It’s been over a year since the Singularity Institute launched our ongoing Visiting Fellows Program and we’ve learned a lot in the process of running it. This summer we’re going to try something different. We’re going to run Rationality Boot Camp.
We are going to try to take ten weeks and fill them with activities meant to teach mental skills - if there's reading to be done, we'll tell you to get it done in advance. We aren't just aiming to teach skills like betting at the right odds or learning how to take into account others' information, we're going to practice techniques like mindfulness meditation and Rejection Therapy (making requests that you know will be rejected), in order to teach focus, non-attachment, social courage and all the other things that are also needed to produce formidable rationalists. Participants will learn how to draw (so that they can learn how to pay attention to previously unnoticed details, and see that they can do things that previously seemed like mysterious superpowers). We will play games, and switch games every few days, to get used to novelty and practice learning.
We're going to run A/B tests on you, and track the results to find out which training activities work best, and begin the tradition of evidence-based rationality training.
In short, we're going to start constructing the kind of program that universities would run if they actually wanted to teach you how to think.
And then at the end, some of us are going to go to Burning Man for training in desert survival and living in an emotionally positive community.
When I call the program Rationality Boot Camp, I mean this quite literally. Six days per week, participants will rise, meditate, prepare and eat food, attend lectures, participate in group and individual activities and exercise together.
Everyone who applies needs to have read at least some of the Sequences, and may be assigned particular posts as makeup material - in which case you will need to read them before you arrive and you may be turned away otherwise. Apart from that, we'll look for a mix of people who've demonstrated high productivity and who already seem like good epistemic rationalists. The program will begin in the first week of June and continue through mid-August. We will cover room, board and airfare. We're going to try to take this up to the next level of awesome. It's our first time trying something this ambitious and there will be speedbumps - and if that sounds very scary, consider applying next year when we'll know more for certain about how to teach people courage and the art of overcoming setbacks. But if you're the sort of person who wants to be part of this program today, instead of putting it off into the indefinite future of maybe-never - or if you know that's the sort of person you want to be, and you're willing to put in the effort to reach up to that - then send in an application.
Edit:
Attention: Anyone still interested in attending the course must get their application in by midnight on Friday the 8th of April. I would like to make the final decision about who to accept by mid April and need to finish interviewing applicants before then.
I expect to make all decisions about acceptance before the end of April and will try to do so sooner. I will start scheduling skype interviews in a few days and will not wait until an arbitrary date before accepting people. Apply as soon as possible to maximize your chance of being considered for this summer!
Don't worry if you're not chosen this time. This program is an experiment, and if all goes well we will be holding holding several (even better!) programs like it each year. If we never hold it again, you probably didn't miss much.
Postscript first: I'm interested, and I would like to see you succeed. At my present level of information, I am pessimistic about your chances of success and my desire to attend.
10 weeks is a massive time commitment. That's as long as actual basic. Do you have a plan for all that time, or or is that just why you picked that number?
Because at 6 days a week at 11 hours a day (presuming you use the same time as basic) for 10 weeks, you're looking at 660 hours of training. I can see how you can fill 660 hours with exercise and drills; it's not clear to me mental or group exercises scale similarly.
The comparison to what colleges would do if they tried to teach you how to think seems off. The standard college course represents 42 hours of in-class time; summer courses do that at 14 hours a week for 3 weeks. You're proposing a college course and a half's worth of class time per week, for 10 weeks. Now, that's possibly doable- especially if what you're doing is more like pushups and less like absorbing lectures- but a proof of concept seems like a good plan.
I'm also curious about the "next level of awesome" line. What's your current level of awesome? Do any of the instructors have experience as drill sergeants or instructors? Have you done similar programs? You mention the visiting fellows but the only obvious carryover is "we know how to pay for travel/accommodations." When you say "speedbumps," what sort of things are you talking about? I'm imagining: running out of material three weeks in, the instructor resigning because of burnout, being unable to actually admit international students because of immigration concerns, critical staff becoming ill, having trouble securing a location, students withdrawing, and that's probably enough for now. How do our imaginations differ?
I'm also curious about how you select the curriculum. I can see how learning to draw is useful, but it's not clear to me that it's useful enough for everyone to learn it as part of basic. Is it rationality training or life-enjoyment training? How will you deal with people who are uninterested or unwilling to engage in some of the training?
My suggestion: any complex system that works derives from a simple system that works. A 1-week training program will help you figure out many of the speed bumps that could derail a 10-week training program. A 2-week program will be feasible for people who need to take vacation time to be able to attend, while still allowing you enough time to develop several skills. It also makes it easier to experiment with structure: do people learn to draw better when they do it for an hour a day for 2 weeks, or 4 3 hour blocks spread over 2 days? Instead of changing midway through, you run two separate camps and can compare the results.
Also, it's not boot camp unless a man in uniform is shouting at me. :3
Do you have other suggestions for "learn[ing] how to pay attention to previously unnoticed details, and see[ing] that they can do things that previously seemed like mysterious superpowers"?