trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k huggingface dataset:
Meetup : Less Wrong sydney - Prediction gambles and location testing
by Oklord — 2012-04-25T14:15:31.904Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Less Wrong sydney - Prediction gambles and location testing

WHEN:
03 May 2012 06:00:00PM (+1000)

WHERE:
77 Liverpool Street, Sydney, Australia, Level 2

Hey everybody!

Apologies for the short notice on this meeting, but it felt preferable to sort this sooner given we are testing out a new location and time- Norita Cafe & Board Games (It's on level 2 - elevator access is weird, if you think you'll have trouble, contact ahead!). The topic is pretty social- we will attempt to build a small pool of predictions (based off local and global events) as a group, to be trialed over the next couple weeks until the next meeting. Given that this is a trial run style meeting, and the venue stocks tonnes of popular board games, I don't see why we should not consider the advantages of de-railment...

Otherwise, we'll be discussing more administrative matters like formalizing the regularity of meet-ups and fleshing out focused rationality skills workshops as suggested by one of our attendees.

Discussion article for the meetup : Less Wrong sydney - Prediction gambles and location testing
Another cooperative rationality exercise
by Richard_Kennaway — 2012-04-25T13:21:29.161Z

I don't know how well this is going to work, but I mention it here because it's actually going to be done in a few weeks time at a day-long meeting of the research group that I work with. (Not my idea. I don't know which of us thought it up.)

Keyword game: explaining a scientific term. Everyone puts a keyword used in their project (for example, "Selective Sweep") into a hat. For each keyword in turn, get someone who does not understand the keyword to explain what they think it might mean. They can then be enlightened by the people who know (of which there should be at least one!).

This is to be done in groups of four, and afterwards, the groups reassemble and each group presents its newly understood keyword meanings to the main group.

There are twenty people altogether.

Trying to guess what e.g. "Selective Sweep" is just from the words doesn't seem very sensible to me, but in practice I expect the result to be more of a conversation between the one on the spot and those who actually know. How do you know when you've grasped an idea that someone is explaining to you, and when you have not?
A Kick in the Rationals: What hurts you in your LessWrong Parts?
by sixes_and_sevens — 2012-04-25T12:12:05.893Z

A month or so ago I stumbled across this. It's a blog piece by one Robert Lanza M.D., a legitimate, respected biologist who has made important contributions to tissue engineering, cloning and stem cell research. In his spare time, he is a crackpot.

I know I shouldn't give any of my time to an online pop-psychology magazine which has "Find a Therapist" as the second option on its navigation bar, but the piece in question could have been *designed* to antagonise a LessWrong reader: horrible misapplication of quantum physics, worshipful treatment of the mysterious, making a big deal over easily dissolvable questions, bold and unsubstantiated claims about physics and consciousness... the list goes on. I'm generally past the point in my life where ranting at people who are wrong on the internet holds any appeal, but this particular item got my goat to the point where I had to go and get my goat back.

If reading LW all these years has done anything, it's trained me to take apart that post without even thinking, so (and I'm not proud of this), I wrote a short seven-point response in the comments lucidly explaining its most obvious problems, and signed it Summer Glau. It got removed, and I learned a valuable lesson about productively channeling my anger.

But this started me thinking about how certain things (either subjects or people) antagonise what I now think of as my LessWrong Parts, or more generally cause me distress on an epistemic level, and what my subjective experience of that distress is like so I can recognise and deal with it in future.

I've seen a few other people make comments describing this kind of distress, (this description of "being forced to use your nicely sharpened tools on a task that would destroy them" seems particularly accurate). Common culprits seem to be critical theory, postmodernism and bad philosophy. I've also noticed some people distress me in this fashion, in a way I'm still struggling to characterise.

Who else has this experience? Do you have any choice examples? What hurts you in your LessWrong Parts?
Crowdsourcing the availability heuristic
by kalla724 — 2012-04-25T06:20:13.789Z

There are goals which can be achieved only by personal exertion and hard work – finishing a university degree, learning a language, mastering a martial art… But there is also a plethora of smaller goals, where small differences in approach and resources can make a huge difference. I’m going to examine how one particular cognitive bias affects execution of small-to-midrange goals, why this bias cannot be realistically overcome on a personal level, and how it can be effectively short-circuited simply by involving other minds.

Do note: the point I’m making may seem obvious; in my personal experience, and from observation, it is one of those things that are obvious once you know the answer (and one still needs occasional reminders). The solution to the problem is high-impact and available to practically everyone, but remains vastly underused.

The bias in question is availability heuristic. LW has a decent definition:

The availability heuristic judges the probability of events by the ease with which examples come to mind. Sometimes this heuristic serves us well, but the map is not the territory; the frequency with which concepts occur in your thoughts need not reflect the frequency with which they occur in reality. Undue salience, selective reporting, even subtle features of how the human brain stores and recalls memories can distort our perceptions about the probability of events. Because it's easier to recall words by their first letter, people judge words that begin with the letter r to be more frequent than words with r as their third letter, even though in fact, the latter is more frequent. Or selective reporting by the media of dramatic tragedies makes them seem more frequent than more threatening albeit mundane risks.

This topic has been talked about many times on LW, and there is a great deal of academic research as well [1], including seminal texts many here will be familiar with [2]. It's all interesting, but there are two critical points I want to pull up to the forefront.

I - availability heuristic is commonly treated as a simple perceptual bias. In actuality, it is also a choice bias - if you fail to

...
[SEQ RERUN] Bell's Theorem: No EPR "Reality"
by MinibearRex — 2012-04-25T04:37:20.675Z

Today's post, Bell's Theorem: No EPR "Reality" was originally published on 04 May 2008. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):

(Note: This post was designed to be read as a stand-alone, if desired.) Originally, the discoverers of quantum physics thought they had discovered an incomplete description of reality - that there was some deeper physical process they were missing, and this was why they couldn't predict exactly the results of quantum experiments. The math of Bell's Theorem is surprisingly simple, and we walk through it. Bell's Theorem rules out being able to locally predict a single, unique outcome of measurements - ruling out a way that Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen once defined "reality". This shows how deep implicit philosophical assumptions can go. If worlds can split, so that there is no single unique outcome, then Bell's Theorem is no problem. Bell's Theorem does, however, rule out the idea that quantum physics describes our partial knowledge of a deeper physical state that could locally produce single outcomes - any such description will be inconsistent.

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 Entangled Photons, 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.
Meetup : West LA Meetup - Mind-Hacking Planning Session
by  — 2012-04-25T02:44:50.716Z

Discussion article for the meetup : West LA Meetup - Mind-Hacking Planning Session

WHEN:
25 April 2012 07:00:00PM (-0700)

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

When: 7:00pm - 9:00pm Wednesday, April 11th.

Where: 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.

Parking is free for 3 hours.

Activity: We are going to discuss and plan out our approach to future experiments with habits, attention, memory, and various heuristics. One of the key things we have to figure out is how to do measurements, accounting for confirmation bias, etc.

We may focus on a specific sort of experiment, such as building skills modulating mindfulness, evaluating techniques for fermi problems, building habits, or other experiments training us to be more strategic and rational at a System 1 level.

Or we could play The Resistance.

Don't worry if you don't have time to read any links, or even if you've never read any Less Wrong! Bring a friend! The atmosphere is casual, and good, intelligent conversation with friendly people is guaranteed.

I will bring a whiteboard with Bayes' Theorem written on it.

Discussion article for the meetup : West LA Meetup - Mind-Hacking Planning Session
Meetup : Pittsburgh Meetup: Big Gaming Fun 5!
by Kenoubi — 2012-04-25T02:31:40.654Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Pittsburgh Meetup: Big Gaming Fun 5!

WHEN:
29 April 2012 12:00:00PM (-0400)

WHERE:
1324 Wightman St., Pittsburgh, PA 15217

You can see my game collection here; please bring anything else you'd like to play. We can order food and go as late as 19:00. If I get paged I may have to deal with an emergency (from home, using my laptop), but if that doesn't bother you, it doesn't bother me. I have a cat. Please let me know if you're allergic and need me to put her upstairs. RSVP here or by sending me a private message (but don't not show up because you didn't RSVP, I just want a rough idea of the number of attendees). Ring the bell, knock, or call or text (412) 657-1395 to get in when you get there.

I intend to hold meetups every 2-3 weeks, so watch this space! Please let me know if you'd like to run some other kind of meetup (discussion group, presentation) at my house. I am partial to the location since I'm frequently on call and unable to go anywhere.

Discussion article for the meetup : Pittsburgh Meetup: Big Gaming Fun 5!
Mindfulness Meditation Thread
by  — 2012-04-24T20:08:55.754Z

Hi everybody,

There's been a bit of talk of Mindfulness meditation around. I am curious about this, because it looks like it might be practical advice backed by a deep theory.

Unfortunately, all the tutorials on mindfulness meditation seem to be semi-practical advice backed by totally bogus theories (focus your energies, blah blah). I've been able to extract some useful stuff from such articles, but I don't know what I can trust, and I still don't fully understand how it's even supposed to work.

My current understanding is that you are supposed to pay attention to something and then pay attention to your attention, notice when you go off track, not judge yourself, and focus your attention back on the thing you were paying attention to. Or something.

I'd like to understand the technique at least well enough to judge success. When I'm doing chin-ups, it's easy to see if I did a chin-up or not, and how many, but I don't even know what this mindfulness stuff is supposed to look like.

If anyone knows more about what it's supposed to feel like, what the steps are an so on, I would really appreciate if you posted your knowledge here.
Meetup : Small Berkeley Meetup
by Thausler — 2012-04-24T17:00:54.567Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Small Berkeley Meetup

WHEN:
25 April 2012 06:30:00PM (-0700)

WHERE:
2071 University Avenue, Berkeley, CA

This will be a small meetup. This will be the last joint dinner with the MPHD folks! We will be meeting at Taiwan Restaurant on University Avenue.

Discussion article for the meetup : Small Berkeley Meetup
Help come up with better meetup activity descriptions
by Kaj_Sotala — 2012-04-24T11:51:52.143Z

The current version of the How to Run a Successful Less Wrong Meetup booklet contains descriptions about various games and activities. The problem is, some of these descriptions are quite short and don't really inspire people to try them out. I've been asked to make those descriptions sound like more fun, but for some reason I have difficulty doing so. At first, I thought it was just because I hadn't tried most of those exercises myself, and it felt dishonest to try to make something sound fun if I didn't know to what extent it actually was fun. But then I realized that I also couldn't come up with anything good for Zendo, which is a game that I've played and which I've liked. So I'm kinda stumped as to what the reason is.

But if you can't solve a problem, outsource it! I'm posting some excerpts from the most boring-sounding activities in the comments below, and I'd like people to reply to those comments and come up with exciting-sounding descriptions for them. Something in the style of the Biased Pandemic writeup (which I quoted liberally in the booklet) might be ideal, but other styles are cool, too.

Thanks in advance!
If calorie restriction works in humans, should we have observed it already?
by Mark_Eichenlaub — 2012-04-24T04:28:03.516Z

Although there are no long-term scientific studies of calorie restriction in humans, there are religious groups, cults, and ascetics who voluntarily practice calorie restriction or intermittent fasting. Presumably there have been tens or hundreds of thousands of people who have practiced calorie restriction throughout most of their adult lives. There were/are probably also groups that involuntarily practice calorie restriction - servants, slaves, prisoners, or people who simply regularly don't have enough to eat.

If calorie restriction has a dramatic effect on life expectancy in humans, shouldn't we expect to observe extended life expectancy in at least some groups? Or would each of these groups likely have some mitigating circumstances that would shorten their lifespans, such as lack of medicine?

With an hour on Google, I found some references to Okinawa, to monks on Mount Athos, and to similar groups. In no case was there a reasonable claim of life expectancy over 90 (which would represent just a 10% improvement over life expectancy in Japan).

This paper reviews the evidence on calorie restriction in humans and other animals, including discussion of religious fasting, but there's no evidence there of fasting extending lifespan.

I found a few other sources where people asked this question (or made this point as an attack on CR), but I haven't yet found any good answers on the subject, and didn't find any discussion on LessWrong yet.
[SEQ RERUN] Entangled Photons
by MinibearRex — 2012-04-24T04:04:31.566Z

Today's post, Entangled Photons was originally published on 03 May 2008. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):

Using our newly acquired understanding of photon polarizations, we see how to construct a quantum state of two photons in which, when you measure one of them, the person in the same world as you, will always find that the opposite photon has opposite quantum state. This is not because any influence is transmitted; it is just decoherence that takes place in a very symmetrical way, as can readily be observed in our calculations.

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 Decoherence as Projection, 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.
Meetup : Melbourne, practical rationality
by matt — 2012-04-24T01:34:07.475Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Melbourne, practical rationality

WHEN:
04 May 2012 06:30:00PM (+1000)

WHERE:
197 Little Lonsdale St, Melbourne VIC 3000

Practical rationality, as distinct from the social and rationality outreach meetups. Look for a social meetup on the 3rd Friday of each month.

Discussion: http://groups.google.com/group/melbourne-less-wrong

This meetup repeats on the 1st Friday of each month.

And, watch this space - [content removed]

Aubrey de Grey is speaking at Embiggen Books, and we're going along. Feel free to recruit promising skeptics, futurists, or anyone interesting - remember, think of them as meat.

From the Embiggen Books blog: Aubrey Du Grey with Dr Krystal Evans.

Discussion article for the meetup : Melbourne, practical rationality
Meetup : Washington DC meetup
by rocurley — 2012-04-24T01:18:22.860Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Washington DC meetup

WHEN:
29 April 2012 03:00:00PM (-0400)

WHERE:
Portrait Gallery, central plaza

There will be Zendo; or as dubbed at the last meetup "Science: the game"

Discussion article for the meetup : Washington DC meetup
Meetup : Vancouver Cafe Meetup!
by  — 2012-04-24T00:40:50.462Z

Discussion article for the meetup : Vancouver Cafe Meetup!

WHEN:
29 April 2012 01:00:00PM (-0700)

WHERE:
Benny's Bagels 2505 W Broadway Vancouver, BC

Hey everybody.

Everyone from anywhere near Vancouver should all come out and hang out with us at Benny's in Kitsilano. Sunday at 13:00.

We are going to be discussing the reductionism sequence, but please come out anyway even if you don't have the time to read it this week; we will discuss in detail and make sure everybody is filled in by the end.

This is our big super out-of-the-basement meetup that everybody should come out to, so if you've been waiting for an excuse to come to one of our meetups come to this one. I hope to see some new faces!

As usual, most of our discussion happens on the mailing list, so join that.

No excuses, see you all there!

Discussion article for the meetup : Vancouver Cafe Meetup!
An exercise in really going through with it
by  — 2012-04-23T23:17:47.972Z

I'm re-posting a small bit of writing from my blog that was inspired by reading some recent discussions about cryonics on LW. I'm by no means a skillful fiction writer, but I found it emotionally rewarding to write this and really try to mentally simulate what it would be like to choose cryocide if I was cognizant of my own quickly approaching mental decline.
Constructive comments are welcome.

An exercise in really going through with it:
Well, this is it. You had thought it would be more like a retirement party all those months ago when you first suggested the idea. The truth is, you had to frame it that way to get your daughter to go along with it. Thank god she's of a different generation, one with ubiquitous electronics; everyone's a software developer. She understands that the weirdness of your request isn't something to be afraid of, but she's human after all. She still wants to show that she cares. Yes, you had to say it was like a retirement party. Good thing you were an accomplished scientist, a person whose understanding and reputation on matters like this had to be respected. It was the only way to trick them all into respecting your wishes... wishes that fly in the face of everyone who loves you.

You wonder how long cake will be a thing. We have hydrogen-powered cars and technology has cut our work weeks to 25 hours, and yet we still celebrate occasions with cake. It seems like such a foolish thing, knowing what will happen tomorrow. And yet it's still so human. It reminds you of your own childhood which seems long gone. Everyone around you was big and in charge and when there was a cake at something it meant it was a Big Deal. And here you are, surrounded by pictures of yourself. People are giving short speeches about your accolades. People are giving short speeches about morally questionable things you once did to goof off. And everyone is laughing in that very plastic it's-ok-to-laugh-at-questionable-things-because-we're-at-an-event sort of way.

But their guts get hit by gravity as the evening wears on. You are going to die, after all. For all their moralizing, all their pseudo-respect for your wishes, all their sophisticated rational utility calculations, they can only contort their facial muscles to provide paltry masks for their visceral uneasiness. The ones who traveled here, not your family, just want to say their goodbyes and head home, a...
Living Forever is Hard, part 3: the state of life extension research
by gwern — 2012-04-23T18:17:28.353Z

Previous:

"Living Forever is Hard, or, the Gompertz Curve"

"Living Forever is Hard, part 2: Adult Longevity"

From the excellent Fight Aging! blog comes a pointer to "A Histogram of Results from Life Span Studies", a graph of thousands of animal studies by Kingsley G. Morse Jr. (updated version from mailing list):

(This is not the same as a funnel plot, as the y-axis is # of studies finding that percentage gain and nothing to do with the n of studies.)

On the closed GRG mailing list, the compiler says:

Many test the same intervention on a different strain of the same species, or with a different dose.

I asked some questions, and Steven B. Harris replied:

“I was gratified to be able to answer promptly, and I did. I said I didn't know.” (Twain)

Though I can observe that the center of that distribution isn't very far from no-effect, and one would expect that there's a publication bias toward reporting positive effects vs. null effects. I would think that could account for it entirely.

There's also the problem we've discussed before, that feeling animals stuff they don't like the taste off, amounts to calorie restriction. So this clouds the issues terribly in non-CR studies, unless you're very, VERY careful to control them somehow.

The relevance of this summary graph to news like the C60 rodent life extension experiment is obvious. Reading GRG has been interesting and educational about that experiment; a rough summary of points made by various people including myself:

contradictory median/lifespan figures

duplicate image

small sample

doses of C60 small enough that the direct antioxidant activity can't be responsible

justifying cites not published when experiment started

the C60 was administered for brief period (think the analogy given was 'imagine taking a supplement only during your 40s and doubling your lifespan')

the massive life extension observed in the olive-oil-only rats - not doubling, but still really implausible