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steven0461 comments on Open Thread: May 2009 - Less Wrong
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To make a good decision, it's not necessary to be a good thinker. If you're wise enough to defer to someone who is a good thinker, that also works. And if you're wise enough to defer to someone who is wise enough to defer to someone (repeat N times) who is a good thinker, that also works. That suggests to me the hopeful thought that in a population of agents with varying rationality, a small change can cause a phase transition where the system goes from a very incompetent agent making the decisions to a very competent agent making the decisions. One might call this an "authority cascade". Do you agree? Discuss, etc.
The major problem with this approach is that you'd need to ask the good thinker about each particular decision of this kind, taking into account the context in which you are making it. Only when you have good understanding of the world yourself, you can make good custom decisions for every situation.
Textbook decisions only work where textbook writers know in advance what questions they need to address.
And then, of course, there is a task of making sure this system doesn't turn into an echo chamber.