New Year's Predictions Thread
I would like to propose this as a thread for people to write in their predictions for the next year and the next decade, when practical with probabilities attached. I'll probably make some in the comments.
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Comments (337)
I would say better-than even chances that sites like intrade gain prestige in the next decade
and betting on predictions will become common ( 90% that there is a student at 75% or so of high schools in 2020 that will take bets on future predictions on any subject, 40% that >5% of US middle class will have made a bet about a future prediction)
naive guesses based largely on http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/11/case-for-climate-futures-markets-ctd.html
I predict further that I will continue to post on LW at least once a month next year (90%) and in 2020 (50%)
Is there any comparable website that you were posting on in 2000 and continue to post on today? I agree that LW is awesome, but web communities have a short shelf life (and a tendency to be superseded as web technology improves).
Probably a good reason to adjust the estimate down. On the other hand I was 11 in 2000 so I wouldn't have been on this kind of site anyway, and conditional on the prediction that news-betting becomes more prestigious rationality almost certainly will.
Point taken, with the real point being that I have no sense of how long a decade is, so I'll adjust that down to a 20%
I have stayed in touch with a different web community for five years, with which I'm still in touch, although only barely at the level of once a month. So my odds for awesomeness overcoming shelf-lifes may be higher than for most.
I expect that Brain-Computer Interfaces will make their way into consumer devices by the next decade, with disruptive consequences, once people become able to offload some auxiliary cognitive functions into these devices.
Call it 75% - I would be more than mildly surprised if it hadn't happened by 2020.
For what I have in mind, what counts as BCI is the ability to interact with a smartphone-like device in an inconspicuous manner, without using your hands.
My reasoning is similar to Michael Vassar's AR prediction, and based on the iPhone's success. That doesn't seem owed to any particular technological innovation; rather, Apple made things usable that were only previously feasible in the technical sense. A mobile device for searching the Web, finding out your GPS position and compass orientation, and communicating with others was technically feasible years ago. Making these features only slightly less awkward than previously has revealed a hidden demand for unsuspected usages, often combining old features in unexpected ways.
However, in many ways these interfaces are still primitive and awkward. "Sixth Sense" type interfaces are interesting, but still strike me as overly intrusive on others' personal space.
It would make sense to me to be able, say, to subvocalize a command such as "Show me the way to metro station X", then have my smartphone gently "tug" me in the right direction as I turn left and right, using a combination of compass and vibrations. This is only one scenario that strikes me as already easy to implement, requiring only some slightly greater integration of functionality.
I expect such things to be disruptive, because the more transparent the integration between our native cognitive abilities, and those provided by versatile external devices connected to the global network, the more we will effectively turn into "augmented humans".
When we merely have to think of a computation to have it performed externally and receive the result (visually or otherwise), we will be effectively smarter than we are now with calculators (and already essentially able, some would say, to achieve the same results).
I am not predicting with 75% probability that such augmentation will be pervasive by 2020, only that by then some newfangled gadget will have started to reveal hidden consumer demand for this kind of augmentation.
ETA: I don't mind this comment being downvoted, even as shorthand for "I disagree", but I'd be genuinely curious to know what flaws you're seeing in my thinking, or what facts you're aware of that make my degree of confidence seems way off.
One word: subcultures.
I think we'll see an expansion to most of the First World of the trend we see in cities like San Francisco, where the Internet has allowed people to organize niche cultures (steampunk, furries, pyromaniacs, etc.) like never before. I think that, by and large, people would prefer to seek out a smaller culture based on a common idiosyncratic interest if it were an option, not least because rising in status there is often easier than getting noticed in the local mainstream culture. I think that the main reason the mainstream culture is presently so large, therefore, is because it's hard for a juggling enthusiast in Des Moines to find like-minded people.
I expect that over the next 10 years, more and more niche cultures will arise and begin to sprout their own characteristics, with the measurable effect that cultural products will have to be targeted more narrowly. I expect that the most popular books, music, etc. of the late 2010s will sell fewer copies in the US than the most popular books, music, etc. of the Aughts, but that total consumption of media will go up substantially as a thousand niche bands, niche fiction markets, etc. become the norm. I expect that high schoolers in 2020 will spend less social time with their classmates and more time with the groups they met through the Internet.
And I expect that the next generation of hipsters will find a way to be irritatingly disdainful of a thousand cultures at once.
You forgot us!
So it's possible that, if we had a really huge, dense, wired city with excellent transportation, we would find a significant subculture of steampunk furries, or vampire gothic lolita hip-hop dance squads? Actually, this sounds like a lot like Tokyo.
It's easy, really. Practice this phrase: "Man, what weirdos." You just have to selectively overlook the weirdness of your own subculture while recognizing and stigmatizing it in others. It's an elegant approach.
Atleast one asian movie will exceed $400 mn in worldwide box office gross before the end of the decade.
It will most probably not be a wuxia movie. My guess of its genre is urban action or speculative fiction.
I'm 90% confident that the cinematic uncanny valley will be crossed in the next decade. The number applies to movies only, it doesn't apply to humanoid robots (1%) and video game characters (5%).
Edit: After posting this, I thought that my 90% estimate was underconfident, but then I remembered that we started the decade with Jar-Jar Binks and Gollum, and it took us almost ten years to reach the level of Emily and Jake Sully.
You don't think that the Valley will be crossed for video games in the next ten years?
Considering how rapidly the digital technologies make it from big screen to small, I'm guessing that we can see the Uncanny Valley crossed (for Video Games) within 2 years of its closure in films (the vast majority of digital films having crossed it).
Part of the reason is that the software packages that do things like Digital Emily (mentioned below) are so easy to buy now. They no longer cost hundreds of thousands, as they did in the early days of CGI, and even huge packages like AutoDesk, which used to sell for $25,000, now can be had for only $5,000. And, those packages can be had for a similar price. That is peanuts when compared to the cost of the people who run that software.
I agree with you. The uncanny valley refers to rendering human actors only. It is not necessary to render a whole movie from scratch. It is much more work, but only work.
IMO, The Life of Benjamin Button was the first movie that managed to cross the valley.
My reply is here. BTW, major CG packages like Autodesk Maya and 3DS Max were at the level of $5000 and below for over a decade.
I've been out of circulation for a while. Last time I priced Autodesk, was in the early 90s, and it was still tens of thousands. I'm just now getting caught up to basic AutoCAD, and I hope to begin learning 3DS Max and Maya in the next year or so. I am astounded at how cheap these packages are now (and how wrong one of my best friends is/was about how quickly these types of software would be available. In 1989, he said it would be 30 to 40 years before we saw the types of graphics displays & software that were pretty much common by (I have discovered) 1995)... Thanks for the head's up though.
Is there a reason Avatar doesn't count as crossing the threshold already?
Avatar and Digital Emily are the reasons why I'm so confident. Digital actors in Avatar are very impressive, and as a (former) CG nerd I do think that Avatar has crossed the valley -- or at least found the way across it -- I just don't think that this is proof enough for general audience and critics.
I think before the critics will be satisfied, one would have to make an entirely CGI film that wasn't Sci Fi, or fantastic in its setting or characters.
Something like a Western that had Clint Eastwood & Lee Van Cleef from their Sergio Leone Glory Days, alongside modern day Western Stars like Christian Bale, or.. That Australian Guy who was in 3:10 to Yuma. If we were to see CGI Movies, such as I mentioned, with the Avatar tech (or Digital Emily), then I am sure the critics and public would sit up and take notice (and immediately launch into how it was really not CGI at all, but really a conspiracy to hide immortality technology from the greater public).
Exactly. I was thinking about something like an Elvis Presley biopic, but your example will do just fine (except that I don't think that vanilla westerns are commercially viable today).
Because the giant blue Na'vi people are not human.
You mean you didn't notice the shots with the simulated humans in Avatar? ;-)
In a way, the uncanny valley has already been crossed-- video game characters in some games are sufficiently humanlike that I hesitate to kill them.
I once watched a video of an Iraqi sniper at work, and it was disturbingly similar to what I see in realistic military video games (I don't play them myself, but I've seen a couple.)
Why such a big gulf between your confidence for cinema and your confidence for video games?
Movies are 'pre-computed' so you can use a real human actor as a data source for animations, plus you have enough editing time to spot and iron out any glitches, but in a video game facial animations are generated on-the-fly, so all you can use is a model that perfectly captures human facial behavior. I don't think that it can be realistically imitated by blending between pre-recorded animations like it's done today with mo-cap animations -- e.g. you can't pre-record eye movement for a game character.
As for the robots, they are also real-time, AND they would need muscle / eye / face movement implemented physically (as a machine, not just software), hence the lower confidence level.
The obvious answer would be "offline rendering".
Even if the non-interactivity of pre-rendered video weren't an issue, games as a category can't afford to pre-render more than the occasional cutscene here or there: a typical modern game is much longer than a typical modern movie -- typically by at least one order of magnitude, i.e. 15 to 20 hours of gameplay, and the storyline often branches as well. In terms of dollars grossed per hours rendered, games simply can't afford to keep up. Thus, the rise of real-time hardware 3D rendering in both PC gaming and console gaming.
Rendering is not the problem. I would say that the uncanny valley has already been passed for static images rendered in real time by current 3D hardware (this NVIDIA demo from 2007 gets pretty close). The challenge for video games to cross the uncanny valley is now mostly in the realm of animation. Video game cutscenes rendered in real time will probably cross the uncanny valley with precanned animations in the next console generation but doing so for procedural animations is very much an unsolved problem.
(I'm a graphics programmer in the video games industry so I'm fairly familiar with the current state of the art).
I wasn't even considering the possibility of static images in video games, because static images aren't generally considered to count in modern video games. The world doesn't want another Myst game, and I can only imagine one other instance in a game where photorealistic, non-uncanny static images constitute the bulk of the gameplay: some sort of a dialog tree / disguised puzzle game where one or more still characters' faces changed in reaction to your dialog choices (i.e. something along the lines of a Japanese-style dating sim).
By 'static images rendered in real time' I meant static images (characters not animated) rendered in real time (all 3D rendering occurring at 30+ fps). Myst consisted of pre-rendered images which is quite different.
It is possible to render 3D images of humans in real time on current consumer level 3D hardware that has moved beyond the uncanny valley when viewed as a static screenshot (from a real time rendered sequence) or as a Matrix style static scene / dynamic camera bullet time effect. The uncanny valley has not yet been bridged for procedurally animated humans. The problem is no longer in the rendering but in the procedural animation of human motion.
Within ten years either genetic manipulation or embryo selection will have been used on at least 10,000 babies in China to increase the babies’ expected intelligence- 75%.
Within ten years either genetic manipulation or embryo selection will have been used on at least 50% of Chinese babies to increase the babies’ expected intelligence- 15%.
Within ten years the SAT testing service will require students to take a blood test to prove they are not on cognitive enhancing drugs. – 40%
All of the major candidates for the 2016 presidential election will have had samples of their DNA taken and analyzed (perhaps without the candidates’ permission.) The results of the analysis for each candidate will be widely disseminated and will influence many peoples' voting decisions - 70%
While president, Obama will announce support for a VAT tax - 70%.
While president, Obama will announce support for means testing Social Security - 70%
Within ten years the U.S. repudiates its debt either officially or with an inflation rate of over 100% for one year - 20%.
Within five years the Israeli economy will have been devastated because many believe there is a high probability that an atomic bomb will someday be used against Israel – 30%
Within ten years there will be another $200 billion+ Wall Street Bailout - 80%
"While president, Obama will announce support for means testing Social Security - 70%"
I'd be wiling to take those odds, with some refinements.
How about this - I win if before he leaves office I can point to a speech Obama gave in which he advocates means testing Social Security. Otherwise you win. The speech has to be given after today, so you don't fear this is some kind of trick.
If I win I get $100 from you. If you win I give you $233. But with these odds I'm indifferent to making the bet. So for me to be willing to bet I want you to agree that if Obama makes such a speech you have to pay me right away.
That works for me, with one little change. The end of his term needs to be counted as the end of a presidential election he doesn't win, rather than the inauguration of his successor. This is because the reason I don't think its very likely is that the political effects on him would be dire, so if he does it as a lame duck president he has nothing to lose. I'm still willing to take the risk on his second term since even a second-term president is subject to some political forces.
And as a clarification, I take "means testing" to mean increasing or decreasing social security payouts based on a person's assets or income. It also has to apply to US citizens to count.
And since I'm not an American, I'd just like to confirm that the best is in US dollars. That works for me, and I assume it works for you too.
OK, I accept - and yes the bet should be in U.S. dollars.
Please contact me at
EconomicProf@Yahoo.com so we can exchange addresses.
I'd take the other side on any of these if we can find a way to make it precise.
By the end of 2013: Either the Iranian regime is overthrown by popular revolution, or there is an overt airstrike against Iran by either the US or Israel, or Israel is attacked by an Iranian nuclear weapon (70%).
Essentially seconding mattnewport: the price of gold reaches $3000USD, or inflation of the US dollar exceeds 12% in one year (65%).
The current lull in the increase of the speed at which CPUs perform sequential operations comes to an end, yielding a consumer CPU that performs sequential integer arithmetic operations 4x as quickly as a modern 3GHz Xeon (80%).
Android-descended smartphones outnumber iPhone-descended smartphones (60%).
The number of IMAX theaters in the US triples (40%).
When you say sequential integer operations, do you mean integer operations that really are sequential? In other words, the instructions can't be performed in parallel because of data dependencies? If not, then this is already possible with a sufficiently wide superscalar processor or really big SIMD units.
But let's assume you really mean sequential integer operations. The only pipeline stage in this example that can't work on several instructions at once is the execute stage, so I'm assuming that's where the bottleneck is here. This means that the speed is limited by the clock frequency. So, here are two ways to achieve your prediction:
Crank up the clock! Find a way to get it up to 12 GHz without burning up.
Make the execute stage capable of running much faster than the rest of the processor does. This is natural for asynchronous processors; in normal operation the integer functional units will be sitting idle most of the time waiting for input, and the bulk of the time and complexity will be in fetching the instructions, decoding them, scheduling them, and in memory access and I/O. But in your contrived scenario, the integer math units could just go hog wild and the rest of the processor would keep them fed. This can be done with current semiconductor technology, I'm pretty sure.
So, either way, kind of an ambitious prediction. I like it.
I predict a 10% chance that I win my bet with Eliezer in the next decade (the one about a transhuman intelligence being created not by Eliezer, not being deliberately created for Friendliness, and not destroying the world.)
I'll go ahead and claim a 98% chance that, if a transhuman, non-Friendly intelligence is created, it makes things worse. And an 80% chance that this is in a nonrecoverable way.
I kinda hope you're right, but I just don't see how.
This prediction is technically consistent with my prediction (although this doesn't mean that I don't disagree with it anyway.)
In other words, one of us did not specify the prediction correctly.
I don't think it's me. I deliberately didn't say it'd destroy the world. Would it be correct to modify yours to say "..and not making the world a worse place"?
No. If you look at the original bet with Eliezer, he was betting that on those conditions, the AI would literally destroy the world. In other words, if both of us are still around, and I'm capable of claiming the money, I win the bet, even if the world is worse off.
Yup. If he lives to collect, he collects.
Assuming that there is, in fact, a correct way to specify the predictions. It's possible that you weren't actually disagreeing and that you both assign substantial probability to (world is made worse off but not destroyed | non-FAI is created) while still having a low probability for (non-FAI is created in the next decade).
I'll put down money on the other side of this prediction provided that we can agree on an objective definition of "transhuman intelligence".
My bet with Eliezer can be found at http://lesswrong.com/lw/wm/disjunctions_antipredictions_etc/.
I said there at the time, "As for what constitutes the AI, since we don't have any measure of superhuman intelligence, it seems to me sufficient that it be clearly more intelligent than any human being." Everyone's agreement that it is clearly more intelligent would be the "objective" standard.
In any case, I am risk averse, so I don't really want to bet on the next decade, which according to my prediction would give me a 90% chance of losing the bet. The bet with Eliezer was indefinite, since I already paid; I am simply counting on it happening within our lifetimes.
I like your side of the original bet because I think the probability that the first superintelligent AI will be only slightly smarter than humans, non-goal-driven, and non-self-improving, and therefore non-Singularity-inducing, is better than 1%. The reason I'm willing to bet against you on the above version is that I think 10% is way overconfident for a 10-year timeframe.
Would a sped-up upload count as super-intelligent in your opinion?
The second estimation in each paragraph is conditional on the first.
By 2020 some kind of CO2 emissions regulation (cap and trade) will be in place in the US(.85). But total CO2 emissions in the US for 2019 will be no less than 95% of total CO2 emissions for 2008 (.9).
Obama wins reelection (.7). The result will be widely attributed to an improving economy (in the media and in polls and whether or not the economy actually improves) (.85)
By 2020 open elections are held for the Iranian presidency (no significant factions excluded from participation) (.5). The president (or some other position selected through open elections) is the highest position in the Iranian state (.5)
"The president (or some other position selected through open elections) is the highest position in the Iranian state (.5)"
Qualify this. Formally, the highest position in the British state is unelected. In terms of political power, the highest position in the British state is elected.
In terms of political power.
Next Year
Next Decade
US states aren't allowed to secede. Not even Texas. The US government would lose so much prestige from the loss of a state, that they would never allow it. So it would require some kind of armed conflict that no one state could ever win.
Are you really certain that the federal government would send the military in to prevent a state seceding if secession was clearly the democratic will of the people of the state? I wouldn't rule out the possibility but I think it would be an unlikely outcome.
I'm pretty certain the federal government will not take the blow of a state leaving in the next decade, at least. They might be slightly more likely to let a quirky, small state like Vermont or New Hampshire leave, since clamping down on a tiny state would look bad, and the loss would be negligible. But then they would set a dangerous precedent for more important possible secessionist states like Texas (Texans are somewhat nationalistic, though also often super-american/patriotic), New Mexico (majority-minority state) or Alaska (active secessionist movement).
What exactly is the federal government going to do about it though? I think using the military to suppress a state that was attempting a peaceful secession would be very hard for the government to justify. It's a possibility but I think the probability is low that US troops would be deployed on US soil to prevent a state seceding. Plus I expect the federal government to have very major financial problems which will limit its ability to act.
Few people in 1982 would have predicted that the USSR would allow its constituent republics to secede peacefully within a decade.
It is settled legally, that the states do not have the authority to secede, they tried during the Civil War. Many people thought that states could leave the union at that time. However the precedent set by Lincoln's actions are unchallenged now by the legal establishment.
Anyway, the procedure would go like this:
then
2a. Federal government challenges legality of secession in courts.
3a. Supreme court declares the secession unconstitutional.
Or:
2b. Federal government charges rebels with Treason.
3b. Federal government arrests the secessionists. Using federal troops would likely not be necessary, since national guards are ultimately under the authority of the president, if he calls them up for national service.
Finally, if there was an armed insurrection by natives, they would be put down as domestic terrorists. It would certainly be embarrassing, but not as dangerous as the precedent set by a state leaving the union without a shot fired.
Obviously if the Federal government financially collapses in the next decade, this wouldn't be a problem. But that is very unlikely, since the government has the power to inflate away its debts. With the dollar as global reserve currency, it doesn't really have to worry about an Argentina situation.
I think it is likely that the dollar will not still be the global reserve currency by the end of the decade.
I don't see that happening -- which one or ones do you think are most likely to leave?
Scotland may well leave the UK (10%), or the UK leave the EU (15%).
Texas is probably the most likely but I can imagine a number of other possibilities. MatthewB's post above outlines a plausible case for California for example.
Being from Texas (I was born in Texas, but moved to CA in my mid-20s), I agree with you.
I noticed, when I went to school in Europe in the mid 80s that people there acted as if Texas was almost a different country from the rest of the USA. It was also easy for Europeans to recognize. When a foreign citizen, in Europe, was asked where they were from, Texans would usually answer "Texas", yet if a person from Louisiana, Alabama, Montana, Idaho, or some other more obscure state attempted to explain where they were from in the terms of their home state, it would usually devolve to "I am from the Southern USA" or "I am from the Northwest/Midwest USA".
Only New York and California seemed to enjoy this same recognition in Europe.
But, for Texans, they would consider themselves from Texas, first, and the USA second. Whereas most of the other US citizens from other states seemed to identify as USA citizens first, and then by their state.
Texas has a really strong independence from the USA, and it is pretty much the only state with an active Federal movement (movement to recognize the state as its own Nation). California also have one, but it is not nearly as diverse nor as active as that in TX.
However, despite the strong state recognition of its citizens, I think that there are other states that might lead the pack in an attempt to secede. Most of the former Confederate States still seem to have Very deep grudges against the federal gov't, and when I lived in GA for a few years back in 91/92, I was stunned at how many people I encountered who really believed that the Civil War was still not finished, and that The South Shall Rise Again!
Many Republicans seem to be fomenting this sort of thinking as well, with things like the Tea Baggers, or trying to force the recognition of the USA as a Christian Nation
I will take a bet on this, if you like. Also, did you perhaps mean "attempt to secede", or are you predicting actual success? I'll take the bet either way.
You'll have to define what constitutes an attempt.
Perhaps a vote goes through the state legislature in favor of secession?
On further reflection I think I need to revise my estimate down somewhat. Thinking on it further my 30% estimate is conditional on general trends that I think are more likely than not to occur but I did not correctly incorporate them into the estimate for secession. I think 10-15% is probably a better estimate taking that into account.
I think the political pressure for secession will stem from an extended period of economic weakness in the US and widespread fiscal crises in states like California and New York. If, as seems likely, federal aid is seen to go disproportionately to certain states that have the most troubled finances then the states that feel they are losing out will begin to see secession as an attractive option. My original estimate did not sufficiently account for the possibility that I am wrong about the economic troubles ahead however.
I would still be willing to take a bet at these odds, given some reasonably clear-cut definition of "attempt to secede".
I think we could probably hammer out a mutually agreeable definition but the decade time frame for a pay out makes a bet on this impractical I feel. I'm reasonably comfortable making a bet to be settled next January but a bet to be settled in 2020 doesn't seem practical through an agreement on a forum.
I would be very happy to accept a bet with you on those odds if there's a way to sort it out. I'd define major as any attack with more than ten deaths.
I voted all the betting comments up because I think this is awesome. Does this kind of thing happen often here?
I occasionally offer people bets, but I think this has been the first time for me that the subject of contention is the right shape for betting to be a real possibility.
Do you have a PayPal account? I'd be willing to wager $50 USD to be paid within 2 weeks of Jan 1st 2011 if you're interested. I can provide my email address. That would rely on mutual trust but I don't know of any websites that can act as trusted intermediaries. Do you know of anything like that?
For $50, trust-based is OK with me.
How about this wording? "10 or more people will be killed on US soil during 2010 as the result of a deliberate attack by a party with a political goal, not overtly the act of any state". And if we hit an edge case where we disagree on whether this has been met, we'll do a poll here on LW and accept the results of the poll. Sound good?
I'd like to change the wording slightly to "on US soil, or on a flight to or from the US" if that's alright with you (even though I think an attack on an aircraft is less likely than an attack not involving aircraft). A poll here sounds like a fair way to resolve any dispute. I expect to still be reading/posting here fairly regularly in a year but I'm also happy to provide my email address if you want.
Do you think this was a terrorist attack? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Hood_shooting
Excellent question! If such an attack happens this year, I'd say it wasn't a terrorist attack, but if mattnewport felt that it was I'd pay out without making a poll.
I'd lean towards saying it was a terrorist attack but I'm sufficiently uncertain about how to classify it that I'd be happy to let a community poll settle the question.
The term "terrorism" is usually taken to mean an attack on civilians, though as a legal matter, this is far from settled. This definition would exclude the Fort Hood shooting, where the targets were soldiers. In any case, the bet is over non-state, politically motivated killing, which is broader and would include Fort Hood, I think.
FWIW: The targets at Fort Hood were soldiers, but predictably-disarmed soldiers. In the area Hasan attacked, the soldiers he shot at aren't allowed to carry weapons or even have them within easy reach. So it's more analogous to shooting up a bar frequented by soldiers that takes your weapons at the door.
Plus, his attack was intended to spread terror, not to achieve a military objective (any weakness he inflicted on the army capability itself was probably a secondary goal).
I was going to ask whether people would classify the recent attack on the IRS building in Texas as terrorism. It wouldn't qualify for the bet either way because there was only 1 casualty but I'm curious if people think it would count as terrorism?
Bob Murphy's post, excerpting Glen Greenwald, summarizes my position very well. In short:
1) What Stack did meets the reasonable definition of terrorism: "deliberate use of violence against noncombatants to achieve political or social goals by inducing terror [in the opposing population]".
2) Most of what the government is classifying as terrorism, isn't. Fighting an invading army, no matter how unjust your cause may be, is not terrorism. Whetever injustice you may be committing does not additionally count as terrorism. Yet the label is being applied to insurgents.
3) It's in the government's interest, in taking over the terrorism label, that Stack not be called a terrorist, because he seems too (otherwise) normal. People want to think of terrorists as being "different"; a middle-aged, high-earning programmer ain't the image they have in mind, and if they did have that in mind, they'd be more resistant to make concessions in the name of fighting terrorism.
Could you email me so I have your address too? paul at ciphergoth.org. Thanks!
Had limited Internet access over the New Year, I've sent you an email.
Fine with me. My email is paul at ciphergoth.org. How exciting!
Re: "10 or more people will be killed on US soil during 2010 as the result of a deliberate attack by a party with a political goal, not overtly the act of any state".
How come "Pakistan" got dropped? A contributing reason for the claim being unlikely was that it was extremely specific.
From the wording, it seemed that the 50% was for any attack, not just one with Pakistan involved. I think I'm on to a pretty good bet even without it. It's not as unlikely as a US state seceding, but I didn't want to wait ten years :-)
The US State seceding is something that many of my friends sit around contemplating. We have had speculations about whether it will be a state like Mississippi, or South Carolina (Red), or if it will be a state like California or Oregon (Blue).
The Red States are pretty easy to understand why they might wish to secede from the heathen atheistic socialist nazi USA... But, the motivations for a Blue State are a bit more complex.
For instance, in California, I have noticed a lot of people complaining about how much money this state pays into Social Security, yet only gets back about 10% of that money. If we were able to get back all of it, instead of supporting states like South Carolina or Mississippi, we would be able to go a long way toward solving many of our own social ills. Not to mention that many in CA chafe under having to belong to the same union as states such as those I have mentioned, and thus have issues with being able to even pursue social solutions that might pay off big (Stem Cell research, Legalization & regulation of narcotics, work and skills training for inmates - and socialization skills for the same, infrastructure work to which the USA is slow to commit, and so on).
All of these are also issues that Red States like to brag about being able to focus on if they were to secede. The only problem with most Red States is, just like in the Civil War, they have little to no economy of their own. Texas (Maybe Florida) is really the exception. Also, should a Red State secede, most of the best and brightest would flee the state (Academics usually don't like working under ideological bonds, for instance).
It will be interesting to see what would happen should a state try to secede. I think it could be the best thing that could happen to our country if things continue to become divisive.
Oh, I see - sorry!
I looked into who was going to win such a bet.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_assassinations_and_acts_of_terrorism_against_Americans
...looks like a reasonable resource on the topic.
I'm not sure that the acts of a single person with no associations with anyone else are really the sort of thing I had in mind, but it's too late to refine the bet now, so we'll see whether people think such a thing counts if we need to.
"10 or more people [...] as the result of a deliberate attack" seems to suggest that 10 assassinations in 2010 would probably not qualify - unless it was proved that they were all linked. My summary of the link is that there have been few terrorist attacks against Americans on American soil recently.
Agreed.
What makes your think 2010 is the year? I mean, this has even been floating around lately. And at 99%^h^h^h50% confidence!
That was 99% confidence that the response will be disproportionate to the magnitude of the attack, if an attack takes place, not 99% confidence that there will be an attack. My odds of an attack were 50%. I think an attack is fairly unlikely to be on an aircraft - security is relatively tight on aircraft compared to other possible targets.
I'll agree that if anything happens, or even if something doesn't (is thwarted), the response will be silly and disproportionate. However, I still think you're way too high with 50%.
You must specify disproportionately high, or disproportionately low.
I thought disproportionately high went without saying (but then I would with a confidence level that high wouldn't I?)
A declaration of war, curtailment of liberties, or other expenditure of resources more than ten times the loss of resources (including life, which is not priceless) it tries prevent.
Is there a standard method for assigning a numerical value to liberties?
The money those people would pay to avoid the loss of liberty, had they the option.
That's a valid measure, but it would require a fairly complicated study to actually get a value for it.
This is the sort of thing I was thinking of and expect to see more of.
Haven't riots been going on in Greece pretty regularly? (eg, 11/2009) Did you put at 50% the chance that the riots in Greece would stop? Maybe it was reasonable to put at 50% the chance that the riots would stay at 2009 levels and 50% the chance that they would go back to 12/2008 levels, but it's not clear that "significant" should mean that.
Yes, Greece had riots in 2009. I expected increased civil unrest in developed countries in 2010. My impression is that there is more civil unrest in Greece now than there was last year but I don't know how to objectively measure that which makes me think I was not specific enough with my prediction in this case.
Since nobody took the other side of the bet it doesn't matter too much. I'm more interested in how my investments pan out as they represent real bets on my predictions - it's not much use being right if you can't turn it into profit.
I'm going to call this a hit but it was pretty much a gimme. My 80% estimate may have been too low.
U.S. Retail Sales Unexpectedly Fall After Bigger Gain
I'm inclined to call this a confirmation of the first part of my prediction but in retrospect I could have been more specific as to what would constitute confirmation. As to the resulting market turmoil that constitutes the second half of my prediction, I'd say that's unconfirmed as yet and is also rather unspecific. I'm actually now betting real money on market turmoil by buying VXX which is a bet on increased volatility so I still stand by the second half of the prediction.
I'm going to attempt to continue posting updates on the state of my 1 year predictions as relevant news develops. This prediction exercise is only useful if outcomes are tracked.
I'm not going to claim this [1] as a confirmation of that prediction but I expect to see a lot more of these kinds of demonstrations and on a larger scale. Flaming torches are just the start, the metaphorical pitchforks will come.
I'm curious what the response of the secret service would be to a group of demonstrators with flaming torches surrounding the White House.
[1] "Fire and ice: On Monday, hundreds of people gathered outside the residence of Icelandic President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson in Reykjavik, where they held torches and delivered a petition asking him not to sign the controversial debt legislation."
Great example of what I'm talking about. I'd challenge you on most of those actually, if there was a convenient and well structured betting forum, but none of them seem crazy to me.
None of the others do, but this one seems ludicrous to me.
30% probability might be around the point where we start to call things ludicrous. If you talk seriously about things that you think have a 10% chance of happening, you will be beyond the point where most people call it ludicrous, or even crazy; they simply will not understand or believe that that's what you mean.
This comment provides more confirmation for a view I've held for a long time, and which was particularly reinforced by some of the reactions to (the first version of) my Amanda Knox post.
People have trouble distinguishing appropriately among degrees of improbability. This generalizes both underconfidence and overconfidence, and is part of what I regard as a cluster of related errors, including underestimating the size of hypothesis space and failing to judge the strength of evidence properly. (These problems are the reason that judicial systems can't trust people to decide cases without all kinds of artificial-seeming procedures and rules about what kind of evidence is "allowed".)
The reality is that given all the numerous events and decisions we experience on a daily basis and throughout our lives, something with a 10% chance of happening or being true is something that we need to take quite seriously indeed. 10% is, easily, planning-level probability; it should attract a significant amount of our attention. By the same token, something which isn't worth seriously planning on shouldn't be getting more than single digits of probability-percentage, if that.
There is a vast, huge spectrum of degrees of improbability below 1% (never mind 10% or 30%) that careful thinking can allow us to distinguish, even if our evolved intuitions don't. Consider for instance the following ten propositions:
(1) The Republicans will win control of both houses of Congress in the 2010 elections.
(2) It will snow in Los Angeles this winter.
(3) There will be a draft in the U.S. by 2020.
(4) I will be dead in a month.
(5) Amanda Knox (or Raffaele Sollecito) was involved in Meredith Kercher's death.
(6) A U.S. state will make a serious attempt to secede by 2020.
(7) The Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, as opposed to the many-worlds interpretation, is correct.
(8) A marble statue has waved or will wave at someone due to quantum tunneling.
(9) Jesus of Nazareth rose from the dead.
(10) Christianity is true.
I listed these in (approximately) order of improbability, from most probable to least probable. Now, all of them would be described in ordinary conversation as "extremely improbable". But there are enormous differences in the degrees of improbability among them, and moreover, we have the ability to distinguish these degrees, to a significant extent.
The 10%-30% range is for propositions like (1) ; the 1%-10% range for things like (2) (the last time it snowed in LA was in the 1960s). Around 1% is about right for (3). Propositions (4), (5), and (6) occupy something like the interval from 0.01% to 1% (I find it hard to discriminate in this range, and in particular to judge these three against each other). Propositions (8), (9), and (10), however, are in a completely different category of improbability: double-digit negative exponents, if you're being conservative. We could argue about (7), but it probably belongs somewhere in between (4)-(6) and (8)-(10); maybe around 10^(-10), if you account for post-QM theories somehow turning Copenhagen into something more mundane than it seems now.
So the point is, we, right here, have the tools to make estimates that are a lot more meaningful than "probably yes" or "probably no". I remember reading that we tend to be overconfident on hard things and underconfident on easy things; I think we can afford to be a little more bold on the no-brainers.
It would of course be sacrilegious to place (8) below (9) and (10). Nevertheless even in the case of apparently overwhelming evidence, if you disagree with a mainstream belief 10^(-20) times you will be wrong rather a lot more than once.
Meanwhile, quantum tunnelling is a specific phenomenon which, if possible (very likely) gives fairly clear bounds on just how ridiculously improbable it is for a marble statue to wave. Even possible improbable worlds which make quantum tunnelling more likely still leave (8) less probable than (9) (but perhaps not 10).
I personally place (10) at no less than 10^(-5) and would be comfortable accusing anyone going below 10^(-7) of being confused about probabilities (at least as related to human beliefs).
Like most majoritarian arguments, this throws away information: the relevant reference class is "mainstream beliefs you think are that improbable". (edit: no, I didn't read the whole sentence) In that class, it's not obvious to me that one would certainly be wrong more than once, if one could come up with 10^20 independent mainstream propositions that unlikely and seriously consider them all while never going completely insane. Going completely insane in the time required to consider one proposition seems far more likely than 10^-20, but also seems to cancel out of any decision, so it makes sense to implicitly condition everything on basic sanity.
(Related: Horrible LHC Inconsistency)
(9), and (10) for some definitions of "Christianity", being more likely than (8) seems conceivable due to interventionist simulators (something I really have no idea how to reason about), but not for any other object-level reason I can think of. Can you think of others?
I'd be inclined to accuse anyone going above... something below 10^-7... of being far too modest.
No, that is the reference class intended and described ("apparently overwhelming evidence").
Your prior is wrong (that is, it does not reflect the information that is freely available to you).
Considering normal levels of sanity are sufficient. Failing to account for the known weaknesses in your reasoning is a failure of rationality.
I am comfortable accusing you of being confused about probabilities as related to human beliefs.
Well under 30% certainly, but I wouldn't give it under 4%. A decade is long and the US is young.
I think a draft is much more likely.
You display a pessimism much greater than I think is warranted. My predictions for some of your statements:
Next decade:
Next year:
These seem overly optimistic to me. Maybe increase the numbers by 50% to 100% other than 99?
I estimate 90% odds that Emotiv's EPOC will fail like the Segway did.
I have one of these puppies. It's the most fickle device I've laid my hands on. It's useless for anything except gaining nerd status points. Hey, do you guys want me to post a detailed review? :)
I'd like to see a review, but it isn't a LW thing. It would be nice to have a forum / news structure, so that we could have a section for "Off-topic posts". Heck, it would be nice to sort the posts by topic.
Isn't that what tags are for?
A killer application for augmented reality is likely to be the integration of communication channels. Today's, cellular phones annoy people with constant accountability and stress, not to mention spotty coverage, but if a HUD relay over life can display text messages as they are sent and invite fluid shifts to voice conversation. When video is engaged and shared, people could also see what their potential conversation partner is doing prior to requesting attention, giving distributed social life some of the fluidity and contextual awareness of natural social life. These sorts of benefits will motivate the teenagers of 2020 to broadcast much of their lives and to interpret the absence of their friend's data streams as a low intensity request not to call. Archival will at first be a secondary but relatively minor benefit from the technology, but will ultimately widen the divide between public and private life, a disaster for privacy advocates but a boon for academic science (by normalizing the publication of all data). Paranormal beliefs will also tend to decline, as the failure to record paranormal events and the fallibility of memory both become more glaring.
Robin Hanson makes a similar prediction in 'Enhancing Our Truth Orientation' (pp. 362-363):
There are already plenty of supposedly "paranormal" events recorded on Youtube, as well as elsewhere. With the increase of recording devices, many more such things will be recorded, and paranormal beliefs will increase.
On a AR theme I think there will be a high level language created within ten years for AR that will try to make the following accessible
People will want to mash up different AR services in one "view" so you don't have to switch between them. There needs to be a lingua franca and HTML doesn't seem suited. I'd think it likely that it will be some XML variant.
If AR gets any sort of popularity, even just among early adopters, I guarantee you that there will be several competing tools for doing what you describe, with more coming out every month.
It already has a sort of popularity. There are already startups working in the field.
If you want to keep abreast of the field keep an eye on Bruce Sterling's Blog.
I think these are great predictions.
Better than even odds that in 2020:
GDP per capita at purchasing power parity for Singapore will be more than US$80,000 in 2008 dollars.
GDP per capita for China (PRC), will be more than twice 2009 GDP
Tourism to suborbital space will cost less than $50000.
My second prediction is that the largest area of impact from technological change over the next decade will come from increasing communications bandwidth. Supercomputers a hundred times more powerful than those that exist today don't look revolutionary, while ubiquitous ultra-cheap wireless broadband makes storage and processing power less important. Improvements in small scale energy storage, tech transfer from e-paper and lower power computer chips will probably help make portable personal computers more energy efficient, but for always-on augmented reality (and its sister-tech robotics) in areas with ubiquitous broadband computing off-site is the way to go.
And distributed to more people. >60% of people will have at least 1 Mb/s internet access by 2020 (75%).
Latency worries me, though. Bandwidth has been improving a lot faster than latency for a while now. For always-on augmented reality, I think that we're going to need some seriously more power-efficient computing so we can do latency-limited tasks locally. (Also, communication takes energy too -- often more than computation.)
Good news on that, by the way: modern embedded computer architecture and manufacturing techniques are going in the right direction for this. 3D integration will allow shorter wires, making all digital logic much more power efficient. Network-on-chip architectures will make it easier to incorporate special-purpose hardware for image recognition and such. And if you stick the memory right on top of your processor, that goes a long way to speeding it up and cutting down on energy used per operation. If you want to get even more radical, you could try something like bit-serial asynchronous processors (PDF) or something even stranger.
</nerding-out>
Agree on the trend, but I'd put significant odds on some (as yet unexpected) trend being "the largest area of impact" in retrospect.
Do you have any ideas about how the scale of the impact from various different technological changes should be measured in this context? As far as I know, there is no standard metric for this. So, I am not clear about what you mean.
We will end the decade with some mobile energy storage system with an energy density close to or better than fat metabolism.
ETA: I mean in the context of electronics.
From looking at the diagram, aren't we starting the decade with such a system (gasoline)?
You are the second person to mistake my intent. I meant in the field of mobile electronics. Take a look at where lithium ion is on this chart.
The graph you link to says magnesium and diesel already have greater energy density than fat.
So, I think you have to specify how portable, how common or cheap, and maybe whether you are talking about rechargable or not - or the prediction is probably going to be vague - and subject to the criticism that it has already happened.
I meant commonly used for powering portable electronics. I don't assign a high probability to this. It is the upper bound of what I think worth discussing.
Right. TNT does not count as a mobile energy storage system.
I think you're wrong; but it's a really interesting prediction.
The reason I think you're wrong is that the rate of improvement of technologies in a field is more-or-less fixed within a field, because it depends on the economics, not on the science. Moore's Law exists not because there's some magic about semiconductors, but because the market is sized and structured such that you need to sell people a new system every 2 years, and you need to double performance to get people to buy a new system.
This means you can look at the past exponential curve for battery density, and project it into the future with some confidence. I don't know what the exponent per year is; but my gut feeling before checking any data or doing any calculations is that it isn't high enough.
I disagree.
I am typing this on a machine I bought 6 years ago. Its CPU speed is still competitive with current hardware. This lack of speedup is not because processor manufacturers chaven't been trying to make processors faster; they have. The reason for the lack of speedup is that it is hard to do. The problem is more to do with the nature of physical reality than the structure and economics of the computer industry.
Consider cars. They do not halve in price every two years. Why not? Because they are designed to move people around, and people are roughly the same size they have always been. But computers move bits around, and bits can be made very small (both in terms of the size of circuitry and the power dissipated); this is the fundamental reason why the computer/communications industry has been able to halve prices / double capabilities every year or two for the last half century.
I don't think there is an exponent curve as such for battery tech. Li-ion came in about 2006? And nothing much has improved since then. The trouble with batteries is you can't just shrink components and get some improvement as you do with semi-conductors. Your components are already on the atomic scale. So more fundamental breakthroughs are needed.
The prediction is based mainly on our increasing control of biology and the ability to work on the small scale. If nothing else we'll invent a way to metabolise fat or other carbohydrates to electricity and have small home bioreactors that produce carbs and make nice little cartridges for people to plug into their electronics. Maybe not in 10 years, but some substantial movement is definitely possible in this direction.
A graph of battery energy density between 1985 and 2008:
http://www.kk.org/thetechnium/Battery%20Energy%20Density.jpg
Extrapolate away!
What about some of the advances in micro-generators and Fuel-Cells that I have read about?
For instance, I have seen one of those tiny turbine engines running to power an equally tiny generator, and it looked to provide a hellofa lotta power for its size. I know the military is putting them into some applications in the field, so it will probably not be too terribly long before we see them on things like Laptops/tablets or cell phones.
I haven't seen anything recent on these. Any keywords to google? The key thing for a consumer electronics application is ease of getting the fuel. People don't want to have to head out to the shops to get it every few days, which is why rechargeable batteries are the current winner.
Try "MIT Micro Turbine Generator". That will get you to the base technology. I tried to find the DARPA Page, but it seems to have been buried. The MIT Technology has also got a lot smaller from the 2006 initial turbines, which were roughly the size of a quarter. They know measure less than 1cm on a side. The Generator that creates the electricity from these things is roughly the same size as the turbine. It basically looks like a DVD Motor (really flat and broad).
I saw them as a field power source for laser designator and weapon (a modified laser designator that could be used as a sniper weapon), and as a source for communications gear. They used the same propellant that a butane lighter uses (that stuff in an aerosol can), They were said to run much longer than one day of full use on one charge.
The problems with them:
Heat and noise. They make a high pitched whine that can be muffled, yet is still easy to pick up on a mic that has the appropriate filtering software. The heat can also be shielded, but it creates a problem for the user. A last rumor that I hear is that when these things fail, they can cause the propellant to burn off. I have only heard one person talking about that though.
MIT is not the only one to come up with small turbines to use as power sources. some of the really small jet-turbine engines (1/2" in diameter, and 2" to 3" long) have been discovered to be excellent power sources as well when coupled to a generator.
Two semesters ago, I looked into making my own micro-turbine as a project for an engineering lab (I couldn't find anyone willing to donate the Mill Time on a CAD/CAM mill to make the turbine blades, and I couldn't afford the ready made ones). This is what led to my discovery of most of these (and then friends helped with actually seeing one).
I am 99% confident that AGI comparable to or better than a human, friendly or otherwise, will not be developed in the next ten years.
I am 75% confident that within ten years, the Bayesian paradigm of AGI will be just yet another more or less useful spinoff of the otherwise failed attempt to build AGI.
Can you be more specific about what you mean by the Bayesian paradigm of AGI? Is it necessarily a subset of good-old-fashioned symbolic AI? In that case, it's been dead for years. But if not, I can't easily imagine how you're going to enforce Bayes' theorem; or what you're going to enforce it on.
Here's an example of what I had in mind by "the Bayesian paradigm" -- see especially pp.12-13. Bayesian reasoning may be the one correct form of reasoning about probabilities, just as the first-order predicate calculus is the one correct form of reasoning about the true and the false, but that does not make of it a method to automatically solve problems.
I also had in mind something broader than just Bayesian reasoning, although that's a major part: the coupling of that with a goal system based on utility functions and their maximisation (the major thrust of the paper I linked).
Shane Legg gives a 10% probability of that here:
http://www.churchofvirus.org/bbs/attachments/agi-prediction.png
My estimate here is a bit bigger - maybe around 15%:
http://alife.co.uk/essays/how_long_before_superintelligence/graphics/pdf_no_xp.png
You seem to be about ten times more confident than us. Is that down to greater knowledge - or overconfidence?
You seem to be about ten times less confident than me. Is that down to greater knowledge - or underconfidence?
I'm not very confident - primarily because we are talking ten years out - and the future fairly rapidly turns into a fog of possibilities which makes it difficult to predict.
Which brings us back to why you seem so confident. What facts, or observations are the ones you find which provide the most compelling evidence that intelligent machines are at least ten years off. Indeed, how do you know that the NSA doesn't have such a machine chained up in its basement right now?
The NSA does have some scary machines chained in their "Basement," yet I doubt any of them approach AGI. All of them(that I am aware of - so, that would be 2) are geared toward some pretty straightforward real-time data mining, and I am told that the other important gizmos do pretty much the same thing (except with crypto).
I doubt that they have anything in the NSA (or other spooky agencies) that significantly outstrips many of the big names in Enterprise. After all, the Government does go to the same names to buy its supercomputers that everyone else does. It's just the code that would differ.
So: you have a hotline to the NSA, and they tell you about all their secret technology?!? This is one of the most secretive organisations ever! If you genuinely think you know what they are doing, that is probably because they have you totally hoodwinked.
Hardly a hotline... A long, long time ago, when I was very young, I wound up working with the NSA for about six months. I was supposed to have finished school and gone to work for them full time... But, I flaked when I discovered that I could get laid pretty easily (women seemed much more important than an education at the time).
I still keep in touch, and I have found that an awful lot of their work is not hard to find out about. They may have me hoodwinked, as my job was hoodwinking others. However, I don't usually spend my time with any of my former co-workers talking about stuff that they shouldn't be talking about. Most of it is about stuff that is out in the open, yet that most people don't care about, or don't know about (usually because it's dead boring to most people).
And, I am not aware that I have stumbled onto any secret technology. Just two machines that I found to be freakishly smart. One of them did stuff that Google can probably now do (image recognition), and I am pretty sure that the other used something very similar to Mathematica. I was really impressed by them, but then I also did not know that things like Mathematica existed at the time. At the time I saw them, I was told by my handler than they were "Nothing compared to the monsters in the garage."
Edit: Anyone may feel free to think that I am a nut-job if they wish. At this point, I have little to no proof of anything at all about my life due to the loss of everything I ever owned when my wife ran off. So, you may take my comments with a grain of salt until I am better known.
It hasn't worked in sixty years of trying, and I see nothing in the current revival to suggest they have any ideas that are likely to do any better. To be specific, I mean people such as Marcus Hutter, Shane Legg, Steve Omohundro, Ben Goertzel, and so on -- those are the names that come to me off the top of my head. And by their current ideas for AGI I mean Bayesian reasoning, algorithmic information theory, AIXI, Novamente, etc.
I don't think any of these people are stupid or crazy (which is why I don't mention Mentifex in the same breath as them), and I wouldn't try to persuade any of them out of what they are doing unless I had something demonstrably better, but I just don't believe that collection of ideas can be made to work. The fundamental thing that is lacking in AGI research, and always has been, is knowledge of how brains work. The basic ideas that people have tried can be classified as (1) crude imitation of the lowest-level anatomy (neural nets), (2) brute-forced mathematics (automated reasoning, logical or probabilistic), or (3) attempts to code up what it feels like to be a mind (the whole cognitive AI tradition).
My estimates are unaffected by hypothetical possibilities for which there is no evidence, and are protected against that lack of evidence.
Besides, the current state of the world is not suggestive of the presence of AIs in it.
ETA: But this is becoming a digression from the purpose of the thread.
Thanks for sharing. As previously mentioned, we share a generally negative impression of the chances of success in the next ten years.
However, it appears that I give more weight to the possibility that there are researchers within companies, within government organisations, or within other countries who are doing better than you suggest - or that there will be at some time over the next ten years. For example, Voss's estimate (from a year ago) was "8 years" - see: http://www.vimeo.com/3461663
We also appear to differ on our estimates of how important knowledge of how brains work will be. I think there is a good chance that it will not be very important.
Ignorance about NSA projects might not affect our estimates, but perhaps it should affect our confidence in them. An NSA intelligent agent might well remain hidden - on national security grounds. After all, if China's agent found out for sure that America had an agent too, who knows what might happen?
I would guess that the NSA is more interested in quantum computing than in AI.
They are the National Security Agency. Which of those areas presents the biggest potential threat to national security? With a machine intelligence, you could build all the quantum computers you would ever need.
This is my sense as well. I also think there is a substantial limit on what we're likely to learn about the brain given that we can't study brain functionality with large scope, neuron-level definition, in real time given obvious ethical constraints. Does anyone know of any technologies on the horizon that could change this in the next ten years?
My first prediction is that as is usually the case, political and random events will change the way people live far more over the next year than technology will. Given the current state of the financial system, I would place about even odds on politics having more impact than technology over the next decade, but with the caveat that over such a long time scale political and technological events will surely be interwoven.
There's no separation to be had between politics and technology.
The biggest influence on technology is regulation which outlaws, restricts, or places huge financial barriers to entry (as with medical research); another non-trivial influence is politically controlled financing of R&D.
And arguably, the biggest influence on politics that isn't itself political is technology (case in point: modern communications, computer, and the Internet spreading censored information, creating more popular awareness and coordinating protests.)
So I think political and technological events are inseparable over almost any timescale.
I agree that there is little to no separation, but I think a distinction can be made. Namely, there are two different words that mean different things. When predicting what is going to affect people you can probably find a way to split the techno-political mash usefully. This may be as simple as using one word over the other.
It seems pretty vague - do you have any ideas about how this should be measured?
Carry-on luggage on US airlines will be reduced to a single handbag that inspectors can search thoroughly, in 2010 or 2011.
I get into UC Berkeley - 70%
Secession: If you mean a state trying to leave the US in the next decade, 5%. If you mean a state actually being allowed to leave, I put it at 0%.
Insurrection in the next decade: I'm defining an insurrection as at least 1000 people in the same or closely allied organizations with military weapons taking violent action against the US government: 30%. They'll lose. It's certainly possible that my opinion on this is based on reading too much left wing material which is very nervous about the right. On the other hand, 1000 isn't a lot of people.
All predictions are 10 years out unless otherwise noted.
The rest of the world: Another EU-style organization gets started: 30%. The advantages of having a large population are getting obvious, and it's astonishing to me to see countries begging for a chance to give up some national sovereignty.
Fabbing: Automated custom shoes: 50%. Possibly wishful thinking-- I have feet which aren't quite in the easy-to-fit range.
On one hand, there's a massive market. On the other, shoes are a way of signaling status, and it's probable that I wildly underestimate how hard it is to put a shoe together. And shoes are a way of signaling status, so a custom machine shoe for the general market can't look much different from the standard shoes.
Custom machine shoes will start out expensive, and be for the athletic market.
Another product: Sous vide cookers (poaching food in vacuum-sealed bags at precisely controlled temperatures: has many good effects and should be especially appealing to geeks) will be down to $200 within 5 years (80%) and half as common as microwaves within 10 years (50%).
Obama will be re-elected unless he is assassinated (5%), there is a major terrorist attack on US soil (I'm not betting on that one, too random, and how he responds will have an unpredictable effect, too), or the economy doesn't improve (I think it will, but don't have a percentage).
Surely you mean "my estimate rounds to 0%"?
I meant 0%, but you probably have a point that I should present the chance as negligible rather than non-existent. Is there a limit, though? Does it make sense to say that there's a non-zero chance that a state will propose secession and be allowed to leave by tomorrow morning?
Yep. It even makes sense to say that there's a non-zero chance that a state seceded last month, and that we haven't heard about it yet. The word 'epsilon' is useful in such cases; it means 'nearly zero' or 'too close to zero to calculate'.
"Negligible" is a much better word, in my opinion, since epsilon is (conventionally) an arbitrarily small number, not a sufficiently small number. You could use "infinitesimal", but nothing in reality is actually infinitesimally small (including probabilities), so again you'd be inaccurate. I always get frustrated when people misuse precise mathematical words that have lots of syllables in them. The syllables are there to discourage colloquial use! I don't mind if you try to show off your knowledge, but for heaven's sake don't screw up and use that precise brainy term wrong!
You're straddling a strange line here. You're demanding a certain amount of strictness that is itself short of perfect strictness.
There's no such thing as an "arbitrarily small number". There are numbers chosen when any positive number might have been chosen. In particular, a given epsilon need not be "negligible". Really, to conform to the strict mathematical usage, one shouldn't say "epsilon" without first saying "For every". Once you're not demanding that, you're not using the "precise mathematical words" in the precise mathematical way.
I'm not saying that you're on some slippery slope where anything goes. But I wouldn't say that AdeleneDawner is either.
Actually, I'm fine with people speaking vaguely, I just don't want to see terminology misused.
"Through adding zeroes between the decimal point and the 7 in the string '.7', the number we are representing can be made arbitrarily small." Is this a misuse of the word "arbitrarily"?
The important think about an epsilon in a mathematical proof is, conventionally, that it can be made arbitrarily small. This is a human interpretation I am adding on to the proof itself. If the important thing about a variable in a proof was that the variable could become arbitrarily large, my guess is that a variable other than epsilon would not be used.
Your usage is fine, so long as it's clear that "arbitrarily small" is a feature of the set from which you are choosing numbers, or of the process by which you are constructing numbers, and not of any particular number in that set. This is clear with the context that you give above. It wasn't as clear to me when you wrote that "epsilon is (conventionally) an arbitrarily small number".
'Kay.
I'm not the only one you should be ranting at, though - I picked it up here, not in a math class, and I suggested it because it's in common use.
Yep, it is probably unrealistic to expect random folks to avoid picking up multisyllable terms in the way they pick up regular words.
Don't forget "modulo".
Suppose that Nancy meant 0% except for a few special cases that she didn't think should be relevant. Then she could say, '0% modulo some special cases'.
I often use epsilon in the same informal way AdeleneDawner does, though I'm perfectly aware of the formal use. Still, I think the informal use of "modulo" is more defensible - it maps more closely to the mathematical meaning of "ignoring this particular class of ways of being different"
Could you explain this in greater detail? This way of using "modulo" bothers me significantly, and I think it's because I either don't know about one of the ways "modulo" is used in math, or I have an insufficiently deep understanding of the one way I do know that it's used.
In modulo arithmetic, adding or subtracting the base does not change the value. Thus, 12 modulo 9 is the same as 3 modulo 9. Thus, for example, "my iPhone is working great modulo the Wifi connection" implies that if you can subtract the base ("the Wifi connection") you can transform a description of the current state of my iPhone into "working great".
(For your amusement: modulo in the Jargon File. Epsilon is there too.)
Edit: Actually, in this case, you would have to add the base, because my Wifi isn't working, but the statement remains the same.
No predictions about the state of the environment? Is every point of contention too close to call, then?
Next 10 years:
Nativism discredited (80%)
Traditional economics discredited (80%)
Cognitivism/computationalism discredited (70%)
Generative linguistics discredited (60%)
To elaborate somewhat: By #1 I mean that in the fields of biology, psychology and neuroscience the idea that behaviours or ideas or patterns of thought can be "innate" will be marginalised and not accepted by mainstream researchers.
By #2 I mean that, not only will behavioural economics provide accounts of deviations from traditional economic models, but mainstream economists will accept that these models need to be discarded completely and replaced from the ground-up with psychologically-plausible models.
By #3 I mean the idea that the brain can be thought of as a computer and the "mind" as its algorithms will be marginalised. I give this lower odds than nativism being discredited only because the cognitivist tradition has managed to sustain itself through belligerence rather than evidence and is therefore likely to be more persistent and pernicious. Nativism, on the other hand, has persisted because of the difficulty of experimentally demonstrating that certain behaviours are learned rather than innate (as well as belligerence).
By #4 I mean that traditional linguistics, and especially generative grammar, will be marginalised. This one has long puzzled me since the generative grammarians based their ideas on intuition and explicitly deny a role for data or experiment (or the need to reconcile their beliefs with biology). The main problem has been the absence of a viable alternative research program. This is beginning to change.
If we could agree on a suitable judging mechanism, I would bet up to $10,000 against you on #1 and on #3 at those odds (or even at substantially different odds). I also disagree on the latter claim in #2, but that's not as much of a slam dunk for me as the others.
Can you unpack what you mean by innate. I think babies would have a hard time surviving if sucking things wasn't a behaviour that was with them from their genes.
And more generally, the distinction innate/learned is overly simplistic in a lot of contexts; rather, there are adaptations that determine the way organism develops depending on its environment. The standard reference I know of is
J. Tooby & L. Cosmides (1992). `The psychological foundations of culture'. In J. Barkow, L. Cosmides, & J. Tooby (eds.), The adapted mind: Evolutionary psychology and the generation of culture. Oxford University Press, New York.
A few thoughts:
It would be valuable to do an outside view sanity check: historically, how frequently have research programs of similar prestige been discredited?
There are all the standard problems with authority---lots of folks insist that they're in the mainstream and that opposing views have been discredited. Clearly nativism &c. have been discredited in your mind; when do they get canonically discredited? Sometimes I almost think that everyone would be better off if everyone just directly talked about how the world really is rather than swiping at the integrity of each other's research programs, but I'm probably just being naive.
Re 3, my domain knowledge is somewhat weak, so everyone ignore me if my very words are confused, but I'm not sure what would count as a refutation or the mind being an algorithm. Surely (surely?) most would agree that the brain is not literally a computer as we ordinarily think of computers, but I understand algorithm in the broadest sense to refer to some systematic mechanism for accomplishing a task. Thought isn't ontologically fundamental; the brain systematically accomplishes something; why shouldn't we speak of abstracting away an algorithm from that? Maybe I've just made computationalism an empty tautology, but I don't ... think so.
I don't think the innate/learned dichotomy is fundamental; it's both, everyone knows that's it's both, everyone knows that everyone knows that it's both. Like that old analogy, a rectangle's area is a product of length and width. What specific questions of fact are people confused about?
I think these research programs represent something without a clear historical precedent. Traditional economics and generative linguistics, for example, could be compared to pre-scientific disciplines that were overthrown by scientific disciplines. But both exhibit a high degree of formal and institutional sophistication. I don't think pre-Copernican astronomy had the same level of sophistication. Economics also has data (although so did geocentric astronomy) whereas the generative tradition in linguistics considers data misleading and prefers intuitive judgement. What neither has is a systematic experimental research program or a desire to integrate with the natural sciences.
Cognitivism is essentially Cartesian philosophy with a computer analogy and experiments. In practice it just becomes experimental psychology with some extra jargon. Nativism, too, comes from Cartesian philosophy (Chomsky was quite explicit about this). While cognitivism has experiments it has an interpretation that isn't founded in experiment (the type of computer the brain is supposed to be and the algorithms it could be said to run is not addressed) and an opposition to integration with the natural sciences (the so-called "autonomy of psychology" thesis).
These research programs are similar to pre-scientific research programs but have managed to persist in a world where you have to attempt to "look scientific" in order to secure research grants and they reflect this fact.
You point to many problems and I wouldn't take any bets because of these. It would be too difficult to judge who had won. On the nature/nurture debate: Empiricism evolved into constructivism/interactionism (i.e., the developing organism interacting with the environment with genes driving development), which is the dominate view in biology, and it's not obvious what, precisely, modern Nativists believe. But it is obvious that they still exist since naive nativist talk persists almost everywhere else. It's similarly difficult to figure out what computationalists mean by their analogies and the degree to which they intend them to be analogies vs. literal propositions. This is probably why the natural sciences tend not to base research programs on analogies. What is clear is that they have a particular style of interpreting their results in terms of representations and sequential processing that is clearly at odds with biology and display no interest in addressing the issue.
First, this is the genetic fallacy. Secondly, I don't take Chomsky's authority seriously.
The experimental evidence that, say, Steven Pinker presents in How the Mind Works for innate mental traits and for the computational perspective are sound, and have nothing to do with Cartesian dualism.
Regarding 3, there's no way to find evidence against it (or for it, for that matter). You can't look at a given system and measure its sentience. The closest to that anyone's ever attempted is to try and test intelligence, but that assumes cognitivism/computationalism, among other things.
I agree with orthonormal, except that I don't have $10,000 to bet.
China is the 2nd biggest economy in 2020 (99%). Note I'm counting the EU as lots of countries, not as one big economy. Counting the EU together, China will be the 3rd biggest.
Pirate Parties will have been in government for a time in at least one country by 2020 (90%)
Pirate Parties will win >=10 seats in the European parliament in 2014 (75%), and <=30 seats (75%).
The Conservatives will win a majority the next UK general election (60%), there will be no overal majority (37%), or any other outcome (3%).
Do you have bets on Intrade or Betfair for those guesses? It's probably better for you to bet directly than for me to do arbitrage on you :-) They have around 68% Conservative victory, 26% no overall majority, and around 6% Labour victory.
Betfair
For the next decade: Videoconferencing.
Videoconferencing what, exactly?
I've been using it for years. I'm not sure how to correctly expand your sentence, and it shouldn't be subject to interpretation.
I suspect Eliezer is making broad predictions about what is important in the next 10 years. As if someone said smartphone for the next decade in 2000. Not giving too much detail makes it more likely to be true...
coughmakingbeliefspayrentcough
Eliezer seems to be predicting that videoconferencing will become common in the next decade. Yes, some use it now, but it is still not common. I predict that it will not become common until someone uses a utility to modify your appearance so that when you look at the eyes of the person on the screen, your image on the remote end will look like it is looking at the eyes of the person on the other end. This might well be developed in much less than 10 years, however.
By 2020, an Earth-like habitable extrasolar planet is detected. I would take a wager on this one but doubt anyone would give me even odds.
Will anyone give me even odds if the bet is by 2015?
I think I'd give better-than-even odds for either date, and would be shocked if no one else would. How are you defining "Earth-like" and "habitable"?
I think he just meant with liquid water, some type of atmosphere, and approximately earth sized. Given this, my guess is that they find one within the next three years. If he meant "habitable" to human beings without protection, i.e. oxygen atmosphere etc., then this is extremely unlikely (less than 2% chance) that they will find such a thing by 2020.
Yes.
I'm not sure we have the technology to make that call even if such a planet does, in fact, lie within range of our telescopes.
We don't. My prediction then is only almost certainly true if we define habitable as a planet in a sun's habitable zone. However, I still think finding a habitable planet, per Unknowns's definition, is likely to happen by 2020.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=101493448
If Kepler does indeed find hundreds of planets in habitable zones, that should get the popular imagination going enough for the successor to Kepler to be very well funded. Kepler Mark II in the air by 2017?
At even odds I would take a loan to make the bet.