trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k huggingface dataset:
Book Review: Cognitive Science (MIRI course list)
by So8res — 2013-09-09T16:39:19.798Z

I'm reviewing the books on the MIRI course list. After reading Heuristics and Biases I picked up Cognitive Science, by José Luis Bermúdez. It taught me a number of interesting things, but I strongly disliked it.

Cognitive Science

I recommend against reading this book, for reasons that I'll go into at the end of the review. Before that, I'll summarize each chapter.

Chapter Summaries

The prehistory of cognitive science

The discipline matures: three milestones

The turn to the brain

Cognitive science and the integration challenge

Tackling the integration challenge

Physical symbol systems and the language of thought

Applying the symbolic paradigm

Neural networks and distributed information processing

Neural network models of cognitive processes

How are cognitive systems organized?

Strategies for mapping the brain

A case study: Exploring mind reading

New horizons: Dynamical systems and situated cognition

Looking ahead: Challenges and Applications

1. The prehistory of cognitive science

This chapter introduces the idea of cognition as a form of information processing, and discusses how that viewpoint came about. Short version:

Behaviorism isn't enough to explain intelligent behavior.

Mice allowed to wander in mazes with no goal were able to navigate the maze quickly when goals were added. Reinforcement on its own does not sufficiently explain learning.

Church & Turing put forth the Church-Turing thesis (anything computable is computable by a Turing machine).

Studying language syntax revealed deep structure and rules.

The chapter illustrates how these insights led to the idea of cognition as information processing.

This chapter is informative from a historical perspective. It might be worth reading.

2. The discipline matures: three milestones

This chapter touches upon three early cognitive science "milestones": A computer program, an experiment, and a cognitive model.

SHRDLU was a program that uses natural language in a very limited setting.

The study measured the time it takes to, given two images, determine whether the second depicts the same object as the first (viewed from a different angle).

It turns out the amount of time it takes is a linear function of the amount of rotation between views of the object.

Because each image contains the same amount of visual data (measured in pixels or bits), this shows that cognitive processin

...
Meetup : Melbourne Social Meetup
by Maelin — 2013-09-09T07:08:58.837Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Melbourne Social Meetup

WHEN:
20 September 2013 06:30:00PM (+1000)

WHERE:
5/52 Leicester St, Carlton 3053

Melbourne's regular monthly Social Meetup will be running as normal on the third Friday evening of the month. All welcome from 6:30pm, feel free to arrive later if that is easier for you.

Our social meetups are friendly, informal events where we chat about topics of interest and often play board games. Sometimes we will also play parlour games like Mafia (a.k.a. Werewolf) or Resistance. We usually order some sort of take-away dinner for any that wish to partake.

Please ring the number 5 button when you arrive in the foyer and we'll buzz you up. If you get lost or have any problems, feel free to call me (Richard) on 0421231789.

Discussion article for the meetup : Melbourne Social Meetup
High school activities and medical school admissions
by JonahS — 2013-09-09T04:01:21.356Z

Many people consider medicine to be a desirable profession because of the high status of the job of being a doctor, the opportunity to help people, and the high income. Whether conventional views about what it’s like to be in medicine are well grounded is unclear, but it’s undeniable that many young people aspire to become doctors.

In order to become a doctor, you need to secure admission to medical school. This post offers one perspective on one aspect of what to do if your goal is to get into medical school.

What Matters for Medical School Admissions?

Medical school admission is competitive, with the overall rate of acceptance to US medical schools at 45.2%. So in order to get into medical school, the average applicant faces the challenge of differentiating him or herself from other applicants.

Many high school students who aspire to be doctors place high emphasis on getting into a good college, because they think that it will better position them to get into medical school.

Medical school acceptance rate varies significantly according to college attended. The statistics that colleges release about the acceptance rates for their undergraduates can be misleading, because some colleges discourage underqualified students from applying to medical school. But there’s a strong case that among those undergraduates who aspire to be doctors, Harvard undergraduates get into medical school with much higher probability than do undergraduates at lower tier state universities.

Some high school students take this to be evidence that going to a more prestigious college increases their chances of getting into medical school. This could be true, but a major confounding factor is ability bias: students who are able to get into a prestigious college are unusually strong academically, and so would have been more likely into medical school independently of where they went to college. Though different people have different views, it appears that the consensus view of medical advice forums and websites is that undergraduate institution attended plays a relatively minor role in medical admissions (see, e.g. here).

What are the major inputs into medical school admissions? The Association of American Medical Colleges publishes statistics on percentage of applicants accepted to US medical schools, according to GPA range and MCAT range. The associations between...
Mistakes repository
by Dorikka — 2013-09-09T03:32:20.194Z

This is a repository for major, life-altering mistakes that you or others have made. Detailed accounts of specific mistakes are welcome, and so are mentions of general classes of mistakes that people often make. If similar repositories already exist (inside or outside of LW), links are greatly appreciated.

The purpose of this repository is to collect information about serious misjudgements and mistakes in order to help people avoid similar mistakes. (I am posting this repository because I'm trying to conduct a premortem on my life and figure out what catastrophic risks may screw me over in the near or far future.)
High School, Human Capital, Signaling and College Admissions
by JonahS — 2013-09-08T19:45:31.984Z

During high school, students learn skills that will help them in their future careers. This can be referred to as building human capital. They also build up a record of grades, standardized test scores, and extracurricular activities that colleges use to assess whether to admit them. This can be referred to as signaling quality to colleges.

High schoolers engage in valuable activities that fall outside of these two categories, such as personally enjoyable activities and helping others. This article focuses on building human capital and signaling quality to colleges, for the sake of simplicity, rather than because I think that these are the only two things that matter.

In an ideal world, building human capital would be perfectly aligned with signaling quality to colleges. In the real world, this is not the case. Consider the following story:

Kevin is an ambitious high school student who aspires to become a molecular biologist.

Kevin attends a competitive high school, where a student is awarded an extra GPA point for each honors or AP course that he or she takes. The maximum number of grade points that a student can get taking a “regular” course is 4.0 and the maximum number of grade points that a student can get for taking an honors or AP course is 5.0 A student who gets all A’s and takes at least one honors or AP course gets a GPA that’s greater than 4.0 so that taking a “regular” course reduces his or her GPA. GPA determines class rank, so taking a “regular” course lowers such a student’s class rank.

Kevin’s school offers a molecular biology elective during second semester, which is not an honors or AP course. Kevin would like to take the elective during the second semester of his junior year, in addition to his other coursework, but he knows that doing so would low

...
Course selection based on instructor
by VipulNaik — 2013-09-08T19:13:35.161Z

I've been trying to compile advice on how to select good instructors in college, assuming that the major and course level are given. Of course, many people don't have a lot of flexibility with instructor choice, so this advice has limited applicability. The reason I'm posting to LessWrong is to get feedback from interested LessWrong readers regarding some of the factual assertions I make. I've marked the parts where I'm most eager for feedback. My experience with instruction (direct and indirect) has been focused largely on mathematics. Thus, it's possible that some of the points I raise have limited applicability in more discussion-based subjects.

Note also that although my experiences have been partly shaped by the undergraduate teaching I've done in four years as a graduate student at the University of Chicago, I'm neither representing the University nor am I critiquing or describing any features specific to the University of Chicago.

I'm working within the conceptual framework that there are three broad types of value that students derive from college courses:

Human capital: Students acquire knowledge, skills, and abilities that help them with further courses, jobs, graduate school, or other aspects of their future life. When choosing between different instructors for courses at the same level in the same college, the human capital differential boils down to how different the instructors are in how well they teach the material.

Signaling: that they have learned material, again both for future courses, jobs, graduate school, or other aspects of their future life. When choosing between different instructors for courses at the same level in the same college, the signaling differential boils down to the relative ease of getting a good grade (the "ease" could stem both from better learning and easier grading). In addition, some instructors may be willing to write recommendation letters or referral letters for further courses, jobs, graduate school, scholarships, internships, etc.

Consumption: Some courses can be fun to consume. The instructors and fellow students could be entertaining. The homeworks could be challenging in a nice way. Just like a good physical workout can be edifying in addition to building muscle or stamina, so can a good educational experience.

Why I think instructor selection matters:

Instructors differ significantly

...
Terminology point rationality vs rationalism.
by beoShaffer — 2013-09-08T04:42:53.184Z

Rationalism should not be confused with rationality, nor with rationalization.

-Wikipedia article on rationalism

I frequently see people using rationalism in place of rationality. Usually other commenters understand them, however I believe that using the word rationality is superior. The Less Wrong tag line is "A community blog devoted to refining the art of human rationality". On the other hand, rationalism is the philosophical term for a very different epistemological position. Furthermore, -the -ism suffix has some undesirable connotations.
Meetup : London social meetup
by Paul Crowley — 2013-09-07T15:22:04.693Z

Discussion article for the meetup : London social meetup

WHEN:
15 September 2013 02:00:00PM (+0100)

WHERE:
Shakespeare's Head, 64-68 Kingsway, WC2B 6BG

Weather is predicted to be thoroughly rainy for next Sunday, so let's retreat back to the safety of the Shakespeare's Head, near Holborn station. With no more updates of HP:MoR until October at the earliest, what better way to get your fix of LessWrongy goodness?

See you there!

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/194188274096175/

Discussion article for the meetup : London social meetup
New LW Meetup: Boulder CO
by FrankAdamek — 2013-09-06T16:11:42.077Z

This summary was posted to LW Main on August 31st. The following week's summary is here.

New meetups (or meetups with a hiatus of more than a year) are happening in:

New Meetup: Boulder CO: 03 September 2013 07:03PM

Other irregularly scheduled Less Wrong meetups are taking place in:

Arizona State Lunch Group: 03 September 2013 12:00PM
Helsinki Meetup: 08 September 2013 03:00PM
LessWrong Israel September meetup: 12 September 2013 08:00PM
Moscow: The Sunday Meetup: 01 September 2013 04:00PM
Saskatoon Meetup: Value of Information: 31 August 2013 01:00PM
Urbana-Champaign, Illinois: 01 September 2013 02:00PM

The remaining meetups take place in cities with regular scheduling, but involve a change in time or location, special meeting content, or simply a helpful reminder about the meetup:

Austin, TX: 31 August 2019 01:30PM
[London] Comfort Zone Expansion outing - London: 01 September 2013 11:00AM
Melbourne Practical Rationality: Group Prediction Calibration and Aumann's Agreement Theorem: 06 September 2013 06:30PM
[Salt Lake City] Fall Equinox: Festival of Heroes: 21 September 2013 03:00PM
[Washington DC] Robin Hanson visits to talk about prediction markets: 08 September 2013 03:00PM

Locations with regularly scheduled meetups: Austin, Berkeley, Cambridge, MA, Cambridge UK, Columbus, London, Madison WI, Melbourne, Mountain View, New York, Research Triangle NC, Salt Lake City, Seattle, Toronto, Vienna, Washington DC, Waterloo, and West Los Angeles. There's also a 24/7 online study hall for coworking LWers.

If you'd like to talk with other LW-ers face to face, and there is no meetup in your area, consider starting your own meetup; it's easy (more resources here). Check one out, stretch your rationality skills, build community, and have fun!

In addition to the handy sidebar of upcoming meetups, a meetup overview will continue to be posted on the front page every Friday. These will be an attempt to collect information on all the meetups happening in the next weeks. The best way to get your meetup featured is still to use the Add New Meetup feature, but you'll now also have the benefit of having your meetup mentioned in a weekly overview. These overview posts will be moved to the discussion section when the new post goes up.

Please note that for your meetup to appear in the weekly meetups feature, you need to post your meetup ...
Are certain types of loyalty categorically unreasonable? 
by Torello — 2013-09-06T13:42:31.295Z

I want people to express their opinions on the following questions/idea. I guess the answer will depend on your personal definition/interpretation of loyalty, but I guess that's the point, I want to see what people think about what I consider to be an important topic.

It seems like there is a spectrum of loyalty.

Maybe on the left end we have "transactional" loyalty; as in the case of, "if my spouse doesn't cheat, I will stay with them."

Maybe on the right end we have "stubborn" or "cost-independent" loyalty; as in the case of, "if a member of my military unit dies, my unit will recover the body - burning through all available resources if necessary."

In practice, does "stubborn" loyalty exist? Is it desirable? What about when it comes to beliefs? Does it allow for institutions to flourish that couldn't otherwise? Is this type of loyalty categorically unreasonable?

I guess these all seem like prisoner's dilemma questions, about "tit for tat" strategies, etc, but I want to know how people on this site think about these matters in everyday life; in personal relationships, with regards to their own beliefs, especially toward their children (if you have children).
The genie knows, but doesn't care
by Rob Bensinger — 2013-09-06T06:42:38.780Z

Followup to: The Hidden Complexity of Wishes, Ghosts in the Machine, Truly Part of You

Summary: If an artificial intelligence is smart enough to be dangerous, we'd intuitively expect it to be smart enough to know how to make itself safe. But that doesn't mean all smart AIs are safe. To turn that capacity into actual safety, we have to program the AI at the outset — before it becomes too fast, powerful, or complicated to reliably control — to already care about making its future self care about safety. That means we have to understand how to code safety. We can't pass the entire buck to the AI, when only an AI we've already safety-proofed will be safe to ask for help on safety issues! Given the five theses, this is an urgent problem if we're likely to figure out how to make a decent artificial programmer before we figure out how to make an excellent artificial ethicist.

I summon a superintelligence, calling out: 'I wish for my values to be fulfilled!'

The results fall short of pleasant.

Gnashing my teeth in a heap of ashes, I wail:

Is the AI too stupid to understand what I meant? Then it is no superintelligence at all!

Is it too weak to reliably fulfill my desires? Then, surely, it is no superintelligence!

Does it hate me? Then it was deliberately crafted to hate me, for chaos predicts indifference. ———But, ah! no wicked god did intervene!

Thus disproved, my hypothetical implodes in a puff of logic. The world is saved. You're welcome.

On this line of reasoning, Friendly Artificial Intelligence is not difficult. It's inevitable, provided only that we tell the AI, 'Be Friendly.' If the AI doesn't understand 'Be Friendly.', then it's too dumb to harm us. And if it does understand 'Be Friendly.', then designing it to follow such instructions is childishly easy.

The end!

...

Is the missing option obvious?

...

What if the AI isn't sadistic, or weak, or stupid, but just doesn't care what you Really Meant by 'I wish for my values to be fulfilled'?

When we see a Be Careful What You Wish For genie in fiction, it's natural to assume that it's a malevolent trickster or an incompetent bumbler. But a real Wish Machine wouldn't be a human in shiny pants. If it paid heed to our verbal commands at all, it would do so in whatever way best fit its own values. Not necessarily the way that best f...
Meetup : Atlanta Lesswrong September Meetup (1st of 2)
by Nova_Division — 2013-09-06T04:49:47.145Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Atlanta Lesswrong September Meetup (1st of 2)

WHEN:
08 September 2013 06:00:00PM (-0400)

WHERE:
2388 Lawrenceville Hwy. Apt L. Decatur, GA 30033

Come join us for the first meetup for the month of September! We'll be doing our normal eclectic mix of educational mini-presentations, structured discussion, unstructured discussion, and social fun and games times!

Discussion article for the meetup : Atlanta Lesswrong September Meetup (1st of 2)
Help with a derivation in chapter 18 of Jaynes PT:LoS?
by alex_zag_al — 2013-09-05T20:55:34.714Z

Hi, I've spent like two hours trying to derive 18.11 from 18.10. Can anyone who's read it help me?

If you comment or message me I can send you my gmail for gchat or we can work out something else.
Meetup : West LA—What, Exactly, Is a Person?
by OpenThreadGuy — 2013-09-05T10:56:17.945Z

Discussion article for the meetup : West LA—What, Exactly, Is a Person?

WHEN:
11 September 2013 07:00:00PM (-0700)

WHERE:
10850 West Pico Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90064, USA

How to get in: Go to the Westside Tavern in the upstairs Wine Bar (all ages welcome), located inside the Westside Pavillion on the second floor, right by the movie theaters. The entrance sign says "Lounge".

Parking is free for 3 hours, or for longer if you are a caitiff.

Discussion:

if we only care about desires we act upon, then we only respect preferences with optimization power, and thus might actually makes right

—drunken muflax

I no longer find the Hansonian construal of "care" tenable. Caring is feeling strong emotions, not magically becoming an agent.

—Grognor

Acknowledging that personhood is a nonbinary concept inspires questions. How do we measure how persony someone is? Are octopodes people? Birds are obviously people, but what about the nonhuman great apes? Is there a relationship between agency and qualia, and if so, what is it? Do persons with more intense qualia care more about things, or do people with more agency care more about things? Is the idea of being more-of-a-person coherent at all? Should we allow more intense experiences to count more on the utilitarian calculus, even though this can in principle be hijacked? How should we treat instrumental utility monsters? When does a baby become a person? Can you lose personhood through an act of will? Why do we think personhood is important? Why do we think importance is important? Who the Hell do you think I am!? We'll discuss all this and more, this Wednesday, at the Westside Tavern! Be there or be square!

Recommended reading:

Personhood by Zack M Davis

Reasons and Persons

Reasons for Persons

Hacking the CEV for Fun and Profit

Vladimir_M's comment's on Yvain's Offense vs. Harm Minimization post

The Truth Points to Itself, Part 1

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann

Prior exposure to Less Wrong is recommended but not required. That which can be destroyed by your presence at this meetup should be!

There may or may not be a whiteboard.

Discussion article for the meetup : West LA—What, Exactly, Is a Person?
The Up-Goer Five Game: Explaining hard ideas with simple words
by Rob Bensinger — 2013-09-05T05:54:16.443Z

xkcd's Up-Goer Five comic gave technical specifications for the Saturn V rocket using only the 1,000 most common words in the English language.

This seemed to me and Briénne to be a really fun exercise, both for tabooing one's words and for communicating difficult concepts to laypeople. So why not make a game out of it? Pick any tough, important, or interesting argument or idea, and use this text editor to try to describe what you have in mind with extremely common words only.

This is challenging, so if you almost succeed and want to share your results, you can mark words where you had to cheat in *italics*. Bonus points if your explanation is actually useful for gaining a deeper understanding of the idea, or for teaching it, in the spirit of Gödel's Second Incompleteness Theorem Explained in Words of One Syllable.

As an example, here's my attempt to capture the five theses using only top-thousand words:

Intelligence explosion: If we make a computer that is good at doing hard things in lots of different situations without using much stuff up, it may be able to help us build better computers. Since computers are faster than humans, pretty soon the computer would probably be doing most of the work of making new and better computers. We would have a hard time controlling or understanding what was happening as the new computers got faster and grew more and more parts. By the time these computers ran out of ways to quickly and easily make better computers, the best computers would have already become much much better than humans at controlling what happens.

Orthogonality: Different computers, and different minds as a whole, can want very different things. They can want things that are very good for humans, or very bad, or anything in between. We can be pretty sure that strong computers won't think like humans, and most possible computers won't try to change the world in the way a human would.

Convergent instrumental goals: Although most possible minds want different things, they need a lot of the same things to get what they want. A computer and a human might want things that in the long run have nothing to do with each other, but have to fight for the same share of stuff first to get those different things.

Complexity of value: It would take a huge number of parts, all put together in just the right way, to build a computer that does all

...