I already know it's got a couple of flaws (the "Problems I Can't Solve" post, you solved one of them). The "Ingredients" page should let someone get as far as I got, no further, if they had all the standard published background knowledge that I had.
The theory has two main formal parts that I know how to formalize. One is the "decision diagonal", and I wrote that out as an equation. It contains a black box, but I haven't finished formalizing that black box either! The other main part that needs formalizing is the causal network. Judea Pearl wrote all this up in great detail; why should I write it again? There's an amendment of the causal network to include logical uncertainty. I can describe this in the same intuitive way that CDT theorists took for granted when they were having their counterfactual distributions fall out of the sky as manna from heaven, but I don't know how to give it a Pearl-grade formalization.
Hear me well! If I wanted to look impressive, I could certainly attach Greek symbols to key concepts - just like the classical causal decision theory theorists did in order to make CDT look much more formalized than it actually was. This is status-seeking and self-deception and it got in the way of their noticing what work they had left to do. It was a mistake for them to pretend to formality that way. It is part of the explanation for how they bogged down. I don't intend to make the same mistake.
Last summer, 15 Less Wrongers, under the auspices of SIAI, gathered in a big house in Santa Clara (in the SF bay area), with whiteboards, existential risk-reducing projects, and the ambition to learn and do.
Now, the new and better version has arrived. We’re taking folks on a rolling basis to come join in our projects, learn and strategize with us, and consider long term life paths. Working with this crowd transformed my world; it felt like I was learning to think. I wouldn’t be surprised if it can transform yours.
A representative sample of current projects:
Interested, but not sure whether to apply?
Past experience indicates that more than one brilliant, capable person refrained from contacting SIAI, because they weren’t sure they were “good enough”. That kind of timidity destroys the world, by failing to save it. So if that’s your situation, send us an email. Let us be the one to say “no”. Glancing at an extra application is cheap, and losing out on a capable applicant is expensive.
And if you’re seriously interested in risk reduction but at a later time, or in another capacity -- send us an email anyway. Coordinated groups accomplish more than uncoordinated groups; and if you care about risk reduction, we want to know.
What we’re looking for
At bottom, we’re looking for anyone who:
Bonus points for any (you don’t need them all) of the following traits:
If you think this might be you, send a quick email to jasen@intelligence.org. Include:
Our application process is fairly informal, so send us a quick email as initial inquiry and we can decide whether or not to follow up with more application components.
As to logistics: we cover room, board, and, if you need it, airfare, but no other stipend.
Looking forward to hearing from you,
Anna
ETA (as of 3/25/10): We are still accepting applications, for summer and in general. Also, you may wish to check out http://www.singinst.org/grants/challenge#grantproposals for a list of some current projects.