trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k huggingface dataset:
Suspended animation/hibernation: would you use it if it were available?
by forward — 2011-06-14T11:36:07.589Z

This TED talk on suspended animation by Mark Roth captivated me when I first saw it last year, and I have been eagerly trying to follow developments on the subject ever since.

My question for the lesswrong crowd is, if suspended animation were available today in such a way that you could "skip" years, decades or even centuries in a de-animated state while not aging or aging only slightly, would you go for it? Would it be the rational thing to do, or would it be more rational to wait until you really needed it, for example, when you are nearing end of life or if you get diagnosed with an incurable, terminal illness?

What about friends and family? I can see people not wanting to use it because it would mean "waking up" in a world where the people they care about no longer exist. This is also an issue with cryonics, and I believe was the main reason Heinlein chose to be cremated rather than cryopreserved. However, the moral dilemma is more complicated, because with cryonics, it happens after you're dead, but with suspended animation, it must be done while you're still alive, so unless you get de-animated towards the end of your life, you've made a conscious decision to spend your remaining time on Earth in the future with other people rather than with those around you in the present. However, I could also see it being easier to sell people on than cryonics, if it worked as advertised, because it would be more of a sure thing, and might even be cheaper. I could even see it becoming so popular that a large percentage of the population opts out of their present life and the problems it presents them, hoping to "sleep" their way to a better future, causing problems of population imbalance.

I'm bringing this subject up here because I find the concept fascinating, and it doesn't seem to get nearly as much attention as cryonics, yet it will be much more disruptive if/when it ever arrives.
Rationality Boot Camp
by bentarm — 2011-06-14T07:15:13.226Z

We have been at Rationality Boot Camp for nearly a week (Jasen has decided it should be renamed "megacamp", but since everyone here has probably heard of it under the name Boot Camp, I'll stick with that).

So far, it has been quite a lot of fun certainly a fair amount more than I expect I would have at regular Boot Camp. We have a blog about the sessions (I think it is likely to be too high volume for posting to Less Wrong to be the ideal solution: I'm willing to change this if there's a strong consensus that I'm wrong). So far, I have made the only two posts: I think some of the other campers will be blogging at some point, I will try to post at least a few times a week. If anyone is interested in reading it, it can be found here:

http://rationalitybootcamp.blogspot.com
Model Uncertainty, Pascalian Reasoning and Utilitarianism
by multifoliaterose — 2011-06-14T03:19:08.189Z

Related to: Confidence levels inside and outside an argument, Making your explicit reasoning trustworthy

A mode of reasoning that sometimes comes up in discussion of existential risk is the following.

Person 1: According to model A (e.g. some Fermi calculation with probabilities coming from certain reference classes), pursuing course of action X will reduce existential risk by 10-5 ; existential risk has an opportunity cost of 1025 DALYs (*), therefore model A says the expected value of pursuing course of action X is 1020 DALYs. Since course of action X requires 109 dollars, the number of DALYs saved per dollar invested in course of action X is 1011. Hence course of action X is 1010 times as cost-effective as the most cost-effective health interventions in the developing world.

Person 2: I reject model A; I think that appropriate probabilities involved in the Fermi calculation may be much smaller than model A claims; I think that model A fails to incorporate many relevant hypotheticals which would drag the probability down still further.

Person 1: Sure, it may be that model A is totally wrong, but there's nothing obviously very wrong with it. Surely you'd assign at least a 10-5 chance that it's on the mark? More confidence than this would seem to indicate overconfidence bias, after all, plenty of smart people believe in model A and it can't be that likely that they're all wrong. So you think that the side-effects of pursuing course of action X are systematically negative, even your own implicit model gives a figure of at least 105 $/DALY saved, and that's a far better investment than any other philanthropic effort that you know of, so you should fund course of action X even if you think that model A is probably wrong.

(*) As Jonathan Graehl mentions, DALY stands for Disability-adjusted life year.

I feel very uncomfortable with this sort of argument that Person 1 advances above. My best attempt at an summary of where my discomfort comes from is that it seems like one could make the sort of argument to advance a whole number of courses of action, many of which would be at odds with one another.

I have difficulty parsing where my discomfort comes from in more detail. There may be underlying game-theoretic considerations, there may be underlying considerations based on the anthropic principle, it could be that the probability that one ascribes to model A being ...
How would you modify this text for Less Wrong 
by diegocaleiro — 2011-06-13T23:13:38.126Z

Here I have written a post with some suggestions on how Less Wrong might become better at promoting rationality, without being detracted by other more "fun-love-PUA-etc" kinds of things.

I am aware that my post goes too far in one direction, so I would ask you to edit it at will and give me a new version, a more mild attack on the non-epistemic fun-oriented side of Less Wrong

<!-- @page { margin: 2cm } P { margin-bottom: 0.21cm } A:link { so-language: zxx } -->

Short Version: Less Wrong has been trying to address rationality in all domains. This may prove too wide a scope. As it has been suggested, effectiveness changes should come soon. Those who just read the sequences need more a focused walkthrough. A proposed path is tightening the scope within rationality to Externally Oriented, Tech-friendly, H+(Transhuman) posts. Once the sanity waterline within is raised only the highest peaks remain above water, thus what remains must be more focused. How to do this is discussed.

I'm testing this quote from Less Wrong's Best Of to introduce my post:

A facility for quotation covers the absence of original thought. -- Dorothy L. Sayers

Garrett Lisi has advanced, in the last minutes of this video, the suggestion that life should equally divided between Physics, Love, and Surfing.

Eliezer Yudkowsky, here, advanced that we buy fuzzies and utilons separately.

Patrissimo, in a very controversial post said that: As Merlin Mann says: "Joining a Facebook group about creative productivity is like buying a chair about jogging". Well, reading a blog to overcome akrasia IS joining a Facebook group about creative productivity. " [...] " I believe that most people, particularly smart ones, do way too much thinking & talking and way too little action (me included), because that is what's easy for them."[...] "To aid growth at rationality, Less Wrong would have to become a skill practice community, more like martial arts, PUA, and physical fitness, with an explicit focus of helping people grow in their ability to set and achieve goals, combining local chapters with global coordination, infrastructure, and knowledge accumulation. Most discussion should be among people working on a specific skill at a similar level about...
Malice, Stupidity, or Egalité Irréfléchie?
by lionhearted (Sebastian Marshall) — 2011-06-13T20:57:06.178Z

Anyone who has decided to strike off the mainstream path has experienced this: Strong admonitions and warnings against what they were doing, and pressures not do it.

It doesn’t really matter what it is you’re trying to change. If you’re trying to become a nondrinker in a drinking culture, if you’re trying to quit eating junk food, if you’re trying to become a vegetarian or otherwise have a different diet, this will have happened to you.

If you decide to pursue a nontraditional career path (artist, entrepreneur, etc), you will have experienced this.

If you try to live a different lifestyle than the people around you – for instance, rising each day at 4:30AM and sleeping early instead of partying, you will have experienced this.

People will pressure and cajole you in many different ways to keep doing it the old way. Almost always, it will be phrased as though they’re looking after your best interest.

The specifics will vary. It could be phrased as cautious prudence – “What if your business doesn’t succeed and you don’t have a college degree? That could be really bad for you.”

It could be phrased as desiring for you to have the best way in life – “Go on, live a little, a beer won’t kill you.”

It could be encouraging you to do whatever you’ve set out to change without any specific reasoning at all.

I used to wonder why this is so common. Are people stupid? Or malicious? They must be one of those two.

If someone has a preference that has an expected value of a better life for them and they really want to live that preference, then why would someone that’s in their peer group or family want to discourage them? Is it because they have different calculations of what’s valuable, even when pursuing obvious no-brainer decisions like quitting the lowest quality junk foods? Is it because they’re malicious and want to hold you back and tear you down?

I think now – neither. Rather, I think it’s an uncritical, unexamined form of desire for equality.

The egalitarian instinct is strong in humans. Most people want others to do and act broadly similar to them. It’s almost an affront if you don’t live the normal way – do you think you’re better than them? No matter how subtle, gracious, or modest you try to be about it, i...
For the game theorists out there...
by CronoDAS — 2011-06-13T20:55:06.755Z

Today's Poll of the Day at gamefaqs.com poses an "interesting" question...

Which poll answer do you think will be the most popular today?

The third one

The first one

The last one

The second one

The fourth one

I guess it's sort of like the minority game? Anyone want to try to analyze this?
Murder as a victimless crime
by Eneasz — 2011-06-13T19:47:42.087Z

SMBC often does great rationalism jokes, Zach Weiner is definitely our people (anyone know if he frequents Less Wrong?). Today's comic rephrases the old Torture-vs-Dust-Specks debate. I realize some people posit that death has infinite disutility and thus is inapplicable. Still, an example of the sort of problem one often encounters when trying to promote a shut-up-and-multiply rule in morality.

V = K / x
What do bad clothes signal about you?
by Wei Dai — 2011-06-13T17:48:22.219Z

Yesterday I attended a meetup where the discussion turned to fashion for a time (because apparently the mini-camp participants were given some instructions on fashion as a useful part of instrumental rationality). (Unfortunately none of us knew much about the topic so the discussion turned into "how can we find an expert to advise us for minimal cost?") It was mentioned that dressing "badly" can be a useful signalling device, and some examples were given. Here's an attempt at a more complete list of possible signals one might be sending by dressing "badly".

I have better use of my time than thinking about what to wear. Since thinking about what to wear is generally a highly valuable use of time, perhaps I'm really productive at something else.

I'm in a profession where technical skills are valued above social skills.

Costly signaling is mostly a zero-sum game. I like to opt out of zero-sum games.

Either I'm a loner or none of my friends care about fashion either. If you care a lot about fashion, our interests are probably too different, and us socializing is probably not the best use of your time or mine.

I'm a member of a group or subculture where dressing "badly" is normative and used for identification/affiliation.

The idea here is, if you do decide to start dressing "well", know what you're giving up first. (Of course you're also giving up possibly implying that nobody taught you how to dress and you're not sufficiently strategic to have thought of learning it yourself. Or implying that you don't have the mental, financial, and/or social resources to keep up with fashion. A lot of signaling depends on what your audience already knows about you, or can infer from your other signals.) See also Yvain's related post, Why Real Men Wear Pink and comments there.
Quantum computing for the determined (Link)
by XiXiDu — 2011-06-13T17:42:24.523Z

21 videos, which cover subjects including the basic model of quantum computing, entanglement, superdense coding, and quantum teleportation.

To work through the videos you need to be comfortable with basic linear algebra, and with assimilating new mathematical terminology. If you’re not, working through the videos will be arduous at best! Apart from that background, the main prerequisite is determination, and the willingness to work more than once over material you don’t fully understand.

In particular, you don’t need a background in quantum mechanics to follow the videos.

The videos are short, from 5-15 minutes, and each video focuses on explaining one main concept from quantum mechanics or quantum computing. In taking this approach I was inspired by the excellent Khan Academy.

Link: michaelnielsen.org/blog/quantum-computing-for-the-determined/

Author: Michael Nielsen

The basics

The qubit

Tips for working with qubits

Our first quantum gate: the quantum NOT gate

The Hadamard gate

Measuring a qubit

General single-qubit gates

Why unitaries are the only matrices which preserve length

Examples of single-qubit quantum gates

The controlled-NOT gate

Universal quantum computation

Superdense coding

Superdense coding: how to send two bits using one qubit

Preparing the Bell state

What’s so special about entangled states anyway?

Distinguishing quantum states

Superdense coding redux: putting it all together

Quantum teleportation

Partial measurements

Partial measurements in an arbitrary basis

Quantum teleportation

Quantum teleportation: discussion

The postulates of quantum mechanics (TBC)

The postulates of quantum mechanics I: states and state space

The postulates of quantum mechanics II: dynamics

The postulates of quantum mechanics III: measurement
Rewriting the sequences?
by Student_UK — 2011-06-13T14:14:15.531Z

If this has been discussed before, then I ask for patience, and a point in the right direction.

I have been a lurker on Lesswrong for a while, and have mostly just been reading things, and only commenting occasionally. It wasn't long before I realised that the sequences played a very important role for understanding lots of what goes on here.

I have been trying to read them, but I've been getting very frustrated. Apart from being insanely long, they are not very easy to understand.

Take the first one I came to "The Simple Truth".

It is a very long story, and it is never really explained what the point is. Is it that truth is whatever helps you to survive? If it is, that seems obviously false.

It also took me quite a while to realise that all these posts are written by one person, that struck me as a bit odd for a "community" blog. So couldn't there be some work to improve the sequences, while also making it more of a community effort?

Maybe:

* Some people could rewrite the key ones, and others could vote on them, or suggest changes

* There could be summary posts alongside the sequences listing the key claims

Any other suggestions?
Rational Humanist Music
by Raemon — 2011-06-13T13:50:36.476Z

Edit: Since posting this, I've gone on to found a rationalist singalong holiday and get an album produced, available at humanistculture.bandcamp.com

Something that's bothered me a lot lately is a lack of good music that evokes the kind of emotion that spiritually-inspired music does, but whose subject matter is something I actually believe in. Most songs that attempt to do this suffer from "too literal syndrome," wordily talking about science and rationality as if they're forming an argument, rather that simply creating poetic imagery. I was recently motivated by the Baba Yetu music video for Civilization V, which essentially showcases the power of scientific achievement over the course of human history.... but the lyrics basically attribute this to Christianity, rather than scientific progress. I'm not opposed to religious music being used for such a purpose, but I wanted to find a song that hit all the right emotional notes as well as the intellectual concepts. I think that art is an important medium by which to communicate ideas, and for rationality to be successful as a meme it's going to need "carrier wave" works of art to help it compete with religion for the general population's passion and understanding.

I've only found two songs that come close to being the specific thing I'm looking for:

Word of God

Singularity

(Highly recommend good headphones/speakers for the Singularity one - there's some subtle ambient stuff that really sells the final parts that's less effective with mediocre sound)

Over the past few months I've been working on a rational humanist song. I consider myself a reasonably competent amateur songwriter when it comes to lyrics, not so much when it comes to instrumental composition. I was waiting to post something when I had an actual final version worth listening to, but it's been a month and I'm not sure how to get good instrumentation to go along with it and I'm just in the mood to share the lyrics. I'd appreciate both comments on the song, as well as recommendations for good, similar music that already exists. And on the off chance someone likes it enough to try putting it to the music, that'd be awesome. (I don't mind other people using the lyrics for non-profit purposes, I do mind using them for profit purposes)

Brighter than Today
Many winter nights ago
A woman shivered in the cold
Stared at the sky and wondered why the gods i...
Survey: Risks from AI
by XiXiDu — 2011-06-13T13:05:48.260Z

Related to: lesswrong.com/lw/fk/survey_results/

I am currently emailing experts in order to raise and estimate the academic awareness and perception of risks from AI and ask them for permission to publish and discuss their responses. User:Thomas suggested to also ask you, everyone who is reading lesswrong.com, and I thought this was a great idea. If I ask experts to publicly answer questions, to publish and discuss them here on LW, I think it is only fair to do the same.

Answering the questions below will help the SIAI and everyone interested to mitigate risks from AI to estimate the effectiveness with which the risks are communicated.

Questions:

Assuming no global catastrophe halts progress, by what year would you assign a 10%/50%/90% chance of the development of human-level machine intelligence? Feel free to answer 'never' if you believe such a milestone will never be reached.

What probability do you assign to the possibility of a negative/extremely negative Singularity as a result of badly done AI?

What probability do you assign to the possibility of a human level AGI to self-modify its way up to massive superhuman intelligence within a matter of hours/days/< 5 years?

Does friendly AI research, as being conducted by the SIAI, currently require less/no more/little more/much more/vastly more support?

Do risks from AI outweigh other existential risks, e.g. advanced nanotechnology? Please answer with yes/no/don't know.

Can you think of any milestone such that if it were ever reached you would expect human‐level machine intelligence to be developed within five years thereafter?

Note: Please do not downvote comments that are solely answering the above questions.
Rational Humanist Music
by Raemon — 2011-06-13T12:59:59.143Z

Something that's bothered me a lot lately is a lack of good music that evokes the kind of emotion that spiritually-inspired music does, but whose subject matter is something I actually believe in. Most songs that attempt to do this suffer from "too literal syndrome," wordily talking about science and rationality as if they're forming an argument, rather that simply creating poetic imagery.

I've only found two songs that come close to being the specific thing I'm looking for:

Word of God

Singularity

(Highly recommend good headphones/speakers for the Singularity one - there's some subtle ambient stuff that really sells the final parts that's less effective with mediocre sound)

Over the past few months I've been working on a rational humanist song. I consider myself a reasonably competent amateur songwriter when it comes to lyrics, not so much when it comes to instrumental composition. I was waiting to post something when I had an actual final version worth listening to, but it's been a month and I'm not sure how to get good instrumentation to go along with it and I'm just in the mood to share the lyrics. I'd appreciate both comments on the song, as well as recommendations for good, similar music that already exists. And if someone likes it enough to try putting it to the music, that'd be awesome.

Brighter than Today

Many winter nights ago
A woman shivered in the cold
Stared at the sky and wondered why the gods invented pain.

She bitterly struck rock together
Wishing that her life was better
Suddenly she saw the spark of light and golden flame.

She showed the others, but they told her
She was not meant to control
The primal forces that the gods had cloaked in mystery.

But proud and angry, she defied them
She would not be satisfied.
She lit a fire and set in motion human history.

Tomorrow can be brighter than today,
Although the night is cold
And the stars may feel so very far away

Oh....

But every mind can be a golden ray
Of courage hope and reason
Surely we can find a better way.

Ages since but not yet now
We built the wheel, and then the plow
We tilled the earth and proved our worth against the drought and snow;
Soon we had the time to ponder
Look up to the sky and wonder
Could there be some deeper meaning we were meant to know?

Tomorrow can be brighter than today,
Although the night is cold
And stars may feel so very far away.
But futures can unfold where
Courage, hope

...
Formatting Articles
by Raemon — 2011-06-13T12:56:22.882Z

The comments section has the handy little "help" feature (confusing though its title may be) that explains how to format. I can't figure out where that section is for actual articles, which use completely different syntax.

In particular, I don't know how to post a I'm having trouble posting "lyrics", i.e something that's supposed to look like this:

Hickory Dickory Dock

The Mouse Ran Up the Clock

Blah blah blah

except without the paragraph breaks in between. The "preformatted" present sort of works, but makes everything tiny. (Also, when I actually submit, it seems to randomly make some sections of the preformatted stuff large, so it ends up looking really unprofessional)