trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k huggingface dataset:
May 2012 Media Thread
by RobertLumley — 2012-05-02T01:34:28.363Z

This is the monthly thread for posting media of various types that you've found that you enjoy. I find that reading the sequences makes me less likely to enjoy some entertainment media that is otherwise quite popular, and finding media recommended by LWers is a good way to mitigate this. Post what you're reading, listening to, watching, and your opinion of it. Post recommendations to blogs. Post whatever media you feel like discussing! To see previous recommendations, check out the older threads.

Rules:

Please avoid downvoting recommendations just because you don't personally like the recommended material; remember that liking is a two-place word. If you can point out a specific flaw in a person's recommendation, consider posting a comment to that effect.

If you want to post something that (you know) has been recommended before, but have another recommendation to add, please link to the original, so that the reader has both recommendations.

Please use the comment trees for genres, which I was apparently too dumb to do.
Rationality Quotes May 2012
by OpenThreadGuy — 2012-05-01T23:37:37.317Z

Here's the new thread for posting quotes, with the usual rules:

Please post all quotes separately, so that they can be voted up/down separately. (If they are strongly related, reply to your own comments. If strongly ordered, then go ahead and post them together.)

Do not quote yourself

Do not quote comments/posts on LW/OB

No more than 5 quotes per person per monthly thread, please.
Meetup : Big Berkeley Meetup
by Thausler — 2012-05-01T16:10:22.262Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Big Berkeley Meetup

WHEN:
02 May 2012 07:00:00PM (-0700)

WHERE:
2128 Oxford St, Berkeley, CA

Tomorrow there will be a big Berkeley meetup. We will be meeting at 7:00pm at the Starbucks on Oxford St (2128 Oxford St, Berkeley, CA).

Discussion article for the meetup : Big Berkeley Meetup
Rationality Quotes May 2012
by Jayson_Virissimo — 2012-05-01T07:44:11.917Z

Here's the new thread for posting quotes, with the usual rules:

Please post all quotes separately, so that they can be voted up/down separately. (If they are strongly related, reply to your own comments. If strongly ordered, then go ahead and post them together.)

Do not quote yourself.

Do not quote comments/posts on LW/OB.

No more than 5 quotes per person per monthly thread, please.
Meetup : Phoenix, Arizona
by Jayson_Virissimo — 2012-05-01T06:31:41.895Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Phoenix, Arizona

WHEN: 15 June 2012 07:00:00PM (-0700)

WHERE: 2502 E. Camelback Road Phoenix,AZ,85016

The meetup will take place at the Paradise Bakery & Cafe in Biltmore Fashion Park. We will be discussing chapter I-V of Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas R. Hofstadter.

Discussion article for the meetup : Phoenix, Arizona
[SEQ RERUN] If Many-Worlds Had Come First
by MinibearRex — 2012-05-01T02:18:47.578Z

Today's post, If Many-Worlds Had Come First was originally published on 10 May 2008. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):

If early physicists had never made the mistake, and thought immediately to apply the quantum laws at all levels to produce macroscopic decoherence, then "collapse postulates" would today seem like a completely crackpot theory. In addition to their other problems, like FTL, the collapse postulate would be the only physical law that was informally specified - often in dualistic (mentalistic) terms - because it was the only fundamental law adopted without precise evidence to nail it down. Here, we get a glimpse at that alternate Earth.

Discuss the post here (rather than in the comments to the original post).
This post is part of the Rerunning the Sequences series, where we'll be going through Eliezer Yudkowsky's old posts in order so that people who are interested can (re-)read and discuss them. The previous post was Collapse Postulates, and you can use the sequence_reruns tag or rss feed to follow the rest of the series.
Sequence reruns are a community-driven effort. You can participate by re-reading the sequence post, discussing it here, posting the next day's sequence reruns post, or summarizing forthcoming articles on the wiki. Go here for more details, or to have meta discussions about the Rerunning the Sequences series.
A few questions on International Rationality
by Joshua Hobbes — 2012-04-30T22:27:13.442Z

Disclaimer: I'm still fairly new here, and though I did use the search bar it's entirely possible this has been discussed before. Just point me in the right direction if this is so.

While reading about 4chan's Japanese progenitor website, it occurred to me that I know nothing about the state of rationality in the non-English-speaking world, and more specifically the non-English-speaking internet. Is there a Russian version of SIAI? A Japanese Less Wrong? What about Korean Robin Hansons and Eliezer Yudkowskys?

If we take Religion as any indication of irrationality then America should be one of the least rational countries in the world. So if there are like-minded individuals out there speaking in languages we don't know, are we doing anything to collaborate with them? Do they have their own sequences and their own HPMORs which we could be reading?

And if there are no Singularitarian, Cryonics-Supporting, Utilitarianism-Advocating websites for the majority of the human race, isn't that a huge deal? Aren't Europeans and Asians more likely to be open to rationality, if only because of their atheism? If we want Friendly-AI to be developed, should we be translating the sequences into Chinese and Hindu as quickly as possible?
Experiment: a good researcher is hard to find
by gwern — 2012-04-30T17:13:54.687Z

See previously “A good volunteer is hard to find”

Back in February 2012, lukeprog announced that SIAI was hiring more part-time remote researchers, and you could apply just by demonstrating your chops on a simple test: review the psychology literature on habit formation with an eye towards practical application. What factors strengthen new habits? How long do they take to harden? And so on. I was assigned to read through and rate the submissions and Luke could then look at them individually to decide who to hire. We didn’t get as many submissions as we were hoping for, so in April Luke posted again, this time with a quicker easier application form. (I don’t know how that has been working out.)

But in February, I remembered the linked post above from GiveWell where they mentioned many would-be volunteers did not even finish the test task. I did, and I didn’t find it that bad, and actually a kind of interesting exercise in critical thinking & being careful. People suggested that perhaps the attrition was due not to low volunteer quality, but to the feeling that they were not appreciated and were doing useless makework. (The same reason so many kids hate school…) But how to test this?

Simple! Tell people that their work was not useless and that even if they were not hired, their work would be used! And we could do Science by randomizing what people got the encouraging statement. The added paragraph looked like this:

The primary purpose of this project is to evaluate applicants on their ability to do the kind of work we need, but we’ll collate all the results into one good article on the subject, so even if we don’t hire you, you don’t have to feel your time was wasted.

Well, all the reviews have been read & graded as of yesterday, with submissions trickling in over months; I think everyone who was going to submit has done so, and it’s now time for the final step. So many people failed to send in any submission (only ~18 of ~40) that it’s relatively easy to analyze - there’s just not that much data!

So, the first question is, did people who got the extra paragraph do a better job of writing their review, as expressed in my rating it from 2-10?

Surprisingly, they did seem to - despite my expectation that any result would be noise as the sample is so small. If we code getting no parag...
Meetup : Vancouver Fake Utility Meetup
by  — 2012-04-30T16:02:04.383Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Vancouver Fake Utility Meetup

WHEN:
06 May 2012 01:00:00PM (-0700)

WHERE:
2875 East 24th ave, Vancouver, BC

Hello again, LW

Next vancouver meetup is being held at my house again. Sunday at 13:00. Go around back to the basement back door.

Last meetup (the monthly supermeetup) was a success! We got 3 people who don't otherwise show up to come out, and had fun talking about the reductionism sequence. We hope to see more of you at the regular meetups (like this one).

This week, we are going to discuss the Fake Utility/Evolution semisequence. The exact list of posts is findable with some detective work on the wiki, or you can just read them from our mailing list.

Additionally, we are going to attempt to build 5-second-level skills for all (or at least some) of the techniques in 37 ways that words can be wrong, which we read a few weeks ago. Again, see our list for details.

Just because this isn't the supermeetup doesn't mean you shouldn't come out. Hope to see you there!

Discussion article for the meetup : Vancouver Fake Utility Meetup
Why a Human (Or Group of Humans) Might Create UnFriendly AI Halfway On Purpose
by ChrisHallquist — 2012-04-30T15:35:39.670Z

First, some quotes from Eliezer's contributions to the Global Catastrophic Risks anthology. First, from Cognitive biases potentially affecting judgement of global risks:

All else being equal, not many people would prefer to destroy the world. Even faceless corporations,meddling governments, reckless scientists, and other agents of doom, require a world in which to achieve their goals of profit, order, tenure, or other villainies. If our extinction proceeds slowly enough to allow a moment of horrified realization, the doers of the deed will likely be quite taken aback on realizing that they have actually destroyed the world. Therefore I suggest that if the Earth is destroyed, it will probably be by mistake.

And from Artificial Intelligence as a Positive and Negative Factor in Global Risk:

We can therefore visualize a possible first-mover effect in superintelligence. The first mover effect is when the outcome for Earth-originating intelligent life depends primarily on the makeup of whichever mind first achieves some key threshold of intelligence - such as criticality of self-improvement. The two necessary assumptions are these:

• The first AI to surpass some key threshold (e.g. criticality of self-improvement), if unFriendly, can wipe out the human species.
• The first AI to surpass the same threshold, if Friendly, can prevent a hostile AI from coming into existence or from harming the human species; or find some other creative way to ensure the survival and prosperity of Earth-originating intelligent
life.

More than one scenario qualifies as a first-mover effect. Each of these examples reflects a different key threshold:

• Post-criticality, self-improvement reaches superintelligence on a timescale of weeks or less. AI projects are sufficiently sparse that no other AI achieves criticality before the first mover is powerful enough to overcome all opposition. The key threshold is criticality of recursive self-improvement.
• AI-1 cracks protein folding three days before AI-2. AI-1 achieves nanotechnology six hours before AI-2. With rapid manipulators, AI-1 can (potentially) disable AI-2's R&D before fruition. The runners are close, but whoever crosses the finish line first, wins. The key threshold is rapid infrastructure.
• The first AI to absorb the Internet can (potentially) keep it out of the hands of other AIs. Afterward, by economic

...
Non-orthogonality implies uncontrollable superintelligence
by Stuart_Armstrong — 2012-04-30T13:53:53.700Z

Just a minor thought connected with the orthogonality thesis: if you claim that any superintelligence will inevitably converge to some true code of morality, then you are also claiming that no measures can be taken by its creators to prevent this convergence. In other words, the superintelligence will be uncontrollable.
Adopting others' opinions
by TraderJoe — 2012-04-30T12:30:22.654Z

There are some issues where a) I have no direct knowledge of the facts, b) there is some dispute over the facts, c) I hold an opinion on what the facts are. You probably do too.

For example, I believe that ~6mm Jews were killed in WWII, and that most people who deny this are anti-semites. If someone produced a theory which conflicted with my views, I would probably be very suspicious of the person's motives. I think this without ever having seen evidence that would satisfy me directly. [I've been to Auschwitz and a few other camps, and I've read a few books about WWII, but the only reason I have to cite the figure of 6mm rather than 3mm, or even 300,000, is that most knowledgeable people use that number]. I suspect most LWers are at a similar state of opinionated ignorance.
Now, I am in no way incentivised to investigate this: my opinions matter roughly zero to anyone, including me. So I don't have any reason to investigate the Holocaust. But there are other areas where the facts do matter to me.
I know very little about medicine. When I need medical assistance, I tend to do what a doctor tells me without criticising his diagnosis. For example, I suffered from eczema a few years ago. I was prescribed a medicine which contained hydrocortisone as the active ingredient. I Googled this ingredient and then took the medication until the affected area cleared up. I noted that there were other steroids available [Clobetasol propionate is one such] which are considered cures for eczema. I did not know why my doctor prescribed me one rather than the other, and the distinction between the two would likely affect me. But I took the 'expert advice' without a pinch of salt. Unlike the WWII question, here the facts are actually relevant to me, and a mis-diagnosis could have caused some complications. But just as I don't check the wiring of my house's electric systems, or check my walls' stability and capacity to support my ceiling, I take my doctor's advice.
There are some less clear-cut examples. For example, the 'smartest' [read: some combination of high-IQ, high-rationality, knowledgeable] people I know tend to identify as either libertarians or utilitarians, rather than as socialists. There are a few exceptions to this, but not many. From this, I could arguably assume that it would be correct to adopt a libertarian or utilitarian, rather than a socialist*, mindset to poli...
[SEQ RERUN] Collapse Postulates
by MinibearRex — 2012-04-30T06:49:51.041Z

Today's post, Collapse Postulates was originally published on 09 May 2008. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):

Early physicists simply didn't think of the possibility of more than one world - it just didn't occur to them, even though it's the straightforward result of applying the quantum laws at all levels. So they accidentally invented a completely and strictly unnecessary part of quantum theory to ensure there was only one world - a law of physics that says that parts of the wavefunction mysteriously and spontaneously disappear when decoherence prevents us from seeing them any more. If such a law really existed, it would be the only non-linear, non-unitary, non-differentiable, non-local, non-CPT-symmetric, acausal, faster-than-light phenomenon in all of physics.

Discuss the post here (rather than in the comments to the original post).
This post is part of the Rerunning the Sequences series, where we'll be going through Eliezer Yudkowsky's old posts in order so that people who are interested can (re-)read and discuss them. The previous post was Quantum Non-Realism, and you can use the sequence_reruns tag or rss feed to follow the rest of the series.
Sequence reruns are a community-driven effort. You can participate by re-reading the sequence post, discussing it here, posting the next day's sequence reruns post, or summarizing forthcoming articles on the wiki. Go here for more details, or to have meta discussions about the Rerunning the Sequences series.
(Almost) every moral theory can be represented by a utility function
by lukeprog — 2012-04-30T03:31:25.765Z

This was demonstrated, in a certain limited way, in Peterson (2009). See also Lowry & Peterson (2011).

The Peterson result provides an "asymmetry argument" in favor of consequentialism:

Consequentialists can account for phenomena that are usually thought of in nonconsequentialist terms, such as rights, duties, and virtues, whereas the opposite is false of nonconsequentialist theories. Rights, duty or virtue-based theories cannot account for the fundamental moral importance of consequences. Because of this asymmetry, it seems it would be preferable to become a consequentialist – indeed, it would be virtually impossible not to be a consequentialist.

Another argument in favor of consequentialism has to do with the causes of different types of moral judgments: see Are Deontological Moral Judgments Rationalizations?

Update: see Carl's criticism.
Logical Uncertainty as Probability
by gRR — 2012-04-29T22:26:35.078Z

This post is a long answer to this comment by cousin_it:

Logical uncertainty is weird because it doesn't exactly obey the rules of probability. You can't have a consistent probability assignment that says axioms are 100% true but the millionth digit of pi has a 50% chance of being odd.

I'd like to attempt to formally define logical uncertainty in terms of probability. Don't know if what results is in any way novel or useful, but.

Let X be a finite set of true statements of some formal system F extending propositional calculus, like Peano Arithmetic. X is supposed to represent a set of logical/mathematical beliefs of some finite reasoning agent.

Given any X, we can define its "Obvious Logical Closure" OLC(X), an infinite set of statements producible from X by applying the rules and axioms of propositional calculus. An important property of OLC(X) is that it is decidable: for any statement S it is possible to find out whether S is true (S∈OLC(X)), false ("~S"∈OLC(X)), or uncertain (neither).

We can now define the "conditional" probability P(*|X) as a function from {the statements of F} to [0,1] satisfying the axioms:

Axiom 1: Known true statements have probability 1:

P(S|X)=1 iff S∈OLC(X)

Axiom 2: The probability of a disjunction of mutually exclusive statements is equal to the sum of their probabilities:

"~(A∧B)"∈OLC(X) implies P("A∨B"|X) = P(A|X) + P(B|X)

From these axioms we can get all the expected behavior of the probabilities:

P("~S"|X) = 1 - P(S|X)

P(S|X)=0 iff "~S"∈OLC(X)

0 < P(S|X) < 1 iff S∉OLC(X) and "~S"∉OLC(X)

"A=>B"∈OLC(X) implies P(A|X)≤P(B|X)

"A<=>B"∈OLC(X) implies P(A|X)=P(B|X)

etc.

This is still insufficient to calculate an actual probability value for any uncertain statement. Additional principles are required. For example, the Consistency Desideratum of Jaynes: "equivalent states of knowledge must be represented by the same probability values".

Definition: two statements A and B are indistinguishable relative to X iff there exists an isomorphism between OLC(X∪{A}) and OLC(X∪{B}), which is identity on X, and which maps A to B.
[Isomorphism he...
Request for feedback: paper on fine-tuning and the multiverse hypothesis
by AlexSchell — 2012-04-29T21:19:03.579Z

A while back, I posted in the "What are you working on?" thread about a paper I was working on. A few people wanted to see it once I have a complete draft, and I'm of course independently interested in obtaining feedback before I move on with it.

The paper doesn't presuppose much philosophical jargon that isn't easily googleable, I think. Math-wise, you need to be somewhat comfortable with basic conditional probabilities. I'm interested in finding out about any math errors, other non sequiturs, and other flaws in my discussion. I'd also like to find out about general impressions, such as what I should have spilled more or less ink on. Some notation is unfinished (subscripts, singular/plural first person, etc.), but it's thoroughly readable.

ABSTRACT: According to a standard form of the fine-tuning argument, the apparent anthropic fine-tuning of the physical constants and boundary conditions of our universe confirms the multiverse hypothesis. According to the inverse gambler’s fallacy objection, this view is mistaken: although the multiverse hypothesis makes the existence of a life-permitting universe more probable than it would be on a single-universe theory, it does not make it any more probable that our universe should be life-permitting, and thus is not confirmed by our total evidence. We examine recent replies to this objection and conclude that they all fall short, usually due to a shared weakness. We then show how a synthetic reply, obtained by combining independent insights from the literature, can overcome the weakness afflicting its predecessors.

If you'd like a slightly more detailed description before deciding whether or not to read the whole thing, see my post.

Here is the actual paper: DOCX PDF (on some computers, italicized Times New Roman looks weird in the PDF)

EDIT 5/9/12: Current draft (edited, shortened to 13.5K words) is here:

DOCX: http://bit.ly/Jc4pXr

PDF: http://bit.ly/Jdc7z3

NOTE: The paper occasionally makes use of the notion of a person as a metaphysical individual. Roughly and likely inaccurately, this is the concept of an individual essence that can only be instantiated once in a possible world and is partly independent of the physical pattern it inhabits (i.e. you can have different possible worlds that are physically identical but contain different individuals -- I think this is what Eliezer refers to as "th...
Correcting errors and karma
by rebellionkid — 2012-04-29T17:03:06.424Z

An easy way to win cheep karma on LW:

Publicly make a mistake.

Wait for people to call you on it.

Publicly retract your errors and promise to improve.

Post 1) gets you negative karma, post 3) gets you positive karma. Anecdotally the net result is generally very positive.

This doesn't seem quite sane. Yes, it is good for us to reward people for changing their minds based on evidence. But it's still better not to have made the error the first time round. At the very least you should get less net karma for changing your mind towards the correct answer than you would for stating the correct thing the first time.

Questions:

Is there an advantage to this signalling-approval-for-updates that outweighs the value of karma as indicator-of-general-correctness-of-posts?

If so then can some other signal of general correctness be devised?

If not then what karma etiquette should we impose to ensure this effect doesn't happen?
Meetup : Philadelphia Meetup: Introduction to drawing
by Michelle_Z — 2012-04-29T16:44:11.947Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Philadelphia Meetup: Introduction to drawing

WHEN: 05 May 2012 02:00:00PM (-0400)

WHERE: Kimmel Center, 300 S. Broad Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102

This meetup will be an introduction to drawing as it relates to the articles on Map and Territory and Cached Selves.

*Note: I just realized I had the wrong address. I am sorry for the confusion.*

Discussion article for the meetup : Philadelphia Meetup: Introduction to drawing