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gwern comments on I'm Not Saying People Are Stupid - Less Wrong
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If you aren't saying that most people are systematically stupid, then what are you saying? That most people are smart, but they have just a few little issues which if fixed would turn them into Eliezers?
EDIT: saying "I'm saying they're crazy" really doesn't help much. Can you give an example of someone smart, but 'crazy' in a way which doesn't involve 'just a few little issues'? not reaching the right answers = stupid to me, regardless of whether it's because someone has a brain tumor, has too few myelinated neurons, is on drugs, or was brought up to believe the Flying Spaghetti Monster decreed the right answer to be something else.
This just seems like a definition dispute. "Stupid" and "crazy" are not precise words, so taboo "stupid", "smart", "crazy". Well, he's clearly not saying "most people have a low IQ". As timtyler pointed out elsewhere, this version of "stupid" is inherently relative. Eliezer's message is more like "most people make objectively bad decisions". If that's how you define stupidity, then I'd conclude that he is indeed saying that most people are systematically stupid.
"Stupid" isn't a very useful term in this focused a context.
He's saying most people are crazy. I'm inclined to agree.
I would agree, even to the extent of saying that all people are totally nuts.
Especially if von Neumann is labeled crazy for believing in the Copenhagen interpretation of QM...
Or maybe he did not really believe it but while being a demigod, had made a detailed study of humans and decided that in order to fully imitate humanness he had to imitate a bit of craziness as well.
Not necessarily that most people are smart, but that smart people can still believe and do crazy/stupid things.
(That's how I interpreted it, at least.)
That they are crazy.
Yup.