Does anyone else agree that, as a piece of expository writing, that document sucks bigtime?

111 pages! I got through about 25 and I was wondering why Eliezer thought I needed to hear about how his four friends had decided when presented with the Newcomb's soda problem and how some people refer to this problem as Solomon's problem. So, I decided to skim ahead until he started talking about TDT. So I skimmed and skimmed.

Finally, I got to section 14, entitled "The timeless decision procedure". "Aha!", I think. "Finally." The first paragraph consists of a very long and confusing sentence which at least seems to deal with the timeless decision procedure.

The timeless decision procedure evaluates expected utility conditional upon the output of an abstract decision computation - the very same computation that is currently executing as a timeless decision procedure - and returns that output such that the universe will possess maximum expected utility, conditional upon the abstract computation returning that output.

It might be easier to understand if expressed as an equation or formula containing, you know, variables and things. So I read on, hoping to find something I can sink my teeth into. But then the second paragraph begins:

I delay the formal presentation of a timeless decision algorithm because of some significant extra steps I wish to add ...

and closes with

Before adding additional complexities, I wish to justify this critical innovation from first principles.

As far as I can tell, the remainder of this section entitled "The timeless decision procedure" consists of this justification, though not from first principles, but rather using an example. And it doesn't appear that Eliezer ever gets back to the task of providing a "formal presentation of a timeless decision algorithm".

So, I skip forward to the end, hoping to read the conclusions. Instead I find:

This manuscript was cut off here, but interested readers are suggested to look at these sources for more discussion:

Followed by a bibliography containing one entry - A chapter from a 1978 collection of articles on applications of decision theory.

"...was cut off here ..."? Give me a break!

Let me know when you get it down to a dozen pages or so.

ETA: A cleaned up copy of the paper exists with a more complete bibliography and without the "manuscript was cut off here" closing.