: Great Explanations

  ...as long as you don’t mind listening to Sagan drone out “millions, and billions, and millions” for millions, and billions, and millions… basically number-novocaine delivered verbally.

  And surely aliens are everywhere, we just haven’t noticed them yet.

  I tried watching Cosmos about a year ago, and quickly stopped. Is there a case to be made that it’s worth soldiering through the awfulness?

• loqi 24 Oct 2011 17:45 UTC

  0 points

  in reply to: brazil84’s comment on: Amanda Knox: post mortem

  Please quote me where I accused you of having faith that you’re more reliable than those people.

  Right here:

  Thanks!

  I also won’t engage with people who refuse to answer reasonable questions to let me understand their position.

  Thanks!

• loqi 23 Oct 2011 23:22 UTC

  −4 points

  in reply to: brazil84’s comment on: Amanda Knox: post mortem

  Please quote me where I accused you of having faith that you’re more reliable than those people.

• loqi 21 Oct 2011 17:17 UTC

  −1 points

  in reply to: brazil84’s comment on: Amanda Knox: post mortem

  Do you agree that the tone of your post is a bit nasty?

  Yes. It’s a combination of having little respect for the feelings of typically-wrong pseudonymous internet posters as well as faith in my own ability to look at incomplete justifications for sloppy reasoning and draw snarky conclusions.

• loqi 21 Oct 2011 6:09 UTC

  11 points

  in reply to: brazil84’s comment on: Amanda Knox: post mortem

  So, to summarize why you didn’t update:

  • You didn’t know the names of the people commenting.

  • You have faith that you’re more reliable than those people.

  • You would lose your job if you weren’t so great at seeing through bullshit.

  • You have often failed to see through bullshit.

  Boy was Upton Sinclair ever right.

  What links here?

  • brazil84's comment on Amanda Knox: post mortem by gwern (24 Oct 2011 0:23 UTC; 0 points)

• loqi 14 Oct 2011 7:23 UTC

  21 points

  on: On the Open­ness per­son­al­ity trait & ‘ra­tio­nal­ity’

  My inner Hanson asks me

  So you’ve got a case of the Inner Hanson, eh? My estimation of your psychological fortitude is hereby incremented.

• loqi 12 Oct 2011 5:24 UTC

  0 points

  in reply to: LauWren’s comment on: Beau­tiful Probability

  Good point, there is some ordering information leaked. This is consistent with identical likelihoods for both setups—learning which permutation of arguments we’re feeding into a commutative operator (multiplication of likelihood ratios) doesn’t tell us anything about its result.

• loqi 3 Oct 2011 23:10 UTC

  15 points

  in reply to: [deleted]’s comment on: Ra­tion­al­ity Drugs

  If you don’t mind sharing, how do you plan to do this? Is it as simple as “this controlled substance makes my life better, will you prescribe it for me?” Or are you “fortunate” enough to have a condition that warrants its prescription?

  I ask because I’ve had similar experiences with Modafinil (my nickname for it is “executive lubricant”), and it is terribly frustrating to be stuck without a banned goods store.

• loqi 3 Oct 2011 21:28 UTC

  1 point

  on: Knox and Sol­lecito freed

  Hooray!

• loqi 25 Sep 2011 1:05 UTC

  0 points

  in reply to: ec429’s comment on: The Ap­par­ent Real­ity of Physics

  Thanks for following up on Almond. Your statements align well with my intuition, but I admit heavy confusion on the topic.

• loqi 25 Sep 2011 1:02 UTC

  1 point

  in reply to: ec429’s comment on: The Ap­par­ent Real­ity of Physics

  Thanks, that’s a concise and satisfying reply. I look forward to seeing where you take this.

• loqi 23 Sep 2011 22:14 UTC

  0 points

  in reply to: wedrifid’s comment on: Par­ti­cles break light-speed limit?

  And what, if I may ask, are your plans for your grandmother?

• loqi 23 Sep 2011 22:07 UTC

  6 points

  on: The Ap­par­ent Real­ity of Physics

  All I see here is Tegmark re-hashed and some assertions concerning the proper definitions of words like “real” and “existence”. Taboo those, are you still saying anything?

  Have you read any of Paul Almond’s thoughts on the subject? Your position might be more understandable if contrasted with his.

• loqi 10 Jun 2011 1:47 UTC

  0 points

  in reply to: CuSithBell’s comment on: Ra­tion­al­ity Quotes: June 2011

  Intuition is extremely powerful when correctly trained. Just because you want to have powerful intuitions about something doesn’t mean it’s possible to correctly train them.

• loqi 1 Jun 2011 18:54 UTC

  22 points

  on: Ra­tion­al­ity Quotes: June 2011

  If you can’t think intuitively, you may be able to verify specific factual claims, but you certainly can’t think about history.

  Well, maybe we can’t think about history. Intuition is unreliable. Just because you want to think intelligently about something doesn’t mean it’s possible to do so.

  Jewish Atheist, in reply to Mencius Moldbug

• loqi 30 May 2011 22:50 UTC

  0 points

  in reply to: Alicorn’s comment on: Over­com­ing suffer­ing: Emo­tional acceptance

  Ceteris paribus, I would prefer not to be sad when my friends are sad. But this is incompatible with empathy—I use my sadness to model theirs. I can’t imagine “loving” someone while trying not to understand them.

• loqi 20 May 2011 17:54 UTC

  0 points

  in reply to: Kevin’s comment on: Gri­gori Perel­man re­fused prize be­cause he knows “how to con­trol the uni­verse”

  Same here.

• loqi 19 May 2011 20:16 UTC

  −1 points

  in reply to: DanielLC’s comment on: Should I be afraid of GMOs?

  The assumption that we can better determine toxicity with our current understanding of human biology than thousands of years of natural selection seems questionable, but peanuts are certainly a good lower bound on selection’s ability.

  I also don’t have much confidence that the parties responsible for safety testing are particularly reliable, but that’s a loose belief.