I’m a freak about tools and symmetries. I suffer from chronic achronic dysfunction. Usually displaced a few years into the future? What is now or then? Probably on the spectrum, too, but why know where? I’d actually prefer to discover I am less right because that’s where the biggest learning opportunities are, but at the same time deep learning becomes more difficult with age. Latest recent self modifications? Homo sapiens’ mobile larynx and DNA as recipe book, not blueprint.
shanen
Karma: −9
[Question] Is the influence of money pervasive, even on LessWrong?
Thank you for your reply. I’m pretty sure you meant “thought” rather than something like “been through this [before]”. [And later I got detoured into the Chat help and had some trouble recovering to this draft...]
As regards your closing, I believe the trite reply is “No fair! I asked you first.” ;-) [I recently read The Semiotics of Emoji and would insert a humorous one if it were available.[But in chat it appeared to convert the one I just used. Here?]]
I am considering submitting a new question, either for this question or for your other reply (which might relate to a long comment I wrote on karma (but I can’t see the full context from here) or about LW’s financial model (in the context of how it influences discussions on LW).
With regards to this question, I can already say that LW seems to be solidly implemented and matches the features of any discussion website that I know of. Not the same, but at the high end of matches. I also confirmed the Unicode support. [A test here: 僕の二つの言語は日本語ですよ。]
But I have already consumed my morning writing time, so I’ll wrap for now and hopefully will be able to figure out the context of your other reply later today. Time allowing (as always).
This is just a test reply mostly to see what replies look like. The time-critical question about the Verification code may already be moot?
Pretty sure this comment is going to go badly. Please excuse me for my incoherence, amplified by my limited time. But I have a number of strong reactions. The three strongest are:
(1) I do not want to reduce humans to or be reduced to a single metric. Symmetry violation (of the Golden Rule).
(2) Arbitrary scaling should be avoided by normalization. Most obvious example is weighting down votes by 4. From a symmetry perspective, the weighting should reflect which way the votes are cast and who is casting the votes. (I also think negative votes should be justified, but that’s a new aspect.)
(3) Insufficiently detailed accounting for the costs of the project. However I am quite favorably impressed that success criteria were at least considered. (Is cost recovery a symmetry? (But in actionable terms, I don’t know if I would have pledged money to implement this project. I’m having trouble seeing it as a step in any positive direction.))
Now for the worst part. I have a delusion of a better solution approach. As a joke, “I know it when I see it” and this isn’t it and doesn’t even seem to be a step in a “right and proper” direction. I think a simple up-down vote is okay, but should mostly be limited to defining a weight that is applied to a multidimensional vector. I’ve described it as MEPR elsewhere, but here I’m going to retag it as DK for Deeper Karma.
Defining the direction of that DK vector should involve an optional deeper reaction. Rather than +/- it would involve looking at some dimensions and voting them up or down. As much as possible, the dimensions should be orthogonal and symmetric. (In the OP, this use of “dimension” is close to “metric” selection.)
A few examples of dimensions: Simple dimension of humor, with + for funny and—for unfunny. The age of the identity is a one-way metric, but it can be normalized on a scale from youngest to oldest. Really messy dimension but a dimension for fox versus hedgehog would be interesting. (Considering how IBM and the google analyze identities, there are hundreds of such dimensions, but we human beings have limited attention spans and at any one time the number of dimensions should be limited, perhaps to 5 or 7.)
Now for an elevator ride past the trickiest symmetry. It is necessary to begin by dividing DK in twain. Let’s call them DK-A for Artifact and DK-I for Identity (that created the artifact). Now “You will know them by their fruits.” Reacting to an artifact will change it’s DK-A, and the identity whose comments earned those reactions will have those reactions reflected in the DK-I.
In addition, in the process of giving reactions, the identity’s DK-I should be considered. The humor dimension is a simple example. If someone has earned many positive humor reactions, then it should count more when that identity reacts to another artifact by assessing it as +/- humor. In contrast, an identity with negative humor should not be able to affect humor scores much.
Now for the messy bit that seems to confuse people. How can the DK be displayed? I imagine the DK-I should be paired with its identity. I would actually favor a little radar diagram with selected dimensions. Clicking on the identity’s own link would take you to whatever the identity wants to say about itself, but clicking on the DK-I icon will take you to the details about all of the data that contributes to the DK-I. (Symmetry time again. The comment (as a public artifact) would have a DK-A link for its data and history.)
Why do this? Now we’re getting into the cans of worms by the six-packs of cans. But I can reduce it to two major cans:
(1) My time is limited and there is always much more content than I could read. (Ditto videos or podcasts or pictures or whatever.) DK could help me filter.
(2) I want to become a better person and looking at my own DK-I would be useful feedback in improving. Am I being too much of a prick? For example, I don’t want to be rude, but I think too many of my reactions are negative in ways that seem negative on the polite dimension, and my own DK-I would let me get an honest assessment of how rude (or polite) other people think I am.
Already spent much more time than I had intended, but mostly I have to apologize for having taken up so much of your time. I think this description is quite shallow and confusing. If you have been able to follow it then you deserve some kudos and DK-I positive for reading skills’ dimensions. Also you are being quite polite to a stranger, and your DK-I should go up for that reason. (Not only are I one, but I’m currently reading L’Étranger with Japanese annotations.)
Oh yeah. One more thing. It would be interesting if the the website itself could pick out DK-A dimensions of interest and relevance. That would simply the rating process if you opted to look at the deeper karma instead of the simple +/- reaction.
My mistake. This is the “Hello, world” place. But the default sort of this one should probably not be by “top scoring”? However, like the visible top scored comment, I, too, have been away from LW for some years. (Nice to see that I can change the sort order without losing my draft. Evidence of solid code. However the newly visible top comment is from 5 months ago? Months between comments?)
I was reminded of LW by The AI Does Not Hate You, though I’m pretty sure I’ve seen other references to it over the years. So far my impressions are mostly favorable, except that it seems to use 1D karma and I’m averse to reducing people (or even my opinions about people) to any single dimension.
I am somewhat interested in the mentioned books related to LW, but I have trouble finishing ebooks. Perhaps the first thing I should seek is advice on how to enjoy ebooks? I still enjoy many dead trees every year. (And I confirmed that none of my local libraries has any of them. I pretty regularly use a half dozen library systems.)
First question is about the “Verification code” that was just sent to my already validated (6 years ago) email address. It might even be urgent? Is there some penalty if I ignore the code now that I’m apparently already logged in? (No mention of “verification” in the FAQ. I know that I did not manually enter the verification code anywhere, but the website somehow decided I was logged in anyway.)
I visited this website at least one time (6 years ago) and left a message. Then I forgot about LW until the book The AI Does Not Hate You reminded me.
My next question is about a better website, but perhaps the premises of my question are false. If so, then I hope someone will enlighten me. I think I know what I am looking for, and this does not seem to be it (even though I do like “the feel” of the website. I think this website has a one-dimensional rating system for karma (along the lines of Slashdot?), but I think reality is more complicated and I am looking for a thoughtful discussion website with a deeper representation of reality and more dimensions.
I could describe what I am seeking in much more detail, but for my first comment in a long time, and basically a practice post, I think I should just Submit now (and look around some more). This welcome-to-lesswrong seems to be a “Hello, World” starting place. So “Hello, world”. See ya around?
I was actually looking for an errata page for the minor mistake on page 119, where it says “three billion” for “three million”. The notes are clear, but it still stuck a thumb in my eye.
For what it’s worth, I rate the book as good, though a bit drier than The Willpower Instinct. Also, this book seemed less focused on specific things to do.
Is an ACK called for?
I would add one more aspect if I didn’t suspect it’s a moot topic. The financial side. Someone has to cover the costs of things… I personally favor cost-recovery from wannabe donors and actual beneficiaries. However I think LessWrong may use the big donor model, which only works as long as the donor’s pockets stay full and the donor doesn’t make too many bad calls.