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wedrifid comments on PSA: Very important policy change at Cryonics Institute - Less Wrong
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I do not believe this individual is in possession of the best of current knowledge or at all capable of judging the capabilities of all future scanning or simulation technologies.
One of the local junkies speaks again... Look. Most neuroscientists do not think it works. Most physicists do not think it works. You have to pick that careful ground in the middle where you are trusting cryonics organization (literal scams run by unscrupulous individuals who gone as far as to have people make the last wish to be freezed after weeks on dry ice!) and not people with measurable success at making something actually work. The reason it doesn't work is that there is extensive chemical damage, i.e. the state information of proteins, protein adhesion, and so on, is lost irreversibly. It is almost as implausible that it works as if you literally cook the head in a pot for an hour or two prior to freezing it.
This claim would require citation and such a citation does not exist. Most physicists have not thought about the subject one way or the other. Moreover, most physicists (those who don't have particular expertise in information theory) are not particularly qualified to evaluate the subject except, of course, as intelligent laymen.
It is possible to find neuroscientists who are not aware of their own incompetence outside their area of expertise and who claim that cryonics cannot work. All such 'expert' testimony that is dragged up here over and over has included claiming that cryonics cannot work because it is not possible to repair preserved neurons in place. Since this is not remotely how cryonics works whatever dubious claims to authority that they may have had are screened off.
The private_messaging account is one of the many identified sockpuppets of a persistent troll. Me choosing to reply to it constitutes feeding a troll---it is deeply disappointing that voting standards make it necessary. Nothing said to it will influence its behaviour except by virtue of providing more information about typical beliefs so that it can better target its provocation.
I never seen a pro cryonics argument that actually relied on information theory.
Even cryonics proponents would generally agree that you won't leave enough information if you boil a head in a cooking pot for 2 hours then freeze it. A valid pro cryonics argument must concern specifically the chemical damage (and loss of information stored in the chemical states), and distinguish between cryonics and hypothetical "boiling then cryonics". edit: that is to say, before information theory enters consideration, you have to deal with chemistry and physics enough as to not be making a fully generic argument that is equally applicable to the hypothetical "boiling then cryonics".
And when further asked about actual information content, they tell that they do not think information is preserved either.
That's how it is generally advertised, so this is what they are going to opinion on before they are actually informed of your specific variety of cryonics belief.
Yeah, except you're the one who were trying to argue by authority in the first place.
A proper test of that claim would require a poll, but since most physicists are not signed up for cryonics, don't make public statements endorsing it, and when specifically interviewed about it say they don't believe cyronics works, it seems fair to infer that most physicists indeed don't believe cyronics works.
What makes you believe that? Cryonics is relatively well known among scientifically educated audiences. it's even the main plot device of a tv show aimed at general audiences (Futurama).
Moreover, physicists are usually atheists, therefore in principle they should have no religous objection to cryonics.
Seriously, where do you think information theory comes from? And do you actually even know what information theory is about? Because people here seem to be using the term as a buzzword without actually using any information theory in their arguments.
Except that cryonics is actually in their area of expertise. And in the area of expertise of cryobiologists (the people who cryopreserve tissues in a way that can be shown to actually work). What do cryobiologists say about cryonics? I bet you already know the answer...
Irrelevant ad hominem.
This physicist has never heard anyone talk about cryonics in meatspace, and assumed that the Futurama thing was fictional until reading Less Wrong. (Also, Fry was alive when he got frozen.)
For some not-very-large value of “usually”. Where I am, physicists aren't that less likely to be religious than random people the same age and geographic provenance (but it's probably different elsewhere).
How old were you when you started reading Less Wrong?
That would be surprising. Do you have any reference?
24. Why?
No statistics about that, I'm afraid. You'd have to accept my anecdata. I have met at least a dozen Catholic physicists, many of whom engaged in various kinds of Catholic associations; that's somewhere around half the physicists I know well enough to know their religious stance. (Also, [REDACTED].)
That's less surprising if you know that the person most people where I'm from think of first when they hear "physicist" is this guy.
Because the younger you started reading Less Wrong the higher the probability that you were first exposed to its common topics by it.
You seem to be suggesting that the knowledge physicists have about cryonics is based on their generalist knowledge as educated layment. You further observe that much of this knowledge comes from fictional evidence in popular culture. I heartily agree.
Physics and mathematics. My comment doesn't suggest otherwise. This does not mean that all physicists are particularly well versed in it when it is not their area of expertise.
This is your core confusion. Reasoning from this premise would indeed lead you to the conclusion you reach. Given that I reject this premise it follows that I can gain little information from all the chains of reasoning that you base upon it. Neuroscientists are not experts in extracting one to one mappings from preserved brain tissue to individual identities. This is why the expected behaviour of neuroscientsists is to do what experts nearly always do when thinking about things outside their field---pattern match to the nearest thing within their field and overestimate the relevance of their knowledge.
False. You have the common misunderstanding of what that logical fallacy refers to. If my argument was "this is a confirmed troll therefore its words are false" it would be an ad hominem fallacy (mind you, a slightly weakend variant would hold even then, to whatever extent personal testimony of the troll was considered evidence). This was not argument in that quote. It is highly relevant to why I believe it was necessary to excuse myself for the act of replying to disruption attempts.
The existence of cryonics is common knowledge. You just need an internet connection to look up the details.
Still I expect them to be more proficient in it than random people who use the term as a buzzword over the interwebs.
While the people who would keep you on dry ice for two weeks obviously are.
You are making classical crackpot excuses to handwave away expert knowledge. I don't think there is any productive way for us to continue this discussion.
Um... no? I seem to recall questioning that choice elsewhere on this thread and giving partial support to another (MichaelAnisimov) who claimed in colourful terms that it is a critical failure.
No I'm not. I'm disagreeing with you about which people are experts. You are not an expert at choosing appropriate experts to defer to. You are appealing to absurdly irrelevant authority. "Expert" status and prestige is not transferable across domains. Or at least it shouldn't be for those who are interested in attaining accurate beliefs.
Obviously not. Our disagreement about how how rational thinking works is rather fundamental, with all that entails.
I would assume most physicists hold the standard pop-culture position, actually, just like anyone else.
However, the rest of your comment is entirely correct, including the disappointing karma result; I personally didn't downvote them, but only because my karma is being periosidally mass-reduced by someone whenever I get close to passing the limit that would exempt me from the anti-troll restrictions :/