Harley-ml/lesswrong huggingface dataset:
# Beware Trivial Fears

Does the surveillance state affect us? It has affected me, and I didn't realize that it was affecting me until recently. I give a few examples of how it has affected me:

1.  I was once engaged in a discussion on Facebook about Obama's foreign policy. Around that time, I was going to apply for a US visa. I stopped the discussion early. Semi-consciously, I was worried that what I was writing would be checked by US visa officials and would lead to my visa being denied.
2.  I was once really interested in reading up on the Unabomber and his manifesto, because somebody mentioned that he had some interesting ideas, and though fundamentally misguided, he might have been onto something. I didn't explore much because I was worried---again semi-consciously---that my traffic history would be logged on some NSA computer somewhere, and that I'd pattern match to the Unabomber (I'm a physics grad student, the Unabomber was a mathematician).
3.  I didn't visit [Silk Road](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road_(marketplace)) as I was worried that my visits would be traced, even though I had no plans of buying anything.
4.  Just generally, I try to not search for some really weird stuff that I want to search for (I'm a curious guy!). 
5.  I was almost not going to write this post. 

And these are just the ones that I became conscious of. I wonder how many more have slipped under the radar.

  

Yes, I know these fears are silly. In fact, writing them out makes them feel even more silly. But they still affected my behavior. Now, I may be atypical. But I'm sure I'm not _that_ atypical. I'm sure many, many people refrain from visiting and exploring parts of the Internet and writing things on different forums and blogs because of the fear of being recorded and the data being used against them. Especially susceptible to this fear are immigrants.

  

In [Beware Trivial Inconveniences](/lw/f1/beware_trivial_inconveniences/), Yvain points out that the [Great Firewall of China](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Firewall_of_China) is very easy to bypass but the vast majority of Chinese people don't bypass it because it's a trivial inconvenience.

  

I would like to introduce the analogous and very related concept of a _**trivial fear**_: fear of low probability events that affects behavior in a major way, especially over a large population. Much more insidiously, the people experiencing these fears don't even realize they're experiencing it: because the fear is of small magnitude, it can be rationalized away easily.

  

In this particular case, the fear acts in a way so as to restrict the desire for information and free speech.

  

In a recent conversation, a friend mentioned that calling the modern surveillance state 'Orwellian' is hyperbole. Maybe so. I don't know if the surveillance state is a Good Thing or a Bad Thing. I'm not an economist or a political scientist or a moral philosopher. I simply want to point out that the main lesson from _1984_ is not the exact details of the dystopia, but the fact that the people living in the dystopia weren't even remotely aware that they were living in one.
# True numbers and fake numbers

> In physical science the first essential step in the direction of learning any subject is to find principles of numerical reckoning and practicable methods for measuring some quality connected with it. I often say that when you can measure what you are speaking about, and express it in numbers, you know something about it; but when you cannot measure it, when you cannot express it in numbers, your knowledge is of a meagre and unsatisfactory kind; it may be the beginning of knowledge, but you have scarcely in your thoughts advanced to the state of _Science_, whatever the matter may be.
> 
> \-\- Lord Kelvin

If you believe that science is about describing things mathematically, you can fall into a strange sort of trap where you come up with some numerical quantity, discover interesting facts about it, use it to analyze real-world situations - but never actually get around to measuring it. I call such things "theoretical quantities" or "fake numbers", as opposed to "measurable quantities" or "true numbers".

An example of a "true number" is mass. We can measure the mass of a person or a car, and we use these values in engineering all the time. An example of a "fake number" is utility. I've never seen a concrete utility value used anywhere, though I always hear about nice mathematical laws that it must obey.

The difference is not just about units of measurement. In economics you can see fake numbers happily coexisting with true numbers using the same units. Price is a true number measured in dollars, and you see concrete values and graphs everywhere. "Consumer surplus" is also measured in dollars, but good luck calculating the consumer surplus of a single cheeseburger, never mind drawing a graph of aggregate consumer surplus for the US! If you ask five economists to calculate it, you'll get five different indirect estimates, and it's not obvious that there's a true number to be measured in the first place.

Another example of a fake number is "complexity" or "maintainability" in software engineering. Sure, people have proposed different methods of measuring it. But if they were measuring a true number, I'd expect them to agree to the 3rd decimal place, which they don't :-) The existence of multiple measuring methods that give the same result is one of the differences between a true number and a fake one. Another sign is what happens when two of these methods disagree: do people say that they're both equally valid, or do they insist that one must be wrong and try to find the error?

It's certainly possible to improve something without measuring it. You can learn to play the piano pretty well without quantifying your progress. But we should probably try harder to find measurable components of "intelligence", "rationality", "productivity" and other such things, because we'd be better at improving them if we had true numbers in our hands.
# Publication: the "anti-science" trope is culturally polarizing and makes people distrust scientists

Paper by the Cultural Cognition Project: [The culturally polarizing effect of the "anti-science trope" on vaccine risk perceptions](http://www.culturalcognition.net/blog/2014/1/31/the-culturally-polarizing-effect-of-the-anti-science-trope-o.html)

This is a great paper (indeed, I think many at LW would find the whole site enjoyable). I'll try to summarize it here.

Background: The pro/anti vaccine debate has been hot recently. Many pro-vaccine people often say, "The science is strong, the benefits are obvious, the risks are negligible; if you're anti-vaccine then you're anti-science".

Methods: They showed experimental subjects an article basically saying the above.

Results: When reading such an article, a large number of people did not trust vaccines more, but rather, trusted the American Academy of Pediatrics less.

My thoughts: I will strive to avoid labeling anybody as being "anti-science" or "simply or willfully ignorant of current research", etc., even when speaking of hypothetical 3rd parties on my facebook wall. This holds for evolution, global warming, vaccines, etc.

///

Also included in the article: references to other research that shows that evolution and global warming debates have already polarized people into distrusting scientists, and evidence that people are not yet polarized over the vaccine issue.

If you intend to read the article yourself: I found it difficult to understand how the authors divided participants into the 4 quadrants (α, ß, etc.) I will quote my friend, who explained it for me:

I was helped by following the [link to where they first introduce that model](http://www.culturalcognition.net/blog/2013/12/2/why-cultural-predispositions-matter-how-to-measure-them-a-fr.html).

The people in the top left (α) worry about risks to public safety, such as global warming. The people in the bottom right (δ) worry about socially deviant behaviors, such as could be caused by the legalization of marijuana.  
  
People in the top right (β) worry about both public safety risks and deviant behaviors, and people in the bottom left (γ) don't really worry about either.
# [Meta] Open thread even more often?

This week's [open thread](/r/discussion/lw/jnx/open_thread_for_february_11_17 "Open thread February 11-17") is less than a day old, and has already accumulated more comments than the 15 latest non-open-thread posts combined.  I fear the thread will wither and die before Friday.

Going from monthly to weekly open threads was a big hit.  Should we ratchet up open thread frequency even more?  Should we add [more outlets for comments](http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Special_threads#Periodic_threads), or will comments inevitably expand to fill the available room?

**Proposal for discussion**: We follow a regimen of weekly blather threads for the next two weeks, then reassess.

*   **Stupid questions** (_Monday_) \- Admit your ignorance
*   **Advice** (_Tuesday_) \- Seek the wisdom of the crowd
*   **Open Thread** (_Wednesday_) \- Catch-all prattle
*   **Links** (_Friday_) \- Quality readings.  Meme postings punishable by death

#### Addendum

I posted a [Links](/lw/joa/open_thread_links_20140214/) on Friday and a [Stupid Questions](/lw/jp0/open_thread_stupid_questions_20140217/) on Monday.  In the 5 post-days that they've been up, they've accumulated 32 comments.  Based on these numbers, _it seems unlikely that these topical open threads will relieve pressure on the main Open Thread_ and so I've stopped the experiment.
# A few remarks about mass-downvoting

_To whoever has for the last several days been downvoting ~10 of my old comments per day_:

It is possible that your intention is to discourage me from commenting on Less Wrong.

The actual effect is the reverse. My comments still end up positive on average, and I am therefore motivated to post more of them in order to compensate for the steady karma drain you are causing.

If you are mass-downvoting other people, the effect on some of them is probably the same.

_To the LW admins, if any are reading_:

Look, can we really not do anything about this behaviour? It's childish and stupid, and it makes the karma system less useful (e.g., for comment-sorting), and it gives bad actors a disproportionate influence on Less Wrong. It seems like there are lots of obvious things that would go some way towards helping, many of which have been discussed in past threads about this.

Failing that, can we at least agree that it's bad behaviour and that it would be good in principle to stop it or make it more visible and/or inconvenient?

Failing that, can we at least have an official statement from an LW administrator that mass-downvoting is not considered an undesirable behaviour here? I really hope this isn't the opinion of the LW admins, but as the topic has been discussed from time to time with never any admin response I've been thinking it increasingly likely that it is. If so, let's at least be honest about it.

_To anyone else reading this_:

If you should happen to notice that a sizeable fraction of my comments are at -1, this is probably why. (Though of course I may just have posted a bunch of silly things. I expect it happens from time to time.)

My apologies for cluttering up Discussion with this. (But not very many apologies; this sort of mass-downvoting seems to me to be one of the more toxic phenomena on Less Wrong, and I retain some small hope that eventually something may be done about it.)
# Cambridge (England) lecture: Existential Risk: Surviving the 21st Century, 26th February 

The [Centre for the Study of Existential Risk](http://www.cser.org) will be holding a public lecture on "Existential Risk: Surviving the 21st Century" in collaboration with [80,000 Hours: Cambridge](https://www.facebook.com/80kCambridge) and [Giving What We Can: Cambridge](https://www.facebook.com/GivingWhatWeCanCambridge) on the 26th of February in Cambridge (United Kingdom).

Lady Mitchell Hall, Sidgwick Site, Cambridge. 5:30pm-6:45pm, with drinks reception to follow.

SPEAKERS:

Lord Martin Rees, Astronomer Royal

Jaan Tallinn, co-founder of Skype

Huw Price, Bertrand Russell Professor of Philosophy at Cambridge

"In the coming century, the greatest threats to human survival may come from our own technological developments. However, if we can safely navigate the pitfalls, the benefits that technology promises are enormous. A philosopher, an astronomer, and an entrepreneur have come together to form the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk. The goal: to bring a fraction of humanity’s talents to bear on the task of ensuring our long-term survival. In this lecture, Huw Price, Martin Rees and Jaan Tallinn will outline humanity’s greatest challenge: surviving the 21st century."

This event is free and open to all.

Facebook event notice is [here](https://www.facebook.com/events/1407072239542324).

In other news, I hope to be posting a general update on progress with the Centre's establishment fairly shortly for those who are interested, although it's still an ongoing process. Things have become quite busy and there are a lot of opportunities to follow up on, so I'll be taking a leave of absence from the Future of Humanity Institute for 6 months in April to work full-time on the project to establish the centre.
# Audio Version of "How to Actually Change Your Mind"

The audio version of the mega-sequence "How to Actually Change Your Mind" is [now available](http://castify.co/channels/46-how-to-actually-change-your-mind).  It's the biggest sequence we've done yet, coming in at over 8 hours of audio.  Here at Castify we think this sequence is the most important one we've done so far.

On the wiki it says, "The most important technique that Less Wrong can offer you is 'How to Actually Change Your Mind'".  I couldn't agree more.  If you haven't read it already I'd strongly recommend it.  If you have more free "ear time" than "eye time" or you learn better from listening this audio version is for you.

Feedback is welcome: support@castify.co
# 17 Rules to Make a Definition that Avoids the 37 Ways of Words Being Wrong

Eliezer's [writing style](https://www.evernote.com/pub/adelenedawner/Eliezer#b=90390ce2-1356-4522-959e-a300957704c5&st=p&n=2c519b03-7a75-41cc-87aa-abac27d3bcef "Ch. 50 Author's Notes") of A->B, then A, then B, though generally clear, results in a large amount of redundancy.

In this post, I have attempted to reduce the number of rules needed to remember by half. The numbers are the rules from the [original post](/lw/od/37_ways_that_words_can_be_wrong/).

So, without further ado, a good definition for a word:

1.  can be shown to be wrong^37^ and is not the final^13^ authority^18 19^
2.  has strong justifications^33^ for the word's existence^32^ and its particular definition,^20^ which leave no room for an argument^17 22^
3.  agrees with conventional usage^4^
4.  explains what context the word depends on^36^
5.  limits its scope to avoid overlap with other meanings^25^
6.  does not assume that definitions are the best way of giving words semantics^12^
7.  directs a complex mental paintbrush^35^ to paint detailed pictures of the thing you're trying to think about^23^
8.  is a brain inference aid^13^ that refers to and instructs one on how to find a specific/unique^24^ similarity cluster^21^ that is apparent from empirical experience^28 29 30^, the cluster's size being inversely proportional to the word's length^31^
9.  is not a binary category^9 11^ and cannot be used for deductive inference^27^
10.  requires observing only^14^ a few^3^ real-world^1^ properties that can be easily^5^ verified^2^ and are less abstract^6^ than the word being defined (in particular, the definition cannot be circular^16^)
11.  is not just a list of random properties^10 21^
12.  contains no negated properties^10 33^
13.  specifies exhaustively all of the correct connotations of the word^25 26^
14.  makes the properties of a random object satisfying the definition be nearly independent^34^
15.  has examples^6^ which satisfy the definition, including the original example(s) that motivated the definition being given^15^ and typical/conventional examples^7^
16.  tells you which examples are more typical or less typical^9^
17.  captures enough characteristics of the examples to identify non-members^8^

And there you go. 17 rules, follow them all and you can't use words wrongly.
# LINK: In favor of niceness, community, and civilisation

Scott, known on LessWrong as Yvain, recently wrote a post complaining about [an inaccurate rape statistic](http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/02/17/lies-damned-lies-and-social-media-part-5-of-%E2%88%9E/).

Arthur Chu, who is notable for winning money on Jeopardy recently, argued against Scott's stance that we should be honest in arguments in a comment thread on Jeff Kaufman's Facebook profile, which can be read [here](http://www.jefftk.com/p/are-feminist-blog-stats-atypically-bad#fb-649351137992_976222).

Scott just responded [here](http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/02/23/in-favor-of-niceness-community-and-civilization/), with a number of points relevant to the topic of rationalist communities.

I am interested in what LW thinks of this.

Obviously, at some point being polite in our arguments is silly. I'd be interested in people's opinions of how dire the real world consequences have to be before it's worthwhile debating dishonestly.
# What are some related communities online?

I think that it might be useful to create a list of related communities online that people might want to check out. Suggestions much appreciated.

**Directly Related to rationalism**

[Skeptics Stack Exchange](http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/) \- useful for confirming factual claims you are skeptical of. Requires specific, answerable questions

[Straight dope](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/) \- similar to Skeptics, but less strict on the questions accepted

[Change my view](http://reddit.com/r/changemyview) \- place to get your view challenged

[Cognitive Science](http://cogsci.stackexchange.com/) \- you are expected to do your reading first, but useful if your want to lean about what the research says

[Philosophy Reddit](http://www.reddit.com/r/philosophy)

[Rational Wiki](http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Main_Page): I only just learned about the existence of this site, so I don't know how good it is yet

**Secondary**:

Stacks: [StackOverflow](http://stackoverflow.com/), [Computer Science StackExchange](http://cs.stackexchange.com/), [Theoretical computer science](http://cstheory.stackexchange.com/), [MathOverflow](http://mathoverflow.net/), [Math StackExchange](http://math.stackexchange.com/), [Cross Validated](http://stats.stackexchange.com/), [Physics Stackexchange](http://physics.stackexchange.com/)

[Ask Science](http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience)
# How to teach to magical thinkers?

I'm afraid I haven't properly designed the Muggles Studies [course](/lw/irh/a_muggle_studies_course/) I introduced at my local Harry Potter fan club. Last Sunday we finally had our second class (after wasted months of insistence and delays), and I introduced some very basic descriptions of common biases, while of course emphasizing the [need](/lw/he/knowing_about_biases_can_hurt_people/) to detect them in ourselves before trying to detect them in other people. At some point, which I didn't completely notice, the discussion changed from an explanation of the attribution bias into a series of multicultural examples in favor of moral relativity. I honestly don't know how that happened, but as more and more attendants voiced their comments, I started to fear someone would irreversibly damage the lessons I was trying to teach. They basically stopped short of calling the scientific method a cultural construct, at which point I'm sure I would have snapped. I don't know what to make of this. Some part of me tries to encourage me and make me put more effort into showing these people the need for more reductionism in their worldview, but another part of me just wants to give them up as hopeless postmodernists. What should I do?
# "Smarter than us" is out!

We're pleased to announce the release of "Smarter Than Us: The Rise of Machine Intelligence", commissioned by MIRI and written by Oxford University’s Stuart Armstrong, and available in [EPUB, MOBI, PDF](http://intelligence.org/smarter-than-us/), and from the [Amazon](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00IB4N4KU/ref=as_li_ss_tl?tag=lesswrong-20) and [Apple](https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/smarter-than-us/id816744180) ebook stores.

![](http://images.lesswrong.com/t3_jrb_0.png?v=c1161819d2def5870c2a150f0349c3ca)What happens when machines become smarter than humans? Forget lumbering Terminators. The power of an artificial intelligence (AI) comes from its intelligence, not physical strength and laser guns. Humans steer the future not because we’re the strongest or the fastest but because we’re the smartest. When machines become smarter than humans, we’ll be handing them the steering wheel. What promises—and perils—will these powerful machines present? This new book navigates these questions with clarity and wit.

Can we instruct AIs to steer the future as we desire? What goals should we program into them? It turns out this question is difficult to answer! Philosophers have tried for thousands of years to define an ideal world, but there remains no consensus. The prospect of goal-driven, smarter-than-human AI gives moral philosophy a new urgency. The future could be filled with joy, art, compassion, and beings living worthwhile and wonderful lives—but only if we’re able to precisely define what a “good” world is, and skilled enough to describe it perfectly to a computer program.

AIs, like computers, will do what we say—which is not necessarily what we mean. Such precision requires encoding the entire system of human values for an AI: explaining them to a mind that is alien to us, defining every ambiguous term, clarifying every edge case. Moreover, our values are fragile: in some cases, if we mis-define a single piece of the puzzle—say, consciousness—we end up with roughly 0% of the value we intended to reap, instead of 99% of the value.

Though an understanding of the problem is only beginning to spread, researchers from fields ranging from philosophy to computer science to economics are working together to conceive and test solutions. Are we up to the challenge?

Special thanks to all those at the FHI, MIRI and Less Wrong who helped with this work, and those who [voted on the name](/lw/j4j/please_vote_for_a_title_for_an_upcoming_book/)!
# Amanda Knox Redux: is Satoshi Nakamoto the real Satoshi Nakamoto?

Many of you here have likely heard of Bitcoin, and maybe know something about it.

Earlier today, [a story broke](http://mag.newsweek.com/2014/03/14/bitcoin-satoshi-nakamoto.html) that a reporter had apparently tracked down the real Satoshi Nakamoto, infamous creator of the Bitcoin protocol.

This seems like an excellent opportunity to practice our Bayesian updating!

So, how likely do you think it is that this man is the founder of Bitcoin? What do you believe and why?
# In favour of terseness

I like posts that are concise and to the point. Posts like that maximize my information/effort ratio. I would really like to see experienced rationalists simply post a list of things they believe on any given subject with a short explanation for why they believe each of those things. Then I could go ahead and adjust my beliefs based on those lists as necessary.

Sadly I don’t see any posts like this. Presumably this is because of the social convention where you’re expected to back up any public belief with arguments, so that other people can attempt to poke holes in them. I find this strange because the arguments people present rarely have anything to do with why they believe those things, which makes the whole exercise a giant distraction from the main point that the author is trying to bring across. In order to prevent this kind of derailment, posters tend to cover their arguments with endless qualifications so that their sentences read like this: “I personally believe that, in cases X Y Z and under circumstances B and C, ceteris paribus and barring obvious exceptions, it seems safe to say that murder is wrong, though of course I could be mistaken.” The problems with such excessive argumentation and qualification are threefold:

1.  The post becomes less readable: The information/effort ratio is lowered.
2.  It becomes much more difficult to tell what the author genuinely believes: Are they really unsure or just trying to appear humble? Is that their true objection, or just an argument?
3.  Despite everything, someone is STILL going to miss the point and reply that sometimes killing people is ok in certain situations, and then the next 100 comments will be about that.

By contrast, terseness makes posts more readable and makes it less likely that the main point is misunderstood. So if we as a community could just relax the demand for argumentation and qualification somewhat, and we all focussed on debating the main points of posts instead of getting sidetracked, then perhaps experienced rationalists here could write nice and concise posts that give clear and direct answers to complicated questions. Instead, some of the sequences are so long and involve so many arguments, counter-arguments and disclaimers that I feel the point is lost entirely.
# Making LessWrong notable enough for its own Wikipedia page

_LessWrong_ is a great resource. It gets a fair amount of traffic ([800,000 pageviews per month](http://www.sitemeter.com/?a=stats&s=s18lesswrong&r=33) back when pageview-counting was working properly), has a large number of people identifying as part of the online community ([2013 survey results](/lw/jj0/2013_survey_results/)), and has a number of lurkers including high school students (see [this post](/lw/jtz/what_we_learned_about_less_wrong_from_cognito/)). And yet, it doesn't have a Wikipedia page of its own. [LessWrong on Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LessWrong) currently goes to Eliezer Yudkowsky's page, which has a sentence devoted to LessWrong.

The main reason for the absence of the page is that _LessWrong_ hasn't received enough coverage in the media, so it wouldn't pass Wikipedia's [notability criteria](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability). Even if one of us created a page on _LessWrong_, it would get speedily deleted because there wouldn't be any reliable sources to cite.

So, question: any ideas on how to generate media coverage for _LessWrong_, enough that it passes the notability criteria of Wikipedia and can be given its own page? The media coverage will help directly in addition to being useful to creating a Wikipedia page. The Wikipedia page itself will help portray _LessWrong_ as "legit" and also provide information to people that'll help them decide if the site is suitable for them.
# Why are Harvard's alumni so wealthy?

\[**Added:** [Solipsist](/lw/jwh/why_are_harvards_alumni_so_wealthy/ap6h) made good comments that partially account for the phenomenon, and [Douglas_Knight](/lw/jwh/why_are_harvards_alumni_so_wealthy/ap9a) pointed out that the figure of $200m+ below should be $30m+\]

[This article](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2314669/Harvards-billionaires-Ivy-League-college-leads-world-richest-alumni.html) reports that Harvard has 2,964 alumni worth $200+ million, with a total wealth of $622 billion. These figures are staggering:

*   The university with the next highest figures (University of Pennsylvania) are ~2x less, and the figures for Yale (for example) are ~4x less.
*   If you assume that Harvard has ~60 living classes of alumni, each of which has ~2,000 students, then the wealth per graduate coming from the alumni worth $200+ million alone is ~$5 million. Furthermore, the fraction of Harvard alumni with $200+ million is on the order of 2%. \[**Added:** from [here](http://www.economist.com/node/17929057): "Of Americans, some 30,000 have more than $100m and 2,800 have more than $500m", so < 0.01% of Americans have that much money.\]

Note that Bill Gates "only" has ~$75 billion and that Mark Zuckerberg "only" has ~$30 billion, so that they don't account for Harvard's decisive advantage over other universities.

What is going on here? Why would Harvard come out ahead by such a large margin? Its [acceptance rate](http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/lowest-acceptance-rate?src=stats) is smaller than those of Stanford, Yale and Princeton, but by no more than 25%. Moreover, this has been true historically

One can ask a similar question of University of Pennsylvania, which is significantly less selective than Yale and Princeton, but has a decisive advantage over them.

Some possible explanations for the discrepancy:

*   Harvard selects students with higher expected earnings.
*   Harvard selects students from families who are already wealthy (more than other top schools: the wealthy alumni are not self-made).
*   Students who aspire to make a lot of money choose Harvard (over other top schools).
*   Going to Harvard increases students' earning power (more than other top schools), for example, through better networking opportunities.

Regardless of which of these explanations hold, there remains a question of _why_ they would hold.

Is Harvard a better choice than other universities for students who aspire to be wealthy than other top schools?

Even if Harvard has historically been better for increasing expected earnings, this may have ceased to be the case because of the rise of the tech sector and Stanford and MIT's focus on tech.
# Intelligence-disadvantage

While LessWrong contains a large amount of high-quality material, most of the rationality advice isn't actually targeted at our core audience. The focus seems to be more on irrational things that people do, rather than irrational things that smart people do. (Sidenote: If we wanted to create a site focused on spreading general rationality, then we'd need to simplify the discussion, remove a lot of the maths/controversial ideas and add in some friendly images. Does such a site exist?).

This has led to a number of comments questioning the real world value of having read the sequences. If your average person had the patience to read through the core sequences and understand them, they'd find them extremely valuable. It'd provide them with a glimpse into a new way of thinking and even though they would likely hardly appear to be very logical to most Less Wrongers, they'd be much better than they were at the start.

On the other hand, most Less Wrongers already know the basics of logic. That's not to say that we don't act extremely irrational much of the time, but just that going over the basics of logic again probably provides minimal benefit. What is needed is something specifically targeted at the kind of irrational mistakes and beliefs that intelligent people make. I would argue that if this were a sequence, it would be the most important sequence in the entire site. But, since I lack that level of writing ability, I'm not even going to attempt such a project. So I just created a post where we can list articles or ideas that should be part of such a sequence in the hope that someone else might pick it up

Here are some examples of mistakes that intelligent people make:

[Taking a fixed instead of a growth mindset](http://michaelgr.com/2007/04/15/fixed-mindset-vs-growth-mindset-which-one-are-you/) \- shying away from challenges, convincing oneself that we are just naturally bad at non-intellectual things and that we shouldn't focus on them

[Directly pointing out people's flaws](/lw/372/defecting_by_accident_a_flaw_common_to_analytical/)

Overthinking issues that are really very simple

Counter-signalling by ignoring the value of fashion, money, being liked

Valuing intelligence above all other qualities

Rigidly adhering to rules

Expecting other people to always be rational

Not considering popularity as a signal that is worthwhile understanding

Overvaluing being right  
  
I'm sure there are plenty more. Any other suggestions or relevant articles?
# Terrorist baby down the well: a look at institutional forces

_Two facts "everyone knows", an intriguing contrast, and a note of caution._

"Everyone knows" that people are much more willing to invest into cures than preventions. When a disaster hits, then [money is no object](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26131515); but trying to raise money for [prevention ahead of time is difficult](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-25676973), hamstrung by penny-pinchers and short-termism. It's hard to get people to take hypothetical risks seriously. There are strong institutional reasons for this, connected with deep human biases and bureaucratic self-interest.

"Everyone knows" that governments overreact to the threat of terrorism. The amount spent on terrorism dwarfs other comparable risks (such as slipping and falling in your bath). There's a huge amount of security theatre, but also a lot of actual security, and pre-emptive invasions of privacy. We'd probably be better just coping with incidents as they emerge, but instead we cause great annoyance and cost across the world to deal with a relatively minor problem. There are strong institutional reasons for this, connected with deep human biases and bureaucratic self-interest.

And both these facts are true. But... they contradict each other. One is about a lack of prevention, the other about an excess of prevention. And there are more examples of excessive prevention: the war on drugs, for instance. In each case we can come up with good explanations as to why there is not enough/too much prevention, and these explanations often point to fundamental institutional forces or human biases. This means that the situation could essentially never have been otherwise. But the tension above hints that these situations may be a lot more contingent than that, more dependent on history and particular details of our institutions and political setup. Maybe if the biases were reversed, we'd have equally compelling stories going the other way. So when predicting the course of future institutional biases, or attempting to change them, take into account that they may not be nearly as solid or inevitable as they feel today.
# Engineering archaeology 

[Here's](http://lemming-articlestash.blogspot.com/2011/12/institutional-memory-and-reverse.html) an account by a retired engineer of what happened when his old company wanted to streamline a process in the factory where he used to work.

People only knew how to keep the factory going from one day to the next, but all the documentation was lost-- the factory had been sold a couple of times, and efforts at digitization caused more to get lost. Even the name of the factory had been lost.

Fortunately, engineers keep more documentation than their bosses allow them to. (Trade secrets!) And they don't throw the documentation away just because they've retired.

I've been concerned about infrastructure neglect for a while, and this makes me more concerned. On the other hand, instead of just viewing with alarm, I'd like to view with quantified alarm, and I don't have the foggiest on how to quantify the risks.  
  
Also, some of the information loss is a result of a search for efficiency. How can you tell when you're leaving something important out?
# Effective Altruism Summit 2014

In 2013, the Effective Altruism movement came together for a week-long Summit in the San Francisco Bay Area. Attendees included leaders and members from all the major effective altruist organizations, as well as effective altruists not affiliated with any organization. People [shared strategies, techniques, and projects,](/lw/hx4/four_focus_areas_of_effective_altruism/) and left more inspired and more effective than when they arrived.

More than ever, rationality and existential risk reduction are part of the Effective Altruism movement, and so I'm glad to announce to LessWrong the 2014 Effective Altruism Summit.

Following [last year’s success](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEK_l4Qtnyw), this year’s Effective Altruism Summit will comprise two events. The Summit will be a conference-style event held on the weekend of August 2-3, preceded by a smaller Effective Altruism Retreat from July 27-August 1. To accommodate our expanding movement and its many new projects, this year’s Summit will be bigger than the last. The Retreat will be similar to last year’s EA Summit, providing a more intimate setting for attendees to discuss, to learn, and to form lasting connections with each other and with the community.

We’re now [accepting applications](http://www.effectivealtruismsummit.com/#registration-form) for the 2014 events. Whether you’re a veteran organizer trying to keep up with Effective Altruism’s most exciting developments, or you're looking to get involved with a community of people who use rationality to improve the world, we’d love for you to [join us](http://www.effectivealtruismsummit.com/#registration-form).
# The Problem of "Win-More"

In [Magic: the Gathering](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic:_The_Gathering) and other popular card games, advanced players have developed the notion of a "win-more" card. A "win-more" card is one that works very well, but only if you're already winning. In other words, it never helps turn a loss into a win, but it is very good at turning a win into a blowout. This type of card seems strong at first, but since these games usually do not use margin of victory scoring in tournaments, they end up being a trap-- instead of using cards that convert wins into blowouts, you want to use cards that convert losses into wins.

This concept is useful and important and you should never tell a new player about it, because it tends to make them worse at the game. Without a more experienced player's understanding of core concepts, it's easy to make mistakes and label cards that are actually good as being win-more.

This is an especially dangerous mistake to make because it's relatively uncommon for an outright bad card to seem like a win-more card; win-more cards are almost always cards that look really good at first. That means that if you end up being too wary of win-more cards, you're going to end up misclassifying good cards as bad, and that's an extremely dangerous mistake to make. Misclassifying bad cards as good is relatively easy to deal with, because you'll use them and see that they aren't good; misclassifying good cards as bad is much more dangerous, because you won't play them and therefore won't get the evidence you need to update your position.

I call this the "win-more problem." Concepts that suffer from the win-more problem are those that-- while certainly useful to an advanced user-- are misleading or [net harmful](/lw/jep/worse_than_worthless/) to a less skillful person. Further, they are wrong or harmful in ways that are difficult to detect, because they screen off feedback loops that would otherwise allow someone to realize the mistake.
# Gunshot victims to be suspended between life and death [link]

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22129623.000-gunshot-victims-to-be-suspended-between-life-and-death.html?full=true

\- First "official" program to practice suspended animation

\- The article naturally goes on to ask whether longer SA (months, years) is possible 

\- Amazing quote: "Every day at work I declare people dead. They have no signs of life, no heartbeat, no brain activity. I sign a piece of paper knowing in my heart that they are not actually dead. I could, right then and there, suspend them. But I have to put them in a body bag. It's frustrating to know there's a solution."

\- IMO this if (I hope!) successful, will go a long way to bridge the emotional gap for cryonics
# Introducing Skillshare.im

_by Patrick Brinich-Langlois and Ozzie Gooen_

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Communities once kept our ancestors from being torn apart by mountain lions and tyrannosaurus rexes. Dinosaur violence has declined greatly since the Cretaceous, but the world has become more complex and interconnected. Communities remain essential.

Effective altruists have a lot to offer one another. But we're geographically dispersed, so it's hard to know whom to ask for help. [Skillshare.im](http://www.skillshare.im) is built to fix this.

**[Skillshare.im](http://www.skillshare.im) is a place for effective altruists to share their skills, items, and couches with one another.**

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Offer skills or things that you're willing to share. Request items that other people have offered. Here are a few things people have offered on the site:

*   access to academic papers
*   advice on fundraising, careers, nutrition, productivity, startups, investments, etc.
*   French translation (two people!)
*   math tutoring
*   lodging in Switzerland, the Bay Area, London, Melbourne, and Oxford

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As of this writing, we already have 59 offers from 55 people. With your help, we can make it 60 offers from 56 people!

Why use [Skillshare.im](http://www.skillshare.im), instead of getting the things you need the normal way? Certain things, like career advice or study buddies, can be hard to get. Even if you can find someone who has what you're looking for, you might enjoy the opportunity to relationships with other altruists. Plus, by participating in [Skillshare.im](http://www.skillshare.im), you show that the community of do-gooders is welcoming and supportive, qualities that may draw in new people.

You can be notified of new offers and requests by [Twitter](https://twitter.com/skillshare_im) or [RSS](http://skillshare.im/proposals.atom). As with all [.impact software](http://www.dotimpact.im), the source code is available on [GitHub](https://github.com/patbl/skillshare.im). We use a publicly accessible [Trello board](https://trello.com/b/3ULaf1Ob/skillshare-im) to track bugs and features.

-

We'd love to hear what you think about the site. Is it awesome, or a horrifically inefficient use of our resources? What could be improved? Send us an e-mail or leave a comment.
# Explanations for Less Wrong articles that you didn't understand

[ErinFlight said](/lw/i4z/welcome_to_less_wrong_6th_thread_july_2013/aqyn):

> I'm struggling to understand anything technical on this website. I've enjoyed reading the sequences, and they have given me a lot to thing about. Still, I've read the introduction to Bayes theorem multiple times, and I simply can't grasp it. Even starting at the very beginning of the sequences I quickly get lost because there are references to programming and cognitive science which I simply do not understand.

Thinking about it, I realized that this might be a common concern. There are probably plenty of people who've looked at various more-or-less technical or jargony Less Wrong posts, tried understanding them, and then given up (without posting a comment explaining their confusion).

So I figured that it might be good to have a thread where you can ask for explanations for any Less Wrong post that you didn't understand and would like to, but don't want to directly comment on for any reason (e.g. because you're feeling embarassed, because the post is too old to attract much traffic, etc.). In the spirit of various Stupid Questions threads, you're explicitly encouraged to ask even for the kinds of explanations that you feel you "should" get even yourself, or where you feel like you could get it if you just put in the effort (but then never did).

You can ask to have some specific confusing term or analogy explained, or to get the main content of a post briefly summarized in plain English and without jargon, or anything else. (Of course, there are some posts that simply cannot be explained in non-technical terms, such as the ones in the Quantum Mechanics sequence.) And of course, you're encouraged to provide explanations to others!
# Business Networking through LessWrong

Is anyone interested in contacting other people in the LessWrong community to find a job, employee, business partner, co-founder, adviser, or investor?  
  
Connections like this develop inside ethnic and religious groups, as well as  among university  alums or members of a fraternity. I think that LessWrong can provide  the same value.

For example, LessWrong must have plenty of skilled software developers in dull jobs, who would love to work with smart, agenty rationalists. Likewise, there must be some company founders or managers who are having a very hard time finding good software developers. 

A shared commitment to instrumental and epistemic rationality should be a good starting point, not to mentioned a shared memeplex to help break the ice. (Paperclips! MoR!)

Besides being  fun, working together with other rationalists could be a good business move.

As a side-benefit, it also has good potential to raise the sanity waterline and help further develop new rationality skills, both personally and as a community.

Naturally, such a connection is not guaranteed to produce results. But it's hard to find the right people to work with: Why not try this route? And although you can cold-contact someone you've seen online, you don't know who's interested in what you have to offer, so I think more effort is needed to bootstrap such networking.  
  
I'd like to gauge interest. ([Alexandros](/user/Alexandros) has volunteered to help.) If you might be interested in this sort of networking, please fill out this short [Google Form](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1mQZjqHZz98diy66TOzyaEsi6cr6tPpNgiGPGA-gBAnw/viewform) \[Edit: Survey closed as of April 15\]. I'll post an update about what sort of response we get.

Privacy: Although the main purpose of this form is to gauge interest, and other details may be needed to form good connections,  the info might be enough to get some contacts going. So, we might use this information to personally connect people. We won't share the info or build any online group with it. If we get a lot of interest we may later create some sort of online mechanism, but we’ll be sure to get your permission before adding you.

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Edit April 6: We're still seeing that people are  filling out the form, so we'll wait a week or two, and report on results.

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Edit April 15: See a summary of the results [below](/r/discussion/lw/jzp/business_networking_through_lesswrong/ataf).