trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k huggingface dataset:
The Categories Were Made For Man, Not Man For The Categories
by Scott Alexander — 2014-11-21T14:34:26.000Z

I.

“Silliest internet atheist argument” is a hotly contested title, but I have a special place in my heart for the people who occasionally try to prove Biblical fallibility by pointing out whales are not a type of fish.

(this is going to end up being a metaphor for something, so bear with me)

The argument goes like this. Jonah got swallowed by a whale. But the Bible says Jonah got swallowed by a big fish. So the Bible seems to think whales are just big fish. Therefore the Bible is fallible. Therefore, the Bible was not written by God.

The first problem here is that “whale” is just our own modern interpretation of the Bible. For all we know, Jonah was swallowed by a really really really big herring.

The second problem is that if the ancient Hebrews want to call whales a kind of fish, let them call whales a kind of fish.

I’m not making the weak and boring claim that since they’d never discovered genetics they don’t know better. I am making the much stronger claim that, even if the ancient Hebrews had taken enough of a break from murdering Philistines and building tabernacles to sequence the genomes of all knownspecies of aquatic animals, there’s nothing whatsoever wrong, false, or incorrect with them calling a whale a fish.

Now, there’s something wrong with saying “whales are phylogenetically just as closely related to bass, herring, and salmon as these three are related to each other.” What’s wrong with the statement is that it’s false. But saying “whales are a kind of fish” isn’t.

Suppose you travel back in time to ancient Israel and try to explain to King Solomon that whales are a kind of mammal and not a kind of fish.

Your translator isn’t very good, so you pause to explain “fish” and “mammal” to Solomon. You tell him that fish is “the sort of thing herring, bass, and salmon are” and mammal is “the sort of thing cows, sheep, and pigs are”. Solomon tells you that your word “fish” is Hebrew dag and your word “mammal” is Hebrew behemah.

So you try again and say that a whale is a behemah, not a dag. Solomon laughs at you and says you’re an idiot.

You explain that you’re not an idiot, that in fact all kinds of animals have things called genes, and the genes of a whale are much closer to th...
Meetup : West LA—The Relativity of Wrong
by OpenThreadGuy — 2014-11-21T13:48:33.290Z

Discussion article for the meetup : West LA—The Relativity of Wrong

WHEN:
26 November 2014 07:00:00PM (-0800)

WHERE:
11066 Santa Monica Blvd, Los Angeles, CA

How to Find Us: Go into this Del Taco. We will be in the back room if possible.

Parking is free in the lot out front or on the street nearby.

Discussion: Human ignorance is vast, so human knowledge is often understated. The domains of our ignorance keep getting smaller and further away from the decimal point. We will be discussing Isaac Asimov's important essay The Relativity of Wrong.

Recommended Reading:

The Relativity of Wrong by Isaac Asimov

A Technical Explanation of Technical Explanation

No prior exposure to Less Wrong is required; this will be generally accessible. In fact, this is a 101-level topic, only a touch more advanced than basic map and territory. While I'm at it, I want to mention that a few of us habitually show up early, so you should feel free to.

Discussion article for the meetup : West LA—The Relativity of Wrong
Meetup : Tel Aviv Meetup: Rump Session
by JoshuaFox — 2014-11-21T11:12:53.067Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Tel Aviv Meetup: Rump Session

WHEN:
25 November 2014 07:00:00PM (+0200)

WHERE:
Yigal Alon Street 98, Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel

WHEN: 25 November 2014 07:00:00PM (+0200)
WHERE: Google, Electra Tower 29th Floor, Yigal Alon Street 98, Tel Aviv.

It's going to be a Rump Session. Each speaker gets 4 minutes to talk, with a 3 minute encore if we applaud hard enough. So, come with an idea or two. It's optional, but everyone is encouraged to talk about whatever they want: science, poetry, history, decision theory, rationality, life, the universe, and everything else.

We'll start the meetup at 19:00, and we'll go on as much as we like to. Feel free to come a little bit later.

We'll meet at the 29th floor of the building. (Note: Not the 34th where Google Campus is.) If you arrive and can't find your way around, call Anatoly who is very graciously hosting us at 054-245-1060 or Joshua at 054-569-1165

Why come:
- You'll get to hang out with awesome people and have fun!
- You'll hear ideas that you have never heard, in snippets short enough that you never get bored.
- You'll get an appreciative audience, in snippets short enough that you never run out of things to say.

If you have any question feel free to send me a Private Message.

Discussion article for the meetup : Tel Aviv Meetup: Rump Session
Meetup : Urbana-Champaign: Experimentation
by Manfred — 2014-11-21T09:37:07.484Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Urbana-Champaign: Experimentation

WHEN:
23 November 2014 02:00:00PM (-0600)

WHERE:
206 S. Cedar St, Urbana IL

What sorts of things would you try out if you could? What meta-level strategies can help turn that list into actually trying things?
I also kind of want to talk about some ideas related to anthropics.

Discussion article for the meetup : Urbana-Champaign: Experimentation
Trustworthy automated philosophy?
by Benya_Fallenstein — 2014-11-21T02:57:23.000Z

Reply to: Stable self-improvement as a research problem

Paul's post, and subsequent discussions with Eliezer and Nate, have made me update significantly towards the hypothesis that the best way to get a positive intelligence explosion might be to (1) create a seed agent that's human-level at doing mathematical philosophy, (2) have this agent improve a small number of times (like "tens" of significant improvements), thereby making it significantly smarter-than-human (like 10x or 100x according to some relevant scale), and (3) have the resulting agent invent and approve a decision-making framework reliable enough to undergo an intelligence explosion.

My first reaction was that it seemed probably too difficult to create an initial agent which is capable of doing the necessary philosophy and whose decision-making system is (knowably) sufficiently reliable that we can trust it with our future. Subsequent discussions have made me revise this, and I expect that as a result I'll shift somewhat in what problems I'll be working on, but I'm still rather worried about this, and think that it is probably the core of remaining disagreement with Paul in this area.

(I apologize for taking so long to reply! I've been finding it really hard to articulate my thoughts while having my assumptions jumbled around.)

First of all, I want to say that I do currently agree with the following argument, and that I hadn't considered it before reading Paul's post (so I'm grateful for having had it pointed out to me!).

Suppose that we can make a seed agent that is aligned with our values and is able to "reason as well as we are" about computers and the external world.

Suppose further (Paul doesn't mention this, but it seems important to me) that this agent has a clean, non-kludgy design, which its human research team (and therefore by construction the agent itself) understands on a conceptual level.

Say that this agent does ten or twenty self-improvements, each consisting of significant changes to the code that give the agent about a ~30% efficiency boost each, for a total of a 13x or 190x improvement.

Say that when a previous version of the agent makes a new one, it doesn't replace itself by this new version, but instead observes this new version as it goes about its business (including making and observing future versions), and checks the new version's reasoning in enough detail that it wo

...
How can one change what they consider "fun"?
by AmagicalFishy — 2014-11-21T02:04:57.735Z

Most of this post is background and context, so I've included a tl;dr horizontal rule near the bottom where you can skip everything else if you so choose. :)

Here's a short anecdote of Feynman's:

... I invented some way of doing problems in physics, quantum electrodynamics, and made some diagrams that help to make the analysis. I was on a floor in a rooming house. I was in in my pyjamas, I'd been working on the floor in my pyjamas for many weeks, fooling around, but I got these funny diagrams after a while and I found they were useful. They helped me to find the equations easier, so I thought of the possibility that it might be useful for other people, and I thought it would really look funny, these funny diagrams I'm making, if they appear someday in the Physical Review, because they looked so odd to me. And I remember sitting there thinking how funny that would be if it ever happened, ha ha.

Well, it turned out in fact that they were useful and they do appear in the Physical Review, and I can now look at them and see other people making them and smile to myself, they do look funny to me as they did then, not as funny because I've seen so many of them. But I get the same kick out of it, that was a little fantasy when I was a kid…not a kid, I was a college professor already at Cornell. But the idea was that I was still playing, just like I have always been playing, and the secret of my happiness in life or the major part of it is to have discovered a way to entertain myself that other people consider important and they pay me to do. I do exactly what I want and I get paid. They might consider it serious, but the secret is I'm having a very good time.

There are things that I have fun doing, and there are things that I feel I have substantially more fun doing. The things in the latter group are things I generally consider a waste of time. I will focus on one specifically, because it's by far the biggest offender, and what spurred this question. Video games.

I have a knack for video games. I've played them since I was very young. I can pick one up and just be good at it right off the bat. Many of my fondest memories take place in various games played with friends or by myself and I can spend hours just reading about them. (Just recently, I started getting into fighting games technically; I plan to build my own joystick in a couple of weeks. I'm having a b...
Narcissistic Contrarianism
by HalMorris — 2014-11-21T00:19:14.999Z

The recent discussion on neo-reactionary-ism brought out some references to (intellectual hipsters and) meta-contrarianism linking to a 2010 posting by Yvain.

For some time I've been thinking about "narcissistic contrarians" -- those who make an art form of their exotically counterintuitive belief systems, who combine positions not normally met in the same person. There can be good reasons for being a contrarian. If you're looking for a scarce resource, it may help to not look where everyone else is looking, hence contrarian stock market investors may do very well, if they actually see something others don't; same with oil explorers. Less creditably, I believe Nate Silver's The Signal and the Noise made reference to the way a novice pundit or prognosticator may have nothing to gain by saying anything like what other people are saying, and much to gain, in taking some wild extravagant position or prediction if it happens to attract an audience others have ignored, or if the predictions happens to be right.

The Narcissistic Contrarian is much like the Intellectual Hipster, but more extreme. The Intellectual Hipster usually stakes out a few unusual or incongruous positions, to create an identity that stands out from the crowd. The Narcissistic Contrarian is constantly dazzling her fans. Something written by Camille Paglia made me think of the idea in the first place. Nicholas Taleb is another suspect although I think he started out with some good ideas. If she/he manages to get a fan-base, they are apt to be pretty worshipful -- they can't imagine being able to come up with such a wild set of insights. The contrarianism is for its own sake rather than an attempt to find and settle on some previously undiscovered thing, so it particularly likely to lead people astray, into unproductive avenues of thought.

Does anyone else think this is a real and useful distinction?
Meetup : Washington, D.C.: Fun & Games
by RobinZ — 2014-11-20T23:15:17.292Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Washington, D.C.: Fun & Games

WHEN:
23 November 2014 03:00:00PM (-0500)

WHERE:
National Portrait Gallery

We will be meeting in the Kogod Courtyard of the National Portrait Gallery (8th and F Sts or 8th and G Sts NW, go straight past the information desk from either entrance) to hang out, play games, and engage in fun conversation.

Note: Feel free to send an email to the Google Group - lesswrong-dc - if you have a game you wish to recruit people to play in advance. This is especially useful for games that take 3+ hours, as you would want to start playing by 3:30 to be sure of finishing by 7:00.

Upcoming Meetups:

Nov. 30: Thanksgiving break - no meetup planned

Dec. 7: TBA (to be summarized)

Dec. 14: TBA (to be summarized)

Discussion article for the meetup : Washington, D.C.: Fun & Games
Irrationalism on Campus?
by HalMorris — 2014-11-20T19:17:47.986Z

Since many LRers are fairly recent college graduates, it seems worthwhile to ask to what extent would people here agree with reports of rampant irrationalism such as this one: http://www.city-journal.org/2014/24_4_racial-microaggression.html from a right-leaning journalist known for her book The Burden of Bad Ideas (which I'm certainly not promoting).

Some other sources like Massimo Pigliucci (see http://scientiasalon.wordpress.com/) who seem more alarmed by creationism or the idea that all climatology is one big conspiracy, are also quite bothered by extreme relativism in some camps of epistemology, and sociologists of technology and science.

To what extent, if any, do you think PC suppresses free speech or thinking? While sociology and epistemological branches of philosophy have partisans who to me seem to advocate various kinds of muddled thinking (while others are doing admirable work), in your experience, is that the trend that is "taking over"?

To what extent if any do you think any of that is leaking into more practical or scientific fields? If you've taken economics courses, where do you think they rank on a left to right spectrum?

Also, have you observed much in the way of push-back from conservative and/or libertarian sources endowing chairs or building counter-establishments like the Mercatus Center at George Mason University? And I wonder the same about any movement strictly concerned with rationality, empiricism, or just clear thinking.

My mind is open on this -- so open that it's painful to be around all the hot tempers that it can stir up.

Thanks, Hal
What do you mean by Pascal's mugging?
by XiXiDu — 2014-11-20T16:38:46.970Z

Some people[1] are now using the term Pascal's mugging as a label for any scenario with a large associated payoff and a small or unstable probability estimate, a combination that can trigger the absurdity heuristic.

Consider the scenarios listed below: (a) Do these scenarios have something in common? (b) Are any of these scenarios cases of Pascal's mugging?

(1) Fundamental physical operations -- atomic movements, electron orbits, photon collisions, etc. -- could collectively deserve significant moral weight. The total number of atoms or particles is huge: even assigning a tiny fraction of human moral consideration to them or a tiny probability of them mattering morally will create a large expected moral value. [Source]

(2) Cooling something to a temperature close to absolute zero might be an existential risk. Given our ignorance we cannot rationally give zero probability to this possibility, and probably not even give it less than 1% (since that is about the natural lowest error rate of humans on anything). Anybody saying it is less likely than one in a million is likely very overconfident. [Source]

(3) GMOS might introduce “systemic risk” to the environment. The chance of ecocide, or the destruction of the environment and potentially humans, increases incrementally with each additional transgenic trait introduced into the environment. The downside risks are so hard to predict -- and so potentially bad -- that it is better to be safe than sorry. The benefits, no matter how great, do not merit even a tiny chance of an irreversible, catastrophic outcome. [Source]

(4) Each time you say abracadabra, 3^^^^3 simulations of humanity experience a positive singularity.

If you read up on any of the first three scenarios, by clicking on the provided links, you will notice that there are a bunch of arguments in support of these conjectures. And yet I feel that all three have something important in common with scenario four, which I would call a clear case of Pascal's mugging.

I offer three possibilities of what these and similar scenarios have in common:

Probability estimates of the scenario are highly unstable and highly divergent between informed people who spent a similar amount of resources researching it.

The scenario demands skeptics to either falsify or accept its decision relevant consequences. The scenario is however either unfalsifiable by definition

...
Link: Simulating C. Elegans
by Sniffnoy — 2014-11-20T09:30:03.864Z

http://radar.oreilly.com/2014/11/the-robotic-worm.html

Summary, as I understand it: The connectome for C. elegans's 302-neuron brain has been known for some time, but actually doing anything with it (especially actually understanding it) has proved troublesome, especially because there could easily be relevant information about its brain function not stored in just the connections of the neurons.

However, the OpenWorm project -- which is trying to eventually make much more detailed C. elegans simulations, including an appropriate body -- recently tried just fudging it and making a simulation based on the connectome anyway, though in a wheeled body rather than a wormlike one. And the result does seem to act at least somewhat like a C. elegans worm, though I am not really one to judge that. (Video is here.)

I'm having trouble finding much more information about this at the moment. I don't know if they've actually yet released detailed technical information.
Meetup : London social meetup in my flat
by philh — 2014-11-19T23:55:37.211Z

Discussion article for the meetup : London social meetup in my flat

WHEN:
23 November 2014 02:00:00PM (+0000)

WHERE:
Flat 3, 9 White Church Lane, E1 7QR

(It is also James/kerspoon's flat, but I don't know a way to put both of us in that phrase without it sounding atrocious.)

The meetup on Sunday will (for the first time) be at our flat in Aldgate East. No fixed theme, but I recently got back from volunteering at a CFAR workshop, so that's a plausible topic of conversation.

Join us from 2 pm. I'm not sure yet what we'll do about food, ordering takeout is one possibility.

Directions:

We are practically next door to Aldgate East Station. Come out Aldgate East Station and hotfoot towards Whitechapel along Whitechapel Road, turn right just before little Altab Ali Park (which is also on the right) on to White Church Lane, about 30 ft down the road, just after the Mekyle shop is a black door on the right (technically our door is number 9). Buzz for flat number 3.

If you have difficulty finding us, my number is 07792009646.

About London LessWrong:

We run this meetup approximately every other week; these days we tend to get in the region of 5-15 people in attendance. By default, meetups are just unstructured social discussion about whatever strikes our fancy: books we're reading, recent posts on LW/related blogs, logic puzzles, toilet usage statistics....

Sometimes we play The Resistance or other games. We usually finish around 7pm, give or take an hour, but people arrive and leave whenever suits them.

Related discussion happens on both our google group and our facebook group.

Discussion article for the meetup : London social meetup in my flat
The Centre for Effective Altruism is hiring to fill five roles in research, operations and outreach
by RobertWiblin — 2014-11-19T22:41:16.968Z

The Centre for Effective Altruism, the group behind 80,000 Hours, Giving What We Can, the Global Priorities Project, Effective Altruism Outreach, and to a lesser extent The Life You Can Save and Animal Charity Evaluators, is looking to grow its team with a number of new roles:

Giving What We Can: Director of Research

Giving What We Can: Communications Manager

80,000 Hours: Head of Research

Central CEA: Chief Operating Officer

Global Priorities Project: Research Fellow (accepting expressions of interest at this point)

We are also looking for 'graduate volunteers' for Giving What We Can in 2015, particularly over the summer

We are so keen to find great people that if you introduce us to someone new who we end up hiring, we will pay you $1,000 for the favour! If you know anyone awesome who would be a good fit for us please let me know: robert [dot] wiblin [at] centreforeffectivealtruism [dot] org. They can also book a short meeting with me directly.

We may be able to sponsor outstanding applicants from the USA.

Applications close Friday 5th December 2014.

Why is CEA an excellent place to work?

First and foremost, “making the world a better place” is our bottom line and central aim. We work on the projects we do because we think they’re the best way for us to make a contribution. But there’s more.

What are we looking for?

The specifics of what we are looking for depend on the role and details can be found in the job descriptions. In general, we're looking for people who have many of the following traits:

Self-motivated, hard-working, and independent;

Able to deal with pressure and unfamiliar problems;

Have a strong desire for personal development;

Able to quickly master complex, abstract ideas, and solve problems;

Able to communicate clearly and persuasively in writing and in person;

Comfortable working in a team and quick to get on with new people;

Able to lead a team and manage a complex project;

Keen to work with a young team in a startup environment;

Deeply interested in making the world a better place in an effective way, using evidence and research;

A good understanding of the aims of the Centre for Effective Altruism and its constituent organisations.

I hope to work at CEA in the future. What should I do now?

Of course this will depend on the role, but generally good ideas include:

Study hard, including gaining useful knowledge

...