trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k huggingface dataset:
Exegesis
by rogersbacon — 2021-12-31T17:48:55.795Z
Link: https://rogersbacon.substack.com/p/exegesis

Untitled (Escalators) by Scott Mutter

I. Traversing the Landscape of Scientific Knowledge

Consider a landscape in which peaks represent scientific knowledge and valleys represent all that is false, irrational, or ill-conceived. Scientific progress depends on our ability, as individuals and as a scientific community, to (1) find new peaks and to (2) climb them. These two sub-goals require two fundamentally different modes of travel, what I will call wandering (i.e. random walk, or the explore in explore/exploit) and climbing (hill-climbing in algorithmic parlance). As will become clear momentarily, I have chosen these terms over the more conventional explore/exploit dichotomy because I have something in mind that is a little more expansive and multi-dimensional than is typically implied by that framing.

We begin by considering the wandering/climbing distinction at the level of an individual scientist and their research activities. Climbing is what Yanai and Lercher, and Francoise Jacob before them, call Day Science, “…the one you read about in the news, it is the one we learn about in school, the one captured by the phrase “hypothesis driven”. It’s epitomized by the women and men in white lab coats holding pipettes or looking intently at a computer screen. A day scientist is a hunter who has a clear picture of what she is pursuing.” Night science then is wandering, something that is made explicit in the following passage, “…it wanders blind. It hesitates, stumbles, recoils, sweats, wakes with a start. Doubting everything, it is forever trying to find itself, question itself, pull itself back together. Night science is a sort of workshop of the possible where what will become the building material of science is worked out”.

Nobel prize-winning biochemist Albert Szent-Györgi used different terminology to describe these same basic categories of scientific activity in a 1972 letter to Science.

In science the Apollonian tends to develop established lines to perfection, while the Dionysian rather relies on intuition and is more likely to open new, unexpected alleys for research…The future of mankind depends on the progress of science, and the progress of science depends on the support it can find. Support mostly takes the form of grants, and the present methods of distributing grants unduly favor the Apollonian. Applying for a grant begins with writing a project. The Ap

...
Counterexamples to some ELK proposals
by paulfchristiano — 2021-12-31T17:05:10.515Z

(This post was written as part of my work at the Alignment Research Center.)

In this post I’ll describe some possible approaches to eliciting latent knowledge (ELK) not discussed in

our report

. These are basically restatements of proposals by Davidad, Rohin, Ramana, and John Maxwell. For each approach, I’ll present one or two counterexamples that I think would break it.

I think of these approaches as being based on two fundamental hopes:

If our AI tampers with one sensor, there may be other sensors we could deploy, or experiments we could run, in order to notice that something fishy has happened. We could have an AI help us design those experiments/sensors.
Actions that covertly tamper may be similar to actions that visibly tamper, e.g. they may exploit similar unknown facts about physics or they may involve common substeps. So we might be able to notice covert tampering by pointing out similar action sequences that lead to visible tampering.

While these hopes may hold in practice, in this post I’ll describe possible situations where they would fail. (I don't think anyone particularly expected these approaches to be counterexample-proof.)

I’m only claiming that these failures are possible. I think it is also interesting to try to generate the most probable failure cases and to actually estimate their probability, but that’s definitely not what I’m doing here.

Strategy: Hold out sensors

(Proposal #1

here

)

In addition to asking my model to predict one set of sensors, I can deploy a second “held out” set (e.g. more cameras or seismographs or microphones…). I don’t ask my model to predict those sensors, but I show them to a human before getting them to answer questions. Hopefully that sometimes lets them notice tampering that would have been invisible without the new sensors.

Worry: human simulator can use all the extra sensor readings too

I’m concerned that I will learn a better version of the human simulator which predicts the readings of all sensors and then outputs what a human would infer from the complete set. That task need not be much more computationally demanding than the original human simulator.

Moreover, my AI may be able to deduce the presence of the additional sensors very cheaply. Perhaps it can notice the sensors, or it can learn about my past actions to get a hint about where I may have placed them. If this is possible, then “Predict the readin...
D&D.Sci Holiday Special: How the Grinch Pessimized Christmas
by aphyer — 2021-12-31T16:23:41.223Z

STORY (skippable)

Every Who down in Whoville enjoys Christmas Day

But you are the Grinch! And whatever they say

You HATE Christmas Day, with those terrible lights

(They shine into your eyes, and they shine much too bright)

You HATE Christmas Day, with those huge awful trees

(You think you're allergic...they're making you sneeze)

But you HATE most of all all those Christmasy toys

That bring Christmas morning that Christmasy noise

(Oh god, all the noise! All the noise, noise, NOISE, NOISE!)

(If there's one thing you hate, it's the noise, noise, NOISE, NOISE!!!!!!)

And tomorrow you know all those noises will start

As the presents bring joy to each Who child's heart

And they'll show all this joy (as Who children do)

By making loud noises and bothering you!

But as you are leaving earplugs by your bed

And preparing the pillows to cover your head

You realize there might be a thing you can do!

You can't steal the presents (they'd know it was you)

But for fifty-three years you've been hearing this riot

And sometimes it's louder! And sometimes more quiet!

For the more a Who child enjoys all their toys

The more they will make all that terrible noise

But what if - you think - they were feeling less glee?

Yes, that is the way, it's so clear now you see!

For it's long been tradition (among all the Whos)

That when you give presents, each child must get two

And it's also tradition there (don't ask me why)

To distribute them randomly, closing your eyes

So at night, when the Whos sleep and dream of their joy

You'll creep in and rearrange all of those toys

And the very next morn, when the Who children wake,

They'll run down the stairs and their presents they'll take

But then, why, instead of the gifts that they're hoping

You'll give each one gifts that will make them start moping!

A doll for the Who who thinks dolls are for babies!

Puppies for the Whos who think they carry rabies!

And then, why at last, why on Christmas this year

You'll sleep soothed by the sound of those Who children's tears!

But the whisper, so soft, from your treacherous heart:

You could bring them more joy, and no more stand apart...

DATA & OBJECTIVE:

Each Who child has been given two presents. Based on long Who tradition, you believe these presents have historically been allocated among the children randomly.
You must allocate two presents to each child, and may not assign any child two of the same present, but other th

...
The Other Earth (Chapter 2)
by Justin Bullock — 2021-12-31T16:20:11.641Z

In this post, Chapter 2 of the sequence, I share the fable of The Other Earth from Olaf Stapledon’s Star Maker. It is abridged and lightly edited. I have also added a brief introduction titled “Learning to Travel” to provide context found elsewhere in Star Maker. It is within the fable of The Other Earth that Stapledon engages in a beautiful world modeling exercise that is relevant to our own journey.

Learning to Travel

It was the discovery of the psychical power of “projecting my mind” or of allowing my subjective viewpoint to expand and travel beyond earth from which I began my travels. And, as I would learn later, this was a skill that had to be exercised and studied before I could experience a wider range of the diversity of other minds inhabiting the cosmos. It turns out though that in the beginning of my journey I could only understand or communicate with minds that were more similar in constitution to my own. It was near the beginning of my journey that I found The Other Earth.

My consciousness had floated out into the greater cosmos. It floated out of my home solar system, out of the Great Milky Way, out into the great darkness between stars. This was something I had experienced already while honing my mind expanding power. However, this time was different. This time as I, I as my mind, floated out in the darkness, I spotted a planetary system not that dissimilar to my own. The sun seemed larger and darker, showing its age, but there, a planet was encircling it at an apparently approximate optimal distance, because I saw what could only be described as oceans and green continents scattered across this alien planet.

Being so drawn to the planet as I was, I decided to explore it closer to the ground:

On the Other Earth

As I slowly descended toward the surface of the little planet, I found myself searching for a land which promised to be like my home planet. But not sooner did I realize what I was doing than I reminded myself that conditions here would be entirely different from terrestrial conditions, and that it was very unlikely that I should find intelligent beings at all. If such beings existed, they would probably be quite incomprehensible to me. Perhaps they would be huge spiders or creeping jellies. How could I hope to ever make contact with such monsters?

I glided with wingless flight over the surface of the planet, through glades, across tracts...
Omicron Post #11
by Zvi — 2021-12-31T15:50:01.088Z

The traditional action for New Year’s Eve is to go to a party, stay up until midnight and watch the bell drop, and the traditional song is Auld Lang Syne.

I’ve stopped doing any of these things.

My traditional action is now to watch a bunch of great college football games that are the cumulation of the year’s season, and maybe have a few friends over.

As for songs, I have two. First, to look back on the year and the ways one is stuck, and think about and motivate what one might change, Anastasia’s Same Old Story. Then, to remind that life is awesome and my life is awesome, Jewel’s This Way.

It’s important to have rituals and traditions that speak to you.

It’s also important to contain multitudes.

The darkness is coming. So is the light.

Life is good. All signs point towards the golden scenario of a quick peak under reduced severity.

Happy new year!

Around the World

South Africa, the UK and Denmark are no longer uniquely informative places, so I’m combining all the areas into one section now.

There are a few cities where we may have peaked, but otherwise outside of South Africa? Not so much.

Cases still growing in the UK, but perhaps no longer growing in London.

Here’s a UK hospital update, from the comments via MoveMyCat:

I work at a large teaching hospital in the UK, but outside London. I’ve been isolating for a while (very mild if any symptoms, but was undergoing regular testing at work). Prior to my isolation, there were rising numbers, but they were still using respiratory beds for ‘Incidental Covid’ types. Anecdotal observation supported the idea that staff isolation and the need to isolate from vulnerable Covid-negatives was more of a challenge at that point than any influx of very unwell Covid pneumonitis types.

I’ll aim to update when I’m next in work.

…

I’m back in work now. There’s a small uptick in actual respiratory admissions but most of the increased Covid capacity the hospital has put together is being filled by geriatrics patients who happen to have Covid. A friend who works at a nearby hospital reports that she has about a quarter of her unit in self isolation for one reason or other.

It’s actually remarkable how few people are coming in with fevers and breathlessness.

If we do have access to the numbers on any of that, please do share, for now I only know of such numbers in San Francisco.

Germany is behind other countries in terms of spread and has stalled for...
[Review] The Matrix Resurrections
by lsusr — 2021-12-31T11:10:00.404Z

Do I recommend it?

Yes.

Is it good?

I don't care.

The Waschowskis movies are always ambitions. The Wachowskis never phone it in. I get the sense they make every movie as if it's the last one they'll ever get to make. The Matrix Resurrections is imaginative. It does not hold back. I feel like Lana Wachowski had full creative control of The Matrix Resurrections (2021).

I heard the The Matrix Reloaded (2003) and The Matrix Revolutions (2003) were boring. Do I have to watch them first?

You should watch The Matrix (1999) before watching The Matrix Resurrections (2021).

It is not necessary to watch The Matrix Reloaded (2003) and The Matrix Revolutions (2003). You can figure out the important bits from context just by watching The Matrix Resurrections (2021). Another option is to just read the plot summaries of The Matrix Reloaded (2003) and The Matrix Revolutions (2003) on Wikipedia.

What about The Animatrix (2003)?

Animation is cheaper to produce than live-action. You should watch The Animatrix (2003) if you want to find out what would happen if the Wachowskis were totally unconstrained by budget.

I love The Matrix so much I can recite the whole thing from memory. How can I better appreciate such a cinematic masterpiece?

Check out this video about the music of The Matrix Trilogy.

Censorship Policy

Absolutely no spoilers. Not even if you use spoiler tags or you use ROT13. Not even "it's good" or "it's bad". Spoilers for The Matrix Resurrections (2021) are forbidden. Spoilers for anything else the Wachowskis have produced is allowed.
From Considerations to Probabilities
by jsteinhardt — 2021-12-31T02:10:14.682Z

The previous post started forecasting the UK hospital peak (based on information through Dec. 21, 2021). We generated several considerations and ultimately focused on the Omicron doubling time, the peak number of cases, the current number of Omicron cases, and the seasonality. In addition to a reference class forecast based on seasonality, we assumed the case peak would be roughly governed by hospital capacity and used the calculation:

DateOfPeak = Dec. 21

+ 10 days to reach case peak (2.4-day doubling time and 4.1 doublings)

+ 9 days (case peak to hospital peak)

+ 3 days (lag of 7-day average)

= Jan. 12th

In this lecture we'll focus on going from this point estimate to a full probability distribution. This will involve two steps:

Asking "what invalidating considerations could cause this forecast to be totally wrong"?

Asking "which numerical quantities is my forecast most sensitive to, and how uncertain am I about them?"

The motivation for this is that most uncertainty is from either your entire estimate being structurally wrong (invalidating considertions), or from the specific numbers going into your estimate being inaccurate (numerical sensitivity). In many (most?) cases, the first form of uncertainty dominates, so it's good to check both.

We'll work through both steps, then combine them into a final uncertainty estimate. At the end I've also included a Q&A with Misha Yagudin on how this approach compares with his approach to forecasting.

Part 1: Invalidating Considerations

I did the brainstorming exercise of "If the previous estimate is totally off, why is that?" I recommend that you try this exercise as well before reading what I came up with.

(whitespace to avoid spoilers)

...

...

...

Okay, here's what I came up with:

If the UK cases are capped by herd immunity rather than hospital strain (17+ million cases instead of 6.7 million)

If the doubling time is actually 1.5 days (vs. 2.4 days), as suggested in some articles

If the peak happens due to people self-adjusting their behavior to make $R$ barely less than $1$, leading to a very long "peak".

Let's see how much each of these could affect the answer.

Consideration 1: herd immunity. This would add at most 2 more doublings, or ~5 days, to the date of the peak.

Consideration 2: short doubling time. Since we assumed around 4 doublings before, this would subtract only ~4 days from the date...
The Genetics of Space Amazons

by Jan Christian Refsgaard — 2021-12-30T22:14:14.201Z

If you wanted to colonize other planets with meat suite humans, then females are the superior choice as they have lower nutritional needs. Here I imagine a fictional Amazon gene that could lead to a skewed sex ratio favoring females.

Background

Human Females need less food than males

Human Females silence a random X chromosome because otherwise every protein
from the X chromosome would be twice as abundant for XX females compared to
as for XY males

If Humans could be engineered to have a female biased sex ratio, then they would have an advantage when traveling to new worlds because:

then they will need less food.

their space ships would require slightly less fuel as females tend to be lighter.

the could increase their population size faster as there are more
gestating members of the species.

So this is a cool premise for an egalitarian feminist spacefaring society... or a harem anime :)

Premise

Imagine a novel X chromosome mutation that allows the X chromosome to silence
the Y chromosome such that these XY mutants have a female phenotype and
reproduction strategy, to make this less confusing we denote the mutated X
chromosome as A, the Amazon chromosome

In this new society there are the following species with a male phenotype: XY,
and the following with female phenotype XX, AX and AY (AA would also be female,
but cannot exist as the males have no A's)

Try to stop up and guess the sex equilibrium ratio... Is it 1/4 of each one
because there are now 4 sexes, is it 1/3 XY and 2/3 female genotypes?, or
something completely different?

Amazon mating: The Next Generation

Let's try to "mate" these new sex genotypes and see what would be produced

XY and XX (the standard): XX has 100% chance of giving an X and XY has 50/50
for each, so the offspring will be 50% XY and 50% XX

XY + XX -> 50% XX and 50% XY

Let's try to mate XY with AX:

XY + AX ->25% XY, 25% AX, 25% XY and 25% AY

Finally XY with AY, if we assume that egg cells carrying a Y are nonviable, then AY amazons will always donate their A giving:

XY + AY -> 50% AX + 50X AY

We can put this in a table where the columns are the mating pairs and the rows
are offspring probabilities.
(For mathematical reasons explained later we add a Male on Male columns with has 0% chance of getting offspring)

XY + XY
XX + XY
AX + XY
AY + XY

XY
0
0.5
0.25
0

XX
0
0.5
0.25
0

AX
0
0
0.25
0.5

AY
0
0
0.25
0.5

Looking ...
Personal Response to Omicron
by jefftk — 2021-12-30T20:40:06.029Z

Throughout the pandemic, our household has been on the careful end. We
started preparing in

February
2020, isolated thoroughly from

March to

July, moderately over
the summer, and then thoroughly again from

October until all the adults
in our house were

vaccinated. Because I
was

immunocompromised, we
had a

newborn, and kids under
five couldn't get vaccinated yet, however, our family's 2021 was still a lot
like 2020. Then, in doing

Christmas
holidays with family I was very careful individually in the two weeks leading
up to it and I was the one

working on precautions and
making sure we had enough tests: some of the people I really wanted to
spend Christmas with are at elevated risk.

I wrote last week about how there are a
range of paths we could take with Omicron as a society, but now that
Christmas is over what am I going to do personally?

Well, what's the weather out there?

That's a lot of covid in
the sewer, 5x the previous peak and still going up.

I think if it were critical that I or a housemate didn't get Omicron, it
would be possible, but very difficult. We would need to go back to
isolating the way we were in Fall 2020, treating vaccinated people as
about as risky as unvaccinated people, pulling the kids out of school,
and never going indoors anywhere. Given the likely effects of
contracting covid as a child or boosted adult, this is not worth it
for us or I suspect most people.

Instead, I expect that I, the people in my house, and pretty much
everyone who doesn't take intense and careful effort to avoid it will
be exposed to Omicron at some point in the next ~month. It's not a good
thing, but it is what it is. Afterward, people's immune systems will
have had yet another covid exposure, and I expect cases to go low
until next fall. So I'm not going to stress about it: I'll follow
official guidance and mask regulations, cheerfully go along
with precautions others need, and test+isolate when sick, but I'm not
going to go above and beyond to attempt to reduce spread the way I did
for earlier parts of the pandemic.

I'm thinking of Omicron as the first wave of the endemic phase of
covid-19. While "it's just the flu" was completely wrong in 2020, in
2022 the situation has changed enough of that "what would I do in flu
season" is now a good guide.

Comment via: facebook
Covid 12/30: Infinity War
by Zvi — 2021-12-30T17:20:01.216Z

The new year is about to start out with a bang.

For five weeks, we’ve seen Omicron double and double again. That which can’t go on forever, won’t. There aren’t many doublings left. This is it.

The CDC’s revised guidelines made it even more clear that we’re going to collectively make the right decision, let it happen, and hope for the best. It’s not like we have any choice in the matter.

A month from now, we’ll be on the way back down, and we’ll know how bad it was and what the death toll will end up looking like.

Two or three months from now, if all goes well, The After Times can begin in earnest after all the previous false starts.

Executive Summary

Cases way up despite holiday, and will keep going up.
Testing is increasingly difficult to get.
Too early to know if hospitals will be able to handle it.
See Omicron Posts (#10 from Tuesday) for further details.

Let’s run the numbers.

The Numbers

Predictions

Prediction from last week: 1.85mm cases (+80%) and 10,200 deaths (+10%).

Results: 1.81mm cases (+77%) and 8,599 deaths (-6%).

Prediction for next week: 3.5mm cases (+94%) and 10,800 deaths (+25%).

Note that some other sources have more cases than Wikipedia for the past week (e.g. BNO reports the total case count as closer to 2.1mm).

With how much things are changing each day and how many confounders there are, getting the case count that close was largely luck.

What will happen this coming week?

Uncertainty is through the roof on that, except that it will be a lot higher as we enter fog of war. Testing capacity will be exhausted and thresholds to get tested will rise in some places while desperation to get tested pre-emptively rises in others. It’s possible a few places like NYC will peak, while others haven’t fully taken off yet. On top of it all, we don’t know how much the holiday ended up slowing things down, and how much of what’s happening the past few days is filling in a backlog, so we don’t know what the right baseline is.

I’m going to go with an average of 500k cases per day, for 3.5mm total. I wouldn’t be that surprised to miss high by up to a third, or miss low by quite a bit if things are still doubling every few days and we manage to identify enough of those cases.

This is it.

On deaths, it looks like the West and Midwest are still on vacation in terms of reporting deaths, and it’s not obvious they’re going to fix this by next week. Which means they might backfill th...