DuncanS comments on The Useful Idea of Truth - Less Wrong

77 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 02 October 2012 06:16PM

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Comment author: DuncanS 04 October 2012 11:02:46PM *  2 points [-]

Although I wouldn't think of this particular thing as being an invention on his part - I'm not sure I've read that particular chain of thought before, but all the elements of the chain are things I've known for years.

However I think it illustrates the strength of Eliezer's writing well. It's a perfectly legitimate sequence of thought steps that leads in a clear and obvious way to the right answer. It's not new thought, but a particularly clear way of expressing something that many people have thought and written about in a less organised way.

To clarify - there are times when Eliezer is inventive - for example his work on CEV - but this isn't one of those places. I know I'm partly arguing about the meaning of "inventive", but I don't think we're doing him a favor here by claiming this is an example of his inventiveness when there are much better candidates.