Harley-ml/lesswrong huggingface dataset:
# Many-worlds versus discrete knowledge

[epistemic status: I'm a mathematical and philosophical expert but not a QM expert; conclusions are very much tentative]

There is tension between the following two claims:

-   The fundamental nature of reality consists of the wave function whose evolution follows the Schrödinger equation.
-   Some discrete facts are known.

(What is discrete knowledge? It is knowledge that some nontrivial proposition X is definitely true. The sort of knowledge a Bayesian may update on, and the sort of knowledge that logic applies to.)

The issue here is that facts are facts *about* something. If quantum mechanics has any epistemic basis, then at least some things are known, e.g. the words in a book on quantum mechanics, or the outcomes of QM experiments. The question is what this knowledge is about.

If the fundamental nature of reality is the wave function, then these facts must be facts about the wave function. But, this runs into problems.

Suppose the fact in question is "A photon passed through the measurement apparatus". How does this translate to a fact about the wave function?

The wave function consists of a mapping from the configuration space (some subset of R^n) to complex numbers. Some configurations (R^n points) have a photon at a given location and some don't. So the fact of a photon passing through the apparatus or not is a fact about configurations (or configuration-histories), not about wave functions over configurations.

Yes, some wave functions assign more amplitude to configurations in which the photon passes through the apparatus than others. Still, this does not allow discrete knowledge of the wave function to follow from discrete knowledge of measurements.

The [Bohm interpretation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Broglie%E2%80%93Bohm_theory), on the other hand, has an answer to this question. When we know a fact, we know a fact about the *true* configuration-history, which is an element of the theory.

In a sense, the Bohm interpretation states that indexical information about *which world we are in* is part of fundamental reality, unlike the many-worlds interpretation which states that fundamental reality contains no indexical information. (I have discussed the trouble of indexicals with respect to physicalism [previously](https://unstableontology.com/2020/03/12/puzzles-for-physicalists/))

Including such indexical information as "part of reality" means that discrete knowledge is possible, as the discrete knowledge is knowledge of this indexical information.

For this reason, I significantly prefer the Bohm interpretation over the many-worlds interpretation, while acknowledging that there is a great deal of uncertainty here and that there may be a much better interpretation possible. Though my reservations about the many-worlds interpretation had led me to be ambivalent about the comparison between the many-worlds interpretation and the Copenhagen interpretation, I am not similarly ambivalent about Bohm versus many-worlds; I significantly prefer the Bohm interpretation to both many-worlds and to the Copenhagen interpretation.
# Petrov Day 2020 Virtual Celebration

**Edit Sept 23: Updated finalized agenda.**  
  
Agenda (Eastern Time, UTC -4)  
  
3:00pm - 3:15am Welcome   
3:15pm - 4:15pm Ice Breakers  
4:15pm - 5:30pm Lightning Talks & Activities  
5:30pm - 6:00pm Snack/Water Break  
6:00pm - 7:00pm Ritual  
  
  
  
If you cannot make it to the full day, that's also okay! You can drop in for any part of the event.  
 

We'll use Discord as event HQ. Join here: [https://discord.gg/PFd2qPw](https://discord.gg/PFd2qPw)

  
You're strongly encouraged to do a bit of preparation for the ritual. Here are what you'll need: 

\- Eight (unlit) candles  
\- Means of lighting them (and holding them upright)  
\- Emergency fire extinguishment supplies  
\- Drinking water

If you're unable to acquire candles before the event, use your creativity!
# Sunday August 16, 12pm (PDT) — talks by Ozzie Gooen, habryka, Ben Pace

This Sunday at 12pm (PDT), we're running another session of "lightning talks" by curated LessWrong authors (see [here](https://www.lesswrong.com/tag/lesswrong-events) for previous weeks' transcripts).

*   Each talk will be 3-5 minutes followed by discussion. Afterwards, we'll have a hangout in breakout rooms. The talks will be short and focus on presenting one core idea well, rather than rushing through a lot of content.
*   We want to give top LessWrong writers an interesting space to discuss their ideas, and have more fruitful collaboration between users. Think of it like a cross between an academic colloquium and some friends chatting by a whiteboard.

*If you're a curated author and interested in giving a 5-min talk at a future event, which will then be transcribed and edited, sign up* [*here*](https://forms.gle/iwFatbhys9muPmQA7)*.*

Speakers
--------

*   **ozziegooen**
    *   Curated post: [Prediction-Augmented Evaluation Systems](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/kMmNdHpQPcnJgnAQF/prediction-augmented-evaluation-systems)
*   **habryka**
    *   Curated post: [Integrity and accountability are core parts of rationality](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/xhE4TriBSPywGuhqi/integrity-and-accountability-are-core-parts-of-rationality)
*   **Ben Pace**
    *   Curated posts: [A Sketch of Good Communication](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/yeADMcScw8EW9yxpH/a-sketch-of-good-communication)
    *   [The Costly Coordination Mechanism of Common Knowledge](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/9QxnfMYccz9QRgZ5z/the-costly-coordination-mechanism-of-common-knowledge)
    *   [A model I use when making plans to reduce AI x-risk](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/XFpDTCHZZ4wpMT8PZ/a-model-i-use-when-making-plans-to-reduce-ai-x-risk)
    *   ...

Details
-------

**When?** Sunday August 16, 12pm (PDT)

**Where?** https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89469745577
# An Invitation to the Guild of the Rose — Alpha (formerly the Guild of Servants)

  

Salutatio[и](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%98)s,

You are cordіally invited to apply to the [Guild of the Rose](https://guildoftherose.org/) (edit: formerly the Guild of Servants), an organization dedicated to more effective tһinkіng and ӏiving, and providing support to our members and communities in this pursuit.

Thiѕ will be a three month test rսn of the рrogram wе have developed, and will be free of charge for the test run and 1 year thereafter. Яequired activities will be weekly 1-2 hour workshops on various i[и](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%98)trodսctory topics related to applying rational thinking in your own life. Classes will cover the areas of personal branding and aesthetic design, resisting manipulation, and self-optimization through introspection.

Мembers will receive a comprehensive, long term experience aimed at Eudaimonia of our members and community.

For more information please follow this link to the Episode of _The Bayesian Conspiracy_, “[The Guild of Servants”](http://www.thebayesianconspiracy.com/2020/08/117-the-guild-of-servants/), starting at the 24 minute mark.

Spaces are limited, so if you choose to accept this offer, please email [guildofservants@gmail.com](guildofservants@gmail.com) with your name and a short response (1000 character limit) by August 31 explaining your hopes for the courses, introducing who you are, and how you received this invitation.

With great and terrible patience,

The High Council
# Do we have updated data about the risk of ~ permanent chronic fatigue from COVID-19?

Months and months ago, when COVID-19 first broke, one of the most concerning aspects of the disease was the possibility that it might produce long-term chronic fatigue, based on a comparison with SARS (apparently a large percentage of the people who had SARS in 2003, had chronic fatigue symptoms years later, though I can't find the paper right now), plus [some other evidence](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/uvmsoBqEDiynnJcMS/for-viruses-is-presenting-with-fatigue-correlated-with).

At the time, we didn't have much data, but now we're a few months into the pandemic. Obviously, we won't know how long lasting it is, but what are the updated risk estimates of chronic fatigue from COVID?
# Announcing the Study Group for Progress

This fall I will be hosting a study/discussion group on the history, economics and philosophy of progress.

The primary attraction of the program is a weekly Q&A, each week featuring a different special guest—usually a historian or economist who has written on science, technology, industry and progress. Reading from that author will be given ahead of time. Confirmed speakers so far include:

*   Robert J. Gordon (Northwestern), author of *The Rise and Fall of American Growth*
*   Margaret Jacob (UCLA), author of *Scientific Culture and the Making of the Industrial West*
*   Richard Nelson (Columbia), author of the classic paper “The Simple Economics of Basic Scientific Research”
*   Ashish Arora (Duke), co-author of “The changing structure of American innovation: Some cautionary remarks for economic growth”
*   Pierre Azoulay (MIT Sloan), co-author of papers such as “Funding Breakthrough Research”
*   Jay Bhattacharya (Stanford), co-author of “Stagnation and Scientific Incentives”
*   Patrick Collison (Stripe), co-author of “We Need a New Science of Progress”, the article that coined the term “progress studies”
*   Anton Howes, author of *Arts and Minds: How the Royal Society of Arts Changed a Nation*
*   Alicia Jackson, former DARPA program manager and director

The program will also include all of the reading from my high school course, [Progress Studies for Young Scholars](https://rootsofprogress.org/announcing-progress-studies-for-young-scholars): a summary of the history of technology, including advances in materials and manufacturing, agriculture, energy, transportation, communication, and disease. This provides the indispensable historical framework for a proper empirical grounding of the study of progress.

More details and enrollment forms: [https://rootsofprogress.org/announcing-the-study-group-for-progress](https://rootsofprogress.org/announcing-the-study-group-for-progress)
# Becoming an EA-influencer on YouTube etc.

Hey, fellow EA people!  

  
I am an effective altruist from Finland. I have noticed that not so many people have heard of effective altruism. I am aware of great people like Peter Singer and William McAskill who do some great research and influence the public discussion of EA. I still believe though that there could be even more talk about EA.

  
The problem I found is that I couldn’t find any single famous EA related YouTube/internet personalities other than Singer, McAskill, and other fellows who are academics in this field. If you think about veganism or climate change you could find many good content creator’s on YouTube. Earthling Ed is a great example of promoting veganism really effectively.

  
I think starting EA-related vlog or becoming an EA-related internet personality could be really effectively altruistic as then more people could become Effective altruists. Now the problem is that many people aren’t aware of the EA thoughts.

  
I would, therefore, encourage the EA-community members to take up to this challenge and maybe even someone to become an online influencer. I am also thinking about the option of starting my own YouTube channel dedicated to EA-related topics. I would be also keen to cooperate with people from all around the world. I think it would be pretty unique if we could have a YouTube channel related to EA and then have people from all around the world contributing to the making of the content.

  
Please let me know in the comments what you think about this suggestion and would you be interested to collaborate with me with the videos or maybe give tips on how to start the YouTube career etc. I will keenly wait for all of your comments. The good thing about globalization is that it could really be possible to have a global YouTube account with people uploading videos from all around the world with EA-related topics. The important thing would be to just have really good content so that people can relate to it.
# 10 Fun Questions for LessWrongers

Here are [**10 fun questions for LWers**](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSe3_HR5T1Sbs26HAcdvFOpL1ADrPzDqxQ64nFheJhLdjLFN2g/viewform).

Questions like "how much karma makes a post worth reading" and "do emotions mostly help or hinder you in pursuing your goals".

All multiple choice / dropdown selection (bar an optional one).

I'll publish the results in a few days.

I've filled it out. [**Fill it out here?**](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSe3_HR5T1Sbs26HAcdvFOpL1ADrPzDqxQ64nFheJhLdjLFN2g/viewform)
# WordPress Destroys Editing Process, Seeking Alternatives

WordPress had an editor that worked. They have forcibly replaced it with an editor that doesn’t. There does not seem to be a free way to switch back.

Please, if anyone knows a good alternative hosting service, especially one that can seamlessly transfer over the old blog contents, please share in the comments.

There _might_ be a way to switch back to the old editor if I payed them the ransom money to upgrade my account to Business so I could use plugins, but I don’t want to do that unless I’m positive it will work. If you know for a fact that this would still work, let me know that, too.

Even if I knew it would work, it’s really bad decision theory to pay ransom money, so I’d need to think long and hard before doing it even if the amount of money is trivial. I _think_ that if the service is otherwise good enough it’s _mostly_ all right, since I’ve gotten a lot of value from them, but I also welcome thoughts on that front. I’m pretty furious right now.

Also, the new editor looks like it literally doesn’t function – it already ate a post and keeps telling me I don’t have permissions.
# Looking for adversarial collaborators to test our Debate protocol

EDIT: We're also looking for people to become trained Honest debaters, which requires a greater time commitment (ideally >=5 hours per week for >= 2 months) but for which we're offering $30/hr. If you're interested in doing that, please fill out this form: [https://forms.gle/2bv1Z8eCYPfyqxRF9](https://forms.gle/2bv1Z8eCYPfyqxRF9)

\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-

We’re looking for people to help us adversarially test our [Debate](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/Br4xDbYu4Frwrb64a/writeup-progress-on-ai-safety-via-debate-1) protocol.

We have a set of questions, a (somewhat complicated) set of rules and mechanisms for how the debate should work, a (slightly janky) web interface for conducting the debates, and a protocol for judging: we have a pipeline for selecting good judges through MTurk, and they get 5 minutes to judge the final round from the debate.

We think that the person who gives the better answer to the question at the start (the “honest debater”) should win the debate, if they understand why that answer is good, and they have practiced the “honest debater strategy” a bit.

We’re looking for people to play the ‘dishonest debater’ role, and win against our trained honest debaters.

We’re ideally looking for people who:

*   Have good physics ability and can understand the [questions](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1V4fgappqFsUT0vmRWZmUMYmrB5b2WRGyENjH4k2MrN4/edit?usp=sharing) in the problem set (mostly a few of the harder questions from the first few sections of Thinking Physics, plus a few probability/stats puzzles/paradoxes)
*   Are very good at argumentation and deception
*   Believe that there’s a dishonest strategy that should win in these debates
*   Will be adversarial in the debates, but constructive and cooperative in figuring out the rules for the adversarial testing and overall experimental setup
*   Are available during daytime PST

More details, rules, experiment plan and tips for debaters are [here](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1iuF8RbajtGgPiO1jkXAh0IGThwcSFRq2fibx3-eftMo/edit?usp=sharing).

First we want to pilot our overall protocol with only a small number of adversarial collaborators, and we’ll probably find some holes in our experiment rules and general setup that are unrelated to the properties of the debate mechanism itself.

If we manage to fix the holes in the experimental protocol, but don’t believe we’ve found problems in the actual debate mechanism yet, we’ll probably try to escalate the adversarialness, for example by scaling it up to a larger number of people, or offering prizes for dishonest wins.

If you're interested, comment below or email me: barnes \[at\] openai.com.

If you would be interested in participating conditional on us offering pay or prizes, that's also useful to know.
# On Defining your Terms

Let's suppose you're having a discussion with someone about free will. They believe that you have it and you believe that you don't. Most of the time when these discussions occur, people are just talking past each other, so you ask them to define what they mean by "free will". They say that they can't define it, so you suggest that they spend some more time thinking about it and that you resume the discussion when they produce a definition. They claim that they don't think there's any way they could ever define it, so you leave the discussion there and conclude that they are being unreasonable.

But are they? Let's suppose someone asks you to define "a pile". This is clearly a useful concept, but it's hard to define. 100 grains of rice is a pile, 1 grain isn't, where do we draw the line? We could pick a number arbitrarily, but perhaps the number of items required to counts as a pile varies depending on whether we are talking about rice or sand or waterbottles with smaller items needing a greater number and larger needing a lesser number. And maybe there's other contextual factors too that you've left out? The word doesn't have a nice crisp definition, you simply learn how to use it from experience. It's kind of the same for words like red and orange where the boundaries are also extremely fuzzy.

This isn't perfectly analogous to the free will situation, but it does highlight the difficulty of definitions. Let's suppose both you and the person you have talked to work together and you manage to identify five models of reality. He argues that the first two would have free will and that the last three wouldn't. That seems all well and good, but what if there's another three models of reality that neither of you had considered and if they had thought of them, they would have considered the first one to clearly be free will and the second one to be a case where you could reasonably call it either way. That would certainly complicate things, wouldn't it? The point is that expecting a complete definition may require someone to have thought of all the possible models of reality, which is a pretty massive, arguably impossible, burden to put on someone.

Nonetheless, I think the discussion can proceed. Even if the first person can't perfectly define what they mean by free will, they should be able to produce some kind of imperfect attempt. They could define a paradigmatic case of what would count as free will for them and what wouldn't count as free will. They could provide a definition that attempts to capture most of it, even if it doesn't completely match the way that they would draw the boundary. Or they could endorse a definition purely for the purpose of this discussion. For example, I might say that I think that grains of rice would be a reasonable cutoff for a pile, even if my actual model is more complicated with 20 grains definitely being a pile and 10 mostly being a pile and 3 grains only kind of being one.
# AI safety as featherless bipeds *with broad flat nails*

There's a [famous story about Diogenes and Plato](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diogenes#In_Athens):

>[...] when Plato gave the tongue-in-cheek definition of man as "featherless bipeds," Diogenes plucked a chicken and brought it into Plato's Academy, saying, "Behold! I've brought you a man," and so the Academy added "with broad flat nails" to the definition.

![](https://www.dropbox.com/s/r3idem8xec5o0tn/Diogenes_brings_a_plucked_chicken_to_Plato.jpg?raw=1)

What  Plato was (allegedly) doing was not providing a definition of man, but what I'd call a sufficient reference or a sufficient pointer. If I'm in ancient Athens and divide the obvious objects that I can see or think of into "featherless bipeds" and "not featherless bipeds", then "man" will match up with the first category.

Then Diogenes, acting like an AI, created something that fell within the sufficient pointer class but that was clearly not a man. The Academy then amended the pointer to add "with broad flat nails", patching it till it was sufficient again. Had there been a powerful AI around, or a god, or a meddling human with enough means and persistence, then they could have produced a "featherless-biped-with-broad-flat-nails" that was also not a human, making the pointer inadequate again.

A lot of suggestions on AI safety are sufficient pointers. For example, take the idea that an AI should maximise "complexity". This comes, I believe, from the fact that, in our current world, the category of "is complex" and "is valuable to humans" match up a lot. It's a sufficient pointer. But along comes a Diogenes/AI with complexity as a goal, and now it enriches the set of objects in the world with complex-but-worthless things, breaking the "definition".

Therefore, a lot of things that people say they value or want AIs to preserve/maximise, should not be taken as saying that they value the specific thing they say. Instead, this should be taken as pointer to what they value in the current world, and the challenge is then to extend that to [new maps and new territories](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/pfmFe5fgEn2weJuer/go-west-young-man-preferences-in-imperfect-maps).
# The US Already Has A Wealth Tax

In [Modeling A Wealth Tax](http://paulgraham.com/wtax.html), Paul Graham writes:

> Even a 0.5% wealth tax would start to keep founders away from a state or country that imposed it.

The US, however, effectively already has a ~0.3%-0.4% wealth tax.

Specifically, the long-term capital gains rate in the US is 20% for high earners (like the startup founders Graham describes) and the IRS taxes nominal gains. This means that part of what they're taxing is real gains, but another part is imaginary gains due to inflation. This is not exactly the same curve as a percentage wealth tax, because while it starts at `total inflation * capital gains` it asymptotically approaches the capital gains tax rate. You can see this in the extreme: if inflation is high enough or you hold your money long enough, effectively everything you have is capital gains, and when you sell you'll be taxed at the capital gains rate.

Inflation is about 2.4% (the annual [CPIAUCSL](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CPIAUCSL) change from January 1990 to January 2020) and the long-term capital gains rate is 20%, so we have something close to a 0.4% wealth tax over 20y, or a 0.3% wealth tax over 50y:

[![](https://www.jefftk.com/wealth-tax-vs-inflation-and-capital-gains.png)](https://www.jefftk.com/wealth-tax-vs-inflation-and-capital-gains-big.png)  
([sheet](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1EF28gRkuJMJsyyUkuwQoQCQZKfvcxJ2zwfOu13_SUb0/edit); shows a real interest rate of 0% for illustration purposes)

To be concrete, imagine you had $100 in 2000, and invested it in the US stock market. In 2020 it's worth $250 and you sell it. Your nominal gain is $150, and that's what the IRS will tax you on. But your real gain is only $100; the rest is 2020 dollars being about 2/3 as valuable as 2000 dollars. Taxing this difference is taxing wealth.

This makes me think that Graham is overstating his claim, since the US is very popular for startups and has a wealth tax nearly as high as he discusses.
# Alex Irpan: "My AI Timelines Have Sped Up"

Blog post by Alex Irpan. The basic summary:

> In 2015, I made the following forecasts about when AGI could happen.
> 
> *   10% chance by 2045
> *   50% chance by 2050
> *   90% chance by 2070
> 
> Now that it’s 2020, I’m updating my forecast to:
> 
> *   10% chance by 2035
> *   50% chance by 2045
> *   90% chance by 2070

The main underlying shifts: more focus on improvements in tools, compute, and unsupervised learning.
# Should we write more about social life?

Social life is a thorny subject. Writings on that topic can be noxious, for a variety of reasons. Yet we live in a social world, and instrumental rationality ought to make us better at navigating it. Furthermore, if status competition is a war of all against all, and "all warfare is based on deception," as Sun Tzu says, then we should expect that this is one of the areas where rationality might be especially helpful. On this website, people post self-help advice through a rationalist lens all the time. Yet I rarely see rationalist self-help advice on topics such as how to have a thriving social life, get along with your parents, strike up a conversation with a stranger, build a blog audience, or field a disagreement without lying, submitting, or looking like a jerk.

I'd consider the following to be virtues of posts about social life:

1.  Striving for generality as much as (but no more than) is possible.
2.  Avoiding moral judgments and political resentments.
3.  Balancing a basically positive and constructive attitude with a healthy skepticism towards platitudes.

Do you agree that this forum might benefit from more posts on social life? What would you be most interested in writing or reading about? What do you tend to find most frustrating when reading people's takes on social life, here or elsewhere?
# What am I missing? (quantum physics)

I've read many times about an experiment: take a 2-particle system and measure that it has a spin of 0. This tells us that the particles have opposite spin. Now, take the particles far away from each other and measure one. If you measure spin up, for example, you now know the other particle has spin down.

Why would anybody be surprised by this?

Let's imagine a similar classical experiment that uses literal spin. Take a system of two gyroscopes, each spinning at the same fixed speed, each in it's own sealed box. They can be powered or whatever so they stay spinning for the duration. Stack the two boxes ("entangling" their spin), and measure 0 spin to confirm that the gyroscopes are in fact spinning in opposite directions (some helicopters use this principle for stabilization on the y-axis instead of a tail propeller). Now, send the boxes far apart and measure one of them using the right hand rule. If it turns out to have spin up, the other will intuitively turn out to have spin down. But nobody will be surprised by this because we knew from the beginning that the pair was spinning in opposite directions; we just didn't know which was which before measuring one of them.

\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-

**Update: 2020Apr24**  
Thanks for all the comments, explanations, and links! I'm not ignoring them, just trying to find time between work and family responsibilities to digest and understand them before I ask my follow-up questions. I appreciate your patience!
# What's a Decomposable Alignment Topic?

What's an alignment topic where, if someone decomposed the overall task, a small group of smart people (like here on Lesswrong) could make conceptual progress? By "smart", assume they can [notice confusion](https://www.lesswrong.com/s/zpCiuR4T343j9WkcK), google, and program.

Be specific. Explain what strategies you would use to explore your topic, and give examples on decomposing tasks.

This is more than just an exercise in [factored cognition](https://ought.org/research/factored-cognition); there are stakes: I host the [key alignment group](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/EnnCnnjB52MDGtiYF/solving-key-alignment-problems-group), and if your answer is convincing enough, then we'll work on it (caveat: some people may leave if your topic isn't their cup of tea, but others may join because it is). Additionally, you can pitch your idea in the key alignment group meeting on (8/25) Tuesday 7pm UTC; just DM me if you'd like to join the next meeting.
# What price would you pay for the RadVac Vaccine and why?

I have been following with interest the RadVac team and their [synthetic peptide based intranasal vaccine.](https://radvac.org/vaccine/) They have published a protocol for [making and taking the vaccine](https://radvac.org/protocols-for-making-and-taking-the-vaccine/) as well as a list of potential risks (on pg. 9 of the white paper).

How much would you pay for the RadVac vaccine? If you wouldn't use it - e.g. because you feel it's ineffective/risky - please say so and optionally put a negative number. And why would you pay that amount? An example of the type of model I'm looking for is $XX because you expect it would be effective at cutting your risk of COVID-19 by YY%, or because you think it might be dangerous you wouldn't take it at all.
# [Oops, there is actually an event] Notice: No LW event this weekend

Just a notice to say there's no event this weekend.

Will be back to your regularly scheduled LW event on Sunday 29th, which we'll announce in a few days.

**Update: We're having a double crux, between Buck Shlegeris and Oliver Habryka, on AI takeoff speeds.** [**Event page.**](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/p5iuER9Ms5QrReFW2/sunday-august-23rd-12pm-pdt-double-crux-with-buck-shlegeris)
# Sunday August 23rd, 12pm (PDT) – Double Crux with Buck Shlegeris and Oliver Habryka on Slow vs. Fast AI Takeoff

This Sunday at 12pm (PDT), we're running a double crux between two curated LessWrong authors (see [here](https://www.lesswrong.com/tag/lesswrong-events) for transcripts of events from previous weeks).

*   We'll have 1.5–2 hours of Double Crux between Buck and Oliver, facilitated by Eli Tyre. They'll discuss the topic of slow vs. fast AI Takeoff. This will be a conversation guided by attempts to communicate with each other, rather than a prepared presentation focused on communicating a particular argument to the audience.
*   This will be followed by some Q&A with the attendees, and a hangout in an online space (Gather Town).

*If you're a curated author and interested in giving a 5-min talk at a future event, which will then be transcribed and edited, sign up* [*here*](https://forms.gle/iwFatbhys9muPmQA7)*.*

Speakers
--------

*   **Buck's curated posts**
    *   ["Other people are wrong" vs "I am right"](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/4QemtxDFaGXyGSrGD/other-people-are-wrong-vs-i-am-right)
    *   [Six economics misconceptions of mine which I've resolved over the last few years](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/MgFDzAfCku9MSDLuw/six-economics-misconceptions-of-mine-which-i-ve-resolved)
*   **habryka's curated posts:**
    *   [Integrity and accountability are core parts of rationality](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/xhE4TriBSPywGuhqi/integrity-and-accountability-are-core-parts-of-rationality)
*   **elityre's curated posts:**
    *   [Historical mathematicians exhibit a birth order effect too](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/tj8QP2EFdP8p54z6i/historical-mathematicians-exhibit-a-birth-order-effect-too)
    *   [Does it become easier, or harder, for the world to coordinate around not building AGI as time goes on?](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/b9ErEMen42X94749t/does-it-become-easier-or-harder-for-the-world-to-coordinate)
    *   [How do you assess the quality / reliability of a scientific study?](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/gxbGKa2AnQsrn3Gni/how-do-you-assess-the-quality-reliability-of-a-scientific)

Details
-------

**When?** Sunday August 23, 12pm (PDT)

**Where?** https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81137654971
# Why don't countries, like companies, more often merge?

Whereas companies often undergo a friendly merger or acquisition, why don't countries more often do this? Set aside colonialism because I'd like to focus on the case where the threat of violence is not paramount.

I suppose the right incentives aren't in place but is this an intrinsic fact of international relations or democratic politics?

For example, a merger between the US and Mexico seems, naively, like it could be in both nations' interest. The US gets more land and lower-cost labor and Mexico gets access to better governance and knowledge spillover.
# Current guidance for COVID-19 self-care?

What is the current consensus on supplements to take or skip? I thought zinc lozenges and high dose Vitamin C were clear winners, but I am now finding conflicting information on how Vitamin C may impact interferon.

There's also the HCQ issue, where it's been so politicized that it's rather difficult to determine efficacy as an early intervention.

Edit: The internet exists, I have no plans to defect in the Prisoner's Dilemma and go shopping in person.

Asking for myself, because, well, y'know. Getting tested tomorrow, and regarding that - come on San Francisco, it's nearly September, DO BETTER. Please DM if you know of a way to get tested with a <24 hour turnaround time.
# SlateStarCodex Online Meetup: Dr David Manheim on Cooperation for AI

On August 30, 17:30 GMT, 20:30 IDT, 10:30 PDT, Dr David Manheim will speak on "Cooperation for AI: From formal models in AI safety to geopolitics".

He will discuss multiagent dynamics, and also competition and race dynamics for AI takeoff safety.

David is a researcher with the University of Haifa, who works with Future of Humanity Institute and other organizations on investigating large-scale risks to humanity.

[Read his related paper here](https://arxiv.org/abs/1810.10862).

[Sign up here](https://forms.gle/GQ4hrjFakzrsGZc49) and we'll send you a link to the online meetup
# How to set up foot pedals

Let's say you would like to control your computer partly with your feet: how do you go about it? This wasn't something that I was especially interested in before my [wrists started hurting](https://www.jefftk.com/p/wrist-issues), but now I have it set up I like it a lot and I would definitely keep it even if my wrists were completely better. I have three pedals, set for scroll down, scroll up, and "archive this email message and take me to the next unread message." You could possibly use foot controls for different things in different programs, but I haven't gotten into that.

[![](https://www.jefftk.com/simple-three-pedal-foot-switch.jpg)](https://www.jefftk.com/simple-three-pedal-foot-switch-big.jpg)

I got a [cheap no-name three pedal foot switch](https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B07D3MF62M/) for $35 shipped. I suspect it's not the most durable option, but it's cheap enough that if it breaks I can easily replace it. It comes with (useless-to-me) Windows-only software to program it, but out of the box the three foot switches send `a`, `b`, and `c`. I installed the open source tool [Karabiner-Elements](https://karabiner-elements.pqrs.org/) to remap them. First I needed to tell Karabiner to only affect the foot pedals:

[![](https://www.jefftk.com/karabiner-configuration-only-foot-pedal.png)](https://www.jefftk.com/karabiner-configuration-only-foot-pedal-big.png)

USB vendor id 1452 (0x5AC) is Apple, so I could tell that the foot pedal was the remaining device. Then I needed to configure what I want it to happen:

[![](https://www.jefftk.com/karabiner-key-remapping.png)](https://www.jefftk.com/karabiner-key-remapping-big.png)

The reason for using open square bracket (`[`) is that it's the gmail keyboard shortcut for "archive this email message and take me to the next unread message."

By itself this is definitely not enough to make my wrists happy again, but it takes a substantial load off them, and lets me handle my email mostly hands-free. If I had a one-off repetitive task I needed to do, I would consider setting up a temporary remapping just for that task. At some point I also might consider setting up something to let me use this hardware to control my [rhythm stage setup](https://www.jefftk.com/news/jammer).

*Comment via: [facebook](https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100180581864332)*
# Investment is a useful societal mechanism for getting new things made. Stock trading shares some functionality with investment, but seems very very inefficient, at that?

Jack Bogle, the creator of the first index fund, says

> **The stock market has nothing—n-o-t-h-i-n-g—to do with the allocation of capital**. All it means is that if you’re buying General Motors stock, say, someone else is selling it to you. Capital isn’t allocated—the ownership just changes. **I may be an investor, you may be a speculator. But no capital goes anywhere**. This is basically a closed system. **You have new IPOs and whatnot, but they’re very small compared to this vast thing we call a market**

My response to this has always been... if that's true, what is the point in all of this? It's a mechanism that predicts the success of companies, but plays only a very small role in investment? Could we get that money to do something better, then?
# Split-a-Dollar Game

When researching the topic of [distributing government seats in Switzerland](https://250bpm.com/blog:163/index.html). I've chanced on the so-called split-the-dollar game, which is kind of simplified, game-theoretical model of the process. Given that despite having some basic knowledge of the game theory I have never heard of the game, it may be worth making a short blog post about it.

In the game, three players are asked to vote on splitting a dollar. The game is iterative, it has multiple rounds. At the beginning, a third of a dollar may be assigned to each player. The players, unanimously, vote for the arrangement.

However, the arrangement is not stable. It's a game about forming coalitions. Two players can conspire and vote in a arrangement where they split the dollar fairly among themselves and give nothing to the third player.

But even then the arrangement isn't stable. Now the third player can approach one of the other two coallition parties and propose a better deal: Instead of 50 cents they would get 75 cents and the proposing party would content itself with just 25 cents. Their current coalition partner would get nothing. The party is incentivized to accept not only because of sheer greed, but also because it is aware that if they rejected the proposal, the proposing party can make the same offer to their coalition partner and thus lock them out of the coalition.

But even now, with two players sharing the dollar in 75:25 ratio, the arrangement is not stable. The senior partner can blackmail the junior partner by threatening to make a coalition with the opposition party. The junior partner, in their turn, can do exactly the same thing.

As can be seen, any arrangement is, in principle, unstable. The negotiation game can go on forever without reaching a stable state.

We can see the game in action in the case of Switzerland. In 1953, despite FDP (liberals), CVP (christian democrats) and SP (social democrats) getting very much the same amount of votes, the seats in government were distributed among them in 4:2:0 ratio. (There was also one seat going to SVP, which matched their election result and is not relevant to this story.)

The interesting aspect here is that unlike in other countries with the same problem, Switzerland has been able - after more than 100 years of playing the game - to reach a stable state. They did so by adopting a cultural norm, so called "Magic Formula", which splits the seats in government in a fashion proportional to election results.

Note that the game still doesn't have a stable strategy. The problem wasn't solved within the game. It was solved on the meta-level, by parties agreeing to respect the voting results, internalizing that respect and punishing those who don't behave.

Also note that this haven't in fact solved the problem, but rather moved it, commendably so, to a different level. Today the split-the-dollar game isn't played among parliamentarians forming a government, but rather among members of government voting on practical issues.

**August 24th, 2020**
# Do you vote based on what you think total karma should be?

I recently strong-downvoted a post that I would have weak-upvoted if it had been at a lower karma. In general, I usually vote primarily based on what I think the total karma should be. I'm curious whether other people do similar things.

This is both a question and a poll. The poll is in the comments; it works via upvotes but there is a karma balance comment. (Note that one can recover the non-weighted results (i.e., number of votes) by hovering one's mouse over the current score.) This is about votes on LessWrong only.

I'm also wondering whether this behavior is, in some sense, anti-virtuous. If everyone votes based on what they think the total karma should be, then a post's karma reflects \[a weighted average of opinions on what the post's total karma should be\] rather than \[a weighted average of opinions on the post\]. This feels worse, though I'm not entirely sure that it is.

**Correction:** as jimmy [points out](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/xBAeSSwLFBs2NCTND/do-you-vote-based-on-what-you-think-total-karma-should-be?commentId=nFwZquB5a4XrFGzYm), voting independently of current karma does _not_ give you a weighted average of opinions on the post because there are only a limited number of ways you can vote.

**Meta:** There's been [some speculation](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/ShDhcWfzMLrzGN3P4/karma-fluctuations?commentId=wRJaMtks9GjBnzaR3) about this (maybe read after voting), but nothing conclusive.

Current non-weighted results (08/28 07:05 EDT) (TK is 'target karma'.)

![](https://s12.directupload.net/images/200828/kn3qwiip.png)
# Why hasn't there been research on the effectiveness of zinc for Covid-19?

There was significant interest in zinc early on. It seemed like one of the most promising avenues for protecting oneself against Covid-19. Searching on both Google and Lesswrong itself, I do not see new research on it. ([This](https://wellcomeopenresearch.org/articles/5-188) is the closest thing I found; A metareview that says there is almost no research whatsoever.) Its epistemic status seems frozen in the pre-Covid past: promising experimental treatment with no significant evidence confirming or disconfirming it, and no largescale commercialization and deployment.

This seems quite an inefficient result, if my understanding is correct. What has gone wrong?
# The Best Toy In The Park

One of the [playgrounds](https://www.somervillerec.com/info/facilities/details.aspx?FacilityID=14346) near our house has an [angled ring shaped merry-go-round](https://www.kompan.us/play/freestanding/supernova-carousels-spinners/supernova-1):

[![](https://www.jefftk.com/supernova-carousel-angled-playground-roundabout.jpg)](https://www.jefftk.com/supernova-carousel-angled-playground-roundabout-big.jpg)

There are lots of different toys at the park, but this one is different. It has depth.

It's a freely spinning ring, with a 10deg tilt. As you walk up, it spins you back down again. It has enough momentum, however, that you can get yourself to higher positions on the ring by working it back and forth. Because of the tilt, your speed changes as you move around the ring, and you have to adjust your angle relative to the ring as well. First is the challenge of staying upright as you walk at the bottom. Then the challenge of getting yourself to the top. Then the challenge of getting around it at different speeds, changing orientation, riding with other people, rolling on it, jumping, etc.

There are shallow games, like Tic-tac-toe, that are fun for a bit, and deeper games, [like Go](https://www.jefftk.com/p/simplest-interesting-game), that can be enjoyed for years. While I haven't spent years on any of these toys, this angled spinning ring has the most depth of any I've seen.

*Comment via: [facebook](https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100180802701772)*
# I Started a Sports and Gambling Substack

The substack is [here](https://thezvi.substack.com/).

The latest post is [here](https://thezvi.substack.com/p/team-offensive-ratings-825) and contains predictions for tomorrow’s baseball games. I also posted predictions for yesterday’s games [here](https://thezvi.substack.com/p/aikido-predictions-825), and [here](https://thezvi.substack.com/p/team-offensive-ratings-825) you can find my offensive team ratings. Pitcher ratings will be posted soon.

I wanted to try out the substack system and software as a potential landing point, and as per [my discussion regarding the forced switch to the new WordPress editor](https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2020/08/18/wordpress-destroys-editing-process-seeking-alternatives/). I also wanted to avoid conflating the sports modeling and gambling talk with my rationality blog, as I expect them to be relevant to the interests of different groups of people.

If you have meaningful feedback for what the model has to say, or are finding these posts interesting or useful, let me know and also hopefully subscribe to the substack. If not, I’ll likely periodically mention it is there, but will do my best to keep the two efforts distinct.
# nostalgebraist: Recursive Goodhart's Law

Would kind of like to excerpt the whole post, but that feels impolite, so I'll just quote the first four paragraphs and then suggest reading the whole thing:

> There’s this funny thing about Goodhart’s Law, where it’s easy to say “being affected by Goodhart’s Law is bad” and “it’s better to behave in ways that aren’t as subject to Goodhart’s Law,” but it can be very _hard_ to explain why these things are true to someone who doesn’t already agree.

> Why?  Because any such explanation is going to involve some step where you say, “see, if you do that, _the results are worse_.”  But this requires some standard by which we can judge results … and any such standard, when examined closely enough, has Goodhart problems of its own.

> There are times when you can’t convince someone without a formal example or something that amounts to one, something where you can say “see, Alice’s cautious heuristic strategy wins her $X while Bob’s strategy of computing the global optimum under his world model only wins him the smaller $Y, which is objectively worse!”

> But if you’ve gotten to this point, you’ve conceded that there’s _some_ function whose global optimum is the one true target.  It’s hard to talk about Goodhart at all without something like this in the background – how can “the metric fails to capture the true target” be the problem unless there is some true target?