Lumifer

Karma: 19,795

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 9:45 PM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion
No, what surprises me is your belief that you just figured it all out. Using philosophy. That’s it, we’re done, everyone can go home now.

And since everything is binary and you don’t have any tools to talk about things like uncertainty, this is The Truth and anyone who doesn’t recognize it as such is either a knave or a fool.

There also a delicious overtone of irony in that a guy as lacking in humility as you are, chooses to describe his system as “fallible ideas”.

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 9:29 PM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

You don’t think that figuring out which ideas are “best available” is the hard part? Everyone and his dog claims his idea is the best.

well, using philosophy i did that hard part and figured out which ones are good

LOL. Oh boy.

Really? So you just used ~~the force~~ philosophy and figured it out? That’s great! Just a minor thing I’m confused about—why are you here chatting on the ’net instead of sitting on your megayacht with a line of VCs in front of your door, willing to pay you gazillions of dollars for telling them which ideas are actually good? This looks to be VERY valuable knowledge, surely you should be able to exchange it for lots and lots of money in this capitalist economy?

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 8:59 PM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

why are you trying to make claims about them?

I didn’t think that stating that libertarians like Ayn Rand was controversial. We are talking about political power and neither libertarians nor objectivists have any. In this context the fact that they don’t like each other is a small family squabble in some far-off room of the Grand Political Palace.

intellectual fixing of errors

What is an “intellectual” fixing of an error instead of a plain-vanilla fixing of an error?

Aubrey de Grey says there’s a 50% chance it’s 100 million a year for 10 years away.

What’s the % chance that he is correct? AFAIK he has been saying the same thing for years.

it’s most scientists and funders not wanting the best available ideas

You don’t think that figuring out which ideas are “best available” is the hard part? Everyone and his dog claims his idea is the best.

most people are pro-aging and pro-death

I don’t think that’s true. Most people don’t want to live for a long time as wrecks with Alzheimer’s and pains in every joint, but invent a treatment that lets you stay at, say, the the 30-year-old level of health indefinitely and I bet few people will refuse (at least the non-religious ones).

can and should be explained in terms of culture, memes, education, human choice, environment, etc

Why is there a “should”?

The twin studies are garbage, btw

All of them?

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 8:16 PM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

Where can I find them?

I’m not plugged into these networks, but Cato will probably be a good start.

apparently thinks that homosexuality is a disease

Kinda. As far as I remember, homosexuality is an interesting thing because it’s not very heritable (something like 20% for MZ twins), but also tends to persist in all cultures and ages which points to a biological aspect. It should be heavily disfavoured by evolution, but apparently isn’t. So it’s an evolutionary puzzle. Cochran’s theory—which he freely admits lacks any evidence in its favour—is that there is some pathogen which operates in utero or at a very early age and which pushes the neurohormonal balance towards homosexuality.

This is clearly spitballing in the dark and Cochran, as far as I know, doesn’t insist that it’s The Truth. It’s just an interesting alternative that everyone else ignores.

scientific racism

Generally translated as “I don’t like the conclusions which science came up with” :-D

I might or might not disagree with you politically, but I believe myself to be capable of distinguishing normative statements (this is what it is) from prescriptive ones (this is what it should be).

I don’t wanna pick a random paper from one of them

I am not expecting you to go critique their science. Their names were a handwave in the direction of what kind of heritability studies we’re talking about.

might actually agree with my broader point (about the possibility of going into fields and pointing out inadequacies if you know what you’re doing, due to the fields being inadequate)

It’s a bit more complicated. Scientific fields have a lot of diverse content. Some of it is invariably garbage and it’s not hard to go into any field, find some idiots, and point out their inadequacies. However it’s not a particularly difficult or worthwhile activity and certainly one that can be done by non-philosophers :-D In particular, during the last decade or so people who understand statistics have been having at lot of fun at the expense of domain “experts” who don’t.

I would generally expect that in every field there would be a relatively small core of clueful people who are actually pushing the frontier and a lot of deadweight just hanging on. I would also expect that it would be difficult to identify this core without doing a deep dive into the literature or going to conferences and actually talking to people.

However the thing is, I like empirical results. So if you claim to be able to go into a field and “fix massive errors”, I don’t think that merely pointing at the idiots and their publications is going to be sufficient. Fixing these errors should produce tangible results and if the errors are massive, the results should be massive as well. So where is my cure for aging? frozen and fully revived large mammals? better batteries, flying cars, teleportation devices, etc.?

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 4:43 PM
1 point
in reply to: Viliam’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

A pharmaceutical company with a strategy “let’s try random molecules and do scientific studies whether they cure X” would go out of business.

Funny you should mention this.

Eve is designed to automate early-stage drug design. First, she systematically tests each member from a large set of compounds in the standard brute-force way of conventional mass screening. The compounds are screened against assays (tests) designed to be automatically engineered, and can be generated much faster and more cheaply than the bespoke assays that are currently standard. …Eve’s robotic system is capable of screening over 10,000 compounds per day.

source

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 3:25 PM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

Considering Rand was anti-libertarianism

Funny how a great deal of libertarians like her a lot… But we were talking about transforming the world. How did she transform the world?

wanna do heritability studies? cryonics?

Cryonics is not a science. It’s an attempt to develop a specific technology which isn’t working all that well so far. By heritability do you mean evo bio? Keep in mind that I read people like Gregory Cochran and Razib Khan so I would expect you to fix massive errors in their approaches.

Pointing me to large amounts of idiocy in published literature isn’t a convincing argument: I know it’s there, all reasonable people know it’s there, it’s a function of the incentives in academia and doesn’t have much to do with science proper.

he came up with much better ones

You are a proponent of one-bit thinking, are you not? In Yes/No terms de Grey set himself a goal and failed at it.

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 5:57 AM
1 point
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

consider the influence Ayn Rand had

Let’s see… Soviet Russia lived (relatively) happily until 1991 when it imploded through no effort of Ayn Rand. Libertarianism is not a major political force in any country that I know of. So, not that much influence.

What could stop them?

Oh dear, there is such a long list. A gun, for example. Men in uniform who are accustomed to following orders. Public indifference (a Kardashian lost 10 lbs through her special diet!).

some would quickly be rich or famous, be able to contact anyone important, run presidential campaigns, run think tanks, dominate any areas of intellectual discourse they care to, etc

Are you familiar with the term “magical thinking”? Popper couldn’t do it. Ayn Rand couldn’t do it. DD can’t do it. You can’t do it. So why would suddenly you have this thousand of god-emperors who can do anything they want to, purely through the force of reasoning?

Trump only won because his campaign was run, to a partial extent, by lesser philosophers

I think our evaluations of the latest presidential elections… differ.

a good philosopher can go into whatever scientific field he wants and identify and fix massive errors currently being made due to the wrong methods of thinking

You are a good philosopher, yes? Would you like to demonstrate this with some scientific field?

Even a mediocre philosopher like Aubrey de Grey managed to do something like that.

de Grey runs a medical think tank that so far has failed at its goal. In which way did he “fix massive errors”?

Have you read Atlas Shrugged? It’s a book in which a philosophy teacher and his 3 star students change the world.

… (you do understand that this is fiction?)

try to imagine someone with ~100x better ideas and how much more effective that would be

We’re back to magical thinking (I can imagine a lot of things, but presumably we are talking about reality), but even then, what will that someone do against a few grams of lead at high velocity?

He spread bad ideas

Did he believe they were bad ideas? How is his belief in his ideas different from your belief in your ideas?

a few people survive childhood

Since my childhood was sufficiently ordinary, I presume that I did not survive. Oops, you’re talking to a zombie...

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 5:42 AM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

i don’t suppose you or anyone else wrote down your reasoning

Correct! :-)

i disagree that it’s false. you aren’t giving an argument.

This is false under my understanding of the standard English usage of the word “torture”.

then i guess you can continue your life of sin

Woohoo! Life of sin! Bring on the seven deadlies!!

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 4:23 AM
0 points
in reply to: Fallibilist_duplicate0.16882559340231862’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion
So, a professor of physics failed to convert the world to his philosophy. Why are you surprised? That’s an entirely normal thing, exactly what you’d expect to happen. Status has nothing to do with it, this is like discussing the color of your shirt while trying to figure out why you can’t fly by flapping your arms.

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 4:19 AM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

I don’t see what’s to envy about Marx.

His ideas got to be very very popular.

I estimate 1000 great people with the right philosopher is enough to promptly transform the world

ROFL. OK, so one philosopher and 1000 great people. Presumably specially selected since early childhood since normal upbringing produces mental cripples? Now, keeping in mind that you can only persuade people with reason, what next? How does this transformation of the world work?

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 4:15 AM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

ppl don’t need to die, that’s wrong

And yet everyone dies.

that’s the part where you give an argument

Nope, that’s true only if I want to engage in this discussion and I don’t. Been there, done that, waiting for the t-shirt.

“torture” has an English meaning separate from emotional impact

Yes. Using that meaning, the sentence “I mean psychological “torture” literally” is false. Or did you mean something by these scare quotes?

if you wanted to have a productive conversation

LOL. Now, if you wanted to have a productive conversation you would have defined your terms. See how easy it is? :-D

you don’t seem to be aware that you’re reading a summary essay

Oh, I am.

are you aware of many common ways force is initiated against children?

Of course. So?

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 2:29 AM
0 points
in reply to: Fallibilist_duplicate0.16882559340231862’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

It hasn’t worked for him.

It didn’t? What’s your criterion for “worked”, then? If you want to convert most of the world to your ideology you better call yourself a god then, or at least a prophet—not a mere philosopher.

I guess Karl Marx is a counterexample, but maybe you don’t want to use these particular methods of “persuasion”.

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 2:23 AM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

everything good in all of history is from voluntary means

I understand this assertion. I don’t think I believe it.

ppl initiate force when they fail to persuade

Kinda. When using force is simpler/cheaper than persuasion. And persuading people that they need to die is kinda hard :-/

The words have meanings.

Words have a variety of meanings which also tend to heavily depend on the context. If you want to convey precise meaning, you need not only to use words precisely, but also to convey to your communication partner which particular meaning you attach to these words.

Right here is an example: I interpret you using words like “cripple” and “torture” as tools of emotional impact. In my experience this is how people use them (outside of specific technical areas). If you mean something else, you need to tell me: you need to define the words you use.

It’s not a replacement for talking about issues you think are important, it’s a prerequisite to meaningful communication.

So you said “I’m using strong words b/c they correspond to my intended claims” and that tells me nothing. So you basically want to say that conventional upbringing is bad? Extra bad? Super duper extra bad? Are there any nuances, any particular kind of bad?

You are failing to communicate.

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 1:29 AM
2 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

those people don’t matter intellectually anyway

Ivory tower it is, then.

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 1:06 AM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

The right approach is to use purely voluntary methods which are not rightly described as passive.

How successful do you think these are, empirically?

I don’t see the special difficulty with evaluating those statements as true or false.

I do. Quantum physics operates with very well defined concepts. Words like “cripple” or “torture” are not well-defined and are usually meant to express the emotions of the speaker.

Lumifer Dec 1, 2017, 1:02 AM
2 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion
“Not getting shunned” is not quite the same thing as attempting “persuasion via attaining social status”.

Which method do you think can work for what you want to do? Any success so far?

Lumifer Nov 30, 2017, 10:11 PM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

accusations of “extremism” are not critical arguments

Of course they are not. But such perceptions have consequences for those who are not hermits or safely ensconced in an ivory tower. If you want to persuade (and you do, don’t you?) the common people, getting labeled as an extremist is not particularly helpful.

Lumifer Nov 30, 2017, 10:08 PM
0 points
in reply to: Fallibilist_duplicate0.16882559340231862’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion
I am not worried. However taking positions viewed as extremist by the mainstream (aka the normies) has consequences. Often you are shunned and become an outcast—and being an outcast doesn’t help with extinguishing the fire. There are also moral issues—can you stand passively and just watch? If you can, does that make you complicit? If you can’t, you are transitioning from a preacher into a revolutionary and that’s an interesting transition.

The quotes above don’t sound like they could be usefully labeled “true” or “not true”—they smell like ranting and for this genre you need to identify the smaller (and less exciting) core claims and define the terms: e.g. what is a “mental cripple” and by which criteria would we classify people as such or not?

Oh, and I would also venture a guess that neither you nor curi have children.

Lumifer Nov 30, 2017, 9:05 PM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion

I made no claims as to extremeness

Would you like to?

You are basically a missionary: you see savages engage in horrifying practices AND they lose their soul in the process. The situation looks like it calls for extreme measures.

Lumifer Nov 30, 2017, 8:40 PM
0 points
in reply to: curi’s comment on: Open Letter to MIRI + Tons of Interesting Discussion
So you don’t feel these quotes represent an “extremist” point of view?

Current parenting and educational practices destroy children’s minds. They turn children into mental cripples, usually for life. … Almost everyone is broken by being psychologically tortured for the first 20 years of their life. Their spirit is broken, their rationality is broken, their curiosity is broken, their initiative and drive are broken, and their happiness is broken. And they learn to lie about what happened …

When I use words like “torture” regarding things done to children or to the “mentally ill”, people often assume I’m exaggerating or speaking about the past when kids were physically beaten much more. But I mean psychological “torture” literally …

Parenting more reliably hurts people in a longterm way than torture, but has less overt malice and cruelty. Parenting is more dangerous because it taps into anti-rational memes better …