Perplexed comments on An introduction to decision theory - Less Wrong

16 [deleted] 13 August 2010 09:09AM

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Comment author: cousin_it 13 August 2010 01:55:33PM *  3 points [-]

Sorry for deleting my comment - on reflection it sounded too harsh.

Maybe it's just me, but I don't think you're promoting the greater good when you write an intuitive tutorial on a confused topic without screaming in confusion yourself. What's the hurry, anyway? Why not make some little bits perfectly clear for yourself, and write then?

Here's an example of an intuitive explanation (of an active research topic, no less) written by someone whose thinking is crystal clear: Cosma Shalizi on causal models. One document like that is worth a thousand "monad tutorials" written by Haskell newbies.

Comment author: Perplexed 16 August 2010 12:41:04AM 0 points [-]

Thx for the Shalizi link. I'm currently slogging my way through Pearl, and Shalizi clarifies things.

At first I thought that AdamBell had invented Evidential Decision Theory from whole cloth, but I discover by Googling that it really exists. Presumably it makes sense for different problems - it certainly did not for the baby-kissing story as presented.

Comment author: cousin_it 16 August 2010 08:11:39AM *  0 points [-]

As far as I know, there's still no non-trivial formalization of the baby-kissing problem (aka Smoking Lesion). I'd be happy to be proved wrong on that.