Hello everyone, I’m Nicholas Rutherford! I’m a 21 year old undergraduate student at the University of Saskatchewan studying pure math.
My original start to rationality is due to OK Cupid (hooray for on line dating!). After being fed up with the lack of people in my area I decided to see who my top world wide match was (It turns out that this ‘top’ person will actually change so I guess I lucked out). This person’s profile was written in a very clear, well thought out manner and the answers to their questions showed that they had a fantastic decision making process. After chatting with them they told me the secret to their knowledge was less wrong.
From there I started making my way through The Sequences (currently about 40% of the way through), reading HPMOR and lurking the general discussion board here. I also had the pleasure of attending the July 2013 CFAR workshop, which has really inspired me to focus on improving my rationality and actually being a part of the community (and not just a lurker).
This community is awesome and I can’t wait to improve it in any way I can! I mean, it is the least I can do after all I’ve gained from it :)
As cwillu mentioned you really can use practically anything as the pieces (change, lego, numbers, paper, etc.). I did decide to use the actual ‘looney pyramids’ that I got from a local game store. You can also get them on amazon for $15: http://www.amazon.com/Looney-Labs-5512573-IceDice/dp/1929780788/