sark

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• sarkJun 25, 2011, 2:11 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: gwern’s comment on: Ques­tion about Large Utilities and Low Probabilities

  I don’t doubt that might be the ultimate cause, as different methods are amenable to different subject matters. But that does not affect the inference I want to draw here, that in doing abstract reasoning, one has to hold oneself to a ridiculously high standard of precision and rigor.

• sarkJun 25, 2011, 11:24 AM

  7 points

  on: Ex­clude the su­per­nat­u­ral? My wor­ld­view is up for grabs.

  Supernaturalism is a distraction. Theologists defend supernaturalism as an indirect way of defending whatever God they want to believe in. See http://​​www.uncrediblehallq.net/​​2011/​​06/​​24/​​atheism-is-just-thinking-there-arent-any-gods/​​.

  The sequences are not specifically tailored to convince people of atheism. They are rather a more general set of tools in going about and reasoning about the world. So don’t over-ascribe relevance to atheism many of the philosophical ideas you see in there.

• sarkJun 25, 2011, 10:06 AM

  0 points

  in reply to: gwern’s comment on: Ques­tion about Large Utilities and Low Probabilities

  So are you suggesting their differences in success has to do with subject matter?

• sarkJun 25, 2011, 10:05 AM

  0 points

  in reply to: Manfred’s comment on: Ques­tion about Large Utilities and Low Probabilities

  Hmm, why is this the case? I think I’m missing background knowledge here.

Ques­tion about Large Utilities and Low Probabilities

• sarkJun 24, 2011, 4:30 PM

  1 point

  in reply to: [deleted]’s comment on: Meetup : Ed­in­burgh Grand Meetup

  We talk. Discuss stuff usually discussed on LW. In a social setting.

• sarkJun 23, 2011, 10:25 AM

  0 points

  on: Meetup : Ed­in­burgh Grand Meetup

  Ahem, that embedded map on this page is not right! Why does it show New Delhi?

Meetup : Ed­in­burgh Grand Meetup

• sarkJun 22, 2011, 9:22 AM

  2 points

  in reply to: Jonathan_Graehl’s comment on: The proper use of re­gret?

  Bravo! That’s insightful. Thank you.

  (I placed the Nesov quote there to hopefully prime people into not immediately accept whatever senses of regret which seem to ‘make sense’. For example, merely looking for ‘consistency’.)

• sarkJun 20, 2011, 8:41 PM

  1 point

  in reply to: cousin_it’s comment on: The proper use of re­gret?

  Well I don’t think it makes sense to regret one’s entire past and be satisfied with merely that. You want to draw specific lessons from your past. An ideal agent might not need regret of course, being able to learn from past mistakes without a feeling of regret toward a specific event which gave rise to the general lesson. But I think humans might find it useful to have an event serve as a reminder of a lesson learned.

  We can interpret Caplan’s “no regret” (perhaps too charitably) as “my past does not contain any lessons wrt. me behaving in a certain way in order to have my children be a certain way”. But this leaves room for other lesson-specific regret wrt. other genuine lessons.

  As for the massive counterfactual of “Caplan having behaved even minisculely different in his past”, I think it’s quite useless and hence meaningless, at least with respect to Caplan and his children. It doesn’t help him better raise his children, for example. It’s like how not every English sentence corresponds to a meaningful statement.

• sarkJun 20, 2011, 5:33 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: cousin_it’s comment on: The proper use of re­gret?

  Hmm it depends on what you’re trying to accomplish with the counterfactual I think. Is there a particular reason why you think it would make more sense to empathize with the Caplan-counterfactual, independent of it being more ‘consistent’ I guess?

• sarkJun 20, 2011, 4:28 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: atucker’s comment on: The proper use of re­gret?

  This seems likely. Still I think there’s a lesson to be learned here :)

• sarkJun 20, 2011, 4:23 PM

  1 point

  in reply to: cousin_it’s comment on: The proper use of re­gret?

  I don’t see how it’s even approximately the same mistake.

  Caplan is correct in thinking that his children would be different persons than who they are now, if there were any alterations to his past. He is correct in thinking Caplan-now would not love these children. He also realizes that Caplan-counterfactual would love these children.

  It’s as with the pebble sorters. You could acknowledge that you would find prime number heaps morally correct if you were to become a pebble sorter yet deny that prime number heaps are morally correct.

  I just don’t think it’s a very productive regret Caplan is having there. Because he should regret some parts of his past life because such regret would be instrumental in making his future better.

• sarkJun 20, 2011, 3:23 PM

  0 points

  in reply to: Benquo’s comment on: The proper use of re­gret?

  Whoops. Thanks for the correction.

• sarkJun 20, 2011, 11:40 AM

  0 points

  on: What are the best news sources to read for *in­sight­ful* dis­cus­sions?

  I follow people who have a taste for insight. Mostly via twitter, but there are other ways as well.

The proper use of re­gret?

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