Lumifer comments on Looking for opinions of people like Nick Bostrom or Anders Sandberg on current cryo techniques - Less Wrong

7 Post author: ChrisHallquist 17 October 2013 08:36PM

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Comment author: Lumifer 18 October 2013 07:43:25PM 4 points [-]

Personally, I would like to see more research into prediction as a science.

If you want non-domain-specific, that's called statistics, specifically statistical modeling.

Comment author: BaconServ 18 October 2013 08:32:59PM 0 points [-]

I specifically want it to be more specific.

Comment author: Lumifer 18 October 2013 08:45:32PM 2 points [-]

Do you mean more confidence in the prediction? Narrower error bands?

Comment author: BaconServ 19 October 2013 02:11:55AM 0 points [-]

More domain-specific, invention specific, plotting events with ever-narrower error bands. If you could isolate the specific month that news media gets in a buzz about uploading three years in advance, that would be a significant increase in prediction usefulness.

Comment author: Lumifer 19 October 2013 02:33:01AM 2 points [-]

That doesn't sound realistic to me. It sounds impossible.

Comment author: BaconServ 19 October 2013 02:56:01AM 0 points [-]

It may be impossible even with significant effort, but it's certainly impossible without having first tried. I want to know, if nothing else, the limits of reasonable prediction. That itself would be useful information. Even if we can never get past 50% accuracy for predictions, knowing that all such predictions can only be 50% likely is actionable in the presence of any such prediction.

Comment author: Lumifer 19 October 2013 03:06:38AM 2 points [-]

I want to know, if nothing else, the limits of reasonable prediction.

These are very much domain-specific plus are the function of available technology.

You seem to want psychohistory -- unfortunately it's entirely fiction.

Comment author: BaconServ 19 October 2013 03:20:25AM 0 points [-]

I want exactly as I've stated: Research into a method.

Comment author: Lumifer 19 October 2013 03:25:22AM 1 point [-]

So, um... go for it?

Comment author: BaconServ 19 October 2013 03:27:37AM 0 points [-]

I'm afraid that the only methods I can think up require vast collection of many different types of data, far beyond what I can currently manage myself.